Narratively speaking, “Crisis On Infinite Earths” has been a faithful adaptation of its source material only in its broadest strokes. In terms of capturing the everything-but-the-kitchen-sink spirit of the enterprise, however, “Crisis” has been a resounding success so far. It’s a hot mess, there’s no question about it. To call it overstuffed would be an understatement; this thing is a piñata bursting at the seams, and the creative team is gleefully taking Barry Bonds-like swings at it. There are five-minute subplots here that could have been entire episodes of the various series making up the Arrow-verse, and the whole thing feels like it could fly apart like the Flash on the cosmic treadmill at any moment. But that’s what makes it so much fun.
I worried that this installment would be a letdown following the Superman-go-round and Bruce Wayne beyond his darkest night from “Part Two,” but if anything, this is the Flash episode that most accurately captures the anything-goes quality of the DC Comics era that culminated with the original Crisis. By any sane measure, there are way too many characters in way too many places doing way too many preposterous things to try to save humanity. I’m reminded of the comics of my youth in which every other panel contained an aside urging me to refer back to a previous issue of some comic I’d never read before in order to completely grasp the significance of what was happening.
On a basic plot level, it’s pretty simple: heroes trying to find a way to stop the anti-matter wave from destroying the multiverse. Having previously learned the identities of four of the seven paragons, Ray uses the Wave Rider’s computer to identify the others: Barry, the Martian Manhunter, and someone named Ryan Choi. Ray, Ralph, and Iris set out in search of Choi, while Constantine, Diggle, and Mia Smoak continue their quest to reunite Oliver Queen’s soul with his reanimated body.
That mission leads them to Earth-666, where they encounter Lucifer from the show of the same name. I gather this came as at least some surprise, as Lucifer actor Tom Ellis earlier squashed the rumor that he would appear. But isn’t that what Lucifer would do? Actually, I don’t really know—Lucifer is not a show I follow, and he’s hardly the only character in “Part Three” unfamiliar to me, not that it matters much. He’s the devil and he sends the trio to Oliver’s purgatory, and that’s really all you need to know. This is one of the subplots that feels rushed, as the emotion of Diggle’s brief reunion with Oliver doesn’t get much of a chance to breath once the Spectre shows up to take the Green Arrow off to play whatever role he has in the finale.
Supergirl’s plan for restoring her own Earth and the rest of the multiverse involves using the Monitor’s Book of Destiny to magic them back into existence. Kate Kane thinks this is a bad idea, and she has the chunk of kryptonite from Bitter Bruce’s Batcave if she needs it. This appears to be leading to another Super vs. Bat showdown, but cooler heads prevail and Kate and Kara exchange new-bestie compliments about each other’s hope and courage.
In the tunnels under STAR Labs, Cisco and Frost encounter Pariah, formerly Nash Wells, whose transformation was weirdly tipped in “Part One” for no particularly good reason. Using Nash’s memories, they are able to access the hidden chamber holding the anti-matter cannon. That cannon is powered by Flash-90 (John Wesley Shipp) running on a cosmic treadmill, and here’s what we all should have realized long ago (and many of you probably did): The Monitor said Barry Allen had to die, but he never specified which Barry Allen. Sort of makes all the angst of the first half of the season feel a little cheap, no?
Except our Flash does disappear in the Crisis as predicted, along with the other paragons. In fact, they appear to be all that’s left of our universe, as Earth-1 is destroyed and everyone left on the Wave Rider is vaporized. Yeah, sure, it’s kind of a ripoff of Avengers: Infinity War, and almost all of it is going to be reversed when the final installment airs on January 14, but as far as cliffhangers to hold us until after the holidays go, it’ll do.
Stray observations
- Another cameos of note: Ashley Scott as the Huntress, the character she played in the short-lived Birds Of Prey series from 2002. Seen here in the New Gotham of Earth-203, she appears just long enough to be disintegrated by the anti-matter wave.
- I’ve also never seen Black Lightning, but Cress Williams did a lot with a little in this episode, given the amount of devastating information his character had to process in a very short time. His chat with Barry about the loss of their respective fathers was one of the few quiet moments this week, and more effective because of that.
- So Team Flash didn’t know Earth-2 (along with Harry and Jesse) had been destroyed until tonight? Team Arrow never thought to shoot them an email about that?
- The Flash-back to the 1990 series starring Shipp and Amanda Pays was surprising, and surprisingly effective. It made this immense fictional universe feel even larger.
- Cisco is Vibe again, much to his dismay, but whether that will stick is anyone’s guess at this point.
- In the comics, Ryan Choi is a protege of Ray Palmer who becomes the New Atom. This doesn’t bode well for the original, especially since we know Brandon Routh is parting ways with the CW.
- I have no idea how we’re covering the conclusion of “Crisis” here at TV Club, but we’ve got a month to figure it out.
397 Comments
Death Count:Everyone……execpt Sarah Lance, Barry Allen, J’onn J’onzz, Kara Danvers, Kate Kane, Ryan Choi and Superman Lex Luthor. Possibly also Ollie as I’m not sure how it works with the Spectre.
The In Memoriam bit they ran during the after show was genius. rip all the puppies
RIP Kevin Smith of Earth-420. Snoogans.
Possibly also Ollie as I’m not sure how it works with the Spectre. In the comics the Spectre gets to partly live again as Jim Corrigan but I don’t know if Ollie will get the same treatment.
It depends from host-to-host(more importantly, from writer-to-writer, I guess). Hal Jordan didn’t “live again” as the Spectre but he could pop up here and then as Hal somewhat. Crispus Allen got stuck as Spectre.With no source material-bound rules, they can theoretically resolve Ollie’s plot however they see fit.
Given the previously rumored cameos of Anissa Pierce, Jennifer Pierce, the David Mazouz Bruce Wayne and Stargirl (note: I have not idea how true some of these rumors are and am not saying that any of these people are appearing for sure) I think we are getting one of two things in hour 51. When the Multiverse is restored we get a bunch of little shots of various people and Earths returning or…2. An all hands on deck moment where EVERYONE comes in for the big fight (or at least everyone that Berlanti can get to appear) a la Avengers: Endgame.
2. An all hands on deck moment where EVERYONE comes in for the big fight (or at least everyone that Berlanti can get to appear) a la Avengers: Endgame.You mean like…
Looking at that beautiful Perez art reminds me, as botched as they were as characters in Legends S1, for this occasion I’d welcome the Hawks back…and I still miss Firestorm something fierce.
Flash-forward to the Legends episode:
Everyone: :: Gathers::
Nate: Sara you said no more crossovers! You promised!
Gary: This is SO COOL
Kind of crazy just how many characters from that iconic cover are either involved in Crisis, or have appeared on the Arrowverse shows:Vigilante, Batwoman, Wildcat, Jay Garrick, Martian Manhunter, The Ray, Supermen, Dr Light, Kid Flash, Black Lightnint Hawkman, Harbinger, Firestorm. Even a Jason Todd cameo.
Captain Marvel looking beast as always
Given the way Jennifer turned into an incorporeal lava lamp at the end of the last Black Lightning episode, I suspect we haven’t seen the last of her. Maybe, who knows.
No – she will be a disembodied lamp for the rest of the series now. And because the CW budget can’t afford to CG that, she’ll evolve into a floating lamp held afloat by a piece of string.
If the Lucifer rumor turned out to be true there’s probably some merit to the other ones.
Even the Titans rumor turned out to be true. I thought it would’ve been impossible. It’s repurposed archive footage, but the fact that they’re allowed to put it in is big in itself. I knew that’s also Berlanti-produced, but I would’ve thought the higher-ups wouldn’t allow it.
I’d vastly prefer #2. The fun of getting all these people together is actually seeing them interact in some way, and it’s even more special in live action because it’s so much harder to coordinate. I’ve really been enjoying things, but having Burt Ward yell a catchphrase at the sky isn’t quite what I want out of this.
The fact that Stargirl has not shown up yet just leads me to believe that Geoff Johns was on vacation when they were writing this.
“Heroes of various CW TV shows … form up!”
To me my Legends!
The scene where Flash-90 takes Flash-1’s speed and then gets back on the cosmic treadmill was perfect. The music, the flashback – perfect.Black Lightning fits in naturally with everyone else. I hope they find a way for more crossing over, difficult as it is.Lucifer!Glad Constantine acknowledged Corrigan wasn’t the same one he’d met. I wonder if that actor wasn’t available, and if Stephen Lobo is going to have more substantial scenes in January. But Ollie becoming the Spectre makes sense.Cavanaugh hasn’t had much interesting to do as Pariah.Huntress!
Agreed on Corrigan/Constantine. I was wondering how they were going to handle it.
“I was wondering how they were going to handle it.”Very quickly! That was maybe the most rushed scene in the series so far, and maybe of any Arrowverse show. Corrigan just comes waltzing in out of the brush, “Hey, oliver, i’m tired so you’re the Spectre now!” and… SCENE.
Did we know beforehand that Ollie was gonna be the Spectre? I’ve seen that “theory” a lot these past few weeks. Wonder if they revealed/leaked that somewhere.
I don’t know if we “knew,” but people probably started speculating it as soon as Ollie died in part one. I think most people thought Corrigan/Spectre would serve the same role he did in the book which was, uh, this:
I had Crisis #10’s cover ready to post in case something related happens, but you beat me to it!
We did not, it wasn’t teased anywhere.
All we knew was that Corrigan would show up. I don’t even think they’d confirmed that he was in fact the Spectre.
I haven’t read COIE, so I didn’t know Specter played a big role, or it might have occured to me. As soon as Corrigan identified himself, I thought oh, shit, Ollie’s already wearing the suit! Super obvious in retrospect.
Hey Ollie’s costume already had a green hood , they just need to add a Cape!.I liked the new Jimmy Corrigan , and I was half hoping Corrigans original actor Emmet J Scanlan would turn up as the current DC character he plays ,Lobo …not to be mixed up with the actor who now plays Corrigan ,Stephen Lobo ..christ! I’m confused now.
I guess that was not the voice of Dina Meyer as Oracle/ Barbara talking with Ashley Scott’s Huntress? Or was it, uncredited? … Oh shit, it was!
Wait what?(BTW Evil since I’ve been real busy these past few months and haven’t been able to be in the comments of reviews but I’ve missed your comments. I also thought of you the other day when I was Hallmark Christmas Movies. There was one with Summer Glau, but that wasn’t even the main thing. It had a even pre The 100 Izabela Vidovic.)
Hope you are well! Help for the Holidays with Summer Glau! One of the better Hallmark Christmas movies. I had forgotten that little Kara from Supergirl, Isabela Vidovic, was in that!
It seems like there’s just one purgatory that all the universes share, since Oliver died on Earth-1 but traveling to purgatory from Earth-666 still let them find him. So, presumably, there are Jim Corrigans from a bunch of different Earths floating around purgatory, too.
I only wish Smallville got the same respect that Flash-90 did. Sure, Clark getting a happy ever after ending is nice, but I’d have like to see him be a hero and contribute to saving lives much like Flash-90 got to.
I thought the way the show handled Clark-167 was super respectful (no pun intended) both to the character and to what the show was. And I get wanting to see him get to save the day like Flash-90 (whose show was cancelled after one season vs Smallville ending after ten), but he got to punch out Lex Luthor. Even Routh’s Superman didn’t get that satisfaction.
Respectful to the show might be a stretch. 10 seasons of Smallville was dedicated to Clark learning to embrace his destiny. Even the final episode was a montage of Jor-el showing him all the trials he went through to be ready to be Superman. For him to give it up is off-brand for what the show was all about.
It was however, very on brand for Welling who never wanted to wear the suit and always viewed his character as a man who is Superman, but you never see him. A hero in the background.
10 seasons of Smallville was dedicated to Clark learning to embrace his destiny.Ehhh… maybe that happened towards the end, but I remember those first five seasons Clark just wanted to be “normal” more than anything. It was very early-2000s TV, where they had no idea how long the show was going to run, so the character couldn’t really grow very much. So for every pivotal event that happened, or every Dr. Swann or Legion of Super-Heroes that he met, where it seemed like he was finally his embracing his destiny (a concept I hated, but it’s what they went with), there’d be some obstacle or season finale where he walks back any major character development I know he became the Blur and the Red-Blue Blur later, and Superman in the finale, but honestly, I completely buy that he’d give it all up so he could have kids with Lois. He’d already fought most of his most famous villains on the show, and there were a whole bunch of superheroes out there before he even put on the cape.A long-winded way to say: Al Gough and Miles Miller pitched the show as a “no flights, no tights” story about Clark Kent on his farm. The scene in Crisis was just that. I consider that respectful.
I also wanted to see Cain and Hatcher from Earth-93 but alas, such was not to be.
Cain Superman died on his way to Fox and Friends.
That may have been confusing given that both actors showed up as villains on various seasons of Supergirl.
Maybe the original actor doesn’t look good with white body paint wearing a green Speedo?
If the endgame is to put everyone in the same universe like in the original Crisis we could see lots more Black Lightning going forward.
That was also definitely Dina Meyer’s voice on the other end of the radio.
No, Pariah hasn’t gotten to do much, but the realization as to why he was actually on the bridge of the Waverider was killer (literally), and when he sent the Paragons to the Vanishing Point I literally yelled OH FUCK.
I love that Jon Cryer heard they were doing Crisis this season and said “I want in!” because Holy Beebo, his Lex Luther is a world class bastard. Seeing Clark vanish and get replaced by Lex was a damn fine bombshell.Kate and Kara really are the World’s Finest and I hope they do a team up in the back half of the season. While we all knew Earth-90 Barry was going to bite it, that clip of Flash 90 got to me, excellent call to add that in.Lastly, I had a real hard time buying Kellogg as God’s angel of vengeance, but making Oliver Specter is such a genius decision. If he doesn’t tell the Anti-Monitor he has failed the multiverse then what are we even doing?
As soon as Lex appeared at the end, I literally said “Oh, you sonovabitch!” out loud. Well done, Jon Cryer. Well done.
My language was a lot more colorful, but it conveyed the same idea 😉
Didn’t know that about Jon Cryer. That makes me respect him rather quite a bit more.
Yeah, he actually had some interesting things to say on the Crisis after show, which surprised me because those things are usually dull as dishwater
You didn’t think Kevin Smith saying the Stargirl teaser was better than the birth of his child was interesting?
Kevin Smith says a lot of shit is better than the birth of his daughter, I’m sure Harley is used to it by now.But on the subject of Stargirl does she really need to wear a crop top? It’s 2019, fashion has moved on.
Yea, teen girls still wear crop tops. It’ll probably get changed to a full bodysuit in Season 2 or 3 anyway.
It’ll probably get changed to a full bodysuit in Season 2 or 3 anyway.Stargirl (excited look at costume): Shirt!
Not 5?
To be fair, the actual birth itself isn’t usually that pleasant right?
Kevin Smith is more of a celeb than an actual creator these days, so I tend to forget he did write one of the(if not the) best Green Arrow runs ever. When he was arranging the character magnets on the first Aftermath show, I thought “well, at least he knows which characters are which” before I remembered, “wait, he used to write these stuff”.
Hell Arrow made one of Kev’s creations a core character for years and years.
Blanking on which of them was his, care to clue me in?
Mia Dearden/Speedy, which Arrow used as the basis for Thea Dearden Queen/Speedy.
I wasn’t sure that one counts, since Mia was decidedly not related to Ollie by blood, but I guess she does count!
Of course, we all know that Kevin Smith is not prone to hyperbole.
I wasn’t at the birth of Harley Quinn Smith, but the Stargirl teaser did look pretty good
Well, not in the flesh, anyway….
I like that the CW and Kevin Smith are both into this enough to do an aftershow.But once I realized it’s just like The Talking Dead, I had a hard time paying attention.
Showing clips from an episode we just watched is the definition of wasting time.
Yeah I’ve been watching in case anything slips. Conroy doing ‘Jingle Bells, Batman Smells’ was worth it though. The Stargirl teaser was decent and the statement that the goal is to have the Kara/Kate relationship becoming the Ollie/Barry relationship of the future seasons is good to know I suppose. But that’s about it
i have never watched one of these after shows before, holy hell that was one of the most insufferable things I have ever watched. Especially that whole Robert Wohl part where he clearly didn’t want to be there and just needed the money
Yeah After show episode 1 was pretty mediocre. Felt like the guests had more to say all around on episode 2. Surprised they let Jon Cryer talk about a key scene from an upcoming episode.
Yeah, if this was certain other company Cryer would have been hit with a tranquilizer dart from the shadows, but Guggenheim and Kevin just sit there a let him ramble on…
Hearing him say that he goes to Comic-Con on purpose by himself made me want to buy him a beer.
Jon Cryer has unexpectedly become my favorite live action Lex Luthor. He’s not a bemused sitcom character like Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor, and he’s not complex and three-dimensional like Michael Rosenbaum’s Lex Luthor. He’s just very, very smart and very, very evil.Normally I would be thrilled to have more of his character, and have him pop up in such a deliciously horrible and unexpected way.So it speaks to how great Brandon Routh is as Earth-96 Superman that I was really disappointed when the swap happened. An effective storytelling beat, but I just wanted more Routh Superman.
Same! I loved the cliffhanger for its, you know, surprise element (as is befitting a cliffhanger) and for how completely Lexy a move it was. But man oh man that was heartbreaking, as I was really looking forward to seeing more of BR’s Superman esp. in the final battle episodes. I don’t know if he maaaay still show up (hopefully??), but yeah, that was a gut punch – his return as supes has been perfect. So Kudos Jon Cryer, but also…how dare you?! At least I do love his version of Lex.
Kara’s face when she realized she was losing (a version of) Kal was something else. I mean, shit, she just watched two Kals die. I’d be surprised if the other paragons don’t have to hold her back from beating Lex into a pulp for this stunt.I’m really glad they’re bringing Lex back on the latter half of SG. Such a bastard, but so fun to watch.
I think the benefit of Jon Cryer is that he’s a genuine superman fan. He did a random roles years ago where he spoke passionately about how exciting, and ultimately gutting it was to star in Superman IV. But he got to spend a movie hanging with Gene Hackman, and that’s clearly been a massive help with his own take. I would imagine as well that after a decade of being paid extremely well to endure the hell of Two and a Half Men has made him enjoy a fun wacky super villain role.
And I just realized where I recognize this Cryer guy from. lol
I stopped watching Supergirl regularly before he showed up, but the night before he won me over. His reaction to Smallville Clark and when he said it was it was more fun to watch Supermen kill each other I was on board.
I felt the same way. I feel cheated out of more Routh Superman. (Especially with the intro of Ryan Choi, which is like a punch to the gut for Ray fans.)
I was pissed when it happened, because it takes Super-Routh away from us.
But at the same time, what a villain-move. It reminded me very much of the JL/JLU animated Lex Luthor voiced by Clancy Brown. I feel like that’s exactly the sort of move that Luthor would pull.
The fact that he simply wrote his name on the Paragon sheet over Superman’s logo was hilarious. Then him casually putting the sheet back in his pocket, sublime.
That got a big chuckle out of me! I like how it a) shows how much of a bastard this Lex is and b) felt unbelievably comic-booky.
He makes me want to watch last season of Supergirl. Well, him and the delightfulness that was Brainy on Part One.
The fact that he simply wrote his name on the Paragon sheet over Superman’s logo was hilarious. Then him casually putting the sheet back in his pocket, sublime.
My *only* complaint with that ending was it would have been fantastic to go all-in on duplicating the Crisis Issues 7 cover with Kara holding Kal only for him to morph into a very alive Lex. On the other hand it would have likely significantly burst the tension bubble and probably prevented the death glare of instant pant soiling so….
I know Melissa Benoist has built up muscle to play Supergirl, but I kinda question if she’d be able to hold Brandon Routh in that pose with that big, bulky bodysuit on.
Eh, they’ve had her carry Lena and a security guy before now (albeit he very clearly jumps into her arms the instant before the shot starts then puts a leg down to support himself but it’s cheap and works well enough). Would have required a wire rig to pull off but technically could have been done. Def not worth the effort, especially as it’d be a double rig setup for both Brandon and Jon and it’d likely be a bit too comedic. Need to double check the source material but at a glance it looked like they kinda combined the Crisis cover with the Death of Superman shot they used in ep 2.
I want a “you have failed this multiverse” and would if be too much to ask for one last “suit up”? I mean I know they’re all in costume already but throw me this bone, CW.
Disappointed we didn’t get a glimpse of him as Alexander Luthor though.
The actor whose name I also forget and so shall also refer to as Kellogg does have some decent acting chops, so I feel like given enough time he could have sold it, but of course he barely had any time onscreen at all, just enough time for me to go “oh hey, that’s Kellogg!”
“If he doesn’t tell the Anti-Monitor he has failed the multiverse then what are we even doing?”Lmao, perfectly said!
I thought it was a really nice touch that Frost switched with Caitlin for what they thought was the moment they were saying goodbye to their Barry.
That might’ve been the best subtle touch in the episode.
I love that even though we didn’t see her Dina Meyer returned as Oracle. I would have loved if Rachel Skarsten appeared as Black Canary and she and Huntress made it to Earth 1 just for the moment when Kate met BC but alas.
Not enough Canaries in the Arrowverse for you yet, eh?
Just wait…..
-I’ll never get tired of Kate roughing up Lex on Kara’s behalf.-Tom Ellis, Matt Ryan, and a Dylan Thomas reference? This is the Welshest thing I’ve seen since Torchwood.-Kara is desperate to undo the disaster and fix her universe. Jefferson is desperate to undo the disaster and fix his universe. Why aren’t they talking?-Barry + Jefferson talking about their dads are pretty effective, though. Can Jefferson bring his obviously resurrected family with him for a mini-crossover later?-KARA TRUSTS KATE TO KEEP KRYPTONITE??? omfg after all the drama with Lena keeping Kryptonite around.-Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo SuperRouth! Dammit Lex.
Clark trusts Bruce with kryptonite, of course Kara trusts Kate with some.
she’s gotten mad at both her friend and the DEO- run by her sister and her pseudodad!- for having Kryptonite. it’s a big deal that she trusts Kate already!
Yeah that would be even more ammo for Lena if she ever learned about that.
I want to see both Lena flipping out about it and Kara making @AmaltheaElanor’s point above about learning from Lena that it’s ok for some people to have Kryptonite just in case.
Of course Lena would freak out on Kara about trusting Kate more than her and view it as a betrayal, but at this point she would do that if Kara wished a happy Hannukah to Kate (who is Jewish) and not her
Why did it take me until now to realize that Kate had a… wait for it… Bat Mitzvah?
And they say Bruce has a branding fetish.
Lena and Kate are not remotely on the same page when it comes to trustworthiness. Let’s be honest: there is a reason that Kara told Nia that she was Supergirl before she told Lena. In her gut, Kara knows that she can’t really trust Lena. Kate is not shady like Lena and Kate doesn’t have a hidden agenda. Kate wants to make Gotham a better place and she wants to save her sister Beth. That’s it. Kate has demonstrated that she can be trusted; Lena has demonstrated that she will always keep secrets but demand that everyone tell her everything.
Yeah, Lena is a Luthor, she may not have Lex’s bloodlust, but I would say she does share some of the megalomania…
At this point I’m shocked they are not making out already. Kara so obviously has a serious girl thing for Kate and for Lena that I am surprise she’s not talking to her sister about if she’s bi too or not lol.
And how many years of shared adventures and tribulations were necessary for Clark to bulid that trust in Bruce? A lot maybe? How long have Kara known Kate? ;)Cheers
I like to think Lena did a lot to open Kara’s eyes about the necessity of keeping Kryptonite on hand and how not to take it personally.
Also, simply the fact that they’ve had to fight evil doppelgangers of Kara three different times now. At this point it’s a question of when, not if, that happens again.
That’s actually a good way to look at it, cuz my first reaction was also “Damn, poor Lena.”
Bats can have a little bit of kryptonite…as a treat.
Kate is really a vital addition to the Arrowverse.
I’m glad people are coming round to Batwoman. I was feeling so discouraged when everyone was bemoaning the show and character’s existence before it even had a proper debut.
I’m still a few episodes behind, and I personally still feel on the fence of the show overall. I think Kate’s a good character, but I fear she could be smothered by her own show the way Barry oftentimes is.Those who have been dismissive of the show before it even started are just not worth the time. Those are the same kind of people who thinks Arrowverse on the whole is trash because it doesn’t compare to what the Neflix-Marvel shows were doing, for instance.
Yeah, I struggled watching the first few episodes, it wasn’t really until I think the 6th episode, that I think the show is starting to find itself…
In fact, they appear to be all that’s left of our universe, as Earth-1 is destroyed and everyone left on the Wave Rider is vaporized. Yeah, sure, it’s kind of a ripoff of Avengers: Infinity WarIt’s actually taken from the original Crisis. The remaining five Earths, including Earth-1 and Earth-2, where the major heroes were at the time of it happening, were obliterated by the anti-matter wave. Then the Harbinger and Alexander Luthor brought the heroes to the Monitor’s ship.The only difference here is that only the Paragons are left, whereas in the original Crisis Harbinger saved a ton of heroes from the five Earths.Infinity Gauntlet, which was where Infinity War took cues from, actually took some of its ideas from the original Crisis first. It has kind of become full circle.
They even have the same artist, George Perez.
a.k.a. If You Want 100+ Superheroes On A Single Page, You Know Who To Call
I have JLA/Avengers and his work still blows me away. That man can do so much with 1 page.
Perez only did the first half of IG. Ron Lim did issues #4-6
Tom Ellis truly makes the awesome awesomer! I don’t know which I want more, Constantine to make an appearance on Lucifer or Diggle to meet up with Amenadiel (tall, dark, & annoyed by me).
Why not both? And Lucifer trying to hit on the Arrowverse women would be supremely entertaining, can you imagine him pulling that ‘what do you desire’ schtick on Sara, Kate, Lena, Alex or, god forbid, Kara? Hope his wings are in working order…
“Daddy issues! Why didn’t you say so?”Line of the night.
Lucky Devil that he said that to Mia and not… well, how long have you got? Could you imagine the carnage if that had been Alex? Have to go and reshoot the opening season of Lucifer to show Lux being rebuilt from the foundations!
Well if anyone knows about Daddy issues, it’s Luci.
I want Lucifer to hit on Brainy.
I adored that cameo so much, I nearly hyperventilated. I did hyperventilate, actually, and then my blood pressure shot up so I had to do some deep, calming breathing … I adored that cameo.
That comes so close to how my reaction. But you need to add squee from 200+ miles away as my son who we were watching “with” at a distance lost it at the same moment. I now know what a stroke via text looks like.
Oliver becoming the Spectre is just a stroke of genius. The green hood. I’ve never made that connection before. But it just fits.
Whew, if I have any complaints, it was almost too much. I actually wish they had more time for this so that more of the emotional moments could land.Really liked the showdown with Kate and Kara. Their dynamic is evolving in interesting ways.There was speculation in the comments that Earth-90 Barry Allen would die instead, which is kind of what I feared. I guess there are still two episodes to go, but I still worry this means The Flash just spent weeks trying to milk emotional drama for a death that was probably never going to happen.I’m not familiar with the comics, so when some guy randomly pops up and says he’s something called Spectre, I did feel like that was something that only worked if you already know who he is. It also doesn’t help that I really would’ve liked more time for Oliver’s reunion with Diggle and Mia.That being said, I’m still having a blast. I suspected they might end it with the destruction of Earth-1 and I like not really knowing what’s going to happen next or how they’re going to fix anything.
Spectre is a DC “hero” who is the Spirit God of Vengeance, but can only interact with our plane of existence via a host. Typically, at his most powerful, he’s stronger than even The Monitor.
“But can only interact with our plane of existence via a host.”I was not aware of that. I thought that was just Deadman’s thing. I could’ve sworn seeing Spectre in action lots of times without a host — unless I read a different DC comics era, which makes sense too.
The Spectre needs a human host to keep him in check. After Corrigan, there was a period when the Spectre was free to operate without restrictions and the results were not good. Crispus Allen (no relation) became his host around Infinite Crisis.
Is it still current continuity that Hal Jordan was the Spectre for a while?
The Spectre has been around since the 1940s and has periodically been the most powerful being in existence. Basically the ghost of a murdered cop who is anointed the Spirit of Vengeance by God. Every once in a while The Spectre is separated from the dead cop and someone else becomes The Spectre. Looks like it’s Oliver’s turn. The Constantine TV show was building up to a Spectre reveal but it got cancelled before that happened.
Thanks. I wish the episode had had more time to give that context.
Considering the next episode in the crossover is the Arrow one, I expect it’ll spend some time exploring Oliver’s new role.
He really did come out of nowhere. There should’ve been a set-up, but I guess they didn’t want to tip their hand too much.
I would love the DC Universe to do a more mature-aimed Spectre show that can really do all that crazy shit Spectre would do as vengeance to bad people. A sort of Twilight Zone-meets-EC comics-meets-Punisher kind of thing.
Yeah the Spectre intro felt off. He needed an air of mystery or something to him. Or at least Constantine should be a little afraid of him as opposed to annoyed. I mean ultimately they can use the Spectre however they want, but it just felt like a random guy walking into the shot.And agreed, all the fan service is fun but we need more emotional moments to land. The Black Lightning/Flash scene was nice for that.
I mean ultimately they can use the Spectre however they want, but it just felt like a random guy walking into the shot.considering the last time I saw Stephen Lobo he was stranded in a forest three million years in the past, him just walking up to them out of nowhere felt appropriate.
You’re right about the Spectre’s entrance, not a green puff of smoke or nothing, he just wandered in like he was separated from his tour group lol Lian Yu Purgatory Island Tours (and Gift Shop!) ha.Also, the first comic book I ever bought was this one…
Yeah somehow stumbling through the Vancouver underbrush was not the grand entrance I was hoping for for the Spectre, arguably the most powerful being in the DC universe.Then again, it’s also kind of weird for the most powerful being to wear forest green briefs and gloves…
Constantine season 1 DID set up Corrigan as the Spectre, green glow and all, so even though its going back a few years, that show’s canon being adopted into tge Arrowverse via Matt Ryan technically makes corrigan a known entity in tge Arrowverse, but I get it if folks were confused. I was delighted. I guess if I could say anything about it, it’s GO WATCH CONSTANTINE SEASON ONE. It was almost impossibly better than anybody dared imagine, and it’s cancellation by NBC was tragic. It was a great show, and retroactively can fill in great context for the character as he appears on Legends.
I was never attracted to the premise of Constantine, but Matt Ryan is just killing it over on LoT.
The Constantine show is worth it just for Zed
Kate and Kara really are working well together. I bet Kara wouldn’t even mind if Kate dated her sister … who was almost single recently when Kelly tried to break up with her. Just saying.Every moment with Diggle in the crossover was a highlight, especially him challenging The Monitor, being just slightly flustered that Lucifer flirted with him, and of course rescuing (well almost) his brother Oliver from purgatory. I slightly thought he was out of line for yelling at Sara but it was a very intense moment, I’m sure she understood.
I still think that Kate will date Kara before she ever dates Alex. Or at least they’ll have a fling.
I am not opposed to that, at all. But I feel like it is truer to Kara’s generous spirit that she would try to hook her sister up with Kate rather than do so herself
Also Kara’s spent more time looking at Luke Fox’s abs and SuperRouth’s general jacked-ness.
Where the hell is my annual Sarah Lance Sexual Conquistador crossover moment?
Diggle-Oliver is my favorite relationship on Arrow, so I’m glad to see it get a bit of screentime here in the middle of all this madness.
Barry was never going to die, or if he did/does it won’t take. What is key is that we know that, but he doesn’t.
But that’s exactly my point. They spent weeks belaboring the whole “Barry’s going to die! You all have to get ready to move on!” And it’s just as I feared: it just makes all that drama feel cheap and hollow.Not entirely unlike Iris’s future death at the hands of Savitar. I wish the show would stop going down the well of “someone’s going to die in the future, everyone spend weeks mourning and preparing for it! Oh, just kidding – someone else stepped in at the last minute and all that emotional work was building toward basically nothing.”
I did kind of like the flip of how they spent all that time preparing to lose Barry and it turns out Barry’s the one who has to live with knowing he just lost Iris and (almost) everyone he loves. That shot of them reaching towards each other as Barry got teleported really got to me.
I had no idea who/what it was, either.
That was Great Television. They took 30 year-old plot threads, how Shipp’s The Flash was canceled with no sendoff to the character and here finally he got it. And the talk show afterwards does make a great point: Cryer is the all-time best actor at playing Lex Luthor and doing what’s required: bring the comic book character to life. He’s nailing it.
Yeah, sure, it’s kind of a ripoff of Avengers: Infinity War, Uh, yes and no. The multiverse is annihilated in the comic series. I can’t say anymore without possible spoilers.
It’s a 33 year old comic book. I think the time for spoiler alerts has passed.
Calm down. Again.
I am calm, sunshine.It’s a 33 year old comic book. I think the time for spoiler alerts has passed.What in my original post suggested that I wasn’t calm?
you running all through the comments with your hot takes. relax, damn. Let us nerds/geeks/fans have this.
you running all through the commentsTwo replies is “running all through the comments”? relax, damnDespite repeatedly telling others to stay calm, you seem pretty unnerved yourself. Let us nerds/geeks/fans have this.Did I do something to hurt your feelings? Because this is not the best venue to deal with these issues.
Just ignore him. His entire comment history going back years is him passive-aggressively flaming people then turning it back around to them with a “you’re getting so triggered!”.
I meant for the show, and for those who haven’t read the comic.
Oh sure. Just like how various adaptations of popular comic book stories (Winter Soldier, Days of Future Past, Age of Ultron, Dark Phoenix, etc.) have taken some liberties with the source material, I doubt this version of Crisis will end like the original did.Still, it makes sense not to spoil the ending, just in case people want to be surprised.
…how can it be a ripoff of Infinity war, reviewer, if Crisis came before Infinity Gauntlet
Yeah, it can’t really have the same ultimate ending, i.e., squishing all of the Earths into one, since these shows still have ongoing plot threads to resolve and dropping them all into a new reality would be an incoherent mess and a continuity disaster.
First off, I wanna ask something about last night’s Black Lightning: So, the other two Jen’s are on Earth-1 and Earth-2, right? Why didn’t Star Labs ever detect the Freeland metas? Is it because they aren’t powered by Dark Matter? Also, shouldn’t the Earth-2 Jen have vanished long, long beforehand? As for the special itself, it was so good. I honestly figured 90’s Flash would be the one to die as soon as he appeared in Elseworlds. But his death scene was awesome.I heard a rumor saying The Spectre would make an appearance, but I didn’t think they’d actually make Ollie him. Sure, it came the fuck outta nowhere, but it’s The Spectre, so it doesn’t matter.The Lucifer scene was glorious. Kate vs. Kara was pretty tense and despite Kate being the newbie, she sold her scenes of friendship with Kara.Wish we could’ve done more with Black Lightning.Lex replacing himself with KC!Superman is both irritating and hilarious, plus perfectly in-character.
It’s probably best to assume that the Earth of Black Lightning is a different one, and that the people who live there just use their own numbering system.After all, who wouldn’t refer to their own Earth as “Earth-1″? I think Harry Wells pointed this out years ago, but no one has since.
When in doubt, it’s always best to consult the Bureau of Earth Numbering website to find out which Earth you are actually on.
Everyone’s earth is the ‘real’ earth so instead of Earth 1,2,3 they’d be named ‘Earth 1′ ‘Earth A’ , ‘Earth Prime ‘ ,‘Earth Alpha’ , ‘Cowboy Earth ‘ and so on.
The Jinn Earth couldn’t have been literally Earth-2, because that one was destroyed weeks earlier as a test case and the three Earths in last night’s episode were among the last ones to be destroyed.
Given that “Black Lightning” was completely disconnected from the Arrowverse until last night, and given that there is thus presumably a significant chunk of the show’s audience that doesn’t normally watch the other Arrowverse shows, last night’s episode had the burden of explaining the multiverse to the viewers who had never heard the concept before.Rather than pick three random numbers that weren’t previously utilized, they used Earth 1 and Earth 2 as a shorthand for “first Earth” and “second Earth” to keep things as simple as possible.It looks like the “Black Lightning” Earth was Earth-73.
Technically they were identified Earth 1 and Earth 2, no hyphens so they were probably not supposed to be Earth-1 & Earth-2. This doesn’t make it better but at least it would make more sense than them being from Earth-1 & Earth-2 since in terms of timing and content that makes no sense.
Yeah. It seemed odd that Earth-1 would have the ASA and a whole bunch of potential metas that nobody from Flash, Arrow or Legends knew anything about. However….Black Lightning IS a DC/CW show and the production team knows full well the significance of ‘Earth-1’ and ‘Earth-2’ so I have to think they meant it. The most likely explanation is that Jen’s connection with her counterparts stretched across time as well as space so that she perceived their deaths at the same moment even though they happened both before and after her own planet got vaporized.
Since they are a separate team from the other shows I’m just going with a screwup/bad attempt at simplifying.
On Supergirl almost everything can be explained by “bad writing.” Simultaneously nice to know and depressing that it also applies to the other shows, including Black Lightning.
Oh Black Lightning has one of the most infuriatingly written storylines on any of the shows. And it’s not this confusing Earth bit.
I’ve watched Black Lightning from the beginning. I know just how wretched the current season is. But the Earth numbering fowl up was just lazy and dumb.
The reveal of Corrigan as already being The Spectre was one of the BIGGEST threads left dangling from Constantine’s first season on NBC. I assumed they simply didn’t have room in the Arrowverse ensemble shows to deal with stuff like that or the Rising Darkness arc. But it turns out the writers of these shows are tenacious, even giving some measure of catharsis to the 1990 Flash. There is a certain measure of elegance to making Ollie, who already wears a green hood, mind you, the Spectre in this world. Barry & Ollie’s conpicuously absent mutual friend Hal played that role for quite awhile at one point. Speaking of ring bearers, John Stewart was the primary Green Lantern of Sector 2814 during the original Crisis comics…if we were ever supposed to see a Diggle doppel charge up…well, here’s hoping.As an enormous Gaiman/Sandman fan, I hated the handling of Lucifer on Fox/Netflix, but honestly, he shined in that scene with Constantine. Enough to tempt me to go back and watch that show? Probably not, but credit where credit is due.
The Lucifer show has nothing to do with the Gaiman/Carey comics, but once you accept that, it’s a fun show in its own right. Definitely worth a look.
Wasn’t it originally based off that, though?
I mean, it was based off it in the sense it starts with the basic concept of “What if the Devil left Hell and started hanging out on Earth?” But all similarities end after that.
I know im in the greys but dear god watch the show. It was so bad in the beginning of season one, but starting with “A Priest Walks Into A Bar”, it became something wonderful. TOTALLY different from Mike Carey’s run, but really wonderful and Tom Ellis is just amazing. It’s why it got saved.
As for BL, I’m with FatherOctavian that is was shorthand.
I was hoping someone would say “By Any Means Necessary” one more time, just to see if Malcolm X would appear I was hoping that, at the very least, Rachel Skarsten’s Dinah Lance would have shown up alongside Ashley Scott in the Birds Of Prey scene but I guess I should be grateful that there was a homage to that long dead show at all.So I’m guessing that Black Lightning’s world was Earth-73, the last world to be wiped. Loved Jefferson’s reaction to seeing real live Supermen, letting his comic book geek flag, flyJefferson and Barry clicking so well was so good, I could feel Joe getting jealous. Barry has great rapport with black folk (except Diggle…man, no obligatory super speed throw up scene?), he could teach Mayor Pete a thing or 20 (hey-o!)One more Jefferson thing. Cress Williams did an amazing job. I felt his pain of losing his daughters…Lynn got a mention, maybe two. Poor Uncle Gambi didn’t get nada, I has a sad.I loved the cut away shot of the New World’s Finest making fists. I was ready to see Kara and Kate throw down!I didn’t see the big deviation from the source material coming and I fully expect the Endgame stans to jump all over that like Tenshu ninjas. When they do, remind them that DC, my beloved Legion Of Super Heroes, did the 5 years later thing before MCU did.
my beloved Legion Of Super Heroes, did the 5 years later thing before MCU did.Yes, and I’m sure they were the first ones to use that literary device in the history of the written word.
Calm down. I didn’t say they did.
Oh, I’m quite calm when I use sarcasm.
This review’s MCU comparison has riled up a certain subset of people, tho.
You knew it would.
Well sure, anyone would. Some of these pedants are easily riled.After all, pedantry is important, dammit.
I was hoping someone would say “By Any Means Necessary” one more time, just to see if Malcolm X would appeari enjoyed the little nod between Diggle and Jefferson when Dig said that.
That nod should have been between Diggle and Joe West. However, I’ll allow this.
I, unironically, started to raise my fist.
So I’m guessing that Black Lightning’s world was Earth-73, the last world to be wiped.Except he asked if his world was gone long before we saw Earth-73 wiped. Since most of the Earth numbers are somehow significant to the series/comic they portray, the thought is Black Lightning is from Earth-77, since Black Lightning debuted in 1977
I thought Jefferson namedropped Gambi when talking to Barry
& that was actually Dina Meyer on the other end of the comms reprising Oracle. Sadly, Ian Abercrombie who played the best portrayal of Alfred in live-action in BoP I’ve ever seen isn’t with us anymore.
“Barry has great rapport with black folk (except Diggle…man, no obligatory super speed throw up scene?)” Diggle is still, justifiably, upset with Barry for erasing his son/daughter from existence and replacing her with a daughter/son (I can’t remember which gender was the original and which was the replacement).
The cameos are fun (I think Lucifer in this episode is my favorite of them all), but there’s too much going on here too quickly for me to be super invested in any of it. And that makes me sad since Arrow’s whole season has been dedicated to setting this up, and Oliver died quickly, was resurrected quickly, and turned into *a god* really quickly. I hope the pacing is a little better when it comes back from the break. As of now the scale is so big that I can’t be upset about most of it because there’s no way they don’t set a lot of this right by the time it’s over.
I’m hoping Arrow’s finale will have the needed time to deal with the emotional fallout for Oliver, if nothing else.
I mean, Crisis is such a big storyline they could have easily devoted an entire season just to its storyline. The original comic book version managed to stuff in practically every single hero (and alternate version) DC owned at the time.
I understand that it’s a big story, I just think that it could’ve been pared down a little bit more to give the moments with the characters that we’ve been following on the main shows some room to breathe. There’s been a lot of build up for a few of these characters and so far I don’t feel like their stories have been done much justice, although that could change in the back two episodes.
I feel you.This is why I personally preferred, for example, Elseworlds to Crisis on Earth-X. CoEX got really big and exciting, but it also wasn’t as emotionally grounded. Elseworld built itself in Oliver and Barry and their dynamic, which made it more compelling and memorable, imo.I’m having a lot of fun with this crossover, but it has so many characters, and is trying to do some many things in such a short span of time, there aren’t any one or two characters that it’s emotionally grounded in. And it moves so fast, that a lot of the emotional moments don’t have sufficient time to land.
I’m having a lot of fun with this crossover, but it has so many characters, and is trying to do some many things in such a short span of time, there aren’t any one or two characters that it’s emotionally grounded in. And it moves so fast, that a lot of the emotional moments don’t have sufficient time to land.Yeah. I can appreciate what they’re trying to do and how big of an undertaking it is. Even though I don’t read the comics or watch any of the shows apart from Arrow, I’ve never had a hard time getting emotionally invested in the events and outcomes of these crossovers. This one just seems more like checking off boxes, which makes me sad because there are some really great emotional beats to be had if there was just a little more time given to them.
Based on these three episodes, I do kinda wished they could’ve devoted a whole season to it.
I am not ok – NOT OK – with Lex taking the place of and killing off KC Superman, as I was soooo looking forward to Brandon Routh playing him in the final episodes. I just have such tremendous affection and stanny fandom for his supes. For as much as that “return”/debut was teased, this is a gut punch, and sort of takes away the great gesture I thought it was to make a non-CW Superman a paragon. But…. I gotta appreciate the ending as well, bc it’s a perfectly narcissistic Lexy move and a great cliffhanger. Nonetheless….heart breaking….million pieces….owww. I will have to hope for reversals and more surprises after the break. Give that man his own Superman series IMMEDIATELY! This is the only acceptable reason I will accept for his jettisoning off Legends.
Absolutely adored the falshback to 1990s Flash series – what a tremendous and respectful send off for that character, John Wesley Shipp and his arc. So many emotions, Crisis!Lucifer! Daddy issues! That was definitely unexpected given the denials of the on-set rumors a few months ago – oh Tom Ellis, you devil. And I got a new “Tell me, what’s your deepest desire” without having to wait for the next season to drop – perfect.
So, that was Supernatural’s Kevin, no?? The tie-ins they keep on a’comin.Hopefully this at least means I won’t have to watch Barry Allen watch all the versions and doppelgangers of his father repeatedly die. I liked his call back to the Duet episode when he sang his proposal.
Really looking forward to Sara’s role in the final episodes, as the Crisis conclusions will apparently be a heavy lead-in to the season of Legends. And a season of Arrow has not had me warming up to Mia as much as these 3 Crisis episodes – welcomed surprise!
While I respect the twist, removing Routh’s Superman deflated much of my excitement for the finale. It was such a treat seeing Routh in that role again.
Same. 100% same. I don’t want to sound ungrateful bc I’ve loved the Crossover and Routh’s role(s) in it so far, and I don’t just want to sound like a hysterical fangirl – but I’ll fully admit, it was pretty disappointing. It’s indeed been such a treat to see him in the role again, and so much fun watching his KC!Superman interact and completely charm the other Arrowverse characters (and goodness, he literaly towers over everyone, in size and presence). It makes complete sense for Lex to do this of course – he even tells Smallville’s Clark his mission is to kill all Earths’ Supermen so if the superfriends find a way to save humanity, there won’t be a supes to stand in his way. I get it, he literally forecasts this. But it’s also deflating as you say. I am hopeful Routh will return for the finale at least. I haven’t read the Crisis books myself, but I think Earth-2s Superman has a big role in it? Alleged reports of his fighting the Anti-Monitor? haha whatever it is, fingers crossed.
It was indeed Kevin!
Lucifer: “Consider us even, John Constant-eye-ne.”
I loved that Iris and Lois has been so good collecting heroes for this. It wouldn’t work without them. They found the Paragon of Truth. Iris convinced Paragon of Humanity to help. But in the end they are both gone. And so are all the Supermen. Lyla, John. Nash. Cisco. Ralph. Caitlin. All this time Barry was trying to prepare his team for losing him but it was he who lost them. Even his knew friend Jeff.
But of course losing Earth-90 Barry Allen really hit in the feels. Especially that montage.
After all the preparation to Olliver dying. After he actually died. And after all this time Mia and John and even Constantine spent to save Olliver. He still lives in as Spectre while they all got annihilated.
I still love the way they develop Kara and Kate’s friendship. The way Kate stopped Kara from using the Book of Destiny by convincing her instead of forcing her. And then they go through mutual declaration of trust, hope and courage with kryptonite. If only Kara could redo this with Lena this way. If only Kate could have this with Beth.
The Book is a bust but I know we are getting the Earths back. They are all destroyed. All the heroes but 7 (and Lex Luthor) are gone. Even Monitor is no longer. There is no other way. The Book of Destiny has to big of a cost but I think they’ve already told us the solution.
The last exchange between Monitor and Anti-Monitor.
“It was foolish to try to stop me, Novu”
“No, Mobius. It was foolish to allow your creation in the first place.”The Paragons are in the Vanishing Point outside time and space. This crossover ends with time travelling show. They are going to travel back in time to undo Anti-Monitor. The Earths will never die. Everything will go back to normal with other people unaware it even happened. And only Barry will remember bonding with Jeff about their fathers.
The Flash of the 90s was of course the most heartbreaking cameo especially with that flashback with Amanda Pays. And Lucifer was the most fun on (hitting on both Mia and Diggle). But I have to say that I loved seeing Ashley Scott Huntress and even more hearing Dina Meyer’s Oracle (Dina is on a CW show too so maybe we shouldn’t be surprised). I was not expecting that last one. But with Rachel Skarsten on pay roll they really should’ve made it all three Birds of Prey.
I’m starting to think there can’t be time travel without Stephen Lobo. Continuum. Travelers. And now he’s arrived in Arrowverse and I bet the Crisis can’t be resolved without little time travel.I love that the highest numbered Earth we have is Earth-666. But I wonder where the Earth-206 designation comes from.
They might have “Hey we’re back alive!” cameos that bookend these getting-fried cameos, and … add-in more. Hopefully, maybe. (?)
I hope so. Those talks between people who don’t normally meet are my favourite parts of these crossovers (I’d be fine if the next one is just them going to a pub – no saving the world/s necessary) so I hope for more of these superfriends moments.
I always loved Invasion! for ending with Barry and Oliver getting a beer.
Continuum & Travellers were both great quality sci-fi shows that did quality story-tellimg & character-work on a budget.
Yes, I miss both but especially Travelers as Continuum at least got a proper ending. I really wish we got another season of Travelers.
The writing was really om the wall for Travelers with how s3 concluded. It felt like Sanctuary where it was the end of a chapter & the story goes, but we just don’t get to continue with them – so frustrating that we dont get to see it, but at least its not a cliffhanger.
Does Sara being the paragon of destiny mean she is going to have to use the book of destiny to restore the multiverse eventually? In Legends of Tomorrow s2 that is what she did with the spear of destiny to restore the reality that the Legion of Doom had altered.
Maybe. Maybe they’ll make a Voltron Beebo again and the One True Blue God can save the reality again. I wouldn’t put anything past that show. That’s what makes it so fun.
So, I think something else was foreshadowed. When Kara and Kate are asking Lex about the Book of Destiny he says in order to do what Kara wants to do with it, she’d need to have (paraphrasing) an incredible will in order to resist the madness.And, look, people have been on about Diggle-as-Lantern for quite a while… but, when I heard a specific mention for will to operate the Book and restore everything, all I could think is… that’s literally what the Green Lanterns’ bag is, baby…
That makes sense but I don’t know that I see any new characters introduced for really major roles for the rest of the crossover, though I’m sure there will continue to be fun cameos (and I hope the Diggle Lantern is one)
Well, also, Berlanti wrote the Green Lantern film, we know they’ve approached Keanu, Cage, and Keaton… and Ryan Reynolds shows great ability to show up places solely for funsies and to make fun of himself (and he loves Vancouver)… I’m wondering how far out of the question or not that may be… >.>
Nah! I think they’ll use this opportunity to combine the earths to make crossovers easier to explain. Also, I think everyone will remember what happened.
– Sara should have slapped Diggle.
– The Monitor should have slapped him too.
– Don’t you think that 10.5B people is enough people to have on Earth-1?
– Is there some cosmic reason that a lot of the paragons are on Earth-1?
– Kara, don’t do something stupid.
– I hate that they’re getting rid of Ray because they’re out of stories to tell for the Atom, but they’re bringing on a Ryan Choi.
– If Cisco becoming Vibe again sticks, then what was the point of getting rid of his powers in the first place?
– I don’t watch “Lucifer” (and no, I’m not going to), but that was a fun cameo.
– So Black Lightning is Lady Quark.
– Is Barry going to run backwards on the track? (Yes, Barry did.)
– Well that finding of Oliver’s soul and reasoning with him was fast…and anti-climatic.
– Ah, the Spectre.
– The Kate/Kara dynamic is just awesome.
– A flashback of the 90’s “Flash”.
– Trust Lex to eff everything up.
– Wasn’t Oracle sending information about the anti-matter wave out into the universe? Whatever happened to that?
I hate that they’re getting rid of Ray because they’re out of stories to tell for the Atom, but they’re bringing on a Ryan Choi.I mean, they probably feel like they’ve run out of stories to tell about Ray, specifically.
“Kara, don’t do something stupid.” – Is it bad that my immediate reaction was “Kara, don’t Barry this up.”? Though, in fairness, her success rate when it comes to messing with space, time and reality is quite a bit higher than Sir Flashpoint so, eh, 50/50.
– Is there some cosmic reason that a lot of the paragons are on Earth-1? Most of these multiverse stories tend to single out Earth-1 or Prime-Earth as the nexus point of all the multiverse, so that’s always how the explain away why “we’re” the most important one.
The fact that all the paragons save Choi and Routh Superman are all in the same immediate circle of friends, out of a literal infinite universes, is a little annoying to me. I’ll chalk it up to the fact that the Monitor has been pulling strings for a very, very long time and got them all together, even when he didn’t know some of the paragons. Let’s just say Berlanti’s the Monitor.
omg. thank you. re: So Black Lightning is Lady Quark.
I just found this. Looks like they snuck in a little bit more of the DC TV universe in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.
o.OI would never have caught this without the screenshot!
That’s an awesome catch.
HAha, my eyes went to exactly that in that brief shot, to the point I missed the Earth #
Paying it forward, maybe?
Maybe next we can get The Flash showing up on Watchmen and fighting Dr Manhattan.
Be careful, in case someone in the comments will chastise you saying “As if it’s the first time in history a show put on an affiliated show’s billboard in the background, *insert Marvel property here* did it first anyway!”.It sure takes a special kind of person to be so hateful that others are enjoying something they don’t.
I was hoping that the Lucifer scene was happening , and that it’s be Constantine (‘Constanteen’ ..’..yeah..I dont care’)Matt Smith in it . As soon as I saw Earth 666 I went ‘Yes!’.
What the what
Black Lightning is a really great show and Cress Williams is so good as Jefferson. One of the daughter characters, Anissa, is a lesbian and due to her superpowers cannot be killed and she has a superhero girlfriend Grace Choi.
Anissa has enhanced healing. I didn’t get the impression she can’t be killed. She almost died from Painkiller’s venom.
Man, having bounced off Arrow quite a while ago I really regret not having kept up with it but now it just seems way too late. It seems that with all the crossovers and such, these shows are virtually impossible to catch up with via streaming.
I’d encourage you to try a cut down version. The crossovers have been surprisingly accessible if you’ve got a smattering of DC knowledge to at least get a handle on the characters (hell, Elseworlds is pretty much entirely standalone). As for the shows I reckon you could probably hit, oh, half a dozen episodes per season and get the major beats or just hit up a couple of recap videos on YouTube. Put it this way I’m completely up on Supergirl, mostly up to date on Legends, have never watched Black Lightning, gave up on Arrow around S3 ep 1 for… some spoiler-filled reason… and realised the Flash didn’t seem to know what to do after a spectacularly good S1. With a quick brush up prior to this I’ve had no problem following along and getting sucked in to the emotional parts even without being heavily invested in specific shows.
The Spectre! That makes a lot more sense because I kept thinking it was Deadman or Dr. Fate. Oliver donning another green hood would be very appropriate.
You know what, this was all worth it for the few minutes of TV that Lucifer was on screen. I figured he’d be another cameo but no, he actually contributed to the plot (not that that plot went anywhere). I suspect that that Constantine thread will never be brought up on any show ever again but I wouldn’t mind Constantine showing up on Lucifer. They do have 16 episodes to fill after all.The whole Paragon situation annoyed me because they spent most of last episode acting like it was some big mystery and then here it’s just Jon & Barry with no fanfare. At least Ryan Choi was new.They got to have their cake and eat it too I see. They managed to do Barry’s iconic death without him actually dying. Speaking of dead father figures, where’s Jay Garrick?
The whole Paragon situation annoyed me because they spent most of last episode acting like it was some big mystery and then here it’s just Jon & Barry with no fanfare. At least Ryan Choi was new.Yes. On top of that awfully convenient reveal, the way the Monitor has been written for this crossover bugs me. He pulls plot points out of thin air at random moments and seems to know/not know key information based on the needs of the plot. I thought he was actually the Anti-Monitor leading the heroes on, but nope.And yes, they’ve still got one more JWS character in their pocket for next crossover.
“And yes, they’ve still got one more JWS character in their pocket for next crossover.”Besides these are comic books shows, when has that ever mattered?
Speaking of dead father figures, where’s Jay Garrick?
So if the Anti-Monitor has a fail safe that will destroy all the remaining universes at once, why not do that instead of the long way?
I’m assuming we’ll see Flash-90 again becauseif that was sacrifice that saved the multiverse, it didn’t and was utterly pointless.
I love that Cisco *also* acknowledges that no matter how classic ‘The Anti-Monitor’ is always corny as hell to say/hear. Plus that Frost is in on the ‘crossover’ talk. Of course Lucifer is both friends with Constantine, residing on Earth-666, and razzing John about his name. In hindsight I’m kind of surprised they couldn’t snag Keanu Reeves – he seems to always be up for any ‘fun’ project but I’m guessing they didn’t have the nerve to ask.
Called the ‘no one said which Flash’ back at the start of the season – though it was a pretty easy call to make since we knew this wasn’t the end for Earth-1 Barry.Oliver as The Specter I did *not* see coming but makes sense you can’t keep Arnell out of the shows even if his own is done. As for the ‘no particularly good reason’ for Pariah in episode one this episode actually explains it: Anti-Monitor only has him pop in to witness tragedies. Hence being there, out of nowhere, for Oliver’s death and vanishing again for last episode.
I was just thinking this seemed like the kind of thing they could have gotten Keanu to do at least a short cameo for. It would have been fun to see him interact with Matt Ryan.
Guggenheim said they asked both Keanu, Keaton AND Nic Cage (for Superman), but that they asked for too much $.
Totally unsurprising, but just knowing that they asked makes me a little bit happier.
I’m surprised Cage said no, he’s such a big superhero fan and Superman seemed to be his dream role.
I mean, there’s 2 episodes left. maybe we’ll find out he said YES.
Especially being with his financial troubles I thought Cage has been in a say yes to anything mode for the last however many years or so.
As for the ‘no particularly good reason’ for Pariah in episode one this episode actually explains it: Anti-Monitor only has him pop in to witness tragedies. Hence being there, out of nowhere, for Oliver’s death and vanishing again for last episode.I mean, he did literally spend 100 pages in the comic just popping up out of nowhere, going, “I AM THE WITNESS, I CAN DO NAUGHT BUT OBSERVE, HOW LONG WILL I BE PUNISHED FOR MY SINS?!” and just then just popping out again when that earth is destroyed, so… there’s precident.
That is indeed his role, but Cavanagh just doesn’t sell it for me. He feels half too serious, half too cool for the character. He doesn’t sell the torment, he just comes across as someone who wanders into the room and not amused by anything going on.
Yes, there should be more loud weeping.
What’s funny about Lucifer’s razzing is that there is a Hellblazer comic that specifically states that Constantine is pronounced that way. I enjoyed that reset a great deal.
That was a pretty fantastic hour. My only complaint so far is how useless the monitor has been but in an unintentionally hilarious way. He fucked Oliver over from Elseworlds. I blame him for Olivers ill choreographed death in part 1 and getting hurt lamely by an arrow. He then creates a powerful being like Harbinger and fails to forsee her betrayel before it’s too late, and does lame death keel over. This guy better have some elaborate plan.
Without revealing too much, in the comics, Harbinger’s betrayal of the Monitor is an inevitability.
I appreciate the little meta gag when Lucifer pronounces Constantine’s name wrong and ticks him off. For those not in the know, the joke is that Lucifer is actually using the correct pronunciation from the comics, where Constantine has to correct people a lot. We Americans just keep making it Constant-een.
I appreciate that Black Lightning is from a world where superheroes (specifically Superman) are still fiction so meeting 2 of them gives him a tiny silver lining to the enormous cloud that is his whole world being annihilated.
After the clunky setup of part 1, 2 & 3 have just been everything I wanted. The interactions, the universes (KILLER BATMAN!), the cameos (LUCIFER!!!), the deep cuts (SPECTRE!!!), the surprising moments (FLASH 1990 TV SERIES), the great cliffhangers (EVERYTHING IS GONE! LEX WITH THE ULTIMATE SWERVE)Ugh, can I just get on the Waverider and go to January already?
Those last 10 minutes left me out of breath. I knew coming into Crisis it was going to be a bit of a mess but I dont care this is awesome as someone who has read the original crisis.
I can’t be the only one who caught it but when The Monitor was listing attributes he said “Strength of will” and then it panned to Diggle… that’s Green Lantern foreshadowing if I’ve ever seen it. And now Oliver is The Spectre he can help make that happen!
Wasn’t there a green flash in Diggle’s eyes as everyone was running to escape at the end of the episode as well?
Screen grab or it didn’t happen!
I thought this was the most balanced episode so far in terms of pacing – enough urgency that existence(!) is ending, but finding a few moments to play scenes between characters. Vanishing Point! Man I know there’s all these other cameos to get excited over, and the Lucifer one was fantastic, but the fact that the Arrowverse is going back to reference Legends season 1 (which often ends up on everyone’s skip list) made me smile. I almost find at this point there were too many characters to keep track of, especially with the way people arbitrarily portal in and out of the Waverider. I thought we’d left J’onn with the evacuation of Earth-38, and I forgot what Lois and Hoechlin-Supes were supposed to be up to. For better or worse the cliffhanger solves that in its own way, but it does speak to how messy things get when you have a sprawling cast and not everyone can appear in every instalment.Overall at the halfway point – CoIE is easily the most ambitious and sprawling crossover yet, and has the most fan service. I still think Crisis on Earth-X is the closest to feeling like a fully-formed feature film in terms of pacing and emotional weight.
CoEX will always be their best crossover, no doubt about it. However. To me, CoIE has done an outstanding job handling this larger than life event. I am simply in awe of what they’ve managed to accomplish and certainly, they had to cut corners somewhere. They needed to keep the sense of urgency present and while Part 2 did slow things down, it still maintained the momentum necessary to reach this point. Certainly, the pacing could be better and the sheer amount of characters can make it difficult to keep track, but I wasn’t expecting this to be flawless. Anything this huge, especially on network TV, is a monumental undertaking. I’m still incredibly pleased that this has been as great as it has. It’s clear that the people making this love these characters and the universe they’ve built. I am very glad that they did give us more emotional moments between characters here. Kara and Kate have been bloody awesome from the get go. Barry and Jefferson interacting honestly made me tear up. The Supermen and honestly every other character interaction have been true highlights. But indeed, it does get overstuffed and it does bring the thing down just a tad bit. This is still a fantastic crossover though and I love how they’ve decided to handle it.
Seeing the Vanishing Point made me a lot happier than I thought it would.
Agreed Crisis on Earth X remains the best crossover. I accept the flaws to a degree in this story since they’re adapting one of the most convoluted comic book stories ever. It was never going to be perfect given all the characters and cameos involved. I still would’ve had the episodes be an hour long. Actually wiping out most of the characters may give the last two episodes more focus now.
With the Vanishing Point reveal, and the fact that Reverse Flash has yet to show up (I really expected him to pop up this episode) I’m guessing they’re going to reveal RF was hiding out in the Vanishing Point cos he figured out that it would survive the antimatter wave too. We did see him hanging at the Point in Season 2 of Legends.
Having BARRY comfort Jefferson/Black Lightning instead of J’onn, a character who literally has gone through the exact same thing as he has (losing his entire world, wife and two daughters, plus bonus points for having lived in America as a black man) was such a missed opportunity but other than that this was a pretty solid part 3. Nobody will ever beat Rosembaum’s Lex but Jon Cryer’s Lex is growing on me.
Barry lost a daughter too, he can relate!
Did they do that with Supergirl/Superman and J’onn?
I haven’t watched much Supergirl, but does Martian Manhunter get shelved as often as he does in these cross-overs. Obviously his full appearance is a little more costly, but it would be nice to see him more involved as a character.
Loving Lyla as Harbinger.
I squealed like a little girl when Ellis appeared, even though I was pretty sure it was coming when I saw Lucy’s penthouse and the “Earth-666″ label.
I had no idea Lucifer was going to be a part of this so it was a delightfully fun surprise. That was great.
So if the Anti-Monitor could rig his antimatter ray to destroy all the universes at once if Flash ever got off the treadmill why didn’t he just do that in the first place?
If you could make your doomsday device powered by a wacky cosmic treadmill, wouldn’t you? If not then I don’t think you’re really a very good supervillain.
That’s like asking why the villain doesn’t just shoot the hero instead of monologuing about his big evil plan first.
Best explanation: it exploding would create a blast big enough to wipe out all REMAINING universes, but only because, by that point, there were only a handful of universes left. If the Anti-Monitor had detonated it right off the bat, he might have destroyed a dozen or so universes, but that’d still leave him Infinity -12 to go.
Can anyone explain who this Spectre guy is? I haven’t watched Arrow in a spell.
He’s not from Arrow, Constantine had some teasers to him, but was cancelled before that could pan out.In the comics, The Spectre is the Spirit God of Vengeance who inhabits a host in order to interact with our plane. When allowed to be at his full potential, he is one of the most powerful beings in the DC Universe, several magnitudes beyond The Monitor.
I’ve watched every dang episode of Arrow including this season and have no frakking idea who the heck Spectre is.
So…. how much do we have to crowd fund to get a crossover with Kara, Kate, Alex and Sara stuck on Earth 666 with Lucifer for an episode? For that matter Kara *could* do with a decent therapist used to the, umm, unusual right about now…Lex… oh you magnificent bastard! Loved that he took the time to write his name in block caps, clearly not taking any chances on the book of destiny having trouble with his handwriting 😉 And that death glare from Kara was… *shudder*… really hope that at some point they figure a way to let Melissa play Red Lantern Kara for a little while, even if only an episode. Talking of which boy and Kate and Kara a fantastic pillar to build the next pha…. wav… umm, chapter (Marvel ain’t used that yet have they?) of the CWVerse on. Love that they talked it through rather than punching, Kate having so much faith in Kara after so short a time is testament to both characters and Melissa and Ruby just light up the screen. More please, preferably with Supergirl visiting Gotham. Plus it’ll continue to tweak the nose of that small but annoyingly vocal section of fandom that seem to have issues with either character doing something that their male counterparts would get praised for while hollering that the men are being disrespected to make the women look good. Odd that, sure there’s a reason but can’t quite put my finger on it…Can we take a moment to gawk at the CW managing to give us a team of Supergirl, Batwoman, Martian Manhunter, Lex Luthor, Flash, a proto-Atom and White Canary standing together after the destruction of the entire multiverse (and, presumably, the CW’s bank balance) while the movies, uh let’s be polite and say couldn’t make Superman and Batman work properly? Oh and introducing the freakin’ Spectre at the same time, let’s not forget that!And finally, as odd as this will sound, I think it was the right call to have a month gap over the holidays before the second chunk drops. Five hours, no matter how good, delivered over a week might have lost some impact by the end. This way we get to recharge a bit and come at the remaining episodes fresh. Though a part of me hopes it starts with “One. Month. Later” and we find Kara’s spent the entire month using Lex as a basketball.
“I’ve also never seen Black Lightning”Well you should. Best of the superhero shows on TV.
So far we haven’t seen a seen a Wonder Woman. The Legends have shown us Themyscira. Perhaps we’ll see her in the final episode of Crisis.
Linda Carter?
LYNDA, I mean.
Cathy Lee Crosby.
I am SO here for that. When they showed “Earth-75″ I momentarily got my hopes up, because that seemed like the DC property most likely to have started in 1975. (It was actually 1974.)
I do not think they are allowed to do Wonder Woman since the movie is coming out next year and it is Gal Gadot’s part. They only allowed the superman appearances and the new Tv show coming out next year once the movie version was no more.
“I have no idea how we’re covering the conclusion of “Crisis” here at TV Club, but we’ve got a month to figure it out.”I know there is no longer a staffer assigned to Arrow, but there damned sure BETTER still be somebody on Legends! It is the best Arrowverse show/best show on TV and the AV Club coverage has always been as fun and entertaining a joy to read as the show is to watch! As for the Arrow episode, maybe all the Arrowverse recappers could tag team it, in the way there were group columns weighing in on Legion for a time?
I would imagine the question is if they should do two separate reviews for the last two episodes of the crossover or,since they air the same night, just do one review, which is probably more practical
How many times must Barry watch a man who looks just like his father die, anyway? Poor John Wesley Shipp, here’s hoping he gets a long, natural life as Jay Garrick, at least, once this whole “every universe is dead” thing gets sorted out. A bit of a shame there was no Wally to mourn this Barry…unless you count, well, Grant Gustin’s Barry. Perhaps tge Arrowverse has never quite known what to do with Wally because tge way they made Barry likable and relatable in the first place was basically by giving him a lot more of Wally’s personality than Barry’s. Hell, they even had him briefly date Linda Park! Honestly, Wally has ALWAYS been my Flash, and one of the reasons TV Barry works for me is that he seems to channel more of Wally than Barry.
I remain a bit sad that we didn’t get the disintegrate into a skeleton and then fade away into an empty suit, however…but that’s the purist in me…the death was well-handled on its own merits.
On paper the idea of Pariah is a lot of melodrama which could easily become annoying, but Perez and Wolfman managed to add genuine pathos to the character. I haven’t watched a lot of this but seeing Tom Kavanaugh in that role is…strange. How does it come across onscreen?
Well his not crying all the time. Its just…alright. I think some things in the crossover could have been moved to regular flash/arrow eps. He could of came Pariah earlier in the series.
I am truly hoping we haven’t seen the last of Routh’s Superman. Earth-2 Superman played such a huge role in the original Crisis, as befit the hero that started it all in Action #1. Since Routh’s Supes is canonically also Christopher Reeve’s Supes, there’s also a beautiful sense that in some ways, Donner’s first Superman was the Action #1 for the modern era of live action superheroes (with apologies and all due respect to Wonder Woman ‘77, the Shazam/Isis Hour, Batman ‘66, Adventures of Superman, and the old serials, of course). I still want to see our grey-templed Supes wailing on the Anti-Monitor a bit.With all of that said, props to Luthor for being every bit as conniving and opportunistic as his comics counterpart was during the Crisis. I’m not holding my breath for fan service on this level, but to get him back in the Battle Suit long enough for a live action homage to the classic cover of Crisis #9 would make me jump for joy!
And it doesn’t seem like they’re gonna go in this direction, but it’d be fairly extraordinary to have Cryer take a crack at playing Alexander Luthor Jr…
I must say, I’ve been enjoying Pariah well enough, and Harbinger has been GREAT. I can do without the added complication of Krona. But I have to say it…I am missing the Psycho Pirate so far!
Iv been wondering if they would do Krona/seeing the hand of time stuff. I doubt it at this point but we do have 2 hours left and they have shown they will twist stuff around (like lex fucking luthor holy shit that was crazy).
I’m ok with no Psycho Pirate – he’s annoying on the pg, he’d be even worse in live-action.
The entire team may have had a little more time attempt to stop the Crisis if Barry and Iris weren’t stopping every 15 minutes to stare into each other’s eyes while embracing.
In the tunnels under STAR Labs, Cisco and Frost encounter Pariah,
formerly Nash Wells, whose transformation was weirdly tipped in “Part
One” for no particularly good reason.Well, he spends a solid hundred pages in the comic popping up, going “UGH, I AM FORCED TO WITNESS! THERE IS NOTHING MORE I CAN DO! HOW LONG MUST I SUFFER FOR MY SINS?!” and then just disappearing when that world’s destroyed… so there’s precident.
I loved everything about this episode. It may be my all-time favourite episode since the first Kara/Barry crossover. I was in tears for half the damn episode (and I don’t even have my period as an excuse!). Jefferson repeating his mantra while channeling the energy… a mantra he taught to so many students to help keep them off the mean streets of Freeland… students who no longer exist… fucking got me. Barry and Iris’ flashback scene, where he said he promised he’d always run home to her when he proposed, made me flash back to Grant Gustin’s amazingly heartfelt performance of the “Keep Running Home to You” song and fucking got me (just like his performance fucking got me the first time).
And aside from all the crying, there was clapping and squealing as we got to the Earth-666 Los Angeles title card overlaying the Lux building. I avoided ALL casting notices and news for Crisis (only got spoiled on Black Lightning’s appearance) specifically for these kinds of moments. I fucking love Lucifer. It’s a show much like The 100. It’s a bit of a slog for the first part of the first season when they were still figuring out tone and format (which, for the 100 was “do we want to be a cookie-cutter CW teen angst show that plays Radioactive twice an episode?” and for Lucifer was, “are we going to be a police procedural that happens to have the Devil in it?” Luckily, both shows said hell no.), but get past that and you are in for some serious awesome and serious fun. And Tom Ellis is just as much of a revelation in the role of Lucifer as Matt Ryan is as Constantine.
This entire crossover has been a goddamn delight. So much so that I wish we’d just completely dispensed with other storylines on all the crossing over shows and just had one MEGA four-hour-per-week Crisis on Infinite Earths season/half-season.
I’ve tried to avoid casting notices for this and still so much got spoiled.
I do agree that each episodes should’ve been 1 hour long. This would’ve given each part just a bit more breathing space and an easier pace to keep up with the storytelling.
How have you kept up with other Arrowverse shows but not yet watched Black Lightning? It’s excellent.The whole Cisco-dropping-Vibe thing was strained at best in the series. He’s a superhero and it was always going to stay that way.The scene from the 1990s Flash was excellent, but not entirely surprising. Am I the only one that noticed that the backgrounds in the close-up flying scenes during the SuperFight in Part 2 were from older movies (I’m not sure which one, but as was pointed out the music was from the original Superman)? I really love that they’re using not just characters and actors from old shows/movies but also actual footage.
CW/DC, you can have this one for free so long as you do it:Remember the Batman/Superman animated episode where Superman pretends he’s Batman for a while? Do that same thing with Kara pretending she’s Batwoman for a bit to help Kate out.
I won’t lie, I was hoping that’s where they were going in the Batwoman episode with Alfred’s daughter.
Isn’t that what they did in that episode? Alfred’s daughter puts the Batwoman suit on and shows up at the same place as Kate and her ex (whose name escapes me) because the ex thought Kate was Batwoman and Kate wanted to “prove” her wrong.
Okay that’s brilliant.
Back in the silver age when Superman and Batman were friends they used to cover for each other every once in a while so there’s ample precedent.
They are knocking this entire thing out of the park. They aren’t just knocking it out of the park, they’re knocking it out of their park, into another park, then out of that park.Simply put, this is what good old fashioned Superhero Crossovers used to be. I love it. i love every second of this. Every cheesy second. Every “let’s wrap up that obscure character from a cancelled 2003 show just because we can.”My only real concern is next year’s crossover when they inevitably can’t top it. (or claim they can’t. Hypertime? New Years Evil?)Regardless, inject all of this content directly into my veins.
I’m hoping next year’s crossover is just everyone getting together for a party and getting rip-roaring drunk.
Yeah, they really can’t do bigger than this.Maybe they could find different outlets – do mini-crossovers with different shows, and smaller-stakes stories.If they go really big again, I would want it to be when/if Arrowverse was coming to some kind of a definitive end, and bring back everyone they possibly can from shows that will have since ended.
Next season I would like to see smaller crossovers that build on the relationships developed in Crisis: Supergirl/Batwoman, Flash/BL, Sara/Mia .
I’m also hoping for more Iris and Lois.
Yes! That would be great too.
Constantine and Lucifer 100% fucked at some point, right?
Hundo P.
The “Consta-Tyne/Teen” back and forth had the bitchy air of two Exes.
Buried lede: at last, someone on this show can pronounce ‘Constantine’.
This is a comment I expect from you Lupin.
Well played. “What would your family think Jefferson?”Me: “Lynn would be screaming that it’s his fault?”
Yeah, I *really* want Jefferson to find out she got herself addicted to green light and throw her self righteousness back in her face.
Same along with the girls and Gambi.
90’s Flash was my first non-animated comic book show. My bother and I would watch it and talk about a day when all of our favorite comic book heroes would be on our TV screens each week. That is one of the reasons I find the Arrowverse so fun-these are the kind of shows I dreamed of having as a kid, and Flash started it all.So, that scene with 90’s Flash was amazing for me. I am so glad they a paying tribute to the shows that paved the way for the Arrowverse.The review put it so well-the crossover is an overstuffed mess. And most of the plot makes zero sense. Like, if the Anti-Monitor could build a fail safe to destroy all the planets, why not just do that in the first place? But…..I don’t care? Because just like all the crossovers-yes, even the Vandal Savage one-I am having a blast watching it.
Love the idea of Oliver becoming the Spectre, but couldn’t they have cast a redhead to play Corrigan? Also, in a perfect world this all ends with the seven paragons forming the Justice League.
Best episode of the crossover so far. Loved how it was so focused on character over FX. That Barry/Jefferson scene was great, and I thought Ollie’s goodbye in this scene was better than the one in the first episode.
if Ollie is “dead” aka Spectre, then Diggle can become the Paragon of Will —> Green Latern?
Is this the record for the number of shows from different networks to crossover?Abc: Batman 66Cbs flash 90 and supergirlNbc ConstantineDc streaming: titansFox/Netflix LuciferWb/cw: everone else.
I personally don’t consider Constantine a crossover, just the same actor playing an extremely close version of the same character, but that’s neither here nor there.
Man, vanishing Brandon Routh Superman was so disappointing. He was the highlight of this crossover and his absence deflates the finale for me. I guess I just have to remember that the focus is always going to return to the main CW characters.
Don’t know about you, but I’m not a fan of Cryer’s Lex Luthor, which added another layer of disappointment to the reveal.
I think he’s a pretty good Luthor, although that might be because, after years of seeing Jon Cryer get dumped on constantly on “Two and a Half Men,” it’s gratifying to see him enact some revenge. However, his appearance at the ending of this episode didn’t work for me as a compelling cliffhanger. It just really annoyed me that it removed Superman from the story.
All the Supermen are off the board. In the CW Universe it’s Kara’s House…
Yeah, I was definitely reminded of that priority last night, for sure. Kara’s great, but I wish the writers would have kept them both in the final battle.
I’m quite certain they’ll at least bring Hoechlin’s Clark back for the final battle. I wouldn’t be surprised if they actually did that scene with the three Supermen (Welling, Routh and Hoechlin) in the very final battle. At least one Superman will return, no doubts about it.And of course it’s Kara’s house. She’s had a show for more than four years now. It’s about time she’s actually given a more pivotal role in the crossovers, rather than have Superman (not to mention Oliver and Barry) overshadow her once again as they’ve done literally everywhere else.I get the disappointment, certainly. But I never imagined they would sideline the main leading heroes in favor or cameo appearances. And I’m glad they haven’t done so.
I don’t watch Supergirl much, but Jon Cryer’s Lex is a fantastic bastard. I wanted to see Routh Superman more in the final two, but that was such a glorious Lex move where he apparently takes a sharpie to this magic book and writes his name. Incredible.Also need a gif of Black Lightning and Dig’s Black man head nod.
Especially if we still get more RouthMan I loved that Lex move.
I’ll only really love that move if we get more RouthMan. For now I just admire it with cautious reserve!
Only one mention of Oracle in the comments here. They didn’t even give Oracle an RIP in the post-show show.
Shoot Dina Meyer is even uncredited.
The ending to me seems most reminiscent of Jonathan Hickman and Esad Ribić’s Secret Wars from from Marvel Comics (2015-2016). All alternate Earths are destroyed and in the last moments a group of 8 heroes (Reed Richards, T’Challa, Peter Quill, Scott Summers, Carol Danvers, Jane Foster, Peter Parker, Miles Morales) are whisked away as a new universe is created by Victor Von Doom.
Hmmm…the Anti-Monitor did say he was creating his own universe, didn’t he?
I’d been burned out on the Arrowverse a few seasons back (for all of them.) But catching clips of this crossover makes me want to dive back in. Seeing Lucifer and John Constantine share a scene? Damn. Guess I have some holiday watching to do.
Did they really have to acknowledge Birds of Prey? I personally ignore that show’s existence. I will admit the cast was pretty hot though.
I’m going to guess at a twist. So Routh-Superman was identified as the Paragon of Truth because he has seen almost unimaginable loss … but you know who’s seen even more? Pariah. And Pariah is right there at Vanishing Point for the big battle, so it seems to hold up to the prophecy about the big battle. It also means that Lex swapping himself out for Routherman doesn’t fundamentally change anything.We already know that the Monitor is kind of unreliable when it comes to Paragon identification; for example he couldn’t identify the Paragon of Courage standing right in front of him (Batwo-Man) until after she’d gone to the future. OR, maybe the Monitor was deliberately trying to fake everyone out with Pariah.
The more I think about it, the more Tom Cavanagh’s Pariah just doesn’t work for me. I don’t know if its the lines, or his delivery, or just the seemingly half-assed effort of adapting the character and his role so far, it just feels silly. And not ‘good’ silly like so many other things are. It just feels weird every time Pariah rush-hushed his lines.
Seeing Lucifer show up in this cross over had me wondering were the Winchester boys going pass through too?(can I come out the grey ….it’s dusty in here)
Mike Carey/Peter Gross/company’s Lucifer run is so completely definitive that I can’t bring myself to touch any other iteration, but that was a fun scene. And oh man, did I start cackling with glee the moment I realized where they’re going with Ollie, that’s absolutely perfect.What a beautiful sendoff for Shipp’s Flash. His show was some of my earliest extended DC exposure, and to let him have this heroic exit after so many years is just wonderful. Let’s hope Barry remembers that trick the next time an evil speedster comes calling.The Lex twist at the end was great, and, sorry Supes, he’ll be more
useful when it comes to figuring a way out of this mess. I wonder how
many times he’s read Count of Monte Cristo there.Kate/Kara continues to provide excellent chemistry and I hope they get some smaller crossovers in the future.Ryan naming his daughter Simone is one of the all-time great Arrowverse creator nods.Ralph was exactly the right person to squeeze in the All-Star Squadron line.
He had some good lines, but let’s give Jeff more to do than be a big power sponge, yeah?WHAT DID THE MONITOR UTTER WHEN HE WAS REMINISCING ABOUT HIS FAMILY?! Seriously, even the closed captions left the word at [indistinct].
I turned on CC just to figure out what The Monitor said.
Thank you for mentioning the mention of the All-Star Squadron. I loved that comic and was thrilled with that.
I don’t watch much of Supergirl but I really like Cryer’s version of Lex as just a smug asshole. I told Miss. Mal-Content that he’s kinda doing a “what if Tony Stark was also a bad guy” riff where he’s so self-satisfied to piss everyone off and outsmart them. It’s its own thing, not doing a Hackman impression or Rosenbaum. If anything, this is how he should have been in the BvS movie but turned out just being a weird douchebag.
I also enjoyed Routh’s Superman standing LIKE SUPERMAN in most of his scenes. Elbows out, hands on the hips, rail-straight back. I dunno if he was directed to be that way or that was choice Routh made, but it just felt…right? Like, out of every Superman, Routh’s feels like the one who would be the most…”Superman”-ish.
Even before they brought him back as Supes for this the Arrowverse has totally proved that Routh deserved a better movie.
Granted, I never read this comic series, so I don’t know if it was more effective in that form, but—COME ON!!!! A cosmic TREADMILL? THAT’S what’s been causing all of the destruction and death? A fucking TREADMILL????
Because Speed Force
Exactly!
The Flash had a cosmic treadmill in the comics at one point that he used for time travel. But the energy required to produce that much antimatter would be staggering.
Only something that truly evil could cause so much pain.
Barry marries his sister, becomes Paragon of Love.
Don’t make it weird. Oh wait too late.
A few random thoughts from a Supergirl fan: 1. Kara’s comment about megalomaniacs sounds a lot like Lena. Why doesn’t she see it? 2. The antimatter is coming from underground? It’s being made?! It would take a whole lot of antimatter to destroy multiple universes. “Just” to create enough antimatter in a day to destroy one Earth would take 6.25X10^36 Watts! Even with a gizmo powered by the Flash that much would be impossible to produce 3. And no, Black Lightning wouldn’t be able to contain that much energy 4. And the antimatter that had already been produced wouldn’t just disappear. Even by comic book TV standards this was really badly written.
Pretty fitting that the Flash ep of Crisis was also the most talky episode so far.Also the general cluelessness of everyone until the very last minute that, “Wait a minute, Pariah only shows up when something awful is about to happen!” was very on brand.
That was unbelievably good. It’s literally insane how much they’re cramming into these CRISIS episodes. With that in mind:GOT ME IN THE FEELS: Dig expressing his sorrow at not being there for Oliver / Jefferson and Barry’s heart-to-heart / Flash-90’s flashback.BEST CAMEO: Lucifer, capturing the charming arrogance and one-liners of his own show: “It’s Constan-teen.” / “I don’t care.”WEAKEST SUB-PLOT: The Spectre reveal. I mean, it’s an awesome reveal, but literally having a dude step into shot and deliver exposition (at least give us a shot of the costume!) was weeeeeaaakkkk. MASSIVE BASTARD AWARD: goes to Lex Luthor. Swapping places with Superman was grade-A bastardry and I loved it!Over in BLACK LIGHTNING, we had Jen comment that all universes are being folded into one (or simply destroyed), so that does make it seem like we may actually get Earth-1 back, with everyone on that. If everything is literally returned to normal (ie. the multiverse pops back into existence) that’d be bollocks and, I think, lose a huge chunk of goodwill from viewers. CRISIS is a big deal; there should be some big emotional/narrative consequence after it’s resolved. I think maybe we’ll get a handful of Earths back, actually, as a kind of ‘middle-ground’.
Eh, I’m not so hung up on the consequences and I think others are making to much of it given that this is just a cross over of CW series (and cameos from a bunch of other past series). We’re already losing Olive Queen and probably someone else. It also sounds like Legends is going to colored by the fallout from Crisis. I would imagine Flash to. I’d have no complaints if the entire multiverse is restored outside of that.
I gather this came as at least some surprise, as Lucifer actor Tom Ellis earlier squashed the rumor that he would appear. But isn’t that what Lucifer would do? On the show, Lucifer is always truthful, but I’m glad Tom Ellis isn’t because I hadn’t heard about his cameo and was very happily surprised to see the Earth-666 card and Lux.
Luthor, you fiend! You magnificent fiend! You’ve finally done it! You’ve cheated your way into the spotlight! Jolly good show! XD
As soon as they brought Shipp back as Flash 90 last year for what seamed like a throwaway cameo the switch was kind of phoned ahead. If you wanted it spelled out more then you would have zero dramatic tension building into this thing.
This is an ambitious crossover of thirteen TV shows so far (Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman, Black Lightning, The Flash ’90, Batman ’66, Birds of Prey, Constantine, Titans, Smallville, Lucifer) with too much going on to really evaluate before it finishes. What I can tell you is that The Monitor is very dumb! He spent so much time tormenting his champions instead of adequately preparing them.
So was this whole half season of The Flash
foreshadowing a fake-out or is his death to come? (The after show
implies this is the loophole cop out they’re going with even though
Reverse-Flash promised he’d be there.)
Lex usurping Superman’s place is such a magnificent bastard surprise!
Called it two months ago!!!
I’m not at all convinced that our Barry Allen won’t still die during this Crisis. Maybe it’s just optimism (because letting him live would undo so much of the what’s been built up for years), but a lot can happen in these final episodes.Overall, I’m still pleased by how Crisis has unfolded. It’s departed a lot from the source material so far, but the groundwork has been laid for what made the original Crisis great; introducing Olive as Spectre has a lot of potential, and I see the foundation for the battle at the beginning of time. Hopefully they stick the landing in the new year.
Iris and Earth-38’s Superman trading resolute looks before vanishing into nothing was so incredibly pure.
I have no idea how we’re covering the conclusion of “Crisis” here at TV Club, but we’ve got a month to figure it out.I’d suggest a multi-writer teamup to match the multi-show nature of this crossover.Granted I doubt your alien overlords would spring for actually paying multiple writers like that, but!
If the first three are “Avengers: Infinity War” – -The last two is “Avengers: Endgame”. And in the “Crisis on Infinite Earths” comic, Time travel to the past is a key plot element and an ordinary heroic guy gaining cosmic level power to save the universe against an evil cosmic powered alien is the climax.A real chicken or the egg scenario here between DC and Marvel.
I tend to wax poetic about each episode so I’ll be brief this time:Jefferson and Barry? Amazing team up and convo.That jump to the original Flash show? Tears.A return to the Vanishing Point, which we haven’t seen since early Legends Season 2??? YOU ABSOLUTE GENIUS MADMEN. (Also, where is Rip??!!)
Imagine how confused everyone who doesn’t watch Legends will be once they see how “why the fuck not??” that show has become. (Yes, I know it will probably just be the finale instead of a true Legends episode, but imagine the Crisis finale with the tone of Legends’ newest trailer. Absolutely joyous madness.)
“I worried that this installment would be a letdown following the Superman-go-round and Bruce Wayne beyond his darkest night from “Part Two,”Part 2 was a real let down for me, the whole episode felt unnecessarily drawn out, spinning their wheels going nowhere kind of episode, and these two bits were some of the lazier pieces (putting aside the nonsense ghost demon fight of the 1st part). Lex’s crazy unstoppable one step ahead of everyone evil plot is subverted by…someone sneaking up behind him. And the fun of getting to see Kevin Conroy play Bruce Wayne is quickly undercut by him Bruce being killed by basically tripping into a randomly placed high voltage box in his batcave. Eh.Part 3 felt like the 1st episode that felt like it was firing on all cylinders though (and the end almost makes the Lex silliness of Part 2 go away, like we can pretend he needed to get caught again for this part of the plan to work or something…even if it ruins what may be my favorite part of the crossover so far, Routh getting to play Supes)
This was better than part 2, mainly because they focused a lot more on the story, rather than fan service. This felt more consequential and had some big dramatic moments along with better character moments.Kara & Kate prove to be a good partnership. I’m really glad they didn’t fight which makes their relationship a lot more stronger as a result.I’m not convinced on this whole quest for Oliver’s soul / Spectre arc. I’m sure it will pay off later but at this point it just doesn’t feel important. Oliver’s ‘death’ from part 1 really feels like a wasted moment.I did like the 90s Flash death / flashback scene, but it would’ve carried more weight if this version had more time in the story. Black Lighting’s introduction was good but was it needed? Again he needed more screen time though i did like his scene with Barry.The Lex reveal at the end still has me confused. When exactly did he switch with Kingdom Come Superman? Shouldn’t Pariah have been able to detect him? Just didn’t make much sense at the time but again may do so later on.Overall really liking this crossover. I think we need to appreciate the difficulty of adapting such a convoluted comic book story, especially on a tv budget. I think they’re doing a good job of it overall.
Enjoying this for the cameos and interactions between heroes who haven’t met before, but tbh the story is pretty much a mess. And i have no idea how it would come across to someone not steeped in DC lore.I may be biased as i didn’t like the original crisis come back in the day and liked it even less when i tried rereading it a decade ago. The George Perez art is the saving grace imo.
I thought they might be heading towards merging into one earth but as soon as Jefferson’s family died i knew that was out of the question, and then of course the ending confirmed that a lot of the antimonitor’s destruction will be undone.
Regarding the “Birds of Prey” cameo: That was obviously Ashley Scott as Huntress, but has anyone determined if the voice on the other end was actually Dina Meyer? It sure sounded like her. Archival recordings, maybe?
It was indeed Dina Meyer. They probably just did it by phone.
Ah, I hadn’t even thought of that! I bet you’re right.
Scott was also wearing the original necklace & Belt as she still had the costume props from the 2002-2003 series.
I was totally surprised by that Lucifer cameo and I legit had to pause the TV because I was so excited. For all the SPN fans out there, when I saw Osric Chau’s picture I immediately yelled out, KEVIN TRAN!? haha with all the cameos I thought for a split second that would be something plausible. After the ep I thought the only thing that would have made this crossover even more overstuffed and insane would be a Sam and Dean cameo. Scott, you totally nailed this review/recap. I agree with you about Barry’s non-death feeling a bit cheap. It doesn’t surprise me that much because Barry is such a dingus sometimes. How did no one freaking think that it didn’t have to be Earth 1 Barry. I mean, I didn’t…but still. Something I have come to realize about the arrowverse is that things that should not work under any circumstance somehow work perfectly. I did think there were one too many meta lines about the crossover ha one seems like enough. All this ridiculousness makes me miss LOT so much! Can’t wait for January.
The Purgatory scene was clumsy. Having a totally new character jump in just to break up that reunion was gilding the lily, and pushing the crossover leeway on traditional writing rules to the limit. At best, it was flinging a Chekov’s gun at the audience at 11:58 on the doomsday clock, and that’s still not great.It could’ve been done far, far better – subverted expectations in a way that made more sense and wasn’t so amateurish.
Meanwhile, Wrex and Shepard – wait, shit, I mean Doctor and Doctor – no, hang on, still not right, I mean Hope and Faith – shit, no, though that was close… Kate and Kara! Riiiiiiight. Kate and Kara.Yeah. Kate and Kara got to deliver one of those most cringeworthy exchanges of all time. I expected one of them to start pulling out note cards of all the various HOPE and COURAGE lines they’d written in hot anticipation of their third eye-fuck date. That shit was brutal, man. I was embarrassed for both the characters and the actors.Then we have the wonderful anti-climax of Barry not dying, which once again seems like it’s a time anomaly that nobody cares about, because, uh, there was still that article that was clearly about Barry Allen, not just any Flash (but hey, it already changed once and nobody cared.)And then suddenly Pariah, who we’ve been told constantly has been *doomed* by the Anti-Monitor to do nothing but witness tragedy, has magic powers of his own. Suddenly. Oh wow.I do not care if that’s from the source material or not. That is fucking stupid.
That infinity war ripoff tho lol
Infinity War ripped it off from the original Crisis comic tho lol
Really? Had no idea haha
And I’m sure the original Crisis comic ripped it off from something else. These are pretty standard ideas in sci-fi fiction so it’s hard to say “A stole it from B” when B actually stole it from C, who stole it from … etc.
Agreed. It’s the whole Thanos vs Darkseid debate
“I have no idea how we’re covering the conclusion of “Crisis” here at TV Club, but we’ve got a month to figure it out.”A crossover review is literally the only option
Also, the black man nod that Dig and Black Lightning gave each other was slightly corny, but hella relatable as a fellow black man
What an event