A Crisis is Coming!
A year ago CW teased the impending threat called, Crisis on Infinite Earths. A threat so big that all of the heroes from the Arrowverse will be called upon to help stop it.
With days until the event we decided to give a little rundown of what Crisis on Infinite Earths was in the comics. As well as give our take on what might transpire in this current iteration.
Obviously if you have not seen anything from the Arrowverse shows to this point SPOILERS ahead!
What Was Crisis on Infinite Earths?
(this section by John Horsley)
Back in the 1980’s DC had a big problem on their hands. They had all these amazing characters, with extremely hard to follow story lines from 50 years of story telling. They had the Golden Age Characters, the Silver Age Characters, the Bronze Age, The ones they bought (Charleston and Fawcett to name a few) but no real way to tell universe level stories like their counterparts at Marvel did. Sure they had some cross overs and team books, but they have different “earths” of characters and it got super complex.
Enter Marv Wolfman and George Perez who collectively said “I bet we can solve this in 12 issues or less!”. They didn’t say that, but they are the team that handled a MASSIVE universe shattering story called Crisis on Infinite Earths that was meant to re-boot the DC Universe with no multiple earths and everything would be told in a shared universe for everyone to play in. They did this by basically collapsing all the multiple earths into each other to try and make the multiverse stronger. It gets complex really fast, and I’m not going to tell you a lot about it because that would be an entire new essay on its own. All you need to know about the comics is they had dozens upon dozens of multiple earths with different versions of their characters and this event was meant to reset everything to one universe to make things easier, no more imaginary stories and so on. (It should be noted that the Elseworlds imprint started a few years after this event, as well as Vertigo – which was both in and out of the main DC Continuity.)
In the comics they kill off two main characters, so if you don’t want to know who they are then I highly suggest not reading on. Supergirl (Kara Zor-El) died at the hands of the Anit-Monitor, the dude trying to destroy it all (issue #7). And The Flash (Barry Allen) died by using his speed and the speed force to stop the Anti-Monitor(issue #8). Hundreds of others died, but those are the biggest. From this we got Wally West as The Flash for TWENTY THREE YEARS until his return from the Speed Force. Supergirl came back faster, but as a clone from Lex Luther named Matrix. She didn’t return until 2003’s Superman/Batman series. (Issue #8 if you wanted to know.)
Crisis spawned many more Crisis events in the DCU, so much so that it’s a running thing now. Final Crisis. Infinite Crisis. Crisis on Toast. You get the idea. Ultimately it’s one of the most (if not THE MOST) important event that has had lasting effects on the DC Universe, and comics as a whole. Most publishers today do not have the stones to keep main stream characters dead for so long. Though I have to admit having a replacement character to take over the mantle is a little cheating.
The Arrowverse Crisis on Infinite Earths
Since the Pilot episode of The Flash we have known that the Crisis event was coming. We saw an article written by the eventually Mrs. Allen with the headline ‘Flash Missing. Vanishes in Crisis’
Fans went wild when seeing what they thought was a simple Easter egg. Little did we know that 6 years later the actual Crisis this article was speaking of would come to be.
It wasn’t until season 5 of the Flash we started to learn a bit more of what happened and how the future looked after Crisis. Nora, Barry and Iris’ future daughter comes back in time to live a life with her father whom she never met.
It was during the Elseworlds crossover last year that revealed a Crisis was coming. Oliver Queen, the Green Arrow, made a deal with a God named Monitor to save Barry Allen and Kara Danvers lives from the Elseworld events.
Still at this point, just days away from Crisis, we do not know what that deal was.
During the season 5 finale of the Flash the newspaper is shown once again but with the date changing from March 2024 to December 2019.
What to Expect
It really is anyone’s guess at this point. We do know that many iterations of characters we already have met or seen will be appearing as well as many we have yet to see in the Arrowverse.
The current seasons of the Flash and Arrow have been heavily leaning on the idea of the two Heroes dying during Crisis.
The ongoing theme with Barry has been. In order for everyone to live he must die.
And with Arrow his death appears to be part of the deal made with the Monitor last season.
The interesting part is we know that in the original comic arc (see above) both Barry Allen and Kara Danvers die during this Crisis.
This was absolutely shocking in the World of comic books
Do we think that both Kara and Barry will die in this crossover event? Not sure how they can be killed off completely. When it comes to ratings and popularity of their shows it is unlikely both die or stay dead for long. However, that doesn’t mean another beloved character couldn’t die.
The one who started it all Green Arrow is on its final season ending its 8 year run with Crisis. The flash forwards in the last two seasons have shown Oliver’s kids, Mia and William, dealing with the loss of their father. As well as the state of their city, Star City, and how it has been in shambles ever since his death. While this could all be for effect most people are putting money on Oliver meeting his end in just a few weeks.
The problem is, with so many announced cameos it is hard to know what is going to happen. Kevin Conroy as Bruce Wayne, Brandon Routh as Superman and Tom Welling as Clark Kent are just a few. Not to mention the Easter eggs connecting to many other iterations of these characters.
Producer Greg Berlanti teased in an interview the scale and excitement of this event.
“It is our biggest one yet… It is really incredibly epic and I think everyone is going to be satisfied. There are so many cameos, really great cameos. People have seen some of the castings we’ve had in the trades, but in one scene we have three supermen onscreen at one time and that is pretty cool.”
If you are still not ready for this epic five episode arc check out the trailer below and then don’t miss any of the action starting on December 8th!
Supergirl — “Crisis on Infinite Earths: Part One” — Image Number: SPG509c_0115r.jpg — Pictured (L-R): Grant Gustin as The Flash, Melissa Benoist as Kara/Supergirl, Tyler Hoechlin as Clark Kent/Superman, Ruby Rose as Kate Kane/Batwoman and Brandon Routh as Ray Palmer/Atom — Photo: Dean Buscher/The CW — © 2019 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved. 
