Legends of Tomorrow: Out of Time
October 13, 2016 6:23 PM - Season 2, Episode 1 - Subscribe
Season 2 begins with historian Dr. Nate Heywood seeking out Oliver Queen for help to find the scattered Legends. Once reunited, they try to protect Albert Einstein from being kidnapped before the Nazis destroy New York City with a nuclear bomb.
My thoughts:
-This was actually a lot more fun than I expected. If they can maintain this I might be persuaded to turn off my brain and stop worrying about plot holes and/or rules of time travel.
-1 episode in and they're already toeing the line of overusing the "Sara Lance is irresistible to all women everywhere" gag.
-Bringing back a "greatest hits" of Flash and Arrow villains is not a bad choice. Plus Neal McDonough does such a great job with, and has so much fun with, Damien Dahrk, that it can't possibly *not* help this show. And an Evil Speedster is a good, challenging time-traveling opponent that is already well-established in-universe. Even if those of us who watch the Flash are maybe getting a bit sick of Evil Speedsters as villains.
-I didn't miss the Hawks or Vandal Savage even a teensy bit.
-I'm not sure how long Rip is gonna be gone for, but his sort of world-weary-James-Bond-watching-the-kids-run-amok schtick that he was doing at the Einstein Symposium worked a lot better for me than his mopey/angsty control freak of last season. So if they keep him around/bring him back I hope he'll keep it dialed back a bit.
-The biggest issue with this show last season was the idiot ball. Relatively little of it, this episode (they substituted hand-wavey time travel rules instead) and the brief bit where Sara carried it she got called out hard by Ray. I'd much rather have them BS about "oh it has to be this way, because [made up time travel reasons]" than have them all just being dumbasses, so I hope they keep it up.
posted by mstokes650 at 8:55 PM on October 13, 2016 [1 favorite]
-This was actually a lot more fun than I expected. If they can maintain this I might be persuaded to turn off my brain and stop worrying about plot holes and/or rules of time travel.
-1 episode in and they're already toeing the line of overusing the "Sara Lance is irresistible to all women everywhere" gag.
-Bringing back a "greatest hits" of Flash and Arrow villains is not a bad choice. Plus Neal McDonough does such a great job with, and has so much fun with, Damien Dahrk, that it can't possibly *not* help this show. And an Evil Speedster is a good, challenging time-traveling opponent that is already well-established in-universe. Even if those of us who watch the Flash are maybe getting a bit sick of Evil Speedsters as villains.
-I didn't miss the Hawks or Vandal Savage even a teensy bit.
-I'm not sure how long Rip is gonna be gone for, but his sort of world-weary-James-Bond-watching-the-kids-run-amok schtick that he was doing at the Einstein Symposium worked a lot better for me than his mopey/angsty control freak of last season. So if they keep him around/bring him back I hope he'll keep it dialed back a bit.
-The biggest issue with this show last season was the idiot ball. Relatively little of it, this episode (they substituted hand-wavey time travel rules instead) and the brief bit where Sara carried it she got called out hard by Ray. I'd much rather have them BS about "oh it has to be this way, because [made up time travel reasons]" than have them all just being dumbasses, so I hope they keep it up.
posted by mstokes650 at 8:55 PM on October 13, 2016 [1 favorite]
Well there were more staff members shown working at Star City Hall in the opening scene than there have been in the entire season of Arrow so far. And they actually used hallways. They didn't just move from room to room. (Sorry, the logistics and geography and staffing issues on Arrow are bugging me at the moment.)
Did they change the order of the credits? I don't think Victor Garber was first before and Caity Lotz was so far down the list. Maybe this has to do with the lack of Rip (at least for a little while).
I thought it was a bit of a cheat that they're discussing Hourman's warning without us having seen it. At first I thought I missed something or forgot something that happened last season.
I wasn't really fond of Damien Dahrk on Arrow, even though I like McDonough, but I suspect he'll work better on this show. What I do want is the Reverse Flash to somehow tie together all of the time travel dos and don't (Time Wraiths, etc.) that exist between Flash and Legends, but I suspect that won't happen. It would just be nice to know there was some consistency in this universe.
Maybe time traveling, interfering with Einstein's "moves" and changing history has resulted in us getting Trump now. I mean there must be something aligning in the universe to give us this episode now.
Overall, it was fine for a season two start, and I'm back on board. I was contemplating dropping the show after last season, but I thought I'd give it a chance because of the promised crossovers. At least now I'm willingly watching it as opposed to obligation watching.
posted by sardonyx at 2:13 PM on October 14, 2016
Did they change the order of the credits? I don't think Victor Garber was first before and Caity Lotz was so far down the list. Maybe this has to do with the lack of Rip (at least for a little while).
I thought it was a bit of a cheat that they're discussing Hourman's warning without us having seen it. At first I thought I missed something or forgot something that happened last season.
I wasn't really fond of Damien Dahrk on Arrow, even though I like McDonough, but I suspect he'll work better on this show. What I do want is the Reverse Flash to somehow tie together all of the time travel dos and don't (Time Wraiths, etc.) that exist between Flash and Legends, but I suspect that won't happen. It would just be nice to know there was some consistency in this universe.
Maybe time traveling, interfering with Einstein's "moves" and changing history has resulted in us getting Trump now. I mean there must be something aligning in the universe to give us this episode now.
Overall, it was fine for a season two start, and I'm back on board. I was contemplating dropping the show after last season, but I thought I'd give it a chance because of the promised crossovers. At least now I'm willingly watching it as opposed to obligation watching.
posted by sardonyx at 2:13 PM on October 14, 2016
i thought it had its slow moments, but overall a good start to a second season. it was fast paced and it was a pleasure to have no mention of hawk people and no mention of savage. Would have been better with captain cold but i like the arson guy running the show and like that sara got some more lines with a smaller cast in play.
posted by about_time at 6:23 PM on October 14, 2016
posted by about_time at 6:23 PM on October 14, 2016
Oh and how is it that the ship survived but Rip didn't? I mean given that the ship did survive, Rip's judgement is incredibly bad to scatter everyone. And why would stasis protect arson guy from a ship that didn't survive? these plot holes are among the things that annoy me about this show sometimes.
posted by about_time at 6:31 PM on October 14, 2016
posted by about_time at 6:31 PM on October 14, 2016
Oh and how is it that the ship survived but
I'm still shaking my head over the nuclear aspect. Like, they just Chernobyl-ed the Eastern seaboard; is the Berlanti writing staff under the mistaken impression that an atomic bomb just makes an impressively large boom? At least with this one they could have technobabbled something about the Waverider having the capability of absorbing/containing the radiation, and choosing to set the ship on an intercept course in order to save NYC and the rest of the East Coast.
posted by oh yeah! at 7:58 PM on October 14, 2016 [1 favorite]
I'm still shaking my head over the nuclear aspect. Like, they just Chernobyl-ed the Eastern seaboard; is the Berlanti writing staff under the mistaken impression that an atomic bomb just makes an impressively large boom? At least with this one they could have technobabbled something about the Waverider having the capability of absorbing/containing the radiation, and choosing to set the ship on an intercept course in order to save NYC and the rest of the East Coast.
posted by oh yeah! at 7:58 PM on October 14, 2016 [1 favorite]
the nuclear aspect
the atomic aspect. :)
posted by about_time at 8:13 AM on October 15, 2016 [4 favorites]
the atomic aspect. :)
posted by about_time at 8:13 AM on October 15, 2016 [4 favorites]
is the Berlanti writing staff under the mistaken impression that an atomic bomb just makes an impressively large boom?
Judging from Arrow, where Felicity dropped an ICBM on a small town and there's been relatively little fallout from that (no pun intended!), yeah, that seems to be about right.
posted by mstokes650 at 2:05 PM on October 15, 2016
Judging from Arrow, where Felicity dropped an ICBM on a small town and there's been relatively little fallout from that (no pun intended!), yeah, that seems to be about right.
posted by mstokes650 at 2:05 PM on October 15, 2016
~is the Berlanti writing staff under the mistaken impression that an atomic bomb just makes an impressively large boom?
~Judging from Arrow, where Felicity dropped an ICBM on a small town and there's been relatively little fallout from that (no pun intended!), yeah, that seems to be about right.
Perhaps they're just getting a head start on acclimating everyone to a Trump administration?
posted by Thorzdad at 3:40 PM on October 15, 2016
~Judging from Arrow, where Felicity dropped an ICBM on a small town and there's been relatively little fallout from that (no pun intended!), yeah, that seems to be about right.
Perhaps they're just getting a head start on acclimating everyone to a Trump administration?
posted by Thorzdad at 3:40 PM on October 15, 2016
Well, that was already better from a lack of Savage and Carter. The Legends as a replacement Time Council or whatever is a better idea already. Plus, nice use of Oliver (and a fancier set?!) and introducing a new time detective guy. I would have preferred it be a girl, though, as most of this team is quite a sausagefest. The only reason I missed Kendra is a lack of girl power. I am curious as to who they will bring on now, though. If anyone.
I had not heard that Darvill was getting any kind of boot on this show, but since his character was unpleasant to say the least...on that level he would not be missed, even if it doesn't make sense to have the time travel guy abandon ship. I was missing the shit out of Captain Cold, though. I'm not really into watching his buddy without him.
I wasn't impressed by the one episode of Timeless I caught, but it did make me remember "oh yeah, this show does have a black person on it, how well has that been going in the past?" Also, how is your iPhone still charged?
I guess it's now a running gag that Sara turns every woman in history towards the bi side, but her "warming up" the Queen was making my eyes roll. I bet we get to watch her de-virginize Queen Elizabeth I sometime too.
The use of Einstein, especially between the professor's constant quoting and Einstein calling him stupid, was just painful.
Overall: show still kinda middling, but better than last year now that the more irritating characters are gone. And Damian's a suitable villain that we know can pull off villainy without annoying the crap out of the audience.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:12 PM on October 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
I had not heard that Darvill was getting any kind of boot on this show, but since his character was unpleasant to say the least...on that level he would not be missed, even if it doesn't make sense to have the time travel guy abandon ship. I was missing the shit out of Captain Cold, though. I'm not really into watching his buddy without him.
I wasn't impressed by the one episode of Timeless I caught, but it did make me remember "oh yeah, this show does have a black person on it, how well has that been going in the past?" Also, how is your iPhone still charged?
I guess it's now a running gag that Sara turns every woman in history towards the bi side, but her "warming up" the Queen was making my eyes roll. I bet we get to watch her de-virginize Queen Elizabeth I sometime too.
The use of Einstein, especially between the professor's constant quoting and Einstein calling him stupid, was just painful.
Overall: show still kinda middling, but better than last year now that the more irritating characters are gone. And Damian's a suitable villain that we know can pull off villainy without annoying the crap out of the audience.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:12 PM on October 15, 2016 [1 favorite]
Yeah, Savage and the Hawks were some of the worst aspects of last season, all wrapped up in a really really dull knot. My only concern with using Damien Dahrk in this season is we _just saw_ how hard it was to kill him in 2016 in the last season of Arrow, and now you're suggesting that Sara is going to do what Ollie and the Team could only just, at great loss, do last year?
Yeah. OK. I guess?
At least the professor and the football champ are sniping less often at each other, that was annoying. I get it, they are two different people with two different drives, but all last season it was the pair of 'em passing the stupid ball back and forth. And yes, they're so important to the story that they don't have names in my mind yet. Honestly, only Sara and Palmer do because of Team Arrow, the rest of them are known by their powers. This is a failing of some sort.
Still, I could see being interested in this after a godawful first season, and the JLA showing up at the end was amusing.
posted by Kyol at 11:47 AM on October 17, 2016
Yeah. OK. I guess?
At least the professor and the football champ are sniping less often at each other, that was annoying. I get it, they are two different people with two different drives, but all last season it was the pair of 'em passing the stupid ball back and forth. And yes, they're so important to the story that they don't have names in my mind yet. Honestly, only Sara and Palmer do because of Team Arrow, the rest of them are known by their powers. This is a failing of some sort.
Still, I could see being interested in this after a godawful first season, and the JLA showing up at the end was amusing.
posted by Kyol at 11:47 AM on October 17, 2016
My forever love for Mick Rory, with his total disdain for both the nerd parties and for doing anything but getting increasingly drunk over the course of the episode. Yes, Oliver, you should definitely set him loose with the keys to a time machine, this will be the best DUI ever.
Not enough Snart in this episode. I don't care that he's dead. New guy is cute but he'd better work fast to differentiate himself from Ray as the resident enthusiastic clueless nerd hero with an odd Mick bromance.
I love to watch the frayed threads of Mayor NIMBY Oliver's patience wear ever more thin in the crossover episodes. "Not within Starling City limits? NOT MY PROBLEM!" He is thisclose to yelling at these upstart super whippersnappers to get off his lawn. My fervent hope for the Supergirl crossover is that Oliver will come to accept the alien hordes (i.e. Kara) when he finally meets his suspicious grouch bastard soulmate J'onn/Hank.
posted by nicebookrack at 10:57 AM on October 19, 2016
Not enough Snart in this episode. I don't care that he's dead. New guy is cute but he'd better work fast to differentiate himself from Ray as the resident enthusiastic clueless nerd hero with an odd Mick bromance.
I love to watch the frayed threads of Mayor NIMBY Oliver's patience wear ever more thin in the crossover episodes. "Not within Starling City limits? NOT MY PROBLEM!" He is thisclose to yelling at these upstart super whippersnappers to get off his lawn. My fervent hope for the Supergirl crossover is that Oliver will come to accept the alien hordes (i.e. Kara) when he finally meets his suspicious grouch bastard soulmate J'onn/Hank.
posted by nicebookrack at 10:57 AM on October 19, 2016
You are not logged in, either login or create an account to post comments
Is Rip only gone for an episode or two, or has Darville gone to recurring status? The character was probably my least favorite part of S1, so, the longer Mick is in charge, the better.
posted by oh yeah! at 8:27 PM on October 13, 2016 [1 favorite]