In an effort to extend Chief's life, Rita, Jane, and Cliff enter the realm of the Terrible Dr. Tyme. In Detroit, Vic attends a PTSD therapy group meeting and bonds with military veteran Roni Evans. Larry visits his son's funeral and reconnects with his remaining family.
Tropes for this episode include:
- Bait the Dog: Inverted. Tyme is set up as a terrifying Reality Warper that bends time to his will... but he just uses it to host an endless party with visitors from across history. The worst thing he intentionally does is insult Rita, after she nearly kills him.Chief: I warned you, my research was thin-Cliff: Oh, but confident enough to call him terrible when he was just some self-involved putz!
- Disco Dan: Dr. Tyme lives in a perpetual roller disco, and asserts that the world never got better than it was in 1980.
- Mythology Gag: Cliff accuses the Chief of trying to form a hit squad out of the Doom Patrol, one of the real reasons he formed the Doom Patrol in the comics.
- Not a Mask: It looks like Tyme's wearing an incredibly garish helmet shaped like an alarm clock with a face. He's not. That's his head. Which Rita finds out the hard way when she accidentally smashes his head open and his brain spills out.
- The Reveal: We finally figure out how Niles kept himself alive all these years, with a talisman he stole from Doctor Von Fuchs, that was given to him by Eric Morden / Mr. Nobody.
- Terrible Artist: When Rita presents her plan of finding Dr. Tyme, her illustrations are stick figures. Even Cliff asks her if Dorothy drew it.
- That said, when they see that Dr. Tyme does have a helmet shaped like an alarm clock, he apologizes for mocking her drawings.
- When You Coming Home, Dad?: Gary Trainor never stopped trying to find Larry. Paul, in a moment of anger, snarks that it took Gary's suicide for Larry to finally reveal he was alive.
