That was easily the best part of this crossover, seeing the contrast between both shows and both heroes, Flash is the light hearted comic book show that solves problems as cleanly and family friendly as possible. While Arrow is the darker of the series where people die and sometimes you don't win with your hands clean. What makes this work so well is that neither characters have to exaggerate their roles in order for this contrast to be created, Green Arrow (I don't care if the show doesn't call him that yet, i will!) takes his job very seriously and is very professional about his work, as well as being willing to shoot a couple of arrows into the bad guys in order to get what he needs. Flash runs in guns ablazing and will try to find the nicest solution rather than the most efficiant one. What makes it great is that neither is in the wrong, the way Barry works, works for Barry, the way Oliver works, works for Oliver. It was some of the best writing i've ever seen in either shows and i'm very happy with the way this all turned out.
And the way how the other characters interacted with each other almost felt like this was meant to be, they just fit like a glove and despite both shows having some differences in tone, they still work well together and I can see crossovers like this happening again in the near future, hopefully with some more Justice League members like the Atom or Black Canary joining, maybe if we're lucky we'll get some other A list members like Aquaman or Cyborg.
And then there is Captain Boomerang...I honestly didn't think I would have as many posts as I do making fun of this guy, i made a joke about how lame he was in my intial DC Line-Up post, then again in the previous Arrow review and in the Suicide Squad casting and now again here, why does he keep showing up? But, i'll be honest, he was kinda badass here, don't get me wrong, Boomerangs are still the dumbest weapon a villain can think of, and the puns didn't help...but he still looked cool using them. So, yeah it's a weird mixture between Boomerang looking both badass and ridiculous at the same time, i have no idea how they pulled that off.
But the biggest problem with both shows is their lack of subtlety, and how they always have to explain things as clearly as possible to the audience. Like when Diggle's wife (she's not his wife) sorry, not wife, was attacked by Captain Boomerang (Imagine explaining that to the doctor, "she was stabbed by a boomerang!") and in the next scene at the nightclub Cisco has to explain how they thought things were all fun & games. Why do they do this? We know they didn't expect this to happen, you already set it up in a way that they were warned things would be harsher in Starling City and guess what, you were right, you don't need to explain that, your audience can figure it out. The same with the whole Diggle calling his not-wife sweetie, and every time she replies "you only call me sweetie when you want something" and really, you only needed that the once, respect your audience a little more guys. I'll admit the lack of subtlety isn't as bad in this episode as it is in some, but I still want more out of them.
Also Thea & Laurel show up for like a scene...that's it for them I guess. Hell, even Detective Lance (Or Captain Lance, okay that joke is starting to get funny) doesn't have that much to do in the episode, but i did enjoy the little reference when he called Barry, Bart (Ha! I get it!). But still, the Flash cast got a lot more to do in their episode, why did most of Arrow get sidelined?
Overall these were some damn great episodes, and I can't wait to see the next time they crossover, and it's the mid-season finales next week which will hopefully be awesome and i'll review those as well. But as for this episode(s) it has the best writing of the season, the characters have great chemistry together and Captain Boomerang wasn't completley ridiculous.
I'm giving Flash Vs Arrow and The Brave & The Bold a 9/10.
-Danny
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