Legends Of Tomorrow - Land Of The Lost/Moonshot - Double Review: "O' Captain, My Captain"

Alright, So things have been crazy, and I had fallen behind on Legends. Shame on me for making you wait so long, and I apologize. The vastly improved Season 2 of Legends is drawing to a close, and I couldn't be more excited to see how things are going to shape up. This week, I'm just going to give you 'drive by reviews" for the episodes Land of the Lost and Moonshot. This means they'll be short and to the point, maybe just two paragraphs and a rating. Please don't think that means I didn't enjoy these episodes(Spoiler alert, I did), it's that I just started a new job recently and have classes I'm attending while also running my podcast, so I've been crunched for time. Let's dive in, shall we?

Land Of The Lost: Evil Rip enacts a protocol in Gideon that causes the Legends to crash land in the exact same place where we found Ray at the start of the season. While Ray, Amaya and Nate go searching for the piece needed to get the ship back up and running, Sara and Jax enter Evil Rip's mind to try and find out where he sent Commander Steel with the last piece of the Spear of Destiny. This episode was probably more of one of the most cost effective episodes we have had in awhile. Sure, there was Gertrude the T-Rex that Ray crossed with once before, but she only makes an appearance at the end of the episode and it's pretty anti-climatic how Amaya simply just talks to Gertrude to smooth things over. Don't get me wrong, it's pretty freaking cool how good Gertrude looked and how Amaya was able to channel a T-Rex to communicate, but after two high concept episodes in a row, Legends had to cool it's jets on the CGI. For me, the best part of the Gertrude plot was Ray revealing to Nate that he knows what's up with Nate and Amaya, but that Nate needs to back off. Amaya will have to return to her time as she isn't like the rest of the Legends because her existence in the timeline actually matters. I was wondering if the show would ever address the Amaya out of time situation and I think adding this complication to the Nate-Amaya relationship adds just the right amount of angst. Of course, Nate isn't going to listen to what Ray said to him because he's too excited about getting some of Amaya's goodies to care, which makes this super irresponsible seeing as he's a historian, so I'm intrigued to see how this plays out in the end.

The journey to Evil Rip's mind was interesting to say the least. After Rip escapes his cell and destroys the medallion that tracks the Spear of Destiny, they knock him out and Mick is actually the one to suggest that use this method to get inside Rip's mind since it was used on him by the Time Lords. Sara and Jax volunteer to go inside and end up facing off with evil versions of themselves and the rest of the team inside Rip's mind. It was a nice way to infuse action into the plot and make use of the Waverider as the backdrop for the episode(saving $$$ in the process). The only weird part of this plot was that Rip ends up making out with his mind's physical representation of Gideon. Thawne and the Legion corrupted the rest of the Legends in Rip's mind, but not Gideon because they didn't view her as a threat. Gideon helps Jax track down Rip and Sara, who were trapped in a cell and then Rip is able to overcome his evil teammates by taking control of his mind and using powers. As his mind begins to rid itself of this evil stronghold, Rip shares a moment with Gideon, praising her dedication and eventually kissing her that I still don't know how I feel about it. In the end, the team is a whole unit again as they not only get the ship back working, but they get the old Rip back as well. It's a bit awkward for everyone, aside from Mick, greeting their old Captain which means that what he's done won't just be swept under the rug(and I'm okay with that as I love Sara as Captain and don't think Rip can just come back and take over). I thought this was a pretty solid episode, minus the Rip-Gideon kiss. The team is back together and they can get down to business finding the spear and stopping the Legion. I love that Amy Pemberton (Gideon) got the chance to physically play the role, that Mick tells Stein to treat his partner Jax as more than just a kid and I'm still interested in the fate of Nate and Amaya's relationship for now. All in All. Land of the Lost achieved quite a bit in what is to be considered one of the smaller scale episodes of the season so far.B

Moonshot: Moonshot is one of those episode of Legends that I feel demonstrates exactly how the show is improving upon season one and helps set itself apart from the rest of DC/CW shows. Moonshot centers around the team traveling to 1970 to find the last piece of the spear that Rip charged Commander Steel, Nate's grandfather Hank Heywood, with protecting. Hank has worked his way up the ranks in NASA and his the piece of the spear in the flag that Neil Armstrong planted on the moon. Thawne is also in 1970 as he's infiltrated the crew of Apollo 13 to get to the piece of the spear and caused a time aberration while doing so. One thing I loved about this episode was that while we got our usual time travel hi-jinks, we also got a lot of emotional moments throughout the episode as well. While Mick, Jax and Stein stay on the ground at NASA, Sara and the rest of the team head into space to stop Thawne, with Hank. Rip is feeling the effects of his absence as he struggles to come to terms with Sara's leadership, and it's fun to watch. Rip's main contribution was that he was the Captain of this ship and also had his knowledge of time but now that the team has had to learn how to do this on their own, where does Rip fit in? It's an interesting question that I'm looking forward to finding out, along with which Captain is still standing in the end of the season.

Ray is the one who ends up infiltrating Apollo 13 thanks to his suit, but he ends getting seen by Thawne. Thawne and Ray battle, though Thawne can't use the speedforce in zero gravity. Ray wins the fight and manages to get the piece of the spear(which involves Stein having to create a distraction on the ground by singing "Day-O" and that honestly was the real highlight of this episode), but the Waverider can't come and get him thanks to Sara's decision to take on a meteor belt head on. Ray ends up having to work with Thawne, who reveals that part of him misses that feeling he got when he worked with Cisco and Caitlin at S.T.A.R. Labs. I like that the show gave us more layers to Thawne this week, as it made his character a little less one dimensional. (Thawne doesn't see himself as evil and even calls out Ray for his selfishness by keeping the dwarf star to himself for his suit rather than using it to it's potential) Nate and Amaya continue to surprise me as well, watching them I'm realizing that they genuinely care about each out. Hank is upset with Rip for taking him away from his wife and son, something that intensifies when Nate tells Hank what kind of man his son was when he was raising Nate. The two talk about dropping Hank back off in time before he ever left and how that may fix things, but Amaya overhears and cautions Nate to how bad this could be. In the end, Hank ends up sacrificing himself, leading Nate to seeking some comfort with Amaya before meeting his own father as a kid (Hank had arranged a visit to NASA for him because he hated not seeing his son) and offering him some comfort. The team brings Thawne onto the ship but he doesn't make off with spear as his little time wraith problem is about to catch up with him so he dashes off and promises Ray they will meet again. Moonshot, with it's nice emotional moments and it's great use of space and the 70's a backdrop was one of the better episodes of season 2. A

What did you think of these episodes? Sound off below!

The Next Episode of Legends of Tomorrow, Fellowship of the Spear, airs 3/21 on The CW.

About the Author - Winston Mize

I always have the most trouble coming up with a blurb to describe me. Which is really weird for someone who wants to make a career out of writing. If you think I'm awkward online, it's just because you haven't met me in person. I'd like to think I have other interests outside of TV, and maybe I do, but TV is the one that gets me most excited. I live a pretty boring life so TV's the way I get my fix, and I'd love to chat about it with you. I'm also always looking to guest on podcasts and become a podcasting sensation, so if you've got the opportunity, I'm in there like swimwear. You can check me out with different previews of various shows or read my reviews of iZombie, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend and Legends Of Tomorrow here on the site. If you're a fan of One Tree Hill you can check out my podcast about as well by checking out our twitter page @OnlyOthPod.

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