This week saw the stars of Supergirl, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow and Arrow join forces to fight the Nazis of Earth-X. We’re recapping the four-episode, four-series crossover.
With Barry and Iris’s nuptials only a day away, friends from across Earths and time make plans to arrive in Central City 2017. Oliver and Felicity are part of the wedding party so will, of course, be there. Of the Legends, Sara, Mick, Stein and Jax attend. And Kara, still stinging over Mon-El being married to someone else, brings Alex.
At the rehearsal, Joe gives a lovely speech about how Barry and Iris taught him how to love again. Alex and Sara share some shots before falling into bed together. Meanwhile, Oliver asks Felicity to marry him and Felicity, louder than intended, turns him down because the last time they got engaged, Felicity was shot and paralyzed.
The next day, Barry meets a strangely eager young waitress as he waits for the ceremony to start, and I’m guessing this young woman is Dawn Allen, one of Barry and Iris’s twin children from the DC comics.
Anyway, everyone arrives at the church, and Alex feels incredibly awkward about having a one-night stand, but Kara assures her that she did nothing wrong — plus Sara’s a badass assassin, so she could’ve done worse. Kara sings the song Barry sang when proposing to Iris as Iris walks down the aisle, but the ceremony is interrupted before the vows can be shared when the priest is disintegrated.
The wedding is crashed by Nazis. Kara and Oliver share Mick’s oft-repeated sentiment: “I hate Nazis.”
The combined forces of the Arrowverse beat back the Nazis and even capture a Nazi wearing the Prometheus suit. They place their captive in the S.T.A.R. Labs pipeline, and he reveals himself to be Tommy Merlyn.
The team quickly realizes that this is not an anachronism; these are visitors from Earth-X, a 53rd Earth that shares its history with Earth-1 up until the point that the Nazis won World War II.
Tommy reveals that he and Oliver are best friends on Earth-X as well, but he says that his Earth-1 doppelganger was weak for having died. He then takes a cyanide pill, declaring loyalty to the Reich. It’s a special kind of cruelty for Oliver to have to watch another version of Tommy die.
Oliver doesn’t have long to brood, however, as the Earth-Xers are on the move, so Green Arrow, Flash and Supergirl head out to confront them. It’s here they discover their enemies are Earth-X’s Kara (Overgirl) and Oliver (Dark Arrow) — who are married — and Earth-1’s Eobard Thawne — wearing Wells’s face once more — because time travel.
Rather than linger on this revelation, Oliver pulls a Batman by shooting a Kryptonite arrow at Overgirl, wounding her. To distract the good guys, though, they endanger some local construction workers on a crane and get away with something called the prism.
The brains at S.T.A.R. Labs work on using Overgirl’s blood, which shows extremely high amounts of radiation, from the Kryptonite arrow to track the Earth-Xers down. Meanwhile, Barry is upset about Thawne being back and Oliver is worried about Felicity not wanting to marry him.
The Earth-Xers are eventually tracked to a warehouse, so Green Arrow, Flash, Supergirl, White Canary, Alex and Firestorm head out to fight them. However, this is a distraction as Dark Arrow attacks S.T.A.R. Labs. He makes quick work of Mick, Killer Frost and Team Arrow, who show up to help. (Cisco was concussed from the first fight.)
Back at the warehouse, the Earth-Xers bring out their secret weapon: Metallo. They capture the good guys and reveal the true reason, besides conquering, they’re on Earth-1: Overgirl is dying from radiation exposure, and they plan to take Supergirl’s heart to save her. The prism will be used to create a red sun effect to weaken Supergirl enough to operate on her.
To prevent the remaining heroes from getting in the way, the invaders send Oliver, Sara, Barry, Alex, Jax and Stein to Earth-X, where they find themselves in a concentration camp.
On page 2: The heroes must find their way back to Earth-1
The officer in charge of the camp arrives, and much to Sara’s shock, it’s Quentin Lance’s doppelganger. He admires Sara’s Aryan looks and wonders why she has aligned herself with the “unpure,” so she reveals herself as bisexual. Earth-X Quentin says his own Sara was the same but he removed her from the family line. He then calls for the execution of the heroes as well as another prisoner, Ray (not Palmer).
The execution is interrupted, however, by a familiar face: Leonard Snart (call him Leo). He and Ray are freedom fighters, and they take the heroes back to their base, which is presided over by General Winn Schott, much to Alex’s shock.
With Dark Arrow and Overgirl on Earth-1, General Schott plans to blow up the temporal gateway that leads between the worlds. Alex begs for time to get her friends through the gateway first, but it takes a talk from Ray and Leo (who is warm and kind) to convince him to give them an hour.
As the group sets up a plan using Oliver’s resemblance to the Fuhrer, back on Earth-1, Kara is being weakened to the point that Thawne can remove her heart. Felicity and Iris send an S.O.S. to the Legends, but they can’t open the pipeline to free their friends. Instead, they shut down the lab’s power and free Kara, but they’re stopped from escaping by Metallo. Felicity is forced to reveal how to turn the power back on, and Kara is captive once more.
Back on Earth-X, Oliver and Leo enter the facility housing the gateway, but Quentin is suspicious. So he has Earth-X Felicity brought in for an execution. Oliver, of course, can’t kill his girlfriend’s doppelganger, so he takes down the guards. He arms Felicity and tells her to run.
The good guys head to the gateway facility, but Red Tornado has been deployed to destroy it. Barry and Ray head out to stop the android while the Nazis defend the gateway. Jax and Stein split so Jax can hotwire a power box while Stein pulls the lever to open the gateway. Jax is successful, but Stein is shot as he runs to the lever. Stein manages to pull the lever but is shot again. To keep Stein alive, Jax merges with him and the team heads through the gateway.
Meanwhile, Eobard is unable to cut into Kara because the Atom stops him. The Legends have arrived; they free the prisoners and along with the newly arrived heroes force the Earth-Xers to flee on their own Waverider. However, Stein’s condition continues to deteriorate, and Jax is also affected; their bond is the only thing keeping Stein alive, but it is also killing Jax.
Gideon is unable to heal Stein because of reasons, so Stein tells Jax to give him the serum that will remove their bond. Jax is willing to die, but Stein refuses to allow his surrogate son die. Jax tearfully gives him the serum and holds Stein’s hand as he dies. Sara finds them moments later and is also heartbroken, as Stein had been the one to help her believe in herself.
The Legends are all heartbroken, but they can’t properly grieve until the Earth-Xers are defeated. So, while Jax delivers the tragic news to Stein’s family, the remaining heroes of the Arrowverse go into all-out battle against the Earth-X invaders. For the professor.
Kara takes on Overgirl as Overgirl’s condition reaches critical, and Kara has to fly her into space to keep her from obliterating the continent. Meanwhile, Barry and Eobard fight. Barry gets the upper hand but refuses to kill him. Instead, he lets him go, which is a bad move. Oliver also fights his evil self and kills him after he watches Overgirl die.
After a huge battle, the invaders are defeated.
With the enemy defeated, The Ray returns to Earth-X, though Leo decides to hang around Earth-1 for a bit; he promises his lover that he won’t stay longh. Everyone attends Stein’s funeral and Jax feels guilty, but Clarissa reminds him that he’s part of the family, and everything hurts.
Sara and Alex share a sweet moment before the Legends head back to traveling through time. Kara and Alex return to Earth-38, leaving WestAllen and Olicity behind. When Iris says there’s not going to be a second ceremony — fewer Nazis that way — Oliver and Felicity suggest having Diggle finish their ceremony. Barry brings him from Star City.
Barry and Iris exchange lovely, heartfelt vows. But before Diggle can conclude, Felicity interrupts, proposing to Oliver. He agrees, though they don’t exchange vows since they can’t top Iris and Barry. Diggle happily declares the two couples married, and they kiss.