The Arrowverse’s Next Crossover Will Raise Emotional Stakes

Fans may feel that the alien invasion in last year’s Arrowverse crossover will be hard to top, and they may be right when it comes to pure scale, so the team behind The CW’s DC television shows is taking a different approach.

Rather than simply trying to one-up last year’s “Heroes vs. Aliens” story in terms of physical threat, executive producer Marc Guggenheim says what their plan right is to scale up on emotional consequences instead.

“If we end up doing what we’re talking about doing, it’s going to be pretty cool,” Guggenheim tells Entertainment Weekly. “The crossover is always the most challenging thing we do, but it’s also the most fun. Every year we feel the pressure [to top ourselves]. I feel like each crossover has topped the previous one. Topping last year’s, that’s a high bar, if for no other reason than what do you do that’s bigger than aliens? We’ve got some very, very exciting ideas…. Very early on in the process of doing last year’s crossover, Greg [Berlanti] said there’s probably no way to get bigger than aliens, so the best way to make the [next] crossover especially epic is if you can’t increase the bombast, increase the emotional stakes and the emotional payoffs, so that’s a very oblique comment on where our heads are at for this season.”

The CW’s DC Comics shows will return for the 2017-2018 television season in October. The CW will also be at Comic-Con International: San Diego, where more information about the upcoming season and crossover may be revealed.

With the future of the team left hanging in the balance, Arrow gave new definition to the phrase “blowing up the show.” The emotional showdown between Oliver Queen and Adrian Chase was the perfect conclusion to a stellar fifth season of The CW’s gritty DC Super Hero series. Now, the focus shifts to uncovering the fate of each and every member of Team Arrow. Could anyone have possibly survived an island-wide explosion, or has the book closed on them, as it has on Oliver’s five-year flashback story? Returning to San Diego Comic-Con for a sixth consecutive year, cast members Stephen Amell, David Ramsey, Willa Holland, Emily Bett Rickards, Paul Blackthorne, Katie Cassidy, Echo Kellum, Juliana Harkavy, Rick Gonzalez and producers will be on-hand for an eye-opening conversation about the upcoming season.

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