'The Flash' Is Going On Break For The Holidays, But Season 4 Isn't Over Yet

Don't think you blinked and missed The Flash when you try to tune in over the next several weeks. After the show's fall finale next Tuesday, Nov. 4, Barry Allen and his crew are going to be taking a break for a while. Find out when exactly you can expect The Flash to speed back into your life and what the rest of Season 4 might have in store for fans when it does resume right here.

Now, I know we are all still riding high off the events of the "Crisis on Earth-X," the massive four-way crossover between The Flash, Arrow, Supergirl, and Legends of Tomorrow that just totally overtook all of the past week on the CW, but that special will have to hold us over for a while. Next Tuesday (Dec. 5) will be the last new episode of The Flash of 2017, as the show enters a winter hiatus before entering the second half of Season 4. The fall finale episode is called "Don't Run," and the episode's synopsis reveals that it will involve Caitlin Frost being captured by Amunet at the same time that The Thinker holds Barry Allen hostage, forcing Iris to choose which one of them she will save. Obviously, this sounds ripe for a major cliffhanger, so get ready to be worrying about Barry and Caitlin for the entire show hiatus.

The CW hasn't revealed an exact date for when The Flash will return yet, but it's actually pretty easy to guess when you look at how long the winter breaks lasted for the show's three previous seasons. The Flash's winter hiatuses have always come between the ninth and tenth episode, and have always lasted either six or seven weeks. With the ninth episode of Season 4 "Don't Stop" airing on Dec. 5, we can safely presume that the next new episode will premiere either on Jan. 16 or Jan. 23. If I had to get even more specific, I would lean more towards Jan. 23 as the probably return date, since that's closer to the dates the show has returned from winter break in the past.

Although seven weeks does feel like a long time to wait for a new episode of The Flash, the good news is that once it comes back, there are a ton more new episodes coming at us. Each season of The Flash has consisted of 23 episodes total, and since it will only have nine under its belt heading into its winter hiatus, that means the new episode on (presumably) Jan. 23 will be the first of 14 new episodes to round out Season 4. The season will likely continue through to the end of May, as the past three seasons have done.

As for what we can expect from The Flash in the upcoming latter half of Season 4, well, I think all we can go off of is the aftermath of "Crisis on Earth-X" and Barry's new nemesis The Thinker who has been becoming more of a nuisance recently. The most notable recent events have been Barry finding out that his old foe Eobard Thawne (AKA the Reverse Flash) is still alive after the events on Earth-X, and in happier news, Barry is also finally married to Iris now. Expect to see the Reverse Flash popping by at some point in the future now that we know he's still out there, and also probably a lot of focus on Iris and Barry's relationship being put to the test now that they are newlyweds. And of course, the climax of the season will likely involve a final showdown between Barry and The Thinker, right?

Anyway, enjoy the fall finale of The Flash on the CW next Tuesday at 9 p.m. ET, and expect the season to continue on either Jan. 16 or Jan. 23 after a winter hiatus.