Sunday, March 25, 2018

Crossovers: Arrow-verse Episode One

Hello again, Everyone! I've been out for a while, but I found myself with some extra time on my hands and lots of TV to binge watch. I thought some of you might want to binge with me! I'm working on the DC's Arrow-verse at the moment. (I'm caught up on the Marvel-verse, but will probably do an episode or two about Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and the gang in the near future.)

Just as a reminder: SPOILERS EVERYWHERE!

In case you are not aware (and if you're not, you may want to stop reading...), the Arrow-verse includes Oliver Queen in Arrow, Barry Allen in Flash, John Constantine in Constantine, Mari McCabe in the animated series Vixen, Kara Danvers in Supergirl, many of the sideliners in the Doctor Who-esque DC's Legends of Tomorrow, and Ray Terrill in the animated series Freedom Fighters: The Ray. It has become quite the crossover-heavy universe and has much potential for more!

                                                       

                                                

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Source of my episode order: https://flash-arrow-order.herokuapp.com/

I will admit, I am nowhere close to caught up on this universe. I have just recently reached the point where Constantine joins in. I have decided to watch the episodes in the order they were aired, starting with the first couple seasons of Arrow and then alternating as the new shows seep in. I did watch a couple of episodes of Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow when they first began, but I decided to go back to the beginning and watch them as they were arguably meant to be watched.

There is a plea here, as well. Crossovers and multi-show universes are becoming more common. What I would love to see are releases of the DVDs and BluRays and whatever other types of media we have now that work those in. Provide collections of all the shows involved in the order you're supposed to watch them in! I know it would make the most sense to wait until the entire universe is finished, but I'm sure those network types could figure out something. I know I'd shell out quite a bit if I started seeing these!

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Anyway, back to the Arrow-verse...It, aptly, begin with Oliver Queen in Arrow, which I have loved so far. Not only because Stephen Amell or Oliver Queen spends half of the show shirtless and doing salmon ladders, but also because of the combination of occasional clever writing and fairly well choreographed action sequences. Many parts of it are quite close to unbelievable, but there is a level of suspension of belief required when watching shows depicting comic books and superheroes.

                                                             



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The cleverness abounds when Arrow is joined by Barry Allen in Flash. Barry Allen (Grant Gustin), Caitlin Snow (Danielle Panabaker), and Cisco Ramon (Carlos Valdes) are a perfect combination of young geniuses to show the rest of us that the 20- and 30-somethings of the world can be clever and make a difference and be superheroes, too! Most of us aren't geniuses or superheroes, but for some reason we LOVE to watch them on television, and Flash gives us the opportunity to watch both.




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Next, jumps in John Constantine in Constantine. I've only watch a couple episodes so far. It seems to have a Supernatural feel to it, if you've seen the Winchester boys riding around in their '67 Impala fighting demons and sometimes angels and everything in between. I very much enjoy the British addition of Matt Ryan as Constantine. His begrudging acceptance of his responsibility to fight the demons slowly infiltrating the area is entertaining to watch. I've always enjoyed that UK dry humor. And he rocks that trench coat. Fight demons, must wear trench coat.



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AND more Doctor Who similarities...coincidence? Constantine just happens to have an inconspicuous piece of paper (playing card) that takes on the appearance of what the holder requires...sound like any psychic paper you've heard of?? And Captain Jack Harkness makes an appearance as the dark Malcolm Merlyn.


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I haven't reached the entry of Vixen, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, or The Ray quite yet. I wasn't all that impressed with the few episodes of Supergirl that I saw, but I will give it another shot when I get to that point. The similarities between Legends of Tomorrow and Doctor Who are hard to ignore (especially since Rip Hunter [Arthur Darvill] was once Rory Williams, one of my favorite companions from Doctor Who), and I very much enjoy Doctor Who, so I'm guessing I will get sucked in by that series, too. I'm not sure how I will feel about the animated additions to the universe, but I will probably try to get my hands on them just to satisfy my completionist needs.




Hopefully, we can enjoy these crossovers together! I will probably confuse myself trying to wind these all together, especially with virtually zero previous comic book knowledge and my constant hope that Doctor Who is involved, but I'm hoping we can help each other. I can't imagine trying to keep up with these shows when they were airing, waiting a week between episodes. I would have been SO lost. Thank goodness for Netflix and all the other binge-assisting tools we now have!