While I usually review ‘Arrow,’ last night’s episode was part of the big ‘Crisis on Earth X’ crossover event, so this week’s review is going to be a little different, as I’m going to touch on the events that also occurred on ‘Supergirl,’ as they directly informed this week’s ‘Arrow.’ Honestly, none of the CW series feel like they standalone this week, but are rather just all part of one giant 4-hour movie.
So basically, ‘Crisis on Earth X,’ in great comic-book tradition, basically starts with the wedding of Barry Allen and Iris West, with almost all of the heroes of the four major shows of the network coming together to celebrate this union (except oddly for most of Team Arrow minus Felicity and Oliver, and most of the Legends, except for Sara and Rory. I thought at least Dig and Ray Palmer would warrant an invitation). Leading up to the big nuptials we see that Kara Danvers and her sister have chosen to attend the cross-dimensional event as a way to escape their love-lorn lives back home, with Alex finding a friend in Sara Lance, who she has her first drunken one-night stand with following the rehearsal dinner, much to Kara’s amusement and her own horror. Meanwhile, Oliver is very much in the wedding spirit, and after talking with Barry about how marriage gives them something to fight for, Oliver decides to broach the subject with Felicity, who does not take it well, and rather publicly turns down his proposal, saying she does not want to marry Oliver. We later found out a lot of her feelings come from the last time the pair got engaged when she felt everything went wrong, as right after they got engaged she was shot, and that was followed by her leg paralysis, and eventually finding out Oliver had a son which he lied to her about, which ended their relationship the first time.
The big day finally arrives, with Kara singing Iris down the altar after having been asked by Barry to show off her non-heroic superpowered voice (a nice touch I thought), and just when things look like they might turn out alright, the wedding is hit by Nazis from Earth X. I should mention, earlier we had been introduced to a dark Archer fighting “rebels” in Earth X, and later a dark woman who looked like Supergirl talking about plans with her superiors, all of which seemed ominous, and we all had a feeling they would be showing up to break up the wedding anyway, it is how comic-book stories work after all.
Anyway, the wedding is attacked, and everyone jumps into action. Alex and Sara take down a dark archer with a mask very similar to last year’s villain Prometheus, while Oliver takes on another archer frightening similar to his skill level. While Cisco is helping take down bad guys he is hit in the head by debris from Supergirl’s battle with her own dark doppelganger and knocked unconscious, while Rory is impressed when Killer Frost comes out to play, clearly liking having another cold partner to match his heat. Eventually, Kara knocks out her dark attacker and the Earth X Nazi’s retreat, though Cisco cannot be woken, hurting their research into where these people came from. Fortunately, Rory has brought along the memory modifier so none of the guests remember the heroes fighting out of costume, and they have a prisoner, the Prometheus looking guy that Sara and Alex took down, who turns out to be the Tommy Merlyn of Earth X, much to Felicity and Oliver’s shock.
So now we finally get to the ‘Arrow’ hour, which starts with Oliver speaking to Tommy-X in the Star Labs prison, with Tommy pretending to listen to Oliver’s promise to help him, and fight against his dark superiors in Earth X. Eventually, Tommy calls Oliver a fool and says his weakness and gullibleness is why he is going to lose, right before he takes a suicide pill and kills himself, much to Oliver’s shock. At that moment across town, we learn that the archer Oliver had been fighting is actually Oliver of Earth X, the dark Supergirl is Kara of Earth X, and the reverse Flash is also working with the villains of Earth X, forming an evil triumvirate intent on taking over all dimensions, but first they have another plan involving their Kara X, who apparently Oliver-X is in love with.
They are alerted to the death of Tommy, which stings Oliver X, but they know they have to move forward with the plan. They stage a heist and steal a massive ruby, and are almost foiled by the arrival of the Flash, Supergirl and the Green Arrow (who arrives later than the rest, commenting in a great moment that he does not have super speed), and the Earth X villains reveal their identities to our heroes. They fight, and the ruby is stolen, but not before Oliver manages to shoot Kara-X with a kryptonite arrow, revealing its existence a bit too early as it was not a kill shot (and also alarming Kara who wants to know why Oliver had one of those).
They retreat back to Star Labs where Cisco is sadly still unconscious, unable to help them as he is their main source for cross-dimension research and jumping, since he can open breaches, though Felicity has been in touch with the Quiver Crew back in Star City, having Curtis use their satellites to look for the dark doppelgangers. Barry and Iris have a moment lamenting the fact that the Reverse Flash is still alive, and once more wearing the face of Harrison Welles just to torture Barry. They manage to locate the villains once more and head out to confront them, leaving Felicity, Harry, Iris, Rory and Caitlin at STAR Labs, with Oliver and Felicity agreeing they would talk more about this marriage business later, as Oliver needs to focus on the upcoming battle right now.
The heroes arrive at the staple location for a battle in the Arrowverse, an abandoned warehouse, and they begin to battle the Nazis and their doppelgangers, with Supergirl, the Flash, the Green Arrow, Firestorm, Alex Danvers, and White Canary all part of the fray, more or less holding their own against the massive number of bad guys arrayed against them, though they do notice the Oliver of Earth X is not there. Sadly for them, Harry spots Oliver X at STAR Labs right before he is knocked unconscious, though Harry does manage to set off the alarms. Felicity and Iris hide, while Rory and Caitlyn (going full Frost) head out to fight Oliver X. Rory is easily taken down by a binding arrow, though Frost seems to be winning, her freeze effect having a hold on the bow and making its way through Oliver X’s body. He activates some kind of electric charge and she is knocked unconscious as well. Oliver X asks if anyone else wants to be a hero and just in that moment the rest of Team Arrow arrives (minus Dig, who is still out of commission), and they battle the dark doppelganger of their boss, with Curtis loving the intro they just received. Sadly, they had no budget for this fight, so Team Arrow is handily defeated by Oliver X with no Canary Cry from Dinah or usage of the T-Spheres by Curtis, which was very disappointing in my opinion. Back at the warehouse, the Earth X villains reveal their new weapon, Metallo, who they clearly freed from Kara’s Earth, whose surprise appearance helps take down all the heroes, and everyone is captured.
The episode ends with the villains monologuing their plans. Apparently, Kara-X is dying from too much solar radiation having literally flown too close to the sun too many times, and in order to save her, they need a new heart, hence why they need Kara Danvers. And the ruby they stole was to create a fake red-sun so they can weaken Kara enough to cut out her heart. Back at STAR labs, all the heroes taken down there are thrown into the cells beneath the building, though Iris and Felicity are still on the loose, and at the moment they do not have a plan and can only watch as the heroes are locked up. Back at the warehouse, the villains knock out all the heroes and when they wake up, they find themselves in lock-up with power dampeners around their necks, fairly certain they are now on Earth X.
BOW-STRING THEORIES:
- Well they lucked out, Thea was not in the cross-over, but she wasn’t really needed or missed because it did not take place in Star City. Only 4 more episodes this season for her to be absent from.
- My guess here, we are either going to see Oliver and Felicity engaged by the end of the cross-over or the end of this season because they are clearly planting the seeds.
- Where are the rest of the Legends? There was mention of them being in the stone-age when asked about where the Waverider was, can we hope they will be the ones Felicity and Iris will contact, and will hopefully come to help save the day.
- Is there a chance Diggle will show up to help?
- Really enjoyed seeing Tommy Merlyn back on the show, even for a brief cameo. Power of the crossovers.
Just from the first two-hours, I think this year’s crossover is doing really well and might be better than last year’s Dominator centered event. Sure, there are moments like the Team Arrow fight where you get the sense that they ran out of money, but then you get things like the warehouse fight where it is clear how much budget is going into the event, and it is really fun to see all these heroes on-screen working together and it truly feels like a live-action version of something you would see in the comics. Can’t wait to see how it all wraps up tonight!
