- Title: Supergirl – Blood Memory
- wiki: link
The relationship between sisters is the theme of “Blood Memory” when Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) takes a trip with Nia (Nicole Maines) to her inclusive home town. After meeting Nia’s sister (Hannah James), Kara discovers why her protege has been so hesitant to embrace the powers passed down from her mother (Kate Burton). At the same time the show begins exploring the aftereffects of Alex (Chyler Leigh) forgetting Supergirl’s true identity from small memory gaps, to a lack of confidence, to being far less kind to the Maid of Might in the field. Bonding over their trouble with sisters, the episode works as both an origin story for Nia’s eventual hero push while also staying true to the show’s core principles of friendship and sisterhood as Kara reveals her secret to a friend whose turmoil she understands all too well.
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- Title: Supergirl – Suspicious Minds
- wiki: link
More than any of the other CW super-hero shows, Supergirl has shown a willingness to push the envelope and take an unexpected hard right-turn to shake things up in unexpected ways. This season has seen the show continue to mirror real-life political divisiveness and immigrant issues with an anti-alien hate group movement and the new President’s (Bruce Boxleitner) anti-alien agenda which gets Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) kicked out of the DEO and creates an investigation to uncover the hero’s true identity. In an episode about invisible alien assassins bred by the U.S. Government for black ops, it’s the core relationships between characters and how far they are willing to go to keep secrets to protect each other that highlights “Suspicious Minds.”
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- Title: Supergirl – Elseworlds (Part 3)
- wiki: link
Although apparently it will be the last we see of him for awhile, Superman (Tyler Hoechlin) gets quite a bit of screentime in the the “Elseworlds” finale as Hoechlin does double duty as both the Man of Steel and the new form of John Deegan (Jeremy Davies). As with the previous two episodes, Part 3 gives us more nods and winks at both Crisis of Infinite Earths (which apparently will be next year’s big crossover) and other famous moments of our heroes climaxing in the Flash (Grant Gustin) and Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) circling the globe (Superman: The Movie) so quickly they begin to burn themselves out of existence (Crisis of Infinite Earths). The visuals work quite well, even if the logic of the entire segment seems pretty shaky on multiple levels.
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- Title: The Flash – Elseworlds (Part 2)
- wiki: link
“Elseworlds” continues as Barry (Grant Gustin), Oliver (Stephen Amell), and Kara (Melissa Benoist) head to Gotham City in search of the person responsible for the changes to reality. Who they find is Batwoman (Ruby Rose). As with Part 1, this episode has plenty of Easter Eggs for DC Comics fans including John Wesley Shipp in his classic Flash costume appearing in a vision (not unlike the Flash did in Crisis on Infinite Earths). The episode also cements a couple of points that, up until now, the Arrowverse has been coy about discussing: Batman exists on both Earths, although he’s been absent from the Gotham City of Earth-1 for quite some time.
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- Title: The Flash – Elseworlds (Part 1)
- wiki: link
The CW begins its latest crossover event on The Flash with Part 1 of “Elseworlds” as Barry (Grant Gustin) and Oliver (Stephen Amell) awake to a reality where they have each other’s powers and skills and everyone treats Barry as Oliver and vice-versa. The goofy Freaky Friday set-up provides some humorous moments such as Oliver struggling to deal with the affections of Iris (Candice Patton) and Barry getting some long-waited payback. There are nagging issues here in how quickly both are able to get up to speed, but the episode’s idea that the abilities/skills are inherent to them and just need to be tapped into does the bare minimum to gloss over the plot hole. Also troubling is Team Flash’s reaction to the pair. While throwing them into the pipeline allows for a nice escape sequence, and offering a reason to tie-in appearances from both Supergirl (Melissa Benoist) and Superman (Tyler Hoechlin), you would think that Barry and Oliver (who still have their own knowledge) should have been able to prove who was who simply by talking things through.
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