CW-Arrowverse Crossover 2019: CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS!

[Osiris-Rex]

I did love that nod Diggle and Black Lightning just randomly gave each other. Doubly so given John Stewart is Lynn's brother in some continuities .

On-paper Lex Luthor is a terrible Paragon of Truth. He only believes his own truth.

Lex is the consummate gaslighter. Even if Lex doesn't believe his own truth, Lex will make you believe his truth despite all your evidence to the contrary.

[Patrick Gerard]

Well, its been a great ride so far!

Of course, a lot of it was predictable, but then again, that's just a testament to the fandom's ability to predict twists accurately! Not to mention, this being an adaptation of a 33 year old story...

For instance, Oliver becoming the Spectre is a theory I'd seen floated around for months. We knew for sure that he wouldn't just 'die'...

Barry Allen wasn't going to really die either. So it being Shipp's Barry who dies was also pretty much a given. It was a beautiful scene though, what with the flashback and the use of the original show theme...

The one twist that really caught me of guard was Kevin Conroy's Bruce Wayne being plain evil. I'm not sure how I feel about it (and the accusations that they tore down Bruce Wayne to prop up Kate unfortunately do seem a little well-founded here). But it was an unexpected twist and I guess a kind of take-that to the BvS take on Batman.

On the whole I am amazed by how faithful the overall story is to the original...while of course also being true to the Arrowverse and its history. You have the destruction of the earths, Harbinger bringing together the heroes, the cosmic tuning forks, the anti-matter cannon and the Flash's sacrifice, Pariah being the one who released the Anti-Monitor, and Harbinger being brainwashed into killing the Monitor. Plus, from the previews for the remaining two episodes, we know that we get the big battle at the Dawn of Time between the Spectre and the Anti-Monitor.

Given the way things are going, its a cinch that Part 5 will be set on a newly merged Post-Crisis earth, largely based on Earth 1 but with elements of Earth 38 (Supergirl's earth), Earth 73 (Black Lightning's earth), Earth 2 (to merge the Black Canaries), Earth 3 (to bring in Jay Garrick) and whatever earth Stargirl is from.

Since Part 5 is an episode of LoT, maybe Gideon could be the one giving us a history lesson on New Earth!

Some of my guesses on how they handle continuity-


1. The JSA existed on New Earth, with Starman as one of the original members. Stargirl is his modern-day successor. The JSA from LoT will be mostly wiped from continuity.

2. John Wesley Shipp's Jay Garrick was the Flash in the early 90's. But due to some incident, he and his wife Joan were forced into hiding and assumed the identities of Henry and Nora Allen, and they had a son, Barry. Something separates Henry and Nora from Barry when he's a kid, possibly Thawne related, and he's raised by the West family. He eventually becomes the Flash too and is only reunited with his parents well into his career.

3. Laurel Lance was a lawyer and had a life identical to her Earth 1 version until she was caught in the particle accelerator explosion. Her metahuman powers enabled her to become Black Canary. Her near-death experience at the hands of Damian Darkh temporarily caused her to assume the villanous identity of Black Siren, but she was eventually reformed.

4. Superman and Batman were the first major heroes of the new millenium. Superman eventually took a backseat by the start of the 2010's and Batman was anyway an urban myth, so this paved the way for Green Arrow and the Flash to be the faces of a new wave of heroes. Black Lightning was also part of the Superman and Batman generation of heroes.

I think a more straightforward approach is to recast Henry and Nora and maybe play with that as Barry vaguely remembers both versions but no longer feels the same connection to the people in his photographs. He’s moved on and even the memory of his parents is hazy now.

[90'sCartoonMan]

Cryer's Luthor I think is now the best live action version of that character ever. I actually hate the character--he is truly evil and truly a genius. A fitting arch-foe for Superman.

Kevin Smith said the same thing. Cryer is definitely a great modern version of Lex, but I still love Rosenbaum.

I guess it's to be expected, but I hate it whenever people allege that this is from a source that came after COIE (1986) like the Shadow Demons are just Dementors or the elimination of every single universe and all life in the Multiverse is like INFINITY WAR. Does DC get no credit for creating all this stuff? Makes me mad sometimes.

And Spider-Man of all characters gets the big theatrical animated multiverse movie.

If we could get Matt Ryan to meet DC Universe Swamp Thing...that would be amazing .

I'd like to see him interact with that show's version of the Phantom Stranger.

I'm just disappointed we haven't seen Van Wayne from "Powerless" (Crimson Fox at least.... )

Now that'd be something. Hopefully people wouldn't confuse him for Mr. Nobody.

A thousand times this. Bostwick could play Shazam or a middle aged Captain Marvel.

Uncle Dudley.

Since Part 5 is an episode of LoT, maybe Gideon could be the one giving us a history lesson on New Earth!

It seems to me the whole season could be the Legends exploring the various facets of this New Earth.

[David Walton]

I guess it's to be expected, but I hate it whenever people allege that this is from a source that came after COIE (1986) like the Shadow Demons are just Dementors or the elimination of every single universe and all life in the Multiverse is like INFINITY WAR. Does DC get no credit for creating all this stuff? Makes me mad sometimes.

To be fair, DC hasn't always embraced their strengths, either in film or the comic book side of things. COIE is arguably the biggest example. It is, paradoxically, a love letter to the multiverse that ultimately destroys it in favor of a more streamlined continuity patterned after Marvel. And DC has half-heartedly tried to restore a full-blown multiverse how many times, only to pull back at the last minute? So it's not surprising on some level that the stuff DC got right is perceived as having originated with other storytellers, because DC has often seemed almost embarrassed by its vast history. (If you're looking for a Marvel equivalent, it's not putting their name on the first BLADE film, because they thought it would be a liability.)

All this said, I think Geoff Johns has embraced DC's history and it's paying off.

[Elegant Dreamer]

A couple of questions and ideas:

1. How did Barry figured out Lyla was being controlled? Because she couldn't remembered her reconnaissance?

2. I wonder if Ragman will make an appearance.

3. Why couldn't the heroes go into the past to get a Lazarus Pit, instead of going to another world and meeting the Dark Multiverse version of Jonah Hex?

4. I think there's a way to have a "Doom Patrol" cameo without worrying about schedule conflict: have Danny the Street appear! By the way, can Danny the Street exist outside the multiverse? That would be interesting to see everyone react to a street appearing at the Vanishing Point. Kara and Barry would karaoke, Lex Luthor would have to deal with drag queens flirting with him, and maybe Flex Mentallo could appear, and hopefully this time, he will flex the right muscle.

Thank you for your time and patience tolerating my weirdness.

[Jim Kelly]

Barry is smart. I like that scene because it showed the heroes actually being smart and figuring stuff out. They already knew that Lyla might be with the Anti-Monitor (Monitor said that) and her story didn't add up. Pariah appeared and he usually only appears when the Anti-Monitor wants him to witness a tragedy.

It's just too bad that figuring it out didn't do them any good.

The writers probably wanted to stick with one theme, which was travel to other parallel worlds. Even that seems to have confused some viewers. It would have made it too hard on some people if they brought time travel into it also. That's why some of the worlds, while existing in other time periods, are nevertheless parallel to the 2019 time period of Earth-1.

In the comic book Crisis there was time travel. I would have liked to see some of that--but I can see why they didn't bother. Some discussion of the temporal paradoxes might have helped viewers understand that the entire timeline is wiped out by the Anti-Monitor--past and future. I think you still have to conclude that some time travel is going on to explain, for example, how Jennifer Pierce can encounter her Earth-2 self (in the BLACK LIGHTNING episode), who I assume was already dead by then.

[AnakinFlair]

A couple of questions and ideas:

1. How did Barry figured out Lyla was being controlled? Because she couldn't remembered her reconnaissance?

2. I wonder if Ragman will make an appearance.

3. Why couldn't the heroes go into the past to get a Lazarus Pit, instead of going to another world and meeting the Dark Multiverse version of Jonah Hex?

4. I think there's a way to have a "Doom Patrol" cameo without worrying about schedule conflict: have Danny the Street appear! By the way, can Danny the Street exist outside the multiverse? That would be interesting to see everyone react to a street appearing at the Vanishing Point. Kara and Barry would karaoke, Lex Luthor would have to deal with drag queens flirting with him, and maybe Flex Mentallo could appear, and hopefully this time, he will flex the right muscle.

Thank you for your time and patience tolerating my weirdness.

1. IIRC, they all knew that Lyla was missing at the beginning of the episode, and the Monitor mentioned that he should have forseen that his enemy could corrupt the connection he had with Lyla to turn her to his (Anti-Monitor's) aims.

2. I think he's supposed to appear, but I'm not entirely sure.

3. It could be that the timestream was in sever flux and they couldn't go into the past. That being said, if they had done that, they had a perfect reason to bring in Thea to the crossover- she knew where three additional Pits were located.

[Immortal Weapon]

Where is Wally? I would think they'll get all hands on deck for crisis.

[Jcogginsa]

Where is Wally? I would think they'll get all hands on deck for crisis.

Actor didn't want to return, IIRC, so Wally is only in the Tie in Comic.

[Frontier]

2. I think he's supposed to appear, but I'm not entirely sure.

Not in Crisis, but I'm pretty sure he's in the Arrow finale.

Where is Wally? I would think they'll get all hands on deck for crisis.

He's coming back to Flash Post-Crisis.

[signalman112]

If you read the CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTH GIANT #1, then you get the answer why Kid Flash hasn't appeared in the live-action Crisis.

CRISISGIANT1.jpg

[Elegant Dreamer]

Barry is smart. I like that scene because it showed the heroes actually being smart and figuring stuff out. They already knew that Lyla might be with the Anti-Monitor (Monitor said that) and her story didn't add up. Pariah appeared and he usually only appears when the Anti-Monitor wants him to witness a tragedy.

It's just too bad that figuring it out didn't do them any good.

The writers probably wanted to stick with one theme, which was travel to other parallel worlds. Even that seems to have confused some viewers. It would have made it too hard on some people if they brought time travel into it also. That's why some of the worlds, while existing in other time periods, are nevertheless parallel to the 2019 time period of Earth-1.

In the comic book Crisis there was time travel. I would have liked to see some of that--but I can see why they didn't bother. Some discussion of the temporal paradoxes might have helped viewers understand that the entire timeline is wiped out by the Anti-Monitor--past and future. I think you still have to conclude that some time travel is going on to explain, for example, how Jennifer Pierce can encounter her Earth-2 self (in the BLACK LIGHTNING episode), who I assume was already dead by then.

1. IIRC, they all knew that Lyla was missing at the beginning of the episode, and the Monitor mentioned that he should have forseen that his enemy could corrupt the connection he had with Lyla to turn her to his (Anti-Monitor's) aims.

2. I think he's supposed to appear, but I'm not entirely sure.

Thank you very much for answering! I really appreciate it.

3. It could be that the timestream was in sever flux and they couldn't go into the past. That being said, if they had done that, they had a perfect reason to bring in Thea to the crossover- she knew where three additional Pits were located.

You're right! Another good idea ignored!

[AnakinFlair]

You're right! Another good idea ignored!

In that case, it might not have been them ignoring an idea as much as either they couldn't work the scheduling with Willa and/or they decided not to so they could free up that money in the budget for other cameos. Remember- as lavish as this has been, it's still being produced on a TV budget.

[Elegant Dreamer]

In that case, it might not have been them ignoring an idea as much as either they couldn't work the scheduling with Willa and/or they decided not to so they could free up that money in the budget for other cameos. Remember- as lavish as this has been, it's still being produced on a TV budget.

Makes sense. This is why I think Danny the Street should be the cameo from "Doom Patrol."

[juan678]