Legends Of Tomorrow Season 2, Episode 7: Invasion!

Welp, The CW's big Invasion! Four Part Crossover Event is now history.

Overall the Crossover was a lot of fun, although not quite as epic as it could have been. I'm betting a lot of that was due to that ol' debil the TV budget.

The Crossover allegedly began in Supergirl, even though no one actually crossed over until literally the final thirty seconds of the episode. The Flash chapter was a big improvement, as it was fun seeing the various heroes meet and interact. Unfortunately The CW couldn't afford to show us any hero-on-alien action, and we had to settle for the Flash and Arrow fighting a group of their mind-controlled Super Friends.

The Arrow chapter was the worst of all, as ninety five percent of the episode consisted of Oliver & Company living in an alien-induced dream world. What the hell?

Fortunately they saved the best for last, and this final chapter managed to redeem the Crossover, finally giving us near-movie quality scenes of the Super Friends battling the Dominators. It was just like reading a Silver Age comic!

This isn't the first time characters from one series have crossed over into another. The first example of this I can think of is The Beverly Hillbillies, Petticoat Junction and Green Acres in the 1960s & 1970s. All three sitcoms were produced by Paul Henning, and were part of the same universe (the "Hooterverse, as I like to call it). Characters from one series would occasionally pop up on another late in the various shows' runs.

In the 1980s, a few characters from St. Elsewhere appeared on Cheers, and in the 1990s, NBC aired their "Hurricane Saturday" event, in which a single storyline ran through The Golden Girls, Empty Nest and Nurses.

None of these instances were anywhere near as epic as what The CW attempted here though.

In terms of spectacle and character interaction, this episode was easily the best of the Crossover chapters. That said, it wasn't really a very good episode of Legends Of Tomorrow. Most of the cast was shunted to the B and C storylines, while the Flash and Arrow hogged the A plot. Unfortunate, but probably par for the course. Legends is an ensemble show, made up of lesser-known (at least to the general public) characters. There's no actual "star" of the show, like there is on The Flash and Arrow. So it's not really surprising that they were shoved aside.

A few weeks ago on The Flash, Cisco found out his brother Dante's death was a direct result of Barry's altering of the timeline. This drove a huge wedge between the two, as Cisco said they could never be friends again. Oddly enough the matter's resolved in this episode of Legends Of Tomorrow.

It seems a bit odd to me for a major plot point on The Flash to be resolved on someone else's show. Flash viewers who didn't catch this episode are gonna be mighty confused when they tune in next week and Barry and Cisco are bros again.

Lastly, the Flash, Arrow and Legends Of Tomorrow chapters of this Crossover were ALL titled Invasion! That's gonna make it tough to figure out what order to watch them in years from now when you're binging the shows. Would it have killed them to have labeled them Invasion! Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3?

SPOILERS!

The Plot:
Picking up right after the disppointing non-events of Arrow, the Waverider, carrying Arrow, White Canary, Spartan, Steel and Vixen, returns to Central City (I guess they tossed Speedy out the airlock along the way?). The heroes decide that since the Dominators abducted humans to study, they should return the favor and interrogate one of them. Unfortunately the aliens are in short supply, and they don't know where to find one.

Just then Steel remembers the Redmon, Oregon Incident of 1951 (wrong!), in which the Dominators first attacked Earth. Steel, Vixen, Heat Wave, and for some reason Cisco and Felicity, take the Waverider back to 1951 (wrong!) to kidnap an alien.

Meanwhile, Professor Stein is at STAR Labs, working on a way to destroy the Dominators, Caitlin invites his daughter Lily, who has a PhD in nanotechnology (who doesn't?) to help. As we all know, Stein accidentally altered his timeline a few weeks ago, resulting in a daughter who never existed before (dontcha hate it when that happens?). He's visibly unnerved by her existence, as one is when one discovers they've inadvertently created an adult daughter. He secretly tells Caitlin that Lily is a time aberration, and once the crisis is over he plans to erase her. Dayum, Stein! That's pretty cold!

The Waverider arrives in 1951 (wrong!). Steel wears his new costume for the first time, which Heat Wave finds hilarious (he's not the only one!). They see the Dominators defeat a squad of soldiers and drag them into their ship. They spot an alien who wanders away from the others, and they knock it out. As they're about to take the Dominator back to the Waverider, a group of, well, Men In Black arrive. The leader of these men, King Faraday Agent Smith, tranquilizes the Legends.

Heat Wave, Vixen and Steel wake up some time later in a locked room. They've been drugged so they can't use their powers. The Dominator they were trying to abduct is in the room with them, strapped to a table. They figure they might as well go ahead and question it. The Dominator tells them there's been a recent uptick in metahumans on Earth, and they're trying to determine if they pose a threat to their planet (?). Suddenly the Men In Black burst into the room. Agent Smith orders his men to take the alien away and begin torturing it.

Meanwhile, back in 2016, the heroes get a call that the new President (the old one was vaporized in Invasion! Part 1) wants to meet with them. Flash, Arrow, Atom and White Canary go to a deserted airport for the meeting. They're surrounded by government vehicles. Agent Smith, now sixty five years older (!), steps out of the lead vehicle. He orders his men to fire on the heroes.

The Flash catches all the bullets at superspeed, and the other heroes knock out the government goons, leaving only Agent Smith standing. Flash questions him, and Smith says the aliens consider metahumans to be a threat, and so does he.

Agent Smith somehow knows the Flash is really Barry Allen, and that he created the Flashpoint timeline. He says this violated a truce humanity's had with the aliens since 1951 (wrong!). He says he made a deal with the Dominators— they'll leave Earth alone if Barry turns himself over to them.

Back in 1951 (wrong!), Cisco and Felicity use blasters from the Waverider's armory to bust the heroes out of their cell. They hear the Dominator being tortured, and Steel says they have to save it, to show the aliens that all humans aren't bad. They rescue the alien, give it the Dominator ship the Waverider captured in Arrow, and send it on its way. Cisco says he stole a transponder from the ship before it left, so they can communicate with the alien. They return to 2016.

Cisco calls the Dominator they just left in the past. Amazingly it answers, and says it will spare their lives for helping it, but the Invasion will go on as scheduled. It then launches a gigantic bomb from the Dominator mothership. When detonated, this bomb will kill every metahuman on Earth, as well as millions of normal humans.

Cisco realizes that by saving this alien in the past, he's doomed the present. He's now guilty of making the same mistake his pal Barry did.

Back at the STAR Labs hangar, Barry says goodbye to everyone and prepares to turn himself in to the Dominators. The other heroes refuse to let him do so, and say they're willing to fight to protect him. Professor Stein enters, and says he and his daughter have come up with devices that will inflict excruciating pain on the aliens— but the catch is they have to be placed on ALL of them before they can be activated. Cisco and Canary take off in the Waverider and use the tractor beam to stop the bomb. Unfortunately the weapon is too large, and they only manage to slow it down a bit.

The heroes then make a final stand, battling an army of Dominators. The Flash and Supergirl race around at superspeed, placing Stein's devices on every alien across the entire country (!!!!!). Firestorm flies up to the bomb and attempts to transmute it. Sadly it's just too big.

The Flash and Supergirl finish planting the devices, and Felicity activates them. Every Dominator nationwide doubles over in pain. Firestorm gives it the old college try, and finally transmutes the bomb into water at the last second. The Dominators all beam up to their ship and hightail it out of our solar system.

The new President (who's a woman-- if only!) holds a ceremony in the hangar to honor the heroes for their help. They all have a party afterwards. Agent Smith crashes the party. Supergirl tells him that on her world she works for the DEO (Department of Extra-normal Operations) and she spoke to the new President about starting up something similar on Earth-1. Oh, and also he's being transferred to Antarctica. 

Supergirl prepares to return to Earth-38. Cisco gives her a device that will allow her to generate a breach and visit anytime she wants. Stein tells Jackson he's decided not to erase his new daughter. Everyone forgives Barry for changing the timeline— even Cisco. The End.

Thoughts:
• There's no opening narration this week, but Professor Stein does do the "Previously on..." announcement.

• The title screen in this episode incorporates the icons of The Flash, Arrow and Supergirl into the Legends Of Tomorrow logo. As each icon appears and slams into place, we hear a brief snippet of that show's theme. Because the sequence is so short, all four themes end up playing at virtually the same time, which sounds every bit as lovely as you'd think it would (that was, I say that was sarcasm, son!).

• Despite a few glitches, I'd just like to point out how much I actually enjoyed this episode. We got a much closer look at the Dominators here, and the final battle between them and the Super Friends was absolutely glorious. 

Seeing Vixen channel the powers of an elephant, Heat Wave and Arrow fighting side-by-side and Firestorm using his transmuting powers while Professor Stein chatters away in his head perfectly captured the spirit of the comics. I think I may have even squealed like a little girl while watching.

• Early in the episode, Arrow tells Supergirl to sit out the battle, because he's having trouble dealing with the reality of superpowered Kryptonians or some bullsh*t like that. His exact words are:

Arrow: "Can I talk to you for a second?"
Supergirl: "I don't know." 
Arrow: "I would like to minimize your involvement in this." 
Supergirl: "Why? Because I'm an alien? I also happen to be your biggest weapon." 
Arrow: "You are an unknown quantity, and this is not personal."
Supergirl: "Except that's exactly how this feels."
Arrow: "Kara, when I started living this life, it was just me. I was going up against human threats. That I could handle. Then it was meta-humans, and I can handle that. Now I learn that there are multiple Earths, and I was brainwashed aboard an alien spacecraft."
Supergirl: "I am sure that was unnerving, but I don't…"
Arrow: "I don't get unnerved. But when I go up against something new, I push back. Right or wrong, it is who I am, and it is what I do, so I'm asking for a little bit of space because I have to draw the line somewhere. I need to claw back a sense of normalcy. Please stay here."

Like I said, complete bullsh*t. As a fighter and a strategist, it makes absolutely zero sense for Arrow to want to sideline Supergirl, ESPECIALLY for the new age, wishy-washy reasons he tries to articulate.

I can think of several possibilities for this clumsy bit of writing. It could be yet another example of this Crossover's increasingly obvious budgetary limits. Those flying Supergirl effects probably ain't cheap!

It might have also been a case of power overkill. Supergirl could have dealt with most of the threats in this episode single-handedly, without even breaking a sweat. This would have given the other characters nothing to do but stand around and watch. It would have also wrapped up the storyline twenty minutes too soon.

Or it could have just been a case of availability. Melissa Benoist, who plays Supergirl, may have been busy filming her own series, and there just may not have been time for her to appear in more than a couple of brief scenes here.

Whatever the reason was for sidelining her, it was poorly written and executed.

• In The Flash chapter, Lyla mentions the Redmond, Oregon incident of 1951. The heroes reference it again in this episode.

The Redmond Incident is a real thing, and pertains to a famous UFO sighting in that area. Unfortunately the actual incident happened in 1959, not 1951 as everyone keeps saying here. Sloppy!

By the way, I'm not some conspiracy theory nut or UFO expert who lives and breathes this stuff. I found out the year of the incident with about thirty seconds of googling.

• When the Waverider arrives in 1951 (wrong!), Felicity reacts badly to traveling through time. She vomits on the floor and suffers from "linguistic disorientation," as she begins spouting gibberish. At one point she blurts out, "Darmokandjaladattenagra!"

This is a reference to the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode Darmok, in which Captain Picard is abducted by the Tarmarians, a race with a complicated and indecipherable language. The Tamarian Captain keeps saying, "Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra," to Picard, which makes no sense to him. He eventually realizes that the Tamarians speak in metaphors, and Darmok and Jalad were ancient warriors who became friends after overcoming a common ordeal.

Yes, I'm a big nerd, and knew all this without having to look it up.

* A few weeks ago in Compromised, Professor Stein accidentally altered his past, resulting in him now having an adult daughter named Lily. In this altered timeline Lily has always existed, but Stein has absolutely no memories of her. You're probably asking how the hell that's possible. Good question!

Legends Of Tomorrow has always played fast and loose with causality, but occasionally they do try to explain their time-travel inconsistencies. Last season Rip Hunter said that time is like cement, and any changes made to it in the past will take a while to "harden." This would explain why Stein doesn't remember his daughter, because his altered imeline hasn't  yet "set."

Does this make any sense? Or course not. But it shows me that the writers KNOW it's silly, and they're at least made an attempt at explaining it. So I'm willing to give them a pass on this one.

• Steel's new costume makes its debut this week (OK, we saw it in Outlaw Country, but this is the first time he's actually worn it), complete with be-finned helmet. Note that Steel's sporting some very extensive black makeup around the eye-holes of his helmet.

Note that Michael Keaton did the same thing in his two Batman films. Actually EVERY big screen Batman has done this, from Keaton all the way up to Ben Affleck. I guess this is done to help his skin blend in with the rubber mask? Or to make him look more mysterious or menacing? Honestly I don't know why they do it.

The makeup really a problem until Batman decides to remove his mask. As you can see in this scene from Batman Returns, he's wearing the black makeup around his eyes.

We cut away from him for a second, and when we cut back— suddenly no makeup!

He then rips the top of his mask off, revealing his secret identity. You can see why they removed the black makeup right before he took off the mask. If they hadn't, when he tore off his cowl, he'd have had two comical raccoon spots around his eyes.

I GUARANTEE this same thing is going to happen at some point with Steel and his helmet. He's going to have black makeup on his face, then suddenly it's gonna disappear right before he whips the helmet off his head.

I honestly don't know why they bother with the whole makeup thing anyway. I performed a quick makeup-ectomy in Photoshop, and honestly Steel doesn't look that bad without it.

• After being drugged by the Men In Black, Heat Wave, Vixen and Steel wake up in a locked room. Heat Wave tells the others to use their abilities to escape, but Steel says, "Whatever they tranqed us with is screwin' with our powers."

Hey, wait a minute. Steel's powers come from within him, but Vixen gets hers from her mystical amulet. Which she's still wearing! Whoops! Would a drug really stop her magical necklace from working? I don't see how.

• It's pretty obvious to any comic fans out there that Agent Smith is supposed to be King Faraday.

He was a secret agent character who first appeared in DC Comics in 1950. in 2004, he played a big role in the New Frontier miniseries, in which he lead the government effort to control the large amount of metahumans that began appearing throughout the world. 

Which is pretty much the exact same thing "Agent Smith" did here. I don't know why they didn't just call him King Faraday in this Crossover event. Maybe it was some sort of rights issue with the creators of the character?

• When Felicity sees the Dominator bomb enter our atmosphere, she utters, "Oh, frak!"

That's a Battlestar Galactica reference. In the original show, "frak" was a mild expletive, roughly akin to "darn." In the revamped series from the early 2000s, it unmistakably became an otherworldly substitute for "f*ck."

Coincidentally, actor Donnelly Rhodes, who plays Agent Smith in this episode, starred in the new Battlestar Galactica as Doc Cottle, the chain-smoking chief surgeon of the fleet.

• At the end of the episode, Agent Smith gets his comeuppance by being exiled to Antarctica. Oddly enough this is played for laughs, despite the fact that the man has to be at least ninety by now, and a week in such a climate would surely kill him. HAW HAW HAW!

• At the after-party, Supergirl walks past Atom. He takes a long look at her and says,"You know what's funny? She really kinda looks like my cousin." Get it? Actor Brandon Routh, who plays Atom, was also the Man Of Steel in 2006's Superman Returns. Get it? Eh? EH?

• Before she leaves for her world, Supergirl tells the Flash and Arrow that they're "Earth's Mightiest Heroes." Hey, HEY! Be careful what you say there, Supergirl! Marvel's got Disney's highly litigious army of attorneys on their side now!

Arrow Season 5, Episode 8: Invasion!

OK, full disclosure here— I don't watch Arrow. I started watching Season 1 a few years ago, but quickly grew bored with the show because I'm not a fan of "powerless" superheroes. You know, the kind who can only punch and kick. Like Batman. Blasphemy, I know, but that's just how it is.

You're probably wondering why I bothered to watch Arrow this week then, since I'm not a fan. Well, that's because I stupidly thought that since this episode was titled Invasion!, it would actually be part of The CW's Invasion Crossover Event, and not an episode of Dynasty. Silly me!

Instead of an episode in which the cast actually fights the aliens who are invading the planet, we get a slow moving soap opera— one that plays out like a love letter to longtime viewers. See, the Dominators just happened to abduct the cast of Arrow— and only them— from the superhero team the Flash recruited on his show. What a coincidence! And then the aliens put them all in some sort of stasis pods and create a Utopian, wish-fulfillment virtual world for them, in which they all have absolutely perfect lives. 

Most of this shiny, happy world stuff was completely lost on me, since I have no idea who most of the characters are or their relationship to one another. OK, even I figured out that Ollie's reaction to seeing his parents means they must be dead in reality, but that's about it. 

So this is going to be a VERY short review. Maybe the shortest ever. Hey, HEY! Stop cheering!

By the way, the first part of this crossover event started over on The Flash, and was titled Invasion! This second part is called Invasion! as well. And the third part, which continues on Legends Of Tomorrow, is ALSO called Invasion! That's gonna make it tough a few months from now when you're bingeing the shows and trying to figure out what order in which to watch them. Would it have killed them to have labeled them Invasion! Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3?

UM... SPOILERS?

The Plot:

Picking up where we left off in The Flash, the alien Dominators have abducted Arrow, White Canary, Speedy, Spartan and Atom. They've placed them in stasis pods, and have constructed a virtual paradise for them, in which their lives are all perfect, their fondest wishes have come true, and they've all ended up with the right person.

Eventually they begin to notice cracks in the facade of this perfect world, and realize what's going on. They force themselves to "wake up" from their dream lives, and find they're in a Dominator spaceship orbiting the Earth. 

They run through the corridors of the ship, looking for a way out. They encounter a squad of aliens, and Arrow grabs a powerful blaster that's conveniently hanging on a wall (?) and starts shooting them. They all pile in an escape pod and take off.

They're then pursued by a squad of Dominator space fighters. Unfortunately none of the heroes knows how to operate the alien controls. Just as they're about to be destroyed, the Waverider (the Legends of Tomorrow's timeship) appears and brings them aboard.

Inside the Waverider, Steel and Vixen greet the heroes. Atom remembers a phrase he heard one of the Dominators say back on their ship. Gideon translates the sentence as "We are nearing completion of the weapon." 

We then see a massive Dominator ship heading for Earth.

To be continued on Legends Of Tomorrow...

Thoughts:

• I get that this is an episode of a TV show and not a multimillion dollar superhero movie. Naturally there's going to have to be some budget consciousness. But calling the episode Invasion!, implying it's going to feature superhero-on-alien action and then delivering a story that's nothing more than forty minutes of people engaging in polite conversation at a cocktail party is pretty goddamned low. Five minutes in I got bored and started playing with my phone while I waited for something interesting to happen. Pretty frustrating!

• So why did the Dominators just happen to abduct Arrow, White Canary, Speedy, Spartan and Atom? Um... for reasons? Actually, according to Arrow, it's because none of them have any superpowers. I guess they wanted to study ordinary humans to look for weaknesses? Maybe? Honestly I have no idea.

And why would they create an elaborate fantasy world for these humans, instead of just violently probing the sh*t out of them to get the info they wanted? It doesn't make any sense. I think there was a line implying the aliens were distracting their minds while studying them or something, but it seems pretty flimsy to me.

• When the heroes realize they're in a virtual world, they try to escape. Unfortunately the Dominators whip up a team of simulated villains (consisting of Malcom Merlyn, Damien Darhhhhk and Deathstroke) to keep them from leaving. The heroes battle the fake villains, and Spartan is wounded. 

They then wake up in the real world. Oddly enough, we see that Spartan is injured for real!

Were the stasis pods set up so that any injury sustained in the virtual world would be mechanically inflicted on a body in reality? Or is it some sort of psychosomatic deal? Like dying in your dream makes you die in real life? 

Apparently it's none of our business, as it's never explained.

• And that's it! I got nothing else. I told you this would be short!

The Flash Season 3, Episode 8: Invasion!

This week on The Flash, the big multi-part Invasion! storyline continues! Well, that's not quite true. Actually it's just getting started, but more on that later.

Crossovers and team-ups have been a staple of superhero comics since the genre began in the late 1930s. There's just something appealing about seeing characters from your favorite books join forces. The comic companies recognized this, and that's why DC's Justice League and Justice Society regularly traveled to each other's dimension for an annual joint adventure. And over at Marvel, they actually had two monthly comics that regularly paired their heroes together (Marvel Team-Up and Marvel Two-In-One).

That's why it was so awesome to see pretty much all the Arrowverse characters (plus Supergirl!) band together in an all-star teamup. It's amazing how much fun these DC TV shows are, especially when compared to their dour and dreary theatrical movies. I never thought I'd see something so cool on network TV. It's a wonderful time to be alive.

As wonderful as this crossover is, there are a few caveats. Viewers tuning in thinking they're going to see something like Captain America: Civil War will likely be disappointed. This is a TV show after all, so don't expect theatrical quality effects and storytelling. It's a budget-conscious alien invasion!

Also, if you watched The CW at any time in the past few weeks, you were no doubt bombarded by endless promos breathlessly announcing this amazing four part crossover event. According to these house ads, the big extravaganza would begin Monday night on Supergirl.

That was a big fat lie. Mostly. See, even though Supergirl is finally on The CW were she belongs, she and her world are NOT part of the so-called Arrowverse. She lives in another dimension, on a completely different Earth than the Flash, Green Arrow and the Legends Of Tomorrow. 

So Monday the midseason finale of Supergirl aired, and 99.5% of the episode was spent wrapping up several dangling plot threads that had been brewing all season. Then in literally the last thirty seconds, a dimensional portal opens in Supergirl's apartment, and Barry Allen and his pal Cisco Ramon step out of it. Barry tells Supergirl he needs her help, and that was it for the so-called "crossover!" Thirty seconds out of a forty two minute episode.

Even worse, that scene between Barry, Cisco and Supergirl is actually repeated verbatim in this episode of The Flash! So for all intents and purposes, the crossover event really started Tuesday night. You could completely ignore the Supergirl episode if you wanted and not miss one bit of the Invasion! storyline.

Another oddity— at one point Barry's forced to admit to the assembled heroes that he altered the timeline twice this season. A good chunk of the episode was then spent on the fallout of this announcement, as the characters reacted to the fact that their lives had been changed in various ways. Seriously? Is this REALLY the best time to bring up this plot point? Wouldn't it have made infinitely more sense to repel the alien invasion, THEN have Barry tell everyone he screwed up their lives?

I smell some script padding here. I have a feeling there just wasn't enough to the Invasion! storyline to fill up three episodes, so they needed to do some stretching.

SPOILERS!

The Plot:
At STAR Labs, Wally's still being tested in the Speed Lab. According to Caitlin, he's faster than Barry was when he first got his speedster powers. This worries Wally's family greatly, as they fear his powers will get him killed or something. Caitlin suggests that she, Barry and Cisco join her for drinks. Cisco refuses, as he still blames Barry for Dante's death. HR gives a presentation outlining his plans to turn STAR Labs into a museum, which is as insane as it sounds. Suddenly the Lab's sensors detect a meteor heading for Central City.

Barry rushes downtown and sees the meteor's actually an alien spaceship. It lands and dozens of CGI aliens file out and disappear into the city.

The next day, Lyla from ARGUS meets with the STAR Labs Gang. She says the aliens are known as Dominators, and they visited the Earth once before in the 1950s. Back then they abducted a number of people (ten percent of our children, perhaps?) and then abruptly left. Now they're back, and have landed four ships on Earth. She says the Dominators sent out a message threatening anyone who tries to stop them. Lyla asks the Gang to let ARGUS handle the matter.

Meanwhile in Star City, Green Arrow and Spartan confront Vigilante in a warehouse (where else?). Vigilante opens fire on them, just as the Flash appears and whisks them out of the path of the bullets and into Felicity's apartment. Arrow's angry with Barry for letting Vigilante get away, until he hears about the aliens. Arrow's supporting cast shows up and vows to help the Flash defeat the invasion.

Team Flash and Team Arrow meet in an old STAR Labs hangar, which looks suspiciously familiar. Felicity says she somehow contacted the Legends Of Tomorrow, and sure enough, they show up a few minutes later in a time shuttle. They explain that Steel and Vixen stayed behind on the Waverider (no doubt for budgetary reasons).

Barry and Cisco create a breach and travel to Earth-38 to recruit Supergirl. She agrees to help and returns to Earth-1 with them. The rest of the heroes don't believe she's an alien until she demonstrates by flying and using her heat vision to burn her logo into the floor.

Meanwhile the Dominators set up a device inside yet another abandoned warehouse. They plan to capture and mind control the President.

Back at the hangar, Supergirl says she's familiar with the Dominators, as they invaded Krypton long ago. The Super Friends decide their new team needs a leader. Cisco immediately nominates Arrow, which sounds like a pretty good idea to me. Arrow says Barry should be in charge, since the whole party was his idea. Barry awkwardly fumbles out a few orders, telling everyone to start training against Supergirl (who's a thousand times more powerful than all the other heroes combined, and invulnerable to boot).

Professor Stein and Jackson decide this is the perfect time to tell Barry they found a message from his future self on the Waverider. They play the message, in which Future Barry tells Rip Hunter (former captain of the Waverider) that he altered the timeline and not to trust anyone, including him. Barry decides there isn't already enough going on, and wants to tell everyone about the Flashpoint timeline, but Arrow wisely says to wait until after the crisis.

While Supergirl mops the floor with the other heroes, Professor Stein has another attack. He asks Caitlin to take him home, and when he gets there, his adult daughter— who didn't exist before Flashpoint— greets him. Stein's so flustered he immediately leaves.

Meanwhile, Lyla meets with the President to discuss the Dominator threat. He agrees with her attack plan and leaves in his limo. The Dominators attack the car and abduct the President.

Back at STAR Labs, Wally's upset that his dad Joe and sister Iris don't want him to have powers. He asks HR to train him. HR refuses at first, but eventually agrees, which seems a bit suspicious.

Cisco finds Future Barry's secret recording and listens to it. Not cool, Cisco! He then confronts Barry about the message, and forces him to tell the others about Flashpoint. The heroes are all stunned, especially Spartan, whose son was a girl in the original timeline. Oddly enough the Legends tear Barry a new one too for tampering with time, despite the fact that they all do so on a daily basis.

Lyla informs Barry and the Super Friends that the President's been taken. Everyone's still sore at Barry, and they tell him to stay home while they rush off to save the Prez. Arrow stays behind with Barry.

The heroes easily find the building where the President's being held. They enter and are immediately surrounded by Dominators. The aliens disintegrate the President (!), activate a mind control device and mentally enslave all the heroes.

Barry whines some more about the mistake he made, and Arrow tells him that anyone in his place would have done the same thing. Suddenly the hangar is attacked by the mind controlled Super Friends. Flash and Arrow rush out and begin battling everyone.

Wally watches the fight on a STAR Labs monitor. He can't contain himself, and speeds away to help. He does OK at first, but is eventually violently K-Oed.

Cisco and Felicity locate the mind control signal, and relay the coordinates to Barry. He rushes to the empty warehouse, as Supergirl follows. They have a superspeed battle, and Barry eventually tricks her into flying through the mind control device, destroying it. The Super Friends revert to normal.

The heroes regroup and talk about what to do next. Suddenly White Canary is bathed in bright light and teleported away. Atom follows, then Spartan and Speedy. Arrow begins teleporting and Barry tries to grab him, but is too late.

To be continued on Arrow...

Thoughts:
• I'm puzzled by Joe and Iris' attitude toward Wally and his powers. They can barely contain their terror over the fact that he's now a speedster.

I can kind of understand Joe's reaction, since he's Wally's father, and that's what dads do— worry. But Iris? Why's she care so much? She didn't even know she had a brother until a few months ago.

Oddly enough they're not even remotely concerned that Barry has the exact same powers.

Why are Barry's powers fine, but Wally's are a cause for alarm? Are two speedsters in the family just one too many? Are they worried that Wally's too young to use his powers responsibly? It it because Barry's only a foster member of the family, while Wally's a blood relative? Is it because Joe and Iris have been on the sidelines lately, and the writers needed something for them to do?

• Kudos to the producers for the scene in which Supergirl tries to learn the names of all the assembled heroes. I've been keeping up with these shows for a while now and even I didn't know who everyone was (especially the Arrow characters, since I drifted away from that series a while back). I bet even with the roll call scene, new viewers were probably completely lost.

• When discussing the Dominators, Lyla says the government's been aware of them since the 1950s. She says, "In 1951, they appeared under the same sort of circumstances. A ship crash-landed. Little to no communication. We learned they were abducting humans to gather intel about us. They attacked, and hundreds of soldiers lost their lives. Then, for some inexplicable reason, they left."

Joe speaks up and says, "That was them! Redmond Oregon. The government tried to cover it up. What? I watch Syfy Channel!"

Joe's referring to an actual incident, in which a bright, fast-moving object appeared over the city of Redmond, Oregon. Air Force jets were scrambled from a nearby airbase in Portland, and began pursuing the glowing craft. The planes chased the UFO, but it was too fast and maneuverable and quickly lost them. The Air Force later debunked the incident by stating the object was actually a weather balloon (that could somehow outrun jets traveling at 600 mph).

The only problem here is that the Redmond Incident occurred in 1959, not 1951 as Lyla stated. Whoops!

I wonder… did they fudge the date of the Redmond Incident because of Agent Smith? He looks to be about thirty years old in 1959. That would make him eighty seven when we see him in 2016! That's seems reeeeeally old for a government agent. Jesus, don't these guys ever get to retire? 

It gets worse though. If they had used the proper year of 1951 for the Redmond Incident, then that would make Smith a whopping NINETY FIVE in 2016! No wonder they changed the date!

• From the neck up, the alien Dominators looked pretty close to the comic book version, which was a nice touch.

For some reason, the producers decided the Dominators should be completely CGI. I get that they probably wanted to make them look truly alien, and that's fine. But creating realistic-looking CGI aliens is expensive, which drastically limited their screen time in the episode.

In fact this budgetary limitation ended up affecting the plot. Instead of battling a vast army of CGI Dominators, the Flash and Arrow spend most of the episode fighting a group of mind-controlled fellow superheroes. Aliens are expensive. People are cheap!

Seems to me like it would have been much better dramatically and budget-wise if the Dominators were a practical effect. Guys in prosthetic makeup and long robes, just like in the comic. There've been some amazing looking aliens on Doctor Who the past few seasons, so it's not like it's impossible.

• I recently learned that many comic fans are deeply offended by the Dominators. Apparently their skin tone, prominent teeth, slit-like eyes, long claws and the Japanese "Rising Sun" motif on their foreheads makes them horrible "yellow peril" Asian stereotypes.
 
Jesus wept. I really don't want to live on this planet anymore.

I've been aware of the Dominators since the Invasion! storyline first appeared in the comics back in 1989, and this never once occurred to me. In fact I think if you see buck-toothed Tojo stereotypes in these characters instead of evil aliens, then the problem lies with you, not the comics.

• According to Cisco, Supergirl lives on Earth-38. I'm assuming the 38 refers to the year in which Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster sold Superman to DC Comics (they actually created the character in 1933, but that's another story).

One wonders why they didn't say she's from Earth-59, since that's the year Supergirl was actually created. I guess because Superman got to Earth first in her universe?

NOTE: I've been informed that in the DC Comics universe, there are currently only fifty two parallel worlds in the multiverse, so it would be impossible for Supergirl to come from Earth-59. 

I'm aware of the New 52 thing, but… does it apply to the shows as well? When I hear "multiverse," I think of MILLIONS of worlds, not just fifty two. I can't remember if the series has ever clarified this though.

• During the briefing, Supergirl says she's familiar with the Dominators, as they invaded Krypton years ago.

Obviously she's talking about the Dominators from her dimension, since she's not from Earth-1. Hopefully her Dominators are the same as the ones here, or her intel's going to be useless.

By the way, how did Barry's world get to be "Earth-1?" Do people from Earth-2 or Earth-19 feel inferior when they find out their planet's not "number one?"

• Barry gathers the various Arrowverse heroes together in an old STAR Labs hangar.

Amazingly this hangar looks exactly like the Hall Of Justice from the 1970s Super Friends cartoon. The only thing missing is Ted Knight's pompous narration ("Meanwhile, at the Hall Of Justice, Batman makes an amazing discovery!").

I'm wondering if this hangar is just a one shot deal for this episode, or if it'll become the new headquarters for the STAR Labs Gang. Is this why HR keeps wanting to turn the current building into a museum? Will Barry take up residence in this hangar now that he's no longer has his day job as a CSI?

• Barry's awfully casual about revealing various the secret identities of the various heroes in this episode. I know he gave up trying to keep his a secret long ago, but here he blurts out Arrow's real name right in front of everyone.

Did Oliver really want a criminal like Heat Wave to know his true identity?

• A few weeks ago on Legends Of Tomorrow, the Atom's suit was destroyed. He's never let us forget this fact, as he's whined about the loss in every episode since.

Now suddenly he has a new suit in this episode, courtesy of the white dwarf matter he found in the Old West in Outlaw Country, along with the Waverider's replicator.

Well that was certainly easy! So why the hell didn't he create a new suit immediately after the original one was destroyed, instead of moping about if for months? And doesn't it seem odd that he'd do something important like this offscreen, instead of in an episode of his own show?

• When Barry asks Atom why Captain Cold isn't with the Legends, he tells him that Snart was killed in the Legends Season 1 finale. Barry takes the news hard. OK, I get that the Flash and Cold made a deal a couple seasons ago and were "friendly adversaries," but it's not like they were family or anything. Barry's reaction seemed a little over the top.

• Shouldn't Supergirl's heat vision be red instead of light saber blue? Just asking.

• In the Legends Of Tomorrow episode Shogun, Professor Stein and Jackson found a secret message from future Barry Allen to Rip Hunter. Apparently the contents of the message were so shocking that they dared not to tell anyone about it. Until right now, of course. Because everyone knows the perfect time to reveal a momentous secret is right before going into battle against an alien invasion. But I digress.

So what are the astonishing contents of the message? That prolonged exposure to the time stream is deadly? That none of them are real, and they're all just characters in a television show? That Soylent Green is people?

Nope! Nothing remotely that interesting. Instead, the message says that Barry Allen altered the past, and Rip Hunter shouldn't trust him or anyone. That's it? That's the shocking secret, that Barry changed the timeline? Jesus Christ, he's done nothing all season but announce that to anyone within earshot!

• When the Dominators abduct the President, Lyla springs into action. She calls for help into her mic, saying, "He's gone. Traveler has been taken. I repeat, Traveler has been taken. The Dominators have the President."

Um... which is it, Lyla? Are you going to call the President by his codename or not? It doesn't do any good when you broadcast both (I'm guessing the "The Dominators have the President" line was for the dimmer members of the audience).

Oddly enough the Arrowverse's current President is white. I wonder... did they cast a white man as President because Obama's term is nearly up? Or did the producers fear online PC backlash if they disintegrated a black President?

• Thanks to Barry's time-changing shenanigans, Professor Stein now has a grown daughter. I guess his wife Carissa didn't get erased then?

• Wally asks HR to train him in how to use his newfound speed. HR refuses, saying if he trains him and the others found out, "he'd be gone faster than humor in a Liam Neeson movie." Apparently there's a Liam Neeson on Earth-19 too.

• The episode's best interaction was between Supergirl and Heat Wave, of all people.

Supergirl: "How did you get the name Heat Wave?"
Heat Wave: "I burned my family alive, and I like to light things on fire."
Supergirl: "Aah. Well, that's a... colorful backstory."
Heat Wave: "Well, my shrink thinks so."

Supergirl (seeing the President inside a warehouse): "Yep, he's in there."
Heat Wave: "How do you know that?"
Supergirl: "I can see him. Oh, I have X-ray vision."
Heat Wave: "Oh. You can see everyone's bits with those little peepers, huh?"
Supergirl (flustered): "No, I... "
White Canary: "Ignore him."

• Heat Wave decides he's not going to call Supergirl by her name.

Heatwave: "By the way, I'm not gonna call you Supergirl. It's stupid."
Supergirl: "You could call me Kara."
Heatwave: "That won't work either."
Supergirl: "Well, what're you gonna shout if you need my help?"
Heatwave: "Skirt."
Supergirl: "Seriously?"
Heatwave: "Seriously. But I'm not gonna need your help."

Predictably, several seconds later the Dominators attack, and Heat Wave yells, "Supergirl, do something!"

I knew the second he said he wasn't ever going to call her "Supergirl" that he'd end up doing so before the episode was over. It's called "set up," folks!

• The most puzzling (and frankly stupid) part of the entire episode was the attitude of the other heroes when they found out that Barry had altered the timeline. Oddly enough it's the Legends Of Tomorrow in particular who rip into him, lambasting him for committing such an irresponsible and selfish act.

This is epic hypocrisy on their part. The Legends change the goddamned timeline on a weekly basis! In fact, ALTERING (or "fixing," as they call it) THE TIMELINE IS THE PREMISE OF THEIR ENTIRE FERKAKTE SHOW! And to make it even worse, they SUCK at it! They're constantly screwing up history! What the hell gives them the right to scold Barry for doing the same thing?

I have a feeling this was another case in which the writers needed something for all the excess characters in the episode to do. Apparently yelling at Barry Allen for doing the exact thing they do was all they could come up with.

Unfortunately all this did is make the Legends look like two-faced assholes.

And wait a minute... if Team Flash and Team Arrow are both pissed at Barry for changing the timeline, shouldn't they be ready to tar & feather the Legends for regularly doing the exact same thing? No one says a word about their antics.