Well, that wasn't the death we were expecting now, was it?
Warning, spoilers for The Flash's season three finale ahead. If you've yet to watch, tap into the speed force and zoom on out of here!
Silly, silly TV viewers, did you really think Iris West (Candice Patton) would be the character offed in the season three finale on Tuesday night after her death had been talked about all season long?
No, no, it wasn't Iris who died. The character fans will be saying goodbye to is H.R. (Tom Cavanagh). Let's have a moment of silence, y'all, for our quirky fallen friend before we talk about exactly how it all went down.
As predicted, H.R. had used his fancy face-switching device to switch places with Iris just after Savitar had taken her, meaning Iris was safely donned in H.R.'s silly hat while he was the one who was actually stabbed through the back, to then die in Tracy's (Anne Dudek) arms.
While Savitar managed to steal the speed force bazooka, Barry (Grant Gustin) and his very alive fiancee took the time to check on the future newspaper article. Iris West-Allen's byline had been restored, which meant her future was saved. However, Savitar then remembered that Iris was alive, so his plans had to change—including plans for the captured Cisco (Carlos Valdes).
He revealed that the device Tracy was making could be modified to send fragments of Savitar into every moment in time, so he could rule everything since the big bang. He also just then happened to remember the time that Julian (Tom Felton) revealed he had developed a cure for Caitlin's (Danielle Panabaker) frostiness, so he had the perfect thing to dangle in front of Cisco in order to get him to do his bidding.
But then regular Barry had a different idea. He made Savitar come have a meeting with him, and then strangely brought him back to the lab. For a hot second, with some convincing from Iris, the plan was for future Barry to rejoin team Flash and be a normal-ish person. But of course, after some consideration, Savitar wasn't into that idea and set the philosopher's stone to explode. Barry and Wally just barely had time to get everyone out before Star Labs blew up.
Team Savitar camped out with his speed force gun in the middle of a forest, and was soon joined by Team Flash for one hell of a fight. At one point, Barry ran so fast into Savitar that he pushed future Barry out and took the suit for himself, and had the perfect opportunity to use the stabby arm on "Two-Faced," as Cisco so aptly called him.
But instead, he vibrated the suit to pieces, and it became a much more equal fight, until evil Barry turned on Cisco and Caitlin/Killer Frost. Then, all of a sudden, Savitar went down, and we cut to Iris with a gun, because she is a not-so-secret badass.
Then, everything seemed OK for a minute, other than H.R. being dead. Harry was even back for a visit, and Killer Frost decided not to go back to Caitlin but also to not be so "Killer." Iris was even singing to Barry as he sang to her when he re-proposed while they talked about their upcoming wedding.
Then, of course, everything went nuts. The prison in the speed force was lacking its occupant with the death of Savitar, and it was causing devastating earthquakes and damage all over the city...so Barry said goodbye and sacrificed himself to the speed force, leaving Wally to serve Central City as the Flash.
Obviously, Barry will be retrieved at some point (we hope), but how long is that going to take? How will he get out? Who will replace him in the speed force? Will the West-Allen wedding ever happen? Why does this show torture us so??
The Flash will return for its fourth season this fall on The CW.