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Invasion!

Invasion! published on

This was a bold move on the part of The CW, combine all four of its DC properties, including Supergirl after her move from CBS, into one big crossover story. I was really looking forward to this, the previous cameo’s, Constantine, and crossovers between The Flash, Arrow and Legends Of Tomorrow had for the most part been successful and whilst Gotham is out there on its own these shows have far more cohesion going on than Marvel’s own TV shows, Netflix’s aside, that share the same universe but never really converge. (At the time of writing).

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One of the biggest benefits for Invasion! is that it was able to balance the overall storyline whilst still tying up various threads from each shows storylines and how they impact upon the other shows. Of the four shows Supergirl was the weakest but that was largely down to the episode having nothing to do with the over-arching plot, with the final scene merely involving Barry Allen and Cisco Ramon travelling from Earth-Prime to Earth-38 to enlist Supergirl’s help in their battle with the Dominators.

benoistsupergirlSupergirl however proves to be one of the highlights across the entire arc, Melissa Benoist’s acting is superb as Supergirl attempts to navigate around the vast array of characters presenting us with some moments of gold. Her reaction to Mick Rory’s (Heat Wave) backstory of having burnt his childhood home down with his entire family in it is absolutely priceless as is her interaction with Ray Palmer (The Atom) during the Legends episode that leaves Palmer commenting that she ‘looks like my cousin’. In fact I found the overall story to be a little flat with the various character interactions being the one thing that held everything together, from Cisco’s comments about Curtis’ (Mister Terrific) penchant for quoting films as, sarcastically, ‘original’. These knowing moments where the production team acknowledge that maybe some of their characters are a little derivative of each other works in the shows benefit, as does the reaction of various characters to ‘Flashpoint’ particularly the Legends team who ‘deal’ with time abnormalities on a weekly basis and their questioning of Barry’s selfishness and the repercussions that are being felt across the Arrowverse shows.

Barry’s selfishness which will no doubt continue to have repercussions across the remainder of season 3 for the scarlet speedster and potentially the other Arrowverse shows beyond some superficial changes, such as Diggle now having a son as opposed to previously having a daughter. Oliver Queen’s sometimes prickly nature also works well within the show, although he has had various teams around him during Arrows, now, 5 seasons as a character he has always preferred to work alone where he has total control of the situation. The inclusion of Supergirl and the various characters is something which doesn’t sit well with Oliver and he is not backward in letting his feelings be known about it. It’s character moments like these that are the highlights, the acknowledgement of Snart’s (Captain Cold) sacrifice during the first season of Legends is given a poignant moment of levity along with Dr. Stein’s discovery that he has inadvertently altered his own history with the revelation that he now has a daughter.

The characters are the real bonus of this arc, not the story, and I hope should the shows continue for a few more years that we get some more crossovers. Hopefully one where the Supergirl episode is more than just the introduction and we get some interaction between her cast and Arrowverse characters beyond Barry, though I am massively looking forward to the musical crossover episode, there is some real musical pedigree amongst the casts of Supergirl and The Flash. It is certain that Kara and Barry work best together and this probably has more to do with their shows slightly lighter tone when compared to Arrow or the ensemble of Legends.

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