Arrowverse's Crisis on Infinite Earths to be 5-Part Crossover

[Christopher]

I'm expecting the main show's to be merged onto one Earth, but for new shows and new Earth's to still be found and explored in a still-existing multiverse.

I still don't think there's any point to merging the universes, and a lot would be lost. Why would Supergirl set up this season-long villain arc with Leviathan as these ancient beings "defending" the Earth if they were going to permanently destroy the Earth that Leviathan was associated with? Why send Malefic off to fight for peace on Mars, then destroy Mars a week later?

The fundamental difference between this and the comics is that the comics rebooted their whole continuity from scratch, reinvented the characters and their backstories as a single universe. That wouldn't work here. They're not going to reboot the characters. The individual shows still have their own distinct story and character arcs in progress. Merging their universes midway through the season just doesn't fit into that. As a season finale, hypothetically, maybe. It's not unprecedented for a show to do a wholesale continuity reboot between seasons, like when TNT's Witchblade ended season 1 with a time loop that reset everything to the beginning. But midseason, with ongoing seasonal arcs still in progress? I just don't see that working structurally.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

If the multiverse is gone, I will be less, not more, enthusiastic about the shows going forward. I see no compelling reason to merge anything.

..and again, that forces weaker shows to crossover with the stronger series where the differences in production, acting ability, etc. from the weaker series are glaring.

 

[Phoenix219]

I still don't think there's any point to merging the universes, and a lot would be lost. Why would Supergirl set up this season-long villain arc with Leviathan as these ancient beings "defending" the Earth if they were going to permanently destroy the Earth that Leviathan was associated with? Why send Malefic off to fight for peace on Mars, then destroy Mars a week later?

The fundamental difference between this and the comics is that the comics rebooted their whole continuity from scratch, reinvented the characters and their backstories as a single universe. That wouldn't work here. They're not going to reboot the characters. The individual shows still have their own distinct story and character arcs in progress. Merging their universes midway through the season just doesn't fit into that. As a season finale, hypothetically, maybe. It's not unprecedented for a show to do a wholesale continuity reboot between seasons, like when TNT's Witchblade ended season 1 with a time loop that reset everything to the beginning. But midseason, with ongoing seasonal arcs still in progress? I just don't see that working structurally.

Why can't every single one of those things just now be part of the history of Earth 1, and still be going on in their exact form?

 

[thribs]

Maybe some will merge with Earth-1 and some with Earth-38.
Maybe Superman will move to Earth-1 leaving Supergirl on 38. That way we will be closer to the JL forming.

 

[The Realist]

EW has posted an interview with Marc Guggenheim about Crisis on Infinite Earths.
He does talk about hoping their ending will live up to the big status quo changing ending of the original comic. So it sounds like there will be some pretty big changes coming at the end of it.
They did pick some story points from the comic that they worked into their version.
One of the things that Guggenheim liked about this was being able to develop the relationship between Kate and Kara, which he compares to the relationship we've seen between Barry and Oliver in earlier crossovers.
Sarah gets the most focus of any of the Legends because of her connection to Oliver.
We will get at least one scene of Brandon Routh's Superman interacting with Brandon Routh's Atom.

I was particularly intrigued by this comment from Guggenheim:

Marv [Wolfman]’s interpretation of Lex Luthor, in particular, is genius. What phenomenal, phenomenal material for Jon Cryer!

(Wolfman co-wrote the Arrow installment of "CoIE," which we won't see till January.)

ETA: Guggenheim has also promised another "HUGE" announcement incoming before "Crisis" begins. Source: https://comicbook.com/dc/2019/12/04...arths-has-one-more-big-announcement-before-i/

And another in-depth interview with Guggenheim here: https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-...-cw-crossover-behind-scenes-interview-920570/

I found this bit especially interesting:

[Guggenheim] told the creative teams of all the CW shows (including Black Lightning, whose title character will participate even though Crisis isn’t making an episode for it) to consider Crisis “a magic ticket” that would allow them to make whatever changes, big or small, to their continuity, in the same way that Superman and Wonder Woman got new origin stories and altered supporting casts in the wake of the original comic book Crisis.

 

[Professor Zoom]

Its always this lame Wally-clone with brown hair, but named Barry.

Because Wally was a more interesting character than Barry EVER was, it makes sense adaptations grab onto him and then slap Barry's name on.

 

[JD]

I was particularly intrigued by this comment from Guggenheim:

(Wolfman co-wrote the Arrow installment of "CoIE," which we won't see till January.)

ETA: Guggenheim has also promised another "HUGE" announcement incoming before "Crisis" begins. Source: https://comicbook.com/dc/2019/12/04...arths-has-one-more-big-announcement-before-i/

And another in-depth interview with Guggenheim here: https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-...-cw-crossover-behind-scenes-interview-920570/

I found this bit especially interesting:

Even if they do tweak some of the series continuities, I still can't see them fully merging the different Earths.

 

[Phoenix219]

Because Wally was a more interesting character than Barry EVER was, it makes sense adaptations grab onto him and then slap Barry's name on.

Its almost sadly hilarious that they take a blond, and a ginger, and turn them all into brown haired guys.

Wally was flawed, and had a character arc, and learned and grew the entire time..... between the initial post crisis stuff, the 90s run, linda, impulse, the flash family, the speed force, max mercury and the quicks.... mentored by garrick..... everything awesome about the Flash has *always* been Wally West. I don't even think Reverse Flash and the Thawnes were half as big a deal until Wally. Zoom was all Wally.

 

[thribs]

Maybe it ends with the universes being closed off and Superman gets stranded?

 

[Christopher]

Why can't every single one of those things just now be part of the history of Earth 1, and still be going on in their exact form?

Because that doesn't work for the storytelling needs of each individual show. The crossovers are fun, but they're exceptions to the norm. The priority for each show has to be its own stories and characters. None of the prior crossovers has merely copied what the comics did; rather, it's used a premise from the comics as a way to serve and advance the character arcs of the various series. The needs of the shows as individual, ongoing productions take priority over a single gimmicky event, no matter how huge.

Also because that's not what happened in the comics' Crisis.Things didn't just "go on in their exact form," or if they did, it was with a new history retconned in before them. It was a way of starting over with the whole publishing line, reinventing the individual series and replacing the continuity that had come before. There's just no reason the Arrowverse producers would need or want to do that with their shows, which are going along just fine with no need for massive overhauls.

Besides, what we're shown in the trailer, evidently, is Earth-38 and Argo City (and presumably Mars-38 too) being annihilated, with the population of at least Earth-38 being evacuated. There's nothing to indicate any kind of blending of histories, merely the moving of people from one dimension to another. There's no way that fits into the Leviathan plot they have ongoing. And there's no way they'd just tear down all their costly standing sets either. That destruction is going to be undone somehow.

 

[Phoenix219]

Yup, it'll be undone with a merging/blending, allowing them to keep all of their storylines and sets, but be placed all on one earth.

 

[JD]

I think the big problem with trying to merge Earth-38 with Earth-1 is the alien question. If you add aliens to Earth-1's history it's going to complicate a lot of the history from Arrow and The Flash, but removing aliens from Supergirl's history fucks it up even more. If you throw Black Lightning's Earth into that too, then how do you handle it's history of super powers? It seems that pretty much all super powers in that come from the Green Light, so suddenly throwing it into a world with other metas, and potentially aliens, would compltely fuck it up to. The whole Markovian invasion would make no sense if there were other place were they could go to pick themselves up some metas or super powered aliens.

 

[Christopher]

Even if they did fold in Supergirl (which there is absolutely no good reason to do, since it's not as if the Earth-1 shows ever interact anymore outside of the crossovers anyway), there's no way they'll do it to Black Lightning too, since that's more distinct production-wise from the other shows (both in terms of who produces it and where it's shot), and targeted for a somewhat different audience.

 

[thribs]

Sucks that Supernatural isn’t a DC property as they would have been hilarious in this. Probably too OP though.

 

[Morpheus 02]

We go over this a lot... but what the hey.

All of the CW characters WERE IN ONE UNIVERSE for like 2 generations. That would be a huge reason why they all belong together. And for Supergirl, she was on a different network.. presumable if her show succeeded there, it would make sense for it to be another universe. ANd Blak Lightning's creators, i suspect, wanted to maintain creative control of the characters, and NOT have them shaped by others, but rather in house, so that others would need to conform to them.

We're all STar Trek fans, here right? We are VERY used to reconciling contradictions.

For me, how i see it:

Arrow : Star City was small enough and out there enough that "major" heroes would never stop by, so for that city, Arrow was the first.

Flash: instead of all metas seeming coming from Central City (either the accelerator or dark matter), it opens up that world a bit. (And the city, too, seems relatively small)

Supergirl: all the action seems to be on the coast lines, Gotham and National City. Supergirl, at least was a new phenomenon, isloated mostly to her city.

Legends of Tomorrow : They are so out there... they would probably openly acknowledge and mock any inconsistencies or complaints

Black Lightning: again, a lot of this is isolated to Freeland. The Markovian thing -- there might be some treaties or something , and some other government stuff, to excuse who no one has come to help. I can totally picture the show, pretty much in tact, as being in a post-Crisis Earth. (The mention of what was it, Vixen and SUpergirl... i think could EASILY be interpreted as being real, as Jennifer seemed to believe her mom). Also Black Lightning was an urban legend, like Batman, until recently. So he hasn't made any Super Friends outside of his hometown ... yet.

Batwoman: she also just got started, and Gotham centric for now. So, a post-Crisis world for her is easy to imagine. And Batman was an urban legend, so the hero isolation until now is understandable.

I imagine some earths will still be around, like Earth X...maybe Earth 3. Sure would like to see a REAL evil doppelganger universe...one where there could some battles over the years


I promise -- any merger will NOT be as bad as you fear.


Oh, but one thing that concerns me... for Earth 38 --- we can't save the planet, but we can save the people? How are you gonna get 7 billion people to jump earths??

 

[Phoenix219]

The long history of Superman is the only problem I really have - everything else can be pretty easily integerated IMO.

 

[Ovation]

We go over this a lot... but what the hey.

All of the CW characters WERE IN ONE UNIVERSE for like 2 generations. That would be a huge reason why they all belong together. And for Supergirl, she was on a different network.. presumable if her show succeeded there, it would make sense for it to be another universe. ANd Blak Lightning's creators, i suspect, wanted to maintain creative control of the characters, and NOT have them shaped by others, but rather in house, so that others would need to conform to them.

We're all STar Trek fans, here right? We are VERY used to reconciling contradictions.

For me, how i see it:

Arrow : Star City was small enough and out there enough that "major" heroes would never stop by, so for that city, Arrow was the first.

Flash: instead of all metas seeming coming from Central City (either the accelerator or dark matter), it opens up that world a bit. (And the city, too, seems relatively small)

Supergirl: all the action seems to be on the coast lines, Gotham and National City. Supergirl, at least was a new phenomenon, isloated mostly to her city.

Legends of Tomorrow : They are so out there... they would probably openly acknowledge and mock any inconsistencies or complaints

Black Lightning: again, a lot of this is isolated to Freeland. The Markovian thing -- there might be some treaties or something , and some other government stuff, to excuse who no one has come to help. I can totally picture the show, pretty much in tact, as being in a post-Crisis Earth. (The mention of what was it, Vixen and SUpergirl... i think could EASILY be interpreted as being real, as Jennifer seemed to believe her mom). Also Black Lightning was an urban legend, like Batman, until recently. So he hasn't made any Super Friends outside of his hometown ... yet.

Batwoman: she also just got started, and Gotham centric for now. So, a post-Crisis world for her is easy to imagine. And Batman was an urban legend, so the hero isolation until now is understandable.

I imagine some earths will still be around, like Earth X...maybe Earth 3. Sure would like to see a REAL evil doppelganger universe...one where there could some battles over the years


I promise -- any merger will NOT be as bad as you fear.


Oh, but one thing that concerns me... for Earth 38 --- we can't save the planet, but we can save the people? How are you gonna get 7 billion people to jump earths??

None of this is persuasive as a reason to merge anything. It certainly explains how it could be done—still doesn’t offer a “why?” that would materially improve upon the status quo, whereas the shrinking, if not downright disappearance, of the multiverse diminishes storytelling possibilities.

 

[Kirk Prime]

I'm expecting the main show's to be merged onto one Earth, but for new shows and new Earth's to still be found and explored in a still-existing multiverse.

I think that works very well.

Why would Supergirl set up this season-long villain arc with Leviathan as these ancient beings "defending" the Earth if they were going to permanently destroy the Earth that Leviathan was associated with? Why send Malefic off to fight for peace on Mars, then destroy Mars a week later?

Why couldn't that story be transferred to a rewritten Earth 1? A merger doesn't mean you simply move Earth 38 to Earth 1. History would be altered as well.

Maybe Superman will move to Earth-1 leaving Supergirl on 38. That way we will be closer to the JL forming.

That's an idea I hadn't thought about. But why would he? That could also happen without a Crisis. It would be very interesting to see if they can explain in better detail why there is no Earth 1 Superman. Did Krypton not explode? Does it not exist? Is Clark younger on Earth 1? Is there a different Clark on Earth 1 that looks like Tom Welling, Christopher Reeve, Brandon Routh or Dean Cain, but pre-debut?

I don't mind Earths combining, but I do NOT want the multiverse gone because there are too many worlds to explore.

 

[The Realist]

In a new Variety article, Guggenheim says there's another potential guest they're still working to get, even though production has already wrapped.

 

[DigificWriter]

The Crisis doesn't rewrite time; it destroys the existing universe and remakes it.

In order for the Crisis TV crossover to do what people are expecting it to, every series involved in it would have to undergo a full-stop hard reset and effectively be cancelled for a week or two before coming back with brand-new stories, which isn't going to happen.