Kyle’s Thoughts

Okay. Part of my delay with our weekly Legends of Tomorrow comes from the big snow storm knocking down my cable/internet for an extended time period. The other part for my delay is that I can’t find too many good things to say about the series besides they continue to push the special effects capabilities of a CW show as far as they will go. There were moments when I forgot this was a TV show instead of major motion picture. But there’s not much to like about the story. Since this is the second part of the pilot, I’ll cover some ground covered in the previous week’s review; both parts make up the full vision of the show’s inaugural episode.

Let’s start with characters. They didn’t have time to develop before the show or during the show, disappeared and then suddenly reappeared in contrived ways, or they grated on my nerves during the Arrow and/or Flash. The motivation for these individuals to make something of themselves rings hollow except for Dr. Stein and Ray Palmer. Everyone else on this roster either wouldn’t care (thieves want to die fat and happy, not leave their mark), shouldn’t want to be well-known (the best assassins are anonymous), or they’re Hawkpeople and they want revenge on Vandal Savage, and that’s another good—if not generic—motivator.

We’re supposed to believe that this incompetent group of heroes—I’m sorry, legends—will prevent the world from going to heck. They got manhandled by Chronos in the first episode. How are they supposed to be a threat to Savage if they can’t (as a combined team) deal with a random, solo bounty hunter? It’s one thing to lose. It’s another to lose by 30 points at home, when the visiting team is resting half their starters. Unfortunately, the legends didn’t pull their heads out of their hind quarters in the pilot’s second half.

Stein all but tells his younger self who he is and destroys his timeline in the process (only to have Rip Hunter restore it). The two thieves are sent out on a burglary mission, which makes senses, but Atom’s shocked when they grab more loot than the mission tells them to. Again, they’re thieves. Rip cites the Butterfly Effect (if you do so much as kill a butterfly in the past, you could change time irrevocably) and then the group turns Captain Caveman on the black arms market, complete with a nuclear explosion. That’s even before Atom leaves a parting gift, a piece of future tech fell off his super suit, for Savage and his vandals, which hastens mankind’s demise. They put out the fire Palmer started and go after Savage, and that’s where we get to Hawkman and Hawkgirl.

Hawkgirl is the key because she knows what the inscription on the dagger (that can kill Savage) says. The only problem with this logic is that when Hawkgirl accesses her memory of what the dagger says, she doesn’t read it to herself, she recites the poem on the dagger to Hawkman. Why doesn’t Hawkman have this memory? I thought two Hawks were one too many and (Spoiler) Legends agrees. Hawkman dies in the pilot’s second part, after he plunges Hawkgirl’s dagger into Savage’s chest and then Savage returns the favor. As he delivers the killing blow, Savage tells Hawkman that he should’ve know that he can’t use Hawkgirl’s dagger, and I agree with him. Hawkman should’ve known not to use Hawkgirl’s dagger. For being the one of the two Hawks who had the most clear recollection of their past, he knew shockingly few details. And that’s where Legends falls flat: the details.

I might be able to get over Hawkman’s death as a plot device to galvanize the team, even though the bulk of the team doesn’t know him from Atom. I may even be able to forget that Legends pulled the same plot device in the pilot’s first part with Hawkman and Hawkgirl’s son, but Legends of Tomorrow concerns itself too much with its beautiful CGI to bother with things like characters and story. I hope this was opening show jitters, and Legends rights the ship soon.

There were plenty of secrets in Legends of Tomorrow. Warp to our Legends of Tomorrow secrets page.