Violet recaps Season 1 Episode 6 of Legends of Tomorrow, titled Star City 2046, where the team stumbles upon a dystopian Star City in the year 2046! Following the recap, both Josh and Violet share their thoughts about the episode.
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Episode Recap of Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1 Episode 6: Star City 2046
The ship crash lands, and the team emerges in a dystopian Star City — in 2046. The Green Arrow confronts them, but it’s not Oliver Queen. He attacks them, and they take cover and fight back. Rip Hunter soon orders everyone to return to the ship.
Inside the ship, Rip tells them that this future is not set, and that the best plan of action is to repair the ship, then head back to 2016 to make sure this future never happens.
Jax begins taking a look at the ship to make repairs, while Rip says he needs a specific device in order to repair Gideon’s interface. Ray says Palmer Tech, which is now Smoak Technologies, would probably have it by now. Rip enlists Heat Wave and Captain Cold to obtain the device. Despite Rip’s protests, Sara insists on going too.
Dr. Stein and Jax work on repairing the engine, while Ray and Kendra work on the interface, despite Jax having wanted to work with Kendra. Dr. Stein senses Jax’s frustrations about Ray and Kendra getting friendly, and advises Jax to have confidence.
On the way to Palmer Tech, a gang fight breaks out, and the Green Arrow tries to intervene, while the team members take cover in a school bus. However, the Green Arrow gets shot and falls to the ground. Sara and Rip run to help him, while Heat Wave and Captain Cold wander out on their own. The gang drives up to Rory and Snart, and tries to mug them. However, Heat Wave blasts the gang leader with his heat gun, and takes over the gang. Captain Cold reluctantly joins him.
Sara catches up to the Green Arrow, but his suit saved him. This Green Arrow reports that Oliver Queen is dead, and that no one’s seen him since the Uprising, 15 years ago, when Deathstroke’s son brought an army. Rip and Sara are confronted by the new Deathstroke, who calls forth his army. Green Arrow uses a trick arrow to create a rappel, and Sara and Rip grab on for a quick getaway.
Back on the ship, Jax sees an opportunity to spend some time with Kendra and help her out. Meanwhile, Dr. Stein talks to Ray, who says he hadn’t really considered Kendra as a romantic interest. Ray agrees with Dr. Stein that he and Kendra shouldn’t hook up.
Heat Wave enjoys ruling over his new gang, and doesn’t want to leave when Captain Cold tries to get him to return to Sara and Rip.
Green Arrow, Rip, and Sara hide out in a safe place. Green Arrow tells them that a lot of Felicity Smoak’s projects were relocated — to the present day Arrow Cave. The place was attacked after Grant Wilson outed Oliver as the Green Arrow. They start to look for the device they need — when an older Oliver Queen tells them to get out. We then learn that the Green Arrow is Diggle’s son, John Diggle, Jr., who goes by Connor Hawk as he doesn’t feel he is worthy of his dad’s name, who is dead because he wasn’t able to save him. Connor is upset that he’s been trying to hold the city by himself because he thought Oliver was dead. Oliver tells Sara that Laurel, her dad, Felicity — they’re all gone. He tells them the location and entry code of the warehouse that is holding everything that Felicity had been working on, and tells them to let themselves out.
Dr. Stein reports to Jax that he talked to Ray, who confirmed that he has no interest in Kendra. However, later Ray tells Stein that thanks to their talk, he is starting to see Kendra in that way.
Deathstroke comes into the club where Heat Wave is and barks out orders to kill Green Arrow, Sara, and Rip. Everyone leaves. Captain Cold tells Heat Wave that it’s time to go, but Heat Wave would rather stay there. Heat Wave resists. Cold makes a deal: Heat Wave helps him get to Rip and Sara, then they can have this conversation.
While Rip and Sara look for the prototype they need, Rip confirms that the future is in flux, and this future doesn’t have to happen. They split up to cover more ground. Just as Rip finds what they’re looking for, there’s an explosion. Some guys come in swinging swords and fighting. Green Arrow, Sara, and Rip fight back. Just then, Captain Cold and Heat Wave show up to help them fight back. However, Connor is taken in the scuffle. Sara wants to get Connor back, but Rip tries to talk her out of it, saying that it’s unnecessary if they return to 2016 and make sure this never happens. Snart and Rory continue their conversation, wherein Rory is still keen on staying in 2046. Snart knocks him out, and explains to Rip that it was a difference of opinion. Rip says they need to bring the device and Rory back to the ship.
When Jax finds Stein, he senses that Stein is guilty about something. He finally confesses what happened with Ray, and apologizes. Jax forgives him. The team returns to the ship, and Sara reports to the others what’s going on. Jax and Stein agree with Sara about staying to help. Rip and Sara get into an argument, but Rip says he’ll give her an hour to do what she wants, then the ship is leaving with or without her.
Meanwhile, Heat Wave is being kept in a cell. They have a little talk. Rory just wants to see the world burn, and isn’t very happy with Cold.
Sara returns to talk to Old Oliver and asks for his help.
90 minutes passes, and Sara still hasn’t returned to the ship. Stein tries to plead Sara’s case to Rip, who has gotten Gideon operational.
In Star City, Grant Wilson brings Connor up on stage in front of his people to kill him. Just as he is about to do so, Sara is captured and brought forth. Oliver has suited up and strapped on a mechanical arm, and fires an explosive arrow. In the confusion, Sara fights back, and so does Connor, as Oliver continues firing arrows. Connor and Grant fight, and Grant gets the upper hand. But before Grant strikes with his sword, Oliver fires an arrow at him. Then Grant and Oliver fight. Just then, the team shows up as backup. Oliver succeeds in taking Grant Wilson out, while the team gets rid of Grant’s people.
Sara returns to the Arrow Cave with Oliver and Connor. Sara doesn’t like the idea of leaving Oliver alone, but he says he’s not alone. She tells him to be careful, and hugs him goodbye. Connor agrees to watch Oliver’s back.
Back on the ship, Jax overhears a conversation between Ray and Kendra. Ray asks Kendra to “get a drink.” She realizes he’s asking her out, and says that’s totally okay. But then, talking through how much she’s been through recently, she realizes her life is too complicated to throw anything else into the mix. As Ray walks away, he sees Jax and figures that Jax overheard. Ray is confident that Kendra would have picked him, not Jax.
Sara thanks Rip for sending the team to back her up. He admits that he still has a lot to learn, including the fact that every future is worth fighting for.
Gideon confirms that the repairs were effective. Heat Wave looks out the window just before they leave, and says he’ll miss this place. Rip says the next stop is to hit Savage when he least expects it.
Violet’s Thoughts on Season 1 Episode 6 of Legends of Tomorrow: Star City 2046
Just when I was saying how much Wentworth Miller’s portrayal of Captain Cold has improved since he was on The Flash, then this episode happens. Maybe it’s just me, but it felt like a regression to the type of acting he was doing when he was on The Flash – this over the top sort of acting. Maybe it’s because he was sort of acting in a criminal element yet again, which it turns out, he’s not very good at portraying in a believable fashion, apparently. However, he wasn’t even acting as a criminal very much in this episode, he was mostly trying to talk Heat Wave out of sticking around for the criminal landscape. It also seemed like Heat Wave’s actions were supposed to be a reminder to us that he and Captain Cold are criminals, and not fully integrated into being good guys yet, if ever.
Adding to the cheesy element of this episode was this sudden love triangle that randomly popped up between Jax, Ray, and Kendra. Um, why was this necessary, and where did this come from? It was as if the show just had to come up with some sort of drama on the ship for the characters to deal with while everyone else was out and about. Obviously, Sara couldn’t be the object of affection, since she wanted to be involved with her city and the people she knew there, so without the show daring to venture into LGBT territory, that left it to Kendra. Yes, Kendra who had just recently lost her soulmate Carter, which had then made her realize that she loved him after all (even though I wasn’t convinced that she had actually fallen in love with him again yet, but it’s an established fact in the show, so I’ll stick to it). This only happened, what, a matter of days ago for them? And Jax and Ray decide they’re going to go after her already? Give the girl some space, geez. I’m glad that in the end, Kendra expressed that she wasn’t ready to add romance into the mix.
In any case, it was pretty cool seeing this dystopian futuristic Star City, and a nice surprise seeing Oliver Queen as an old man. Though he was pretty spry for a 60+ year old! So that was a little unbelievable that he would be in such great shape and be able to fight like that after so many years of hiding out in the dark, or whatever he’s been doing. But it’s always fun to have crossover events and see familiar characters.
Overall, the situational believability of this show is bothering me, but there are fun and funny moments, and it is time travel, which provides a lot of potential for some cool stuff to happen. Plus, I’m really enjoying Arthur Darvill in his role as The Doctor — er, I mean, Rip Hunter. So at this point, I’m still optimistic.
Josh’s Thoughts: Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1 Episode 6: Star City 2046
This episode highlights some of the (many) problems with time travel. Fundamentally how does it work? Is time linear, meaning that, there is a time that is “now”, on a set “track”, or is it more loose, meaning time is not constant? It is a tough question to answer, and makes telling time travel stories very difficult.
Specifically related to this episode, if Rip is right, saying that this future has no bearing, and is not “real”, then anything that Rip does in the future has no purpose. That means that any time this team spends in the future, is essentially pointless. Going to the future really has no purpose if this future is all going to be altered anyway.
Going forward I can see this being a problem. I also would like to see the various cities (Star and Central) in present day (2016) to see what is changed by events that these characters have done in the past, as so far we are not witnessing any of these effects.
But trying to analyze the episode ignoring the fundamental issues of time travel, I thought it was pretty interesting. We have a few things developing with the characters, such as Captain Cold seemingly taking up more of the hero mantle, while Heat Wave seems to be more stuck in his ways. This of course is leading to friction between the two, and I hope to see this play out more, and done well.
One thing I have to compliment the show on is the handling of Kendra this episode. While Jax and Ray were fawning over Kendra, I was a little annoyed–this girl is essentially a goddess who lost her eternal love just a few days ago. Why would she have any interest in either of these two people? Thankfully, so far, the show has agreed with my sentiment, with her shutting both of them down.
It was pretty sad seeing Oliver broken down, both physically and mentally. It is also sad that Felicity and everyone just basically up and left him alone. I am curious to know more about what happened to the team. Did everyone just give up, and leave Oliver to die? That would be very disappointing if so, as that would seem to indicate that when things get really tough, the team would abandon Oliver in the end. Hopefully that is just something that happens in this alternate timeline.
Despite my constant thinking about paradox issues with the episode, I have a good time with it, because, at the very least, it asks these questions, and lets my mind think about these things. Hopefully the show can continue this momentum it has with me.
Scenes from Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1 Episode 7: Marooned
Here are scenes from the next Legends of Tomorrow episode, titled Marooned:
It gets kind of repetitive every week. Oh, be careful not to mess too much with the timeline. Oh, wait, we’ll just ignore that idea.