So here's Brandon Routh as Kingdom Come Superman

👀👀

Via Twitter.

*breaks in through a window* KEVIN CONROY IS GOING TO PLAY BRUCE WAYNE IN THE CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS CROSSOVER

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck yeeesssssssssss. Arrowverse is gonna show Warner and DC Entertainment how it's done, son.

So I guess I'll give my $0.02 on the new Supergirl costume

I'm days late and was already dollars short, so you've undoubtedly have heard that season five of Supergirl will feature a brand new costume for the Girl of Steel.

I like it. While the skirt was obviously iconic, it was also silly and impractical. After all, in this day and age of camera phones and creepshots, do you really want to be flying around in a skirt even if there's nothing to see under there (I mean, she was wearing something under that skirt, unless she was Scottish). It's overall just a good look.

On a funny note, however, I need to point out that it does kind of look similar to the costume that pornstar Carter Cruise wore in a Batman v. Superman porn parody (at least, I think it was a BvS parody).

Purely coincidental of course because there's only so many variations in design that you can do with a red and blue costume while retaining enough visual cues that it's a Supergirl costume. Of the two, the CW Supergirl costume wins hands down.

The Arrowverse has found it's Batwoman: Ruby Rose

Credit: Official Arrow Twitter.

So sayeth Entertainment Weekly and others. Interesting choice. Surprising too, given that Ruby Rose isn't exactly an unknown actress and I figured that her star status would put her just beyond what The CW would be willing to pay for her to play Batwoman. I'm not complaining. She's a good actress and it'll be interesting to see her playing a superhero.

Well, this is weird: Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow will start sharing the same timeslot next year

Arrowverse Wiki.

Strange, weird, and damn unusual are words that I'd use to describe The CW's announcement that starting next month two of their Arrowverse shows, Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow, will be sharing the same timeslot.

Following the announcement that The CW’s new superhero entry Black Lightning would be displacing Legends on the midseason schedule, the network has revealed that Legends is moving to Monday nights at 8 p.m. ET in 2018.

Here’s what this means for Supergirl, which already airs in that timeslot: After the holidays, Supergirl will return for four weeks starting Jan. 15, after which Legends will air nine weeks of original episodes starting Feb. 12, while Supergirl takes a break until it reclaims the timeslot on April 16 following the Legends season finale on April 9. Supergirl‘s season finale will then air June 18. What this all adds up to is 23 consecutive weeks of new episodes of Supergirl and Legends.

Arrowverse Wiki.

So both shows will disappear for two months while each take turns airing their remaining episodes. This bugs me, honestly, because I'm afraid it could negatively impact each show's ratings and chances of being renewed. I love Legends to the point of it being my favorite of the Arrowverse, and while I no longer watch Supergirl, I'd still hate to see either get cancelled.

Hopefully neither will, but we'll just have to wait and see.

(h/t Tim Knight's Twitter)

Former Arrowverse showrunner Andrew Kreisberg is at last fired

What a difference a day makes. I ended my boycott of the Arrowverse last night and accused sexual evil-doer Andrew Kreisberg gets shitcanned today. I was a bit trepidatious about ending the one-man boycott before he was fired, but I didn't start catching up on the episodes I missed until today, so it all works out.

Related note: I'm still not caught up yet. I still have one episode of Legends of Tomorrow, three of Arrow's, and that's probably not counting the Crisis on Earth-X episodes. Then again, Wednesday is the perfect catch-up night because there's nothing else on TV that interests me.

Ending my boycott of the Arrowverse

It's been about two weeks since I decided to boycott Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, and Legends of Tomorrow after showrunner Andrew Kreisberg was suspended after being accused of sexual harassment by nineteen people (fifteen women, four men). At the time, I planned on maintaining the one-man boycott until Kreisberg was fired and while that hasn't happened yet, I've decided to end the boycott.

Why? For two reasons. First, various Arrowverse castmembers have both denounced the harassment and come out in support of the victims. Their taking a stance in this will do a lot more in the long run than my dinky little boycott, which was more of a moral stand than anything else. Second, I just don't think Kreisberg is going to return. You just don't get accused of sexual harassment by nearly twenty people and get your job back. You can get elected President of the United States, but not your job showrunning a highly successful TV franchise.

So the boycott is over and now comes the dreadfully hard part: catching up on two weeks worth of episodes! I was already an episode behind on Arrow before this, so I have got to hustle!

One final note before I end this post: Fuck Andrew Kreisberg and every single asshole who sexually harasses and assaults.

Eat shit and die!😃

Why I'm boycotting the Arrowverse

Credit: Bettina Strauss/The CW
(via Entertainment Weekly)

 In case you haven't heard, Andrew Kreisberg, one of the executive producers of The CW's Arrowverse (Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow) was suspended due to allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate physical contact. He stands accused by nineteen people (seventeen women and two men) and is yet another man outed as a sexual predator in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein revelations. I believe his accusers not least because victims are often not believed and as a result most will never step forward both because of that and the fear of retaliation. The fact that nineteen people have come forward to accuse him adds a tremendous amount of weight to the accusations. That not all of them are women is another thing, because I have to imagine male victims are even less likely to come forward with their stories.

And because of all of that, if Kreisberg isn't fired and is allowed to return as executive producer, then I won't be watching any of the Arrowverse TV shows. I love the shows and the cast and characters dearly, but I cannot in good conscience support them if a serial predator is helming them.

To take a step further, I may not watch any of the shows until he is fired. Like with the above, I realize that this won't cause even a tiny ripple, but I have to stand by for what's right and supporting his victims is what's right.

There's a Crisis on Earth-X: DC-TV's next crossover event

I first saw this picture over on Tumblr late last night and it piqued my interest.

via the official Arrow Twitter.

My first take on the title was that this year's big crossover between the four DC-TV shows (Arrow, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, and Supergirl) was going to be an adaption of some sort of the famed Crisis on Infinite Earths mega-event DC Comics did back in the mid-80s. I did some googling and according to the DC Database, Earth-X was one of those infinite Earths of DC's old multiverse. This was an Earth where the Nazis won World War II and was subject of one of the annual Justice League/Justice Society crossovers and a group of heroes from Earth-2 (all of whom DC acquired from Quality Comics), called the Freedom Fighters, moved to Earth-X to free it from the Nazis.

So the obvious question is if this is what DC-TV is going for with this crossover? The answer is yes. DC Comics has an article about the crossover on their website which linked to another article about the upcoming Freedom Fighters: The Ray animated webseries from CW Seed. That series is set on Earth-X and features Nazi doppelgangers of Green Arrow, Supergirl, and The Flash dubbed The Reichmen, so that's what we'll see in the crossover. It's certainly going to be chilling to see those doppelgangers in the flesh and disturbing if they start throwing Nazi salutes.



What I'm curious to see is how events of the crossover effects the non-white and Jewish heroes. I can only hope that the writers don't pull a dumb and have evil versions of them. Provided, you know, that their doppelgangers even exist on Earth-X (because *Nazis*). If they do, they'll probably be members of the resistance.

Moving on from that, the other big thing are Barry and Iris at the bottom of the center-piece. The image suggests that the two are finally going to tie the knot this season, after having been matrimony blocked by the Speed Force last season. How this relates to Nazi doppelgangers, I have no clue. I guess we'll just have to wait for either the trailer or when the crossover happens starting November 27th.

This is a future episode of The Flash right here

If there isn't an episode of the show where Barry gets turned into "The Puppet-Flash" then the show's existence has been for nothing. NOTHING!

"My name is Jesse Quick and I'm the fastest woman alive"

I had planned on posting these preview pictures of Jesse Quick in her sweet new costume from SpoilerTV before the "New Rogues" episode of The Flash premiered this week, but then I saw something shiny and I just got distracted. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I still wanted to post the pictures because, dang, that costume is nice. So backstory for context, last season Jesse Wells (Earth-2 Harrison Wells' daughter) and Wally West were struck by a particle wave from Team Flash's attempt to recreate the same wave that gave Barry and all of the Earth-1 metas their powers in order to restore Barry's after he lost them to Zoom. Still with me? So Jesse nor Wally showed signs of having gotten powers.But in the season 3 premiere, Wally had them as Kid Flash in the Flashpoint timeline Barry created when he traveled back in time to save his mother, but didn't have them in the new timeline Barry created when he went back and stopped himself from saving her.

Yeah, time travel is very confusing and I think the entire Flash fandom wants to smack Barry upside the head.

So anyways, while Wally doesn't appear to have his Speed Force powers in the new timeline, guess who does? Yup, Jesse Wells. She and Harry return to Earth-1 (this is a bit of weirdness because this is actually their first trip to this incarnation of Earth-1 because Earth-2 and the rest of the multiverse is unaffected by Barry's time travel shenanigans) so that Team Flash can run her through a battery of tests, which is actually just a lie on Harry's part because he wants them to talk his daughter out of wanting to be a speedster. As you can tell below, he relented and they stick around long enough for Barry to train her. Harry also gifts her a costume, courtesy of Cisco and without further adieu, let's check it out.

Not bad, not bad at all. The Arrowverse wardrobe department has a better handle on costumes than Warner Bros. does. No rubber suits or molded fake muscles here! Not a surprise, really. I mean, the Arrowverse has thinks on lock better than DC's cinematic universe, which comes off as a confused, jumbled mess.

What do you think about Jesse Quick's costume?

They'll run out of capes at some point

So unless you've been living under a rock for the past month or you just don't watch Supergirl, it was recently announced that Superman will finally make an appearance in the second season. The Man of Steel's has been on the show several times before, but CBS never showed the man in full, opting instead to show his cape or even his boots. I assumed that this was because of the DC Cinematic Universe and Warner Bros not wanting Supes to appear on the small screen, but I'm guessing now that it was because The CW still owned the TV rights.

So who's putting on the blue tights and (hopefully) red trunks this time?

Hopefully, Superman will be scruff-free.

Tyler Hoechlin from MTV's Teen Wolf. An interesting choice that I'm still on the fence about, but I've been wrong in my opinions before and I'm sure Hoechlin will knock it out of the park. According to the Variety article, Hoechlin will be in the first two episodes of season two, which makes sense considering what Kara might have found in the season finale.

I'm really hoping for a more traditional costume and not some 52 reboot nonsense.

Picture via Wikimedia.

Here's an infographic of the many actors who have played famous superheroes

Found this on Mental Floss and thought it was worth posting here. It's not a comprehensive list of all superheroes and their portrayers and as Mental Floss points out, it's imperfect. Oh boy, is it ever. First off, Bill Bixby isn't there along with the other Hulk actors, which considering that he's probably more famous than Eric Bana and Edward Norton at the role, is a true oddity. Speaking of Bana, I'm pretty sure that's not him in the picture, but I could be wrong. There's also the rather humorous way that the pictures of Michael Rosenbaum (who voiced The Flash on the Justice League/Justice League Unlimited cartoon) and Scott Rummell (Aquaman voice actor) got switched around. Other than that, it's a rather informative infograph. I didn't know Channing Tatum voiced Superman in the Lego Movie.

If Blogger shrank the picture, then use the link to MF's article or click here.

Well that was a bit anticlimatic (Flash spoilers)

So yeah, Zoom was finally unmasked in last night's episode of The Flash, "King Shark" and if you haven't seen the episode or the reaction to it yet, then, well, I'll let this Instagram pic give a hint. Beware, spoilers below.

Well, this is a complication...

A photo posted by Teddy Sears (@teddysears) on Feb 24, 2016 at 6:06am PST

Yup, Zoom is Jay Garrick or somebody who looks like him. At the end of the episode, it cuts to the helmeted man that Zoom is still holding prisoner. Zoom walks in carrying Jay Garrick's corpse, dumps it unceremoniously on the ground and pulls his mask off while the camera does a slow turn from his back to front, revealing the face of Jay Garrick. He then looks down at the corpse (while the helmet guy is visibly losing his crap) and says "Well, this is a complication".

Here's what disappoints me about the reveal: It was tacked on to the end of what was essentially a filler episode. Yes, the reveal was shocking and dramatic, but it would have had more impact if it had been done while confronting Barry and the rest of Team Flash. Imagine the shock and horror as Zoom pulls his mask off and they all see Jay's face smiling back at them.

Ah, but it does leave us with a big question. Who is this Jay Garrick? Is it even a Jay Garrick at all? Eobard Thawne was able to use a device to disguise himself as Harrison Wells, so who's to say that this Zoom fellow didn't do something similar? The person I'm leaning towards is Edward Clarisse, who was an enemy to Jay Garrick and used the name The Rival. What lends weight to this is Teddy Sears' avatar on Instagram.

Which looks like this:

DC Comics Database.

Very, very interesting. On the other hand, it could be Hunter Zolomon or a combination of him and Edward Clarisse.

Who is Zoom 2: Electric Boogaloo (SPOILERS)

Last week, I did a post about five people who I thought could be Zoom on The Flash and the episode that aired that night, "Escape from Earth-2" narrowed down the list of Zoom's possible alter-egos, but left us with a lot more questions. First, let's start with the eliminations:

Earth-2 Barry can be scratched off as he was always with Wells, Cisco, E2 Iris, and Killer Frost.

I'm also going to go ahead and eliminate E2 Henry. He was a moonshot and was chosen for the potential drama of The Flash having to fight his dad's doppelganger.

I'm not sure about Earth-2 Wally because we never saw him and neither Iris or Joe mentioned him, so it's questionable if Wally even exists on that Earth. He's provisionally eliminated unless new evidence surfaces of his existence.

This brings us to Jay Garrick and his Earth-1 counterpart, Hunter Zolomon. As I mentioned in the first Zoom post, Hunter Zolomon is Zoom in the comics and on one hand that can't be overlooked, but on the other hand, it feels so much like a red herring. That might be the writers' intention, to make Zolomon look like a red herring in order to throw off the comic fans and people who look characters up on Google.


Then there's Jay. Jay, Jay, Jay. He was a bit shady in "Escape from Earth-2" and there were a lot of hints that he could somehow be Zoom. In the previous episode, "Welcome to Earth-2", Jay confessed to Caitlin that Zoom didn't steal his speed like he originally told Team Flash, but rather he'd lost it from taking Velocity 6 to boost his speed. That raised some red flags with me because if he lied about that, then what else is he hiding? Then, in "Escape from Earth-2", he uses the newly created Velocity 9 to restore his speed long enough to save civilians from a building Geomancer collapsed. Claiming exhaustion, he goes to take a rest somewhere in S.T.A.R. Labs, but when Geomancer shows up and attacks Caitlin and Iris, he's nowhere to be found. This is despite Geomancer wrecking the place with his powers. Plus, just before the attack, Caitlin called for him over the Lab's intercom, but he still didn't show up until after Caitlin dealt with Geomancer herself.

Zoom?

Strange, but easily explain if Jay didn't respond because he was on Earth-2 as Zoom! This episode was hinting very heavily about it too. When Barry is captured by Zoom at the end of "Welcome to Earth-2" and taken to his lair, we see both Wells daughter, Jesse, but also a man in a metal helmet. Now, this guy was initially identified by fans as being some guy named Persuader, who in the comics is from Legion of Super-Heroes. But the following episode strongly implied that it isn't Persuader and that it might be something more familiar. Who?

Jay Garrick.

Let me elaborate. Throughout the episode, the guy taps on the transparent wall of his cell over and over again. Jesse thinks that it's meaningless, but Barry realizes that it's the same form of code used by prisoners of war and together, they decipher what the helmeted man is telling them and it's one name: Jay. Barry thinks he's asking about Jay and tells him that Jay's alive, but that only elicits a negative reaction from the helmeted man, almost as if he's trying to tell them something about Jay Garrick, but they're not understanding. And it might be nothing at all, but they also give us a closeup of the side of this guy's head and you can see some of his hair and well, it's the same color as Jay's.

Hmm. So who is this guy? We never see him without the helmet because Flash, Jesse, and their rescuers (sans Killer Frost, who stays behind to hold off Zoom) are forced to flee for their lives before Flash can free him too.

In The Man in the Iron Mask by Alexander Dumas, the eponymous man is the identical brother of King Louis XIV, so what if there's something similar at work here too? Not an identical twin, but a counterpart, a doppelganger. What if Zoom isn't from Earth-2, but merely traveled there from yet another Earth. After all, Zoom knew about Earth-1 and Barry Allen before the breaches, so it stands to reason that he knew about the larger multiverse too. With that in mind, who's to say that the Jay Garrick who joined Team Flash is from Earth-2? The helmeted man could be Earth-2 Jay and Zoom could be from I don't know, Earth-3 or something. Maybe it is Hunter Zolomon from Earth-1 or a Zolomon from another Earth.

There are problems with this theory, however. First, Geomancer's attack on S.T.A.R. Labs damaged the speed cannon and destabilizing the sole remaining breach to Earth-2. Jay was there during this mini-crisis and helped fix the problem while in the presence of Caitlin, Iris, and Joe. Second, at the very end of the episode while Team Flash is celebrating the rescue of Jesse, their return to Earth-1, and the closing of the final breach, Zoom shoves his hand through Jay's chest (who, god knows why, was standing right in front of the breach) and yanks him through before it closes.

So yeah, problems. My only solution that is that Team Flash's Jay is from Earth-2 and the helmeted man is a Jay from another Earth. Zoom could still be Zolomon because we haven't seen him since "The Reverse-Flash Returns". He could also still be a Jay from an alternate Earth.

Definitely more questions than answers, but the mystery of Zoom's identity is certainly keeping us coming back every week for more clues and answers.

Who do you think Zoom is? Tell me down in the comments.

Zoom may be a murderous supervillain, but even he understands the importance of hydration

I'm not sure whether he's actually drinking or not, but it makes sense that whoever is wearing the suit (since I doubt that Tony Todd is wearing that thing) would be able to while masked up. There's no nose holes in the mask, so he'd have to breathe through those grooves in the mask.

Picture via doc-retro.

How about a behind-the-scenes picture of Flash and Supergirl?

A photo posted by Grant Gustin (@grantgust) on Feb 10, 2016 at 2:07pm PST

Supergirl/Flash crossover HYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYPE. *blows airhorns, pisses off neighbors*

Who is Zoom? My five choices (SPOILERS)

The biggest mystery of The Flash's second season is the identity of the main antagonist, Zoom. Who's under the mask? They haven't revealed his identity on the show yet, but apparently it's going to happen soon, so in the meantime, here's my five picks (four from Earth-2 and one who isn't) on who it might be.

Barry Allen

While our Barry's Earth-2 counterpart comes off as a total dork, he wouldn't be the first person to put on an act to hide an alter-ego. After all, one of the reasons why nobody suspects Clark Kent is Superman and Bruce Wayne is Batman is because they both put on acts that run counter to their superhero personas. Likewise, the Barry Allen of Earth-2 could easily be acting like a skittish dweeb to keep his double life as Zoom a secret.

It would also be dramatic as hell. Imagine The Flash coming face to face with himself. After all, they say that you are your own worst enemy.



Henry Allen

This would be purely for the shock value. Imagine Zoom pulling off his mask and it's Earth-2 Henry underneath! Imagine Barry having to spend the rest of the season wrestling with his emotions over having to fight and defeat a man who looks exactly like his father. Plus, it would be a nice shoutout to John Wesley Shipp's time as The Flash.

Of course there might be a tiny little problem with this. In "Welcome to Earth-2", Earth-1 Barry talks to his counterpart's mom on the phone and she mentions her and Barry's dad going on a trip to Atlantis for their anniversary. I'm assuming that its Henry she's going with, but on the other hand, what if it isn't? We don't know how different Nora and Henry Allen are on Earth-2, so they might not be married here and she was referring to a second husband.

Wally West

We haven't seen Wally's Earth-2 counterpart yet and that's what initially made me suspicious. Then I started thinking about it and realized that Wally and Zoom have something in common: Speed. They both want to go faster, so what if E-2 Wally's obsession with speed escalated? He became a speedster in the same accident that created the other metahumans or had gotten them later on. Either way, the speed gained still isn't enough and that's why he's trying to steal Barry's speed.

Hunter Zolomon

So this is one of the more interesting options. In the episode "Potential Energy", Caitlin discovers that Jay is slowly dying because of the loss of his speed. She comes up with a possible cure in the following episode, "The Reverse-Flash Returns" that involves replacing his damage cells with fresh ones from his Earth-1 counterpart, but unfortunately, can't find the counterpart and assumes Jay doesn't have one. Jay takes her to the park and shows that he does have one, but on this Earth his name is Hunter Zolomon, due to being adopted by a different family when his mother died.

Now, what's interesting here is that in the comics Hunter Zolomon is the name of...Zoom. Personally, I feel like this might be too on the nose and Zolomon is nothing more than a red herring meant to misdirect the comic book fans and people who google character names. Still, having a character who has the same name as the season's antagonist is something that can't simply be ignored. I'm also wondering if there's any significance to the book Zolomon is reading in the above picture. It's Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. I've never read it, so I have no idea if there's a hidden clue there or not.

Jay Garrick

Oh yes, Jay is on the list, make no mistake about that. Why? For two reasons. Firstly, he has the same desire for speed as Zoom has. This led to him taking Velocity 6 in order to increase his speed. Secondly, he lied about how he lost his powers. He originally claimed that Zoom had stolen his powers the night that Jay was sucked into a breach and dumped on Earth-1. However, in "Welcome to Earth-2", he confessed to Caitlin that the loss of his powers was due to taking Velocity 6. It's a strange thing to lie about and caused Team Flash to focus on ways to make Barry faster in order to combat Zoom. Interestingly, Zoom wanted Barry to become faster before he'd take the Scarlet Speedster's speed for his own. Likewise, Jay was taking Velocity 6 because he wanted to be faster. That could easily just to have been from the desire to break the stalemate that existed between him and Zoom, but what if Jay became obsessed with truly being the Fastest Man Alive and when Velocity 6 didn't work out, decided to try other methods?

The question of course is how Jay knew about Earth-1 and Barry? In the season one finale, Barry experienced visions of future events while opening a breach to send Reverse-Flash back to his timeline. Did Jay have similar visions and saw E-1 Barry and how fast he was?

So who is Zoom? We'll just have to wait until he's unmasked to see if any of my choices are right. Hopefully they won't keep us waiting for much longer.

All pictures from the Arrowverse Wiki.

What if Oliver isn't talking about Damian Darhk? (Arrow) (SPOILERS, maybe)

I woke up the other morning with that thought in mind. You know how this season they keep going to Oliver standing in a cemetery in front of a grave and vowing to Barry Allen that he's going to kill somebody? We're all assuming that he's vowing to kill Damian Darhk, the big bad of season 4 and the man responsible for Felicity being paralyzed. But, what if it isn't Darhk? What if Oliver is talking about somebody else entirely? We know that Oliver makes the declaration six months after the season four premiere, but for all we know, that's when the season ends. I'm starting to think Barry's presence was merely a red herring to make us think that Felicity was the one in the grave, but of course she wasn't. So who do I think is the target of Ollie's wrath?

Malcolm Merlyn or an as yet to be introduced baddie. I think it's Malcolm because of all the damage he's done to Thea. After all, he's the one who drugged and used her to kill Sara Lance, which caused Ra's al Ghul to go to war with Team Arrow. This in turn led to Ra's mortally wounding Thea and the latter developing a blood lust after being dunked into the Lazarus Pit. Thea can't break the curse because Ra's is already dead and because she refuses to kill in order to satiate the blood lust, now she's dying. The promo I saw for tonight's episode implies that despite the profession of love he has for his daughter, he's actually okay with her dying. I mean, didn't Malcolm start the war so he could become the new Ra's al Ghul? If Thea's the one in the grave, then that gives Ollie more than enough reason to want to kill him.

As for it being a new baddie, it makes sense if the grave yard scene is taking place at the end of season 4 and whoever Ollie wants to kill is the big bad for season 5.

So, who's in the grave? I have a few guesses: Lyla Diggle, Quentin Lance, Donna Smoak, Thea, or Oliver's son (and man that would be BRUTAL). It could also be Felicity. I know we saw her in the limo after Ollie left the grave and she told him (while crying) to kill whoever Ollie is determined to kill. Buuuuuut how do we know that that's actually Felicity and not some figment of Oliver's mind. I mean, he's clearly wrecked emotionally, so it wouldn't be far-fetched if he's imagining things. Plus, if Felicity is dead, it would be a total and absolute mind frak and the fandom would lose its collective shit.

We'll find out sooner or later.

The Flash 2x13 "Welcome to Earth-2" (SPOILERS)

I think Cisco's face sums up my feelings about this episode pretty well.

(Collider)

Because holy cow, that was one hell of an episode! As the title suggests, this was the ep where Barry, Harrison Wells, and Cisco travel to Earth-2 in order to rescue Wells's daughter, Jesse and stop Zoom. If you like easter eggs, then "Welcome to Earth-2" is going to put you on cloud nine. We get several when the three while traveling through the Speed Cannon to Earth-2:

• John Wesley Shipps's Flash from the 90s TV show
• A certain Kara Danvers, whom Barry will be meeting next month
• Connor Hawke, who is set to appear in a future episode of Legends of Tomorrow
• Jonah Hex, who I think is also set to pop into LoT
• A Legion of Super-Heroes flight ring
• Grodd

None of those are in order of appearance and unfortunately, I missed seeing the last three, but fortunately the internet didn't. I love that they included Shipp's Flash, which was a nice tip of the hat to the actor who went from playing Barry Allen to playing Barry Allen's dad, which is another thing I love about this show. Supergirl's brief cameo is a no-brainer, given the impending crossover. A number of fans on Tumblr said that news of the crossover should have been held back until after this episode aired, since that the news would be that much bigger. The flight ring is the most intriguing out of all of the cameos because of the possibilities it presents. Is the Legion slated to make an appearance on one of the shows? Legends of Tomorrow seems the most logical because of the time travel element. On the other hand, Supergirl has connections to the superhero team in the comics and the Justice League Unlimited cartoon, so that's an option. Could a Legion of Super-Heroes spin-off be on the horizon? Granted, it could have just been nothing more than a tease, but the mind wonders.


So anyways, Barry, Wells, and Cisco arrive on Earth-2 and naturally the Earth-1ers are mindblown by everything they see. Earth-2 is interesting as it's a blend of the 21st century and the 1940s. They have the tech of the former (for the most part), but things like telephones look like they came from the '40s. It's strange, given that they have things like apps and smart watches. The biggest difference between the two Earths are the "dopplegangers", what Cisco calls their Earth-2 counterparts. We know that from the promo materials that Caitlin Snow and Ronnie Raymond are Killer Frost and Deathstorm on Earth-2, but what of Barry, Iris, Joe, and Cisco himself? Well...

Barry is still a CSI, but he's a total dork. He's doesn't appear to be a speedster, but he's still on my forthcoming list of people who might be Zoom. Oh, and he's married to Iris, so there's that. Earth-1 Barry switches places with him after Wells knocks him out.

Iris is a police detective with the Central City Police Department. She dabbled in journalism, but decided to follow in her grandfather's footsteps.

I said Iris followed in her grandfather's footsteps, rather than her dad, because on Joe isn't a cop on Earth-2, he's a jazz club singer. Another departure is that he doesn't like Barry's doppleganger and the feeling is mutual. He blames E2 Barry for Iris being a cop, because he thinks she only did it to help put Barry through school.

Another huge difference between the Earths is that Barry's mom is still alive on Earth-2, which leads to an emotional scene where E1 Barry gets to talk to his mom's E2 counterpart. Barry got to talk to his mom again and Grant Gustin played it so well.

I want to stop for a second to talk about some more easter eggs, because like I said, this episode was rich in them:

• The Central City PD HQ has a wall mural that says "A Free and Just Society for All". Possibly a reference to the Justice Society of America, Jay Garrick's team in the comics?
• Earth-2 Barry has Bruce, Hal, and Diana on his speed dial. Those of course are the secret identities of Batman, Green Lantern, and Wonder Woman
• Atlantis exists, which means Aquaman might too

Back on Earth-1, Caitlyn creates a new version of Velocity 6 called Velocity 7. The former was a drug created by Jay to boost his speed, but in fact caused him to lose them. Yeah, turns out he lied about Zoom stealing his speed. Jay uses Velocity 7 to try and help stop a metahuman from his Earth called Geomancer, but the drug is only partially successful and Caitlyn later mentions that she'll start working on Velocity 8 next. Now what I didn't know is that in the comics, there's a drug called Velocity 9 that was created by Vandal Savage, so this is another easter egg.

Jumping back to Earth-2, Killer Frost and Deathstorm are introduced and decide to hunt down the breachers from Earth-1. Can I just say that these two look awesome as dicks?

(via TV.com)

Danielle Panabaker was really good at playing a supervillain and I'm glad we got to see Killer Frost finally show up. One gripe though is that I wish her outfit had featured an ice motif of some kind, like blue and white coloring or something. Oh well. Killer Frost and Deathstorm both live up their names, as both show in this episode that they have zero qualms about taking lives, with the former murdering some crooks and the latter mortally wounding E2 Joe. Meanwhile, Cisco creates a device to neutralize the two until he can figure out how to activate his "vibe" powers on Earth-2. This leads to a showdown between Killer Frost and Deathstorm on one side, and Iris, her partner Floyd Lawton (yes, her partner is Deadshot, but amusingly on this Earth, he can't hit the broad side of a barn), and Cisco on the other.

And thaaat's when Cisco finally comes face to face with his doppelganger and surprise, surprise, he's a supervillain too. Here, he's called Reverb and not only is he Zoom's right hand man, but he's also developed his powers beyond just precognition.

Arrowverse Wiki.

He's basically has powers similar to Cisco's comic book counterpart and apparently Reverb was a name he used in the comics too. The interaction between the two Ciscos was interesting because Reverb tries to lure Cisco over to the dark side, or as he puts it, trying to "Cloud City Vader" him. A Star Wars ref out of nowhere. I like it. Unfortunately for Reverb and Deathstorm, they both screw up royally. Naturally The Flash intervenes to save Iris, Lawton (who honest to god fires at Reverb point blank and misses), and Cisco, only to be whammied by the two villains. Killer Frost tries to warn them away from killing Barry, but ignore her and incur Zoom's wrath as a result. Deathstorm dies pretty easily given his powers and so does Reverb, for all of his bravado about killing Zoom and taking over Central City himself. Killer Frost is spared and flees distraught at the death of her love, Ronnie. Zoom then kidnaps Barry and takes him to wherever he's holding Wells's daughter, Jesse.

So yeah, things are looking pretty bleak by episodes end. Barry is the prisoner of Zoom, who wants Barry's speed for his own. At the same time, Caitlin and Jay are supposed to close the last rupture to Earth-2 if Barry and Cisco don't return in X amount of time and the clock is ticking closer and closer to that. The promo for the next episode, "Escape from Earth-2" shows Cisco and Earth-2's Barry, Iris, Wells, and Killer Frost coming together to rescue them.



"Welcome to Earth-2" is just such an amazing episode and this post honestly doesn't even do it justice. I'm hyped for "Escape from Earth-2" and I cannot wait until we finally learn Zoom's identity this season.