Did The Flash Almost Set Up Crisis On Infinite Earths With Ben Affleck's Batman?
"The Flash" has become something of an infamous film since its release in June 2023, mired in controversy thanks to the legal allegations against star Ezra Miller and saddled with a multitude of CGI "cameos" from across the multiverse. It has four different Batmen, or at least four different Bruce Waynes (Ben Affleck, Michael Keaton, George Clooney, and a CGI recreation of Adam West's 1966 TV Batman). A recently released pair of images posted by @FlashFilmNews on Twitter shows an additional scene featuring the one played by Affleck, wearing a similar Batsuit to the one he's seen wearing in the opening sequence of "The Flash."
In the original post-credits scene, Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) is contacted from another point of the multiverse by Bruce Wayne (Affleck) via some sort of interdimensional communication device. The images seem to show how this scene was filmed and confirm pre-release rumors that "The Flash" was initially intended to set up a movie based on "Crisis on Infinite Earths," the classic DC Comics storyline that served as a multiverse-spanning crossover and consolidated the DC Universe into a less disjointed narrative timeline. The Hollywood Reporter noted in June that former DC Films chief Walter Hamada planned a sequel to "The Flash" that would eventually produce a "Crisis on Infinite Earths" big screen rendition.
Now, we may never see a Crisis on Infinite Earths big screen movie
The THR report outlines how Walter Hamada intended "The Flash" to serve as a quasi-reboot for the DC Extended Universe, pulling in the various strands of DC Comics properties over the last several decades. This would establish them as part of a massive multiverse, similar to the Earths of the DC Universe. And it still could function that way, although the lackluster reception toward "The Flash" makes that unlikely.
As a result, Hamada's ambition for a big-screen version of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" might never pan out. This is really too bad for anyone who was hoping to see the terrifying visage of the Anti-Monitor blown up to IMAX proportions.
The original ending of "The Flash" was changed amid creative shake-ups at Warner Bros. during the film's infamously troubled production. However, the multiversal concept wasn't abandoned — just reformulated. Theoretically, a "Crisis on Infinite Earths" movie could still happen. But with the future of the DC cinematic universe still in flux, these images from the post-credits "Flash" sequence that never was offer a glimpse at a portion of the multiverse we don't get to experience in full.
Though with an animated "Crisis on Infinite Earths" movie reportedly coming in 2024, fans have at least one multiverse-spanning "Crisis" to look forward to.