Legends of Tomorrow: Séance and Sensibility
April 15, 2019 6:43 PM - Season 4, Episode 11 - Subscribe

When Mona discovers that her favorite author, Jane Austen, might be at the epicenter of a magical alert, Mona, Sara, Charlie and Zari find themselves in 1809. With Nate still dealing with family issues, Constantine and Rory perform a séance and receive a message from the other world that rocks Constantine to his core. Meanwhile, Ray and Nora are forced into close quarters.
posted by oh yeah! (12 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
This show is a joy. I love that I never know what to expect from an episode. It's bonkers in the best possible way.
posted by heathrowga at 7:15 AM on April 16, 2019 [5 favorites]


Yeah, that was completely insane, but I loved it. Heh.
posted by mordax at 6:09 PM on April 16, 2019 [1 favorite]


Damn, that was a jam-packed, roller coaster of unexpected craziness--which is exactly what I hope for with each new episode.

Rather than talking about the big important themes or plots or character developments, I'm just going to list off a bunch of the little things that struck me.

First, Haircut's locks are getting a bit long. He needs a trim.

Second, even though I've not been a fan of Mona becoming a permanent part of the team, the four girls together talking love and relationships was a great dynamic, Bechdel-test pass or not.

Sara looked killer in that black suit (and mock neck?). Sadly, I could never pull that off in a million years, no matter how much I tried, and I have tried.

Zari telling Nate not to fake break-up to spare his mom extra stress was so sweet.

Mick and his napkin and his advice to Nate were all attention grabbers, but the poor guy really has been given so little to do over these past few episodes. While it great to see the girls go on a mission together, it would have been a riot to have Mick sit down with Jane to discuss romance writing techniques and philosophies.

When Sanjay the love god blew the magic gold love dust up into the ventilation system, I thought he was trying to work his magic on Gideon to get her to fall in love with him and release him from captivity. (Which I'll admit, I still kind of want to see, even though the dream sequences were fun.)

Poor Ray tried so hard to be a gentleman, fleeing from the simple touch of Nora's finger. Speaking of Ray and Nora, I guess neither of the actors who portray those characters can sing (base on the way they were incorporated into the musical number). Still, it's nice they were included.

Zari looked absolutely gorgeous during that Bollywood number, especially with that maangtika (I hope that's the correct name for the piece).

I swear this show was just trying to push some of those "dare to defy" inclusion buttons tonight, but especially with the Hindu man and Muslim woman getting married by a Christian preacher line and non-traditional declarations of love at the first wedding (although I thought naming the object of the bride's affections Ellen was hitting things a little too obviously and bluntly on the nose).

Hayworld! It turns out Hank isn't a bad guy after all. He only wanted to make small children happy (I'm sure nobody here would have ever guessed that as his motivation). As Nate said, that pretty much grants him honorary (if posthumous) Legend status.

Poor John, constantly plagued by his inner demons and lack of of self-worth (not to mention literal demons).

I hope the rest of the season gives us more like this episode.
posted by sardonyx at 9:28 PM on April 16, 2019 [4 favorites]


Oh, I forgot Haircut and Pretty: time bros (still) in love. Awww.
posted by sardonyx at 9:32 PM on April 16, 2019 [2 favorites]


From LoT Twitter: behind the scenes music video from Caity Lotz and a kissing discussion between Brandon Routh and Nick Zano.
posted by sardonyx at 10:00 PM on April 16, 2019 [3 favorites]


it would have been a riot to have Mick sit down with Jane to discuss romance writing techniques and philosophies.

I'm kind of horrified picturing that, actually...

I love how every Legends episode is like they have three or four different Wheels of Random and they throw darts or spin the wheels or something and then are all, "now we gotta figure out a way to put these together into a coherent plot." And they DO IT. EVERY WEEK. And it WORKS.

Bollywood was a delight. Charlie ("70's Punk Dirtbag") was a delight, as per that Den of Geek link. Mona (when not wolfed out--the actress playing Wolfie has zero resemblance to her and it is so distracting) and the rest having boy talk was a delight. Heywood! made me crack up. Ray and Nora acting out a romance novel cover? Bwah.

The one issue I have with this really is that frankly, I don't think Zari and Nate have had much in the way of sexual chemistry. I'm not against them dating but I don't really care if they do either. Zari had loads more chemistry with the love god and being forced to compare that to Nate made me think, "throw out Nate, this guy is hotter with you." Ditto Jonah Hex. I swear, the puppets have more sexual chemistry in this photo.

But overall, I really enjoyed Zari's journey and especially her and Mona resolving to try again. That was beautiful and poignant and fitting and I just love Zari, she's the best. Zari-focused episodes are SUPER good.

TV Club review.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:05 PM on April 17, 2019 [3 favorites]


Zari and Hex did seem to have a spark, didn't they?

The one rationale I read somewhere else isn't so much that Nate and Zari have fabulous sexual chemistry but they like and trust each other, and that the foundation of their relationship was in the hedgehog day episode, where Nate was always the one to believe and help Zari whenever she said she was in a time loop. Looked at with that lens, I can kind of see how an appreciation could grow between the characters. Additionally, Nate represents the type of order and stability (well-educated, upper-middle-class united family upbringing) that was pretty foreign to Zari in her own time period, that she might be subconsciously attracted to in that opposites-attract kind of way.
posted by sardonyx at 9:03 PM on April 17, 2019 [3 favorites]


well that was an amazing episode! I want more musical numbers!

So Neron was really helping Hank train magical creatures for Heyworld! and used them however he wanted in his own time? That's hilarious.
posted by numaner at 12:41 PM on April 19, 2019


As someone who doesn't care for Jane Austen, Bollywood musicals, the character of Mona, or the storylines about Nate's dad and the various bureaucratic things going on inside the Time Bureau, this episode was practically the pinnacle of "not for me."

And how many episodes has it been since Ray even put on the Atom suit? They've been playing up the comedic aspects of the character so much that it's like they've forgotten he's supposed to be both a tech genius and a fairly powerful superhero.

I'll stick it out for the rest of the season, but have a feeling I won't be watching beyond that.
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 2:15 AM on April 20, 2019


That is the biggest flaw of the show at the moment, and it's one of the reasons I'm against Mona becoming a regular. Her transformation into Wolfie are terrible, and I'd much rather the F/X budget be spent on Ray's Atom or Nate's Steel (who has even less screen time than Atom, who at least had an appearance in the Charlie episode).

I think I've said this before, but despite being a life-long comic reader, I seem to forget that this Ray is supposed to be Ray Palmer. Between the completely different personality and the almost total lack of shrinking, and knock-off Iron Man suit (when we actually get to see a suit) somehow my mind has just registered the character as "Ray, a goofy, nice-guy" (at least they moved away from Arrow's icky stalker-Ray characterization). At one point, when I was thinking about which characters could be added to the team, the thought actually crossed my mind that The Atom would useful--that's how much not-Atom Ray has turned into.

The show has these characters with all kinds of abilities and we're not seeing them. On the Arrow thread, I mentioned how nice it was to watch Sara in action again, suited up as the White Canary, which is something we rarely see these day. (Arrow even pulled the mechanical canary cry Cisco made for Sara out of the mothballs, and then promptly handed it off to a different character, so it never has to be seen or heard or used on Legends ever again.) Even Mick barely gets to roast anything anymore.

I realize it's hard to balance so many characters with so many story lines and make them all fit into a time travelling, magic-seeking adventure show that's apparently done on a budget. While I've come to enjoy the tone and flavour of this show, it's definitely a long distance from where it started. I don't know if it's possible, but it would be nice to see them blend some of the older superhero aspects of the show into the current mix.
posted by sardonyx at 8:23 AM on April 20, 2019 [1 favorite]


I sort of have the opposite opinion: if the plot doesn't NEED anyone to superpower out, it seems to have been working fine for me. Like they seem to be doing more mental challenges/disguise/Constantine magic-stuff of late and the show still is working for me and I haven't even thought about it much. You don't always need heat/steel/shrinky guy for every plot.

I concur that I don't really get why Mona and wolfing out powers happened and are here, but otherwise it still works for me. Save the powers for the big battle with demon-dude at the end, right?
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:35 PM on April 20, 2019 [1 favorite]


I liked the emotional ground they covered, and the performances of course, but the Bollywood number was pretty weak (it totally whiffed the choreography, cinematography and editing) and the song sounded like a Disney princess song, not a Bollywood song) and the Jane Austen plot had no depth at all. There were too many threads, and I feel like most of them were pretty half-assed.
posted by under_petticoat_rule at 12:45 AM on May 5, 2019


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