DC'S LEGENDS OF TOMORROW - SEASON 5.4

REVIEW:  DC'S LEGENDS OF TOMORROW - SEASON 5.4:  "A Head of Her Time"


Hello again, my freinds!  It's that time of the week, where we join our mirth-filled, time travellilng bunch for another crazy adventure!  Last time we were with our crew, they had just had to deal with the revival of a serial killer who slayed at his high school prom, and then we also had Constantine return home to find Charlie had trrashed his pad with a raging party, only to have to deal with the spooky behind the door, where John needed some answers.  Plus---we got Zari stuck on board, as she checks out just what exactly her brother does....


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We take a peek at our resident dark magic man, as he's back at home in England, where he's found Charlie hiding out, and living it up away from the team.  He just returned from yet another visit from Astra, whom he vows to save before she sends more "encores" to the real world, and start messing up the timeline for good. John, however, has entered into a room in the house where a poltergeist lives---the mother of Astra.  And when John entered to give her the update on his progress---she's none too pleased.  Gary and Charlie are outside the door listening to John get tossed around like a ragdoll, as he tries to explain himself.  Gary is concerned for his mentor's safety, and decides to break down the door, even though Charlie feels that John's getting some just desserts for lousing up the job, and Gary opening the door would be a bad idea.  Gary doesn't listen, speaks the incantation, and the door glows....but nothing happens except the doorknob falls off.  Gary peeks through the hole, and sees John getting thrashed about the room.  Then, the ghost seeps out through the hole in the doorknob, and it's off roaming about the house.  John is pissed at what Gary did.  

Ava is brushing her teeth, when Sara sneaks up on her.  Sara says she's gotta bail the ship, because she's got business in Star City (I'm assuming this is around the time of Oliver's funeral), and she's leaving Ava in charge....much to Ava's dismay.  Ava doesn't feel she's right for the job, and that none of the crew will like her in charge.  Sara says they'll love her, kisses her, and takes off.  All the while, Zari is listening in to their conversation.  

In downtown Hell, Astra's in a seedy (for Hell, anyway), little dive, gambling, when she's pulled aside by a demon with horns and one of them with jewelry hanging off of it.  He's upset that she's been failing at her task, what with losing their assets like Rasputin and Bugsy Seigel.  If they want to operate in the black, she needs to get it together.  She says fine, and yanks off the necklace she had with the coin that has John's name on it.  She says no-more-Miss Nice Demon.  She plans on taking care of John for good.

The ghost on the loose in John's house apparenlty has A LOT to say, and it's to get John to play straight with everyone...including it.  Apparently the ghost's name is Natalie, and she was killed in a car crash when Astra was young.  Her father was distraught, and the thought of resurrection pops up.  Later on, Natalie had been revived, but Astra had been taken from her down to Hell.  Distraught, Natalie killed herself, and has been haunting the house in Newcastle ever since.  John was unable to save Astra, so Natalies giving him a trip down memory lane.  She had been one of many that was a part of John's Newcastle crew.  

Behrad is giving his sister a tour of the ship, telling her about all the perks and things that Gideon can do.  She needs to leave the ship to attend the launch of her perfume, and needs a fancy dress for it.  Ava shows up, and tells her there's no social media allowed on board, but Behrad makes sure that he gets her phone so she can get it back later.  He tells her about the ship and it's ability to travel through time, and she gets the idea of them going into the future and checking investment opportunities, thus getting rich.  Her brother says that's not what the ship is used for.  

Ray and Nora are catching up on some face time together, as she is fulfillling her Fairy Godmother duties.  She's starting to feel good about the job, and helping others.  Mick then storms in, and is annoyed as hell.  Ray and Nora have to cut their conversation short, but not before the say 'I love you' to each other.  Mick tells Ray that he's sick.  He can't eat or drink, and his stomach hurts.  Gideon does a scan, and she finds nothing physically wrong with him.  Ray figures it out, and he's missing Ali...his old high school girlfriend he hooked up with at the reunion.  Ray says that Mick 'like likes' her, and Gideon confirms it.  Ray tells him that he actually CARES about somebody else.  

Ava calls the team in for a meeting on the bridge, and she starts handing out leis to everyone.  She then has binders ready to hand out, in order to be more "fun" but still be an effective leader.  The team really isn't buying into it, and are bailing on her, because there's nothing going on.  Ava then has Gideon check the timeline, and---sure enough---there's a time anomaly in 1793 Paris.  It's the time of the French Revolution, and it's falling apart,  The team has to suit up and stop the threat.  As they get dressed for the part, Zari comes in ready to go as well---and Ava isn't allowing her to go.  But Zari tries to flirt with her a little, and sway her, saying it would be cool if she let her go, and Ava reluctantly agrees.  Zari sprays Ava and herself with her perfume.  They arrive in France, and they attend what seems to be a party, where all the peasants are dancing, and having a good time.  They know there's supposed to be an execution happening, but there isn't.  Ava tries to work her way in, but the guard isn't going for it.  Zari then turns on the charm, and manages to get them into this little shindig.  

Astra visits the coin maker who made the coins with the names of the encores on them, and she presents her with John's coin.  The coin maker wants to know what she wants in trade, but Astra isn't interested in trading John's coin---she wants to kill him once and for all.  

John's devling into his past with Charlie and Gary, talking about how he tried to save Astra, but had failed.  While the husband was distraught, we find out that is was John himself that offered to resurrect her.  Turns out...John and Natalie were a lot closer than we realized.

Ava is doing her best to be a team leader, and give our orders to the team to stay sharp, and keep their eyes peeled.  Zari tells her she's trying too hard.  They spread out more, and Nate takes Zari, and gives her a brief history lesson of the French Revolution.  They end up spotting Napoleon, and he's not supposed to be at the party.  Then they spot their target---Marie Antoinette...who looks A LOT like Nora.  She seems to be the center of attention at this party.  She then calls for a guillotine, and it's brought in.  The team looks on as the guillotine blade comes down....and lands on some cake.  For which, Marie says her famous line of "let them eat cake!".  And thus, EVERYONE starts lunging for all this cake on display.  The people are gorging themselves on it, when Ava realizes that people are starting to collapse and die.  She is killing the Revolution by letting them actually party.  Ava informs the team, but the rest of them are busy macking down on the cake, which leaves only her and Zari to stop Marie from killing the Revolution.  

Back in Newcastle, we hear a punk song blare on this radio, alerting John, Charlie, and Gary.  It's a familiar tune---with Natalie's voice.  It was a song from John's days as a punk rocker, and he and Natalie apparently were in love, as we see the scene unfold in ghostly flashbacks.  In one flashback, she makes him choose between going with her, or magic.  He makes his choice, and she walked away.  His refusal to fess up to his mistakes, and own his issues upsets Natalie, and Charlie calls him out on it.  He then calls out Charlie about WHY she had run away from the ship and the team.  But Charlie re-directs, and eventually gets possessed by Natalie.  

Ava and Zari have to work quickly to get Marie out of this party, and Zari says Ava won't get close to her dressed like a peasant.  They doll her up, and Zari uses her experience as a celebrity to work her way close to Marie.  She flirts with Napoleon, and gets closer to Marie. Then she leaves it up to Ava, who manages to convince Marie that there's an after party.  This makes Marie curious, and she's all over it.  The three go to leave, and Napoleon calls out to her, wondering where she's going.  Marie calls out to everyone there's an after party.  This blows Ava's plan of getting Marie back aboard the Waverider, and they must make a run for it.  This manages to get Ray, Nate, and Behrad back in gear, and they help get the ladies onto the ship, but not before Marie literally loses her head.  

Once aboard the ship, everyone gives props to Zari for helping them save the day, and get their latest encore.  With that, Zari says she's headed to hear launch party.

Natalie and John talk, and John finally opens up and says that he was right about choosing magic over her.  Natalie wanted him to admit it.  John admits that he's tried everything to save Astra, but he's failed.  She, however, believes there's a way.  

Zari is about to take off for her launch party of her perfume, and Marie's head is talking to her, trying to butter her up, and give her a sob story about her life, which then makes Zari curious about her own future.  She asks Gideon to show her, and Gideon does reluctantly.  She sees news stories about how her perfumed was a failure because it destroyed people's olfactory senses, and her company and social media site crashed and burned.  Zari then realizes that Marie's perfume has magical abilities to make everyone like her.  So she plugs Marie's mouth with a rag gag, and then takes her perfume, and heads off the ship to her launch party..intending to use Mare's perfume as her own.  

New York City in the year 2044 is where we land, as it's Zari's launch party for her perfume.  Her assistant catches her up on what's going on, and her boyfriend DJ...who's got a smore mask thing for a head.  They talk about the MTV awards, and how he plans on proposing to her there.  Zari seems annoyed, but ready for her party.  

Ray and Nora are chatting again, and he wants to show Nora how Marie looks just like her, but all Nora sees is a head with a rag in her mouth.  Ray spots that, takes it out,and Marie screams.  Ray then races to the bridge to inform the team that Zari took Marie's perfume to her launch party.  They go to take off after Zari, when they hear some clanging.  They all stop and look into the lab, only to see that Marie's body has snapped her bonds and is loose aboard the ship.  

Zari's on the red carpet with her boyfriend, as the flashbulbs pop, and she sports the bottle of perfume.  Since she sprayed a little, her boyfriend is all worked up, and doesn't want to wait until the MTV awards, and goes to propose to her.  As he goes to propose, he bumps into her, thus spilling the entire contents of the perfume on her.  This causes the magical effect NOT desired, as now, EVRYONE wants to have Zari.  She notices the mistake, and she starts running as everyone gives chase, under her magcial spell.  Aboard the ship, Mick and Ray are desperately trying to subdue Marie's body, but in the process, Mick wants to cook her alive with his gun.  Ray keeps preventing him from doing that, and the gun gets knocked from Mick's hands to Marie's body.  She finds it , and starts shooting at them.  Ava, Behrad, and Nate arrive in 2044 to save Zari, and while Behrad keeps using the air totem to hold the people back, Nate and Ava catch up to Zari.  Ava grabs Zari and they end up leaping into a fountain, thus washing off the perfume, and breaking the spell.  Nate ends up helping her out of the fountain. Just as they arrive back aboard, Mick and Ray manage to grab Marie's body and subdue her.  

We see two kids playing, and making something with threat.  These two kids have been in and out of the show, as they took Gary to play or something while Natalie/Charlie and John talked.  Turns out, theese kids are John and Natalie when they were younger.  They are making what is called the Loom of Fate.  And it's that Loom that can save Astra.  Natalie disappears, and Charlie is back.  John grills Charlie about how she found out about this place, and Charlie says she learned from him, but he responded that he NEVER told anyone about this place, and she she knows of the Loom of Fate.  Charlie was brought there by Natalie, because Charlie knew of the Loom.  Charlie admits she did...but she destroyed it.  

Zari is feeling a tad down, because she caused trouble for the team, and says that she gets what her brother does, and all she ever wanted was for people to like her.  She's been famous since six, and attention is all she craved.  Her brother came just to offer her a donut, and she accepts.  The team is eating donuts, when Sara checks in for an update.  They tell her that Ava did a great job, and Sara tells her to check in personally later.  We see Zari alone, taking a bite of the donut, and all of the sudden, memories begin to flood into her mind about her past aboard the ship.  Ava then comes to see her, and Zari apologizes for the mess she made.  Ava says none of them are perfect, and not to beat herself up over it.  Besides, Ava points out, you got friends.  Zari likes that, and they walk off, a new friendship made.  

Down in Hell, the coin maker opens up John's coin, and we see the inner workings, like a clock. She points out it will be another 10 years before the lung cancer he has will catch up to him.  Astra wants to speed up the timetable.  The coin maker says that while John is the villain in HER story, SHE has enemies of her own---and when the time comes, she's calling Astra in on that favor.  So, the coin maker begins to tinker with the coin, and speed up John's cancer.

John, meanwhile, is getting more information about the Loom that Charlie destroyed.  She said she had scattered the pieces across the multivetrse, but lately, something is wrong, as if her past is catching up to her.  As Astra bids farewell to John, as the coin maker finishes up putting the screws to John's life, he begins to cough violently, and bleeds from the mouth.  John collapses into a fit, and Gary and Charlie are by his side, as he seemingly is dead or dying...and that's how we end this week.



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I truly thought this episode was a good chuckler, with it's share of punchlines (Ava's line of "Don't go all Les Miserables, we're going to France!"), and some sight gags.  The usual fare we can expect from the Legends, but also a little more character development for MANY of the crew...and tthen there's the slap in the face of reality with John's life finally catching up to him...as well as Charlie.  So, we got a little of everything this week---the "Encore" of the week, Marie Antoinette---played wonderfully by Courtney Ford, who did do double duty as she also appeared as Nora in this episode.  She was one of the bright spots, even though she WAS the encore of the week.  But I think it allowed Ford to get out of Nora's shell and have a little fun and be outrageous...and she was that.  

Some major points this episode:

Ava's ability to lead in the wake of Sara being gone (we'll get to the reason Sara was off ship this episode in a bit).  Ava has been an extremely awkward character.  When she's in charge leading the troops into battle, she's calm and confident.  When she's an administrator, she thrives.  Ava's life is about order, discipline, and taking things more strict and serious.  She's very by-the-book.  But, in that manner, it makes her more passive-agressive, and that's a turn off for the team.  She's too bossy.  She's too uptight.  So, having to work with Zari this episode, who knew how to play to an audience to get attention, but also plays things very footloose and fancy free...helped Ava come out of her shell a little more, and not be so stiff and rigid.  At the end, we see that the team DID rally around her, and gave her props for being the leader they needed in Sara's absence.  That's a boost of confidence for her.  Also on the plus side, she learned that she doesn't have to be such a stick in the mud, and that Zari showed her it's okay to let loose.  In the end, we get a new friendship out of the deal.

We also get more into Zari's story.  She has a DJ boyfriend who literally wears a s'more mask on his head with dollar signs on it.  He's a complete dork, and thankfully Nate punches him out for the sheer hell of it...and jealousy, of course.  But we see that her popularity has gained her a business, a social media outlet, and fame...but she has no true friends.  She sees the price she paid for her fame...to feel isolated.  With this episode, working with the team...especially Ava...it opens up Zari's eyes to a whole new place of acceptance.  Plus---with the one bite of the donut----she gets another set of flashbacks of herself in her previous life.  The memories are coming back bit by bit.  Not sure how long it's going to take before she gets them all back.  And if and when she does---what's that do with the dynamic with her brother, and will she remember her feelings for Nate?  Either way, I'm liking the journey.

FINALLY, we got Ray and Nora to admit they love each other.  Been long overdue.  And that had to speed up anyway, since Ray and Nora are leaving the team this season.  As for Mick....we finally found his soft spot---Ali.  Missing his high school sweetheart is driving him nuts.  I guess Mick Rory is human after all.  

I DO beliee that Sara's business in Star City was for Oliver's funeral.  It wouldn't be surprising that they put this episode around that timeline.  It would make perfect sense.  Unless it was Justice League related, I'd go with this as the reason.  

And, lastly, John AND Charlie.  Seems we got to see John's past come back to bite him in the ass in a BIG BIG way.  We see how his relationship with this childhood friend, and love, Natalie--Astra's mother--deteriorated, and his sins were on full display....especially that punk rock haircut he sported...nasty.  He now realized that he needs to be a bit more altruistic in order to save Astra---not as selfish as he was playing off to Ray last week.  Look...no matter HOW goofy Ray Palmer can be...he's an excellent judge of character---and sees the best in everyone.  That includes someone of John's ill repute.  But is it too little, too late?  Thanks to Astra, his lung cancer is now killing him...provided he's not dead already.  And as for Charlie---turns out, she didn't just appear at his pad on a whim.  Natalie brought her there, and KNEW that the one way John could save her daughter is with the Loom of Fate.  But Charlie destroyed it, and spread it across the Multiverse.  But since there IS no more Multiverse (so they think), her past is now catching up with her too.  And I feel it is now up to John, Charlie, and Gary to find the pieces and reassemble them.  But it was a LOOM of Fate...I'm wondering---maybe the pieces were gathered up into something else....like, say, a HELMET of Fate?  I'm just planting seeds here.  But what we DO know is that Charlie can't go doing any interdimensional or intervibrational travelling.  Only a speedster can do that...which also makes me wonder HE is around, they can rope him into this adventure...it would be VERY cool, and VERY overdue.  You all know who I'm taking about.  

It was awesome that we got some backstory on some of our characters this week.  More layers uncovered every episode.  They do a good job of having this show a lot more character driven ...which you HAVE to, what with all the balls in the air you have to juggle.  But they also aren't afraid to continue to give you a wink and a nod with a smile with the humor, sight gags, and overall general tone of upbeat adventure and humor, but also giving us some drama as well.  John's story alone provides A TON of drama.  So, I definitely give this show a thumbs up!

That's all, from THIS Waverider, and I DO sincerely hope you subscribe, tell your friends about me, and leave some comments about what YOU think.  

Until later....Time IS On Our Side!