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“Legends of Tomorrow” recap (1.05): Fireball

Previously on Legends of Tomorrow, Sara and Kendra teamed up to help each other balance their inner monsters and their humanity (and look good doing it), and the Legends headed to Russia in the ’80s to stop Vandal Savage from creating a Soviet Firestorm and ruining the future, but the beautiful-but-deadly Valentina kidnapped Stein, Mick and Ray.

We open with the Professor chatting with…Cisco? The professor chats with him for a moment and realizes something is off-his hair is tidy, he’s being polite, his jokes are boring-why, this isn’t Cisco at all. The Professor snaps out of his hallucination and Valentina reveals that it had been her all along.

Stein says that he knows she can’t kill him, so she better give him a shower and new clothes or else. Vandal Savage shows up and threatens torture, but the Professor isn’t afraid. He’s a brave old soul.

On the Waverider, Jax is feeling the Prof’s fear, and it’s making him twitchy. Kendra tries to reassure him that everything will be okay, and they’ll save his other half.

Out in the control room, Rip, Snart and Sara try to ask Gideon how to get into the Gulag, but there’s no good answer to that question.

Sara suggests asking the Russian mob for some help because of course Sara Lance’s first idea is “Let’s just roll up and have a chat with some of the baddest of baddies.” But it’s the only idea they’ve got, so Rip and Snart go to a bath house to hang out with a mobster. They ask him about how to get in or out of the Gulag, and he’s a little suspicious of them because they don’t have tattoos but also intrigued because people don’t get thrown into a Gulag for jaywalking. To solve it, they decide to fight in gravity-defying towels.

Meanwhile, Sara fights a ton of men in the locker room, taking them all out easy peasy lemon squeezy. She goes into the steam room to check on the boys and is highly disappointed that they haven’t even taken out this one guy two-on-one in the time it took her to knock out an entire room of Russians.

When they get back to the ship, Kendra and Jax are told they’re not allowed out of the Waverider. They’re both too high-risk right now since Valentina is after Firestorm and Savage is after Kendra. Instead, Sara and Snart are assigned the task. Before they head out, Rip pulls Sara aside; he has a special mission for her. He shows Sara Star City in 2016 if they fail. The city is in ruins; Firestorms are flying around causing mayhem. He tells her this so she knows what’s at stake, and so she understands why they have to have a Plan B. She knows what it is before he even has to tell her: If they can’t save Stein, they have to kill him.

Sara suits up and shoves a bunch of little knives into her outfit. Snart comes in and tells her that he knows she was assigned a Plan B, but encourages her to think about it. Tells her that there’s honor among thieves, that she can’t just kill a member of their own team. She insists that it must be done, but Snart says that it’s what RIP thinks must be done. He calls her a pawn, but she tells him that it’s important, for the future.

In the Gulag, Valentina is starting to break Stein down, but then Kendra carves a message into Jax’s arm to tell him they’re coming for him, renewing his resolve.

Rip drives Snart and Sara into the Gulag with a bribe and a name drop, and Snart offers Sara some last-minute advice: Kill Stein with her bare hands, looking him in the eye. Because he’s not just another target, he’s part of the team, and she should remember that if she’s going to make this decision.

Snart smuggles Sara in on a gurney with a sheet over her, joking about her being dead again. Once they’re past the guards, they split up, against orders. Snart is going to save Mick (because bromance), and Sara is going to get Stein.

The fate of the world on her shoulders, Sara sneaks up on the guards leading Snart away and attacks. She takes two down but then she gets shot at, and Valentina gets Stein into the lab before she can get to him.

Sara comms Rip and says she couldn’t get close enough to save Stein. And her heart grows heavy as she realizes what she has to do.

Kendra and Jax go to Rip like siblings who have prepared an argument before approaching a parent. They have a plan for Kendra to fly Jax in so they can help Sara and Snart. They say something important: “When will you learn that we’re better together?” Because I think that’s one thing Rip has a hard time with, learning. And trusting this ragtag team he’s assembled. Knowing that they’re adults who are here willingly and know the risks and work better as a team of Legends than as one-off super-somethings.

So Rip agrees.

In the Gulag, Snart finds the boys. He tries to wake Ray up, but when he doesn’t budge, he tucks the Atom suit into his pocket and tells Mick “Let’s go.” But Mick doesn’t want to leave Ray because they’ve bonded in prison.

Meanwhile, Valentina notices the words carved into Stein’s arm and realizes that Stein himself is half of Firestorm. She looks at him like a hungry lion looks at a gazelle and asks if he’s ever merged with a woman before. Which is funny mostly because Victor Garber is gay.

Outside, is ready to snipe the hell out of Stein as soon as she gets eyes on him. (Bonus unconscious guard lying next to her.)

Kendra swoops in and drops Jax down, and Sara is like, “Uh, what’s happening y’all?”

Rip tells her that they have a new plan. They’re better together; Plan B was a stupid plan. Instead, Sara should use her sniper position to cover Jax as he runs across the yard. She does, and he gets to a breaker and cuts the power. Chaos ensues.

Sara sees Valentina heading to that glowy core room and realizes what her plan is. She tells Rip that they’re seconds away from a Soviet Firestorm and that she has the shot on Stein and can take it. But Snart chimes in and reminds her that she’s not that person anymore. Sara’s trigger finger twitches, but ultimately she decides not to take the shot, fights the Assassin inside.

Valentina is very excited about how close she is to becoming Soviet Firestorm and won’t listen when he shouts at her that merging without a splicer is essentially a murder-suicide.

She absorbs him and ignores his yells at they have to unfuse right quick because she’s drunk with power.

Across the Gulag, Savage finds his Chay-Ara. He doesn’t want to kill her; he wants them to spend eternity together. But Kendra is sick of people deciding her destiny for her; she tells him that her answer was no last time, it’s no now, and it will be no forever.

Soviet Firestorm is testing out her new powers on rogue prisoners, while Sara and Snart cover a limping Jax, who is heading right for her. Jax pep talks Stein and manages to unmerge Stein and Valentina. As Stein warned her she would be, she is unstable without the splicer, and once Team Legends is at a safe distance, she explodes.

After it’s all over, the Legends do shots for a mission not totally failed. Which is closer to a win than they’ve had so far! They start to toast when Stein points out that Jax isn’t quite 21 yet. But Sara happens to have a nugget of information in her back pocket: The drinking age in Russia in 1986 was 12. So Jax is fine! Cheers!

But before they can enjoy their brief happiness, the Waverider is hit. It seems Kronos has found them again. They are knocked out of the timestream, and they crash land in an unknown place and time.

When they exit the ship, Ray notices that the Palmer Tech building says SMOAK on the top (which made me punch the air triumphantly) and Gideon tells them that they’ve landed in 2046. A green-hooded figure drops from the sky and growls at them, and gosh darn it are these folks happy to see him! But when the growling doesn’t stop, when the hood doesn’t come down, Sara is concerned. She says, “It’s me, it’s Sara,” like the idea of her friend not recognizing her in the future would break her whole heart.

Ray chimes in too, reminding Oliver of a long time ago when he sent his friends off to be Legends. But the Green Arrow doesn’t know any legends…and he sure as hell isn’t Oliver Queen. For one thing, he looks younger than Oliver is in 2016, and for another, he’s black.

What did you think of “Fail-Safe”? Are you excited to see Future!Star City next week?

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