Legends of Tomorrow season 1, episode 15, “Destiny,” saw the team taking their fates into their own hands.
The big reveal of “Destiny” is that free will is an illusion. The Time Masters have been controlling time and manipulating people’s actions all along. They’ve been supporting Vandal Savage, Druce reveals, because ten years after Savage comes to power, Earth is attacked by Thanagarians (an alien race that Hawkgirl Shayera Hol belongs to in the comics). Savage is the Earth’s only hope against the Thanagarians, the Time Masters believe, so events have been manipulated — including the deaths of Rip’s wife and son and Rip going rogue — to make sure Savage comes to power and can defend the Earth.
Rip finds this revelation utterly defeating, but after Sara and Snart rescue the team — sans Kendra and Carter, who have been taken by Savage — the Legends decide to take their fates into their own hands by destroying the Oculus, the device the Time Masters use to manipulate time.
While the Time Masters expected this, they clearly didn’t foresee the events that followed, including Jax’s return to the the team (having joined forces with past Stein to successfully time travel back into the future) and Snart sacrificing himself to destroy the Oculus.
Ray first intends to sacrifice himself since the Oculus has a fail safe that must be held down to self-destruct the device, but Mick stepped in. Leonard, however, knocked Mick out to get his Big Damn Hero moment — but not before Sara kisses him (while Adele wails “We could have had it alllllllllll” in the background — or was that just me?). With Snart gone, the team targets Savage in his honor.
It makes a lot of sense that a show about time travel with a governing body of people who are so-called masters of time would eventually explore the concept of free will versus destiny. At the beginning of the show, Rip admits he recruited the team he did because they would not be missed from the time stream but the team decides they’re going to change their own fates by becoming Legends. They’re going to buck destiny.
But it turns out that was entirely expected. Fate. Each team member reacts to this differently — including a revealing conversation between Ray and Mick in which Ray tries to accept his impending death while Mic confesses that he cares about the team, though should Ray ever repeat that he’ll end up bald. But what is unexpected is the two antiheroes’ heroic streaks. Free will is victorious.
I’ve previously discussed how much I’ve loved Leonard’s arc, which has evolved in a fascinating way since his first appearance on The Flash. Him sacrificing himself for the sake of the team’s future felt like a logical culmination of his character development, going from cold blooded murderer and thief to selfless hero. The fact that Leonard believed himself fated to be like his father but ended up, through his own free will, becoming a hero completely unlike his father is an incredibly powerful statement.
(It’s also worth noting, I think, that he tells Sara his only regrets are the things he didn’t do — such as considering a potential future with her — and Sara is clearly having the same regrets in the moments before she leaves him to his death.)
Mick’s arc has been more subtle yet is just as powerful. Since being revealed as Chronos and finding his way back to the team, Mick has developed out of a stock thug character to a significantly more nuanced character who, deep down, has a heroic streak of his own.
And the fact that he, without blinking, takes Ray’s place in the suicide mission shows that his affection extends beyond Leonard; he cares for everyone on the team. He’s willing to do anything for them. He even kept from being reconditioned as Chronos because of his affection for the team. And that’s pretty amazing. With Leonard gone, though, what will Mick do?
I predict he’ll hold the remaining members of the team even closer to him, protecting them with all his might. And that’s some incredible character development, considering where Mick started. He snuck up on me as a favorite in Legends.
But the question of the hour is definitely whether Leonard Snart is really dead. I doubt it, considering he’s one of the most popular characters in the Arrow-verse. Whether he returns of Legends remains to be seen, but I have no doubt we’ll be seeing him again.
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