Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 15 - Swan Thong

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Trapped in a world they never made, the Legends must fight the Fates for the freedom of all that is. But there's no guarantee all of them will survive the battle to come or that the world will return to what they remember...

Influences

1984 (the aesthetic of Loomworld) and Night At The Museum (the battle with the Encores in the museum)

Goofs

For some reason, the Encores let The Legends leave the room to grab weapons from the Hall of Bad Ideas.

Mona and Gary just disappear from the episode and aren't there for the final part. (Then again, neither of them would fit in at a punk show.)

Performances

The whole cast bring their A-game, but if we have to single out a single MVP, it has to be given to Tala Ashe for playing both Zaris.

Artistry

The mock commercial for the FateWatch looks like a real commercial.

The FX work to get the two Zaris to interact is flawless.

Technobabble/Arcana

Magical power usually passes from mother to daughter. As Natalie Louge was a natural conduit for magic, so too is Astra.

Without Gideon to power the Waverider, the only way to make it able to fly manually is to use a superconductor to transfer a huge surge of energy to the Time Core. In this case, Zari uses Nate in his steel form and a pair of jumper cables. 

When a god dies, any gift they bestowed upon a mortal dies with them. In this case, Sara's sight is restored and her second-sight disappears after Atropos dies.

While trying to repair Gideon, Behrad and Zari 1.0 reroute the navigation system and patch into a secondary hard drive.

John works a sleeping spell on Charlie to knock her out.

Zari 1.0 figues out a way to track the Loom using the FateWatch, but it requires an external computer with GPS and WiFi capabilities. She winds up dissecting Zari 2.0's smartphone to get the parts she needs.

John works a spell that lets him phase through the floor to avoid getting hit.

Dialogue Triumphs

Lachesis: Clotho... I have let you play your childish game long enough. It is time to grow up and face the music. 

Charlie: The Legends are my friends. 

Lachesis: Are they? Time and again they have sown chaos into this world. 

Charlie:Well, sometimes they screw things up for the better. I mean, think about it. Encores, that wasn't their fault, and they've been mopping that up all year. 

Lachesis: That's true. The Encores are not the Legends' fault. They're yours. Ambitious villains are the product of the chaos you birthed.(gesturing to the crowd of worshipers)  Look at these people now! Do you see a future Joseph Stalin amongst these lambs? Of the three of us, you always loved these mortal creatures best. What do you think they would want? More choices or a lifetime of peace?

(Nate is standing by the Waverider controls holding both clips of a pair of jumper-cables.)

Nate: You sure this is going to work?

Zari 1.0: Honestly, I'm 60/40. But I believe in you.

Nate: I don't want to do this.
Zari 1.0: I know. (kisses him)

(The Legends look around and see that everyone is talking into their watches, asking them what to do next. They also see the ads for some device called a FateWatch.)

Ava: Uh, what are the chances that everyone's watches got a weird update over the last four months?

John: I'd say one in a monkey's ass, love. 

Sara: Great. So not only do Charlie and her sister have the Loom back, but now it's wearable.

Zari 1.0: I'm hanging out with myself and myself has the hots for John Constantine.

(Astra has told John about how she abandoned the memory of her mother to survive Hell.)

John: You listen to me, all right? You are still her daughter.
Astra: (chuckles) Whose? Natalie or Lachesis? 

Sara: We were all in our own worlds, but a twist in our stories brought us together and made us a family. 

Charlie: But humanity, they've made so many mistakes. 

Sara: Sometimes a mistake is really just destiny. 

Charlie: What, you learn that being a Paragon? 

Sara: No, I learned that being a person

(Zari 2.0 and John are making out in mid-search for the Loom of Fate. Zari 1.0 comes in over the comms)
Zari 1.0: Guys, I think we found it.
(Zari 2.0 reluctantly pulls away from John.)
Zari 2.0: (sighs) I'm the worst.

Zari 1.0: I'm gonna miss you... so much.

Nate: Me too. 

Zari 1.0: You know I have to do this, right?

Nate: (sighing) Yeah.

Zari 1.0: I just wish... I wish I was leaving you with some... something... 

Nate: You... you are, and you have. I mean... I've lost everything at Heyworld... all of our memories, but you brought those back to me. Now I get to remember the woman I love forever. 
(The two kiss deeply.)

Nate: No regrets. 

Zari 1.0: No regrets. 

(Everyone is watching The Smell perform)

Behrad: Weren't they dead?
Nate: (shrugs) I mean, who hasn't died?

Continuity

The Fates have a temple where people can petition them to change reality on their behalf.

The Legends split up. Nate, Zari 1.0, Ava,and Mick are on one team. Sara, Astra, John, Zari 2.0 and Behrad are on the other.

The first team runs into Gary and Mona, who guess that the Waverider was taken to The Forbidden Dump along with all the other artifacts that conflict with the new reality.

Gary and Mona abandon the Legends at the dump because it will be suspicious if they are gone for too long.

Behrad is experiencing chest pains, which he blames as acid reflux from too much green mush.

The second team are recognized as the actors from the shows by a group of fans. John agrees to give them an autograph in exchange for their clothes, which are used to infiltrate the Fates' temple and destroy the Loom of Fate.

Atropos and Lachesis figure out the Legends have escaped when they see the man wearing Constantine's clothes in line at the temple and after one woman asks for her shows to be uncancelled.. 

Sara cannot see the Loom, but can feel the energy of it through her foresight. 

Once they find the Waverider, Mick leaves to find Lita.

John plans to use Astra as a magical conduit to juice up his own spell so he can disrupt the Loom of Fate. Unfortunately, the spell fails after Asttra starts having visions of Lachesis instead of thinking of her mother.

Gideon was removed form the Waverider, makig it all but impossible for the ship to function normally.

Zari is able to jump-start the Waverider using Nate in his steel form as a super-conductor.

Sara is able to hold her own in a fight with Atropos, thanks to her power to see the future. 

The Loom is destroyed after Sara cuts Atropos' life thread after Zari 2.0 and Behrad blast her into the Loom with their totem.

The Legends escape in the Waverider but just barely manage a time jump and crash in the Forbdiden Dump again. 

Sara's sight is restored but she can no longer see the future. John says this means Atropos must be dead, since she was the source of Sara's power. 

The Legends find out they jumped four months into the future.  The world has now changed so that everyone is dependent on a new electronic device, the FateWatch, to tell them what to do.

In Loomworld 2.0, the Temple of The Fates is now a history museum devoted to showcasing "the truth about free will and the atrocities that it brought upon humankind."

The museum features a Hall of Bad Ideas, a Hall of Villains and a a Hall of Atrocities.

The Hall of Bad Ideas contains displays devoted to the Flat Earth theory, spring-shoes, the Shake-Weight, energy drinks, glitter, the Flowbee, the pogo-stick, cigarettes (much to Constantine's annoyance) and Sisqo's "Thong Song".

Nate, unsurprisingly, likes the Thong Song.

Behrad has a flashback to his original death at the hands of ARGUS agents in the pre-Crisis timeline while trying to repair Gideon.

The Hall of Villains contains displays devoted to an unnamed caveman, an unidentified figure in gladiator armor, Charles Manson, General Custer, Joseph Stalin (#10), Marie Antoinette (#12), Vlad the Impaler (#14), Caligula and the Legends (#2). 

The Legend display shows Sara, Ava, John, Mick, Behrad and Nate, with Sara and Nate in their superhero suits.

Mick, Lita, Gary and Mona show up at the Waverider. Mick says it has been four months since they vanished.

According to Mona, when the Loom of Fate was destroyed, people panicked as their memories of the old world came flooding back and nobody could remember what was real or not or what to do. 

Charlie is living in the museum as the #1 ranked villain.

Left all alone, Charlie was broken by Lachesis and convinced she was responsible for all the bad things in the world.

According to Charlie, Lachesis rebuilt the Loom and restored order. 

Astra reveals to John that the price of Lachesis protection in Hell was abandoning her humanity.

The Legends cite The Beatles and he musical Mama Mi 2a! as good things that came of free will, trying to cheer up Charlie. Charlie counters with the fact that The Beatles also inspired Charles Manson's cult and ABBA nearly inspired Napoleon to kill The Legends (311). 

Charlie also cites the song "Octopus Garden" as one of humanity's greatest mistakes. Gary considers it one of the best things to come of free will. 

Zari 1.0 builds a device to track the signal of the Loom of Fate.

The Loom is tracked to somewhere inside the former Clotho Studio's building.

The Loom is revealed to be Gideon, who has been reprogrammed to run the FateWatch program and tell everyone what to do.

Zari 2.0 disables the Loom network by unplugging Gideon.

Astra replaces Charlie during the grand opening of the museum and calls Lachesis out, daring her to smite her and pointing out she can't do it.

The villain "displays" in the museum are revealed to be paralyzed Encores.

Lita breaks Charlie out of her funk by pointing out that she's the product of complete and utter chaos and that life may be messy but that makes it beautiful. 

Charlie and Lita deiver the cache of Hell-Weapons to the rest of the Legends so they can finally end the Encores.

Charlie confronts Lachesis and forgives her for everything she did. She doesn't kill her, leaving her to live out her life as an ordinary mortal.

Gideon is rebooted.

Behrad's chest pains are revealed to be the result of his wounds from the original timeline reopening because of the presence of Zari 1.0.

Zari 1.0 goes back inside the Totem to save Behrad's life.

The Legends go to London in 1977 to watch The Smell (who have apparently been resurrected post-Loomworld) perform.

Charlie sings a punk rock cover of the Mister Parker's Cul-De-Sac theme.

The Smell are apparently Lita's favorite punk band.

Mick agrees to take Lita back in time to see the Runaways play next weekend.

John asks Astra what she plans to do now. She says she thinks she'll live in this place in the sticks and that she thinks she has the rent covered. This leads her to gives John his soul coin.

Charlie decides to stay in 1977 with The Smell.

Sara gets abducted by some kind of alien tractor beam which the rest of the team fail to notice.

Location

Loomworld
Loomworld 2.0

London, England - 1977


The Bottom Line

A fun finale, whose only flaw is trying too hard to set up a fight-scene to the Thong Song to justify the punny title. Still, for a show famous for its great cliff-hanger endings at the end of the season, this one may be the best yet. It will be a long wait for Season 6 and the Legends going into space.

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 14 - The One Where We're Trapped on TV

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

The good news is that Charlie managed to save the other Legends while rebuilding the world with her sisters and placing humanity firmly under The Fates' control. The bad news is she brought them back as characters in the new Loomworld's most popular television series. Can they fight their way out of their new lives and back to reality?

Influences

Stay Tuned (the heroes having to escape a TV world), 1984 (the aesthetic of Loomworld), Friends (The Ultimate Buds segments), Downtown Abbey (The Highcastle Abbey segments), Star Trek (the Star Trip segments) and Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan (Mick's costume is a call-out to the Ricardo Montalban Khan)

Performances

Talented though he is, I never would have imagined Matt Ryan in the role of a butler in a British period drama. Yet he does a fantastic job playing Mister Constantine.

Jess McCallan and Caity Lotz find just the right note in impersonating Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner without going over the top.

Artistry

The production team did a fantastic job of capturing the feeling of each show being parody and creating a nightmarish dystopia for Mona and Gary to escape.

The "Repress" song may be the best musical number in Arrowverse history.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

This episode marked the directorial debut of Marc Guggenheim, who was the co-creator of Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow and Vixen.

Instead of the usual intro, this episode opens with a special intro inspired by Russian propaganda posters, featuring The Fates.

The episode title is a nod to the naming convention of Friends episodes.

Technobabble/Arcana

The Loomworld verison of John Constantine reads Tarot cards and can cast a spell to send someone to someone else. This is how the Legends escape Highcastle Abbey and go to Sara Lance.

In Tarot, the Jack of Wands symbolizes daring exploits and dangerous challenges lying in the future.

There are computers in Clotho Productions that automatically spit out scripts for shows, which are connected to the life threads of people trapped within those shows.

Dialogue Triumphs

(Gary runs up to Mona on the street.)
Gary: Do I know you? You look familiar! Do you recognize me?! My name is Gary, but most people call me Crazy Guy!
Mona: Stay away from me, you weirdo!
Gary: Yeah, they call me that too!

(Zari 1.0 is trying to puzzle out why the world changed.)
Behrad: Sis, what do you think is happening?
Zari 1.0: I think you guys fought The Fates.
Everyone Except Zari: Fates Be Praised!
Zari 1.0: ... and you lost.

Lady Astra: Well? How is he Mr. Constantine? 

Mr. Constantine: Lord Behrad is as advertised, (disdainfully) A foreigner.

(The Waverider is seen flying through space.)
Captain Lance (Voice-Over): Space. The fatal frontier. These are the adventures of the USS Faterider

Ms. Sharpe  (Voice-Over): Its mission; to seek out rebellious life forms.and disobedient civilizations. And blow them up with lasers.  

(Captain Lance and Ms. Sharpe are beamed aboard the Gromulan vessel. Captain Lance immediately draws her phased and points it at Zari.)
Captain Lance : We're taking over this ship!

Zari 1.0: Sure. That works. We're your crew, anyway.

(Captain Lance looks confused.)

Zari 1.0: I know. It's complicated, but we're actually from an alternate timeline where you're our captains.

Ms. Sharpe: You're our crew?

Mr. Constantine: May I interest you in some rare Gromulan tea?

Lady Astra: Oh, it is grand to see lady adventurers in pantaloons! 

Captain Lance: ... what kind of Gromulans are you?

Behrad and Nate: Ultimate buds!

Zari: All right, yeah. I know. It's hard to believe-
Captain Lance: No. It makes perfect sense.

Ms. Sharpe: We encounter this sort of thing all the time. You're probably our crew from an alternate timeline and you've been trapped in some sort of... judging by your mannerisms, late and early 20th Century prison dimension... which calls into question if we ourselves are existing in a prison dimension. It's perfectly logical.

Zari 1.0: (shaking her head) Ava, I love you. 

John: Astra, look at me. What have I got to show for myself? 38 crap years of pain and broken promises. You wanna know what my original sin was? It was you, Astra. I rail against the angels and demons for being arrogant bastards, but I'm worse than the bloody lot of them. You know, I thought I could use your innocent soul as a bargaining chip to save your mother. Bollocks! If you're happy here, then... I will spend an eternity as ruddy Mr. Constantine trying to make it up to you and Natalie.
Astra: Is John Constantine really capable of such a selfless act?

(John steps back and assumes a proper parade-rest position, with his hands resting behind his back. When he speaks, it is with an upper-class British accent.) 
John: Would it be acceptable to dine at half-past seven, Lady Astra? Mrs. Hutchens is running a trifle late.
Astra: (smiling) Perfectly acceptable, Mister. Constantine.

Sara: Ava, life is beautiful and terrible. All at the same time. But if we're only living part of it, we're not living at all.

Continuity

In the new reality, Mona Wu works in the Historical Sanitation Department. As the episode opens, she has just rewritten the history of Spartacus to make him a good worker who never caused trouble instead of the leader of a famous slave revolt.

One of Mona's co-workers, Geoffrey Burch, is killed by Atropos shortly after he asks Mona if she thinks that The Fates running everyone's lives is wrong.

In the new world, Gary is a street protester who is dismissed by most people for his claims that the world is wrong and The Fates are evil. 

Everyone in Loomworld eats mush. Grey mush is the most common color. Other types of mush include green mush, purple mush, sticky mush, slimy mush and blue mush. Blue mush is apparently the best.

Fate-Plus is a streaming service in Loomworld.

Mona watches a sitcom called Ultimate Buds. The main characters are Nate, Behrad and Zari. The show is a lot like Friends, with a similar over-sized loft apartment, Zari working as a chef like Monica and Nate working as an actor like Joey.

Nate is audition for the role of Robin Hood in a new show called Arrow.

The Pre-Crisis Zari emerges from the Totem and takes control of her Post-Crisis self. As revealed in 509, she has no idea what is happening in the real world and is confused by the sitcom world.

Zari 1.0 asks Nate if he remembers the other Legends and starts listing them. When she gets to Mona Wu, Mona (in the real world) wonders why the people on TV are talking about her.

Zari knocks down a door in the apartment. This leads into Constantine's house, which is apparently now the setting of a British period drama called Highcastle Abbey. 

John Constantine is the butler of the Logue family. Highcastle Abbey is the ancestral home of the Logue family, currently headed by Lady Natalie Logue. It is located in Highcastle, Yorkshire.

Lady Natalie is currently trying to arrange a marriage for her daughter, Lady Astra, to Lord Behrad, who has apparently been written into the show as a Persian nobleman and Nate is his valet.

John is still able to do magic, but he tries not to, treating it as scandalous that he can do such things.

Zari tries to tell John about who he was and mentions his apprentice, Gary. This leads Mona to seek out the "Crazy Guy" in the real world.

Astra tells Behrad she wishes she were a man so she could go out into the world and live a life of adventure. He says there is no reason why she couldn't do that.

Astra jumps in as John is working a ritual to teleport Zari and Nate to Sara, resulting in all of them being sent into the reality of Star Trip as aliens called Gromulans..

Gary and Mona decide they need to break into Clotho Productions - the company that makes all the TV shows now.

In the world of Star Trip, Ava and Sara are co-captains of a space-ship. Sara is the hot-tempered one. Ava is the logic-driven one.

After convincing Ava and Sara that they are all trapped in a prison dimension, Ava mentions that had detected an odd transmission from the planet Kuldezax. The transmission turns out to be Mr. Parker's Cul-De-Sac from 507.

They attempt to make contact with the transmission, resulting in a giant hand pulling the ship out of space. This is revealed to be Mr. Palmer playing with a toy of the ship.

Everyone is brought into Mr. Palmer's house as The Community Helpers. Zari is a doctor, Nate is a road worker, Behrad is a sewer repair worker, Ava is a teacher, John is a handyman, Sara is a police officer, and Astra is a fire-fighter 

Zari pleads for everyone to remember who they are. This prompts Mona to start writing into the script-writing machine, writing that it is at this point that the Legends remember who they are.

Everyone remembers the Pre-Crisis and Post-Crisis timelines, including both versions of Zari. 

It is revealed that Charlie based the new lives she created for the other Legends based on what they all said they wanted most in 513. To wit:

* Nate gets to spend the rest of his life hanging out with his friends and having fun.
* Zari gets to be with her brother.
* Astra gets to grow up with her mother.
* John gets to protect Astra and see she has a good life.

* Sara and Ava get to be together and have adventures where nobody really gets hurt.

* Mick gets to be a lovable criminal and has hair again.  

Charlie starts trying to rewrite the Mr. Parker script so that everyone goes back to the lives she made for them.

John and Astra are the last to be sent back. John is ready to fight, but Astra talks him down because she wants to see her mother and see if she's back to who she was or is just a character in a TV show.

Lady Natalie doesn't remember being part of another world, proving she's not really Astra's mom.

Sara and Ava decide to try and escape, when they get an transmission from their enemy, Dhan. This is revealed to be Mick Rory. 

Lita and her mom are revealed to be alive in Loomworld.

When Sara and Ava decide to intentionally lose the fight with Dhan, Charlie is forced to cancel the show so they don't die in the story. This brings Sara, Ava and Mick back into the real world.

Sara is once again blind in the real world.

In Highcastle Abbey, Lady Natalie gives Astra a train ticket to London so she can see the world.outside of Highcastle. This inspires Astra to ask John to take her out of the show and back to reality, which he manages with a spell.

In Ultimate Buds Zari starts ranting about mush being awful and encourages the people watching to take control of their lives.  Charlie cancels their show as well.

Charlie is able to split Zari's thread in two, so that both Zari 1.0 and Zari 2.0 are alive.

The Legends reject Charlie's offer to write them a better life and walk out to face the real world, as Charlie sadly notes that she can't help them anymore.

Location

Loomworld - 2020

The Bottom Line

Peak Legends. The parodies are funny and well-executed. The ensemble is firing on all eight cylinders. There's some great character moments and the story sets up the end of the season quite well.

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 13 - I Am Legends

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Stranded in Newcastle after The Fates steal their ship, The Legends must make their way to London and a Time Bureau safe-house where they can open a time corridor onto the Waverider. There's just one thing standing in their way; a night of the living dead, courtesy of Atropos. This leaves Gary fighting a one-man-war to keep the Loom of Fate out of the clutches of the Fates.  

Influences

I Am Legend (title and zombie apocalypse theme) and Shaun of the Dead (zombie apocalypse in British setting)

Performances

Amy Pemberton has a lot of fun playing the hallucinatory Gideon.

Again, the chemistry between Tala Ashe and Matt Ryan as Zari and Constantine is fantastic.

Artistry

The production team do a great job capturing the jump-scares and general aesthetic of a zombie horror movie.

The final fight scene with the zombies overwhelming the Legends is brilliantly executed.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

Zari asks John how he can not own a car given where he lives and John says he always bummed a ride. This is a nod to the comics and how John never learned how to drive, always depending on his pal Chas Chandler (who was a cab driver) to take him where he wanted, free of charge. 

Technobabble/Arcana

The Shadow Stone is an artifact in John Constantine's possession which is accompanied by a disembodied voice crying like a baby.

Zombies can sense the souls of the living and actively seek them. 

Damned souls, like John Constantine, are ignored by zombies.

John knows an Ancient Egyptian spell that can temporarily stop a person's heart, making it seem like they are dead. He uses this to temporarily "kill" Zari, so he can carry her past the zombie horde in the scrapyard and get her into the van they are stealing.

Gary knows a simple obfuscation spell that can hide small objects.

Dialogue Triumphs

Sara: (dramatic music swelling) We're going to do it! We're going to go to London! Because we are immortal superheroes!

Zari: (music cutting out) Except me.

Sara: ...except for Zari. (dramatic music swelling again) And nothing is going to stand in our way!

(Cut to: The Legends standing at a bus stop, waiting, with no dramatic music.)

John: Have you ever considered the possibility that your brother's fate is doomed in every timeline? Apparently this bloke Rip Hunter used to say that, you know, certain things are just inevitable. 

Zari: (cooly) Go to Hell, John.
John: You know, I've been there and back, love.

(Ava has just been shot in the head by a trigger-happy soldier. She gasps and sits up, groaning, the bullet popping out of her head as her wound heals and she is perfectly fine.)
Soldier:My God! These zombies can withstand headshots!
Mick: Since when do zombies talk, you idiot?!
Soldier: These super-zombies have become sentient!

(Ava is running through their assets trying to come up with an escape plan.)

Ava: Look, we've got a guy who turns into steel. We've got a shapeshifter, right? That's freaking amazing! We've got a kickass blind assassin! And a reformed thief turned romance novelist.
Mick: Who are you calling reformed? 

Zari: If I die, I can't believe the last thing I'm going to see is your face.
John: Yeah, well ah,... better than those zombies out there, eh?
Zari: Debatable. 

Continuity

As the episode opens, the Legends have 23 hours and 45 minutes of immortality left. 

Gary went back on board the ship earlier to take care of his bunny.

Gary's pet bunny has Irritable Bowel Syndrome and bad gas.  

Astra is revealed to have let Lachesis and Atropos onto the Waverider. 

The Fates shut Gideon down.

Sara has a bad vision after taking Ava's hand but she denies it, saying she thinks the Chalice is messing with her powers. It is later revealed that she foresaw everyone dying in a bar in London.

Ava suggests they go to a Time Bureau safe-house in London and use a time corridor from there to get on the Waverider.

The Legends are forced to take the bus to London. However, they wind up hijacking the bus after it turns out nobody has any British currency on them.

Mick knows how to drive a bus.

Newcastle is 275.8 miles from London, traveling along the A1(M) and A1.

Astra agrees to help the Fates, but only if they bring back her mother, eliminate prunes from the new world and arrange for dogs to stay puppies forever. 

Sara asks Ava to take charge of the team for this mission.

John starts smoking again, but Zari stops him.

Atropos uses her powers to raise the dead throughout England.

John makes reference to fighting zombies while facing Atropos before in 509.

Gary tries to fix Gideon and electrocutes himself. When he wakes up, he sees Gideon in the same human form she had in 408.

Gideon tells Gary to hide the Loom rings.

The bus breaks down, forcing John and Zari to go look for alternate transpiration.

Nate is not good with mechanical things.

Lachesis shows Astra a vision of her mother dying in the hospital and says that is what will happen if they rewrite history to bring her back to life.

John Constantine never met Rip Hunter, but knows of him.

Atropos practices her knife-throwing with the wanted poster of Jonah Hex hanging in the parlor of the Waverider. 

Gideon seemingly distracts Atropos by bunny-hopping past the parlor.

Gary steals the Loom Rings at the prompting of Gideon.

Ava and Sara both hate free-form jazz music.

Ava survives being shot in the head by trigger-happy soldiers who think the Legends are zombies. 

Ava, Sara, Mick, Charlie and Nate are captured by soldiers who think they are "super-zombies" resistant to head-shots, who learned how to talk. 

Astra figures out that Gary is still on the Waverider, based on the half-eaten carrot he left behind.

Gideon suggests that Gary steal a Time Corridor to get the other Legends.

Joe and Zari go to a scrapyard John knows about to steal a car. Unfortunately, the scrapyard is full of zombies.

After getting briefly cornered, John is able to temporarily kill Zari with a spell and they steal a van.

John knows how to perform CPR and uses it to restore Zari to life.

The rest of the Legends are able to escape from the military transport they are locked in, after Mick remembers being locked in the same type of vehicle and that they have a weak door that Nate is able to break in his steel form. 

After escaping, The Legends are 80 miles from London when John and Zari catch up to them.

Gary is caught by Atropos, but is able to hide the rings with a simple obfuscation spell.

The Time Bureau safe-house in London is built into a pub, but it's been abandoned by the agents that were working there, as they are out dealing with the zombie apocalypse.

Ava is able to access the Time Courier storage unit but finds that none of the Couriers are charged.

Zari and John winding up making out in the backroom of the pub after having an argument.

Gary asks Astra if Lachesis showed her any good memories of her life with her mother before she died.

As they wait for the Corridor to charge up, the Legends talk about what they'd most want out of life once they use the Loom of Fate.

Nate says he wants to end every day like they are now; sitting around with his friends.

Sara and Ava say they're happy the way they are now, flying around in their ship and having adventures together.

Mick says he'd like to be a criminal again, because he misses how simple his life was then.

Zari says she just wants to be with her brother and happy, but would like to do something to make the world more inclusive.

John says he'd throw a multi-continent rager but confesses that before that he'd really want to do right by Astra and make sure she grew up right in a big house and that he could keep an eye on her.

Ava figures out that Sara was lying about not having a vision before and losing her powers and that she didn't want to tell anyone what she saw.

Sara admits that she foresaw the courier wouldn't charge before zombies managed to get in the building and killed her.  Sara says, however, that she's sure Ava will lead the team to victory and they will bring her back once they have the Loom working.

Astra's mom loves strawberries. She recalls one day her mom took her picking strawberries on a farm.

Gary talks Astra into betraying the Fates and trying to save her mother again, only for Atropos to kill her.

Ava gives the charged Courier to Charlie, saying that she trusts her to find a way to outsmart her sisters a second time. 

Charlie escapes to the Waverider.

Atropos kills Gary, after he brings the rings back and gives them to Charlie.

Charlie says she's done running and that it's time for the Fates to get to work.

Location

The roads between Newcastle and London - 2020

Untelevised Adventures

John Constantine was once called in by Old Man Joe of Joe's Scrapyard to deal with a demonically-possessed  '75 Fiat.

The Bottom Line

A brilliant send-up of zombie apocalypse movies with a lot of great character moments that utilize the whole ensemble well.

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 12 - Freaks and Greeks

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

To use the Loom of Fate, the Legends determine that at least two of them have to become gods to help Charlie reweave destiny. The Chalice of Dionysus holds the power they need, but before they can gain it they have to win the favor of Dionysus by forming a sorority and winning the Greek Games at Hudson University.

Influences

The whole Fraternity Comedy genre, particularly National Lampoon's Animal House and National Lampoon Van Wilder. Also Marvel Comics' Thor (the Chalice of Dionysus can only be picked up the worthy, like Thor's hammer)

Goofs

Nate's past as an aspiring frat bro seems at odds with what we know of his academic life, where he was sheltered well until adult-hood because of his hemophilia. (Possibly he never had hemophilia Post-Crisis?)

Performances

Drew Ray Tanner (best known to CW fans as Fangs on Riverdale) has a fun turn here as Dionysus, playing the Greek god of revelry like Ryan Reynolds in Van Wilder. Which is not a bad choice.

Artistry

The production team did a great job capturing the feeling of a 1980's college sex comedy.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

Most of the action of this episode takes place at Hudson University. This was the college which Dick "Nightwing" Grayson attended in the Batman and Teen Titans comics.

The sorority that the Legends women join is Delta Chi Sigma or DCS.

Technobabble/Arcana

The Philosopher's Stone is a magical artifact used by Merlin to convey immortality, according to ancient legend. However, according to Charlie, the Philosopher's Stone is not real and neither is Santa Claus.

The Chalice of Dionysus was a gift from Zeus to Dionysus. Whoever drinks of the Chalice gains the immortality of a Greek god for a day. However, only a member of a fraternity or a sorority can pick up the Chalice and they have to be deemed worthy by Dionysus himself. (The first requirement can be waved, however, if Dionysus wills it.) 

The Olympian gods fed off the devotion of their followers. According to Charlie, they lost power as less people began worshiping them and their artifacts lost power as they slowly died off.

The gargoyles in John Constantine's house bite intruders. 

Dionysus brews his own beer which causes any mortal who drinks it to stop caring about anything but having fun. 

Dialogue Triumphs

(Lita and Mick are touring the Hudson University campus with a snooty family who keep not-so-subtly trying to show off.)

Snooty Father: I'm an alumnus. Yo probably noticed the scarf. 

Mick: Yeah. (muttered) I'd like to wring your neck with it.

Snooty Mother: What was that?
Mick: (growls) I said-
(Lita coughs and Mick takes the hint.)
Mick: I said it's a great building!  Good brick structure. Fire resistant. 

Snooty Father: Oh, you really know your architecture. Where did you study?

Mick: (cheerfully) Iron Heights.
Snooty Mother: Haven''t heard of it.
Lita: It's a super prestigious art school.

(Charlie and Dionysus catch up.)

Charlie: You're... in college.

Dion: (shrugs) I know. I'm a lifer. Found a place where the party doesn't stop and I haven't left since. But honestly? They worship me here. And they don't even know that I'm THE party god!

(Charlie and Astra almost start fighting again. Sara takes Astra's hand as Ava stands to stop them, as Zari keeps eating.)
Ava: Oh, okay. Whoa! Whoa! Stop! Nobody is killing anybody.
Sara: (still holding Astra's hand, clearly having a vision of the future) Wooh!  Astra was definitely going to go for it. Zari? Hide that fork.
(Zari stops in mid-bite, fork held to her lips.)
Ava: Charlie?  Just chill. Please sit down. Just take a breath, yeah?
(Without saying a word, Zari tucks the fork into her blouse.)

Continuity

The team researches different means of making a person godlike or powerful enough to survive using the Loom of Fate. 

John discovers a reference to a magic cup called the Chalice of Dionysus that is said to make mortals who drink of it immortal for a day.

Nate recognizes the Chalice of Dionysus as "The Chug Cup" - an artifact passed around the fraternities and sororities of Hudson University which was said do make whoever drank from it invincible for a day.

Nate went to Brixton - the rival college of Hudson University.

The Chalice is currently in the possession of the Sigma Psi Phi fraternity.

The Chug Cup is awarded to whichever fraternity or sorority wins am annual contest called the Chug Challenge, which is held in conjunction with Rush Week and the student activities fair. 

Lita calls Ava "Aunt Ava," apparently having grown close to her during her and Mick's trips to visit her as a child.

Lita's guidance counselor told her to apply to Hudson University.

Mick says he can pay for Lita to go to college wherever she wants.

Mick and Lita decide to take a tour of the Hudson University campus.

The moose is the animal mascot of Hudson University.

Astra wants to just take the Chalice by force, while the rest of the team is trying to figure out a way to find it and finesse it.

The economics building at Hudson University is in Quincy Hall. 

Nate claims that he was known as Shotgun Nate when he was in college, because of his ability to chug a beer in a single gulping (aka Shotgunning) 

The president of Sigma Psi Phi is a student named Dion, who is carried into the student fair on a litter.

Zari says she entered the 2044 VMAs the same way.

Nate recognizes Dion and says he was the President of the Sigmas when he was in college.

Dion is revealed to be Dionysus, who has found a way to retain some of his former power by posing as a "lifer" college student and feeding on the admiration of his fellow Greeks.

Charlie was friends with Dionysus in the Ancient Greek days and describes him as "a riot."

Dion says the first of the Chug Challenges will be formally announced that night at a party being thrown by Sigma Psi Phi.

Dion remembers Charlie fondly, saying that the other Greek gods were always reigning in the party before people got free will. He's agreeable to doing Charlie a favor, up until Astra tries stealing the Chalice of Dionysus.

Dion says the only way Charlie and the Legends can sample the cup is to join a sorority or fraternity and win the Chug Challenge.

 

Charlie and Astra attempt to join Theta Lambda Ro - a sorority that is accepting new pledges and having a luncheon that afternoon. They wind up getting kicked out, along with the three other women at their table.

Lita was in a band for a while, but quit because nobody wanted to play The Replacements.

Lita also works a part-time job.

Neuman Hall is a prominent building on the Hudson University campus. It is named for Henry Neuman, who is the grandfather of the snooty kid on the tour with Mick and Lita.

Mick asks Nate to accompany Lita on the tour and pretend to be her dad while he tends to some business. This business is later revealed to be going back in time and donating money to the school. This changes the timeline so that Neuman Hall becomes Rory Hall.

Zari suggests they start their own sorority, using the Waverider to go back in time and take care of everything they'd need to do to have a sorority recruitment party that night. 

Nate and Lita go into Sigma House so they can scout for where the Chalice is kept. 

The sorority the Legends women sign up with is Delta Chi Sigma.

The Legends acquire a run-down house on Greek Row and set up a time corridor to John Constantine's house, which he agrees to let them use for the party.

To be recognized, a sorority chapter needs eight members. This leads the Legends to recruit the three women cut from the Theta table. These women include Inez Martin, a cheerleader who was voted off the pep squad for being too enthusiastic; Lisa Lindhome, an aspiring social media influencer who was shunned after becoming the star of a viral video "Girl Snarts At Party" and Silvia Hines, an artist who created her own major program in Performance Art. 

Nate now has enough fine control over his powers he can turn individual parts of his body into steel. he does this to wow the Sigma Bros by withstanding their paddling by turning his butt to steel and breaking their paddle.

Nate confesses to Dionysus why the Legends were looking for the Chalice of Dionysus, after chugging from a keg of Dionysus' special IPA.

Behrad had a special nacho recipe.

Dionysus disqualifies the Deltas from the Chug Challenge on the grounds that he doesn't want the Loom of Fate being used again, even by Charlie.

Lita tells Mick that she doesn't really care about going to college, much as she appreciates the effort he went through changing time and donating money to try and make her into a legacy recruit. She says she only survived high school thinking about finding a life outside of it.

Nate tells Charlie and Astra that Dion only has power so long as he has followers. This leads them to the idea of throwing a better party than the Sigmas to take away his power so they can take the Chalice.

Zari hacks Dion's DJ set-up and switches his party mix to a selection of yodeling songs. 

Charlie disguises herself as Nate and gets access to Dion's keg storage, allowing Mick to set the whole micro-brewery on fire.

With no beer and no music, the party migrates to Delta House.  Despite this, Mick still can't pick up the Chalice. This is because Dion's followers are his fraternity brothers - not just the people he parties with.

Sara challenges Dion to a game of beer pong for the Chalice before all his bros and uses her precognitive powers to see what moves to make.

Inez, Lisa and Silvia decide to keep Delta House going at Hudson University after the Legends leave.

Dionysus is true to his word and lets everyone drink wine from the Chalice. This makes all of the Legends immortal for a day, save Zari, who refuses to drink because of her religious beliefs. He does request, however, they don't change anything that might ruin his party. 

Lachesis approaches Astra and tells her she's calling in the debt she's owed for agreeing to help Astra kill John Constantine.  

Location

Hudson University - 2020

The Crisis Factor

Astra, who spent a relative eternity in Hell learning how to play the game and manipulate people, suddenly lacks that patience to wait five minutes for the Legends to try and talk Dion into letting them borrow the Chalice and forces them to play his games by trying to steal it.

The Bottom Line

Amusing enough, though the Astra/Charlie conflict seems largely forced. Still, it serves as a fun tribute to a genre of comedy that is rarely executed in the modern day except as a form of self-parody. Which makes it all the more fitting as a target for the Legends to lampoon. The subplot with Mick and Lita is also pretty sweet.

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 11 - Ship Broken

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot


The Loom of Fate is reassembled, but everyone on the team is arguing over who gets to use it first, leaving Charlie to make a big choice. Meanwhile, as Ava and Constantine try to help Sara figure out what's happened to her in the wake of her near-death experience, Mick brings his daughter on-board in a desperate tip to bond with her, while Gary tries to acclimate his new emotional support dog to the ship.

Influences

Gremlins (Gary's joke about buying his pet bunny from a man who told him not to feed it after midnight), The Dead Zone (Sara can see  how someone will die by touching theim), the trope of the blind seer, the trope of the blind warrior (ala Daredevil) and the classic "base under siege" trope where the characters are trapped in a base with an unknown enemy among them.

Artistry

The CGI as the Loom of Fate is worked is rather nice.

The CGI for the Hell-Hound is also impressive.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

The twist of this episode is based around the case of serial killer David Richard Berkowitz, aka The Son of Sam. Berkowitz was convicted of eight shootings over the course of one year, resulting in six deaths and seven wounded.  Berkowitz blamed the killings on a demon that possessed his neighbor Sam's dog, who told him to kill people  He later said that was a lie but did claim to be part of a Satanic cult that plotted the killings in the 1990s. Opinion is still divided as to whether or not Berkowitz ever was a Satan worshiper or a cultist or if he acted alone.

In the reality of the Arrowverse, Berkowitz apparently was influenced by a hell-hound that got loose on Earth.

The given name of the hell-hound in this episode is Marchosias. This is the name of an actual demon, who was a Marquis of Hell who commanded 30 legions of lesser demons in some real world Hermetic traditions.. He is described in the Ars Goethia as appearing to be a great wolf with an eagle's wings and a snake's tail.  

Technobabble/Arcana

Mick has a key fob that unlocks the Waverider and drops its invisibility shield.

Everyone puts on goggles when Charlie tries to use the Loom of Fate. It's unclear if this is because seeing the Loom used has an effect similar to Atropos' death glare or just because it generates bright light when working.

The energy burst unleashed by the Loom of Fate misfiring created an anti-chronotomic field. This means that nobody will be able to leave the Waverider via time travel.

Hell-hounds have the ability to command  humans verbally. This ability is limited to one target at a time, however, and they seem to prefer targeting lone humans rather than one person in a group, as everyone else will just hear them as a regular dog barking. They can still do this, however, if pressed, as we see when Gary Junior commands Nate to kill Zari and Charlie.

Despite their power, Hell-hounds are like regular dogs in most respects and the ultra-high frequency of a dog whistle seems to disrupt their ability to control people. At the very least, the sound annoys them so much they can't maintain the focus needed to manipulate another person's mind.

Hell-hounds have the power to assume the form of non-threatening dogs. They typically appear to be wreathed in fire and the true form of Gary's hell-hound  is a pit bull rather than the small terrier form he appeared as earlier.

Hell-hounds are born of flame and immune to fire damage - even the extreme heat of Mick Rory's heat gun.

In order to banish a demon back to Hell, you need to know their true name.

Dialogue Triumphs

Astra: I'll bet you're the only one on this ship happy to see me.
John: Oh, nonsense. As far as this sorry lot is concerned, as soon as anyone stops trying to murder them on a weekly basis, they're best friends. 

(Sara has just revealed her visions of someone stabbing the Legends to death.)

Charlie: It's got to be Astra.

Ava: Charlie. would you stop with the Astra, thing?! She saved our lives in Hell, okay? I'm not going to just assume the worst. What, that she's some manipulative psychopath?
(Zari walks in.)
Zari: Well, she just tried to manipulate me into coming in here and begging Charlie to use the Loom again.

Ava: Okay, well, that's not a crime.
(Gary runs in holding the glass case that held the Loom Rings.)
Gary: Guys! The rings! They're gone!  I found this in the trash chute.
Ava: (sighs) Okay. That IS a crime.
Zari: Gidget? Play back internal monitoring of the parlor, please?

Gideon: My internal monitoring subsystems. I'm afraid we have a saboteur on-board. 

Ava: Okay. Now I'm assuming the worst.

(Lita looks around Mick's treasure vault.)

Lita: So I really dig the whole Scrooge McDuck aesthetic, but why not put your money in a bank?
Mick: A bank? Too easy to rob.

(Ava and Gary are searching for Gary Junior)

Ava: Where the Hell did you get him?
Gary: (hesitantly) I don't want to say.

Ava: Gary, my girlfriend's gone crazy and I'm looking for a dog to prove it. I'm beyond mad.

Gary: Fine.
Ava: Hmm?
Gary: I rescued him.
Ava: Oh.

Gary: ... from Hell.

Ava: You adopted a hell-hound?!

Gary: Well, when you say it like that...

(John and Sara run from the hell-hound)

Sara: What did you do?!
John: I told it to attack me. But at least I've got you to protect me.

Sara: John, I'm blind!

John: But you're not deaf.

(The hell-hound growls as it comes up behind Sara. It snarls menacingly as Sara tilts her head to one side. As the hell-hound charges and leaps to pounce, she shoves John down and does a perfect backwards somersault over him, catching the hell-bound with her foot and  sending it flying over her head to the ground.)

Continuity

Mick apologies to Lita for missing her soccer match as he was stuck in Hell. (510)

Mick got permission to take Lita for the weekend and has roller derby tickets. When that doesn't win her over and she says she has a history test to study for, he reveals the Waverider.

Mick says they could use the time machine to see Lita Ford and the Runaways, The Ramons or Black Sabbath play.

Astra is concerned that the rest of the Legends don't accept her. John points out that they recruit a lot of their former enemies and that they'll accept anyone as a friend who goes a week without trying to kill them.

Gary has rescued a dog, Gary Junior, who he has officially licensed as an emotional support animal.

Gary is seeing a therapist.

Gary Junior is not housebroken (or ship broken) yet.

Sara is still in a coma.

John and Astra want Astra's mother brought back to life first.

Zari and Nate want Behrad brought back first.

Ava wants Sara to be healed first.

Charlie decides to bring Behrad back first.

Charlie notes that the thread of Behrad's life is a tangled mess. She suspects this is due to his time traveling.

The Loom misfires and knocks out all power on the Waverider briefly. Gideon is fine, but the whole ship is running off of back-up power.

Charlie says she's never tried using the Loom of Fate without her sisters. She supposes it may take at least two immortals to use.

Astra says it probably takes three, since Lachesis intended for Astra to replace Charlie once they recovered the Loom of Fate.

Sara wakes up from her coma but is now blind.

Sara has a vision of Ava being dead, apparently stabbed to death, in  the fiery wreckage of the Waverider bridge.

Sara denies anything having happened despite Ava noting her reaction. She also refuses to rest since there's nobody left on the team who is as good at repairing the Waverider ad she is (She lists herself behind Jax, Ray, Rip, Professor Stein and Behrad, in that order.)

Sara meets Lita and takes her hand. She sees an image of Lita over Mick's dead body.

Astra goes to Zari and suggests that maybe the problem was Charlie needs to work up to something as complicated as Behrad's life and that maybe it would be easier to just prevent her mother's death with the Loom. The thing is, she doesn't want to suggest it herself, and wonders if Zari might be the one to suggest resurrecting Astra's mother first.

Lita's history test involves comparing and contrasting the American Declaration of Independence and he French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen. 

Mick gets Nate to help Lita study for her test while he takes care of making her favorite snack - Ants on a Log.

When John touch's Sara's chin while looking at her eyes, she has a vision of him lying dead with a knife in his chest.

John tells Sara that Astra is on the ship now.

Sara tells John to stay close to Astra.

The food replicator is not working, but the Waverider galley does have some pre-made food, which Mick tries to use to make Ants On A Log himself.

Gary sees something strange in one of the garbage disposal chutes as he is taking care of Gary Junior's leavings.

Charlie knows that Sara is hiding something, but doesn't know the details.

Sara finally admits that she's seeing people stabbed to death whenever she touches someone.

Zari tells everyone about Astra trying to manipulate her.

Gary reveals that someone stole the Loom Rings and threw away the case holding them.

Someone also sabotaged Gideon's internal cameras

Astra is locked in the brig, despite John pointing out that he was with Astra the whole time and that she'd have no idea how to sabotage Gideon.

Lita marched in an anti-gun rally.

Mick is revealed to be financing the Legends through his thefts.

John uses a tracking spell to try and find the ring thief. It leads him to the room where the wires that disabled the security system were unplugged, as Sara and Ava are trying to fix things.

Sara touches John's hand. This time she sees his killer reflected in the knife blade... and it is Sara.

Sara asks Ava and John to lock her up in the medical bay and not let her out, no matter what.

Mick has a sealed room in the Waverider that holds all of his wealth.

Part of Mick's collection includes Marie Antoinette's coin purse.

Lita suggests Mick investing his wealth when the New York Stock Exchange first opened, buying Manhattan in the 1500s, inventing BitCoin and other ways they might be able to use his stealing to become truly rich.

Zari hacks the back-up feed of the Waverider security camera. This reveals Charlie stealing the Loom rings and flushing them down the toilet of the one bathroom of the Waverider, Zari disabling the security system and Nate disabling the food replicator. 

Gary goes into the medbay and gives Gary Junior to Sara, thinking she needs the company more than he does right now.

As Sara touches Gary Junior, she hears him talking to her in English, commanding her to kill Gary and she does so, snapping his neck. This is quickly revealed to be a vision of the future. 

Sara tells Ava and John about Gary Junior being a demon of some kind. They are skeptical, but Ava agrees to search for Gary Junior (who ran off after Sara scared him) with Gary while John stays with Sara.

Zari, Nate and Charlie look at the security footage and realize Gary Junior was barking at them when they were doing all the things they don't remember doing.

Ava identifies Gary Junior as the Son of Sam's dog, recalling an episode of StabCast she did on the Son of Sam killings.

Gary Junior tries to mind control Nate into killing Zari and Charlie. He is thwarted when Gary uses his dog whistle.

Gary, Nate, Ava, Astra, Zari and Charlie take shelter inside the brig to get away from Gary Junior.

John has encountered hell-hounds before and recognizes what Gary Junior is when he sees him in his true form. 

Ava opens the brig only for Astra to lock everyone in an even tighter cell.

Lita locks herself in the library as the hell-hound starts traveling through the vents.

Sara gets the idea to use her visions to search the ship to find where Gary Junior kills someone next and head him off. This causes her to see the hell-hound killing Mick in the library.

Marchosias is the true name of the hell-hound. Astra gives this information to John, which he uses to banish it to Hell. 

Gary is forced to decontaminate the Waverider's septic tank and search for the rings as punishment for bringing a hell-hound on board the ship.

Gary adopts a new emotional support animal - a bunny he named Gary Junior II. He says he got him from a mysterious carnie who told him to never feed him past midnight. It's unclear if he's joking or not.

Mick writes out a speech about what he was trying to tell Lita but she get it;  he doesn't want her to suffer the same ways he did by becoming a criminal, even if he is good at it.

Lita calls Mick "Dad" for the first time.

Zari tries to befriend Astra. Astra blows her off but tells her she gets points for trying.

Gideon runs a full diagnostic on Sara and doesn't find any abnormalities in her eyes. She says there's nothing she can do to return Sara' s sight.

Location

Central City - 2020

The Bottom Line

Get past the conceit that even Gary is as stupid as depicted here and this is an uproariously funny filler episode which also does a fair job of setting up Sara's new superpower and introducing Astra to the team. 

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 10 - The Great British Fake Off

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Charlie notices there's something odd about Sara following her shrugging-off a god's death-stare. Meanwhile, Ava, Gary and Mick take a trip to Hell, as Constantine and Zari get trapped in a 1910 boarding house with an army of Encores while searching for the third and final piece of the Loom of Fate.

Influences

The Great British Bake Off (title), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men's Chest (Black Caesar's compass) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (the enchantment that keeps something from being found by someone actively looking for it) and the original Hellblazer comics.

Performances

The interplay between Matt Ryan and Tala Ashe as Constantine and Zari is the high point of the episode. Much as I normally loathe these "will they/won't they" romances, this one works. And continues the fine tradition of John's bad romances with women whose name start with Z.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

This episode introduces the Arrowverse version of The Enchantress. First appearing in Strange Adventures #187 (April 1966), The Enchantress was the spirit of a witch who took possession of artist June Moone whenever she said the word "Enchantress." Originally a hero, she later appeared in Supergirl as a villain and was numbered among the villains during Crisis on Infinite Earths. John Ostrander later explained the discrepancy in Suicide Squad by revealing The Enchantress to be a succubus bound into the service of good rather than a personification of June's repressed magical power. The current Enchantress origin in the New 52 reality has June Moone and the Enchantress being separate entities bound together like Billy Batson and Captain Marvel.

The Arrowverse version of The Enchantress requires a host and, according to Charlie, seems to favor bonding herself to artists. In Ancient Egypt, she is bonded to a musician. In 1910 England, she is bonded to an older woman who runs a boarding house. This version of the Enchantress is decidedly more benevolent than her comic book counterpart, seemingly helping the Legends out, even if it does benefit her to do so and the end of the episode implies she has her own scheme playing out.

Jack the Ripper, in this episode, is identified as a man named Dr. White. There are many theories as to the identity of Jack the Ripper but some theorists believe that he had to have medical training to be as efficient in cutting as he was. 

Reference is made to a demon called The Norfulthing, who tortured Henry VIII in Hell. The Norfulthing first appeared in Hellblazer #11 and was the demon Astra Logue accidentally summoned to Earth to defend her from her father's friends during a magical orgy. Described by John Constantine as a primordial fear elemental, the Norfulthing.is a destructive creature of pure id that's first instinct is to rape any physical being it encounters and destroy everything else it encounters. Though seemingly slain by the demon Negral (who John summoned hoping to use a stronger demon to drive away the weaker one), it survived as a spirit and haunted the building where the Casanova Club once stood until John Constantine could bind it again. 

Technobabble/Arcana

John knows a summoning spell that can be boosted by drawing off the auras of other people, though it isn't safe to do this.

While Sara is in a coma, Gideon determines that there is unusual activity in her striatium - the portion of the brain that, among other functions, controls the perception of time.

Opening a portal to Hell requires the wizard working the spell to drink demon blood. According to Gary, it tastes tangy.

The spell Gary works is timed to automatically teleport him out of Hell after four hours. Unfortunately, everyone else he took into Hell in the first place has to be touching him in order to leave with him.

John knows a spell to put the target to sleep. He uses this on Jack the Ripper to stop him from struggling while tied up and shoved in a closet. 

Dialogue Triumphs

Zari: I met the other me.
Nate: Really?  How - how is she?
Zari: She's great. Tough. Cool. You must have a thing for warrior women.

Nate: Only if they're from another time period and eventually will leave me, sure.

(The Legends are gathered around a summoning circle.)
John: All right you lot, listen up! Our Lachesis' ring could be anywhere in space and time. I'm going to need to borrow a little bit of magical energy off you lot to help amplify the summoning spell.
Nate: Exactly how does that work?
John: It's easy. All you need to do is keep your mouths shut and let me use your auras like batteries.
Ava: Is this safe? It doesn't sound safe.
John: (quickly) It isn't. Any more questions? Good. Let's hold hands.

Charlie: Mick! I thought you were taking some time off to hang out with your kid?

Mick: She told me to go to Hell. Where are we heading?

Gary: The portal to Hell is ready, Captain.

John: Look, I can't look after you and figure out what Astra's up to at the same time. 

Zari: (holding up the wrist with the Air totem bracelet) This might be Behrad's totem, but there is a little warrior me inside here from a different timeline and she's gonna protect me. 

John: ...I don't even know what to say to that.

(Astra had just discovered all her soul coins have been stolen.)
Astra: At least the most valuable one is still...

(Astra reaches down and looks at the necklace she made of John Constantine's soul coin. Her eyes widen in disgust.)
Astra: Who the hell Vandal Savage?! 

Gary: Oh, I actually know that one. 

Zari: So you're just gonna accept failure when we're this close? I'm not giving up. 

John: Oh, I don't see it as giving up, so much as, uh, accepting reality. I know myself. I'm a ripe old mix of, uh, guilt and torment. If the Loom of Fate offers me even one glimmer of hope of redemption for all my past sins, particularly Astra, then, uh, I'll never not be thinking about it.

Zari: You know, it's funny, I'm usually an expert at getting things out of my head. Boyfriend cheating on me with my assistant/best friend? No time to cry, I have a fall fashion line to plan. Overhearing my mother tell a friend she's embarrassed her daughter is so shallow and self-absorbed? Definitely can't process that. I will check my CatChat analytics.But my baby brother dying because he was trying to protect me? There's nothing that can get that out of my head. I was wearing the totem when he died. If I hadn't been, then maybe he... maybe he would've had a chance. 

John: (takes the seat next to Zari) Now, look, you can take it from an expert. (sighs ) Nothing good ever comes from beating yourself up, love. 

Zari: (smirking) Don't try to make me feel better.

Continuity

Charlie tells the other Legends about Lachesis. She describes Lachesis as the leader of the Fates and her older sister. 

Charlie also tells the other Legends about how she entrusted the final part of the Loom of Fate to the Enchantress in Ancient Egypt, telling her to hide it so not even Charlie could find it again. Enchantress agreed to help on the grounds that humanity needed the shake-up.

Zari tells Nate about how she met her Pre-Crisis self in 509.

Sara begins seeing things before they happen. First seeing her hands move to pour her a drink before she does it. Next, seeing Ava breaking the circle during John's ritual to run to Sara when she passes out.

Charlie fears there will be side effects from Sara shrugging off Atropos' death gaze. Sara lies and says she is fine.

John works a summoning spell to bring the final Loom ring to them at his house. The spell is botched, however, and John binds the ring to the house but isn't able to anchor it in time. This causes him and Zari to be taken to where the ring is in the past.

Sara passes out and lapses into a coma during the summoning ritual. This triggers it botching after Ava breaks the circle to check on Sara.

Zari and John wind up in John's house in the year 1910, when it was a boarding house run by a woman named Mrs. Hughes. They pose as an engaged couple in order to get a room together.

At the same time, another guest checks into the boarding house - a man in Victorian dress named Dr. White. He is later revealed to be Jack The Ripper.

Zari says she was worth $500 million by the time she was 15 and the New York Times called her the most influential influencer of her generation.

John tracks the Loom ring into Dr. White's room. Zari agrees to pose as a patient and distract him while John searches the room. John figures out that he is Jack The Ripper based on his gear and how he tries to kill Zari with a surgeon's scalpel.

The Prognosticator detects all the Encores moving through time and space to converge on a single location. Unfortunately, it crashes before it can determine what that location is. 

When the Prognosticator breaks, Ava decides to go directly to Hell and confront Astra.

John says something is interfering with his magic to keep him from finding the ring.

Another group of guests arrive at the boarding house, led by a man named Clyde Barrow, who is with a woman named Bonnie. This is, of course, the famous robbers Bonnie and Clyde.

Ava puts Charlie and Nate in charge of fixing the Prognosticator, even as they point out that neither of them is really a technical expert.

Gary knows how to work John's "portal to Hell" spell in theory. 

Ava takes Mick and Gary with her to Hell. Mick because she needs some extra muscle. Gary because he's the only wizard she has handy.

Mick is able to locate Astra's club by threatening a random demon on the street.

John realizes that he never told Astra about the Loom of Fate but she must have learned about it somehow to be sending all the Encores after the piece after Zari says it would be overkill to send that many people just to kill John.

John decides to pose as Jack the Ripper to learn what the Encores are up to.

While in Hell, Bonnie and Clyde were personally tortured by Manaxos The Mutilator - a fairly famous demon, by all accounts.

Henry VIII was tortured by the Norfulthing.

The rest of the party includes the notorious pirate Black Ceasar and Roman general Marcus Junius Brutus.

Astra claims to have nothing to do with the Encores currently rampaging on Earth.

Clyde kills Henry VIII.

Zari crashes the dinner gathering dressed as Cleopatra.

Zari, as Cleopatra, convinces the rest of the Encores to work together rather than fight over who gets the ring, even though whoever brings the ring to Lachesis is promised free reign on Earth.

Astra discovers all her soul coins have been removed from her safe. 

Astra's accountant, a demon named Tiberius, is the only other one with access to her safe. He claims Astra told him to remove her coins from the vault last week.

Astra also discovers that her necklace, with John Constantine's soul coin, was replaced with the soul coin of Vandal Savage.

Bonnie kills Brutus. 

Astra pretends to lead Ava to Lachesis, only to hand her over to her own followers and stealing Genghis Khan's sword for herself. 

Black Caesar has a compass that enables him to find whatever treasure he seeks. 

Clyde kills Black Ceasar.

Mick has an appointment to watch Lita play soccer. 

After Zari says that it's like the ring doesn't want to be found, John hits upon the idea that the ring is enchanted to so that anyone who is actively looking for it can't see it. His solution is to get so drunk he doesn't care about anything and then he'll be able to find the ring.

Astra meets Atropos.

Lachesis offers to make Astra the third Fate so they can use the Loom of Fate once they recover it.

Astra agrees to join the Fates, but asks for John Constantine's soul coin. Lachesis agrees.

Bonnie and Clyde discover Jack The Ripper tied up on a closet. He tells them that the "Jack" they met is John Constantine. 

John Constantine's reputation in Hell is such that Bonnie and Clyde have heard of him. 

John sends Zari into a hidden room, promising to hold off the Encores.

Gary tells Ava that she's the best boss he ever had. Of course she is the only boss he ever had.

Astra frees Ava, Mick and Gary, figuring that if John doesn't come through Lachesis will.  When she mentions Lachesis' name, Ava asks Astra to come with them and work to find the Loom directly.

Nate tells Charlie that Amaya did channel an animal once while they were making love. He does not get the chance to tell her which one, however.

Astra is able to use the Air Totem - first to knock Clyde back onto Jack the Ripper's scalpel, then to defect a bullet fired by Bonnie, which ricochets back to hit her. 

Zari and John almost kiss, but then John spots the Loom ring on a side table.

Ava and Nate arrive to save them but find that all the Encores are dead.

Nate, Ava and Zari start gathering up the dropped Hell weapons.

John recognizes the Enchantress through her disguise as Mrs. Hughes. He says he thought she wasn't allowed to interfere any more but she plays dumb.  Later, once John has left, she changes into her true form, and says she'll be seeing John around.

It is revealed that they used John's soul coin to find him since the Prognosticator was broken..

Location

Ancient Egypt
Northumberland County, UK - 2020

Northumberland County, UK - 1910

Hell

The Bottom Line

An enjoyable fit of filler which allows two of the ensemble's more solid performance a chance to play off of each other in a way they haven't had the chance to before. The final twist also puts an interesting spin on the season so far.

Legends of Tomorrow: Season 5, Episode 9 - Zari, Not Zari

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Sara, Constantine and Charlie wind up in British Columbia as they track the next piece of the Loom of Fate. Meanwhile, Zari heads into to a meditative retreat to deal with the odd feelings that she isn't quite herself that have persisted since she came aboard the Waverider, as Ava and Mick go on a trip through time to try and improve Mick's relationship with his daughter and reinsert Mick into the most important moments of her life.


Influences

Supernatural, Greek Mythology (legend of the Fates and their loom), Back To The Future Part 2 (Behrad's explaining the two Zaris with a blackboard of the timeline) and Doctor Who (the scenes of the two Zaris talking are reminiscent of the various versions of The Doctor teaming up.)


Goofs

It's highly unlikely, even for the sake of appearances, that a bag full of real weapons would be left on the set of Supernatural.

Performances

Tala Ashe sparkles as the two Zaris and her final scene with John shows the fire of the first version of the character in the second. Until that point, however, it's almost impossible to believe that both characters are played by the same actress.

Artistry

The fight in which Sara and Atropos duel with John Constantine scrambling around on the forest floor between them looking for spell components is a laugh riot and well blocked.

The scene in which Zari learns Behrad is dead and everyone fades around her, leaving her alone with him, is artfully shot and a beautiful symbolic representation of depression in the face of a loved one's passing.

Trivia Of Tomorrow

This was the first episode to feature a modified version of the original theme teaser. This one lacks Ray Palmer and Nora Darkh (since they left the show in the last episode) but does include Gideon in both her normal "head" mode and her alternate human self from the Sirens of Space-Time reality.

The mask of Tatsu Yamashiro (aka Katana) is in the study on the Waverider.

Technobabble/Arcana

Seeing the true divine form of a god will kill a mortal under normal circumstances, causing them to burn from the inside out.

John works a scrying spell that allows him to track the next Loom piece to Vancouver, using the first Loom piece, a pendant and a globe.

The Coin Maker is revealed to be Lachesis, the Fate responsible for measuring out the length of a person's life.

Lachesis can track John Constantine anywhere in time and space through his soul coin.

Charlie confirms that thanks to John's spell, she is now wholly mortal, despite having regained her shape-shifting powers.

The Fates are able to psychically sense one another's physical presence and can communicate telepathically. This allows Charlie to tell that Atropos is nearby. This sense does not allow for pinpoint precision, however, as Atropos demands to know where Charlie is, indicating she is having to track her through the woods using mundane means.

Behrad theorizes that the future was changed by building Heyworld, which caused a bifurcation of the timeline at that point. In short, there was a historical traffic accident, and the current Zari is the dent in the otherwise functional car.

What Zari describes as a haunting is more properly called a temporal echo. The version of Zari who existed before the Heyworld incident still exists on some level inside the current Zari. 

John casts a spell that requires hemlock, a toadstool and the blood of Atropos. This spell is later revealed to be some kind of ward which protects John from the effects of being stabbed by two god-weapons.

The power of the Loom piece Charlie hid in Vancouver corrupts the land around it. This results in blighted land, people having the life sucked from them and then rising from the dead as zombies. 

Atropos has the power to tell if people are related or connected in some way by looking at them.

Dialogue Triumphs

Charlie: It doesn't have to be a Walk of Shame if you enjoyed it. But if you are walking at all, you didn't enjoy it enough.

Zari: Behrad, I don't know how to play video games! But it's like I'm being haunted by someone who does. Someone who dresses like a teenage boy and makes me do awful things like eat donuts and (shudders) cuddle with Nate!

Ali: (just before Ava takes her and Mick's picture with baby Lita) Wait a minute! Did you break into my house?!

(After Lita rejects Mick's picture album and him once again.)

Ava: I think it's time that you go back in there and do what we should have done from the beginning.

Mick: Go back and kick myself in the-?
Ava: No! (softer) No. Just go tell her you're sorry. 

(Sara looks at one of the dead, desiccated bodies near where the Loom piece was hidden. They are wearing a Supernatural Crew jacket.)

Sara: Oh, it's the crew!
(Sara seems unusually upset about this, for someone who is not used to dealing with dead bodies.)
Sara: Wait, if they're dead, who is shooting Season 15?

Original Zari: Wow. New me came out shockingly self-absorbed.

New Zari: Hey, do carbs count if you eat them in a totem?

Original Zari: No.
(New Zari grabs one of the donuts on the table and daintily bites into it.)

(New Zari asks why the Original Zari doesn't consider her a disappointment.)

New Zari: I mean, you were a superhero who wielded a totem and saved the world. Twice. I'm just a failed Cat-Chat celebrity.
Original Zari: My family's alive. And you... you actually seem like a lot of fun. I'm good with that. 

(Zari demands that John help her save her brother.)
John: We're being hunted by a pair of bloody gods. This situation just got a hell of a lot more dicey.
Zari: I can held dicey! 

(Zari steels herself and fits John with a stare. You can hear the steel in her voice and for one of the few times in his life, John Constantine actually looks afraid as she speaks.)
Zari: I can handle whatever it takes to save my brother. And until you bring him back, I am with you every minute of every damn day. 
(John just nods weakly, not saying a word, stunned silent for once.)

Continuity

The episode opens shortly after the events of 403 and we see Charlie's old bandmates from The Smell.

The Smell have a song called "Assassination Nation."

All of The Smell, and their audience at Covent Garden, were killed by a knife wielding goddess whose true form caused one mortal's head to catch on fire. This is later revealed to be Atropos, the third of the three Fates, and the one responsible for ending lives.

Nate has a plush Beebo and Heyworld posters and banners in his bedroom, along with Scoots McGoots from 506.

Zari reportedly sleepwalked into Nate's bedroom at 2:30 AM. 

When Gideon tried to intervene, Zari hacked her while sleep-walking and somehow added in a Snooze Button function, that left Gidoen inactive for several hours.

Nate's sheets are 200 thread count cotton. Zari has the ability to tell this just by looking at them.

Mick leaves the ship through a Time Corridor to go visit his daughter, taking a teddy bear with him.

Gideon informs Charlie that the timeline was changed so that her old bandmates in The Smell died violently. 

Charlie figures out her sister was responsible based on the details of how The Smell died. 

John takes the jump-ship to go to Vancouver on his own.

Atropos meets with The Coin Maker in Hell, who addresses her as "Sis."

Atropos addresses The Coin Maker as Lachesis in response. Lachesis was the third Fate of Greek mythology.

Sara and Charlie use the Time Corridor to follow John to Vancouver.

Mick returns with the head ripped off the teddy bear he had earlier. This prompts Ava to go help him with his issues.

Ava suggests they can have Mick show up at key points in Lita's life to improve her memories of him. 

Mick spent the first 10 years of Lita's life in prison. Ava agrees to pose as his parole officer to sell the idea he's getting time-off to see his daughter.

The show Supernatural exists in the Arrowverse and Sara is a fan of it.

Sara has permission from Ava to cheat on her with the actor who plays Dean Winchester, if it ever comes up. (i.e. "a hall pass.")

Charlie was not allowed to drink on the job when she was a Fate.

Zari hallucinates a cat on the Waverider, which resembles the cat Pre-Crisis Zari was turned into in 408.

Zari attended the 2044 Grammy's and got excited about the hologram of Tupac Shakur that performed.

Zari retains her old self's talent for playing video games, beating Behrad on the first try at Mortal Kombat.

Zari is somehow able to activate the Air Totem without touching it.

Atropos blows up the Jump Ship. This also takes out the Waverider Coms, leaving Sara unable to call Ava for backup.

Mick is waiting for Ali when she comes home from the hospital with Lita in 2004, having just assembled a crib for her. The crib came from Victoria England.

Mick reads Lita one of his Rebecca Silver books in 2007.

In 2009, Lita loses her first tooth. This leads Mick to tell her about the Tooth Fairy and him leaving a wad of $100 bills under her pillow.

In 2011, Mick teaches Lita how to play soccer and takes a picture of her with her first trophy.

In 2012, Mick takes Lita out trick-or-treating. He wears his original Heatwave costume. She dresses as Captain Cold.

In 2013, Mick helps Lita with her science project. Suffice it to say her volcano produces an impressive flame that sets off the smoke alarm.

In 2018, Mick was there when Lita went to her first Homecoming dance... holding Lita's date at heat-gun point.

Charlie defends her destroying the loom, saying humanity has done good things with free will, like give women the right to vote and punk rock.

Atropos points out humanity also created nuclear weapons, systematic incarceration, mass genocide and pollution with the same free will.

John holds Atropos at bay while Sara and Charlie escape.

Atropos, disguised as John, joins Sara and Charlie, leaving John for dead, bleeding on the forest floor.

Behrad suggests that Zari can get her head together by taking a "Totem Quest"  and using Lyoga root to journey inside the Air Totem and speak with their ancestors. This was first done in 303.

Mick gives Lita a photo album of all the pictures Ava had been taking. She gives it back to him, pointing out that he's been out of prison since 2015 and there was nothing stopping him from being a more active part of her life during that time.

Lita never actually went to her first Homecoming, having gone inside to get her purse after taking the picture with Mick and her date and finding he had already left.

Mick decides to apologize to Lita and quit trying to find a short cut to make things right.

The area around the second Loom piece is blighted and the Supernatural crew members around it dead.

Zari meets her past self in the Air Totem ancestral realm instead of her ancestors.

Pre-Crisis Zari confirms that she has been in the Totem realm ever since the Heywood incident. She's also unaware of what has been going on in the new timeline.

Post-Crisis Zari tells Pre-Crisis Zari that Behrad became a Legend instead of her and that their parents are alive in the new timeline.

There are no video games in the Totem realm, but Zari does get all the donuts she wants and the carbs don't count.

Sara stares down Atropos as she reveals her divine form. She is somehow able to survive this.

Post-Crisis Zari tells Pre-Crisis Zari that she and Nate aren't together and it would be weird since he's Behrad's best friend in the new timeline.

Atropos goes onto the Waverider after Ava and Nate leave to find the rest of the team.

Atropos kills Behrad, cutting the thread of his lifeline, saying he is not supposed to exist, as he protects Zari.

John is revealed to have worked a spell that kept him from dying after Atropos stabbed him and replaced him.

Everyone returns to the ship just in time to see Behrad die.

Sara goes after Atropos with Genghis Khan's sword and fights her in the Waverider loading bay.

Charlie ultimately recovers the two Loom pieces by cutting off the hand Atropos is wearing the golden rings on, as what is left of Atropos is swept into the Temporal Zone.

New Zari promises to being Behrad into the totem to meet the original Zari at some point in the future.

Zari bullies John into agreeing to help her use the Loom of Fate to save her brother's life.

Location

London, England - 1977 - Three days after Charlie joined The Legends.

Hell 
The woods outside Vancouver, British Columbia - 2020
Central City - 2004

Central City - 2007
Central City - 2009
Central City - 2011
Central City - 2012
Central City - 2013
Central City - 2018
Central City - 2020

The Bottom Line

A solid episode, though the Supernatural jokes don't quite land as hard as they should and there seems little point to using the set. Doubtlessly those clamoring for a Constatnine/Winchester Brothers team-up will be disappointed and we should have at least gotten Castiel to show up long enough to say "Nice coat." to John before John told him to piss off or some such. Still, even by-the-numbers Legends is enjoyable and the scenes with the two Zaris are magic and more than make up for everything else being merely okay.