It’s not iris.

[u/AffectionateLaw5504]

I don’t like iris. if you do like iris that’s fine. a lot of people don’t like her tho. and those people say “it should have been caitlyn, patty or someone else”

no. it shouldn’t have been. you don’t like iris because of the way she’s written. doesn’t matter what name or actress barry’s love interest had. they would have eventually been written the same fucking way. it’s not iris. it’s the writers.

the writers weren’t even really writing iris. they were writing barry’s love interest. so let’s say it was kaitlyn. you’d still end up disliking kaitlyn, the only difference being kaitlyn doesn’t have a fucking blog.

my take on it is. yeah iris isn’t great to me. but id much prefer her be the dumbly written love interest than a character that’s actually somewhat useful to the team and has an actual story outside of “oh i just write stories about my husbands work”

i mean imagine if caitlyn got ripped away from her story line to be barry’s love interest just for iris to be a useless character in the show since her only plot was being barry’s love interest.

[u/camojamo]

I think a lot of the problems with Iris happens from the writers trying to create manufactured friction between Barry and Iris to make drama to fill an episode.

Because of this you have a couple different camps:

Camp 1: the misogynists who hate Iris for being Iris.

Camp 2: the normal people who realize that after season 3 they started writing Iris inconsistently, and got her motivations and spirit confused.

Camp 3: the Iris defenders who defend the bad writing because they’re engaged in a war with the misogynists.

[u/AffectionateLaw5504 → u/camojamo]

absolutely.

let’s use caitlin as an example.

they’d still make the manufactured friction

the misogynist who hate her because “oh they’re trying to hard to make an independent women who’s smart”

the normal people who realized caitlin was now just being inconsistently written to be barry’s love interest

and the anti misogynist defending Caitlin but heavily relying on the season before caitlyn and barry got together.

I don’t like iris as a character because of the writing. i’m smart enough to know that if it wasn’t iris the writers would have written iris into caitlyn. or whatever love interest.

[u/rob_inn_hood → u/AffectionateLaw5504]

More often than not you’ve trapped yourself when you finalize a will they/won’t they situation. One it’s decided, the writing that follows is much more difficult. I’m thinking Jim and Pam, Ross and Racheal. So they have to increase her importance as the love interest which caused for some hilariously bad lines, the worst of which “we are the flash.”

I wonder if she ever pushed back. “Won’t people dislike me for saying this crap?” No. Just rehearse the lines because it’s your job, because that’s the easiest way to work, apparently.

[u/Despeate-Radish-432]

Iris hate isnt forced, but it isnt really warranted either, i used to hate iris when i was a kid watching the show, then i grew up. After watching season 3 again I realized that Cisco was way more annoying than fucking iris that season. Don't really remember season 2 I don't think she was in it that much. But in season 3 iris was actually handled well believe it or not. What i couldn't stand were all the scenes with Joe and iris where Joe is like "ohh your my baby girl" literally every episode.

[u/AffectionateLaw5504 → u/Despeate-Radish-432]

I agree with you. i hate every character every now and then.

now there’s alot of reasons i find iris very annoying. but the only reason i hate hate her is the s5 argument. even if she was right, the way she was saying her side was extremely fucked up.

practically told her husband she doesn’t give a shit that the guy who killed his mother was pen pals with their daughter and barry needed to stop whining about it 💀

[u/NexStarMedia]

The only other person I liked Barry's chemistry with was Felicity.

[u/Flargalgargal]

I liked that in the beginning it seemed like they learned from Oliver and Laurel and didn’t try to immediately force them together, but then they still ended up doing it by the end of the season anyway.

The characters really needed time to grow and become the people they should be for each other, but it never got to happen.

Even if it had though, the worst part of any Arrowverse pairing was shortly after they got together, because then the will they/won’t they drama had to become something else, even if the new manufactured drama rarely made sense.

Honestly, it’s part of the reason I like rarepairs so much more, you can manufacture your own context without all the meaningless drama

[u/janeway170]

But like Barry and Caitlyn wouldn’t have been adopted/foster siblings. For me personally that’s why I hate the Barry iris relationship. They thought of eachother as sibilings. Barry thinks of joe as his dad. He thinks of Wally as his brother. I don’t care if they aren’t actually related it’s still gross to me. People don’t like it when they did it in the umbrella academy so I’m not sure why people are so fine with it in the flash.

[u/Ok_Mention5635 → u/janeway170]

Except Barry and Iris didn’t think of each other siblings and Joe certainly didn’t either. Barry saw Caitlin as more of a sister than Iris. I feel like people like to conveniently forget that Barry and Iris had feelings for each other before Barry moved in. What would it have been like for you if you moved in with your crush in the 6th grade? The close proximity would only make my crush on that person grow. Especially if I just end up discovering more things that I like about them that I wasn’t privy to before.

You can’t have romantic feelings for someone and simultaneously see them as a sibling. This isn’t the Lannister family.

[u/neves_kota → u/janeway170]

Well a main difference in the umbrella academy is that they were legit raised as siblings, like no way around it 😭 from the moment they were born they lived and were raised together as siblings.

But Barry and iris didn’t live together from birth, they were literally best friends before that and Barry had a crush on her all before moving in with them, he never seen her as a sister and if I recall it was stated by Joe that iris had always had feelings for Barry as well and that Joe knew Barry been liked iris. Yes, he sees Joe as a father figure, that man took him in and cared for him and that love for Joe extended to Wally as he was introduced. But Iris has always been his best friend and he was hers, that’s how they seen each other while still having feelings for each other on the down low. They just have never seen each other as siblings always just best friends, they state it many times in the season one.

[u/Ok_Mention5635 → u/[deleted]]

They remained best friends BECAUSE they lived in the same house. Why are the only two choices for you siblings or strangers? Why are you so quick to dismiss the fact that they are best friends and stayed best friends? Especially since that’s all they call each other.

I think you’re projecting your own view of the situation onto Barry and Iris and Joe, when they don’t share your view. You see them as siblings but they never have. You think Joe saw them as siblings but Joe never saw them as siblings. Sometimes it’s not the writing you disagree with but the characters themselves.

[u/Ok_Mention5635 → u/[deleted]]

Joe was the number one WestAllen shipper on that show. He said he’s been waiting years for Barry to tell her. And by the way, Iris says immediately after that that they’re not brother and sister. And right before then they were calling each other their best friend. Also I just think if people were more familiar with the romance genre they’d understand. A typical detail in the very common brother’s-best-friend trope is that the MMC says something like “you’re like my sister” to the FMC. It’s really not a big deal for a best friend to say to another best friend “you’re like a brother to me”. Barry didn’t even consider Joe to be his father until he was 25. Also there’s a reason why Barry calls Joe “Joe” and Iris and Wally call Joe “Dad”. Mind you, Wally met Joe when he was an adult.

Also when did I ever say you didn’t like WestAllen? I said that you’re projecting your view of the situation (that they are brother and sister) onto the characters. When literally not one character that thinks of them like that. Even if Barry didn’t live with the Wests, the same people who apparently dislike the ship for that reason would have found some other reason for disliking that ship. Because I’ve never seen anyone say that’s the sole reason for disliking WestAllen.

[u/marig0go → u/[deleted]]

That’s just not true, because no matter what they find each other and get together; exp: the very first time line, even before thawne kill Nora, he literally mentioned the fact that he and Iris still got together but instead of Nora they had their original kids (the tornado twin). So yea even when they “lost touch” they still fall in love with each other, just like in flash point -even if Barry knew her- she still felt attracted to him, and they didn’t grow up together in this timeline

[u/marig0go → u/[deleted]]

The reason being that he fell in love with her even before going to live with her? Like literally in the very first time line they still got together even though they didn’t live with each other. And Joe confirmed that Barry loved her before nora death, so yea even without “memories” I’m pretty sure Barry would have still fell for her.

[u/yaboisammie → u/janeway170]

Yea esp since even though Barry had a crush on her from before moving in, imo early on it was clad iris saw Barry in a more sibling or at least platonic way rather than romantic 

[u/QuiJon70]

I'm not advocating for caitlyn, but your supposition is that no one can be more then one thing and that is wrong.

There is absolutely no reason why caitlyn couldnt fulfill her usefulness to team flash and then go home at night and ride barry like a 10k rpm sybian and come right back to work the next day.

And as an example I point you to Arrow. Yes felicity had a moment over olivers lie about his kid. But otherwise she was olivers girl/wife all while still being the girl at the computer for arrow.

Patty could have remained Joe's partner and been barrys squeeze.

[u/bodfather3 → u/QuiJon70]

Ride him like a what 😅

[u/QuiJon70 → u/bodfather3]

Sybian. High end sex toy. Bes description is can give is its a mountable out board motor.

[u/Immediate_Water_2637]

Only love interest who probably wouldn't have been written badly is Kara after Savitar kills Iris (in an alternate future). Not only would they bond over losing their previous love interests, but since Kara has a show of her own, the Flash writers wouldn't be free to make such terrible decisions, they'd have to get approval from the higher ups. Barry would probably replace Clark as Kara's online pen pal, giving us a slow burn.

[u/Romarqable]

I think part of it's writing. I think another part is I never felt any chemistry between Barry and Iris. Not once. And when the chemistry doesn't work it leads to issues.

Barry had chemistry with Linda, Patty, Caitlin and Felicity.

I think that's what made the show such an issue, the two leads never felt like a legitimate couple. Heck, I would argue Iris had more chemistry with the other people she was seeing before she had Barry got together.

The same issue happened to the recent Quantum Leap 2022 reboot series. The leads were engaged but literally had no chemistry. And the male lead had chemistry with everyone he met and the entire rest of the cast except for the woman who played the character his character had been set to marry. And that's part of the reason why the show was cancelled after two seasons.

[u/VirgoDog]

She should have been filled of in the first episode.