As the anti-matter wave builds, Jen has a long dark night of the soul.

This is an odd episode to review as, thanks to the weirdly obfuscated nature of whether Black Lightning will show up on Netflix this year, it’s the first episode of the year I’ve seen. Plus, it’s not actually focused on Crisis at all. Rather this is a universe’s eye view of the end of everything, focused through Jen. That’s definitely good news as China Anne McClain is consistently one of the strongest performers on the show.

Here we get to see three different riffs on Jen (Earth 1) fought against the ASA invasion of Freeland this season and stripped everyone of their metapowers by infecting the water supply. Agent Odell was so disgusted by this he imprisoned her and executed her father.

Jinn (Earth 2) ended the Markovian conflict by murdering a whole lot of people, including her entire family. Along with Jen, the two versions spend the episode bickering over the best course of action, as Jen’s body begins to break down due to a side effect of the Crisis.

This is essentially a morality play built like an episode and it’s a pretty fun one. McClain clearly loves the part and plays all three with justifiable and interesting differences. She also neatly plays the realization Core Jen has that, far from being the family outcast, she’s actually a pretty well put together human. What relevance that has to the Crisis, who knows? Her entire universe is wiped out a few seconds after she makes that realization. But, given the whole other half of the season is still to come I’m guessing we’ll be back in Freeland soon.

Verdict: Not essential for Crisis viewers but fun nonetheless, this is a smart episode of a smart show. I just wish we could see the rest of it in the UK too. Oh and yes I did check, this episode does explicitly confirm all these characters and the ASA exist on Earth-1. Where perhaps they may be staying… 8/10

Alasdair Stuart