SPOILERS AHEAD, OBVIOUSLY
PREVIOUSLY ON THE CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS: ALMOST EVERYONE DIED!
After a flashback to the start of the Monitor’s journey and all this nonsense, we join the Paragons who are the only people in the Multiverse left alive. These, once again, are the Flash (Barry Allen), Supergirl (Kara Danvers), Batwoman (Kate Kane), Martian Manhunter (J’onn J’onzz), White Canary (Sarah Lance), Ryan Choi, and the usurper Lex Luthor. It’s been a while since we last saw them, both in real life and in the continuity of the show, and it’s been rough on everyone but Barry who has simply disappeared. The only two trying to do anything proactive are Lex and Ryan, who are building a teleporter that winds up not working since there’s nowhere to teleport to. In other words, things aren’t going well.
Meanwhile, in Purgatory, Oliver Queen is learning how to be the Spectre from Jim Corrigan. The end goal is taking the fight to the Anti-Monitor in a desperate bid to undo the destruction of the everything. As they finish their chat, Barry pops back into existence with the news that the Speed Force is going super wonky. Oliver pops in after Barry to let the Paragons know that he can super-charge Barry to allow him to transport everyone back to the beginning of time to fix everything.
The plan doesn’t go well. Barry successfully drops Supergirl, Lex Luthor, and Ryan Choi off but the Anti-Monitor pops in and forces him off course which also results in Oliver’s essence being scattered along with the rest of the Paragons. This takes the form of the Flash running through Oliver’s memories to retrieve the Paragons while Supergirl and Ryan Choi deal with their situation which has been made worse because Lex Luthor has given himself super-powers and he’s attempting to manipulate the Monitor into helping him gain control over everything.
The Paragons are retrieved and the Monitor agrees to never start all this nonsense. Unfortunately, they wind up at the beginning of time and discover that there’s infinite Monitors who are all itching to inadvertently allow this whole mess to begin. The Paragons, led by Oliver, face the Anti-Monitor in battle in a desperate bid to jump-start the Multiverse. They succeed, but the effort winds up killing Oliver for real this time.
Kara then wakes up in her apartment in National City, confused but happy that her world is back. This lasts until she learns that Lex Luthor is not only winning the Nobel Peace Prize but, along with his sister Lena, has always been one of her staunchest supporters. While her confusion is lessened when J’onn shows up to let her know that the crisis actually happened, she’s given the chance for catharsis when there’s news of a villain attacking the city.
The villain in question is the Weather Witch from Central City and Earth-1, and when the Flash shows up to help everyone’s confusion intensifies until Marv Wolfman reveals that as far as the common citizen is concerned all the major Earths (namely, ones where CW shows take place) have always been the same Earth. While they’re reeling from this revelation, Sarah Lance is walking around Star City in a daze until she meets up with Ray Palmer and both are set right by J’onn J’onnz, who has been going around restoring the memories of all the costumed heroes who are called in to deal with a giant Beebo which winds up to be an illusion conjured by Sargon the Sorcerer while he robbed a bank. Meanwhile, Harrison “Nash” Wells has been recovered and is in the care of STAR Labs and reveals that the Anti-Monitor is still out there.
This revelation is only moderately helpful as the shadow demons are already attacking, but everyone joins forces to combat the threat. This includes Ryan Choi and Black Lightning, whose Earth was also merged into this new one. This is actually a nice sequence with all the characters involved given a chance to work to their strengths, with scientist heroes like the Flash and Atom dividing their time between facing the Anti-Monitor head-on and working to finish the shrink bomb they’ve decided will neutralize him. It works, and the President of the United States commends the heroes while revealing that everyone believes Oliver Queen died during this battle. After this, every hero that headlines a show at this point meet up in the warehouse from the first CW crossover and, after memorializing Oliver Queen, basically found the Justice League.
Overall, I enjoyed this crossover though I do wish some of the more minor characters were given more to do in the finale and I have to wonder why Iris Allen was completely left out of things because you’d think she’d be there to give Barry a shoulder to cry on. I also felt that did a much better job of integrating their history and the current state of DC’s live action offerings, unlike another company which talked big but wound up completely fumbling things when it counted.
CHANGES TO EARTH-1
-First of all, it’s called Earth Prime now.
-Layla, John Diggle’s wife, survived her turn as Harbringer and they have two kids again which may mean that Barry’s actions in Flashpoint have been reversed.
-Lois and Clark have two kids instead of just one.
-National City and Freedland (Black Lightning’s base of operations) are on the same Earth as the other CW shows now.
-There’s still a multiverse, though.
THE NEW MULTIVERSE
These are all the ones they show us at the end, though the others may still exist. There’s just no confirmation.
OTHER NEAT STUFF
- During the journey through the Speed Force, the Flash meets the Ezra Miller Flash. Whether or not this is part of the multiverse now is unknown.
- Lex has given himself super-powers, though whether or not they stick is yet to be seen.
- Ryan tries to help fight the shadow demons but just yells and flails at them, which is all one can hope for in some situations.
- Oliver Queen tells the Anti-Monitor that he’s failed this universe, which is a nice nod to his early catch-phrase.
- When Batwoman shows up to help fight Beebo Supergirl gets super excited and it’s adorable. Also, at the end Kate Kane is hanging out with Kara and Alex Danvers. I’m glad they’re friends.
- The whole thing ends with the Justice League hearing monkey noises in their new headquarters, and we see an open cage labeled “Gleek” and then we zoom out while the Superfriends theme plays and zoom out on the warehouse, which still looks exactly like the Hall of Justice. They ended their biggest event to date by teasing Gleek and evoking Superfriends, which is a heck of a way to end this.
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