Today I wanted to talk about a problem I have with the season 8 premiere of Arrow. About the episode itself, I loved it. It was basically a love letter to fans of season 1, and as someone who considers that the best season in the Arrowverse, I got to say this episode succedded in making me miss it. Seeing Malcom Merlyn was good, there were some genually funny moments, and the inclusion of Adrian Chase was fun. The concept of Oliver relieving the events of the pilot and the finale of season 1 was done so well, and I couldn't be happier.
However, I have a big problem with the overall inclusion of the episode in the Arrowverse continuity. You can see that the makers of the episode didn't think about how this episode opens some plot holes in the Arrowverse. Judging the fact that the alternate universe was never called Earth-2, it seems like the writers just wanted to have the alternate Earth being Laurel's home, which is fine considering she played a major role on the show since season 6. But fans who also watched The Flash would realize that this is Earth-2, the same Earth Harry Wells and Jesse Quick came from, the same Earth Zoom came from and tried to conquar, the same Earth that introduced us to the multiverse concept. In that sense, this episode kind of breaks some things that we know about this Earth already.
First, a minor thing: Where is the yellow filter? Didn't we established that in the day Earth-2 is yellow? Where is the yellow? Is it only in Central City? If so, that's pretty weird I would say. There was a similar problem in one episode last season when we saw Earth-2 in a flashback, but here it's much more apperant. That's not really a big deal, but still.
Second, some major stuff: It was mentioned in "Enter Zoom" that Robert Queen is the Hood and a vigilante in Starling City. In that episode that was clearly meant to be a little joke, showing that the opposite from Earth-1 happened on Earth-2: Now Robert survived and became a vigilante while Oliver died at sea. But when you look at this episode, the whole thing doesn't make sense at all. Why is Adrian the Hood now? Why is Moira with Malcolm if Robert is alive? Why does nobody mention Robert? Did he die? Did he left? What is happening?
Third, did Earth-2 get destroyed? If it did, that's also kinda weird. Did they just kill off Harry? And Jesse? And Gypsy? Like it's nothing. This one doesn't really break the episode but it just kinda weird considering major character are on that Earth.
So yeah. I think the writers should watch The Flash first before making the episode. One of the things we like about the Marvel Cinematic Universe is how connected it is, and the reason for that is that Marvel have someone (Kevin Feigi) who have a plan ahead of time for a story and make sure all the movies are connected in a way that makes sense. But this is the first year the Arrowverse has done something like this, and you can clearly see there's no Kevin Feigi there, so the writers of the shows don't work together but instead do their seprate things, which results in episodes like this. This is one of the best premieres, but one huge thing it got wrong is the connection the rest of the continuity.