After three consecutive days of DC TV’s wonders crossing over to each other shows (Supergirl notwithstanding), it all comes down for the final fight on Legends of Tomorrow. Plus, resolution on Cisco and Barry’s fight and Dr. Stein decides to keep the aberration he created alive.
“See You Later, Dominator”
Barry informs the remainders (sans Thea, because I guess they needed Willa Holland’s paycheck for VFX?) that the new president called – a SHE – and wanted to meet with them. Oliver sees this as an opportunity to cut down the budget of the episode/crossover so he spins the wheel of excuses and decides he wants Supergirl not to go because she is an alien and the Dominators are aliens and I could be any more obvious? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
At Star Labs, Caitlin Snow and Dr. Stein are trying to come up with a weapon to beat the Dominators. They decide that instead of something big, they should aim for something small – really small. Stein’s daughter shows up and wants to help, but he’s all “oh, you know, it’s the government, it’s really top secret, I don’t know who the hell you are, this is really important, it’s fighting aliens, blah blah blah…”. She casually mentions her PhD in Nanotechnology which actually gives me the chills – seriously impressed – and just gets to work because her father is being nonsensical. Huge Yay for women in STEM not being shut down by old white men even if it’s their father!!
Mick, Amaya, and Nate pick their candidate and go after him, managing to knock him out. Right after, a team of suits show up, commandeer the situation, and knock everyone down with tranq darts. Now locked away with the restrained Dominator, Nate attempts to converse and the Dom says there had been a resurgence of metahumans caused by the Justice Society of America and they wanted to know what was going on.
Cisco and Felicity break out Nate, Amaya, and Mick from their jail and, before leaving, decide to also break out the Dominator who is being tortured (morals: humans are bad). They send away the Dom on the pod and now they are off to 2016.
Old White Man tells Barry that the Dominators are indeed there because of Flashpoint: his little venture through the past has influenced the universe. The man has struck some sort of deal with the Doms in which Barry has to turn himself in to them and they would leave. If Barry doesn’t, they will release a bomb on Central City that will wipe out all the metahumans, but Cisco somehow figures there could be around 2 million non-meta casualties. In the meantime, Dominator ships are coming in worldwide.
Nate and Cisco realize that they messed up with time when they freed the Dominator, so Cisco has his catharsis about his own feelings towards Barry because he just messed up as well.
Barry decides to be the patsy and sacrifice himself – very noble -, but the rest of them make their own speeches and change his mind. Cisco and Barry are making up when Jax says the mothership has just opened up and is dropping the bomb. Sara and Cisco are aboard the Waverider ready to stop it, however. Dr. Stein shows up and gives them the device he was working on (oh, almost forgot: he and his daughter had their own emotional journey and everything’s cool now) – a little button that has to be attached to the Doms and will cause mass agony for them, but all of the devices have to implanted before activating.
So here we arrive: the third act. The battle begins and the initial shot is very Captain America: Civil War like. It’s all very pretty, there’s CGI everywhere, and everyone is suddenly the “One Punch Man”. Barry is implanting the devices in the meantime. Supergirl saves Oliver from death and Everything is Okay Now ™. Felicity says there are Dominators all over the country and drops a “This is a job for Supergirl”, which is offensive to Barry.
Firestorm is called in to help Sara – apparently, he can transmute objects now. Felicity activated Dr. Stein devices and the Dominators fall down in pain. Dr. Stein himself pep talks Jax into turning the bomb into water and yeah!-they-saved-the-day. All Dominators are retreating!
Now back at the Warehouse-turned-Justice-League-Headquarters, the president (A! BLACK! WOMAN!) is giving a speech congratulating the heroes. Sara and Mick call the president “hot” and the party starts just in time for two subsequent meta jokes: Ray says that Kara looks like his cousin and Kara says they are the “Earth’s Mightiest Heroes” (is Marvel going to sue?!).
Cisco comes up with a little convenient device for Kara that opens portals and communicates with the team solving all potential crossover problems. Mick takes the opportunity to call Supergirl “Skirt” again and I’m glad she is on a different earth also again.
Dr. Stein talks to Jax about deciding to not go back and erase his daughter from existence which is fundamentally against his own quest as a Legend.
Closing up the crossover, Barry and Oliver go out for a beer while talking about how both of them got a glimpse into what life could have been had they not gotten involved in any superhero antics and it’s a nice moment.
In Conclusion
Overall, I liked the crossover. Yes, this was far more a “three-parter” than a “four-parter” and part of me wishes that Supergirl had come on board earlier in her own episode, but the other part also loves that the episode “Medusa” was amazing on its own.
Oh, and by the way, there was a scripted line where Sara tried to make a move on Kara and she replied “You should meet my sister”.
I would definitely say that my favorite hour of the three (I’m counting Supergirl out) was the second one. I particularly loved how emotional the Arrow episode was. Somehow, I don’t think that would have happened had the episode not been the 100th episode of the show, but it definitely happened.
Flash comes second because of the action – this is a superhero crossover so I will not object towards superhero representation. It had some great moments overall despite having to do all of the setup.
I’m glad the CW got to do this, but I’m a little disappointed on some little things that are mostly related to some characters not appearing as much as they should. I strongly think that J’onn J’onnz should have come with Kara and maybe even Alex (not sure about Winn as perhaps that would have been way too much with Felicity and Cisco already there, but maybe not). Thea and Wally also should have been featured in this last installment – the other side characters maybe not, but it would also have helped the final set piece with the fight against the Dominators.
In the end, I’m just glad that they did this. It’s nice to see how connected this shared universe is and we can be sure (like 99.99%) that we will get another next year because the ratings for the episodes have all increased. Let’s just hope the budget also gets elevated so more people can come in and fight!
Images courtesy of the CW.