Spoilers for the Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover event including; Supergirl S5 E9, Batwoman S1 E9, Flash S6 E9, Arrow S8 E8, and Legends of Tomorrow S5 E1.
With the end of the annual Arrowverse crossover, this year’s Crisis on Infinite Earths has reshaped the landscape for the heroes and villains of the world and introduced a very comic book element to TV views, a line-wide rebut. A short spoiler-free review is that the crossover was very ambitious and overall meet those ambitions and exceeded them in some respects. The stakes were high with some long-lasting repercussions and included many fun and very unexpected cameos with strong acting from all involved.
The Crisis event opens with the Anti-matter wave, that has destroyed universe after universe, heading towards Argo city of Earth 38 (Supergirl’s universe). There is nothing either Superman (Tyler Hoechlin) or Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) can do to prevent it’s destruction as the wave marches towards Earth 38. Fortunately, the Monitor (LaMonica Garrett) saves both Superman and Lois Lane (Elizabeth Tulloch), who had sent their son away in a ship believing they were going to die. The Monitor summons various heroes from Earth 1 including Green Arrow (Stephen Amell), Batwoman (Ruby Rose), Flash (Grant Gustin) and White Canary (Caity Lotz) among others. He explains that the Anti-Monitor (LaMonica Garrett) is attempting to destroy the multiverse and replace it with his own Anti-matter universe. The group splits into several teams as they attempt to fend off the Anti-monitor’s forces and save as many people as possible, while Lois and a small group travel to another Earth to save baby John. After the destruction of Earth 38, the remaining heroes start jumping from earth to earth to find the seven paragons needed to defeat the Anti-monitor with many fun and unexpected cameos from long-forgotten TV shows and film franchises. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor (Jon Cryer) of Earth 38 has been resurrected and has stolen the book of destiny, jumping from earth to earth killing as many Supermen as possible. After finding all seven paragons the heroes fail to prevent the death of the multiverse and the paragons are sent to the vanishing point, a place outside of time and space. The Spector appears and summons the paragons to the dawn of time to battle the Anti-monitor and reignite the multiverse. The paragons succeed, at the cost of Green Arrow’s life, and the multiverse is remade, with some changes. Earth 1 and Earth 38 have become folded into Earth prime with Black Lightning (Cress Williams) also on the same earth. Before the heroes can come to grips with Oliver’s death the Anti-monitor returns for one last attack before being shrunken down into the micro-verse until the end of time.
The Pros
Each episode was gripping as they opened with a different Earth as they are destroyed, this provides a sense of wonder in how the characters would survive this apocalyptic event. Every actor brings they’re A-game to the event and work hard to sell every scene on screen. Overall, it was a successful event with the five-part event feeling like one long film more or less. The biggest highlight was the wide and far-reaching range of cameos from beloved classics like Burt Ward as Robin (Earth 66), to unexpected deep cuts like Ashley Scott as Helena Kyle/Huntress (Earth-203) and John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen/Flash (Earth-90). My person favourites were Tom Ellis as Lucifer Morningstar (Earth 666) acting against Matt Ryan as John Constantine (Earth 1) in a fantastic scene that would have both Lucifer and Constantine fans cry out for a new TV series featuring the two characters if not more crossovers between the two. Kevin Conroy as an antagonistic Bruce Wayne (Earth 99) in his first live-action portrayal of the character and Brandon Routh returning to his Superman portrayal (Earth 96) were both fantastic and brilliant extensions to their previous depictions of the characters.
The Cons
Despite the overwhelming positives, there are some negatives to mention. Chifley and this is a result of the event is the sum total of five different shows rather than one long film but in parts three and five it was very clear it was another episode of the Flash and Legends respectively as more of their casts appear where they were not involved before. Flash is the biggest proprietor of this as Hartley Sawyer as Ralph Dibny/Elongated Man stands around the Waverider doing nothing before being shuffled off on a side plot and Danielle Panabaker as Caitlin Snow/Frost and Carlos Valdes as Cisco Ramon/Vibe appear to simply support Flash emotionally as they attempt to stop the Anti-monitor’s Anti-matter cannon. The other main issue is many characters from the various shows simply don’t appear such as Katie Cassidy’s Laurel Lance (Earth 2) who seemed to have an important role after season 8 of Arrow and Tom Cavanagh as Reverse-Flash (Earth 1) which was especially disappointing after his appearance in Crisis on Earth X as he informed the Flash that he would see him in the next crisis. However, the many cameos do distract from the lack of these characters as it wasn’t until after the event ended that their lack of an appearance was noticeable.
Crisis on Infinite Earths was an ambitious project that met the expectations of fans the world over. It is the Arrowverse’s magnum opus bringing together every character within its own world and many more from previous depictions of DC characters. It has left many fans weighting with bated breath for next years crossover, wondering how they will top Crisis on Infinite Earths.
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