Since the first season of ‘THE FLASH’, DC’s television universe, known more widely as the Arrowverse, has been slowly building up to an adaptation of one of the most monumental comic book events in history: Crisis on Infinite Earths. The teasing for this event went into overdrive in the most recent season of the Arrowverse, as the ‘ELSEWORLDS’ crossover event between ‘ARROW’, ‘THE FLASH’, and ‘SUPERGIRL’ acted as a three part set-up for the event, introducing The Monitor, hinting at larger threats, and even confirming that an adaptation of ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ would be coming in 2019.
In the season finales for all three of these shows, as well as ‘LEGENDS OF TOMORROW’, the ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ event was teased even more, with more appearances of The Monitor, and large repercussions for the Arrowverse’s two main protagonists, Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell) and Barry Allen (Grant Gustin). With all this hype, how can they go wrong? Today, we will go over how The CW can make ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ the ‘AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR’ and ‘AVENGERS: ENDGAME’ of television.
Major Deaths
If the Arrowverse wants to show that they mean business with their culmination of years of setups and teases, we’re gonna have to see some big and emotional losses. Now, it has already been confirmed that Oliver Queen, the character who kicked off the Arrowverse itself, will meet his end in the event which, despite already being spoiled by ‘ARROW’ itself, is sure to be an emotional loss. However, it is very unlikely that Oliver will be the only loss in an epic storyline like this. Here are some of the most likely choices for other deaths in ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’.
Clark Kent
Ever since his introduction in the second season premiere of ‘SUPERGIRL’, Clark Kent/Superman (Tyler Hoechlin) has been a fan favorite among Arrowverse fans. However, he is only a minor character in the Arrowverse, and is barely included in the shows. His death could be a very emotional moment while also not being a huge loss. It is very likely that Clark will be given Supergirl’s death from the comic event the Arrowverse is adapting.
John Diggle
John Diggle (David Ramsey) can be best described as the Rhodey to Oliver Queen’s Tony Stark. Diggle has been around since the very beginning of the Arrowverse, and is a very beloved character. ‘ARROW’s seventh season introduced flashforwards that give us a look at the distant future of some of our favorite characters. However, two characters were noticeably missing from these flashforwards: Oliver Queen and John Diggle. With the confirmed loss of Oliver, could Diggle suffer the same fate as Oliver? Only time will tell.
Jay Garrick or Earth-90 Flash
Both Jay Garrick and Earth-90 Flash are portrayed by John Wesley Shipp, who portrayed Barry Allen in the 1990s ‘THE FLASH’ series, and portrayed Henry Allen in the modern series. He also portrayed two alternate Flashes in the Arrowverse, appearing as Jay Garrick, a seasoned speedster who works as The Flash on Earth-3, and reprising his role as Barry Allen from Earth-90. It is very likely that one of these aged, seasoned speedsters will take Barry’s place in sacrificing himself in the Crisis, in order to keep Barry alive for future seasons of ‘THE FLASH’. Now, let’s transition into the next way to make this event live up to its full potential.
A Larger Budget
With the large scale of ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’, a high budget is going to be required to pull off this storyline on television. The safest bet for The CW, in my opinion, would be to shorten both ‘THE FLASH’ and ‘SUPERGIRL’ down to twenty episodes, in comparison to their current twenty-two. ‘ARROW’ will only be ten episodes in its upcoming season, so by shortening all the shows, they can invest more money into making ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHE’ amazing.
An Interesting Villain
The greatest strength of ‘AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR’ was its villain. Thanos was an amazing character who developed thoroughly in the film. With the runtime of ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ being over three hours, there is plenty of time to develop the Anti-Monitor, maybe even including him in an episode or two before the event to introduce and hype him up before focusing on his conflict with the DC heroes in ‘CRISIS’ itself.
Long Awaited Returns
With the scale of ‘CRISIS’, the heroes are going to need all the help they can get. We could see the return of characters who left the show seasons ago. However, with the multiversal travel very present in ‘CRISIS’, it is very possible that we could see things like Tom Welling’s Superman from ‘SMALLVILLE’ or other characters along those lines join the fight against the Anti-Monitor. Finally, the final thing that needs to happen in ‘CRISIS’…
The Merging of Earth-1 and Earth-38
‘SUPERGIRL’ has the unfortunate problem of being set on a completely different Earth from the other Arrowverse shows. However, with the Crisis right around the corner, now would be the perfect time to merge the Earths. This could also make way for ‘BLACK LIGHTNING’ to finally join the Arrowverse after the merging of the multiverse.
All of these and more could make ‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ the ultimate television event. Will it live up to the hype? We’ll just have to wait and see.
‘CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS’ will begin on The CW this fall.
