The Legends go back to 1988 to save Ray from being killed as an eight-year old.
Tropes:
- The Alcoholic: Zari notes that Mick "has been drunk since breakfast".
- All Webbed Up: Both Sara and Ray's mom end up wrapped up in webbing by the Dominator queen (the latter, upside-down in a tree).
- Ambiguous Situation: It's unclear if "Gumball" is making Ray do delinquent things or if he's just glossing over the unpleasant aspects of his childhood; given how young Ray is aghast at the idea of stealing bikes even when escaping from the Men in Black, it was probably the latter.
- Bathos: In the middle of a tense moment of the baby Dominator using its psychic powers on the Men in Black, they suddenly start singing "Good Morning" from Singin' in the Rain.
- Book Ends: The episode starts and ends with a team trust-building exercise.
- A Boy and His X: In keeping with the spirit of the E.T. homage, this episode tells the story of a boy (young Ray) and his baby Dominator pet, a result of the anachronisms.
- Brain Bleach: Nate's fine with making out with Ray's mom...until he learns that she was actually a Dominator in disguise.
- Brilliant, but Lazy: Young Ray finds school boring since he already knows the answers — makes sense for a young prodigy.
- Brutal Honesty: During the trust-building exercise, Zari gives the team her thoughts on each individual in a pretty open and blunt way.
- Call-Back: As the team notes, they've dealt with Dominators before, with Zari acting as The Watson to bring the audience up to speed. They ultimately end up dealing with the same government agency as well.
- Comically Missing the Point: Connected to the Sand In My Eyes moment mentioned below, Nate runs off and says that he is going to brush his teeth forever. Ray being Ray, he doesn't get it and asks why he would do that.
- Continuity Cameo: Agent Smith from the Dominator crossover the year before returns, as a younger man. Strangely, though, he doesn't look 20 years older than he did in The '50s.
- Continuity Nod: Ray once again mentions his "idiot brother" Sydney, though he doesn't appear in the episode.
- A Day in the Limelight: The episode focuses on Ray.
- Dead Guy Junior: It seems very likely that Baby Ronnie was named after Ronnie Raymond.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Zari is still taking time to lighten up, but she does lighten up across the episode — enough that young Ray sees her as his friend and present Ray gleefully takes her up on watching Singin' in the Rain with him.
- Delayed Ripple Effect: After Ray is killed in 1988, he vanishes in the middle of a trust fall with Mick. When the team goes back before the day he was killed, he comes back.
- Double-Meaning Title: "Phone Home" is both a reference to E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial and a description of what Martin has been doing — phoning home to Lily and 2017.
- Double Take: Both Sara and Stein do one after Mick identifies himself as a fan of Fiddler on the Roof.
- Fan Disservice: Seeing Nate hit on Ray's mom is already unsettling enough, but him actually getting kissed by the Dominator queen disguised as her...ew.
- The Ghost: Ray's "stupid brother Sidney"; he's mentioned at the beginning when Ray is visiting his old home, but he doesn't actually appear or even get mentioned after that, like the writers forgot he even exists.
- Gigantic Moon: No E.T. parody would be complete without the silhouette of flying bicycles in front of a giant moon, and this one is actually larger than in the movie.
- Hidden Depths: Mick Rory is a big fan of Fiddler on the Roof.
- Honor Among Thieves: Mick refuses to stop young Ray from shoplifting because he is not a rat.
- Humans Are Bastards: The Dominator Queen seems to think so, as she brushes off Sara's offer to help by stating that humans can't be trusted.
- Humans Are the Real Monsters: While the Dominator queen does some unsightly things in her search for her baby, it's ultimately The Men in Black who serve as the episode's real villains, and surprising to the team (and the audience), are the actual cause of Young Ray's death.
- Just in Time: Ray and Zari manage to catch up to 1988 Ray and the Men in Black right before he gets shot.
- Kids Are Cruel: The two bullies who constantly pick on Ray and which he still saw as friends. They get their just desserts at the end, with the Legends intimidating them into giving up their candy.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Zari accurately predicts that Stein wants to be anywhere but on the ship, a nod to how Victor Garber is leaving the show.
- Mama Bear: The Dominator queen will do anything to get her child back.
- The Men in Black: The same agency that's been in contact with the Dominators since the 1950s is the one that set up the lab.
- Mythology Gag:
- At the end, Zari is wearing a white dress like she does in the comics. (It's actually closer in appearance to the one worn by the original version of Isis in the 1970s series The Secrets of Isis.)
- Young Ray lives in Ivy Town, the setting of the Silver Age Atom comics.
- Oh, Crap!: Ray gets a look at the thing under his younger self's bed, and instantly realizes it is why he is killed: it's a baby Dominator.
- Poor Communication Kills: There wasn't really any good reason for Stein not to just tell his teammates where he was going. His secret keeping made it look like he was actually an informant for the Time Bureau.
- Red Herring: Mick and Jax think Stein's selling the team out to the Time Bureau. Instead he's just been hooking up a way to communicate with Lily so he won't miss the birth of his first grandchild.
- San Dimas Time: Played bizarrely straight with Stein's need to be at his grandchild's birth. It never occurs to him, Jax or Mick that they can just go to the appropriate time after the mission is over.
- Sand In My Eyes: The group bid a somber farewell to Gumball. Nate cries like a baby. And so does Sara.Nate: I'm not crying. I just have some alien goo in my eyes.
Sara: Me too... - Self-Serving Memory: Ray dismisses a pair of kids hassling him as just a couple of friends goofing around. It takes the reactions of the team and hearing the two run off laughing for Ray to realize the duo were bullying him.
- Ship Tease: Zari and Ray get a fair amount of moments, most notably in the end when she agrees to playing a team trust-building exercise game, which she previously declined.
- Shout-Out: The whole episode is one to 1980s movies, specifically E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, but tons of small ones to other movies:
- The episode's opening contains an homage to Raiders of the Lost Ark when little Ray escapes under a collapsing door.
- Nate pretends to polish a DeLorean as the team tails young Ray, stating that "this is a time machine".
- Amaya's line to the Dominator queen ("Get away from him, you bitch!") paraphrases a line from Aliens.
- Young Ray's fort is a lot like Will's from Stranger Things.
- Young Ray resembles Elliot, the kid from E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial .
- "Gumball" looks a lot like Baby Groot from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
- One of the stuffed animals in young Ray's closet is missing its left eye and has its tongue sticking out, just like the pink teddy bear from Breaking Bad.
- I kissed a Dominator and I liked it!
- Gumball forcing the agents to do a musical number is reminiscent of the Cuban Pete scene from The Mask.
- The bullies' Halloween skeleton costumes look like the ones worn by the villains in The Karate Kid.
- Skewed Priorities: Ray's first thoughts upon arriving in the '80s are showing his friends all the attractions in his hometown instead of, y'know, saving his younger self's life.
- Trailers Always Lie: The promo for the episode made it look like the Dominator baby rapidly grew and killed Ray. In reality, it was the government agents.
- Wham Line: A major one from Jax, who feels that Stein should be with Lily and baby Ronnie.Jax: I need your help to break up Firestorm.
- Whole-Plot Reference: To E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, including the episode's title. This is ultimately lampshaded by Nate.
- Would Hurt a Child: One of the agents doesn't hesitate to shoot young Ray Palmer, which makes sense for Agent Smith's ilk.
