Elseworlds #1 / The Flash S05E09 Review: Worlds Within Worlds

The Flash, Season 5, Episode 9: Elseworlds, Hour One

Part of me enjoys the CW superhero shows for what they are. Who cares if Legends of Tomorrow wants to ditch any attempt at serious time travelling or DC comics adapting if the resulting show is fun and the cast manages to deliver? Who cares if Supergirl tackles politics, or if The Flash cares more about its cast's drama, or if Arrow cares more about the nitty-gritty angst? After all, a perfect adaptation of the DC comics isn't going to be particularly feasible, especially with the far more rigorous demands of a TV show. 

But as "Elseworlds" reminds me, holy FUCK it is an amazing, fanboyish feeling whenever the shows stop doing their own loose adaptations, and actually does something that feels amazing as they adapt something familiar. There's a giddy sense of ohmygodohmygodohmygod as I go through this episode, grinning like a god-damned idiot when Clark Kent rips that farm boy shirt open to reveal the Superman symbol, or when the Monitor (Anti-Monitor?) shows up in 100% comic accuracy, or when the crate in the Ivo Laboratories facility turns out to be actually Amazo in the flesh (or, well, metal) instead of a Easter Egg boat, or when we do that amazing panning shot of Gotham City to reveal Batwoman, or when, of course, the amazing scene when Superman, Supergirl, Flash and Green Arrow team up to defeat Amazo. Is this what the Marvel comics fans feel whenever they watch one of the MCU movies? When scenes and characters from your childhood comics and cartoons are recreated faithfully? Because, holy fuck, that was definitely a great dopamine rush. 

Likewise, there's the same sense of funny giddiness just seeing three actors that I've been so familiar with over the years -- Stephen Amell's Green Arrow, Grant Gustin's Flash and Melissa Benoist's Supergirl -- interact with each other with the full brunt of their near five-year history to bear. There's just a great sense of continuity and character moments in all of this, and I do really enjoy Elseworlds for being both a great love letter to the comic book wackiness, as well as to the CW universe's pretty massive history. 

And so I'm going to pretty much dissect this episode in a pretty long review. Because I want to. I'm pretty damn excited, as you can probably tell. The episode starts off with the same old Monitor laying waste to Earth-90 and facing off against the Flash of that world (played by John Wesley Schnipp, implying that this is the 90's Flash show universe), which is... cool, but I have seen that scene three times now, so it unfortunately sort of lost its luster a bit.

We then cut away to Dr. John Deegan, a psychiatrist with some... interesting views, played by Lost's Jeremy Davies, who clearly is able to portray the slightly-unhinged academic pretty well. Comic-book nerds like myself recognize Dr. Deegan as none other than Doctor Destiny, but we'll save that for the Easter Egg Corner. Deegan is approached by the mysterious Monitor, who gives him a book and tells him to, well, basically play god. "I can see everything!"

And then, whatever Dr. Destiny and the Monitor did, apparently wrapped the world so hard that it swapped Oliver Queen and Barry Allen. And I do so appreciate that it isn't just a Freaky Friday situation. Oliver Queen just wakes up with all the memories of Oliver Queen, but in the life of Barry Allen -- with all the powers of the Flash and with the cast of Flash interacting with Oliver the way that they would Barry Allen.

While I had originally thought that it's a groan-worthy concept, the performances is pretty dang hilarious, with Oliver-in-Barry's-life just flabbergasted at the kiss Iris gave him, the raised eyebrow at the name "Cicada", and just the sheer befuddlement at everything, up to the whole fact that, oh, he has super-speed now. And while Oliver does manage to kick ass as the Flash, he ends up basically causing a fair bit of overkill, and causes a bit more destruction, and inadvertently activates a super-robot within Ivo Labs that a bunch of criminals are trying to steal. Absolutely love the random "you have failed this city!" that Oliver growls out when facing the criminals, doubly so when you consider that Oliver himself has probably said the catchphrase maybe two times over the past year. 

Also, one of Oliver's first lines when he dresses up in Flash's suit? "Oh, Barry, what have you done this time." That just got me cracked up.  

And then Barry-in-Oliver's-life is having a little sparring match with John Diggle, and we get to see that apparently Barry manages to inherit all of Oliver's skills in addition to his life. And while Barry still manages to kick some butt when Diggle drags him to help fight the Bratva and the Bertinellis (apparently some of the Bratva survived?), like Oliver, Barry ends up causing a fair bit more destruction that is probably necessary. 

Oliver superspeeds Diggle and Barry away, and ends up trying to talk to Barry about what's going on. Oliver's been glowering throughout the entire episode, but Barry is clearly having a shit-ton of fun. Sure, in these crossovers the gloominess of Oliver and the cheeriness of Barry tend to be ratcheted up to eleven, but it kinda works, you know? And seeing Barry with that goofy ass grin doing the salmon ladder and going "hey, mayor!" is just hilarious... and then when Barry realizes that Oliver woke up in bed with Iris, his angry "we have to fix this right now!" is just delivered perfectly by Grant Gustin. 

And after a meet-up with Team Flash, and a confirmation (much to Barry's irritation) that no one fucked with the timeline and it's not Barry's fault this time, Team Flash ends up drugging Barry and Oliver and putting them in the Pipeline. But not before we get some hilarious bit of Barry telling Oliver that he has to convince Iris with some cheeseball lines to help them out... but what ended up happening is Iris telling Oliver (who she thinks is Barry) that he could never be Oliver Queen, because Oliver had really, really hurt Felicity by cutting that Slabside deal behind her back, and Barry Allen wouldn't do it.

Anyway, with the two of them in the prison, we get a hilarious sequence where Oliver bemoans the last seven months he spent in a prison, and grumbling about however dark things were, toilets weren't something he was worried about. And we finally get an answer to the lack of toilets in the Pipeline -- they're compressed into the wall! 

We get a pretty fun scene of Barry learning to dislocate his thumb, and Oliver learning how to phase, and as we learn later on, this involves Barry channeling his anger, while Oliver has to channel positive emotions. It's something that could've been less cheesy, of course, but hey, again, the acting makes it work. 

Whatever the case, Barry -- the real Barry -- manages to convince Iris of some personal memories, and notes how Iris has always believed Barry whatever happens regarding the impossible, and then Barry and Oliver goes off to Earth-38 to get Supergirl's help. Presumably, the absent Legends of Tomorrow are just stuck in that time-wall mess that Constantine got them stuck in.

Of course, while all of this is going on, Cisco ends up seeing the Monitor via his vibes, and while we don't really see it (boo!) apparently red skies and yellow lightning are happening all over the world. Oh, and Amazo wakes up. 

And we cut away to Earth-38's Smallville, where Superman, Lois Lane and Supergirl are just chilling out as family. Complete with Smallville's theme song, apparently! There is a lot of charm going on here, like Clark Kent pantomiming "no no no no" in the background, Lois wistfully talking about her career, the "you'll catch me" line, Clark apologizing for leaving Kara as the sole protector of Earth, Kara telling Clark about how impressed she was that Lois straight-up just doesn't give two shits that they are super-people... it's just a huge, huge ball of Kent family wholesomeness, and I'm definitely a big fan. I do love the little conversation between Clark and Kara about Kara's decision to leave the DEO after President Baker's threat, and Clark telling Kara that protecting their family is one of the most important things in their life is magnified by the implicit note that he's referring to Lois. 

And I really don't want to be a dick to the big-budget WB movies since I'm in such a good mood right now after watching this episode... but, hey, this is how you do Clark Kent right.

Also also, happy 80th birthday, Superman. The movies haven't been kind to you, but at least as a supporting character in the CW-verse, they did you justice. 

And then, of course, Oliver and Barry show up there, and Lois was straight-up ready to whack them both upside their heads with a hammer. That was a hilarious scene. Equally hilarious? When Kara introduces them to Clark, Oliver's response is to puff up his chest, something that Barry calls him out on. Oh, Oliver. That was hilarious.

The subsequent scene ends up with Oliver and Barry trying to train, and then re-enact a reversed version of the scene from Arrow vs Flash from Flash's first season, with Barry quite literally jumping for joy with a 'gotcha' when the remote-controlled arrows hidden in the bushes shot Oliver in the back. This leads to a pretty nasty verbal spat as Oliver acts like a gigantic douche (something Lois calls him out on -- the woman has no fear, clearly) and just tells Barry off for requiring a sappy motivational speech every five minutes... and gets quite literally knocked on his ass by Barry, who isn't even trying. 

Also, while all of this is going on, back in Earth-1, Elongated Man and Killer Frost fight Amazo! And then Amazo beats them up, and copies their superpowers, and we get a brief information dump about Amazo (Anti-Metahuman Adaptive Zoomtic Organism) from Cisco, and, well, basically the whole "we need our main characters" deal. 

And then Oliver apologizes to Barry, admitting that he was an ass and a good chunk of why he's so angry is that seeing Barry with the bow, but without any of his darkness and just jumping and joking around, pissed him off. We get the rather cheesy "Oliver is always sad, Barry is always happy" exchange... but then again, I enjoy Superman/Batman stories when they do the same thing, so I'm not really going to complain all that much when it's Green Arrow and the Flash doing so. I just am happy that it's restricted to mostly two scenes. Cisco then shows up to bring backup back to Earth-1, and I absolutely love how Cisco just doesn't know who Superman is, and Clark's absolutely bemused reaction is just precious.

And then, well, as Amazo wrecks shit in the city, my inner fanboy is just on the moon as Superman, Supergirl, Flash and Green Arrow swoop in and fight the ever-loving shit out of the super-powered android. I can't express just how happy I am at this scene. It's just so fun! From Flash zooming around in superspeed, Green Arrow pelting him with arrows, Supergirl heat-visioning Amazo and Superman flying overhead, waiting for the "finish him" order... it's just glorious.

And, of course, Amazo manages to get back up and scan everyone's superpowers, leading to a pretty awesome sequence involving Oliver-the-Flash zooming around a half-constructed building and making a fool out of Amazo's frost breath. That was pretty badass. All the action scenes in this episode is just utter top-notch.

And then we get the two Supers charging Amazo and holding him down, while Oliver-the-Flash vibrates Amazo to cancel out his own vibration, while Barry-the-Arrow shoots the Cisco-made deactivation arrow straight into Amazo's head, blowing him out. And, of course, Barry gets to say "Amazo, you have failed this city", which is just as corny and as awesome as it sounds.

After a brief Barry/Iris scene where Iris tells Barry that he can be the Green Arrow, but he can't become Oliver Queen, we get Clark returning back to Earth-38 to protect that world (because, shit, the only superhero left there is like, a grand total of freakin' Guardian), Cisco vibes the Monitor, while Oliver decides that their next step... is to get to Gotham City, ending with a shot of the goddamned Batwoman.

Is it a perfect story? Hell no. Again, I keep noting my problems with the repetitiveness of "Barry, you should be dark/stop being dark like Oliver" and "Oliver, you should stop being happy/start being happy like Barry". But I do admit that the actors handle their roles exceptionally well, and the addition of Tyler Koechlin's very earnest Superman, and Melissa Benoist's always-welcome Supergirl, is just great. Despite the whole Monitor/Dr. Destiny stuff, I do feel like this episode feels more like a self-contained segment unlike the more sprawling bits of Crisis on Earth-X or the messy Invasion. Overall, I definitely really, really enjoyed myself to bits watching this episode. Can't really say much more than that -- it's just entertaining throughout! See you guys soon for part 2. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Dr. John Deegan is the civilian identity of Doctor Destiny, a villain that can make dreams manifest into reality, after exposure to the artifact known as the Materioptikon. Originally a minor gadget-based JLA villain, a guest star appearance in The Sandman ended up giving him the dream theme, and quickly became one of the more memorable villains with a dream theme. 
• (Until I'm sure if Mr. Mutton-Chops reality warper is the Monitor or the Anti-Monitor, I won't be writing about him here.)
• Amazo is one of the most recurring supervillain in Justice League adaptations, a super-adaptive android created by the mad scientist Professor Ivo. Amazo was created to replicate the superpowers of any superhuman sent to oppose him. While initially a mindless android, Amazo would later prove to be independent, although his relative power level varies between incarnations. 
• AMAZO is found here being transported by a crate from Ivo Labs, a reference to his comic-book creator.
• Ivo and Amazo has previously been bizarrely mentioned in Arrow's second season, with Professor Ivo as a minor antagonist, and Amazo the name of the boat.
• Part of Amazo's superpower replication abilities comes from Mirakuru, the super-steroid that was a major part of Arrow's second season, which is a nice nod to the show's incarnation of Ivo.
• Lois Lane, Superman's iconic love interest and later-wife, makes her first proper debut in the CW shows, after being name-dropped many, many times over Supergirl's run. I don't think I have to go into too much detail on her. 
• Red Skies is a very, very common fixture of Crises in the DC universe, so much that it's basically shorthand for huge, world-shattering crossover event.
• Smallville's (the show, not the city) theme song, "Save Me", plays when the show pans over Smallville. In addition, the farm location used for shooting Smallville was apparently reused for Elseworlds. I haven't actually seen Smallville, so I'll take the internet's word for it. 
• Ralph gets a gag about how "it's not even Tuesday", referencing how The Flash normally airs on Tuesday, while this episode swapped timeslots with Supergirl for the Elseworlds event. 
• The whole remote-controlled bow shooting Flash in the back is a reference to the Green Arrow and Flash's first training sequence aaaaall the way back in "Arrow vs. Flash", episode 8 of Flash's first season. 
• Every single time the Flash and Arrow has had a crossover that involves John Diggle, the poor man will invariably be zoomed away with super-speed, and vomit. 
• The "nanites, courtesy of Ray Palmer", is the exact same thing said by Green Arrow when he helped to take down Reverse-Flash with a speed-dampening nanite arrow in the penultimate episode of Flash's first season.
• Superman introducing himself as "a friend" to Cisco is a reference to one of his iconic lines from the original Superman movie.
• Superman notes that he and Lois were "strange visitors" on Argo. "Strange visitor" is one of the many titles that the Golden Age Superman had, and one of the more obscure ones.
• Gotham City and Batwoman! Gotham City, of course, is home to everyone's favourite Caped Crusader, Batman! We'll talk about Batwoman in Hour Two, where I'm pretty sure we're going to have a whole lot more to talk about. 
• Elseworlds, finally, is a DC sub-line of stories that happened on "alternate worlds", an imprint on that took place outside the regular canon. The opening title uses the same Elseworlds logo as the comics imprint.