Plot
Sara, Ava, Gary and Behrad arrive in New York City only to discover that Dr. Gwyn Davies isn't quite the scientist they were expecting. Meanwhile, as Spooner, Astra and Gideon race to try and stop the other Legends from using Davies' time machine, Nate and Zari 1.0 retire to the Mansion Dimension to discuss the Hoover situation and their relationship.
Influences
It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (title, general race theme with Spooner, Gideon and Astra rushing to get to New York), The Terminator (the appearance of the Hoover-Bot without skin, robots traveling in time to kill someone) and The Shining (Gwyn Davies' hospital room is 237, the same number as the motel room)
Performances
The interactions between Tala Ashe and Nick Zano are the episode's high point.
Matt Ryan immediately distinguishes himself as a distinct character that is far different from Constantine.
Artistry
Again, the period costuming is perfect.
Trivia Of Tomorrow
The title is a play on the 1963 comedy It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, which centered around a group of people (played by various famous comedians) racing to the location of a buried treasure. This is mimicked by Astra, Gideon and Spooner's increasingly absurd journey to try to beat the other Legends to New York City.
The episode hangs a lampshade on Matt Ryan's playing a new character, with each Legend commenting that Dr. Gwyn Davies looks familiar. However, they all think he looks like a former Legend other than John Constantine. Gary says he looks like Mick Rory with a beard and hair. Sara says he looks like a younger Martin Stein. Zari says he looks like Ray Palmer.
Technobabble/Arcana
The key to John Constantine's pocket mansion also acts as a microphone, allowing those inside the mansion to hear whoever is holding the key.
Zari determines that the Hooverbot was made using the same kind of microchips as the Waverider and that his coding is the same code used on Gideon.
Astra does not know a spell to make things lucky. She does, however, know a lighting spell powerful enough to short out an electrical tower.
Dr. Davies' time machine requires a machine requires a class CR-055 superconductor that doesn't need recharging in order to power the machine safely.
Dialogue Triumphs
Gary: (whispering) Have you and Zari talked next steps?
Nate: (whispering) No. I don't know what to say. And I don't want to ruin the vibe.
Gary: You're ruining the vibe by not saying anything. This is last time I sneak you train doughnuts.
Nate: The hell you will. You're my doughnut dealer.
(Spooner looks up to the sky and shouts, as if talking to God.)
Spooner: Why can't you just bring us some good luck, man?
Gideon: (looking up curiously) Who are you conversing with? Is there someone up there?
(Gideon waves to the sky.)
Gideon: Hello! I'm Gideon!
(Zari notices Nate and Gary acting weird and secretive.)
Zari: Did you and Gary hook up? I won't be mad. I will be confused.
(Zari notices Nate looking thoughtful.)
Zari: You thinking about Gary again?
Nate: Oddly enough, I am.
Zari: Please say more.
Nate: Actually, Gary and I had a surprisingly enlightening conversation prior to your arrival.
Zari: That is surprising. What did you talk about?
Nate: He made me realize that I've been using your totem as an excuse not to take the next step.
Zari: (sighs) I see. We are having that talk.
Nate: All right, listen, no, we don't have to have it. We've had a really good few days, and I don't want to ruin it.
Zari: No, we... we're always great together. It's being apart that makes it hard.
Nate: I know. I know a way for us to be together. And it's... it's this place.
Zari: Like, here? Like, John's... John's pocket manor dimension?
Nate: Uh-huh. Our problem is that you and other Zari can't coexist without Behrad's head exploding, okay? But in this dimension, time and space doesn't exist. We don't have to worry about that. What do you think?
Zari: I think it's a great idea.
Zari: (to the Hoover-Bot) You know, I don't know why I keep unmuting you.
Dr. Davies: After you have got the rest of your friends, you will hold up your end of the deal.
Sara: I always keep my word.
Ava: Deal? What are you... What... you know what? Nope, I don't even care. It's been a crazy day. I disappeared. I don't want to know anything. Don't tell me anything.
Sara: Um, you should know one thing. Um, we also killed Edison.
Ava: You what?!
Continuity
As the episode opens, Gary has just arrived in New York City, on the train from Chicago, on November 6, 1925.
Only Sara, Ava and Behrad emerge from the pocket mansion.
Behrad confirms that they could hear Gary talking to them through the key.
Zari 1.0 and Nate elect to stay in the mansion to try and figure out who built the Hooverbot.
Behard loves New York pizza, as all the pizza in his time is made from squash blossoms and cauliflower crust.
The ice cream vendor recognizes Ava and Sara and pulls a gun on them.
Sara is seemingly shot dead and heals instantly, which draws further attention to the group.
Zari confirms that whoever made the Hooverbot is also likely responsible for the second timeship that blew up the Waverider.
Zari found a retro computer among the junk in John's attic.
Gary stole donuts off the train, which he gave to Nate to give to Zari.
Dr. Gwyn Davies is employed by Thomas Edison at Edison Labs.
Sara and Gary leave to steal Gwyn Davies' research so they can make a copy of it and use it to build a time machine.
Sara bumps into Dr. Davies and pockets his notes.
Spooner, Astra and Gideon are somewhere in Ohio, having had no luck in hopping trains or hitch-hiking.
Gideon estimates that at their current rate of progress it will take them two weeks to get to New York City. Unfortunately, the timeline still shows that Dr. Gwyn Davies' first test of his time machine is tomorrow night at 7 PM EST.
Fed up with Spooner's complaining about their luck, Astra casts a spell on a rock to make it lucky. (It is revealed later that she is lying.)
Shortly after creating the rock, the three women are picked up by a hitchhiker.
Even with Dr. Davies detailed blueprints, Zari and Behrad estimate that it will take them five years to build his time machine from scratch with 1925 technology.
Sara breaks into Dr. Davies' apartment to replace the plans and discovers his almost complete prototype, which is missing just one part.
A survey of Dr. Davies notes determines he got all of his parts from Edison Labs.
Sara points out that the Time Bureau manual says that Dr. Davies laid the foundation for time travel - not that he invented time travel or built the first successful time machine. She suggests that maybe he traveled somewhere and got stuck, which is why he didn't get the credit, arguing that means they can use his time machine to go to the future, get some Time Couriers, and travel back without disturbing the timeline.
The truck carrying Spooner, Gideon and Astra breaks down.
Gideon does not believe in luck.
Ava: You what?!
Continuity
As the episode opens, Gary has just arrived in New York City, on the train from Chicago, on November 6, 1925.
Only Sara, Ava and Behrad emerge from the pocket mansion.
Behrad confirms that they could hear Gary talking to them through the key.
Zari 1.0 and Nate elect to stay in the mansion to try and figure out who built the Hooverbot.
Behard loves New York pizza, as all the pizza in his time is made from squash blossoms and cauliflower crust.
The ice cream vendor recognizes Ava and Sara and pulls a gun on them.
Sara is seemingly shot dead and heals instantly, which draws further attention to the group.
Zari confirms that whoever made the Hooverbot is also likely responsible for the second timeship that blew up the Waverider.
Zari found a retro computer among the junk in John's attic.
Gary stole donuts off the train, which he gave to Nate to give to Zari.
Dr. Gwyn Davies is employed by Thomas Edison at Edison Labs.
Sara and Gary leave to steal Gwyn Davies' research so they can make a copy of it and use it to build a time machine.
Sara bumps into Dr. Davies and pockets his notes.
Spooner, Astra and Gideon are somewhere in Ohio, having had no luck in hopping trains or hitch-hiking.
Gideon estimates that at their current rate of progress it will take them two weeks to get to New York City. Unfortunately, the timeline still shows that Dr. Gwyn Davies' first test of his time machine is tomorrow night at 7 PM EST.
Fed up with Spooner's complaining about their luck, Astra casts a spell on a rock to make it lucky. (It is revealed later that she is lying.)
Shortly after creating the rock, the three women are picked up by a hitchhiker.
Even with Dr. Davies detailed blueprints, Zari and Behrad estimate that it will take them five years to build his time machine from scratch with 1925 technology.
Sara breaks into Dr. Davies' apartment to replace the plans and discovers his almost complete prototype, which is missing just one part.
A survey of Dr. Davies notes determines he got all of his parts from Edison Labs.
Sara points out that the Time Bureau manual says that Dr. Davies laid the foundation for time travel - not that he invented time travel or built the first successful time machine. She suggests that maybe he traveled somewhere and got stuck, which is why he didn't get the credit, arguing that means they can use his time machine to go to the future, get some Time Couriers, and travel back without disturbing the timeline.
The truck carrying Spooner, Gideon and Astra breaks down.
Gideon does not believe in luck.
Gideon estimates they will need to travel at least 55 mph to make it to New York in time.
By a happy coincidence, Erwin George "Cannon Ball" Baker, a famous race car driver who broke several point-to-point driving records and was also the first commissioner of NASCAR, stops at that moment looking for directions to Cleveland, as he's trying to set the land speed record for driving from Los Angeles to New York City.
Gideon's powers allow her to know the best routes along any road at any time.
Cannon Ball agrees to let the women ride with him to New York City if they can give him good directions.
Sara gives Dr. Davies a collection of papers to be analyzed, claiming they were sent by Thomas Edison himself. This is to keep him distracted while the other Legends prepare his time machine.
Zari determines that the Hoover-Bot has a to-do list in his programming and that one item supersedes everything else - Destroy The Legends.
Nate wonders why whoever is trying to destroy them would also care about preserving the timeline.
Gary finds the final part they need in storage in Edison's Labs. Unfortunately, he runs into Thomas Edison on the way out and bluffs badly that he's a new hire working under Dr. Davies. When he says he was retrieving a part for Davies' time-travel project, Edison becomes enraged.
Thomas Edison fires Davies and has him committed to Bellevue asylum.
Davies is enraged and begs Edison to let him finish his work, calling time travel "his divine mission."
The police pull over Cannon Ball's car.
Astra is able to fast-talk the police into acting as an escort to the county line rather than arresting them by playing on Cannon Ball's celebrity.
Nate and Zari finally talk about their relationship and Nate suggests that they could live in the mansion since it exists outside time and space. Zari agrees.
The Hoover-Bot witnesses this exchange and says it knows that Zari is lying about being happy about the idea of moving into the mansion with Nate.
The Legends realize that that day, November 7, was the day that Dr. Davies was supposed to use his time machine for the first time.
Behrad adds the final piece of the machine to Davies' time machine. After he does this, Ava, Gary and the Time Bureau manual disappear.
Sara guesses that since Davies wasn't the one to complete the machine, it changed the future so that the Time Bureau never existed, which means there's no Ava, Gary or Time Bureau Manual as they knew them.
Sara says they have to break Davies out of Bellevue and recover his plans from Thomas Edison to restore the timeline.
Zari reprograms the Hoover-Bot to help them get the plans from Thomas Edison.
Davies says he wanted to build a time machine for a sacred purpose and refuses to leave the hospital when Sara tries to break him out and claims to be a time traveler, pointing out that everything she said to him before now was lies. He relents, however, when Sara talks about her love for Ava, saying that he can understand doing anything to save the person you love.
Dr. Davies has a medallion with the name Thomas on it that seems precious to him, which he holds while thinking of his past.
Dr. Davies agrees to come with Sara and help her save Ava, if she will help him save the person he loves.
The Hoover-Bot explodes in front of Thomas Edison. This causes him to have a heart attack and he dies in his office while Nate and Zari are there.
Zari tells Nate that she does want to live with him, but wants to do it in the Air Totem, not the mansion, having found a community and family among the other totem wielders whose spirits reside in the totem. Nate agrees to consider it.
A man on a bike steals Cannon Ball's car while he stops to use the bathroom. Gideon is still in the back seat asleep when this happens, as Spooner and Astra were stretching their legs.
Cannon Ball takes the bike and leaves the women to keep pushing to break his record.
Gideon has the lucky rock.
As Zari and Nate are making their escape, they hear a time-ship's engines.
A new Hoover-Bot appears with an Edison-Bot to clean up the crime scene.
Dr. Davies completes the machine, restoring Gary and Ava to their proper place in time.
Gideon hits the car thief with the rock and takes the car.
Dr. Davies, under the Legends direction, sets the time machine to go to Tahiti in 2021, where Ava knows the location of a Time Bureau safe house. Sara and Ava also discuss celebrating their honeymoon there.
Astra uses a lighting spell to cause a blackout in New York City, preventing the time machine from being used. She passes out in the process, but it works.
Gideon, Astra and Spooner catch up with the rest of the Legends.
Gideon says that Davies' machine originally exploded because alternating current could not power the machine safely.
Zari just happens to have one of the parts needed to fix the time machine from the parts she took from the Hoover-Bot
The Legends are transported to a cold place that is clearly not Tahiti.
Location
New York City - November 6-7, 1925
Somewhere on the road between Ohio and New York City - November 6-7, 1925
The Bottom Line
New York City - November 6-7, 1925
Somewhere on the road between Ohio and New York City - November 6-7, 1925
The Bottom Line
Hilarious and high paced. A wonderfully twisty narrative, with Matt Ryan's return as the cherry on the cake.
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