"Invasion!" is the third annual Arrowverse crossover event, crossing over episodes of the Arrowverse television series The Flash, Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow on The CW, and is inspired by the 1989 comic miniseries Invasion!. Events at the end of the Supergirl episode "Medusa" on November 28, 2016 marked the beginning of the crossover, which officially began on November 29 with The Flash, continued on Arrow on November 30, and concluded on Legends of Tomorrow on December 1. Each of the latter three episodes are also titled "Invasion!". "Invasion!" sees Barry Allen recruit Kara Danvers to his Earth to help his team, Oliver Queen and his team, and the Legends defeat the alien race known as the Dominators.
Development for a crossover between the three series, along with Supergirl, began in May 2016 after it was revealed that Supergirl would move to The CW from CBS for its second season. By the following September, the scripts for each episode had been written, with filming occurring shortly after, in October 2016. The premise and episode titles were also revealed that month. "Invasion!" sees all of the main cast members for each series appear in at least their own series, with Melissa Benoist appearing as Supergirl across the entire crossover. Multiple actors and characters from previous Arrow seasons also return to reprise their roles, as it was also Arrow's 100th episode.
Premise: (FULL Spoilers)
Supergirl Season 2, Episode 8: "Medusa" (Fall Finale)
The Danvers along with James, Winn and Mon-El celebrate Thanksgiving. Hank Henshaw unleashes a virus in the alien bar that kills the aliens except Mon-El, who is quarantined. Eliza determines the virus is Kryptonian. At the Fortress of Solitude, Kara learns that Henshaw was after "Medusa", a virus developed by Kara's father to kill all non-Kryptonian aliens in case of an invasion. Cyborg Superman attacks L-Corp looking for the isotope required for dispersal, but Kara stops him. Alex comes out to Eliza, who is fully supportive. Kara tells Lena that Lillian is Cadmus' leader and wants help finding her, but Lena refuses. Lena gives Lillian a case containing the isotope. Kara and J'onn confront the Luthors and Henshaw before Medusa is launched via rocket. J'onn fights Cyborg Superman, becoming a White Martian, while Kara chases the rocket down, but fails. Medusa is dispersed; however it is inert, as Lena switched the isotope with a fake to gain Lillian's trust. Lillian is arrested, but Cyborg Superman escapes. Mon-El is cured and Eliza uses Medusa to restore J'onn's Green Martian form. Maggie and Alex kiss after Maggie admits she has feelings for Alex. An unknown alien race is searching for Mon-El. Barry Allen and Cisco Ramon arrive from another Earth to enlist Kara's help.
The episode ends with a scene setting up the crossover event "Invasion!" that begins on The Flash season 3 episode 8, continues on Arrow season 5 episode 8 and concludes on Legends of Tomorrow season 2 episode 7.
The Flash Season 3, Episode 8: Invasion!! (Part 1)
Kara leads most of the others in a rescue effort, but the Dominators kill the President and trap them with a mind control device. The controlled heroes return and attack S.T.A.R. Labs. While Oliver and Wally hold them off, Barry lures Kara to the device and manipulates her into destroying it, freeing everyone. The team decides to trust Barry again. Suddenly, Sara, Ray, Diggle, Thea, and Oliver are teleported away before Barry can intervene.This episode begins a crossover that continues on Arrow season 5 episode 8 and concludes on Legends of Tomorrow season 2 episode 7.
Oliver finds himself back at Queen Manor; both his parents are alive, he is about to be married to Laurel Lance, and Diggle is the Hood. However, it is revealed that he, Diggle, Thea, Sara and Ray are all being held unconscious inside pods aboard a Dominator spaceship. Meanwhile, Felicity, Curtis and Cisco Ramon try to hack into the Dominators' mainframe using a piece of their technology. The team recovers a necessary device with the help of the Flash and Supergirl, and they manage to locate the others. Oliver begins seeing flashes of his former life, as do Sara and Ray. All five captives soon realize that they are inside a shared hallucination.
Arrow Season 5, Episode 8: "Invasion!!" (Part 2 -- 100th episode special)
Oliver finds himself back at Queen Manor; both his parents are alive, he is about to be married to Laurel Lance, and Diggle is the Hood. However, it is revealed that he, Diggle, Thea, Sara and Ray are all being held unconscious inside pods aboard a Dominator spaceship. Meanwhile, Felicity, Curtis and Cisco Ramon try to hack into the Dominators' mainframe using a piece of their technology. The team recovers a necessary device with the help of the Flash and Supergirl, and they manage to locate the others. Oliver begins seeing flashes of his former life, as do Sara and Ray. All five captives soon realize that they are inside a shared hallucination.
Their escape attempt is blocked by Malcolm Merlyn, Deathstroke, Damien Darhk and their mercenaries, all of whom are defeated by the captives. The captives then leave the dream and awaken inside the ship. Escaping in a shuttle, they are rescued by the Waverider. Ray deduces that the Dominators were gathering information from their minds, using the hallucination as a distraction, to help them complete a special "weapon". The team learns that the Dominator mothership is headed towards Earth.This episode continues a crossover that begins on The Flash season 3 episode 8 and concludes on Legends of Tomorrow season 2 episode 7.
Starting off with Supergirl, I have to say that it was in poor taste by the CW to market this episode as part of the crossover when it really didn't have nothing to do with it outside of the 30 second tease at the end that saw Cisco and Barry Allen arrive to her universe. The majority of this episode was tying up loose ends with the Luthor family/CADMUS, J'onn/White Martian, and Mon-El subplots, along with Alex continuing to cope with her newfound sexual identity.
I don't have a problem with Alex coming out as lesbian to her family and this show going that route to emphasize the importance of coming to terms with your sexual identity, but I fear that some viewers will feel that subject is being forced down their throats, especially with just about every Arrowverse show except for The Flash seems to have a LGBT character as a recurring cast member. That being said, it was a relief to see that Alex's mother was more accepting of Alex's choice than Kara was. That moment from a few episodes back where Kara, of all people, would give her sister hell about that was so goddamn awkward.
That being said, I was pretty sure the Luthor family subplot will have something to do with the conclusion of the ordeal with the Dominators. Otherwise, they shouldn't have gone out of their way to introduce this now. In terms of timing that "new weapon" by CADMUS is FAR too convenient timing - especially for what the heroes are going to be up against. That Medusa virus would have made a much more easier method to dispose of the Dominators instead of blowing the special effects budget in a mediocre action sequence in the conclusion of this crossover arc, but whatever...
One more thing... has anyone else busted out laughing like I did at Cyborg Superman looking like Cyborg from the DC Super Powers cartoon?
Onward to The Flash... I thought it was stupid to reopen Pandora's Box on what Barry did on Flashpoint when Felicity Smoak was one of the first people he told about it but she didn't tell the Team Arrow about it. Stein and Jax should've told the Legends crew before they decided to jump to this era which was even more stupid in my honest opinion. As well as I thought that The Flash handled the Killer Frost episode prior to this, it's bizarre to me to see how they are fumbling around with how to tackle this crossover here by bringing up what happened earlier this season that was already resolved to continuing to give Wally hell about using his powers. Have Iris and Joe West even considered that maybe if Wally got trained properly by Barry (and possibly Jesse and Earth-2 Wells too...) that they wouldn't have anything to worry about? Then again, all of this skepticism about Wally having powers is leaning me more and more into the mindset that they are going to try to pull the swerve that Wally ends up being Savitar in this timeline. I could be wrong but I was right about who was Zoom last season too.
Back onto the Flashpoint debate though.. How the hell can White Canary/Sara Lance be mad about Barry tampering with the timeline when she wanted to do the same thing not once but TWICE in Legends when she had a chance to kill Dahrk? Not to mention that her entire crew has been fucking up the timeline on MULTIPLE occasions. If it wasn't for the Waverider and Rip Hunter's instructions they possibly would have had things spiral even more out of control than what Barry has done too. CW, just get the fuck out of here with this shitty writing.
I found it a bit hard to believe that EVERYONE save for Barry and Ollie were brainwashed by the Dominators. That was just FAR too convenient for the sake of the plot here. Speaking of which, I hope they haven't blown their special effects budget on this crossover. Otherwise, the rest of this season for all 4 shows will be nothing but still images like the original ending to the Neon Genesis Evangelion anime. Seriously, what is up with people being mind controlled in ALL of these Arrowverse superhero team-up crossovers? Is that an ongoing joke or something? If so, it's redundant that they are still using it for the 3rd year in a row.
On a visual level, this stuff STILL looks slightly better than an average episode of Power Rangers.
I've been waiting for another Cisco/Felicity Smoak team-up for TOO long now. Why can't we have her on Team Flash full-time? God I love her. Heatwave and "Skirt"'s banter was hilarious, but made me miss Snart even more as I knew he would've had a ton of great one-liners in this.
Where the hell is Citizen Steele and Vixen? How did Palmer get a new Atom suit so fast? I know that Palmer took some of the dwarf star mineral for he could construct a new suit at the end of last week's episode of Legends, but to say that he already finished it in time for this event is a bit jarring. I would complain about how fast everyone got together to start this team-up too but why did they drag on the training sequence so long?
Last but not least, how the hell does Diggle (a dude who just has GUNS and no superpowers at ALL) get to help in this fight when they left Martian Manhunter and Guardian out of this fight? They completely lowballed the cast of Supergirl in this crossover outside of Kara. I can understand why in terms of conflicting filming schedules but damn...
DC's Legends of Tomorrow Season 2, Episode 7: "Invasion!!" (Part 3)
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| As cool as this image looked I couldn't help but notice that there's a LOT of people missing. What happened to the rest of Arrow's sidekicks without any powers if Diggle and Heatwave get to join in this fight? We know Canary was on the Waverider with Cisco but damn... |
Continuing from "Invasion! part two", Nate, Mick, Amaya, Felicity and Cisco travel back to the first Dominator invasion in Oregon, 1951. The Legends members successfully capture a Dominator for information, but are themselves captured by Federal agents led by an Agent Smith. While in custody, they learn from the Dominator that the aliens arrived to assess the threat humanity posed now that metahumans have appeared. Felicity and Cisco rescue the Legends and help set the Dominator free. Meanwhile in Central City, 2016, the team learns from an older Agent Smith that the Dominators know about Barry's manipulation of the timeline, and that they demand his surrender in exchange for peace. After Nate's party returns, the team discovers that the Dominators' weapon is a bomb that will kill all metahumans on Earth, with millions of collateral human casualties. The teams dissuade Barry from surrendering, with Cisco reconciling with him. They manage to destroy the bomb and force the Dominators to retreat using pain-inflicting nanotechnology. Cisco gives Kara a device to travel between universes. Martin convinces Jefferson not to tell the others that his daughter, Lily, (whom he met in part one), is an aberration.This episode concludes a crossover that began on The Flash season 3 episode 8 and continued on Arrow season 5 episode 8.
The Verdict:
It's only fair to analyze this crossover event by the four separate shows that it consists of.Starting off with Supergirl, I have to say that it was in poor taste by the CW to market this episode as part of the crossover when it really didn't have nothing to do with it outside of the 30 second tease at the end that saw Cisco and Barry Allen arrive to her universe. The majority of this episode was tying up loose ends with the Luthor family/CADMUS, J'onn/White Martian, and Mon-El subplots, along with Alex continuing to cope with her newfound sexual identity.
I don't have a problem with Alex coming out as lesbian to her family and this show going that route to emphasize the importance of coming to terms with your sexual identity, but I fear that some viewers will feel that subject is being forced down their throats, especially with just about every Arrowverse show except for The Flash seems to have a LGBT character as a recurring cast member. That being said, it was a relief to see that Alex's mother was more accepting of Alex's choice than Kara was. That moment from a few episodes back where Kara, of all people, would give her sister hell about that was so goddamn awkward.
That being said, I was pretty sure the Luthor family subplot will have something to do with the conclusion of the ordeal with the Dominators. Otherwise, they shouldn't have gone out of their way to introduce this now. In terms of timing that "new weapon" by CADMUS is FAR too convenient timing - especially for what the heroes are going to be up against. That Medusa virus would have made a much more easier method to dispose of the Dominators instead of blowing the special effects budget in a mediocre action sequence in the conclusion of this crossover arc, but whatever...
One more thing... has anyone else busted out laughing like I did at Cyborg Superman looking like Cyborg from the DC Super Powers cartoon?
Onward to The Flash... I thought it was stupid to reopen Pandora's Box on what Barry did on Flashpoint when Felicity Smoak was one of the first people he told about it but she didn't tell the Team Arrow about it. Stein and Jax should've told the Legends crew before they decided to jump to this era which was even more stupid in my honest opinion. As well as I thought that The Flash handled the Killer Frost episode prior to this, it's bizarre to me to see how they are fumbling around with how to tackle this crossover here by bringing up what happened earlier this season that was already resolved to continuing to give Wally hell about using his powers. Have Iris and Joe West even considered that maybe if Wally got trained properly by Barry (and possibly Jesse and Earth-2 Wells too...) that they wouldn't have anything to worry about? Then again, all of this skepticism about Wally having powers is leaning me more and more into the mindset that they are going to try to pull the swerve that Wally ends up being Savitar in this timeline. I could be wrong but I was right about who was Zoom last season too.
Back onto the Flashpoint debate though.. How the hell can White Canary/Sara Lance be mad about Barry tampering with the timeline when she wanted to do the same thing not once but TWICE in Legends when she had a chance to kill Dahrk? Not to mention that her entire crew has been fucking up the timeline on MULTIPLE occasions. If it wasn't for the Waverider and Rip Hunter's instructions they possibly would have had things spiral even more out of control than what Barry has done too. CW, just get the fuck out of here with this shitty writing.
I found it a bit hard to believe that EVERYONE save for Barry and Ollie were brainwashed by the Dominators. That was just FAR too convenient for the sake of the plot here. Speaking of which, I hope they haven't blown their special effects budget on this crossover. Otherwise, the rest of this season for all 4 shows will be nothing but still images like the original ending to the Neon Genesis Evangelion anime. Seriously, what is up with people being mind controlled in ALL of these Arrowverse superhero team-up crossovers? Is that an ongoing joke or something? If so, it's redundant that they are still using it for the 3rd year in a row.
On a visual level, this stuff STILL looks slightly better than an average episode of Power Rangers.
I've been waiting for another Cisco/Felicity Smoak team-up for TOO long now. Why can't we have her on Team Flash full-time? God I love her. Heatwave and "Skirt"'s banter was hilarious, but made me miss Snart even more as I knew he would've had a ton of great one-liners in this.
Where the hell is Citizen Steele and Vixen? How did Palmer get a new Atom suit so fast? I know that Palmer took some of the dwarf star mineral for he could construct a new suit at the end of last week's episode of Legends, but to say that he already finished it in time for this event is a bit jarring. I would complain about how fast everyone got together to start this team-up too but why did they drag on the training sequence so long?
Last but not least, how the hell does Diggle (a dude who just has GUNS and no superpowers at ALL) get to help in this fight when they left Martian Manhunter and Guardian out of this fight? They completely lowballed the cast of Supergirl in this crossover outside of Kara. I can understand why in terms of conflicting filming schedules but damn...
Next we move onto the Arrow tie-in episode... What a fucking cheap way to get all of the old Arrow cast members that were either in past seasons or now starring in spin-offs in a single episode. I hate CW for making me watch an entire episode of Arrow against my will just to see the next part of this crossover team-up event.
This episode is as much of a throwaway as the Supergirl tie-in. Who the fuck is the geek that I'm guessing is supposed to be Mr. Terrific and that Hispanic Casey Jones (Wild Dog?) looking dude? Sue me. I don't watch this fucking show on a regular basis. I'm sure I wasn't the only one going, who the fuck are these losers when Cisco was taken to Team Arrow's base of operations (the Arrow cave?).
Best Sara Lance looked in while in this though. Hot damn I wish she was into guys... I know Ollie wishes she was too to say that he used to bang her and her sister. Speaking of Sara Lance, she had the best moment in this entire episode when they let her kill Deathstroke of all people like it was nothing. Dream or not, that was pretty bad ass I'll admit that. Out of all of the non-powered people in the Arrowverse, she comes off as the coolest (except when Snart was still around) in all aspects. Heatwave is the number two spot, despite managing to outshine everyone else in this crossover in terms of banter and overall depth to an otherwise generic character archetype in this season of Legends.
To say that they had Ollie had that bad ass speech to Barry on the previous episode in this crossover about shit happens in life and this crap happens kinda scales things back a bit to lessen the impact of that moment. Even more so when they are all forced to live this alternate "perfect" life when Barry already let them know how fucked up the timeline is thanks to Flashpoint. I get that this was Arrow's 100th episode special and they wanted to devote something to everyone who've been a part of it along the way, but they could have done their own thing with this episode as a stand-alone episode for this series and did the crossover tie-in(s) AFTER this week. I can say the same for Supergirl as well as it felt like they were just slapping on the big crossover label just to garner attention for these midseason finales.
Out of the VERY few times that I've seen Arrow, I'm fucking GLAD to hear that Laurel's dead. Kill off Thea too and I honestly might watch that show full time. Those actresses and characters do absolutely nothing for me and made even revisiting this show for the few scenes that they were in this crossover a chore to watch.
Their escape from the Dominators ship was fucking comical. So they just left their gear and Palmer's Atom suit (the main thing in Legends that keeps fucking up the timeline everytime the guy leaves parts of it in the past) on the ship without even caring? I repeat myself from the previous episode... Where was Steele during all of this? Was he just hanging out waiting for this moment to rescue the team because he wasn't invited for the rest of this team-up?
That being said, this was a great episode if you're a long-time Arrow fan in sake of nostalgia. For everyone else, it's the weakest of these crossover tie-ins as the Dominators plot was almost nonexistent in this episode outside of the action with Flash and Supergirl that lasted all but a few seconds before going back to the "dream world" with Ollie's group.
We wrap up this crossover event with Legends of Tomorrow. Much like The Flash tie-in episode, this was a back to form without the Domintors' invasion plot being secondary to what was your typical episode of this CW superhero show. This season of Legends has hit a comfortable pattern now where every episode is pretty much a one-off in terms of their time travel era of the week with the subplot of trying to figure out what Reverse Flash and Damien Darhk are doing tampering with the past.
We get a resolution to the subplot with Martin Stein concerning his daughter that spawned out of a result of his own interaction with his younger self and NOT by Flashpoint, along with some more bonding between Stein and Caitlin Snow. That was something I really missed about having Stein on Team Flash as Stein seemed like a father figure to Snow and after what has transpired with her following the "Killer Frost" episode of The Flash last week, she really needed this time to show her kind side again. I'm anxious to see what they are going to do with Stein's daughter. She has to be harmless, much like Jesse in Earth-2 Wells' timeline.
Citizen Steel, Vixen, and Heatwave took charge on this episode for the most part, with Felicity Smoak and an irritable Cisco Ramon tagging along for the time travel field trip to capture and interrogate one of the Dominators from the past. To say that the Legends are supposed to be careful about who sees them and what they do in the past, they sure do love getting captured. It makes them look REALLY stupid at times, especially during this episode where they are captured by officials from the US government for experimentation. Of course, the gang escapes, thanks to an unexpected rescue by Cisco and Felicity (yeah you read that right...) and they manage to free the Dominator as well.
Doing so ends up screwing up the timeline even further and forces Cisco to realize that his personal gripe with Barry is pointless as he just did the same thing. I don't see why they reopened this wound in the first place when it was resolved earlier this season in The Flash and didn't need to be brought up again here. Much like the entire episode devoted to the trip down memory lane on Arrow, this was more unnecessary drama that dragged this crossover down in a bad way.
By the way, I had to laugh at Cisco making a reference to Stranger Things and I immediately went, "It's WAAYYY too soon to be making references to that show right now, buddy."
Finally, things came together for the final battle of this crossover which pitted the heroes against the main group of Dominators while Supergirl and Flash race around the world slapping on the devices that Stein and his daughter worked on together earlier to "short out" the Dominators' brains. This forced the Dominators to make a hasty retreat, but here's the thing that I had a problem with. Couldn't Kara (who had like a minimal role here in this crossover since Day 1) have gone back to her world, get that bioweapon that the Luthor family tried to use on the aliens there and reconfigure it to work on the Dominators only? That just seemed like a missed opportunity to say that they were billing the entire week as part of this crossover and nothing of use came out of the Supergirl midseason finale that could have been applied here.
Once again though, the final battle pushes the Arrowverse's special effects budget to the limit, but still manages to look underwhelming for the most part. It still cool to see all of these characters working together and interacting with each other on such a large scale as this and at the end of the day, I suppose that's all what matters -- despite how lame the Dominators looked.
This episode ends with all of the heroes having a party together in the Star Labs warehouse that looks conveniently like the Hall of Justice from the old Superfriends cartoons. Cisco gave Kara an inter-dimensional breach device, so they are able to do these crossovers much more easily from here on out as she's able to communicate with them for help (as the Dominators are said to exist in her Earth too) and vice versa. I'm pretty sure Palmer's remark about Kara looking like his "cousin" was lost on most people as Brandon Routh (Palmer/The Atom) played Superman in Superman Returns. That being said, I wouldn't be surprised if there's a Supergirl (more likely Power Girl instead...) in the Arrowverse on Earth-1 though.
This episode is as much of a throwaway as the Supergirl tie-in. Who the fuck is the geek that I'm guessing is supposed to be Mr. Terrific and that Hispanic Casey Jones (Wild Dog?) looking dude? Sue me. I don't watch this fucking show on a regular basis. I'm sure I wasn't the only one going, who the fuck are these losers when Cisco was taken to Team Arrow's base of operations (the Arrow cave?).
Best Sara Lance looked in while in this though. Hot damn I wish she was into guys... I know Ollie wishes she was too to say that he used to bang her and her sister. Speaking of Sara Lance, she had the best moment in this entire episode when they let her kill Deathstroke of all people like it was nothing. Dream or not, that was pretty bad ass I'll admit that. Out of all of the non-powered people in the Arrowverse, she comes off as the coolest (except when Snart was still around) in all aspects. Heatwave is the number two spot, despite managing to outshine everyone else in this crossover in terms of banter and overall depth to an otherwise generic character archetype in this season of Legends.
To say that they had Ollie had that bad ass speech to Barry on the previous episode in this crossover about shit happens in life and this crap happens kinda scales things back a bit to lessen the impact of that moment. Even more so when they are all forced to live this alternate "perfect" life when Barry already let them know how fucked up the timeline is thanks to Flashpoint. I get that this was Arrow's 100th episode special and they wanted to devote something to everyone who've been a part of it along the way, but they could have done their own thing with this episode as a stand-alone episode for this series and did the crossover tie-in(s) AFTER this week. I can say the same for Supergirl as well as it felt like they were just slapping on the big crossover label just to garner attention for these midseason finales.
Out of the VERY few times that I've seen Arrow, I'm fucking GLAD to hear that Laurel's dead. Kill off Thea too and I honestly might watch that show full time. Those actresses and characters do absolutely nothing for me and made even revisiting this show for the few scenes that they were in this crossover a chore to watch.
Their escape from the Dominators ship was fucking comical. So they just left their gear and Palmer's Atom suit (the main thing in Legends that keeps fucking up the timeline everytime the guy leaves parts of it in the past) on the ship without even caring? I repeat myself from the previous episode... Where was Steele during all of this? Was he just hanging out waiting for this moment to rescue the team because he wasn't invited for the rest of this team-up?
That being said, this was a great episode if you're a long-time Arrow fan in sake of nostalgia. For everyone else, it's the weakest of these crossover tie-ins as the Dominators plot was almost nonexistent in this episode outside of the action with Flash and Supergirl that lasted all but a few seconds before going back to the "dream world" with Ollie's group.
We wrap up this crossover event with Legends of Tomorrow. Much like The Flash tie-in episode, this was a back to form without the Domintors' invasion plot being secondary to what was your typical episode of this CW superhero show. This season of Legends has hit a comfortable pattern now where every episode is pretty much a one-off in terms of their time travel era of the week with the subplot of trying to figure out what Reverse Flash and Damien Darhk are doing tampering with the past.
We get a resolution to the subplot with Martin Stein concerning his daughter that spawned out of a result of his own interaction with his younger self and NOT by Flashpoint, along with some more bonding between Stein and Caitlin Snow. That was something I really missed about having Stein on Team Flash as Stein seemed like a father figure to Snow and after what has transpired with her following the "Killer Frost" episode of The Flash last week, she really needed this time to show her kind side again. I'm anxious to see what they are going to do with Stein's daughter. She has to be harmless, much like Jesse in Earth-2 Wells' timeline.
Citizen Steel, Vixen, and Heatwave took charge on this episode for the most part, with Felicity Smoak and an irritable Cisco Ramon tagging along for the time travel field trip to capture and interrogate one of the Dominators from the past. To say that the Legends are supposed to be careful about who sees them and what they do in the past, they sure do love getting captured. It makes them look REALLY stupid at times, especially during this episode where they are captured by officials from the US government for experimentation. Of course, the gang escapes, thanks to an unexpected rescue by Cisco and Felicity (yeah you read that right...) and they manage to free the Dominator as well.
Doing so ends up screwing up the timeline even further and forces Cisco to realize that his personal gripe with Barry is pointless as he just did the same thing. I don't see why they reopened this wound in the first place when it was resolved earlier this season in The Flash and didn't need to be brought up again here. Much like the entire episode devoted to the trip down memory lane on Arrow, this was more unnecessary drama that dragged this crossover down in a bad way.
By the way, I had to laugh at Cisco making a reference to Stranger Things and I immediately went, "It's WAAYYY too soon to be making references to that show right now, buddy."
Finally, things came together for the final battle of this crossover which pitted the heroes against the main group of Dominators while Supergirl and Flash race around the world slapping on the devices that Stein and his daughter worked on together earlier to "short out" the Dominators' brains. This forced the Dominators to make a hasty retreat, but here's the thing that I had a problem with. Couldn't Kara (who had like a minimal role here in this crossover since Day 1) have gone back to her world, get that bioweapon that the Luthor family tried to use on the aliens there and reconfigure it to work on the Dominators only? That just seemed like a missed opportunity to say that they were billing the entire week as part of this crossover and nothing of use came out of the Supergirl midseason finale that could have been applied here.
Once again though, the final battle pushes the Arrowverse's special effects budget to the limit, but still manages to look underwhelming for the most part. It still cool to see all of these characters working together and interacting with each other on such a large scale as this and at the end of the day, I suppose that's all what matters -- despite how lame the Dominators looked.
This episode ends with all of the heroes having a party together in the Star Labs warehouse that looks conveniently like the Hall of Justice from the old Superfriends cartoons. Cisco gave Kara an inter-dimensional breach device, so they are able to do these crossovers much more easily from here on out as she's able to communicate with them for help (as the Dominators are said to exist in her Earth too) and vice versa. I'm pretty sure Palmer's remark about Kara looking like his "cousin" was lost on most people as Brandon Routh (Palmer/The Atom) played Superman in Superman Returns. That being said, I wouldn't be surprised if there's a Supergirl (more likely Power Girl instead...) in the Arrowverse on Earth-1 though.
Watch It or Don't Bother?
If you're a fan of the Arrowverse then give this a shot, but you're a newcomer or just only watch Supergirl, then you're going to be REALLY disappointed.
This crossover is much like the two Flash/Arrow crossovers before it. There's nothing much here to draw in non-Arrowverse fans into these four episodes, especially the Supergirl tie-in as a newcomer, and the entire week long event as a whole seemed like a waste by the time it was said and done. The Dominators came off as an easily forgettable adversary while most of the crossover appeal to this event was mainly due to how these reunions and meetings between the mash-ups of all of these different characters from different branches of the Arrowverse were going to interact with each other. The main cast of Supergirl really got shafted in this event, with only Melissa Benoist serving as the sole representative from her show while the other three Arrowverse shows were highly selective in who they allowed to participate in these episodes while completely omitting or disregarding others to continue plot points that could have been resolved prior or after this event took place.
This crossover is much like the two Flash/Arrow crossovers before it. There's nothing much here to draw in non-Arrowverse fans into these four episodes, especially the Supergirl tie-in as a newcomer, and the entire week long event as a whole seemed like a waste by the time it was said and done. The Dominators came off as an easily forgettable adversary while most of the crossover appeal to this event was mainly due to how these reunions and meetings between the mash-ups of all of these different characters from different branches of the Arrowverse were going to interact with each other. The main cast of Supergirl really got shafted in this event, with only Melissa Benoist serving as the sole representative from her show while the other three Arrowverse shows were highly selective in who they allowed to participate in these episodes while completely omitting or disregarding others to continue plot points that could have been resolved prior or after this event took place.
To say that this was the first "major" crossover connecting all four of these CW superhero shows together, I have to say that in terms of a narrative, they failed to deliver in that regard as the main plot was undermined for the vast majority of this affair in favor for plot points that should have been resolved in each of these individual series (much like Supergirl did before her "official" debut in The Flash) beforehand. That being said, the Dominators weren't really a great enemy to pull from the comics anyway as they weren't given much to work with on that storyline, but damn. To say that this was their first big crossover and this was the best they could do by doing 3 individual average episodes of these shows with some guest-stars thrown in with a loose plot tying it all together, just shows that the CW writers' for these shows are grasping at straws in terms what to do on these shows. Seeing all of these character interact and trade banter was the greatest appeal here, but all of that is for nothing when the story and action (for the most part) doesn't deliver as well.
