Crisis On Earth X: “Parts 1-4”

Quite a few of these class photo moments over the four hours.

I thought Crisis On Earth X turned out pretty good, and then I watched the two-part opening to Agents of SHIELD and I realized I was grading on a curve. But that’s another post.

I mean, it was fine. Certainly better than Invasion, with its dodgy Dominators and the whole “the episode of Supergirl doesn’t count” deal. But given how consistently badly the CW sohws do romantic and emotional storylines, this crossover was packed with them when they could have spent more time with interdimensional Nazis.

It’s weird that I have to say this, but especially in the first part, the modern political statement that NAZIS ARE BAD was really obvious. It’s like they felt they either had to take a stand on it, or, more likely, remind the viewers that there weren’t good people on both sides. 

Everyone got to come out and play, which was nice, although the means of determining who did and didn’t get to participate were a bit weird. Not sure why Ray Palmer and Diggle weren’t invited to Flash’s wedding while Supergirl was, for example. Also, for a show called “Crisis On Earth X”, if this crossover spent more than a quarter of its time ON EARTH X, I’ll be shocked. 

So, the three big elephants in the room are the death of Martin Stein, the double wedding, and the short-term return of Wnetworth Miller as Earth X’s friendly, gay Captain Cold. 

Killing off the (at least in comics canon) less replaceable half of Firestorm was a little shocking, but also not surprising in a “How much Victor Garber can these CW folks expect to get in one lifetime” kind of way. I don’t watch Legends, so I don’t know how much of the maudlin, melodramatic father-son vibe was actually built to, and how much was a sudden revelation to make things extra sadz for the crossover. The death scene was, shall we say... excessive.

The double wedding is slightly problematic, because the whole “Felicity’s attitude towards marriage” subplot is problematic. Given the decision to do it at all and end it where they did, it was handled... OK? I mean, except for that garbage moment in the Time Vault where Oliver got petulant and stupid. But there’s no salvaging an awful idea. This isn’t some anti-Felicity-and-Oliver thing either, just, you know, if you’re going to do that, do it right.

Captain Cold’s relationship with The Ray was the most genuine relationship on the entire show, because, well, Wentworth Miller can act. No reason was given for him staying behind other than “we want Captain Cold around some more”, of course. It’s not like your home dimension is suddenly in the midst of a giant upheaval caused by the entire leadership of Earth X being wiped out or anything.

Overall, the crossover was as good as an average of the best the four shows have been able to pull off. So it was OK. But credit where credit is due - when Supergirl did the Superman II bit to Overgirl, my nerd meter pinged off the charts. Great moment.