TV Review: LEGENDS OF TOMORROW: Season 2, Episode 11: Turncoat [The CW]

Legends of Tomorrow Turncoat Review

The CW‘s Legends of Tomorow: Season 2, Episode 11: Turncoat shows us that once again Christmas is a dysfunctional family holiday – even for time-traveling superheroes.

Turncoat drops the whole multi-villain scenario and tasks the Legends with dealing with only one: Captain Rip Hunter (Arthur Darvill). In some ways, making Rip the focal point of evil for the Legends is the best move so far. The overcrowded, ‘everyone has a vendetta’ formula seemed to strangle the storyline. It shifted away from the more important points at hand and characters who we seem to be less and less familiar with as time goes on.

Rip’s plan to kill George Washington in 1776 successfully lures the Legends into a trap. There, he hopes to gain their piece of the Sphere of Destiny. Now that Rip is completely merged back with his old self, minus a few memories here and there, he cuts the Legends at the knees. He disables the Waverider and any of their electronic devices. This leaves the Legends at a great disadvantage.

Again, this is another fascinating aspect of when good guys go bad. ‘Evil Rip’ is in full knowledge of how the Legends work. You could say he is their ultimate enemy. Based on how this episode played out he will probably continue to be a formidable foe. The best part of this episode is that the show doesn’t gloss over how far removed Rip is from his former self.

That is clearly evident when he shoots Sara Lance (Caity Lotz) earlier in the episode and kills her in a later scene. Jefferson “Jax” Jackson (Franz Drameh) pleads with Rip not to hurt her, insisting over and over again: “It’s Sara…” But Jax’s words have no impact. The Rip Hunter, that the Legends and the audience have come to appreciate, is no more. He has morphed into a completely different individual who has no love for his former team.

The episode also gives a lot of decent character development for Jax. Because Jax is the youngest of the Legends he comes off as a little naive. But in Turncoat, Jax is pushed to the edge when he is forced to come face-to-face with Rip. Jax seems to genuinely think that the only course of action is to rescue Rip without harming him. But after Jax is forced to watch as Rip guns down Sara something shifts.

Whatever veil of hope and innocence Jax has maintained thus far is ripped away. In his anger, Jax goes after Rip in order to exact revenge.

Unfortunately for Jax, Rip Hunter still knows enough about his former crewmember. He knows that Jax isn’t a murderer. This is something the audience, and possibly the crew, have come appreciate about who Jax’s character represents among the rag-tag bunch.

A recently revived Sara knows this too. She knows that a distraught Jax may not be able to come back from gunning down their former Captain. Plus, killing Rip Hunter on Christmas would make this the worst holiday episode ever.

The true guts of this show now are how much Captain Rip Hunter’s old teammates care about him, despite the fact that he is evil and tried to kill all of them. His actions don’t undo that. They let him leave with the Spear of Destiny because they didn’t want to kill him. Moments like that speak a lot of the unspoken nuances of the characters. An on-going theme of family that has been forged between these characters over the last season and a half.

With any luck, those same elements will be strong enough to bring the real Rip Hunter back.

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