Took a while to start, and took a while to finish, but I finally managed to get through the CW's Arrowverse crossover for this season, Crisis on Infinite Earths. It's been teased heavily for a while, with some of the characters from last season's Elseworlds crossover hinting at it, and the Crisis has also been intended to serve as a sendoff for Arrow, the CW's first show in this shared universe.
Like all of the Arrowverse shows, there are a few easily anticipated negatives: the quality from show to show, and from episode to episode, can be variable (just like during the regular season; it's not always clear that the story requires being told across so many hours; and if you don't watch a specific show that participates, there can be a moment of adjusting to figuring out who all the new faces are (or, if you do watch the show, it can be jarring to go from normal one week, crossover the next and back again the week after that).
For this one I'd also add that the mix of characters sometimes struck me as weird, with the so-called Paragons facing off against armies of shadow demons who... burst into ash the minute you hit them? This is convenient for keeping the plot moving, but if you stop to think about why the guy tipped as the new Atom, Ryan Choi, can help the likes of Supergirl and the Flash, then it starts to fall apart.
But that's not why we're here!
They've hinted already in a number of previous seasons and episodes that basically any live-action DC-based show can be included as canon for the Arrowverse. Sometimes it was blatant, like pulling John Constantine from NBC's short-lived show for a pivotal part of Arrow Season 4, and other times it was more subtle, like bringing John Wesley Shipp back to play the same Flash that he played in the early 90s show (and kudos to the Flash team for also bringing in Mark Hamill to play the Trickster, the role he played in that early show, but also filtered through the version of the Joker that he voiced in the 90 Batman animated series).
This time, however, they went all out, and from a fan-service point of view it was all extremely satisfying. The first episode features cameos from none other than Robert Wuhl in his role from the 1989 Michael Keaton Batman (Earth-89) and Burt Ward giving his catchphrase from the 1960s Adam West Batman (Earth-66). Another episode has a cameo from the old Birds of Prey show, they even found time to bring back Tom Welling to reprise the version of Clark Kent he played on Smallville - I only watched a couple of seasons of that show but it warmed the cockles of this jaded old heart to see even him. And of course, they brought in none other than Kevin Conroy to play future Bruce Wayne, which I loved, at least at first.
They also pulled in some more contemporary cameos, for instance DC Universe's Titans, Doom Patrol and Swamp Thing, and the one that made me squeal with the most glee was seeing Lucifer pop up (on Earth-666, no less). I was less sure of Ezra Miller's Barry Allen appearing, because I don't like that version of the Justice League and I don't know if his movie's ever actually coming out, but from the perspective of showing that all DC shows are linked, it was nice to see.
In terms of story, it was entertaining enough - in the title I suggest this is the DC version of Marvel's Avengers: Endgame, which is accurate in terms of closing out one phase of the last few years' shows, but maybe less accurate in terms of plot cohesiveness, for the reasons I mentioned above. But for all the relatively cheap looking sets and effects, it's still nice seeing a classic story like the 1985 Crisis brought to life, pulling in loads of new and old characters and giving them some surprisingly resonant moments, like when the Old Flash remembers a scene from the 90s TV show before disappearing into the Speed Force.
And as far as a farewell for Arrow, it's a nice sendoff for Stephen Amell to kill him not once but twice, bringing him back as the Spectre and allowing some of his supporting cast the leeway to move on to their next shows, like Green Arrow and the Canaries. As mentioned above, the show has seen variable quality, with a good first season, great second, meh third and fourth, and similar ups and downs since.
From the very first season, the creators have thrown in Easter eggs for seasoned fans, both of Green Arrow lore and of DC in general. The current incarnation of Team Arrow has had some curiously D-list supporting players, like Wild Dog. But while some reviewers thought that a negative, I liked it because it was more in keeping with the incarnation of the character that has most influenced this show.
Mike Grell's version of Green Arrow, starting with the Longbow Hunters miniseries, was aimed more at adults and fit in with the Question, Wild Dog and Vigilante as a street-level corner of the DC Universe. Batman would appear from time to time, but so would the word "shit", and the more fantastical super powers were pretty rare. It came at about the same time as Neil Gaiman's Sandman, but while that book spawned the entire Vertigo line, Green Arrow and the Question carried on as their own weird little sub-universe for a few years and then were subsumed back into the main universe. The ironic thing is that if they'd kept on longer, they might have been able to survive within Vertigo once it grew past its horror/dark fantasy roots to include crime books like 100 Bullets.
The other funny thing about Arrow is that because they couldn't use Batman, Green Arrow effectively filled that niche for the Arrowverse, becoming the elder statesman and brooding human vigilante figure - so it's not too surprising how they've skipped past Batman to have a Batwoman show instead, all the while retconning Bruce Wayne and Gotham City into the universe.
It's a little sad to see Arrow draw to an end after all these years - it was one of the first shows I watched on Netflix when I moved back here to the US - but it has been pretty long in the tooth for a while. After season 5, a particular high, they were dragged down by the Ricardo Diaz storyline that went on through two seasons before fizzling out (pun intended, given that someone set him on fire). But it was still fun seeing Ollie and the gang fight the latest menace, and spotting the latest fan service reference (like, why did it take me so long to realize that his buddy Anatoly was the KGBeast from the comics?).
So I'll miss the show, because of the fun times I've had with it. Seeing Ollie go from violent vigilante to mayor to... well, the Spectre, has been entertaining at times and infuriating at others. I'll probably not keep on with the Canaries show, because his daughter Mia and the potential future setting don't grab me as much, though if it gets good reviews I'll probably revise that opinion. I don't know how long I'll keep on with the Flash either, as that's never again hit the heights of its first season, though it's always fun to see how the creators add some new wrinkle to their already convoluted mythology.
In any case, I mentioned several years ago how DC was killing it on TV, if not at the movies, and it's been nice to see that at least some of the attitudes and traditions that I love about DC Comics have made it to the Arrowverse. That may not continue, but in compensation DC looks to be finding its feet at the movies again, starting with Wonder Woman and going through Aquaman and Shazam, which were both surprisingly watchable. I'm just hoping they can manage a good new Superman movie, for once.
And if not... well, maybe Brandon Routh can be persuaded to don the black shield once more and do Kingdom Come? Because that was another fun Easter egg to see.
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