Legends of Tomorrow: The Chicago Way – Trap (Review)

Damien Darhk in LoT

Legends of Tomorrow “The Chicago Way” entertains mightily.  There are some comic moments, the odd poignant moment (Think Leonard’s haunting of Mick.) and one heck of a shocker at the tail end of the episode.

Rip Hunter has reappeared, sans Brit accent, sans time travel and sans a sense of humor. (Okay, Hunter never really had what one could call a funny bone when he ran things, but this version of Hunter seems downright dour.)

The former time traveler is now, apparently, a film, or television, director who is documenting his own time master adventures. Or is he? The rumor mill has been busy since the second season started with hints that Hunter would return and that he was be “very different.”

This clearly means that more about the old master has changed over and above his new accent.  As an end to the episode, this voyeuristic view of Hunter’s Hollywood life is a puzzler.

It is almost as mystifying as Mick being visited by the dead Snart.  Due to the time of year, Leonard’s haunting of his old pal could be seen as a “ghost of Christmas past” theme.  Snart is, after all, warning his old partner in crime not to follow the goody-two-shoes crewmembers or he could end up dead.

Of course on the flipside of the Snart coin Vixen is working overtime to thaw the cold, cold heart of Rory and it seems to be working. The comically dour Mick is warming to Vixen and vice versa. (Stealing a bottle of illegal “bootleg” hooch for Mick was cute and endearing…Just saying.)

The story this week featured a lot of the Reverse-Flash, too little Damien Darhk (our favorite DC villain) and just the right amount of John Barrowman’s uber baddie Malcolm Merlyn.

It has to  be mentioned here that both McDonough and Barrowman kicked it in their 1920’s duds. Snap brim fedoras and long coats made the two men look beyond sharp. No one on the good guy team looked as hot as the duo of villains.

Mick Rory telling Vixen that the bad guys have more fun was spot on but he forgot to mention that they look better in their outfits. Poor old Reverse-Flash was stuck in his supervillain onesie and was not allowed to play dress-up.

Back to the storyline: The entire episode took great pains to let us know that “The Chicago Way” was a trap, or at the very least, a ruse to ensnare the team into a certain course of action.  The added twist of Hunter as director added another level of confusion to the existing plot.

While there is no apparent connect to the 1967 Hunter and the 1927 scenario, it has spawned a number of questions about the former leader of the Legends and why he is in the director’s chair.

More importantly, the stage is set in this mid-winter finale for the Legion of Doom to assemble. It looks as though Leonard Snart may be more than a figment of Mick’s imagination. (Marc Guggenheim has hinted that this version of Snart, like the other surprise guest in this episode; Rip Hunter, may not be the Captain Cold the Legends remember.)

Legends of Tomorrow airs Thursdays on CW. The next installment of Legends will air in January 2017.

Cast:

Guest starring Wentworth Miller as Leonard Snart, Isaac Keoughan as Al Capone and  Cole Vigue as Elliot Ness.

Legends of Tomorrow: The Justice Society of America – Origin (Review)

Justice Society of America

There is just something about beating up Nazis that brings out the inner Indiana Jones in all of us. Legends of Tomorrow “The Justice Society of America” follows up last week’s episode. The new gang of legends have to explain who they are to the “old school” superheroes in 1942.

Before the end of the episode there is a disturbing death, the Reverse Flash  returns and the origin story of one Nate Heywood, aka Citizen Steel is revealed. This was a good look at how superhero styles have obviously changed since the early 1940’s.

All of the future heroes, aka Legends, are nothing like their early counterparts. The JSA is organized and cohesive. The newbies are quirky and full of one-liners.  Commander Steel is not impressed.

The gang return to the present and while Sara rips a strip off of Heywood, he discovers that his grandfather’s dog tags have gone missing. He and Sara realize that history has been changed.

The legends have to go back as Nate learns that his grandfather will die on this day in history. They head to the place where Steel and the rest of the team are due to perish.

A serum was given to Baron Krieger who injects himself and he becomes a giant super soldier. In essence the Baron turns into a less colorful version of the Hulk. The first time Krieger fights both sets of heroes they lose. He takes Vixen and Ray Palmer prisoner.

Dr. Stein is put in charge  of the Legends for a very short time, he steps down after a few moments of indecision in the heat of battle, and Sara is then made the fearless leader. It makes sense, the missing Rip was training her for the task after all.

Before Sara takes over, Nate and his new colleagues infiltrate a Nazi bar where Stein passes himself off as a famed French vocalist; a favorite of Hitler’s.  He sings Edelweiss and boy scout Palmer messes things up because he cannot Sieg Heil the Fuhrer. Ray punches a general instead and an old fashioned bar fight ensues.

Palmer may not be able to “Heil Hitler” but he does win over Vixen. Earlier she tells the scientist he is not a hero. Later, when Ray gives the serum to hemophiliac Heywood to save his life, she changes her mind.

While the gang are feeling all warm and fuzzy after their victory, Reverse Flash pops in, steals the amulet and kills Rex Tyler. Dying, Tyler manages to gasp out “time traveler”  before expiring on the floor.

Oops.

Clearly the Justice Society of America will believe that the Legends of Tomorrow must have something to do with this. They may have to go back and sort this one out.

Season two is pretty entertaining. Rip, who was a tad too serious, is not around to keep a lid on his heroes.  He may still return, but for the time being, the gang are doing very well for themselves.

Nate Heywood is now well on his way to becoming Citizen Steel and Sara is in charge.  The band may have a new leader but it looks like things are going full steam ahead for the heroes.

Legends of Tomorrow airs Thursdays on CW.

Cast:

Legends of Tomorrow: Out of Time – Roasted Nazis (Review)

Damien Dhark in Out of Time

Damien Dhark turns out to be the big bad of season two, along with his “partner” Reverse Flash, and Rip Hunter has done a Houdini and vanished. Legends of Tomorrow introduces a new team member, and maybe more, in “Out of Time.”

The other possible new members of the group may well be the Justice League of America, first seen in last season’s finale and spied again at the end of this episode.

Things will be very different this time around since Hunter has taken a powder and the loss of personal favorite Wentworth Miller as Leonard Snart has left a hole that cannot be filled.  Sure Mick Rory can play the resident bad boy of the group but it just is not the same without Snart. 

“Out of Time” starts with Nate Heywood, aka Citizen Steel meeting Oliver Queen (a nice crossover touch) and explaining that the “Legends” are in trouble.  Nate reveals that he knows Queen is the Green Arrow, almost ending the meeting as Mr. Grumpy Queen gets annoyed at Heywood’s knowledge.

Cue the beginning of an entire expository episode except for near the end where good old Albert Einstein is saved and made to tell the world of his secret collaborative partner in nuclear physics.

There are a few leaps through time as Rip and the group work to sort out all those pesky aberrations in time. The funniest bit of the entire episode dealt with France, a heated battle (pun intended) between every player except Sara who has a heated interchange with the queen. (Again, pun intended.)

Jax gets off a good crack at Sara’s expense when he suggests the queen is all warmed up for the king. Ms. Lance is not amused.

Rory is alone when found on the ship and later the rest of the gang are rescued from their various timelines. A cute bit where Palmer is running with dinosaurs, Sara is about to be hung as a witch and Stein, along with Jax, are court jesters, or magicians about to be beheaded.

As DC  villains go, Dhark, as portrayed by Neal McDonough is at the top of the heap.  Scary powerful and charismatic Dhark proved in this episode that even as far back as 1942, he is pretty much indestructible. (He was oddly very low key as well.)

Looking at who Damian has partnered up with; the Reverse Flash, time will surely undergo a great many changes.  Clearly Eobard has been busy already, how else did those Frenchmen get modern day weapons.

Dhark and Eobard will obviously be the target throughout the season and just as obviously Sara is going to focus on killing Damien in revenge for Laurel’s death.

What will be interesting in the television DC verse is how all this time travel will affect the various shows. The Flash has already affected Arrow…or has it?

Barry learns in Paradox that his timeline change affected John Diggle, changing  the gender of his child. But did he? With the Legends of Tomorrow jumping here and there fixing anomalies in the timeline, could they not have influenced something in the timeline that affected John?

Keeping that in mind, one could reasonably expect to see Laurel once again in the land of the living which would affect a number of things.  While this may not happen, it is a possibility, which could take the second season of “Legends” a long way.

So far the new season has replaced the Brit hero with a square-jawed American; one who is not a leader of the group but a new addition.  Time will tell whether this change will work or not.

The season two premiere was fun but a tad empty with no Snart and too little Hunter.  Arthur Darvill has hinted that his character will be “lighter” this season. Does that mean lighter as nonexistent?

Legends of Tomorrow airs Thursdays on CW. Tune in and see what mischief Dhark and Reverse Flash get up to.

Cast:

 

Guest starring Stephen Amell as Oliver Queen and John Rubinstein as Albert Einstein, 

Arrow: The Recruits – Back to Basics (Review)

Arrow Season Five Logo

Season five of Arrow has, thankfully, gone back to letting the Green Arrow take on the mantle of Mr. Grumpy hero versus the nice chap who wounding the bad guys.  The body count has gone up and in ‘The Recruits” Oliver drops all pretenses of being cordial and tries to bully his new potential team members into learning what he wants.

This is a return to the Arrow of previous seasons, specifically the first two, where everything about Queen was hard core and the episodes had an impressive body count.

After defeating Damian Dhark last season Queen has turned his back on the nicer version of himself.  Arrow has also finally left that island and replaced it with flashbacks of Russia and Bratva.

The old team have departed since the death of Laurel Lance and Oliver recruits some replacements. Wild Dog, Curtis and Evelyn Sharp are given an invite. Tobias Church continues making his move to control Star City and makes a mistake by almost killing Oliver.

Prometheus turns up to kick a little Church butt and tells him to lay off of Queen with a “he’s mine” warning.

Oliver’s Bratva training is followed in flashback and the storyline makes room for John Diggle’s tale of betrayal with his own new recruit.

The altered timeline from The Flash is not mentioned, where Barry Allen’s mucking about with the past changed Diggle’s daughter into a son.  Any changes not mentioned may turn up later however.

Felicity, who has reverted to type after the heaviness of last season, has that nuke rubbed in her face. When Green Arrow approaches Ragman to recruit him to Team Arrow, the new vigilante on the scene reveals he was created in the one town hit by the nuke last year.

Ragman, who was saved by his father wrapping him in magic rags, is a nice addition to the team.  The rest of the new kids on the block will undoubtably need a lot of training before they ever get past ‘B’ team status.

Quentin Lance is hitting the bottle again and even though Thea has offered him the deputy mayor position he may not be able to stop his downward spiral.

It has been pointed out that the flashbacks are wearing  a bit thin.  These have always been a part of the series and while they can be distracting, as well as annoying, they are part of the story.

Yes they are intrusive and more often than not the flashbacks take away from the main plot line .  It may well be that the show will eventually rely less on the backstory as things progress.

The big news this year for Arrow, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow and The Flash is the mega DC crossover and apart from Dr. Alchemy and the new Arrow villain Prometheus things will get even more interesting for the super heroes.

Meanwhile Arrow may have a whole new team but they all, even Ragman, have steep learning curve to overcome.  It will be interesting to see who takes Tobias Church down and how Felicity will be affected by the origin story of Ragman.

Arrow airs Wednesdays on CW.

Cast:

The Flash: The Man in the Yellow Suit (Recap and Review)

The Flash: The Man in the Yellow Suit (Recap and Review)

Now that the whole crossover thing has passed, things have gone back to what passes as normal in The Flash verse and The Man in the Yellow Suit answers a couple of questions, but only one for Barry Allen, the other is reserved for the audience. Dr. Harrison Wells turns out to be a mentor of a different color, with a connection to yellow to be exact, but before fans of the show learn this jaw dropping revelation, The Flash has to spend the whole show trying to catch the man who he believes murdered his mother and framed his father. Allen must also learn to deal with his unrequited love for Iris West. Another character also has some things in the romance department that needs settling, Caitlin Snow learns that Ronnie Raymond did not die in the accident that released all that Meta Dark Matter.

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