Warning: includes spoilers for DC's Legends of Tomorrow and Arrow.
I'm screaming. This. This right here is what Legends of Tomorrow is about: connecting to times, places, and people that are familiar yet new. And oh my time-masters, Star City 2046 is quite the twist.
Green Arrow is shooting at them. Other bad guys are shooting at Green Arrow. And Rip Hunter has a super cool gun. This is the best:
Sara: "That's not Oliver Queen."Star City is on fire. The Wave Rider is on fire. FIRESTORM is not on fire. Well, not literally. They're working as a pretty good team to understand each other's feelings and help each other out. Sort of.
Ray: "Sure dresses like him."
Snart: "Shoots arrows like him."
Jax: "Well, whoever he is, I don't plan on sticking around to get shish kebabbed by this dude."
Ray is still an adorable cupcake, whether he's worried Felicity took over his company and changed everything about it or he's completely oblivious to how his optimism makes it seem like he's flirting when he's not. Big, positive, puppy dog cupcake.
Suddenly, Jefferson is jealous of Kendra and Ray. Stein flips out on them because Jefferson is jealous. Jefferson likes Kendra. So cute. And Stein gives him a little pep talk. So cute. Then, Stein tries to get Ray out of the equation. I'm actually crying. But of course it backfires, which is even better. Jefferson and Ray are hopeless. None of these three men are even stopping to think about how Kendra feels, but at least she's not afraid to give her thoughts when Ray asks her out. Still, Ray has the best rejection response ever: he's just cool with it and walks off like nothing happened. Best cupcake ever.
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Enough of the lovey dovey. On to the explosions and motorcycles! Like Snart and Rory said: "It's like World War III out here. It's beautiful." Speaking of Snart, he did splendidly in this episode. One of his best. Sarcastic, sassy, secretly sentimental. Guess his heart isn't ice cold after all. He does care about the team, destroying Savage, and being "the two baddest sons of bitches this world has ever seen." (Okay, but what does that even mean??) I love it.
Rory, on the other end of the spectrum (the temperature spectrum), is not feeling very... lovey dovey with the team. He's still focused on one thing: watching the world burn. Well, I guess Star City 2046 is the perfect place because literally everything is on fire. Why is Star City on fire? Has it been on fire for the past 30 years? How has it not burned down to nothing yet? Anyways, Rory is still amazingly entertaining because he just takes over a gang. He just takes it over. He claims the gang. But I sort of feel for him because now he's kind of a loner. Snart is suddenly feeling heroic, Sara isn't a crazy monster at the moment, the rest of Team Legends are goody-two-shoes, while he's still focused on looting and thieving and other criminal activity. When he says he doesn't know who is team anymore, he's being honest. He doesn't know if he can trust Snart now. Ouch.
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But the best comes with the events of Star City. The new Green Arrow is... not Oliver Queen. (Surprise! Nobody is actually surprised.) Apparently Oliver Queen is dead. (Again. What is this, the third or fourth time?) No one has seen him since (cue dramatic music) the Uprising! (Duh-duh-DUN!) Wait, what's the Uprising? Oh, just that time in 2016 when the son of Slade Wilson (yes, that Slade Wilson) took over Star City. (However, when Grant Wilson took off his Deathstroke helmet I thought he was Bucky Barnes' evil twin. I'm not ruling it out, even if this is DC and not Marvel.)
But are we really going to believe Oliver Queen is truly dead? Come on, he hasn't been seen for thirty years. No body, no proof, right? No, folks, I do not believe it. And that's good because he isn't dead. Sara, Rip, and the new Green Arrow go to the old Arrow HQ. It's ransacked, it's destroyed, but it's not empty. Oliver is there, old and grumpy with a beard Oliver. Oliver with an old man beard! Oliver with an old man beard! (Oh, and he's missing his left arm? He's literally half the man he used to be.)
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Green Arrow 2046 is John Diggle Junior. (I knew it.) But he goes by Connor Hawke. (Why??? I thought Connor Hawke is supposed to be Oliver's son.) We learn everybody else is gone... as in dead. And Oliver's been alone for thirty years. (Woof. We thought the Island was bad. What the heck are you doing, Ollie?)
Sara: "All my friends and family are dead except Oliver Queen, who is dead inside and missing his left arm."(For some reason this line struck me as really funny. It's the left arm thing.)
Nobody in this episode is happy. Rip isn't happy with Sara. Sara isn't happy with Rip. Jefferson isn't happy with Ray. Ray is still oblivious. Rory isn't happy with Snart. Snart isn't happy with Rory. Oliver Queen isn't happy with anybody. This Star City pit stop has been so fun! Where's the next fun family vacation hot spot? Central City in 2024?
Sara wins all the awards for this episode. Fifty points to Sara for getting grumpy, old-man Oliver to save his city. Fifty points to Sara for kick-butt fighting. All the points for Sara for just being awesome and convincing everybody to save the city, Connor, and the future which will be erased anyways. Does she get her "hero" card yet?
Sara: "I never got the chance to ask Connor why he wears the hood, but I know why. It's because this city will always need a Green Arrow."Also, Oliver Queen now has an epic robot arm. I guess if Grant Wilson is evil!Bucky Barnes, Oliver Queen is the Green!Winter Soldier. (Is that even a thing?) Old, bearded, grumpy Oliver is back in action. Then the whole entire Team Legends arrives for a fight!
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I love that Oliver and Connor/John team-up. This is the best. Petition for a Connor Hawke spin-off show. (So I need a spin-off of a spin-off? Yes. Yes, I do.)
Oliver: "That's good shooting, John."
Connor: "It's Connor."
Oliver: "Either way, it's Green Arrow."
Concluding Thoughts
This episode is definitely what Legends of Tomorrow is all about. Plus, we got to see Oliver Queen with a real beard like in the comics. (And grumpy. We got to see Oliver grumpy.) I loved seeing Star City re-imagined--the worst of the worst taking over the city because a few small events in the past triggered a completely different timeline. Time-travel stories are all about these kinds of monumental changes in history.
The whole Ray-Jefferson-Kendra triangle was more funny than necessary to the plot. It was a good way to appease the serious, darker side of the episode. Plus, it gave them an excuse to hang out in the Wave Rider instead of having too many people running around Star City. I think this episode had good development for Snart, Sara, and Rory. What they did here will trickle over into the upcoming episodes. I'm excited to see what's next for their character arcs.
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Meeting Connor Hawke--and connecting him to John Diggle--was a wonderful move for the episode. I love when known comic characters come into the show, so getting Green Arrow 2.0 was fun even if he wasn't exactly comic book canon. The change they made of him being Diggle's son makes sense with the established Arrow universe. It was heartbreaking to know everybody else died though. Which makes me wonder about the events discussed in this episode. Grant Wilson attacks Star City in 2016, which becomes known as the Uprising. Instead of staying to fight, the people of Star City flee and Oliver Queen "dies." Will these events somehow come to pass on Arrow--only perhaps with a different outcome? Or is this just a potential series of events based on Savage's doings?
I'm curious to know if John Diggle and Lyla will have a son at some point or if Slade Wilson has a son too. And how? I thought the Uprising took place in 2016, but there is no way these guys are old enough to participate in the Uprising and still be that young in 2046. Still, I wonder if this is a preview of events to come for Arrow.
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Overall, the episode was crazy, exciting, and funny. I'm excited to see where the Legends go next in order to stop Savage and save the future!
Bonus: The best quote of the episode goes to...
Grant: "You're not Green Arrow. You're just a punk in a Halloween costume."
Connor: "Funny, I was gonna say the same thing about you."
What did you think of "Star City 2046"?
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