Hats off to the Marvel and DC TV shows for their impressive mid-season finales. After watching throughout the first half of the fall season, I wasn’t sure if it was even possible for The Flash or Arrow to up the ante, especially after the action packed crossover episodes….but they did. The only problem is leaving us on these crazy cliffhangers only makes the winter break all the more unbearable. Spoiler alerts!
Gotham
Surprises abound in the Gotham mid-season finale. For starters, we got a glimpse into the badassness that is Alfred. We all knew that he was once an intelligence agent, back in his heyday, and apparently those skills never left him as it all came right back to him when it was time to protect his “Master Bruce.” Something tells me, we have only seen the beginning of this side of Alfred and I, for one, can’t wait to see him in action again.
Not as thrilling, yet still entertaining were the developments regarding Detective Gordon’s career and the evolution of Oswald Cobblepot. As we all know from the comics and movies, the city of Gotham just wouldn’t be the same without the likes of our favorite prison for the criminally insane. So, there was no real surprise when Arkham Asylum was introduced early on in the first season of Gotham. Although, we’ll have to wait until early next year to spend some real time in the facility thanks to Gordon’s demotion to essentially a prison guard.
Cobblepot, on the other hand, couldn’t be doing better. After initially being on the bottom of the totem pole in the beginning of the season, he eventually wormed his way up to nearly the top, with the likes of the big crime boss Carmine Falcone. By the mid-season finale, this budding criminal mastermind was well on his way to tainting his former boss’ reputation with her superior and happened to learn a thing or two about intimidation and manipulation. The Penguin has arrived!
Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Season 2 was off to a mighty good start thanks in part to a brilliant season 1 finale. With compelling stories lines about Skye’s parents and Coulson’s mysterious writings from memory, for example, things were looking up for the second season.
Going into the mid-season finale, tension was building among the agents as they geared up to locate the city based on the map that Agent Coulson kept drawing. There was also anticipation for the big reveal about what exactly the obelisk was and why were some people able to touch it, versus others. Not to mention, Skye’s connection. Lucky for us, the writers don’t tease for very long as we got all the necessary answers we were looking for and then some. As it turns out, Skye is a superhero and the inhuman- which we know from the Marvel comic book universe- exist and will be brought into the fold of the show. The only problem now is waiting until next year to see how all of this will play out.
The Flash
From the very first episode when we were first introduced to the “fastest man alive,” we knew that there was a Flash doppelganger. And, if you read my two cents back when it premiered, I suspected that it was Dr. Harrison Wells, the brains behind Central City’s S.T.A.R. Labs Particle Accelerator.
Fast forward to the mid-season finale, and quite a few things have changed since we first met Barry Allen. He is much more confident as The Flash- coining the term himself- and has taken down a few meta humans in the process. He was even so bold as to go toe-to-toe with his mentor, in the fantastic Flash vs. Arrow crossover episode just one week prior to the mid-season finale; talk about character growth and an over exuberance of confidence.
Unfortunately, much of that confidence disappeared when his true nemesis, The Reverse-Flash came back to torture him in the mid-season finale. I like the show a lot, but I have to say, it was nice to see The Flash face defeat at the hands of The Reverse-Flash; at least for now. It will make the show all the better, when he does triumph. However, I’m still a bit confused on how (and why) would Dr. Wells go through all the trouble to kick his own butt- so brutally, I might add? Ouch, such extremes for a fake out! Unless, of course, someone else is The Reverse-Flash, like Detective Eddie Thawne. I can’t wait for some answers next year.
Arrow
After two seasons, Arrow is showing no signs of a slowdown, which is great for fans of the show, like me. The third season got off a somber start with the death of Sara Lance, the first Black Canary –according to the writers on Arrow. There were also some other changes, notably Arrow was embraced by Starling City (soon to be Star City), Diggle and his ex-wife/girlfriend had a baby, Roy became the Arsenal, Officer Lance became the Captain of the Starling Police, Laurel has the makings of a vigilante and Felicity and Oliver went on a date. That was a lot, and that was all before the mid-season finale.
On Wednesday night, Arrow delivered one of the best mid-season finales yet. We learned the shocker that Thea was the one that killed Sara, at the nudging of Malcolm Merlin (Thea’s biological father). You see, Merlin being the great father that he is (sarcasm), used his daughter to kill one of Ra’s al Ghul’s league members (Sara) because he knew that Oliver would eventually protect his sister and face off with Ra’s al Ghul on her behalf. In doing so, Merlin would eliminate the threat that Ra’s al Ghul posed to himself and eliminate Oliver at the same time, which Merlin was counting on; clever but maniacal.
When the confrontation between the Arrow and Ra’s al Ghul actually happened, Oliver met a surprisingly early demise. That’s right, Oliver died! The only thing that comes close in shock value was the fact that he admitted to Felicity that he loved her. Obviously, his death won’t stick, I mean after all he is the Arrow and there is no point to a show without him; but man it sure was dramatic to watch.