When The CW's Arrowverse begins its new season in the fall, there are several new big changes to the franchise that will carry over into 2022.
The Arrowverse will look significantly different when it enters its 2021-2022 TV season on The CW, starting this fall. It has been an incredibly challenging year for The CW's Justice League-esque franchise, due to the global pandemic affecting production in every aspect. For the first time in the Arrowverse's history, none of the DC dramas had a standard 22-episode order. The Flash season 7 and Batwoman season 2 are the only ones to have 18 episodes, while the rest have 15 or fewer. Those are only a couple of the changes the pandemic caused.
This is also the first season where there hasn't been a major Arrowverse crossover after Crisis on Infinite Earths. While there were plans for a Superman & Lois and Batwoman two-parter, it naturally got scrapped due to the risks of spreading the virus. Despite the challenging limitations of the pandemic, The CW has already renewed their superhero slate for next season. Luckily, things are slowly starting to return to normal through vaccination and continuous health guidelines protocols that make production flow on unless someone tests positive on the crew.
Nevertheless, the Arrowverse is in for some major changes as the shows come back next season. While a few of them are close to reaching the end of their current seasons, some of the Arrowverse shows just premiered their new seasons. For shows like Stargirl, they have not even debuted their sophomore season, which is scheduled to premiere on August 10. More information is bound to come out as the year goes along, especially at DC FanDome 2021, which occurs in October. But here is what is known so far about Arrowverse's 2021-2022 TV season.
While the Arrowverse lost Arrow in 2020, The CW will have two fewer superhero shows next season. Announced in September 2020, The CW and Warner Bros. TV revealed that the upcoming sixth season of Supergirl would be its last one, with a 20-episode order. However, in a surprise move, The CW revealed later Black Lightning season 4 would be its final one as well, making this the first year The CW sees two Arrowverse shows end in the same season. Black Lightning aired its series finale on May 24, seeing Jefferson Pierce take on Tobias Whale once and for all. Supergirl season 6 will return for its remaining episodes in August as well and end its run sometime in the fall.
Like every network, The CW makes new schedules for every upcoming TV season, as old shows end and new ones get picked up. Even though the Upfronts have been taking place virtually since last year, it has not prevented the networks from unveiling their new programming late. In The CW's case, they are changing a few things that relate to the Arrowverse brand. While The Flash season 8 will continue to air on Tuesdays at 8 PM, it will now be followed by Riverdale season 6 at 9 PM. For Legends of Tomorrow season 7 and Batwoman season 3, The CW is continuing the pair-up, but with a day change. As of this fall, they will be airing back-to-back on Wednesdays, hence Riverdale's move to Tuesdays. Despite Superman & Lois season 2 being a go, The CW is slating it for midseason while Stargirl season 3 is probably back for summer 2022.
If there is one Arrowverse tradition that has been steady for the last few years, it is the annual addition of a new DC TV drama. While Black Lightning season 4 was trying to get a Painkiller spinoff series off the ground, The CW ultimately passed a few months after the backdoor pilot aired. Despite Painkiller being scrapped, The CW's DC TV slate is expanding with the addition of Ava DuVernary's Naomi, starring Kaci Walfall as the titular Multiverse heroine. Based on Brian Michael Bendis, David Walker, and Jamal Campbell's creation, the show follows Naomi, a teenager who begins to investigate the weird and unexplained after her small hometown is affected by a supernatural event. This journey will, according to The CW logline, "challenge everything we believe about our heroes." Similar to Superman & Lois season 2, Naomi season 1 is slated for a midseason debut.
As the Arrowverse shows get further into their respective runs, there are bound to be cast members who will exit the franchise as series regulars. With the loss of Supergirl and Black Lightning, a few long-time Arrowverse players are set to leave their shows after this season. After having played Cisco Ramon, a.k.a. Vibe/Mecha-Vibe since 2014, The Flash season 7 will see Carlos Valdes exit the DC drama. Originally meant to leave after The Flash season 6, Tom Cavanagh is also exiting, after portraying Reverse-Flash and a multitude of Harrison Wells since The Flash season 1. Another Flash-related player who is leaving the Arrowverse, at least as a full-time cast member, is Legends of Tomorrow's Dominic Purcell, who has played Heatwave since 2015. Whether or not more Arrowverse exits are coming remains to be seen.
When The Flash season 8 kicks off this fall, the speedster-centric drama will open up very differently from the past few seasons. The CW president Mark Pedowitz announced at the network's Upfront day The Flash season 8 will start with a 5-episode event, featuring Arrowverse heroes from the other shows. Pedowitz described it will "not quite be a crossover, but it will have a crossover-type feel with the introduction of all these characters," referring to the rest of the Arrowverse. One of them could potentially be Black Lightning's Cress Williams, who revealed The Flash's creative team had reached out to him during the shooting of his final season. While nothing has been set in stone, Williams spoke highly about the prospect of Jefferson uniting with Barry Allen for a few episodes, especially after Crisis on Infinite Earths.
It only took the Arrowverse roughly a decade to do it, but The CW is staging a Christmas Special based on the Legends of Tomorrow fan-favorite toy, Beebo. The 1-hour special, titled Beebo Saves Christmas, follows our titular hero trying to stop the "efficiency-obsessed" elf Sprinkles, who has decided to get rid of Santa Claus to make the North Pole more productive. Together with his friends, Beebo discovers the true meaning of Christmas while also going up against Sprinkles. Beebo Saves Christmas will star Ben Diskin as Beebo, Yvette Nicole Brown as Turbo, Kimiko Glenn as Tweebo, Keith Ferguson as Fleabo, Chris Kattan as Sprinkles, and Ernie Hudson (who played John Diggle's stepfather on Arrow) as Santa. Legends of Tomorrow veteran Victor Garber is returning for the Arrowverse's animated Christmas Special as the narrator.
Despite what The Flash season 8 is doing with its 5-episode event, it still begs the question of whether or not next season will have a major Arrowverse crossover again. Crisis on Infinite Earths was, by far, The CW's most ambitious, expensive, and production-challenging multi-show event they have ever had. Even though there were and are plans for crossovers down the line, the Arrowverse creative team is seemingly holding off with any Crisis-sized event for the time being. The CW has so far not indicated that next season will have a big crossover, which makes sense due to the pandemic.
While things are slowly getting better, things are likely at least another year away from production being entirely safe to host a massive production like Crisis on Infinite Earths. But from a creative standpoint, the shows are probably holding off from doing major DC crossovers until they find the right story. Crisis on Infinite Earths was something they built up to through several seasons. Currently, there is no red thread running through the shows in the Arrowverse's new era. The worst thing the franchise could do is set up a major crossover with a rushed arc that will only hurt the shows.
Until they find the proper Crisis-like story arc to build up to, it is better for the Arrowverse to do smaller and more frequent crossovers. Having someone like Jefferson Pierce visit Central City in The Flash season 8 right after the end of Black Lightning season 4 is more accessible and more practical in the long run. It would allow the creative teams also to establish more intimate relationships across the Arrowverse instead of having 20 superheroes in one room for the sake of doing a mega-crossover. As we get further into 2021, more Arrowverse details will definitely start to come out as The CW gets into its next season.
