Warning: SPOILERS for The Flash Season 5

From the moment Nora Allen came to The Flash fans have been asking one question: why does she seem to quietly hate her mother, Iris West-Allen? The TV show has finally revealed the truth, and shown Nora has a seriously good reason for liking her Dad better.

Since the start of this season, Nora's disinterest in her mother has been growing more and more obvious, and far beyond simply wanting to 'get to know' Barry, the father she never knew. But Nora's distrust for Iris goes back even farther to the previous season, when the West-Allen daughter's trips back in time saw her stealthily spying on everyone in Team Flash. Of course, now that The Flash has revealed WHY Nora hates Iris, the show's writers have teased an even bigger mystery for fans to debate.

We know what Iris did to her and Barry's daughter... but what could drive her to do something so unthinkable?

Iris Takes Away Nora's Speed in The Future

Nora introduces herself to her family

The episode spends most of its runtime emphasizing just how much hostility and passive aggression Nora has for Iris, and Iris alone. Only when the two finally get frustrated enough does the truth come out, as Nora pulls her shirt aside to show the scar she still wears to remind her of her own mother's betrayal. Apparently at some point in the future, Iris has her daughter injected with an inhibitor device to 'turn off' her powers. Since Nora never suspected that her mother had effectively removed her genetic link to the Speed Force, fans can assume the microchip was embedded when Nora was young enough to forget the event.

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Nora eventually elaborates on the timeline of her discovering this shocking family secret (and betrayal), claiming she only learned about the inhibitor chip six months ago. We can presume that means six months from her perspective, at which point the device blocking her powers was removed, and Nora embraced her powers to become guardian of her own, future Central City. The episode doesn't reveal how this lifelong lie affected Nora and Iris's future relationship, so fans hoping that mother and daughter were actually close-knit following Barry's death/disappearance could still be right. But when the truth came out, changing her father's past was obviously Nora's top priority.

But as we stated above, the explanation of 'what Iris did to make her daughter hate her' is only the question that fans have believed would be the important one to answer. Yet in classic science fiction fashion, finding out what terrible thing a good person is driven to in the future only raises the larger, more important secret: why did they eventually choose to do something so awful? In this case, take away Nora's gift of super-speed from her father, and lie to her about ever having them. And assuming Iris West-Allen doesn't become malicious and hateful just a decade from now - making her friends, family, and loved ones presumably carry on the secret as well - she's got to have a good reason.

We've got our suspicions about that very question, and how the speedsters of DC Comics may offer one answer. What if Iris only lied to her daughter about her link to the Speed Force... because it was going to kill her? Potential SPOILERS ahead.

Page 2 of 2: Did Iris Hide Nora's Speed to Save Her Life?

Iris West

Iris Had a Reason To Lie to Nora... Right?

For most of her appearances Nora has seemed young at heart, but still old enough to know when she's made a serious mistake. Unfortunately, that common sense doesn't apply when it comes to her mother, or else she might consider that Iris didn't block her powers out of spite, hatred, or any other cruel motivation that would justify Nora's single-minded anger. And hey, who knows, the future is enough of a mystery to make that possible. But when all the emotion settles, both Iris and Barry come to the same conclusion. Since they both hate the idea of blinding Nora to her powers now, something must happen to justify that extreme decision years down the line.

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Maybe, and we're just spitballing here, but maybe Nora watched Barry's speed get him killed in the coming version of Crisis on Infinite Earths, and wanted a normal life for their daughter. A lie? Yes. A serious withholding of the truth for Nora's own sake? Absolutely. But not all that uncommon in real world families, either. Nora sees her mother as the enemy, and sees her father determining Iris did what made sense as a further betrayal. apparently, Nora seems traveled back in time before actually asking her own mother why she would deceive her (the version of her mother that could actually explain it).

If she had, Nora might have discovered that her connection to the Speed Force was killing her, just as it originally did for Bart Allen in the comics. A speedster descendant of Barry and Iris better known to his friends as Impulse.

Impulse Was Being Killed By The Speed Force, Too

Bart Allen Kid Flash running in DC Comics

The comic fans who know this story may argue that saying the Speed Force was "killing" Bartholomew Allen is a bit strong, since it was only accelerating his metabolism and aging, speeding him towards his death unnaturally fast. Iris West had carried Bart into the future for his own safety, and could only stand by and watch as the Speed Force stole year after year from her grandson with him totally oblivious. This notion of super-speed draining a speedster's life force and vitality is actually common in the comics, and given the similar stories of Barry and Iris meeting their future descendant, it's the most obvious explanation.

In the comics Iris brought Bart back in hopes that the Flash Family could save him - which Wally did, overloading Bart's system with Speed Force energy and "shocking" his aging back to a normal rate. All things considered, if the comic book version of Iris was able to save Bart's life  with a simple microchip, she may have seen it as the obvious fix. And if The Flash TV show's version of future Iris doesn't have Barry around to solve this Speed Force riddle, it makes sense for her to save Nora anyway she can, and take on the burden of knowing what was lost in the compromise.

The Flash Seaon 5 Premiere Review Nora Speedster

Or who knows, maybe Iris just decided she lost her husband to superheroics, and feared losing her daughter too. Nora might not understand that parental deception but if she posed the question to Barry, Iris, Joe, Cecile, Harry Wells... she might realize life's priorities change for more than just metahuman reasons. But the question fans should now ask is: if Iris blocked Nora's speed to save her life, what's happening now that it's been unlocked?

Six months may be an eternity to a speedster, but it may not be long enough to realize the Speed Force is aging Nora dangerously fast. Maybe Iris will be proven to have made the right call sooner, rather than later. We won't know until this next mystery is solved, hopefully before Cicada makes Nora's theoretical death a lot less important than her actual one.

The Flash airs Tuesdays @8pm on The CW.

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