This season’s Arrowverse crossover, “Crisis on Earth-X” was the most ambitious yet. Uniting the casts of Supergirl, Arrow, The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow for a four-part extravaganza, it saw Earth invaded by the evil Nazi doppelgangers of the likes of Green Arrow and Supergirl. The crossover also found the time for two weddings and a funeral, as Barry and Iris as well as Oliver and Felicity tied the knot, with Martin Stein tragically meeting his end, too.
With its amazing scope and scale, “Crisis on Earth-X” is just crying out to be edited into a feature-length movie, so it’s no surprise, then, that this was apparently the plan. Sadly, however, complex crediting rules prevented things from going ahead. Arrow exec producer Marc Guggenheim revealed this interesting bit of news on Twitter, in reply to an official Tweet from The CW promoting the crossover being available to stream.
“I tried to get this released as a single, seamless — no act breaks — “movie”, Guggenheim wrote. “Maybe even with new material. What stopped us? Ironically, union rules regarding credit.”
Even if it can’t be viewed as one piece of entertainment, Arrowverse fans can rest assured that “Crisis on Earth-X” still holds its own against big screen superhero movies all the same. For one thing, it no doubt has just as many – if not more – superheroes running around as Marvel’s upcoming Avengers: Infinity War. And its favourable reviews give it a boost over the recent Justice League, which was infamously met with a sharp backlash from both fans and critics.
In fact, right now, we have no idea how the team behind these shows will be able to top the event next season. Stephen Amell has hinted that he believes the scale of the crossover will be pulled back next time as it’s such a nightmare to schedule and so time consuming for all involved, but we’re still curious to see what they come up with.