Freedom Reborn

I'm genuinely looking forward to seeing if the creators have the brass ones to kill off Barry Allen (or as the Flash tv show calls it "Flash Disappears in Crisis!" There's been talk back and forth about whether Wally will come back, and I've been entertaining this insane notion that the creators would kill off Barry and have Wally take over the entire show, like what happened with the Pre-Crisis Barry and the post-New 52/Rebirth Wally. Or possibly get a different character to replace Barry. I don't know how likely it is, or if I even want them to do it, considering how likable Grant Gustin is as Barry, but I'd be very impressed if they did it and pulled it off.

There's also rumours/speculation that Kid Flash is going to be in Titans, so if that turns out to be the case, that might mean that they're not allowed to bring back Wally anyway, but like I said, they could swap Barry out for another character. Heck, since they love time travel and having the actors play multiple variations on the same character, they could bring in Bart Allen from the future, have Grant Gustin play him, and have him be kind of a punk that all of the other characters don't like Jason Todd style or Harry Wells style. That could probably play for a season or so.

At the end of the Flash season premiere, the Monitor shows up and gives Barry the Oliver Queen treatment...yep, he tells Barry (and the audience) in advance that Barry Allen will die!. One of the showrunners has confirmed online that Barry Allen will die in Crisis. I've already said my theory here, but someone online had a great one. John Wesley Shipp's 90's TV show Flash in place of Grant Gustin's Barry. I wouldn't be surprised if that's what happens.

-Layla has become Harbinger.
-"Nash" Wells has been researching the Monitor and is, by all appearances, about to become Pariah and/or discover the existence of the Anti-Monitor (who, based on promo pics, looks like a vampire-like version of the Monitor)
-The Monitor talked to J'onn J'onnz.
-Lex is indeed working for the Monitor, in exchange for an as-yet unrevealed deal involving his sister (who's currently in the process of a heel-turn in the current season of Supergirl and is confirmed to appear during Crisis)
-Bloodwork, the villain for the current season of the Flash, has already been defeated (he was locked up in Star Labs, but is still alive) meaning the entire second half of this season of the Flash could be spun out of whatever happens in Crisis
-Kevin Conroy is not playing the Batman Beyond version of Bruce Wayne, as previously rumoured, but is playing Kingdom Come Bruce with the cyborg brace.

-Lex is going to either die or be taken off the board in some way. While he stole the show in his episodes of Supergirl, he was really there to motivate Lena Luthor's character development, and this version of Lex is so transparently evil I don't see any way he could do a parmanant face-turn. He'll likely try to backstab the Monitor for his own benefit and either be punished for it and/or do a redemption-equals-death face turn. Then again, a lot of people are hoping he'll show up in the Lois and Clarke show, and honestly, he totally should (and for those wondering, Jon Cryer's age was handwaved in Supergirl with a line about Kryponite poisoning and/or experimenting causing him to age faster) But you could always have him appear in flashbacks - show the legendary Lex vs. Superman battles we never actually saw during Supergirl - or pull a reverse 52 (that would be the weekly comic series "52") and have an alternate universe Lex replace the one we know right now.

-Ray Palmer is going to die this season. We know Brandon is leaving Legends and there hasn't been a big death or a major departure since Legends S3, which featured Stein's death in Earth X (though Zari apparently got written out at the end of S4 - not sure where that's going) And Ray's become more of a comedy character in Legends since (along with the whole show). Since they skipped Elseworlds, this could be a chance for Legends to contribute in a meaningful way. We also have Ryan Choi coming to replace Ray. I'd guess they'll a few episodes to set up Brandon being written out (they did this with Stein) but I think they get the ball rolling with Legends' contribution to Crisis.

-The Monitor becomes the Anti-Monitor. Time travel may be involved.

-Ollie's going to die for real, Barry won't. How this will affect the back end of Arrow and Flash's seasons is completely up in the air as far as I'm concerned.

-Whoever the main villain of the back half of Flash is will be made partially or entirely clear by the time Crisis is over. Unless they just have Bloodwork break out of Star Labs in the back half.

-Characters from other universes will die. Probably Routh's Superman. Can't say I'm fond of that, but it's kinda tradition, it's pretty much what the original comic book did, Infinite Crisis did this with Earth 2 Superman, and the opening scene of Elseworlds showed an entire group of "90's Flash universe" versions of GA, Stargirl, ect, curb-stomped off screen by the Monitor. And of course, Earth 2 got wiped out in the very first episode of Arrow this year.

-There's going to be surprise cameos we don't know about. This one's very much wishful thinking, but I don't believe the DC/tv version of Avengers Infinity War/Endgame would really give away all the surprises on the promotional circuit before the show actually comes out.

-There's going to be at least one backdoor-pilot-style tease for a new show.

-Next will be Zero Hour and/or a Legion of Superheroes show.

-Flash is ending soon and they're not telling us until after Crisis airs.

-Legends won't get picked up for another season. The ratings last year were the lowest they've ever been and, from what I've read, season 4 was considered the weakest. I personally thought it was really bad.

-If Legends doesn't end before Flash does, Ralph Dibney aka the Elongated Man will join the Legends. Because that just makes sense. Ralph's one of the wackiest characters in the entire Arrowverse and Flash has been pushing him hard for the last three years.

And of course, the one that's been expected for over a year - Supergirl will be folded into the Earth 1 universe. We already know Melisa Benoist is going to be guest starring in Batwoman this year and she hasn't shown up yet, so it's gotta be in the back-half of the season.

Barry does die....but in a swerve, its Earth 90 Barry.

The next Wells on THE FLASH ends up being a mashup of the previous Wells that have been regulars on the series. (And I mean actual Wells, NOT Thawne.)

Oliver dies, and the remaining episodes of ARROW lead in to the spinoff featuring the kids, showing how they get back to their own time period.

One new series ends up spinning off out of this, as a replacement for LEGENDS, which ends up being cancelled. (With Brandon Routh exiting, its going to go downhill)

At least one shocking cameo that they actually manage to keep secret.

Cisco gets his powers back. Otherwise, whats the point of him even wearing the Vibe costume?

Either Diggle gets a certain piece of green jewelry, or David Ramsey plays John Stewart from another Earth, as well as Diggle/Spartan.

I don't see ZERO HOUR being done as a follow up, because its still regarded as a major dud. Maybe we'll get something more like Challenge of the Super-Friends?

The Spectre shows up to help unleash an industrial strength smackdown on the Anti-Monitor.

An appearance by the JSA, but NOT the rather blah, disappointing version from LEGENDS. (For all we know, Jay could already be a member on his Earth, but just hasn't mentioned the others.)

As I've mentioned earlier in the thread, the Earth-90-Barry-dies-instead-theory is a prevalent one. Would not be surprised. While I posited the idea of a different lead Flash earlier in the thread, I think it's too much of a risk to do the show without Gustin as Barry - with Arrow we know the show's ending so that works fine.

QuoteThe next Wells on THE FLASH ends up being a mashup of the previous Wells that have been regulars on the series. (And I mean actual Wells, NOT Thawne.)

Rewatching every season of Flash on Blu Ray and Netflix, I've really been reminded that they dragged the "Wells" gag into the mud. The "council of Wells" was goofy enough as it is, but once you made an entire season's Wells a goofy parody of Sherlock Holmes with a funny accent, I think it's started to get old, and it's almost enough to make you forget just how good Tom C was at playing a straight version of Wells. I don't know what the solution is, but I think they need to either retire the gag or go back to him being a serious character instead of a "gimmick" one.

QuoteOliver dies, and the remaining episodes of ARROW lead in to the spinoff featuring the kids, showing how they get back to their own time period.

Oh, so you expect the kids to go Back.....To the Future?! As I said before, I had a vague feeling they were going to get them into the present day before it even happened, so I still think the spinoff will be this premise since that way characters like Diggle ect, can still pop in for cameos, guest roles, ect. To my honest, I don't want them going back to the future since the future was so boring, but then again, I'm not crazy about Arrow without Oliver Queen. Half a season of Oliver in prison was pushing it as it was.

QuoteOne new series ends up spinning off out of this, as a replacement for LEGENDS, which ends up being cancelled. (With Brandon Routh exiting, its going to go downhill)

I'm still of the opinion it's already downhill, but I've accepted that with Routh exiting, it's going to suck just a little bit more, even if Choi ends up being a good character in his own right. The show's just become too much of a farce of itself, and the most recent season was rewritten because they liked Tom Wilson as Nate's father too much to make him the villain for the whole season, and it showed. I've been of the opinion for a full year that it was all downhill after you got rid of Stein, Jax and Rip Hunter, not to mention Damien Darke. I think it might be time to wrap it up before things get too stale. The Arrowverse guys will have to learn at some point that not every show can last 8 years like Arrow.

QuoteI don't see ZERO HOUR being done as a follow up, because its still regarded as a major dud. Maybe we'll get something more like Challenge of the Super-Friends?

Well, they did call the three-man trio of Thawn, Darke, and Malcolm Merlyn the "Legion of Doom" (and joked that they got the name from some lame cartoon) but since they never pretended the crossover adaptations were going to be in order (nor that Marvel do that with the MCU) - Invasion happened after Crisis, after all - you could go straight to Infinite Crisis, you could do a try to do a GOOD version of Armegeddon if you want to try having a good guy hero doing an effective heel-turn (then again, that's also one of the REASONS why Zero Hour is considered a dud - the Hal Jordan version of Paralax is one of the villains in it)....the only reason I suggested Zero Hour is it involved time travel and reshuffling the universe and the Legion of Superheroes got a big revival in the 90's around that time, and again, I think DC will try to do a Legion show at this point. Then again, DC's also been pushing Outsiders lately and the Outsiders stuff in Black Lightning is....kinda lame.  :(

But of course, there's so many big stories you can adapt, there's almost no reason to even list them all. "Elseworlds", after all, was really "Crisis - Prologue" anyway, and Earth-X was...I think, wholly original (though perhaps vaguely inspired by the Crime Syndicate of America).

I dunno, these CW Arrowverse people seem to (mostly) know what they're doing. I think they'll figure something out.

QuoteThe Spectre shows up to help unleash an industrial strength smackdown on the Anti-Monitor.

Oh yeah, I forgot Jim Corrigan is in this! That should be interesting. A Spectre tv show would be amazing if done right, but I can't see it being a CW Arrowverse show. It'd be perfect as a DC Universe show ala Swamp Thing, but I don't know if they'd risk it after Swamp Thing's swift cancellation (pretty good little show, IMO though - it was setting up Justice League Dark, which would have been nifty)

QuoteAn appearance by the JSA, but NOT the rather blah, disappointing version from LEGENDS. (For all we know, Jay could already be a member on his Earth, but just hasn't mentioned the others.)

Yeah, the JSA from Legends served their purpose, writing the Amaya version of Vixen into the show, but they didn't really have the legs for future appearances, so I think it'd be nice if they gave them another shot in the future, especially with Stargirl on the way. It seems like DC has had difficulty getting the JSA collectively some good mainstream exposure (as opposed to just Stargirl and Dr. Fate, both of which pop up with pretty good regularity)

They've already said the ARROW spinoff will take place in the future. Unless the remaining episodes of ARROW deal with either them getting back there, or the rest of Team Arrow getting used to fighting crime without Oliver - or both - I don't see the point in even doing more episodes. The spinoff is not something I am interested in at all, but I admit I'd be interested a bit if they were stuck in the present rather than going back to their own time period.

On LEGENDS, its Rip and Captain Cold no longer being around that bother me more than anything else. I *might* keep watching after Brandon Routh leaves, but it just won't be the same. Bringing Constantine in and giving the actress who played Amaya a new role (and I find Charlie a lot more interesting) were smart moves. I just wish they'd either have Nate wear his Steel costume more often, or get rid of him altogether.  I am not sure Ray will be killed off, because the press release sent out made it seem like the door was open for him to come back for guest appearances down the road. (Yes, I know since time travel is involved, death doesn't mean mucfh. But I'm expecting Ray and Nora to just leave to go be together rather than continuing on as Legends.)

My alternate Flash theory: Barry (Gustin) does die, and someone else takes over as The Flash, but Barry returns out of the Speed Force during whatever the next crossover event is, if not sooner. But NOT during what's left of this season. For a replacement, I'm thinking either Earth 90 Flash (who gets a new costume, hopefully....) or the female one Jay is training. Wally would be too obvious a choice.

Just a note: An episode of THE FLASH later this season is going to be called "Grodd Friended Me". The actress who played Jesse is on a CBS show called "God Friended Me". Some people (not me) are speculating that Jesse might show up during that episode. I highly doubt it, but it would be good to know if her and Harry are still alive, since their Earth got destroyed already.

Is anyone at all surprised that Lex immediately grabbed the book and started killing Supermen?

Heatwave and the baby was hillarious.  Even better that this was not even the one that they all know.

A lot of folks are mad over the Smallville cameo, but it was pretty much along the lines of what I was expecting.

Conroy as evil future Bruce was absolutely fantastic. People are mad about this too.  Don't care.  Loved it.

TITANS ARE BACK ^$%#ES!
Holy-something-or-other, I guess Burt Ward was a retired Dick Grayson from the Adam West show?

I checked my trade of Crisis and sure enough, that opening narration is taken straight from the book. Can't say I was surprised, but still pretty neat.

I'm kinda glad they made sure to have the Monitor say that his powers were fading after the Crisis started. Feels like a way for the writers to cover their tracks, considering how overpowered the Monitor seemed to be initially.

Taking Oliver to an alternate universe Lazarus Pit was a very clever yet obvious solution. I'm kinda disappointed I didn't think of that (then again, pt 2 airing so soon after pt 1, may have had something to do with it. If I had to wait a week, maybe I would have thought of it)

I found the various references relating to the Brandon Routh Superman interesting. The references to fighting an evil version of himself seemed to imply Superman 3 was canon to Superman Returns, while the reference to Tyler's Superman's son resembling "my son Jason" links to Superman Returns, while that Superman went on to have a story modeled after Kingdom Come. Interesting, but kinda bittersweet if that's really supposed to be the Superman Returns iteration of the character.

Yeah, Mick was great in this. I dare say better used here than he was in the entirely of the past season of Legends. Had a very S2-3 Mick sense of humor to him. LOVED that Snart was the voice of the Waverider's ship in this one. That's exactly the kinda surprise cameo I was looking forward to.

People were angry about those things? I'm genuinely surprised. I know fans are particular about their nerd properties, but that seems surprising considering we're dealing with alternate universes and the Arrowverse started with evil Earth 2 doppelgangers.

If Welling's Clarke got his butt handed to him that'd be one thing, but he got to punch out Jon Cryer's Lex. I don't get why people were angry. Because he gave up his powers I guess?

Also, someone really should have been keeping an eye on Lex and/or the book of Destiny. I mean, the first chance he got, THE FIRST CHANCE, he went rogue. And I have to assume noone in the audience was surprised.

Regarding the past season of Legends, it felt to me like there was less costumed superheroics in the show than there used to be, your example of Nate not wearing his Steel costume being a good example.

I did feel like it was a shame to take Snart off the table when they did, but Wentworth Miller did make some reappearances in later seasons, so maybe it is more the most recent season which was hurting from his absence.

On another note, the showrunners have said there won't be a crossover next year. Maybe that's the right route to go. Take a breather after a big crossover like this one.

Things that people predicted were Flash 90 dying in Flash 1's place and Oliver inheriting the mantle of The Spectre.

I did not expect every single Earth to get wiped out, or the Vanishing Point to come back into play again.  That was a nice little callback.  Also Lex stealing Returns Superman's spot was a surprise to me.

Hope Oliver gets to hang around as the Spectre from time to time after the crossover is over.

People really wanted to see Welling in the suit and they wanted him to be the main superman. People are raging all over youtube about it, spamming any clips of that scene with their rage.  Personally I thought it was near perfect.

The outrage about Control was much less, but people really wanted him to be TAS Batman and not something else.

I think in both cases they had a picture in their head as to what they wanted which was never going to happen, so those people probably would never have been happy whatever happened.

The cameos at the start of episode 1 were pretty fun. But Oliver dying at the end of episode one, even if he did save over a billion people? Wow.

The fight between Supermen was okay, but the fight with Earth-38 Clark and the villain turned into an evil version during the last crossover was better done, as was the Clark-Kara fight. Lets have no more Superman vs. Superman fights, okay?

Called it sort of on Earth 90 Flash dying instead of Earth 1.

I never really watched Smallville much, so Tom Welling and Erica Durance showing up didn't mean much. Interesting that he gave up his powers, though.

Whoever designed Anti-Monitor's look was overpaid.

Huntress' cameo in episode 3, just to see her die, was a why even bother? moment.

I liked the way they used Lucifer, and of course his Earth had to be 666. But I missed the preview of episode 4, because my DVR stopped recording at the very start of it. Just saw Oliver alive (in a suit?) for a split-second. Is Corrigan bringing him back to life in a different way, or is Oliver taking his place as the Spectre? (And I'm going to be disappointed if we don't see a Spectre in-costume rather than just a guy with green glowing eyes.)

Cool seeing Black Lightning finally being involved in a crossover.

There has been a lot, and I mean a LOT of focus on parents and their children, and I can't help but think it's being laid out for some sort of narrative reason. And yes, you can make the case that Fatherhood is an important part of Oliver's, Barry's and Jefferson's stories before now, but even characters that don't usually have family have been mentioning them in passing... Ryan Choi, the Monitor, all three Supermen (even KC Superman mentions his presumably dead son in passing). Parenthood, specifically Fatherhood, has been running through a LOT of this story, and I feel it might be central to the narrative for reasons we haven't seen yet.

The Burt Ward cameo was great at the beginning.

A large cast must be hard to write for, but finding baby Jonathan still seemed like a pretty unnecessary side-quest, more designed to keep members of the large cast busy.

I'm not sure what to think of this version of Brainiac 5. He was really cool in the comics, but this version fluctuates between being able to wrestle Amazo and being constantly show up by Toyman's son/being helpless against snare arrows.

The shadow wraiths were odd as combatants. Sure, they were scary, but literally anything seemed to kill them in one hit, with an arrow being just as effective as Kryptonian powers. I have no idea how an "upgraded" batarang kills the wraiths better than the base model aside from the weapon returning to the thrower instead of dissolving (then again, running out of weapons was a big problem for Oliver, so maybe it was useful after all).

Oliver's sacrifice... yeah, he saved a billion people, but at the end of the day, he went down in episode one of the Crisis fighting opponents who are weak against arrows, dying only because he runs out of arrows. It felt like more of a comic strip or parody than anything else. It looks like the writers have more plans for him in Crisis, though, so we'll see. Also, 3 billion extra people, likely most of them being dopplegangers, should have some interesting effects on Earth-1

I was never terribly invested in Smallville, so it's difficult to say much about Earth-167 Clark returning. On one hand, it was a nice ending for the Superman who was arguably the most like a normal person. Alternatively, after 10 seasons of building up to being Superman vaguely "someday," it does seem to spoil things a bit to say that he spends so long to become Superman only to give it up shortly afterwards. Either way, I don't care tremendously, but I would understand fans who like it as well as those who felt like it was done poorly.

The Kevin Conroy cameo was rather disappointing. Sure, the studio had strict rules to follow and likely couldn't have a full Batman be part of the adventure. Still, there could have been a decent version of Bruce Wayne, rather than an odd mismatch of Kingdom Come, Dark Knight Returns, and murderhobo. It could be argued that this version is in some ways cooler, but when a character gets hit once and then falls over and accidentally electrocutes themselves, cool is kind of out of the question. Seriously, this death would only bother me more if a 1966 Batman "ZAP!" had appeared in big letters over the undignified, barbecued Bruce.

Lex Luthor stealing the book to kill all Supermen is very satisfying comic-like. I'm not sure about Jon Cryer's portrayal compared to people like Sherman Howard and Michael Rosenbaum, but I'll give him a chance.

Kingdom Come Superman looks amazing. The timeline is wibbly-wobbly, though, because I thought that Superman Returns was an alternate Superman 3, but Superman mentions both his son (from Superman Returns) and fighting himself (from Superman 3). Add that to it also being the Kingdom Come universe and it feels odd. Still, I absolutely loved the original KC miniseries, so it was still nice to see.

Also, yikes. Hoechlin's Superman seems to get no respect. He loses to Supergirl, who had about 15 years less experience as a hero (just an estimate, unless the show gives a more exact time span), he also loses to Brandon Routh's Superman, who is way older than him. I'm not sure how much experience helps or old age hinders in Kryptonian-level fights, but Hoechiln just loses the fight whichever side of the spectrum he happens to be on. It seems like the poor guy is just there to show how impressive other people are instead of doing much of anything cool himself.

Bringing Oliver back is another side-quest that seems to be just an excuse to make more of the large cast seem useful. With a time-travelling speedster, using magic to find an Earth with a functioning lazarus pit seems unnecessary, as Oliver could brought back in time on Earth-1 and revived in a pit there. Still, it's good to see that the writers aren't done with the character so early in Crisis.

Cisco getting his Vibe powers back was nice. It seemed profoundly unwise for him to deliberately give them up in the previous season. As a bonus, the writers manage both to make it comedic and to not waste too much time undoing a past writing mistake.

I'm not sure if anyone was actually surprised by Earth-90 Flash dying instead of Earth-1 Flash. I guessed it would happen when he first appeared in Elseworlds last year and it went rather predictably. Still, given how many heroes from old series simply die (Burt Ward, Huntress), die embarassingly (Kevin Conroy), or are overall unhelpful (pretty much every other guest star besides Black Lightning and Brandon Routh's Superman), I am happy that John Wesley Shipp's Flash got to do something awesome.

Ryan Choi is a character who I'm not very familiar with, but seems to be done well. I'm curious to see if Ray Palmer will meet a horrible fate to pave the way for Ryan becoming the Atom.

Oliver with the Spectre's power could be epic, or could just mean he doesn't seem much like Green Arrow in the last two episodes. I'll reserve judgement until later on this one.

Lots of time was dedicated to Supergirl debating whether or not to use the book of destiny to bring back Earth-38 and Batwoman being ready to use the kryptonite to stop her. Considering how little time there is total in this crossover for such a large cast to have moments to shine, it felt like a waste. After several scenes of angst and drama, they just decide: "nah, let's just forget about this whole thing and go try to do something about this crisis." I'm certainly not saying that Supergirl should have used the book, but the writers shouldn't have devoted that much effort to something that wouldn't pan out into anything. It came across as yet another odd side-quest to keep characters busy.

I'm really questioning the Monitor's power level here. If someone is taken down by a trick arrow, then they probably shouldn't be strong enough to match energy blasts with someone who just took down Superman with one blow. Maybe I'm just a nit-picking fanboy, but it appears to have very little sense of scale.

Every Earth being destroyed takes a bit of the drama away. I really wasn't sure if they were going to have to make a final stand to protect the last seven Earths, or even just one last Earth. Destroying all of them just leaves the more predictable "punch the bad guy and use science talk to somehow make his scheme reverse." Also, it makes me wonder if Green Arrow or Earth-90 Flash actually accomplished anything with their respective sacrifices. On the plus side, the writers won't have to address how the huge population surge and tons of dopplegangers changes everyday life on Earth-1.

Luthor substituting himself for Kingdom Come Superman was a twist I didn't see coming. Still, KC Supes was one of the most interesting things about this crossover, so I'm not overjoyed that he's unlikely appear for long in the next two episodes.

8 seasons of Arrow have been nice, and lots of comic book stuff has been worked in (I still smile when I think of the boxing glove arrow in season 2). I've been hoping for years that Oliver would wear the iconic Green Arrow hat at some point, and an alternate earth GA could be a good way to write in in. If it included a joke and another impractical arrow I sure wouldn't complain.

Jay Garrick doing pretty much anything with some JSA members could be fun. Stargirl is rumored to be making an appearance, and her show is supposed to feature some JSA members, which could allow a JSA closer to the comics than the one used in Legends season 2.

Batwoman recognizing Earth-99 Bruce could mean that the ever-elusive Earth-1 Batman also looks like Conroy. If the actor could have a scene where he does something cool (ideally as Batman, but if legal rights prohibit that, then just being a good Bruce Wayne who doesn't instantly die in corny ways would be fine).

Instead of an insane Bruce based partially on Kingdom Come (and maybe DKR), it would have been much better if they had made him the Batman Beyond version, set somewhere around the middle of the gap between the heart attack and Terry becoming the new Batman. That way, he's still a good guy, not able to fight, and is actually playing a version he voiced.

Oliver as the Spectre is going to be awesome....provided he actually turns into the Spectre, and we don't just get Stephen Amell with glowing green eyes.

The Flash 90 dying was something I think everyone saw coming from a mile away.

DC Movie Unverse crossover.  Seriously, that was the one thing I thought for sure we would not get!

Multiverse still exists, although it appears to be a different multiverse.  Most notable is that Earth 2 is completely different, being Stargirl's Earth.  Like the comics, however, all the previous Arrowverse shows, including Black Lightning, are now set on Earth Prime. It also confirms that Titans and Doom Patrol are indeed separate universes, which has been confusing people for a while.

Also, Justice League!  Or proto Justice League, anyway. Love the Superfriends theme song.

Superman flew out into space, smiled for the camera. Sweet.

Me watching Arrow's installment: HOLY CRAP IT'S EZRA MILLER!

That was a very pleasant surprise. And pretty in character too: Ezra Miller's Flash is every bit as awkward and nervous as he was in Justice League, if not more so. I also enjoyed Gustin's Barry commenting on his suit. "Looks very safe". And Ezra's Flash got the name "The Flash" from Grant's Flash AND learned about the Speed Force from him. I wonder, if the Flashpoint movie ever gets made, is this scene going to be mentioned in some way?

Also, Crisis on Infinite Earths: the storyline so epic, they killed off Oliver Queen twice!

Lex Luthor was definitely a highlight. The creators certainly seem to like him. And it looks like he'll be making more appearances in Supergirl going forward (and is once again a villain with good publicity as in several other iterations, and owns the DEO).

Even during the crossovers, I still make a point of looking closely at the credits to see who's credited as guest star (making sure to remember that series regulars will be credited even if they don't appear in the episode). So when I saw "Reina Hardesty" credited I was like "Weather Witch is in this?" But her showing up in during a Supergirl-centric sequence is actually very effective in establishing that a) the Supergirl (and Black Lightning) Earths are now part of Earth Prime and b) that villains and supporting characters from National City and Freeland can now just pop up in Star City, Central City, and Gotham whenever the creators want, which makes things a lot more simple. I remember fondly the various episodes of Flash where characters like Felicity (who's understandably absent in these episodes - her mourning Oliver's (first) death happened in a tie-in comic, but I imagine we'll see how she's doing during the final episodes of Arrow), Diggle, Layla and Ray would pop in during Flash episodes whenever there was a good reason. This will make Supergirl guest appearances in Batgirl much more streamlined.

The return of Beebo got a laugh out of me. I noticed the episode of Legends notably avoided referencing what happened to Zari in any way (other than having her actress in the main credits; I also notice the Monitor was on there; is the Monitor going to be appearing throughout Legends this year?) Zari's namedropped in the title of an episode of Legends this year so I'm sure that'll be properly addressed going forward.

Other things I enjoyed:

-The Anti-Monitor turning giant sized, as a homage to basically every other iteration of the character (I think the Beebo reveal was also meant to make viewers think that was going to happen)
-Supergirl flying at the Monitor before Ray showed was surely a reference to the death of Supergirl during the original comic.
-Marv Wolfman cameo. I didn't know that was him so I'm glad they made a point to have him call himself "Marv".
-A quick glace at what other Earths exist - which confirmed something I'd been wondering for a while - that Doom Patrol and Titans do in fact exist in different Earths (explaining recastings and other continuity oddities between the two shows regarding the DP)
-Diggle and Layla getting their daughter back (along with John Jr) got an "ahh" out of me.
-Still a better use of Mick than the past season of Legends.

Other random thoughts:
-Lois and Clark have two sons now? Um, ok then, that's different.
-For a bit during the final episode I thought Ray was going to die and Nash was going to join the Legends. I'm glad Ray's not gone yet though - he should get more screentime before they write him out and killing him off would just take some of the spotlight off Oliver.
-Star Labs had Gleek from Superfriends? Um, that's odd. Is he still a space monkey or he more like Grodd Jr? Also, does this mean the Wonder Twins will be showing up in the future? Because they've gotten a revival in the comics recently as well....come to think of it, the term "Super Friends" has been used several times in Supergirl and Flash before this...Come to think of it, if the Hall of Justice was an abandoned Star Labs facility, what was Gleek eating?
-J'onn now looks like David Harewood, even when in costume, unless he's going to be doing things that use CGI. I see what you did there Arrowverse...
-Nash has got to go. Literally the only thing he had going for him was becoming Pariah, and now that that's over and he's still around I have no idea what they can do with him, and as I've said, the Wells gag has gotten old. I think if they're going to bring back Harry they should just keep him in the cast again and stop making the rotating Wells gag a season-long thing. And if they do insist on keeping Nash for the rest of the season they better find some way to make him more interesting.
-Man, I hope Legends doesn't suck this year...  :unsure:
-Lex is apparently an Alien and Predator fan. I'm surprised. He strikes me as more of a Citizen Kane or Amadeus man.
-[EDIT] Oh, yeah, almost forgot. Why the hell was Ryan Choi the only one who's hair (his beard) grew while they were trapped on Vanishing Point? He grew a beard, and everyone else looked exactly the same. I'm not remembering that wrong am I?

Questions I have going forward:

1. What happened to Harry Wells and Jesse?
2. Does Lex still have powers?
3. With Lex's status quo being drastically rewritten, is Lena still a villain?
4. Is Leviathan still going to be part of the plot in Supergirl?

-The Arrowverse kids are apparently in the future again, as seen in next week's episode/Backdoor pilot "Green Arrow and the Canarys" aka "Arrow's back to being really boring, and SS reads stuff online for an hour"
-Superman and Lois has been picked up for a full series.
-Legends is getting another season after the current one.
-Supergirl's next two episodes should be very interesting: The first one's called "Bottle Episode" and those of us who know our Superman lore can guess what that's alluding to (Bottled Citys and/or Kandor/and/or Brainiac; and considering Krypton is now cancelled, I could see Supergirl using Brainy's evil ancestor in person now) After that, Supergirl's doing a story called "Back From The Future" featuring a copycat Toyman (another one?) and Winn coming back from the future. If Brainy goes back to the future that just leads credence to my prediction that a Legion show will happen in the future.

Black Lightning's younger daughter also remember the multiverse.  Given that she was able to mentally contact her counterparts from Earths 1 and 2, it doesn't particularly surprise me.

Legends: there's plenty of Ray and Nora in the new promo (a promo for the new season, not strictly the next episode), so they'll probably be in it for a while. Ryan is notably absent. Behrad is shown several times (and I missed this, but when I went back and re-watched the Beebo sequence I caught that Sara mentions Behrad a few times, thus confirming that Zari is still replaced with him)

Flash: Is coming back a bit later than the other shows, and apparently will have some new and returning villains.

Supergirl: Lex is pulling the "that murdering scumbag wasn't me, it was a doppleganger from an alternate earth" scheme, as seen in 52. It worked there because they had an actual body to identify, so I'm curious how exactly it's supposed to work here. I just assumed Lex rewrote his own "destiny" using the book of Destiny, as seen during Crisis.

Helen Slater, Dean Cain, Teri Hatcher and Lynda Carter have all been on SUPERGIRL before. Would have been cool to see any of them (well, not Hatcher, obviously) back in costume, even if just for a few seconds.

The Marv Wolfman cameo was a nice touch.

Also, meh to Ezra Miller showing up as the movie Flash. He's my least favorite of the movie characters, because they've written that Flash as a hyperactive idiot, and the costume is awful.

Obviously, they could have Oliver pop up again as the Spectre if the threat is dangerous enough.

And hopefully the writers give Black Lightning and his supporting cast more to do in the next crossover.

Gleek and the Superfriends theme? Awesome. Wonder Twins going to show up at some poin?

Looking forward to the new shows coming, except the Canaries one or whatever they call it. Couldn't care less. The brief glimpse of Stargirl has me holding out hope for a proper JSA. The version on LEGENDS was rather disappointing. The heroes they did used almost looked like cosplayers with a midrange budget. Hope Jay is on that Earth.....

The Miller cameo was not planned or requested by the Arrowverse people.  Warner actually called them up AFTER they had already locked down the entire 5 episodes and asked if there was any way they could fit a Miller cameo in there. They had to get Gustin and a Flash crew to agree to come in as that was not part of their contracted season.  And they had to use  a Flash crew unlike the rest of the episode because the Arrow season had already wrapped at that point and the Arrow crew no longer existed.

So that scene was the very last thing written and filmed for the crossover.

Not sure what the significance of the movie people requesting this is, but it is interesting.  Maybe a sort of stealth promotion for the upcoming film?

That scene, from Miller's point of view, better be in his movie.

Honestly I don't know that the scene needs to be IN the movie (the Speed Force echo and weird editing works in context, but I don't think it'd hold up in a film), but I'd be ok if we saw the prelude and aftermath... sort of like the first Flash/Supergirl crossover, where in the Flash episode Barry warps away and comes back a bit befuddled, having experienced the events from the Supergirl episode.

Oh it makes perfect sense for Warner Bros to put that in the movie. The Flash movie has been in development hell for years now, and with no Justice League movies coming out right now, it makes sense for WB to want to get him out there and put him back in the public eye to tide them over for the movie. Plus as near as I can tell Ezra Miller's not nearly as successful or established  an actor as Cavill or Ben Affleck (or any of the previous Batman movie actors, for that matter) so he was probably the cheapest and easiest actor to lock in. He was in The Fantastic Beasts movies, but I try not to hold that against him considering bad that last one was.

I've heard people discuss whether or not that will be in his movie, and it's been suggested it could simply be referenced as something that happened offscreen, with one person online saying Miller's Barry could simply write it off as a "dream". Though the line "I told Victor this would happen" was a curious one, since Flash didn't seem to know about the Speed Force and hadn't thought of the name Flash yet, but apparently already knows Cyborg, and it sounds like he was planning to experiment with time travel already (that "Lois Lane is the key" cameo in BVS, for example, though supposedly that would have paid off properly in the mythical Snyder Cut)

QuoteThe brief glimpse of Stargirl has me holding out hope for a proper JSA. The version on LEGENDS was rather disappointing. The heroes they did used almost looked like cosplayers with a midrange budget. Hope Jay is on that Earth.....

When you say Jay, do you mean Jay Garrick in general, or the John Wesley Shipp version from the Flash show? Because it would be interesting to see if he's still around somewhere.

As for the JSA, as indicated from the Stargirl trailers, the characters are from the backstory, so at least some of them (Starman, for example) are already dead. So it might be wise not to get your hopes up. From what we've seen, I do think they look (visually, I mean) better than they did in Legends. The truth is they probably didn't value doing the JSA that well in Legends; I think the only reason they were in the show at all was to replace Mari as Vixen.

I mean Jay Garrick in general. But since they did have the John Wesley Shipp version mention once that he was training a female speedster and we still haven't seen her, I'm hoping that version of Jay is still around somewhere.

I know some characters will be dead. Starman kind of has to be, due to Stargirl's backstory and having the Cosmic Staff. Apparently Joel McHale will be playing Starman. I assume that will be Jack, the more recent version, who retired. Not Ted, the original who is deceased.

The JSA, not the JLA, is my favorite DC team.