Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1, Episode 2: Pilot, Part 2
Beyond the fact that neither Rip Hunter nor Ray Palmer stood out much this episode, it really addressed a lot of the problems that the first part of the pilot had, and ended up living up to its potential. Now not having to do a rushed, pacing-destroying recap of all the members of the group, the show is given ample room to breathe and actually tell its story.
Team Legends spends their time in 1975, though once more the team gets split up a couple of ways. We deal a lot with time-travel this episode, hilariously funny because the Flash this week also dealt with the ramifications of changing the timeline. Well, while the moral of the Flash is that you can't forcibly make changes to the timeline, that's the ultimate goal of Team Legends. And while they managed to at least minimize damage to the timeline this time around, their little time-traveling crusade claims a casualty as Hawkman dies!
Well, no big loss there. Hawkman's easily the least interesting of the group, especially when he proves himself quite useless and kind of a jerk. Not only does he barely react to his son's death last episode despite theoretically remembering him, he also makes advances towards Kendra when they should be figuring out how to get Kendra to meditate and learn how to use the magic knife to kill Vandal Savage. Also, Hawkman's excuse for not knowing of the language on the dagger (itself ending up to be a sappy love poem) ends up to not really quite hold. 'It's a language known to the clerics'? Carter, you've lived 4000 years, you're telling me Chay-Ara never taught you that language at all? Doubtful that this is the last we'll see of Hawkman since reincarnation and everything, but we did the threefold way of removing a character that didn't really work, creating a martyr figure for the team to rally around, and delivering a big sacrifice to raise the stakes.
But other than that, the episode focused a lot on characterization. It doesn't quite touch on everyone quite as well, and not all of them worked (RE: Carter Hall), and both Heatwave and Rip Hunter aren't really doing that much, but everyone gets their moment to shine and develop. None moreso than Martin Stein, though Captain Cold does give him a run for his money.
Stein's scenes just utterly shine throughout the episode. From the moment he walked on stage in this episode just threatening the random TerroristCon guard with historical knowledge (and earning him the respect of Heatwave) and just hamming it up in what is easily my favourite Martin Stein moment of all time, to the sub-plot of him having to hunt down his younger self to get the Alpha Particle Scanner that his younger self had (apparently the Waverider doesn't have the capability?)... and meeting his younger self! At first it's just good fun as Stein's younger self is just this super-brilliant bong-smoking dude who keeps hitting on Sara (and has thick luxurious hair) it ends up being a bit of an introspection moment for the older Stein as he is filled with self-loathing over how little he hasn't changed over the years, how he's still an arrogant prick who thinks he has all the answers -- and he points to his grandstanding earlier in the episode as clear evidence of that. Huh.
The older Martin Stein also very nearly had his entire marriage annulled by interacting with his younger self (who followed Team Legends to the Waverider and missed his first meeting with Clarissa), and I have to admit, it would be an easy sacrifice to make for the show-writers, with the loss of Martin Stein's marriage going to factor extremely heavily onto Stein's character and be a huge loss, but they don't have to kill anyone to do it. The prospect of Stein losing his marriage actually affected me more than the actual death of Carter Hall, I can't lie.
Sara and Jax plays off well the older and younger Martin Steins, and Jax's talks of encouragements to the older Martin Stein is well-written, and we finally address the fact that Stein basically abducted Jax against his wishes. Sara... still doesn't do much other than swapping the Rogues for the Firestorm Duo as the ones she hung around with, but she does get a couple of starring roles as she teases the older Stein because his younger self keeps hitting on her, and she does beat up a bunch of Savage's thug single-handedly.
Captain Cold also steals the show, even if his storyline isn't quite as tragic and self-introspective as Martin Stein. Cold just owns every scene he shows up in, from talking to the guard to TerroristCon, or planning a heist, or simply interacting with the novice do-gooder Ray Palmer. He's finally gotten back the smooth charm from the Flash that he kinda lacks in the first episode, and he plays off Ray Palmer quite well. We get a bit of an impression that Cold is more concerned about actually making a mark with his heists instead of just making money, we get more references to the asshole of a father he had... and, y'know, he's just awesome all around.
Ray is a bit less so. He gets to learn that he can't just cock his way through everything and has to actually leave some things to the experts -- like breaking and entering -- as well as ending up causing a big temporal flux by dropping a chunk of his suit in the 70's... but otherwise I still don't really think Ray got adequate screentime or characterization. The miniaturization effects were still cool, though, even if it's lower-budget than Ant-Man. Oh well, we still have an entire season to go.
Kendra also gets to rant about how Carter shouldn't let destiny decide that they have to fall in love together (even if Kendra ends up falling for Carter in the end for... some reasons I don't understand) and it's a nice scene for her when she's just trying to meditate and solve how to use the magic Aman Dagger while Carter's more concerned that Kendra has remembered them having sexytimes and seems to want to re-enact said scene. We get the twist that the dagger's power has to be wielded by Kendra to actually finish off Vandal Savage, which is cool. And leads to Carter's death. Whoops.
Savage himself is still a pretty effective villain. He's just full of gravitas and works quite well for me, being a real threat especially when he establishes his credo as a hero killer. Making him immune to, well, everything other than Kendra's dagger ends up being a bit cheap of a way to take him down, but as this show proves, an Atom suit blast to the face can sure as hell slow Vandal Savage down, and I bet being nuclear-blasted to the face would hurt a hell lot to Savage as well. We'll see just what the full scope of Savage's powers are, however. Back during Arrow/Flash he had these magic tricks which he hasn't exactly shown now. Still, I like Savage. He's cool.
Damien Darhk, all dressed up Blofeld-like, shows up unexpectedly in the 70's, looking as old as he did in Arrow of the present day! Blood rituals? Demonic immortality? Lazarus Pit? Whatever the case, it's a welcome cameo, and not one that ended up being a big 'what is this all about' like Claire Temple's cameo in Jessica Jones. Darhk shows up, does some Darhk things, doesn't overstay his welcome, and leaves.
The action scenes in this episode are likewise awesome. The big superhero throwdown in the VillainCon thing (already awesome because of Martin Stein hamming it up), the other big superhero throwdown in Vandal Savage's holiday home, Sara Lance beating the fuck out of the random scientist goons... it's just fun all around.
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