Hello and welcome to this recap of Legends of Tomorrow season 7, episode 11, “Rage Against the Machines,” aka the (second) one directed by Jes Macallan.
We waste no time and pick up right where we left off, in Sarajevo, 1914, with everyone in the Fixed Point celebrating the fact that Sara and the Legends successfully prevented The Great War. When the bartender realizes Gideon and Gwyn aren’t celebrating, Gideon lets it slip that she’s still nervous because of the RoboLegends, and the time travelers all rally to help the Legends fight them. Gideon tries to call them off, but it’s no use; they are a mob now, there’s no stopping that train.
I hate it when I accidentally start a riot.
Out in the field, Sara is reiterating her plan to ambush and seize the Waverider as soon as it lands, wondering what Gideon’s evil army will look like. An army of Avas? A bunch of Bishops? A gaggle of Gideons? They are very not prepared when the Waverider lands and releases a load of Legends.
“There’s two of you.” “No! There’s only one of me.”
After shaking off the initial shock, they realize not all of the RoboLegends disembarked, so they need to draw them off the ship. At first it looks like the mob of time travelers will do the trick, until they realize the mob is being obliterated without the RoboLegends having to move all that much. After seeing Gen Z³ murdered, Behrad loses his cool and launches himself at the RoboLegends, causing the rest of the Legends to back him up. But then Ava gets shot almost immediately, because she has to direct the episode so the Legends double back, Sara scooping up her wife and getting her team to safety.
The team regroups at the Fixed Point while the RoboLegends focus on righting the timeline by killing Archduke Ferdinand, which Eobard Thawne was already working on doing since Sara’s head-start was over. But, of course, the RoboLegends aren’t known for their subtlety, so when RoboSara finds Eobard, she kills him dead.
Thank you, RoboSara!
Meanwhile, RoboBehrad manages to follow the trail of Ava’s blood all the way to the Fixed Point, but luckily, upon seeing a gun pointed at Gideon, Astra is able to muster up enough magic to take him down and protect her team.
I want to know exactly what spell this was.
Sara finds Eobard just as his last breath leads him and when the Time Bracelet falls off his wrist, she remembers her promise and picks it up, though luckily for all of us she doesn’t put it on just yet. She heads back to the Fixed Point and is pleased to see her wife passed out drunk because at least that means she’s not in pain. The team looks to her for their next steps and is surprised when the ex-assassin doesn’t suggest a butt-kicking plan of action, but instead…a conversation.
Even Zari, who loves talking, isn’t so sure this is a great idea.
This is exactly why I’m polite to my Google Home Mini. So I never have to reason with robots in the future, they’ll just be on my side.
But Sara says that technically their end goal is the same: to get the Legends back to the point in time they belong. Gideon thinks this is a great idea and wants to help, but Astra tells her to get her human butt to the manor right this instant, and Sara not only agrees, but thinks all of the Legends should follow suit. She is, after all, the only invincible one among them.
Sara gives Ava one last “babe” and shuffles them off to Buffalo, taking RoboBehrad’s comm and asking for a parley. Gwyn, a product of wartime, wants to help her, but she shoves him through the manor door, too. No flesh-and-blood Legend will be dying on her watch.
Sara finds RoboNate first and asks to talk to his captain, and when RoboNate says that he’s the captain, Sara scoffs and says, and I quote, “That’s a choice.”
Also RoboNate was doing what felt like a Tr*mp impression and it was really upsetting.
Sara tells RoboNate about how she just wants to bring her family home, but RoboNate has an objective he has to fulfill: He has to kill the Legends. And he’s willing to kill Sara as many times as it takes until she tells him where the rest of his team and her wife are.
Sara underestimates how beefy he is and gets her neck snapped pretty quick, which sends Gwyn into a panic attack until he remembers all the times the Legends have been kind and gentle with him, and then he regains his faculties long enough to get Sara back to safety.
When they’re back in regroup mode, Gwyn tries to return the favor of grounding him and gives Sara a pep talk of his own. Realizing that Gwyn has more tactical experience than the Legends, and that probably the best way to outsmart the Legends is to have someone on the outside directing them, Sara hands the battle planning over to Gwyn.
Gwyn’s plan sounds a lot like playing hide and seek, which pisses Astra off at first. But when he insists they’re just outsmarting them and that she’ll be able to take down a RoboLegend if she wants, she gets on board.
Since BehradBot is dead, they know exactly who to send in as a spy to infiltrate the Waverider. He will have to be the one to disable Evil Gideon while the melee fighter Legends distract the rest of the RoboLegends by causing aberrations.
As soon as Behrad boards the Waverider, he’s confronted by RoboSpooner and RoboGary, and he does his best to keep up appearances, eventually convincing them he has to visit Dr. Sharpe for an upgrade. He instead heads for the mainframe and runs into RoboZari, who seems to be the only one allowed in the server room. (Yes I’m just using computery words with little to no knowledge if they’re the right ones like I’m in a Critical Role NordVPN sketch, don’t @ me.)
I just think we have room in our lives for three Zaris! Something to consider.
Realizing he can’t be the one to get away with this, Behrad returns to the mansion by way of the singular bathroom on the Waverider and tells Fancy Zari it’s going to have to be her.
When she asks about her role and her motivation, Behrad tells her that RoboZari looks like a 90s hacker aka pre-Arrow Felicity) and because she’s #extra, instead of getting actual hacker Flannel Zari, Fancy Zari takes this as an acting challenge and starts getting into character while she heads off to find the right outfit.
“Okay so this will be like the time Tatiana Maslany played Cosima playing Alison. Got it.”
Gideon wants to help, too, but Astra snaps at her like an overprotective mom who isn’t on Gentle Parenting TikTok and tells Gideon she won’t be going anywhere on her watch.
Team Aberration heads out to disrupt the timeline with singing fish, VR tech, and Star Wars spoilers. (Fun fact: I’ve never seen a single Star War, and the other day in a group chat, my friend Callie redacted a Star Wars spoiler, and when I informed her that I was not trying to avoid them, she said that the spoiler she redacted was the fact that Darth Vader was Luke’s father. I proceeded to laugh my entire ass off and said, “I have been a human on this earth consuming media for decades, this fact did not elude me.” And this episode happened to beautifully prove my point just a few days later. As someone who has had people in my twitter mentions maliciously spoiling things on purpose, this was a very sweet act of kindness on my considerate friend’s part, but I did think it was adorable that she thought I somehow didn’t know this. After all, I know Pitch Perfect by heart.)
This mayhem plan works because RoboSara and RoboNate are hot on the Legends’ heels, stamping out these aberrations gleefully, and when it proves to be too much for them to handle alone, RoboSpooner and RoboGary finally leave the Waverider, too.
Unfortunately, this does not leave the Legends as in the clear as they’d hoped, because Dr. Sharpe and RoboAstra find Behrad to give him his upgrade.
She can upgrade me any time she wants. Just saying.
Luckily, he was prepared for this possibility and tricks them into drinking a bit of poison that sends them both rushing for the bathroom. Entering the stall lands them in the Manor, where Gary welcomes them by shoving them out into the plane of fire.
After doing this duty, Gary runs into Gideon, who is playing nurse to the wounded Ava. Gary offers to help but Gideon quickly denies him; playing Florence Nightingale to her captain seems to be the only thing she’s allowed to do around here without Astra snapping at her, so she’d rather keep at it to feel helpful.
Outside, Spooner runs into RoboGary and convinces him that she’s RoboSpooner in disguise, which works because all versions of Gary are a little dumb and also human Spooner can understand his alien language. She manages to Uno Reverse him and when RoboSpooner shows up, RoboGary gobbles her right up, grenade and all, much to human Spooner’s amazement.
Please why is she still wearing this hat!!!
After seeing how upset Gideon is, Gary goes to talk to Astra to ask why she’s been yelling at Gideon all day. Astra says she’s just trying to protect her squishy human body, and Gary realizes that her maternal instincts were triggered by Gideon almost getting hurt. Astra realizes that she does feel protective over Gideon, and she did sort of create her, but she snaps at Gary and says she’s not her mother. Though to be honest, she doesn’t look like she’s even fully convinced herself.
“Haven’t you heard, we keep our feelings in little boxes here on the CW.”
Gary smiles at her and calls her Mama Bear but she DEFINITELY hates that so she shoves him away and gets back to work.
On the Waverider, RoboZari is starting to be suspicious of how quickly Dr. Sharpe and RoboAstra disappeared and haven’t yet returned, so she follows their trail until she finds herself in the manor…and face to face with Fancy Zari dressed like RoboZari.
Soon I’m going to have to start calling Tatiana Maslany-ing Tala Ashe-ing.
Fancy Zari is pleased she nailed RoboZari’s lewk, but RoboZari goes full Tatiana Maslany and Tala Ashe slaps Tala Ashe in the face! Then Fancy Zari and RoboZari start full on slap-fighting and it is both a modern marvel of technology and also fucking hilarious.
Gary and Astra fight them like this, and are trying to decide how to figure out which one is the real Zari, but before they can, Fancy Zari pulls the plug on RoboZari and turns to glare at Gary, who was seriously considering taking a bite out of both of them to see which one tasted more like chicken.
Zari, Behrad, and Astra decide to try to pretend to be RoboLegends but acting is not their strong suit. Zari starts to put in the shutdown code, but while she’s looking for the delta key, Evil Gideon starts to catch on.
“Leave me alone! GOSH! You’re not my real Gidget!”
In a panic, Zari decides to just pull the ripcord, and by ripcord I mean wires. The only problem is, the Waverider was mid-flight. Luckily, between Astra’s survival instincts and Behrad’s ability to hotwire a timeship, they manage to have a bumpy but survivable landing.
Evil Astra outfit + our Astra’s smile = perfection.
Astra and Behrad kiss and honestly, in this heightened adrenaline of survival, it’s the only time I’ve felt like a moment between them was more earned than forced. I still didn’t love it, but it made the most sense to me of all their moments, instead of all the times Astra has been all shy and weird around Behrad.
Gwyn is thrilled his strategy actually helped, and Sara is proud of her team. Because a good leader knows when to step aside and let someone else take the helm, and she sure was right to do so in this case. She dubs Gwyn officially a Legend.
I personally would be fine with dropping him back off in his timeline where he belongs but fine.
Gwyn, Spooner and Sara do a shot and Spooner is ready to head home, but something is holding Sara back; and sure enough, her Canary senses were tingling for a reason; RoboNate and RoboSara are still very mission-focused despite Evil Gideon being offline. They already had their orders, and they’re going to follow through until they hear otherwise.
Sara decides now’s as good a time as any to tell Nate about the bracelet she inherited from Thawne and how it’s her responsibility to be the Fixer now.
Hey now who gave her permission to have such sad eyes?
Sara tells Nate and Spooner to go while she distracts the ro-bits before getting into place to protect the Fixed Point, and asks them to send Ava back to her. She wants to protect them one last time.
And honestly? Not knowing if this show is renewed, or what Caity Lotz’s contract/plans are, this was an extremely stressful moment for me! Especially since I have been worried about this since she shook hands with Eobard! And I wasn’t ready to lose this badass bisexual/the most Unkillable Gay the Unkillable Gay Squad has ever seen!
I’m going to tell my grandchildren this was The Nevers.
Sara is barely squared off against her android counterpart when Nate, Spooner, and Gwyn show up beside her. Sara might be willing to go down with this ship, but they’re going to be playing the violin right beside her.
But Astra has a Big Idea: to have her lil Gideon do a job only Gideon could do, and she impersonates Evil Gideon, giving the RoboLegends the order to remove their CPUs, which they dutifully do. Sara is confused because she couldn’t hear what happened, but Astra could and she’s proud of her girl.
There’s something very D&D about two similarly-aged people having a parent/child dynamic and I’m here for it.
Sara thinks this is all well and good but she still has a duty to fulfill, but Nate asks her to hand over the time trap bracelet and trust him, and so she does. He plugs RoboNate’s CPU back in and Tom Sawyers him into taking the bracelet, dubbing RoboNate The Fixer and freeing Sara Lance from becoming the Last Centurion.
Astra apologizes to Gideon for not letting her help earlier and explains that she was just trying to protect her. She admits that even though it’s weird, she does feel proud of Gideon, and Gideon says, “Thanks, mum,” and throws her lil arms around Astra.
I know this isn’t the point but also: ARMS
And I’m sorry but this height difference is the cutest thing! And the irony of a former AI being the one to further humanize Astra is delicious.
INSRET
Positively giddy, Gideon heads off to look for Gary and Ava, but she’s barely out of Astra’s sight before she gets stabbed in the back, quite literally. Ironically, it’s RoboAstra who has clawed her way back from the depths of hell to stab her human counterpart’s daughter figure. The two of them lay on the floor facing each other, the life draining from each of them, a former robot turned human and robot formed from the image of a human, and…does anyone have Jes Macallan’s phone number? I just wanna talk…
[Image redacted because it’s actually a bit gory and Heather is my editor.]
Unfortunately there’s a wee hiatus before we get more Legends because of the Olympics, and honestly I’m not 200% sure when it comes back. My best guess is February 23rd since I’m 95% sure the Season 7 finale is on March 2nd, but whenever it is, know I’ll be right back here the next day with a recap. The good news is, the preview for the next episode implies that maybe there’s a chance Human Gideon can be saved, but only time will tell.
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If we’re lucky then Robo!Zari somehow ended up in the totem so we might see all three Zaris together one day.
the dream!
Fashion Zari’s signature move seems to be dramatically unplugging things – see Evil Gideon, Fate Gideon, and Robo Zari.
If I had to guess, the only way to save Gideon will be to upload her back into the Waverider and merge her with Evil Gideon.
—-
“That’s for making me wear cargo pants!”
…what’s wrong with cargo pants? They have pockets!
hopefully they can just replace Evil Gideon though i will miss human gideon very much if she goes back to AI form!
Better yet, keep both Gideons running concurrently! We have co-captains, why not co-AIs?
I know Jes was directing but it feels like the last two episodes had a million missed Avalance moments. After what-his-name was like “being gay is a sin, sadface,” Ava didn’t want to go see her wife and get a hug? Sara is like “we need a plan…hmm who should I ask…how about this random old timey gentleman and this idiot, not my wife who LOVES PLANS??” Ava gets shot and Sara is like “so someone else handle that, k?”
It’s like the CW gave all of its sapphic allotment to Batwoman (BLESSED BE WILDMOORE) and so Legends was all out. I mean, I wouldn’t trade *spoiler* and *spoiler* and *belt spoiler* for anything, but we couldn’t even get a crumb here?
It also feels like they heard us about Spatula and…flung Astra at Behrad so hard it was like they were trying to see if the spaghetti was done cooking. I’m all for ace Spooner but she and Astra are IN LOVE unsexually and the Behrad pivot feels soooo forced. SPATULA IS THE HEIGHT DIFFERENCE I WANT. IMAGINE THEIR CUDDLE HUG.