"Best. Team-up. EVER."
Hello everyone!
So, like I promised this past Tuesday, I switched up the line-up for my blog posts because of the awesome and amazing thing that was happening during the week. Because why would I want to spend a long time developing and writing a blog post about a movie that can wait when we had that cross-over to look forward to?
I am firmly convinced you can like both and not have to glare daggers at either camps because, let's face it, all the superheroes and villains in there are for our entertainment.
They probably wouldn't want to be the cause of disputes (if they were real!).
But then I can totally hear Mick Rory already snarling a very trademark 'Speak for yourself!'
Anyway, as you can tell, I'm a fan, I geeked out this week while it was happening, and now that it's over and done with I can finally review it!
Beam me up, Scotty!
That was absolutely the wrong set-up, but bear with me here.
As much as the CW wanted to sell this thing as a four-night, epic event (it was still epic, don't worry), it was actually a three-night one.
Everyone assumed it would start with Supergirl and end with Legends of Tomorrow, but Supergirl was really super minor, actually. There were a couple of times a wormhole appeared in Monday's episode, but until the end when Barry and Cisco actually landed in Kara's apartment, it didn't actually make any sense whatsoever.
But anyway, let's move on to the REAL start-up, Tuesday night's Flash episode, where we learn why Barry recruited Supergirl in the first place.
A spaceship crashes in Central City, and lo and behold, Barry actually has reason to shriek like a little girl when ALIENS walk out of the crashed ship.
Diggle's wife Lyla informs Team Flash that the aliens are called the Dominators and had actually been around on Earth for a visit back in the fifties, but at the time no one paid them much attention as a force that was likely to come a-knocking with war (no one apparently watched Independence Day, either ...).
Anyway, she tells Barry to leave well enough alone, but obviously he's not going to do that, so he goes to do some recruiting!
And can I just say, Oliver exasperated with Barry's puppy-like enthusiasm is still the best?
Team Arrow (the ORIGINAL one, not the ridiculous kiddie one) is in the hangar, and so is Team Legends since we learned last week that Sara intercepted Felicity's distress call. Combine it with Team Flash AND Supergirl, and you've got yourself one hell of a team-up.
Fun fact: the hangar they're in? I learned via the interwebz it's the Hall of Justice!
So, the team starts training with Supergirl to get an idea of what it will be like to fight the Dominators, while the strategists plot. Also, Barry is named Team Leader, even though Oliver might have been the more obvious (and experienced) choice, but it's kind of adorkable how Barry stumbles and stutters and Oliver stage-whispers suggestions.
Admit it, you thought it was cute, too.
Anyway, right about when they're supposed to go find the Dominators who have kidnapped the President of the USA, Cisco finds the message Future Barry sent to the Legends about not trusting him and whatnot, and of course in his infinite wisdom *coughannoyingoutburstcough* forces Barry to do what Oliver had essentially decided against, as a good team leader who prioritizes: to shake the foundation of the team telling them about Flashpoint.
Which sidelines their strongest and key members, as they vote Flash out, but Green Arrow tells them to proverbially bite it, and stays behind with his protégé.
Not surprisingly, the over-eager and under-experienced crew runs into trouble and ends up under mind control by the Dominators, which forces Oliver and Barry to team up to save the day (this is also the point for Obnoxious Wally, but the kid grates my nerves so bad I won't even mention him).
Just as this is over, Oliver, John, Sara, Thea and Ray are beamed up ... up ... and away!
Which is how we land in Arrow's 100th episode where we learn they are caught in an alternate reality in which the Queen's Gambit never sailed, Oliver is about to marry Laurel, and all is well in the world.
Except, the abductees all have visions of their actual lives, and know this is all a fake.
It was still fun seeing Dig as the Hood, though!
Anyway, as they realise what's going on, and that there's this weird building called Smoak Industries (that Miss Smoak does NOT remember having but is a great nod to that Legends episode which was set in the future) they need to get to, pretty much their biggest enemies turn up to fight them. This had to have been a fun episode with literally EVERYONE on set, from Malcolm Merlyn to Darhk and Deathstroke, and fans cheered when Thea decided she couldn't actually stay behind with her dream family, instead choosing to go with her brother.
Of course, traditional let's-wing-it style, the gang steals an alien podship and races off into space, only to be picked up by the Waverider.
And to get an Independence Day moment as a GINORMOUS alien spaceship heads for Earth.
That's how we go into the conclusion of this story arc with them deciding that they need to go back in time and capture an alien in the fifties to interrogate him, but what actually happens is the US government (as per usual) starts nosing about, which forces our interpid heroes to rescue the alien instead of questioning him.
We do get to a point though: the Dominators are afraid of the meta-humans and want to exterminate Earth before the Metas decide to come after them.
Paranoia, much?
What does happen, however, is that Cisco finally gets off his high horse in blaming Barry, because he himself went back in time and changed a point in history, and now it looks like the Dominators are about to nuke the planet if Barry doesn't turn himself in.
Meanwhile, with the rest of the gang, the US government tries the whole 'how about we interrogate you?' ploy again, only this time they don't bring their tranq guns,and so, since they're up against the Atom, the White Canary, the Flash and the Green Arrow, who are the senior heroes, really, in terms of experience, things all end pretty quickly.
Not in favour of the government, might I add.
Not in favour of the government, might I add.
Which is how we learn that Glasses (or, Agent Smith) actually made a deal with the Dominators, which is kind of hypocritical against the backdrop of 'We don't negotiate with terrorists', but, oh well.
Anyway, the team is so NOT having Barry give himself up, even after Cisco talks with their alien friend from the fifties again, and instead they opt to fight for the planet and people they love. Their secret weapon? A machine Dr. Stein and his daughter (who shouldn't exist ... more on that next week!) devised to induce pain in the Dominators when placed on their bodies and activated.
The plan works - the Dominators hightail it out of here, the President congratulates the Heroes, and Agent Glasses is told he's going to be reassigned to Antarctica.
Ah, good times.
The episode ends with everyone going separate ways, a poignant moment as the newbies disperse first (Cisco gifts Kara with a nifty device that lets her jump between Earths whenever), leaving behind the ones who started it all as they slowly trudge off, Sara to the Waverider, Diggle back to Star City ...
And then there were the Flash and the Green Arrow in a bar talking about which one of them is faster.
FIN!
xx
*images and video not mine
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