In Review: Black Lightning: The Book of Resistance: Chapter Four: Earth Crisis

Synopsis: The Pierce family fears for Jennifer’s life.

Review: This episode very cleverly ties the current series arc in with the Crisis event as a means of facilitating Black Lightning’s role in the coming episodes.

The Story

This episode sees Jennifer struggling to choose a side in the current fight between the resistance and the ASA. Having helped the ASA by taking out a Markovian facility and having seen her Father take a stand. She is stuck in the middle.

When the skies of Freeland turn red the Anti-matter energy coming from the red skies interferes with Jennifer’s powers and she collapses and suddenly appears to be phasing in and out of this universe. While a worried Gambi tends to her with Anissa. Jefferson Aka Black Lightning is called up on to help the resistance take out an ASA installation. Jennifer who is seemingly out of this world is seeing glimpses of her lived experiences in two other universes. One in which she is a top ASA asset and the other where she actually goes against the ASA and throws a big spanner in the works.

The episode closes out on a cliffhanger, which will be continued in tonight’s episode of The Flash, which also happens to be the third part of the epic crisis storyline.

The Acting

This series is packed with some of the best acting talents we have seen to date on any CW series. China Anne McClain absolutely hits a grand slam as she portrays three very different versions of Jennifer and manages to find a unique voice for each of them. I loved the contrast between light and dark in terms of the costumes and the two distinct character motives for the Jennifer that goes against the ASA and the one that works for them, but eventually becomes power-hungry and must feed irrespective of who she hurts.

As always the main cast gets brilliant support from the other cast members and the soundtrack to the series still knocks spots off of anything that has been done on the big three superhero shows. In short ‘Black Lightning’ continues to be the most grown-up of the CW’s DC TV Shows.

Overall

I really enjoyed this episode and the clever way in which it ties to the Crisis storyline without compromising any of the great character arcs or the ongoing story with regards to the ASA and the Markovian’s. The cast continues to knock it out the park and the character beats continue to work really well. This sets things up really well for tonight’s episode of ‘The Flash’ in which we will get to see Black Lightning lend a hand in the coming battles against the Anti Monitor.