Legends of Tomorrow S01E11 Review: Jonah Hex, Past Kendra and Rip's Failures

Legends of Tomorrow, Season 1, Episode 11: The Magnificent Eight

Not played by Josh Brolin. He's busy courting death.

Yeah, we don't get anywhere closer to stopping Vandal Savage this episode, and it's ultimately cowboy filler, but what a fun episode this is! In the series of disappointingly-plotted episodes that is episodes 10-13, there is this little fun gem. It won't be mistaken for a big, pivotal episode, and really it will be remembered for the episode where they played cowboys, but it was fun to watch nonetheless.

Jonah Hex himself doesn't get really that big of a role to play in this episode, and quite surprisingly he doesn't get an origin story here, but he was still really fun to have around. He doesn't have any of the voodoo powers that his live-action counterpart had (and it's far more true to his comic-book counterpart), and I thought it was a shame that the big cowboy shootouts ended up falling to Ray and Rip, but he was still memorable. The fact that the small-time cowboy town is apparently a convergence point where a lot of time travel had happened before, and the fact that Jonah Hex is totally acquainted with Rip Hunter is a welcome development that makes Hex a lot cooler than he should be. Maybe Jonah Hex himself can be a main character in a future Legends of Tomorrow season? He's just sort of there, memorable enough but doesn't distract from the main Legends team. Kinda like how Barry Allen was in his appearance in Arrow, I guess.

We get some nice moments for Rip Hunter, and we see why he was so jaded about leaving time as it is. Apparently he had became addicted to the Western period and had spent some time cowboying it around with Jonah Hex before, and while nothing ultimately came out of it, seeing yet another reminder of how Rip fucked up in the past is a nice touch. The shared backstory, and the cryptic allusions we get to it, is welcome. Apparently Rip's cowboy coat and his son's name came from Jonah Hex. It's a nice nod and inversion of how Jonah Hex has been thrown into the future several times in DC's attempts to make this scarfaced cowboy relevant in the mainstream universe.

Kendra met her past reincarnated self, this fat lady, who tells her some cryptic relationship advice that dating non-Carter men would only lead to disaster. It's an eyeball-rolling moment, really, even if they touch upon the reincarnation bit which is much appreciated. It really felt like a distraction to all the more awesome cowboying around we had in this episode, though, and yet another example of the show trying to inject pointless romantic tension into a show that really doesn't need it. Sara went along with Kendra to try to at least stop that particular B-plot from suffering, and, well, Sara is a hell lot more entertaining than Kendra ever will be.

Likewise, the B-plot of Martin Stein saving H.G. Wells with antibiotics is fun though ultimately pointless. (When they said 'Wells' I honestly thought he was going to be Harrison Wells' ancestor, though!) Unlike Kendra, however, Stein's plot doesn't take up that much screentime and is nowhere as annoying.

After the fight against the gangsters where Rip quickdraws the fuck out of the evil cowboy man, the Time Masters' assassins, the Hunters (who Heat Wave built up to be super-powerful dudes) show up and... ended up not really worth a damn, actually, with the Legends team wiping the three faceless dudes out in record time. It's a fun battle, but the Hunters going all 'we're just fodder, the Pilgrim will be coming hur hur' is a bit stupid, honestly. Especially since we all know this random assassin will probably be defeated next episode. It is helluva satisfying to see the Legends team drop all pretenses of being normal cowboys and start sprouting wings, lobbing fireballs and shrinking down in the Wild West.

Jonah Hex going all 'yeah I've seen everything nothing surprises me' and later on shocked and then calmly crossing himself when Firestorm combines is the most hilarious scene in the CW universe.

Also, Mick Rory has been slowly, over the course of this episode and the two before it, slowly been reintegrated into the team. He's letting his guard down, and while he's not really being all friendly and buddy-buddy as he was before, he still knows where he stands, and even lets his guard down a bit with that drinking contest with Sara in the bar. (He lost!). Captain Cold also gets a couple of cool moments shooting the cowboy in that bar to protect Stein, and he's generally just awesome throughout this episode. 

The episode also has a nice, central theme of not allowing destiny to dictate their actions. After kind of failing with Degaton last episode, and Jonah Hex reminding Rip of causing a city to be razed in the past, the episode shows how the characters are choosing to basically say screw destiny and screw keeping the timeline intact if they can do these small things to help the people in their present. Whether it's Martin giving antibiotics, or Ray and Hex fighting against the cowboy bandits... and, um, Kendra... loving Ray instead of holding a torch for the dead Carter? Yeah, Kendra's subplot is just dumb.

Overall, it's definitely a solid episode. A filler episode, yes, but an unmistakably solid one. And that's coming from someone who doesn't even like Westerns!