Legends of Tomorrow: Progeny

Well, at least I loved the clothes

"No litter, no street crime, no smog. How soon can we leave?"

Let's kill Hitler!

I found this episode frustrating. Rip said they had to kill Per Degaton because he's going to cause the end of the world, except that Per is still a kid and they can't kill him because heroes don't do that. And then they somehow made the end of the world even worse.

The thing is, Rip's realization that he couldn't kill a child, even a future king Joffrey and even to save his own child, wasn't exactly a big surprise or anything. If Rip was capable of doing such a thing, he wouldn't be hero material, which everyone, even Mick, pointed out. It was an ill conceived and ultimately botched plan. So what was the point?

Vandal Savage continued to underwhelm me, too. He's squarely in the mustache-twirling category of villain. The kid, Per Degaton, actually wasn't bad; he was a good enough actor that it was clear from nearly the beginning that he was a total bad seed. He had such an evil-sounding name, too. What do potential evil dictators do when they're born with a name like, say, Oswald Cobblepot? Do they quietly change it before they start their evil careers, or give up in frustration? Okay, so they come up with a cool nickname, but you know what I mean.

The "lost child" theme continued with Ray's realization that he'd left a child behind to found an evil robotics company. I was confused about that one, too. Did Ray have a girlfriend back then that we didn't know about? The timing with Felicity wouldn't have worked, would it? Am I forgetting an Arrow character? Help me out, guys.

This "omigod, they've turned my ATOM suit into a race of RoboCops" story thread gave us a few fun things, though: (1) Jewel Staite from Firefly as Ray's great great great great grandniece Dr. Brice, who unlike Per Degaton, turned out to be a good guy; (2) Ray introducing himself as Dr. Hannibal Lecter, which made me laugh out loud; and (3) discovering that Ray has an opportunistic brother named Sidney who looks a lot like Ray. That came out of left field, because I'm pretty sure Ray has never mentioned a brother before.

Since she would be sensed by Vandal Savage, Kendra had to wait out most of the mission on the ship. She used her time to continue with the "lost child" theme and have flashbacks to her life in the 1920s with Carter and their son, future professor Aldus Boardman. At least they didn't do what I thought they would with this one: Ray and Kendra didn't break up. Not yet, anyway. I get the feeling that some version of Carter will be showing up soon, though.

The most interesting exploration of couple issues and the possibility of change turned out to be Leonard Snart and Mick Rory, of course. Sara, who seems to be able to get through to Snart, told him to "stop being an ass and go deal with" Mick, and he did -- even if it was just with his fists. More accurately, Snart did some deliberate penance by letting Mick stomp all over him. And now Mick is sorta kinda back on the team because of a brand new common enemy: inhuman mercenaries called "the Hunters." Because our guys needed another serious problem.

Honestly, I'm glad that Mick is back. I missed him. And I'm glad that Kendra and Ray didn't break up already. But our team of Legends managed to bring on Per Degaton's reign and the release of the deadly virus five years earlier than before. This week's mission was a blazing failure, and I was disappointed. Especially after last week's episode, "Left Behind", which was probably their best so far.

Everybody remember where we parked:

-- This week: 2147, the Kasnia Conglomerate. Where was it? The map had Turkey on one side and Italy on the other, which would make "Kasnia" the countries of eastern Europe. I think.

-- Apparently, corporations took over the government in 2080. I don't know why they didn't just make it 2077 so that it would be a clear homage to Continuum.

-- In his role as royal tutor, Vandal told Per only half the story of Oedipus Rex. He left out some pretty important points.

-- Mick was imprisoned in the "Vanishing Point" where time doesn't seem to move and eons can pass.

-- It was nice to see Jewel Staite again, but didn't the producers even consider her cancellation curse? Maybe they did it because Legends has already gotten a second season, like every other show on the CW.

-- Jax always seems to mention the clothes, doesn't he? I really did like the understated futuristic gray and navy wardrobe.

-- Apparently, Gideon can monitor dreams. That would make me terribly uncomfortable.

-- In the 1920s flashback, Kendra got stuck with an absolutely terrible wig. I don't have anything eloquent to say about that, except that during the flashback scenes, all I could think of was, wig!

Quotes:

Ray: "Great. We've gone from infanticide to child abduction. Progress."

Stein: "Thank you for showing us around, Dr. Brice."
Dr. Brice: "It's my pleasure. We don't get very many visitors from Central City ever since the S.T.A.R. Labs Corporation took it over."

Ray: "I can't believe it. I'm like the Werner von Braun of robots."

Ray: "We don't need weapons."
Stein: "He's right. We have superpowers."
I don't know why, but this one made me laugh.

Snart: "People seem to think we should have a heart to heart."
Mick: "We don't have hearts. Where does that leave us?"

While entertaining, this episode was a big step back from last week's. Two out of four unsuccessful missions,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

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