The Legends try to protect a young woman named Zari from being killed by Kuasa.
Tropes:
- Actor Allusion: Mick is (once again) quite happy to plan a Prison Break.
- Arbitrary Skepticism: Stein refuses to believe that there's a mystical problem with Amaya's totem. Nate on the other hand does look for a scientific solution first, but when that fails he looks up the history of Amaya's village to see if there's a solution to the problem, and is happy to use one when he finds it.
- Bad Future: As common for the Arrowverse; in 2042 meta-humans are illegal (having been so since 2021) and automatically end up in prison and the world in general is a Police State.
- Bar Brawl: Sara has Mick start one as a distraction to enable the Legends to escape from Kuasa.
- Blow You Away: The Wind Totem naturally has these abilities.
- Borrowed Catchphrase: Gideon uses Rip's "oh bollocks" when the ship is contacted by Agent Sharpe.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Kuasa is the latest in a long line of Arrowverse villains who can't kill the hero without risking erasing themselves from history — if she kills her grandmother Amaya, she's gone.
- Continuity Nod: A.R.G.U.S. is still maintaining black sites, though in 2042 they might "technically" not be illegal anymore.
- Cool Ship: The Time Bureau's timeship is even bigger and cooler-looking than the Waverider.
- Curbstomp Battle: Kuasa hands Sara, Ray and Zari their asses. Only Amaya is able to stand up to her totem with her own, but even then Kuasa implies that she could kill, but doesn't because it would kill her too.
- Didn't See That Coming: Kuasa is completely blindsided that she's facing off against her own grandmother — and the totem she long coveted.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: A law against meta-humans including all of them required to be listed in a registry for no apparent reason than for being different; and they're subject to inhumane experiments while in captivity.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Sara cites this in the new intro — the Legends saved the world twice from Vandal Savage and Eobard Thawne and all anybody cares about is them breaking time. Of course, this seems to be a Lampshade Hanging on their tendencies.
- Everybody's Dead, Dave: Zari discovers that all her family and friends have been killed while she was imprisoned.
- Hypocritical Heartwarming: This wonderful exchange between Mick and Ray:Mick: If anyone's gonna kill Haircut, it's gonna be me, lady!
Ray: [touched] Oh, thanks, Mick!
Mick: My pleasure. - Idiot Ball:
- Ray fails to recognize Kuasa even in face-to-face combat; especially egregious since he mentioned his fight with her earlier in the episode.
- Gary lectures the Legends that civilians are not allowed to know about time travel...in front of the person who isn't supposed to know about time travel and without verifying whether or not the Legends told her. They didn't. Nice going, Gary. Though he does promptly admit "That one's on me."
- Jerkass Ball:
- Stein grabs it by casually mentioning he wouldn't mind if Mick was killed and later his condescending bedside manner with Amaya.
- Sara grabs it by antagonizing Agent Sharpe, rather than accept her help — which means Agent Sharpe wants them dead, no matter what Rip wishes. Justified, as the Time Bureau were willing to let Zari be taken into A.R.G.U.S. custody and turned into a science experiment.
- Mushroom Samba: Nate brews tea for Amaya with a hallucinogenic root traditionally used in Zambezi for vision quests, and drinks a cup himself to prove it's safe. The tea works perfectly for Amaya, but it sets Nate higher than a kite.
- Never Wake Up a Sleepwalker: At the start of the episode, Stein warns Nate against waking up the sleepwalking Amaya. Especially since, during her sleepwalk, she summoned the spirit of a spider and is using its powers to climb the ceiling. Nate wakes her up anyway, which causes her to fall down. Despite this, Amaya's training kicks in and she sticks the landing.
- "Not So Different" Remark: When Sara says that Zari lied to and used them, Jax argues that she would have done the exact same thing in her place.
- Police State: The streets are monitored by armed drones and A.R.G.U.S. military squads, metahumans are locked up and experimented on just for existing, and religion is banned.
- Putting on the Reich: A.R.G.U.S. has become a fascist organization going after metahumans (and the religious) — and doing experiments on their prisoners.
- Precision F-Strike: Gideon calls Agent Sharpe a bitch.
- Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!: When Jax sees the experiments the prisoners are subjected to in the A.R.G.U.S. prison he releases all the metahumans with no hesitation.
- Shout-Out:
- When picking her up, Nate says "Come with us if you want to live".
- And, when trying to bring the Waverider to the prison, Nate tells Sara that he's giving the ship all it has. Of course, being on a Mushroom Samba, his perception of velocity's...a little off.Sara: Nate! How're we doing with that rescue?
Nate: [screaming, amidst rampant camera shaking and engine noise] I'm givin' her all she's got, Captain! The ship can't take much more of this!!
Gideon: Actually, Dr. Heywood, the engines are still idling.
[the camera shake and engine noises instantly die down, shortly followed by a cut to the Waverider, motionless in the sky as a bird flies by]
Nate: ...then why's it feel like my face is peeling off?
Jax: Yo, you high or somethin', man?
Nate: You have no idea! - Visually, the Time Bureau's ship looks an awful lot like the Andromeda Ascendant.
- Silent Antagonist: Kuasa doesn't talk for about 2/3 of the episode.
- Sufficiently Analyzed Magic: Stein says that magic is just science humans don't understand yet. Amaya disagrees.
- Taking Up the Mantle: Zari takes up the Wind Totem, which was worn by her brother before A.R.G.U.S. killed him.
- This Means War!: Agent Sharpe makes it clear that she will banish the Legends to the dawn of time if they meddle in her affairs again — no matter what Rip thinks.
- Took a Level in Badass: Kuasa has gotten much more powerful — she no longer needs the totem to control water.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Jax calls Sara out on planning to leave Zari to A.R.G.U.S. after having witnessed their cruelty, which changes her mind.
- The Worf Effect: Sara, the team's most efficient hand-to-hand fighter, gets her ass handed to her by Kuasa.
