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What did you think?
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510 - Great0%290%080%270%160%050%040%030%020%01 - Bad0%0 -
This wasn't one of the better ones for so many reasons, but two things i noticed, both concerning the atom;
1) he has a twin brother? Have we ever heard about him before? And when did he take over palmertech/ smoak industries??
2) after fighting the robots and getting zapped, he plummets to the ground, and gets up almost immediately. Not stunned, no broken bones, nada. That's some super suit. Not a scratch on it. No wonder they made the robots based on his tech. -
The theme of tonight’s episode was parenthood, and in particular fatherhood. Rip Hunter wishes to save his son, Jonas, as well as his wife. Ray Palmer discovers he may have given birth to a corporation that helps Savage conquer the world. Kendra Saunders recovers memories of when she and Carter were the Boardmans with their son, Aldus. The episode explores not only how far they are all willing to go, but where they will draw the line, and that ends up coming from the most unlikely of sources: Mick Rory. As the fire-obsessed maniac turned temporal bounty hunter says, killing a kid (in this case the 2100s version of Adolf Hitler, Per Degaton) isn’t very heroic.
Generally, the episodes for “Legends of Tomorrow” are well put together. But for this particular episode, I just did not feel any need to include those flashbacks to Kendra and Carter's past life where they had Aldus. I felt those were just kind of ‘there’ to fill up space.
Rip’s moral struggle is one that people in our own time would face if they were given the chance to deal with Adolf Hitler as a boy. Do we do this one, horrible thing to save millions? Do we have the right to do it? It also taught a specific lesson which I think Team Legends, both the current one and any additions they have in Season 2, will have to take to heart: the time table for what happened in Rip’s future moved up by five years as Per Degaton killed his father as a young boy rather than at a point where he was nearly a man.
Ray Palmer finds himself worried that he might have left a child behind who would turn his company towards being more of a defense contractor, something Ray is clearly against if the way he reacts is any indication. The disturbing fact that his suit would be later used as the basis for the robotic police force of the future and later used by Savage clearly affects him and I wouldn’t be surprised if we later see him make a vow similar to that of Doc Brown, that he will destroy his invention (the Atom Suit) rather than allow its technology to be perverted by Savage. I think he was a bit relieved (albeit briefly) when he discovered it wasn’t him who birthed the line of Palmers who would allow Savage to pervert their technology, but rather his “stupid brother”, Sydney. I guess for once not having an impact on the timeline is something Ray is fine with.
The Firestorm duo were just kind of ‘there’ this episode.
Now, I think the best subplot of the episode (and honestly the more interesting storyline for it, above even the whole moral dilemma of whether to kill young Per Degaton) was the one between Snart and Rory, which Sara was involved in since those three have had a nice dynamic since the beginning of the series. Sara getting Rory’s input on the whole situation with Per Degaton was a nice little conversation, and I loved how she told Snart to basically grow a pair and face Rory instead of sitting on his ass. Snart and Rory’s fight, at which point Rory seems to have turned back to being more a part of the team, was a nice touch and showed just how those two bond. It is unsurprisingly through violence.
Now, I initially wondered if the episode would end with Rip taking Sara aside and informing her that Laurel had been killed, but I realized that this would be, in Rip’s eyes, a distraction from their goal, so I honestly don’t expect to see those who worked with Team Arrow learn about Laurel’s death until the finale, since one assumes Sara would go to her sister’s grave in the episode she learns about her death.
All in all this was a very good episode. However, the flashbacks only served as a bit of fuel for the whole romantic storyline between Kendra and Ray, and honestly didn’t serve a purpose for the overall story of the season. Since I have a harsh view of letting romantic subplots take too much time (and this is certainly a case of that), I’ll dock it two points.
I give this episode an 8/10 rating.Comment
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The impression I had when it was all over was "meh". Not a particularly strong episode, I'm afraid. Besides the scenes with Rory, it was fairly average. The Per Degaton arc dealt with a theme we've already seen countless times on the Arrowverse (kill or don't kill for the greater good) and in the end it accomplished nothing but speed up the end of the world. I understand that in this show our heroes will try and fail over and over until they stop Savage, but in this instance they actually made it worse.
As for Ray and Kendra, what else is there to say? Pointless. I actually thought they were setting up a potential breakup, but it ended up being a huge waste of time. I don't understand the point in having a romantic arc in the middle of this show. It certainly hasn't helped LoT ratings wise. On the contrary...Comment
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I give it a 5/10 rating... I had to knock off points because I kept on wondering why they just didn't show Per Dagaton the recordings of the future.
I mean think about it... If I wanted to convince some future Hitler that Vandal Savage was not to be trusted, then I would do the following:
1) Show him videos where Savage rises in power, using him as an pawn.
2) and if that didn't convince him, take him though time to the future in order to show him his grave, etc. Show him that you're a time traveller who does know what you're talking about.
In other words, the guys here didn't really play it smart at all... it was like they were deliberately being stupid for plot reasons. If anything their stupidity was shown to cement things even more.Comment
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That would work too.Comment
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Yes, because Kendra wants to live in an age where she's seen as a third-class citizen for being a woman and colored. Take into account the character herself....Comment
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In the comics they both have to die before they can be reborn, that's how they keep the same age span. At some point she has to return to the present, live out her life and die, then they both can be reborn. That wouldn't stop this Kendra from running into a future Carter.Comment
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One problem still is that they've established that the timeline corrects itself if needed and, more importantly, what they do doesn't truly influence the timeline, or if it does its actually organic and not faux-organic like most of Guggenheim's troll-style storytelling. We always knew that Ra's distrusted Sara, but we didn't know why and so they gave us plenty of differing reasons throughout the second and third seasons, including bigotry ("What do you think he would do to the degenerate that would dare steal his daughter's heart!?" - Malcolm to Nyssa, Arrow 3x04, "The Magician").Then they give us a definitive reason: Ra's intuited from Sara's words (that she had come to his doorstep for the second time in her life hoping to find a home, somewhere she belonged) that she had left the League in the future and as a result, he would see this as having not been "truly loyal" to them. He would not know that in the future Sara came from, she was released through death and when she was finally reborn, someone unworthy would wear the Ring, and that his daughter Talia would be either dead or elsewhere, and his daughter yet to be born would have been imprisoned.
The attempt to change the fate of Snart's father did not work and he still ended up in prison, though for trying to sell the precious item.
Rip's attempt to reach Per Degaton in this episode failed and, in fact, caused an acceleration of Per Degaton's rule by five years.
Finally, Aldus very clearly never grew up under either of his parents post age 10. I highly doubt they will have that sort of change in the timeline occur without it being corrected quickly.Comment
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Ok, that's an answer that I can get behind. A mom unwilling to look after her son because it would be inconvenient, or because she would face bigotry just seems unlikely to me. Time it's self stopping Kendra works for me, they could even correct her attempt by having Savage kill her off, thus triggering the rebirth cycle of both hawks.Comment
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