- Share this article on Facebook
- Share this article on Twitter
- Share this article on Flipboard
- Share this article on Email
- Show additional share options
- Share this article on Linkedin
- Share this article on Pinit
- Share this article on Reddit
- Share this article on Tumblr
- Share this article on Whatsapp
- Share this article on Print
- Share this article on Comment
Welcome to The Hollywood Reporter‘s weekly DC TV Watch, a rundown of all things DC Comics on TV. Every Friday, we round up the major twists, epic fights, new mysteries and anything else that goes down on The CW’s Arrow, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, Supergirl and Fox’s Gotham and what it all means.
Supergirl
Mega-crossover update: Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow executive producer Marc Guggenheim reveals that while the mega-crossover slated for November has been called a four-part crossover in the past, it’s actually only three episodes long. The story will kick off at the very end of a Supergirl episode, and then officially take place in an episode of The Flash, continuing in an episode of Arrow and concluding in Legends of Tomorrow. “Some people call it a four-way crossover because it involves four shows; my ulcer requires me to call it a three-part crossover,” Guggenheim says. “The story that’s being told has a beginning, middle and end: a beginning in Flash, a middle in Arrow, and an end in Legends. But Supergirl is very much a part of the whole thing, so we are crossing over four shows — four shows in three parts.”
How Supergirl flies to the Arrow-verse: Since Supergirl takes place in a different universe than the other three Greg Berlanti-produced shows, how will she join in for the big crossover event? “Last year, Supergirl established that Flash [Grant Gustin] was able to make his way to what I call Earth-CBS, and it stands to reason that, with the proper breach technology, the reverse can happen,” Guggenheim says. “Once the heroes realize that they’re up against aliens, they decide that they need an alien on their side. Fortunately, Barry knows a really nice one. I don’t think it’s a big shock that between Barry and Cisco [Carlos Valdes], and all their experiences with Earth-2 and the multi-verse, that they can pluck her from Earth-CBS.”
Calista Flockhart’s exit: In this week’s episode, “The Last Children of Krypton,” Flockhart’s reduced season two role was finally explained when Cat announced that she was taking a leave of absence from CatCo after feeling like she had dominated the media world and wanted a new adventure. While she is set to recur in a handful of episodes this season, the producers haven’t scheduled her return yet, but “hopefully she’ll be back,” executive producer Andrew Kreisberg says. “We’re still trying to work out her schedule, because she’s got stuff going on with her family, and her husband [Harrison Ford] is shooting a pretty big movie right now. We love working with Calista and Calista loves the show, which is why she came back to do this.”
Kara’s new boss: Now that Cat Grant has moved on, Kara’s (Melissa Benoist) new boss is Snapper Carr (Ian Gomez), and his dynamic with budding new journalist Kara is downright hostile since the veteran journo doesn’t believe that Kara deserves a spot in his newsroom. “Cat, both with Kara and I think with others, is actually devoted to mentoring people,” Kreisberg says. “She challenges them hard, but she does that with the idea that she’s forging them and they’re going to come out the other side as stronger, better people. Snapper Carr doesn’t give a crap. He believes in the written word, in facts and are you good at your job or are you not? If you’re not good at your job, I don’t have time for you. The next episode, she writes this piece that she thinks is so great, and he just rips it to shreds, and he’s right too. She’s picked a profession that she, by some rights, shouldn’t even be in. She really has to prove herself.”
Mon-El vs. Supergirl: At the end of this week’s episode, the mysterious man (Chris Wood) in the pod that crash-landed outside Kara’s apartment finally woke up inside the DEO, and immediately attacked Kara. “The last thing Mon-El remembers was being on an alien world and then he jumped into a pod and suddenly he wakes up on a strange world,” Kreisberg says. “He’s all alone, he’s surrounded by people with guns and he’s having a reaction. He’s reacting to the fact that he suddenly has superpowers, which he wasn’t expecting … We’re going to explore the idea that [Mon-El’s home planet] Daxam and Krypton were sister worlds but they didn’t really get along, so there’s a lot of innate hostility that Mon-El and Kara have for each other simply because of their backgrounds, which is interesting because Kara’s not exactly on her best behavior.” He will become the main suspect in the next episode when the President of the United States (Lynda Carter) is attacked.
Related Stories
Gotham
More than friendship? Could Penguin and the Riddler become more than just friends in this Batman origin story? While Gotham has never shown any indication that either Oswald “Penguin” Cobblepot (Robin Lord Taylor) or Edward “Riddler” Nygma (Cory Michael Smith) could be gay, their friendship has always toed the line into questionable territory with how physically and emotionally close they are. And their final scenes in this week’s episode, “Mad City: Anything For You” only reinforced those doubts after Penguin learned his friend Nygma was alive after saving his life. He cradled Nygma’s head in his hands, and later went in for a hug so slowly that it looked like the two men were about to kiss. Pairing these two together romantically wouldn’t be so far of a stretch since they have such incredible chemistry onscreen with their physical intimacy and have proven they care about each other to the point of risking their lives for the other. With Nygma claiming he’d “do anything” for Penguin, could Gotham flip the script on two iconic DC Comics characters and incorporate inclusivity into the Batman canon?
The Flash
Potential return of Kid Flash? After the reveal in this week’s episode, “Magenta,” that Dr. Alchemy’s victims begin their transformation into their Flashpoint alter-egos with dreams about their other identity in the alternate timeline, Wally’s (Keiynan Lonsdale) throwaway line about dreaming about getting speedster powers feels less like an emotional confession to Jesse (Violett Beane) and more like a red flag. Could he be on Dr. Alchemy’s list of potential new metas? He was hit with the same dark matter that caused Jesse to gain her Jesse Quick speedster powers, so it’s not far off to assume that his Kid Flash powers will manifest either with Dr. Alchemy’s push or even just naturally on their own. Considering how desperate Wally is to get speedster powers, even throwing himself in front of a speeding car to try and jump start the transformation, there’s no telling how far he will go to become a meta.
Related Stories
Arrow
Ragman’s origin story revealed: Rory aka new Team Arrow recruit Ragman (Joe Dinicol) finally learned in this week’s episode, “A Matter of Trust,” that his new teammate Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) was the one responsible for his home town of Havenrock getting a nuclear bomb dropped on it. Curtis (Echo Kellum) convinced her to tell Rory the truth after the guilt was tearing her up inside, but instead of reacting to her confession, Rory just walked away silently. So how will he eventually react to Felicity’s honesty? “I feel like he’s got a very human reaction,” Guggenheim says. “He reacts to it the way I think you might expect him to, but not in an overblown way. I think it’s very grounded and very human. I think we were all taken aback, not in a bad way but just surprised, that there was so much outrage over Felicity’s actions in episode 421. People were upset at Felicity, somehow, for saving Monument Point, at the expense of Havenrock. It was fun to actually get a chance to articulate the anti-Felicity point of view, and the pro-Felicity point of view. It made for a very interesting moral dilemma, and we had a chance to play with that.”
Lyla goes rogue: Now that Diggle (David Ramsey) is rotting away in prison after getting framed by his corrupt fellow soldiers, Lyla (Audrey Marie Anderson) decided to take matters into her own hands and get Oliver’s (Stephen Amell) help in breaking him out, regardless of whether Dig wants them to or not. “Oliver and Felicity both have interesting reactions, and they’re not necessarily on the same page,” Guggenheim says of Lyla’s reckless idea. “They don’t see eye-to-eye on Lyla’s plan.”
Felicity’s secret boyfriend: Anti-secret Felicity shocked viewers at the start of season five when it was revealed that she has a new serious boyfriend, Detective Billy Malone (Tyler Ritter), and that no one in her life or on Team Arrow knows that he exists. Will that secret come out? “It’s the classic thing of no secrets stay a secret forever on Arrow,” Guggenheim says. “Oliver is going to find out about Felicity’s boyfriend in episode 505. Because I’m spoiling that, I’m not going to spoil when Felicity’s boyfriend finds out that Felicity is working with Arrow.”
Mister Terrific: While Curtis suited up in a mask and costume for the first time, don’t call him Mister Terrific, his DC Comics alter ego, just yet. “I think he’s still got a ways to go on his journey,” Guggenheim says. “For one thing, that’s not the final costume. We decided to give some of the recruits what we call proto costumes. They have to earn the final one. In terms of all of these characters becoming or being vigilantes, Curtis has the furthest to go. The evolution of Curtis, from comic relief and sidekick to butt-kicking superhero, is a big throw, in my opinion. The only way to do it properly is to watch him try, and then watch him fail, and watch him fail, and watch him fail. So, it’s going to be a real struggle for him, as we go through the fifth season.”
Related Stories
Legends of Tomorrow
Erased from the timeline: Now we know why Hourman (Patrick J. Adams) faded out of existence while trying to warn the Legends not to go back in time after crash landing their Waverider in 2016: Reverse-Flash (Matt Letscher) erased him from the timeline by killing him in 1942. “When we introduced Hourman, we actually had a whole bunch of potential, different scenarios. That was always one of the notions,” Guggenheim says of killing off one of the main members of the Justice Society of America so early. “One of the things we talked a lot about was at what point do we show the audience the moments just after the events of 116? We had a version of 201 that actually had the flashback that you saw in 202, and we decided to move it into 202.”
The JSA: With the Legends leaving 1942 for new adventures, how will the JSA be incorporated into the story moving forward, especially now that their leader has been murdered? “I don’t want to spoil too much but I will say that we do go back to 1987 and we’ll meet a much older version of Obsidian, played by Lance Henriksen,” Guggenheim says. “And then we have another device up our sleeves that I don’t want to spoil because it deals with stuff that is mythology based in the back half of the year.”
Vixen’s vendetta: As for JSA member Vixen (Maisie Richardson-Sellers), expect to see a lot more of her, since Richardson-Sellers is a series regular this season. So how is she going to meet back up with the Legends? “We’ll deal with it directly in episode 203, facing that issue head on,” Guggenheim says. “You have a clue to it in Rex’s final words to her. If you’re Vixen and Rex Tyler is dying in your arms and you hear the words ‘time traveler,’ who would you think is responsible?” Sounds like it’s going to be Vixen vs. the Legends until they can figure out Hourman’s true killer, aka one-fourth of the villain team-up Legion of Doom.
Citizen Steel is born: After Ray (Brandon Routh) was forced to reverse engineer a meta-human serum from the Nazis and give it to new Legend team member Nate Heywood (Nick Zano) after he was mortally wounded, Nate’s life was saved, but there will be side effects of the superhero power persuasion. “You can safely assume that the reason we brought in Nate was so that we could tell those kinds of [seminal superhero origin story moments], including the unpredictable nature of his powers,” Guggenheim says. “The next episode really shows how difficult it is for Nate to get his powers under control.”
What did you think of all the shocking twists, reveals and mysteries on the DC Comics shows this week? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.
Gotham airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on Fox, Supergirl airs Mondays at 8 p.m. on The CW, The Flash airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. on The CW, Arrow airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. on The CW and Legends of Tomorrow airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on The CW.
THR Newsletters
Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day