"Crisis on Infinite Earths: Parts One, Two, and Three" – The Crisis Review

And so the biggest crossover of all times has reached just over the midway point. Unfortunately, we now have to wait until January 14 to see parts four and five, with Arrow and DC's Legends of Tomorrow.

Although the show names really don't matter. Sometimes, the main characters of the particular show get a little more play on a particular night. That's been true this year more than most. Supergirl dwelt on Earth-38 and the Lena rivalry. Batwoman gave us a bit more of Kate Kane, albeit without her supporting cast. The Flash gave us the Flash of Earth-90, Barry and Iris, and Cisco becoming Vibe once more.

But there's been plenty of stuff not related to the particular show of the night, too. Lex Luthor didn't appear at all in Supergirl, but appeared in both Batwoman and The Flash. Brandon Routh and Caity Lotz have been present as Ray Palmer and Sara Lance. Lois Lane and the Earth-1 Superman have been present, and Batwoman featured Tom Welling, Erica Durance, and the introduction of Brandon Routh as... the movie Superman, i.e., Superman of Earth-96.

Speaking of Welling and Durance, part of the fun of this year's Crisis has been the cameos. We got Robert Wuhl, Burt Ward, Curran Walters, Alan Ritchson, and Russell Tovey in Part One. Kevin Conroy, Brandon Routh, Wentworth Miller, and Johnathan Schaech in Part Two. Tom Ellis, Ashley Scott, and Cress Williams in Part Three. Not to mention other comic book characters like the Spectre and Ryan Choi. Let's face it: was anyone expecting Lucifer to show up in the CWVerse?

As faithful readers have gathered from my previous reviews, I'm a big comic book fan. So part of the fun is watching what is basically a CWVerse adaptation of the 1985 Crisis on Infinite Earths maxi-series. We get to see Earths wiped out, and the Monitor, and the Anti-Monitor, and Harbinger, and Pariah. There's still some extraneous material, like the 12/9 episode of Black Lightning. Which didn't have much to do with Crisis, and what happened there will probably be undone by whatever timey-wimeyness the creative team uses to "fix" Crisis at the end. Unless you really think Black Lightning and his Earth, and Iris, Supergirl and her Earth's population (which died when Earth-1 was disintegrated) and Ralph, and Joe, and Diggle, and Mia, and countless others are all never to be seen again on the CW.

But like the maxi-series, the CW Crisis gives us cameos galore. The maxi-series was filled with basically every comic book character that appeared in every DC comic. And the CW Crisis has given us the Titans, and the Huntress, and an older, chubbier Dick Grayson, and Alexander Ford, and Lucifer, and Superman-96. So it basically unifies Titans, Birds of Prey, the 60s Batman, the Burton Batman movies, Lucifer, and the Superman movies. And whoever else they toss into the last two parts. I expect the Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, and The Phantom Hollywood Agent to show up.

But enough comic book goodness. What actually happens? In Part One on Supergirl, we get to see red skies over several vaguely familiar-looking individuals. Then we get Supergirl calming a nervous alien dragon. Soon Brainiac-5 is warning people a wave of anti-matter is sweeping toward Earth-38. It destroys Argo City, including Supergirl's mother, Alura. Superman and Lois Lane send their baby off in a space pod before apparently being disintegrated by the anti-matter wave.

The wave continues to Earth, and in a somewhat confusing sequence, the DEO asks Lena to build a transmatter gate. As best I can tell, the gate will provide access to Earth-1's universe. Billions of people on Earth-38 get into alien spacecraft provided by the alien immigrants (from last season, mostly), and then fly through the gate to Earth-1. Where over three billion people are living on Earth-1 is never revealed. But since they'll be dead in two more episodes, it doesn't matter. And why are they evacuating to Earth-1? At this point they don't know it's any safer than any other Earth.

It turns out the Monitor (LaMonica Garrett) and Harbinger brought Superman and Lois Lane to Earth. Sara, Brainiac-5, and Lois travel to Earth-16 to look for the missing Jonathan, Lois and Clark's son. Jonathan is hanging out in Star City 2046 with that Earth's much older Oliver, who has taken the baby in. Older Oliver and White Canary recognize each other, and we get a chance for Older Oliver to say goodbye, acting as a proxy for the Earth-1 Oliver. Then they head off with the baby, leaving Older Oliver behind. Because they can save three billion people on Earth, but not one elderly green archer?

Harbinger (Diggle's wife, Lyla), is going around gathering heroes like Batwoman, the Atom, and White Canary. Alex asks Lena for help, and Lena is offended Alex doesn't think she would help. They build the gate, and with the barely-seen help of Dreamer, John, and Kelly, get the evacuees off of Earth-38.

A big ole Quantum Tower appears on Earth-38, and it turns out that it's part of the Monitor's plan to keep the anti-matter wave from hitting Earth-38. Green Arrow defends the Tower with the help of the other heroes still with him, and Supergirl and Superman use their heat vision to power the Tower. The Monitor's shadow demons attack the Tower and the Monitor teleports everyone away except Arrow when it's clear the battle is hopeless. Arrow refuses to go, and is mortally wounded. As the others look on, the Monitor and his new flunky, Pariah (Harrison Nash Welles from Earth-1), bring Oliver to them and... Oliver dies.

This is all very impressive although it is a bit rushed. The maxi-series not only had twelve issues, but it had a year of build-up introducing the Monitor and Harbinger. There's a lot of moving pieces in Part One: most of the Supergirl cast get at least a token scene, and we get introduced and/or reintroduced to a lot of other characters: Superman, Lois Lane, the Atom, White Canary, and Batwoman. Plus we get the aforementioned cameos. And there's the exposition as Brainiac-5 mostly lays out the stakes: a wave of anti-matter is sweeping toward Earth-38. Which you think would add a ticking clock of countdown to the shenanigans. It really doesn't, because the story is going in so many different places at once.

The whole thing feels a bit disjointed. But then again, that's how the Crisis maxi-series often felt too.

"Hey, let's assemble a bunch of 'important' heroes to protect these towers."

"Nah, we don't really need the towers, and the 'important' heroes will become spectators and/or cannon fodder later in the series."

"Harbinger is my most trusted aide."

"Nah, I knew all along Harbinger would betray me."

Part One also emulates some of the pointless destruction the original Crisis had, too. Presumably, the various characters we see in the opening tag are all dead. Sure, they'll be back when the CW Crisis gets undone. But the death and destruction goes by so fast there's not much suspense build-up.

There is a lot of Supergirl elements presented. At least we've seen Argo City, so while its destruction is relatively brief, it does make an impression. Lois and Superman sending their son off in a space pod, paralleling what happened to Superman and Supergirl as children, is well done, even if it's undermined a few minutes later when Harbinger brings the couple to Earth. The Lena-versus-everyone rivalry is good, even if it's not a very flattering look for Lena. Sadly, she disappears into the background after presumably evacuating Earth with everyone else, which means we won't get to see her interact with her stepbrother, Lex, who will play a big part in Parts Two and Three.

Part Two takes place on Batwoman. The creative team slows things down a bit, and we get some cameos that actually mean something. Lex (Jon Cryer) escapes with the Book of Destiny, the McGuffin from last year's crossover. He goes off to kill all of the Supermen on the remaining Earths, which seems a bit odd. Isn't he the least bit worried he might get caught on one of the anti-mattered Earths? This does give us a couple of more significant cameos: Tom Welling shows up as a depowered Clark Kent on his Earth. It turns out he's given up his powers so he can have a human child with Lois. Welling has an easy charm and watching him go up against Cryer is fun. Welling's Clark is bemused at this Lex, who isn't the Lex he knows (could anyone confuse Michael Rosenbaum with Jon Cryer?). There's a brief shout-out to the end of Smallville, when Clark mentions his Lex is President. Lex's Kryptonite doesn't work on Clark, who punches him unconscious. Lex slinks away, and Smallville's Lois (Erica Durance, who was Alura in part one) comes out to tell Clark to see what their daughters have done.

Iris, Lois, and Clark then go to Earth-96 and meet that world's Superman. Who is... played by Brandon Routh, just like in Superman Returns. There's in-jokes all around, as the Earth-1 Clark and Earth-90 Clark compliment each other on their glasses. We find out Joker lethally gassed all of Clark's friends, including Lois, so Clark is very sad. Then Lex shows up and uses the Book to turn Superman-96 against Superman-1. Lois and Iris eventually convince Superman-96 he's a paragon of truth, which breaks Lex's mind control.

Speaking of paragons, the Monitor reveals earlier seven Paragons are needed to defeat the Anti-Monitor. He's already gathered three of them: Supergirl is the Paragon of Hope, someone with "Bat" in their hero name is the Paragon of Courage, and White Canary is the Paragon of Destiny. Superman-96 is the Paragon of Truth, which is why they need him.

A future Batman is the "Bat of the Future" and supposedly the Paragon of Courage, so Batwoman and Supergirl go to his world to get him. He has a chest-bared Luke (Camrus Johnson, and the only Batwoman cast member present except for Ruby Rose) answering his door, and Bruce himself is wearing an exo-suit to get around because of all of the injuries he's suffered. Bruce is played by Kevin Conroy, who was Batman in the WB animated shows like Batman: The Animated Series, Justice League, and Batman Beyond.

Here, Bruce is the Paragon of Hopelessness. He's ruthlessly killed all of his enemies, and killed his Earth's Superman because he was an alien who let anyone in authority control him. This Bruce also likes giving lengthy speeches in front of Batcave generators, which gives Batwoman the opportunity to knock her cousin into one of those generators and electrocute him. It turns out, Batwoman is the Paragon of Courage and the Bat of the Future. She also snags a Kryptonite battery from Bruce's exo-suit.

Meanwhile, Sara and Mia have teamed up with Constantine (the always good-to-see Matt Ryan) to bring Oliver back to life. They track down a Lazarus Pit on another Earth, but it's guarded by that world's Jonah Hex. Sara and Mia make short work of Jonah, and they bring back Oliver, but without a soul

Back on Waverider, Kara and Kate bond over alcohol, because booze makes everything better. Kate is feeling hopeless after watching her world die (and three billion evacuees from it presumably living in squalor in the Sahara somewhere. Don't ask because the creative team won't tell). And the chemistry we saw in last year's crossover between Melissa Benoist and Ruby Rose is still going strong. They also talk about Kate's sister, Beth, who is now Alice. It's nice to see the Batwoman storylines getting some play even in the Crisis.

A lot of this is set on Waverider. But it's the Earth-74 Waverider, and only Mick Rory (Dominic Purcell) hangs out on it after the rest of the Legends retired. His buddy, Len (voice of the always good-to-hear Wentworth Miller) is the ship's AI. We get some fun as first Harbinger convinces Mick to join them by offering him heroism and beer ("You had me at 'beer'), and then watching Mick babysitting baby Jonathan by reading him his romance novel. Ray is busy working on a paragon detector, and the look on Brandon Routh's face as Mick reads his romance novel to an infant is well worth the price of admission.

If that isn't worth staying tuned for, watching Kara comment that "Ray" is looking jacked when Superman-90 shows up is. Benoist also has a flare for comedy, and the look on her face when it's pointed out that Superman-90 is her cousin's counterpart matches Routh's earlier facial acrobatics. We also get a split-screen when Ray and Superman-90 are discussing their similarities.

We also see a mentally-controlled Harbinger wander around Waverider, and we finally meet the Anti-Monitor as he emerges from the shadows to take control of her.

To me, "Part Two" works better because we get a couple of decent cameos, and there's more humor. Routh, Benoist, and Purcell all get a chance to loosen up a little bit. The stakes are still high, but with the initial destruction out of the way, the creative team sets in to give the viewers the humor the crossovers have been known for in the past.

Part Three takes place on The Flash, although Joe and Cecile aren't present. Cisco, Killer Frost, and Ralph are as Flash brings them to join the fun. It's off on a series of side adventures again as Ray's paragon detector confirms Flash is the Paragon of Love (??), J'onn J'onzz is the Paragon of Honor, and Ryan Choi is the Paragon of Humanity. To which everyone except Ray basically goes "Ryan who?" It turns out Ryan (Osric Chau, from Supernatural among others) is a normal physics professor, although he's been working with miniaturization. If you're familiar with Ryan from the comics, take that as you will.

Iris, Ralph, and Ray go get Ryan. Who is all "I want to be with my family if the world ends". Iris eventually convinces him to help them save the multiverse.

We also get a brief opening of Huntress from Birds of Prey watching as the anti-matter wave sweeps over her Earth. And I like this "end of another Earth" sequence better than the previous ones. Huntress is actually doing something, and they say she's Huntress. Where in Part One, Wuhl and Ward just looked vaguely like their DC characters and looked up at the red skies, with no indication if their worlds are being wiped out or not.

Since Constantine's magic is on the fritz, he takes Mia and Diggle with him to Earth-666 to get access to Purgatory from his buddy... Lucifer. Which is Tom Ellis doing a pitch-perfect version of his Lucifer from Lucifer. And only makes sense, because the Lucifer TV series is loosely based on the DC comic. Sadly, that means Lucifer is probably gone since Earth-666 is soon to be disintegrated.

The trio end up going to Purgatory to get Oliver's soul. Purgatory looking just like the island Purgatory, aka Lian Yu, where Oliver was stranded. However, Jim Corrigan (Stephen Lobo) shows up and says Oliver must stay in Purgatory. He talks about being a Spectre, and his eyes glow green. Presumably, there are little skulls in the pupils, but if so I missed it.

Meanwhile, the Monitor tells Cisco he must become Vibe for the sake of the multiverse. The Big M then waves his hand and restores Vibe's costume and his powers. Vibe then goes into the sewers with Flash and Frost, and Pariah shows up to say he's only there to witness tragedy. Which makes him slightly more useful than his comic book counterpart, but not much.

Pariah gets the team into the Anti-Monitor's secret underground base. Where Anti-M (say it in a Dorothy/Wizard of Oz voice to get the joke) has a big ole anti-matter cannon powered by... the Flash of Earth-90 (John Wesley Shipp) running on a super treadmill. They free him, but Anti-M rigged the cannon to explode and destroy the rest of the multi-verse if Flash-90 was freed. Pariah brings in Black Lightning (Cress Williams) to slow down the cannon's energy release.

Barry is ready to sacrifice himself to save the multi-verse, even though there's not much left of it. However, Flash-96 steals Barry's speed and says the Monitor didn't say which Flash would die in Crisis. He then sacrifices himself, and we get a brief flashback to the 90s Flash series with Amanda Pays as Tina Magee, who they earlier established is Barry-96's wife. Which means her, Julio, Bellows, Murphy, Lt. Garfield, Joe Kline, and all the others on that show are presumably disintegrated as well.

At the end, Black Lightning deals with the fact his family and world are cosmic dust. And this is the only time, other than Supergirl's occasional mention of Earth-38, that the tragedy of the destruction of the multi-verse hits home. No doubt Earth-BL will be restored along with everything else by the end of Crisis. But Mr. Williams sells the hell out of it. We also get a scene where Jeff and Barry bond over the fact they had father figures beset by tragedy.

Meanwhile, Supergirl hopes to use the Book of Destiny to bring back her Earth. Batwoman keeps warning her it's a bad idea, since Lex has already said using the Book on such a cosmic scale would drive the user mad. Batwoman has that Kryptonite battery to back her up, but Supergirl makes the right choice.

Throughout this, we've been hearing there are seven remaining Earths, and six of them are gone by the end of the episode. We never find out which six, other than presumably Earth-666 is one of them. Destroying the cannon saves Earth-1. But then Anti-M takes over Harbinger's body, kicks some butt, and kills the Big M. However, Pariah uses his powers (whatever the heck they are) to teleport the seven Paragons away. The anti-matter wave comes back and washes over first Earth-1 and then Waverider. So Lois is dead, Superman is dead, Black Lightning is dead, Mick-74 is dead, Ray Palmer is dead, Jonathan is dead, everyone from The Flash is dead except for Flash. And the inhabitants of Earth-1 are dead, as well as the three billion evacuees from Earth-38.

The Paragons appear at the Vanishing Point, which is a nice nod to DC's Legends' of Tomorrow season 1 finale. They're presumably safe from Anti-M, but there's one more surprise: Superman-96 glows with energy and is then replaced by Lex, who wrote himself into the escape via the Book of Destiny. And while I like Routh, I like Cryer better. So we came out ahead.

Now we have to wait until January 14 of next year to see Parts Four and Five. They've narrowed the show down to five heroes, Lex, and Ryan. However, Oliver is still in Purgatory and Corrigan hinted Oliver has some big role to play. As I noted elsewhere, Corrigan/the Spectre was a major player in the comic book Crisis. So I'm curious to see what, if anything, they do with him here.

It's hard to imagine the six Paragons and Lex going up against Anti-M. I suppose Lex will tinker something together. If nothing else, he has at least one page from the Book of Destiny. But with such superheroes as Batwoman and White Canary on their side, the Paragon's chances against Anti-M seem... less than optimal. And they still have to bring the Legends in, and undo the whole thing so the CWverse shows can continue. Can the creative team do it? We'll see.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?