This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.
For this Series Saturday, instead of looking back at a series I’ve enjoyed, I thought I’d make some predictions about a series that starts tomorrow night (Sunday, December 8, 2019): this year’s big “Arrowverse” crossover on the CW. I’m doing this because quite a few friends have asked what I think will happen, so I thought instead of a dozen text messages I’d just post my thoughts here.
AND YES, IF YOU’RE BEHIND ON THE ARROWVERSE SHOWS, THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!!
For those who haven’t heard, Crisis on Infinite Earths will span 5 hours, taking up episodes of 5 out of the CW’s 6 DC Comics-based shows: Supergirl, Batwoman and The Flash on December 8-10, and then Arrow and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow in mid-January. (Black Lightning will also be appearing, but only as a guest-star; the series has always stayed separate from the rest of the DCCW shows.)
The tagline for the television event, as it was for the original DC Comics maxi-series in the mid-80s, is “Worlds Will Live. Worlds Will Die. And nothing will ever be the same.” For better or worse (and I’ll save my detailed thoughts on this for a different post), the maxi-series irrevocably changed the DC Universe. Pretty much every world but one did die; so did a lot of tertiary and secondary and several notable major DC characters (don’t worry; as is standard in comics now, most of them got better over the intervening decades).
I’m looking forward to seeing what beats and moments from the original comics Greg Berlanti, Marc Guggenheim and the individual show runners were able to adapt/incorporate and what they chose to leave out (either because characters have not yet debuted in the Arrowverse shows, or because the moments would make no sense in the context of that universe versus the original comics). I have absolutely NO expectations that five hours of television will rival twelve monthly comic issues, even with the half-season of set-ups done on The Flash and Arrow this fall. But I do have some thoughts and predictions.
WHO WILL LIVE, WHO WILL DIE?
Oliver Queen and Barry Allen: We’ve been told repeatedly over the past several months that in order for anyone else to survive the Crisis, Oliver Queen and Barry Allen must die. Interestingly, it’s The Monitor telling them this, and he hasn’t told either one about the fate of the other. (Ollie thinks he prevented both Barry and Kara’s deaths at the end of the Elseworlds crossover by striking a deal with The Monitor; I don’t think he’s been told Barry is destined to die anyway.) The fact that the other characters on each show only know Ollie and Barry are destined to die because Barry and Ollie have told them leads me to believe that neither one is actually going to die. Also, it’s pretty standard that if a show beats you over the head with a character’s destiny, they will in fact not experience that destiny without some kind of twist.
Arrow is ending for good two weeks after Crisis is over (and one of those episodes is an embedded pilot for a spin-off), but I’m predicting (as I’m sure many others have) that Oliver and Felicity will be given the same send-off that the comic gave to the Golden Age Superman and Lois Lane: living happily ever after (theoretically) in a pocket dimension from which they can never (or so they think) leave. I can’t imagine them outright killing “the one that started it all.”
And The Flash, of course, is not going off the air after Crisis. Barry’s been preparing his team for a “world without Flash,” but I don’t for a minute believe Grant Gustin is hanging up the cowl for more than a few episodes. He may, as they’ve done in a previous season, appear to be lost, but he will be back. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that some other speedster will take Barry’s place at the last minute: and since we’ve seen no evidence that Keiynan Lonsdale (Wally) or Violet Beane (Jessie Quick) will be appearing in Crisis, I’m going to say it will be one of John Wesley Shipp’s characters: either the Flash from Earth-90 or a re-powered Jay Garrick. (This will give Shipp the notoriety of having died on the Flash more times than Tom Cavanagh.)
Prior Minor Characters/Guest Stars: The original comic was well-known for the wholesale slaughter of secondary and lesser characters. Depending on when you started reading DC Comics and/or when you came to read Crisis for the first time, some of those deaths hit harder than others. (For me? The death of the original Dove, Don Hall, made me cry. The death of Mark Merlin / Prince Ra-Man? Not so much.) On the current Arrowverse shows, there aren’t quite as many “blink and you miss them” level characters to be slaughtered by the Anti-Monitor’s Shadow Demons. And the ones that are out there? Well, those actors would cost money to bring back in, if they were even available to reprise their roles. However, I can imagine scenes of carnage like the one that lead off last year’s “Elseworlds” crossover: dead costumed characters strewn across Earth-1’s landscape, with faces not visible so we can’t tell these are just extras. I won’t be surprised to see characters like The Pied Piper, Huntress, Red Tornado, The Ray, Hawkman, and Hawkgirl dead in the background of a shot since at this point those characters/actors are not likely to be brought back. Still, as recently as yesterday showrunner Mark Guggenheim said there were at least 6 cameos/guest-star appearances who had not yet been revealed/spoiled, so there is the possibility of an on-screen death for a former guest-star or two.
Major Characters From Other DC Shows/Movies: We already know we’re going to be seeing, in cameos and/or key scenes, Robert Wuhl (from the Tim Burton Batman), Burt Ward (Batman ’66), Ashley Scott (Birds of Prey tv show), Tom Welling and Erica Durance (Smallville), Kevin Conroy (a Kingdome Come-ish Bruce Wayne) and Brandon Routh (the Donnerverse/Kingdom Come Superman). There was a rumor Tom Ellis (Lucifer) was on set during filming, and I’m holding out hope that some of the unleaked cameos are Lynda Carter and Lyle Waggoner (Wonder Woman), Helen Slater (Supergirl), Dina Meyer (Oracle on Birds of Prey), David Mazouz or Sean Pertwee (Gotham) and/or Michael Grey/Jackson Bostwick/Garrett Craig (Billy Batson/Captain Marvel from the Shazam tv show). Showing any of these characters dying would have huge emotional impact on those of us who grew up on/watched those shows but possibly less-so on viewers only familiar with the current Arrowverse shows.
Major Characters from the Arrowverse Shows: Of course, what would pack the most emotional punch would be the deaths of one or more of the main casts. The title characters on each show are safe. The Flash, Supergirl, Black Lightning, and Batwoman are not suddenly going to become Frost and Friends, Adventures of The DEO, Thunder and Lightning, or Batwing. But if the producers want us to feel, after the fact, that this crossover actually resulted in a real shake-up of the status quo … somebody major is going to have to be killed off from one or more of the Big Three shows. My thoughts/expectations on who:
· The Flash: Cisco Ramon. It’s fairly common on drama shows that if a character gets a happy ending and/or closure, they’re probably going to be written out or die (Lost took this to the level of an artform). Cisco has his happy ending: he got rid of the powers he didn’t really want to have, got closure on his relationship with Gypsy (and by extension, Breacher), and has a solid relationship with an understanding and loving girlfriend. But the show has also introduced another super-hacker/scientist type in Chester Runk. And there were rumors last season after Cisco was de-powered that he was leaving. His death would certainly pack the requisite punch for both viewers and fans – more so than Katie/Frost and Ralph, who have their powers and on-going sub-plots. Second Place Guess: Joe West. There’s no indication Jesse L. Martin is ready to leave the show, and killing yet another of Barry’s father-figures (especially if Jay Garrick takes his place as The Flash Who Must Die) would just be cruel. But after two emotional “I’m not ready to say goodbye to my son” scenes in recent weeks, Joe’s death would be an even bigger gut-punch that Cisco.
· Supergirl: J’Onn J’Onzz. Here’s that closure thing again: in the past season or so, J’Onn has moved on from the DEO, gotten closure with the father he thought was dead and the brother he’d forgotten existed, and is in a good place. But we also saw The Monitor tell him that freeing himself of his past is what would make him a valuable part of the team fighting The Crisis. If that’s not a set-up for a heroic, self-sacrificing death, nothing is. Second Place Guess: Brainiac 5. He still has both romantic and a “am I man or machine” storylines going on, but we also know Jeremy Jordan is set to return for a few episodes as Win, which makes me think Brainy could be sacrificed. Honestly, when it was announced Mechad Brooks was leaving the show, I was confident James Olsen would die during Crisis, but they wrote him out earlier.
· Arrow: Wild Dog. We already know Black Canary and Black Siren are locked into the back-door pilot, so they’re not being killed off, while Rene has not been mentioned as part of that cast. Since the show seems intent this season on subverting their own future timeline (by having Roy come back to the fold sooner and lose an arm in the process, as well as having Dig and Lyla learn about their sons’ futures and work to prevent that), it would make sense for them to write out Rene before he has a chance to become Mayor and screw up Star City and the Glades. Second Place Guess: Roy Harper. It would be cruel, having Roy willingly lose an arm for the team only to then die for them as well, but they could go this route as a way to even further subvert the future timeline.
· Legends of Tomorrow: I honestly don’t think they’re going to kill off any of the major cast. We already know Ray Palmer and Nora Darkh are being written out later in the season, so they’re safe. And most of the returning lead cast have on-going sub-plots. However, if they really want to start the new season off with a change in the status quo, killing Nate Heywood off would do it. Yeah, he’s got that whole “I don’t remember the woman I fell in love with” sub-plot brewing, but plots like that have been dropped on shows before when the showrunners wanted to shake things up (remember Ruby being promoted to series regular on Once Upon A Time only to appear in a handful of episodes and then virtually disappear because other storylines took precedent?). Second Place Guesses: either Gary or Mona, since fan reaction to both supporting characters has been less than favorable.
I’m pretty sure that we won’t see a major character death related to Crisis on Black Lightning simply because the show itself is not a part of the crossover. And Batwoman hasn’t been on the air long enough to lose a second main cast member in one season (after the death of Katherine Hamilton in the fall finale), so I think the remaining cast members there are safe.
WORLDS WILL LIVE, WORLDS WILL DIE?
The original comic ended with the Multiverse being destroyed and history being re-written so that there had always been only One Earth. This created a lot of issues for multiple-Earth dopplegangers and characters with the same names but different histories/powers/etc. The CW shows don’t have that many characters who appear on more than one Earth (and most of those were killed off-camera when Earth-2 bit the dust in the Arrow season premiere) for that to be a storyline problem. (In fact, the only one I can think of that could be a real issue would be the Earth-1 counterpart of Alex Danvers.) But fans have long complained that Supergirl feels way too removed over there on Earth-38 given her great friendship/chemistry with Barry Allen and burgeoning friendship with Kate Kane. We’ve seen in the various trailers that The Monitor decides Earth-38 is where the Heroes need to make their stand, and evidence that first Argo City (home of Supergirl’s birth mother and the few remaining Kryptonians) and then possibly all of Earth-38 get destroyed. There’s also trailer evidence that they manage to evacuate Earth-38 before the anti-matter wave hits.
My prediction is that not all Earths will be destroyed. I think the number of Earths that survive will be small. Most of the Earths that get destroyed will be Earths we’ve either never seen or have only heard mentioned, or will be the Earths for those other DC live action properties outside of the Arrowverse that we know we’re going to be seeing guest-stars from. I’m not even confident Earth-38 will really be destroyed; trailers are notoriously misleading on things like this for dramatic effect. I think we’ll end up with Earth-1 (for Flash, Legends, Batwoman, and the possible Arrow spinoff), Earth-38 (for Supergirl and the possible Superman show), Earth-BL (I don’t think Black Lightning’s Earth has ever been given a numeric designation), possibly Earth-X (just in case they ever want to use evil dopplegangers and The Ray again), and then an Earth-whatever that accounts for the other on-going DC TV shows on other networks (Titans, Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, the upcoming Stargirl) and maybe one that accounts for the current “Movieverse.” Although I’m willing to second-guess myself about Earth-38’s destruction. It would definitely shake things up if Earth-1 and -38 were combined, but would also be a storyline logistical nightmare.
KINGDOM COME
We’ve already been told that Brandon Routh’s “Donnerverse” Superman is the Supes from DC’s mini-series Kingdom Come, and photographic evidence that Kevin Conroy’s Bruce Wayne is from that same Earth. My prediction? With the cameo appearance of Robert Wuhl’s “Burtonverse” Batman character Alexander Knox, I’m betting we’ll get at least a line of dialogue or two telling us that Conroy is the Burton Batman and that those movies (and sequels), the 1970s Wonder Woman and Shazam shows, and maybe the Birds of Prey show all took place on that same Earth, even if we don’t get to see Lynda Carter and Helen Slater in their iconic costumes. And of course, that Earth will go out in spectacular fashion after Bruce and Clark are recruited as two of the “Seven” The Monitor mentions need to be found in a recent trailer.
OTHER MINOR PREDICTIONS
· History will at least slightly be rearranged, through either The Monitor’s doing or the Legends, and after the Crisis is over, Diggle and Lyla (who I predict will both survive) will joyously welcome baby Sara back into the family alongside her twin brother JJ and older adopted brother Connor. And yes, I think Dig and Lyla will remember that they had a daughter, then they didn’t, and now they do again.
· The Council of Wellses will be completely destroyed, limiting Tom Cavanagh to playing only Reverse Flash, Nash Wells/Pariah (who I think will also survive) and the Earth-2 Wells if he was actually on Earth-3 this whole time, as has been rumored.
· The West-Allens will find out Iris is pregnant thanks to that little island-hopping vacation they took a few episodes ago – but early next season, they’ll have twins who they’ll name Donald Henry and Dawn Nora. (In the comics, Barry and Iris’s twins were Don and Dawn Allen.)
· Kevin Conroy will eventually make an appearance as the Earth-1 Bruce Wayne (sans exoskeleton) because like Clark, they can’t avoid the issue of where Bruce has been forever.
I could be completely wrong about all of this. But hey, when it was announced before Season 1 of The Flash that John Wesley Shipp would be playing an important mystery character, I predicted it would be Jay Garrick – and I was only two seasons off! I’ll do a “let’s see how I did post” after the final two hours of the crossover air in mid-January.