The most ridiculously CW moments from the old CW
The A.V. Club toasts the end of an era at the network with this definitive list of the most outrageous, soapy, and quintessentially CW scenes
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The CW as we know it is coming to an end. The network may continue after its acquisition by Nexstar, but it won’t look like the one we know and love. The CW’s new parent company has indicated it plans to target an older demographic and signaled as much by canceling many of the network’s existing shows and announcing that carryover of shows from the previous regime would be minimal. Nexstar also may not extend its partnership with Paramount and Warner Bros., which could render the “C” (for CBS) and “W” (for Warners) obsolete.
And so we prepare to say a slow goodbye to the soapy teen dramas, the DC superhero series, and the fun genre fare that has defined the network since its inception in 2006. The CW aired some of the most hilarious, outrageous, “did they really just do that?” moments in broadcast television history; and to celebrate the end of an era, here are a few of The A.V. Club’s favorites from the last 16 years. Say it with us: The CW is dead. Long live the CW.
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This could easily just be a list of things from Legends of Tomorrow, a show that somehow became “we’ll solve this with the power of love and a song”.Which is not a criticism, that show was fucking magical and I miss it.
I vote for the Smallville episode where Pete gets stretchy powers from chewing kryptonite infused gum
Isn’t that from the WB days though?
Aired in 2008. WB became CW in 2006.CW debuted 2 weeks before Smallville season 6 started. So seasons 6-10 are fair game. Pete gum episode was in season 7.
It’s also from the comics (kinda. In the Silver Age, Jimmy Olson would get the stretchy powers and Pete’s early season role was to play the Jimmy part.)
The high point of the series & the beginning of the run of the team’s best lineup, with original Zari
So true, she stole a show and when she started off I didn’t think she had a chance of being that great of a character. Her and Nate’s storyline was great.
First Zari is best Zari!!
I didn’t even remember Grodd trying to kill Obama from Legends. Maybe I need to rewatch it but I feel like the most “did they really do that” scene from the show is the Legends summoning a giant Beebo to fight the demon-esque Mallus in S3. It was a perfect way to end the season that I doubt anyone remotely saw coming.
The Obama thing was before the show became based.
What do you mean? Looking it up, it looks like it happened in the S3 episode “Guest Starring John Noble”. Which means it wasn’t even the most memorable thing from the episode it was in as I definitely remember John Noble guest-starring as himself working as Denethor on LotR in that episode.The Beebo episode I mentioned happened a few episodes after this one…
As in not having Sarah Lance weirdly say ‘I miss you’ to the type of conservative politician they eventually would go on to distance themselves from.
The conservative pol would spit in Sara’s face for being in a same sex relationship.
Some would also talk behind her back, calling her derogatory slurs. Obama would be that type. Conservativism isn’t a football team. It’s a layered thing. Obama and Trump are closer than Americans like to admit.
When Kara got some “ Ice cream!”A bit of Supergirl sunshine that I would remember in the dark days ahead.
Before the rampant classism of season 4… Those were the days.
Wasn’t that on the CBS season?
Nothing from Smallville smh
Smallville is really a WB show, not CW. It would have made this list during the last transition of the network.
Smallville had 10 seasons and about halfway through is when WB became CW. So they had 4-5 seasons on the CW, so it is definitely fair game.For instance: the episode where Pete Ross gets stretchy powers due to kryptonite infused gum aired on CW, not the WB. And the cringe Justice Society two parter was on the CW.
Def, Supernatural launched on WB as well, and stayed through CW.
I love Supernatural, but it has some cringe moments too. Like Lucifer vs Dean as Michael, the special effects were so cringe.And the series finale…didn’t even have Castiel show up. To be fair, I blame covid for this. Without that, they could have had all their dead friends and relatives show up in heaven.Let’s not forget old Sam’s wig. Or the fact that Dean is so co-dependent on Sam that when he gets to heaven he just drives his car and time has to be manipulated so 40 years pass and Sam is dead by the time Dean is done with his drive. Either that or Dean just drove his car in heaven for 40 years without stopping.
Yeah, sadly it means that the music rights weren’t in effect for that first season, so if you’re gonna start SPN, don’t watch the first season on Netflix – it’s all generic music. Since Classic music was like a 4th character for the show (Sam, Dean, Baby, Classic Rock being all 4), it really guts it and I imagine makes it that much harder for people to get into.
In fairness the most bonkers stuff from that show happened off screen, so anything Clark and Lex and Lana and the gang could have come up with pales in comparison.
They killed Jimmy Olsen and then had a younger brother named Jimmy Olsen show up at his funeral, and then in a flash forward that Jimmy Olsen was played by the same actor.
The most bonkers episode of Smallville for my taste came in season one where they put Amy Adams in a fat suit and made the claim that a car accident+kryptonite = cannibal. I guess it doesn’t count for the argument though since this was firmly in the WB days.
That was a good one
Didn’t Beerfest do a gag where a character dies, then a previously unmentioned identical twin shows up and asks to be referred to by the same name so it’s like nothing happened? I never saw the film, but I could have sworn some AVC writer included it in a list of best comedy gags or something like that.
They did, and it is very funny.
They sure did! It was, obviously, done specifically to make fun of some tropes. It was fantastic, and part of the reason I think Beerfest is the best Broken Lizard film (I have a personal grudge against Super Troopers, as a native Vermonter. Nothing in it is even remotely like Vermont other than the syrup and proximity to Canada.)
Like the one where Chloe became a cult leader?
Isn’t the answer to “What other network would have run something this tone deaf ALWAYS Bravo?”
I loved The 100 all the way through the end, and I feel confident that it had the highest body count of all the CW shows. People accused TWD of being misery porn, but I think The 100 gave it a run for its money. There were times where I wondered why they were so hell-bent on surviving because their lives really sucked!
It’s been a blast, CW. Oso gonplei nou ste odon.
I loved The 100, but the final season was not good. One time Clarke was being interrogated by new arrivals on earth who had been in suspended animation & they demanded she tell them about the apocalypse & she asked “which one,” and was serious. I did love how the two best characters, Clarke and Raven, never entirely trusted or liked each other, going back to s1 when from each of their perspective the other slept with their boyfriend
Yeah, I loved me lots and lots of The 100. I told people to watch it repeatedly, called it stealthily one of the most pro-feminist shows on TV…… and then it How I Met Your Mother/Game of Thrones’d the ending/final season. That was… not a great ending, least of all because of how they treated Bellamy (possibly due to BTS shenanigans with the show creator/runner).
Season 2 of The 100 is truly some great television. not just “great for the CW.” The rest of the series definitely has more misses than hits, but is still a fun watch.
I don’t think it’s an accident that so many shows (especially genre shows) hit their all-time peaks in seasons 2-3. It’s when the cast and writers find a groove and the show explores its possibilities before things go completely off the rail. The 100 is a perfect example of that, as are the Vampire Diaries and Reign.
People were so quick to write it off as another “pretty people survive improbable odds” and then BAM a spear from the woods.The show literally kills off all of humanity.
We were among that group at first, but we watched anyway because we like “pretty people survive impossible odds” shows generally. Then in episode 3, an actual child commits hardcore murder! At that point, we were hooked – the show revealed its true nature as a show with zero fucks to give about life & death, and that bought our loyalty to the end.
the 100 finale also killed the prequel and potential sequels. the show that killed everything
“The most ridiculously CW moments from the old CW”Does that translate roughly as “The WB”?
That’s what I thought at first. But I think they mean anything that happened after WB became CW.
You’re forgetting UPN!
The ENTIRE two part episode from Smallville with the justice society.The part where the villain, who can control ice, sheds an icy tear and they zoom in on it is especially bad.
Smallville is the only Superman narrative (and character) I can stand. I always found it interesting that Clark is presented as being not only deceitful but also quite naive when it comes to the abuses of law enforcement. The regular Superman is just too ‘perfect’ for my taste.
The funny thing is that on Smallville Clark is partially responsible for Lex turning evil. He was constantly gaslighting Lex about his secret. This pushed Lex over the edge, made him begin to start spying…and it went out of control. It began his entire obsession with meteor freaks.“What you think I’m superhuman because you hit me with your car while going 60 mph and I don’t have a scratch on me? You’re so silly Lex, what a wild imagination!”
Excellent observations.
To say he was gaslighting Lex implies Lex was entitled to know Clark’s secret. And THAT was Lex’s superpower all along, entitlement.
The gaslighting came whenever something weird happened and he asked Clark about it and he gave these lame excuses.
He might not be entitled to it, but it doesn’t change the fact Clark was gaslighting him big time.
How does this not make the cut? Start over. Add Beebo.
I mean, if they just added every ridiculous-but-awesome moment from that show, the list would be at least 50% Legends of Tomorrow, and 50 entries long :D.
I don’t see a problem with that.
And?
Supernatural had 3 points where the series could have ended.Season 5 (perfect ending)Season 11 (good ending with God and the Darkness leaving)But season 11 Fan Fiction may have been the best ending (if they did it) the boys ride off into the sunset after hearing Carry on my wayword son and you find out Chuck was God. I get goosebumps just thinking about it.
Who is Chuck? Yes, I quit after Season 5, good call.
Chuck was in season 4 and season 5.
Yeah, thanks but that doesn’t help since that was 12 years ago and Supernatural isn’t really the Big Cultural Moment everyone seems to regard it as.Chuck was the writer. Yeah, everyone thought he might be god. That trope is hardly new.
I don’t think it’s a big deal but if someone is gonna say they watched season 1-5 I think they would remember the characters. I didn’t ask your age as no one cares who you are, like most people don’t care about Supernatural.
Lol, I like to offer people a chance to shine by contributing info (instead of lazily Googling it myself). I was looking for a simple answer, not a smart-ass evasion. Maybe that’s your default style. Whatever.
I think the irony here is you felt watching 1-5 qualified you to comment fruitfully in some way, yet you can’t even remember a major player in 2 of the 5 seasons. Meaning you really didn’t have anything useful to contribute at all.Side note for more of an overall comment: jumping off at season 5 isn’t the humble brag that people like to pretend it is. Not saying everything after was perfect, but some of their best episodes came after 5ths season. Years later when people talk about some of the best moments in SPN, the Season 5 purists will have missed out on a large chunk of that list.
Chuck was the “prophet” writing the Supernatural books in seasons 4 and 5. Turns out he was God all along. Something they nod to towards the end of S5, but too many people missed that so it needed to be spelled out for them in S11.
Chuck was the guy who wrote the Supernatural comics in the first five-year arc.
It also could’ve ended an episode before the actual finale too. I’d say any of those endings would’ve been better than the finale.
I didn’t mind the finale because I know they had bigger plans for it but Covid made it so small. Like the ending in heaven with everyone and Kansas actually perfoming sounds like it would have been great.
I still goosebump up when I think about that rendition…..
Those kids were so great! I got choked up when it 1st aired and I was thinking “okay end the show now!” because it was perfect.
I actually really liked Seasons 6, 7 and 8. Season 9 is when the show ran out of gas.
I liked season 6 alot. I’m a bit different as I think 7-9 were bad. 10 got better but 11-13 were really good and 14 and 15 it was just trying to get to the end. With that said season 10 “Fan Fiction” maybe the best episode from season 7-15. Loved that one so much.
Am I the only one that thought the Flash musical episode was lazy and self indulgent? Wasn’t into the music or the lyrics, it was just one of those musicals for the sake of having a musical, and I remember nothing about it.
Self indulgent? Yes. Lazy? No. Song and dance, no matter the quality of the end result, takes so much work its a wonder any musicals get made ever.
A musical of actual quality is indicative of the lack of laziness. The Flash musical was just here’s a song, here’s a song, here’s a song with some dancing, roll credits. Something like Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and the crazy, non-stop hours Rachel Bloom put into that show as lead, producer, writer, songwriter, dancer, really shows in how strong the entire production is from start to finish, and not just a thing to do for a week. Maybe it’s a bit harder for the cast to learn a little choreography and get into the recording studio than a typical week on the soundstage, but why put on a musical if it’s not going to be great?
Yeah, it’s a shame because I was super-hyped for it when it was announced but it was a real letdown overall. The real big problem, imo, is that there were only like 2 original songs (iirc) and they were both kinda mediocre. And it was a whole “other dimension” thing when what I really wanted was a relatively normal episode but with singing. Like “Once More With Feeling”. Or maybe like the Music Meister debut in Batman: Brave and the Bold where everyone happens to sing but the plot is just trying to catch the bad guy in the normal city. (side note: they super messed up not getting Neil Patrick Harris to be the live-action MM)
Getting NPH was apparently beyond the capabilities of the CW-verse, but it would have been so amazing to see him as the Music Meister in live action. At least the BBatB episodes are great.
I too was hoping for a musical episode that featured more original songs and more of the actual characters—the whole “characters playing other people in a dream/alternate reality” concept didn’t really work, and took some of the potential emotional power away. But it was still one of the most fun episodes of The Flash that season.
I agree that “Superfriends” never really gets off the ground, and isn’t nearly as good as a Rachel Bloom-penned song should be. “Runnin’ Home to You,” however, is great, and I love how it incorporates the strings from the actual Flash theme; it kind of serves as an actual theme song for the whole show in that way. It’s also one of the few times I thought the Barry/Iris ‘ship worked.
Clip shows are lazy.
Except for Clerks: The Animated Series doing a clip show in its second episode (which I believe aired before the first episode).
It DID air as the second episode but after a different episode (the fourth one) aired first, so the joke that some of the flashbacks were accurate was completely missed
I don’t even like most musicals but I was smiling from beginning to end with that episode.
It was an episode that clearly started as an initial thought of, “So many of our Arrowverse actors are great singers!” and that was also the final thought.
I have never seen a single episode of any of these shows. This list was entertaining but I don’t feel any urge to watch the actual shows.
iZombie killing the other Rob Thomas The Arrow season where the flashbacks were to s1 of the showThe reveal about ghost Lucy on s1 of Nancy Drew Pei-Ling AND Zhilan coming back to life this season on Kung FuKate changing faces on Batwoman
This is how a skull breaks.
It saddens me how many people cannot appreciate this moment exists somewhere out there.
Just had the memory pop into my head of Blaine playing “Whiter Shade of Pale” on the funeral parlor organ. Peak iZombie was good stuff.
Also a favorite musical moment of mine
I can’t help but feel that Buffy the Vampire Slayer going from the WB to the CW was the beginning of some sort of ending …
Or perhaps, in way, when you think about it, it was the ending of a beginning.
Buffy went from the WB to UPN. It was off the air before the WB and UPN merged to form the CW.
Oh yeah, that’s right. Oops.
Yeah that switchover from UPN to CW was pretty important. It’s why if you watch SPN on Netflix, the first season’s music got subbed out with generic music. Contracts for the rights of that stuff didn’t kick in till CW started, so that first season got gutted. Seriously – can you imagine a season of Supernatural where Carry On My Wayward son doesn’t play? Well it exists, and it’s on Netflix.
I always get annoyed when people refer back to Buffy’s musical episode because damn it, Xena did it first.
Xena did it twice!
Yeah, but the second one wasn’t as good.
I prefer “Lyre, Lyre, Hearts on Fire” to “The Bitter Suite.”
With the director of High School Musical! Seriously, look it up.
Chicago Hope had one even earlier.
Pretty sure Xena just doesn’t get the replay that Buffy does. It’s just older enough that it matters. 90s were a crazy time.
Also, people overlook the fact that Buffy didn’t just have a musical episode, but it was a pivotal episode for about 5 of the storylines they were pushing that season. So they risked the whole season on that show – I commend them for going all in and not just making it a 1-off ep you can pretend never happened. It was required viewing to know what was happening the rest of the season.
I’d like to pour one out for The Ringer. The Much maligned, little watched, and ultimately pretty terrible Sarah Michelle Gellar show where she played identical twins. (guess what – one’s bad!) I do still love that little piece of trash despite myself.
I join you on The Ringer love. That cast was stacked and had Luke Cage before I knew who he was! It was a double-feature for me with Revenge (which managed to last longer).
Could have been a whole list of Riverdale moments. Or Vampire Diaries moments. And hey, remember that time Oliver Queen nuked a city? Good memories, man.
That was FELICITY who nuked Ragman’s hometown…and was never mentioned again outside the next episode.
Oopsie!
Or Nancy Drew
I love Nancy Drew, but I was struggling to think of quite as many completely unhinged moments from it.
Fair, but from my perspective every time Nancy Drew fought a ghost came off as completely unhinged to me.
There was a time, not so long ago, when our DVR was 99% CW shows. But man, oh, man. 23-24 HOUR long episode seasons is not something I can commit to anymore. Viva la 10 episode seasons!My CW list included:ArrowThe FlashLegends of TomorrowSupergirlThe Vampire DiariesRiverdaleReignSupernaturalSmallvilleThe Carrie DiariesGossip GirlWhat a time it was!
The dog eating the heart is one of the greatest moments in television history.
a masterpiece.
I only clicked this cause I thought that was from a CW show. I saw it on John Oliver’s show.
It’s such a stupid thing on paper, but the execution is what makes it so amazingly stupid. The exchange of bizarre facial expressions in particular.
I freaking loved Fan Fiction. One of my favorite episodes in the entire series. I was really hoping the series finale would end on that musical version of Carry on my wayward son. For a second I thought it was, then it swapped to that terrible rap cover. For the record, I like rap, but THAT cover of the song was crap.
The downside is that to have it be the show’s 200th episode, they were forced to rush through all the implications of the previous season’s big cliffhanger ending so Dean wouldn’t still be a demon and distract from the whole thing.
I’m still happily shocked and traumatized by Rebecca Bunch WAXING HER ASSHOLE IN SONG (and DRAWING BLOOD!!) in the premiere ep of Crazy Ex. Just … omg. Totally a “pilot episode” move as in “Well, if we don’t get picked up, at least we made the brass at the CW watch a bloody ass-waxing scene.”
My understanding is that it was originally made for Showtime, then moved to CW.
Gotta love imagining what the standards and practices comments must have been regarding the quantity of ass-blood spray
Calling Crazy Ex Girlfriend “one of” the network’s most acclaimed shows is kind of an understatement lol
I’ve never watched the 100, but the main character is called “Clarke” and it ends with humanity ascending to join an alien overmind? Isn’t that a bit on the nose?
Most of the series did not seem as overtly derivative but interesting point
Another one of the main characters was named Bellamy, for the real classic sci-fi nerds. The character names came from the novel it was based on, though.
That dog eating the heart was written by someone who didn’t just hate the show he worked on, but had somehow developed a hatred of all fiction: past, present, and future.
If you ignore its every intention, Beauty and the Beast was a postmodern masterpiece. For starters, it spun the whole concept around, with Catherine keeping the beast captive. I always thought the tagline should have been, “Who’s the Beast?” Whereas so many CW shows turned superhero franchises into melodramatic soap operas, here we had a story that was already rooted in melodrama, amping the romantic elements up to satirical levels. I will say, though, as nauseatingly addictive as these cut-and-paste shows were, they offered up the best music library I could have ever dreamed.
Riverdale truly was just ridiculous moments stitched together with barely a through-line between them. I did drop out of the show shortly after they jumped ahead in time, but I think the most ridiculous moment is still Chad Michael Murray about to travel in a homemade rocket.
That’s crazier than the floating babies, or the epic highs and lows of high school football, anything Dark Betty or Vigilante Archie, or that school where Jughead’s presence made everyone very murder-y. (Which, with hindsight, that’s somewhat understandable.)
Come on, no iZombie created by Rob Thomas (the creator of Veronica Mars) having Rob Thomas (of Matchbox Twenty and that awesome Santana song) cameo on the season 3(?) finale of iZombie and turning him into a zombie/killing him? (I think, I just remember he was in the episode)
Good riddance to bad rubbish. Thanks for Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
Shouldn’t this list have been all moments from Legends of Tomorrow?
I still miss the WB network… It had definite growing pains but when it hit it’s stride with hour long dramas – *chefs kiss*Buffy, Gilmore Girls, Supernatural… heck, Dawsons Creek, One Tree Hill, Felicity… They were great.
Everwood…
Allow me to once again express my profound annoyance that AV Club stopped doing “Riverdale” episode reviews just when this past season really started to hit its full metal bugfuck crazy stride.
I really hope that AV Club will recognize the error of its ways and commit to episode reviewing the full, final season of this lunatic TV classic.
Where’s beebo you cowards?!
The Hundred ranks right up there along side The Walking Dead in my book for shows that went out of their way to ignore unsustainable plot development.iFor a moment to count as weird it sort of has to fly in the face of the show. Alien Rapture is completely batshit nuts I agree, but for a show that had an absurd twist ending every season it barely rates.
The amount of turd polishing that took place on this website….
What other network would have put something so stunningly tone deaf on air?I can only guess that whoever wrote this never watched WHO WANTS TO MARRY A MULTIMILLIONAIRE?