‘Legends of Tomorrow’ season 2, episode 8 (winter finale) review: The Sphere of Destiny; Rip Hunter ‘returns’
The second season of “Legends of Tomorrow” spent most of the year building towards the winter finale “The Chicago Way,” which proved itself to be a story of villains just as much as it was the story of villains.
After all, for the first time all season long we had appearances from every single one of the actors within the greater Legion of Doom. The show didn’t really waste any time at all introducing Malcolm Merlyn to the team, which in retrospect may have been a mistake given that it was not entirely clear how the three of them ultimately teamed up. It was a little bit more clear understanding the reasoning for him to want to join them: He wants to change his own future. Think about what happened to Tommy, and everything terrible that happened in his life. He could figure out a way to move forward and make sure that nothing ever happened in the way that it did.
That’s the beauty of Malcolm as a villain: He’s a bad guy, but he’s not evil for the sake of it. At one point during the story, he and his new partners Damien Darhk and Eobard Thawne trapped Stein and Sara and held them prisoner; he used that as a chance to offer her a deal to go back to before all of this started, and before the entire world as she knew it descended into chaos. She wasn’t exactly game for that idea.
Darhk’s plan instead – Using his new associate, the two were teaming up in order to ensure that Al Capone and his crew could find a great degree of success within 1920’s Chicago, paving the way to a different and Darhker future. In classic Legends fashion, it was the responsibility of the team to try and stop it.
One of the largest reasons why this story worked, at the very least to us, is because it offered up a chance to see different ways of thinking prevail. While Mick Rory did not necessarily give in to the dark side, he did use his criminal instincts and Amaya’s help in order to track the bad guys on multiple occasions, and in the process keep a certain amulet of value away from the Reverse-Flash … at least for the time being.
The big problem came when the soon-to-be Legion of Doom started to descend on the Waverider in hopes of getting what they wanted. The Legends were simply outnumbered, and as a result of that, Sara eventually had to make a deal in order to rescue Stein, who was captured once again on the ship: She gave up the amulet.
Rory and Amaya’s … romance? – For now, we’re excited about this. While the CW universe is not exactly well-known for crafting some great romantic arcs, there’s something about these two that we really like. They add fire to each other’s life, Amaya brings out Rory’s good side, and he helps her to have a little bit of an edge.
Here’s your cliffhanger – Well, let’s just say that we learned more about the Legion’s plans. They are after something called the Sphere of Destiny, which could influence almost the entire world around it. What’s the problem? Let’s just say that they need Rip Hunter in order to ensure that they get what they want. In the closing seconds of the episode, we saw that the former Time Master is now a temperamental movie director in the 1960’s. While incredibly weird, this was a fun ending and we’ll roll with it. “Rolling with the punches” as a whole is the name of the game with this show. Grade: B+.
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