Crisis On Infinite Earths Featured A Surprise Connection To 2011’s Green Lantern

The penultimate episode of “Crisis on Infinite Earths” featured a shocking crossover with the DCEU, in the form of a cameo from Ezra Miller’s Flash. This is rightly grabbing a lot of the attention, but it’s being overlooked that the finale included another nod to the DC movie that preceded the DCEU: 2011’s much-maligned Green Lantern. 

Following the rebooting of reality, towards the end of “Part 5” Stephen Amell’s Oliver Queen narrates a montage showing us the rebirth of the multiverse. This includes a roll call of various Earths. Apart from a check-in on Brandon Routh’s Superman from Earth-96, these are all the worlds of the DC Universe/HBO Max TV shows past, present and future. For instance, Earth-9 is Titans‘ world, Earth-21 is Doom Patrol, Earth-19 is Swamp Thing (R.I.P!) and most notably, we have Earth-12. This Earth is represented by a shot of Oa, the homeworld of the Green Lantern Corps.

If you’re up to date with DC news, you’ll know that this is a shout-out to the upcoming Green Lantern series headed for HBO Max. With production yet to start on the show, however, the shot is pulled from none other than the 2011 movie. This moment features towards the end of the film, when the various Lanterns congratulate Ryan Reynolds’ Hal Jordan for defeating Parallax. As we don’t see Jordan in this shot though, it’s unclear whether Earth-12 is the world of the movie or this is the show’s Earth and this clip is just being used to represent it.

Of course, they could be one and the same, considering the same creative minds are behind both. Arrowverse architects Greg Berlanti and Marc Guggenheim co-wrote the screenplay for the film and Berlanti will exec produce the HBO Max series. We know that the show will star two Lanterns as well and if Jordan isn’t one of them, it could well take place in the same universe as the 2011 movie – Earth-12.

So,”Crisis on Infinite Earths” might not have delivered the Diggle becoming John Stewart twist that we were all hoping for, but at least we got this surprising connection to a corner of the DC multiverse that’s largely unsung.