DC’s Legends of Tomorrow Season 1, Episode 10: “Progeny”
Written by Phil Klemmer & Marc Guggenheim
Directed by David Geddes
Airs Thursdays at 7pm ET on The CW
While it’s far from great television, Legends of Tomorrow is hitting its stride in the latter half of its first season. “Progeny” is a relatively strong, somber episode that puts the focus on character conflicts that by now have had time to be built up over a number of episodes, while the Savage-related plot of the week presents an interesting dilemma.
The team has never jumped so far into the future before, and it’s a surprisingly staid one, though no doubt budgetary restrictions had an effect. Uniformity appears to be the lifestyle of choice in 2147, in which we find Per Degaton, a boy who will grow up to deliberately release a virus that will decimate much of the world’s population. Degaton is tutored by Savage, who in the future, steps into the chaos and power gap left by the virus and becomes a world dictator, betraying and murdering Degaton in the process. (Side note: in the DC comics, Per Degaton grows up to become a supervillain obsessed with time travel).
The Kasnia Conglomerate is an interesting premise, and one far closer to a future reality than a one-man world dictatorship would ever be. In this future society, the “haves” have retreated into a society of sheltered wealth and privilege, with access to all the latest technology, but have traded in their freedom for it, being ruthlessly policed by their governing body and a police force of robots using Ray’s technology. The wardrobe and sets of this world are rather dully rendered, and the beats of every event that occurs with the Legends in it are familiar and expected.
The core premise of this week’s problem however is complex, essentially a take on the often-repeated existential and moral question: if an individual had the opportunity to kill Hitler as a baby, prior to his rise to power and the subsequent death of millions – should he/she? Is the evil of killing the baby offset by the millions of lives it saves?
In a stance that seemed out of character given Snart’s clear bleeding heart in past episodes for children in general and troubled youths in particular, Leonard urges the team to kill Degaton. Most of the rest of the team, understandably, is against it, and while Professor Stein appears very little in the episode, he gives the most impassioned and articulate plea for the boy’s life and the meaning of justice in this situation. Rip, however, is absolutely determined to do it, and here’s where Arthur Darvill’s weak performance again undercuts the ruthlessness the character is supposed to have. Not for a moment is it believable that Rip will go through with it; Darvill is able to capture none of the immense moral struggle and anger driving Rip.
Meanwhile, Sara, whom I sometimes think is the only fully-realized character on the show, has conversations with both Rory and Snart individually, in which she tells each with her trademark blend of no nonsense and empathy to work things out with the other. Rory and Snart respond true to form, by opting to duke it out in a no-holds barred fistfight. The troubled relationship between lifelong friends has been one of the anchors of recent episodes, and one in which it’s particularly satisfying to see the show ditch (for the most part) the schmaltz it usually goes for, and commit to the darkness inherent in these characters.
Speaking of schmaltz, Kendra and Ray have several meet-cutes-with-conflict, in which they avoid telling each other their problems despite being in a two-year serious relationship. Their basic communication problems feel forced given the length of time they’ve been together, and the dialogue, in oppositition to their interactions in the last few episodes, is stilted and cliched.
This episode brings up an inherent practical problem of Legends of Tomorrow: they have no way to stop Savage’s allies without killing them. Arrow, The Flash, and Supergirl each have their own specialized prisons, but despite having all of time available to them, Rip doesn’t seem to have recourse to any remote geographical location in which they can isolate enemies for safekeeping. This would have been an obvious fix for the problem of Per Degaton – surely simply returning him to his previous life, in which he would continue on his path toward sociopathy and worldwide murder, and indeed did, was a poor option.
Nonetheless, the questions about morality, sacrifice, and goodness posed by the Per Degaton storyline – and the crew’s ultimate decision not to kill him – are a complex and fascinating set of issues grounding a somewhat dark episode. It also ended well, on a note of upcoming menace, as Mick informs the crew that they’re about to be tracked down and killed by the Hunters, world-class assassins hired by the Time Lords. Next week, however, look for a change of both tone and setting, as the crew goes to the Wild West in what should be one of the most fun episodes yet. The show’s episodic genre shoutouts are all over the place – this one, with a futuristic tech-based dystopia – was more successful than most – but I have confidence in Legends to pull off a fun next episode that plays with the conventions of the Western genre.
Favorite lines:
“Fine. Team kidnapping.”
“Go team.”
Snart: “People seem to think we should have a heart to heart.”
Rory: “We don’t have hearts. Where does that leave us?”