After seven seasons, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow has come to an end. The CW TV series started as the place for all the third-tier superheroes of the other more successful Arrowverse shows and, from there, transformed into something different, unexpected, and unique — something better. It began as a relatively serious show, where Rip Hunter, the captain of the Waverider (a time-traveling spaceship), recruited a band of misfits, full of assassins, criminals, and scientists, to help maintain the timeline. After a not-so-good first season and without a pre-existing comic book series to follow, the show got the freedom to become whatever it wanted. And it wanted to be a genre-bending, heart-in-its-sleeve, always-breaking-time-travel, surrealistically funny show, where its mantra and reason to exist was: Why the hell not?
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Not many shows can sustain a season devoted to aliens, a magic-focused season, a time-displaced historical figures season, or an evil trio with superpowers season. Legends of Tomorrow did it, making sense of all of it while, most importantly, taking care of its characters and their own journeys. It may have started as a time-traveling adventure, but it became much more: from a scrappy spin-off to a TV series that will be remembered. Here’s why.
Different Kind of Superhero Show
The CW
Most superhero shows are dark and existential. Not Legends of Tomorrow. The show started as serious as those TV series and, little by little, it morphed into a comedy series about a group of goofs who somehow also have superpowers. As with many great series, it took its time to find itself, to the point that you could maybe skip the first season to go directly to the good stuff. Then, the show became weirder, funnier, and sillier. It transformed into a hangout comedy where the team never took itself too seriously. Sometimes — most of the time, actually — they screw up the timeline and have to find the strangest, most absurd, and goofiest way to correct their own mistakes.
Genre-Bending TV Series
In more than a hundred episodes, Legends of Tomorrow did everything: sci-fi, meta-comedy, horror, Bollywood dances, princess animation battles, episodes in hell, Shakespeare parodies — everything.
You never knew what would happen in a new episode of Legends of Tomorrow. Is this the one where they go to the wild west? The one where a devil unicorn will try to eat their hearts? The one where they pay homage to Groundhog Day? Is this the one where they parody Friends (title included)? Whatever the case, it was always clear that every episode would have laugh-out-loud moments, heart, and some meta in them. It also gave us Beebo, a fluffy, blue, kind-of-Elmo toy who could become a God for the Vikings or the avatar of our heroes while battling a demonic time demon for the fate of the future (only in this show does that kind of sentence made sense).
Sara Lance: The Evolution of a Great Character
Sara Lance was the sister of one of the most important characters in Arrow. She was thought dead and had become an assassin. When she appeared in Legends, everything changed. The new tone suited her. Sara was still tough and the scariest killer, but also was the leader of this team of silly heads. She was the big sister to the rest of the group and showed her softer side. She became the Captain Kirk of the ship, bedding all kinds of historical figures like the queen of France and showing how fun it could be to travel through space and time.
And then, she met Ava Sharpe. She becomes more romantic, almost giggly at times. She decided to fall in love, marry, and even have a family, things that season one Sara thought were hellish. She evolved. All that while still being the most badass assassin in the whole universe (at any time). As Caity Lotz explained to TV Line, “She’s a lot softer than when she first started, and that’s nice”
Diverse Representation in Its Characters
The show’s last season had LGBTQ+ heroes, Muslim heroes, asexual heroes, and even a love story between an alien and a robot AI. And every character was a lot more than that representation. We still have many TV characters where being LGBT or Muslim is the only characteristic of the role, and thankfully Legends wasn’t like that. Indeed, this show gave us a beautiful queer couple Sara and Ava, who complemented and understood each other even when their points of view didn’t align. It also had the Tarazi siblings, Zari and Behrad, who were Muslim heroes. But that was not the most important thing about them. It influenced their characters and actions, but they were a lot more rounded than that.
Character Development Balanced with Action
Legends was a superhero show with lovable characters where evolving was as important as ass-kicking. The team changed a lot during the years, giving us different teams and combinations: romances (Sara and Ava, Nate and Amaya), bromances (Nate and Ray, Mick and Leonard), and friendships (Zari 2.0 and Ava, Spooner and Astra, Jax and Stein). The Waverider also became the place where many of the characters learned to be themselves and love themselves. And from there, sometimes characters left. Because they were ready for a new chapter of their life, and it was ok because they had evolved for the better.
Legends of Tomorrow may have started as a time-traveling adventure, but it became much more. From a scrappy spin-off to a TV series that will be remembered. Maybe even it will become a legend.
