The CW rides the wave of success mining another hit from the DC Comics universe and giving Berlanti Productions more reasons to mine for gold!
In the second season of The Flash the Scarlet Speedster played by Grant Gustin continues to gain momentum and is heralded as Central City’s guardian angel! After surviving the cliffhanging singularity that threatened to annihilate most of existence, it’s no surprise that the world regard the fastest man alive with such revelry — the Flash is certainly on his way to carving out quite a legacy for himself and has begun to inspire other super powered individuals to follow in his fast-footed steps.
There was of course the introduction of Firestorm in season one. The Nuclear Man quickly became a fan-favorite as realized by actors Robbie Amell and Victor Garber respectfully as the sum parts of the hero as Ronnie Raymond and Prof. Martin Stein, but at the conclusion of last year’s major dramatic arc, Raymond selflessly acts to help the Flash stop the growing singularity from swallowing up Central City. In the end Ronnie is lost, and Prof. Stein is left half-the-man he was before.
In order to survive a new host is found in Jefferson “Jax” Jackson a high school football star player played by Franz Drameh whose dreams of going pro are squashed by the advent explosion that unleashes all sorts of dark matter and energy giving rise to a generation of metahumans — humans with extra-ordinary super powers — like the Flash’s super speed. Fortunately for Stein and Jackson the two are a perfect fit and Firestorm is once again reborn with a new purpose.
After great coaxing from Caitlin Snow (played by Danielle Panabaker) the able S.T.A.R. Labs physician and scientist (and the Raymond’s widow) is able to convince Jackson that he has a greater purpose – a destiny to embrace – as the hero he was meant to be. Under the tutelage of Stein the two embark on a new adventure and leave Central City, but not before another mystery unfolds around a seemingly unassuming young woman named Kendra Saunders.
Having already won the heart of Barry Allen’s colleague Cisco Ramon (played by Carlos Valdes) the lovely Ciara Renée embodies the mythic elegance of another DC Comics icon and brings to life Hawkgirl. When a dangerous interloper comes looking for her, Vandal Savage (played by Casper Crump) proves more powerful for anyone metahuman to handle. The Flash calls in some powerful friends and heads to Star City and asks Green Arrow (the Emerald Archer originated by Stephen Amell) to join the fight.
During the course of this season’s first crossover event, Hakwman (played by Falk Hentschel) reveals himself to his soulmate Kendra, and together along with the Flash and Green Arrow take down Savage, but perhaps our heroes celebrated way too soon. As the newest spin-off from the DC TV Universe is suggesting Savage is alive and well and conquers the world nearly enslaving our future. One man, a Time Master named Rip Hunter (Doctor Who’s Arthur Darvill) travels back to today to assemble…
DC’s Legends of Tomorrow …the title itself appeals as a call to action, no doubt. For fans of the publishing imprint’s more than 75 year continuity it’s a momentous occasion. For the first time in primetime and presented in the form of a serialized hour-long format, the entirety of that history is about to be explored and brought to life! It started with Arrow when Berlanti Productions decided to take on the unlikeliest of heroes and evolve the texturized backstory of Oliver Queen on his journey to greatness.
As he embraced his purpose as his city’s silent avenger, a hooded vigilante that used otherwise primitive weapons – the bow and arrow – in his arsenal against the criminal underworld that plague the innocent. As Oliver’s legend grew and extended beyond the radius of his own Starling City (as it was known before assuming the current Star City moniker) and attracted the attention of an impressionable CSI investigator named Barry Allen from the neighboring Central City.
The Green Arrow, the mighty Atom and the Flash – members of DC Comic’s premiere team of super heroes, the Justice League – were brought to life in primetime in a way unlike any other previous incarnation of their like before commanding the 8pm time slot on The CW.
These two aspiring heroes, their fates intertwined; the producers of Arrow soon introduced their initial spin-off and rebooted The Flash a series that had already coasted onto the small screen with its original 1990’s incarnation. With that show’s full-on fan appreciation and the crossover events that united the primetime universes, the ground work had been laid for what inevitable came next: a team-up show to rival the popularity of the competitors, who wasted no time dominating on the big screen.
Traveling to contemporary times from a fractured and not-so-distant future, Rip Hunter brings together an unlikely group of adventures including Firestorm, Hawkgirl and Hawkman, whom are also joined by the Atom (industrialist Ray Palmer) who joined the cast of Arrow in Season 3, and the mercurial White Canary (Caity Lotz portrayed Arrow’s original “Canary”) Sara Lance before passing the mantle to her sister Laurel Lance (Katie Cassidy) who is now the vigilante Black Canary.
Hunter also recruits the criminal malcontents Captain Cold and Heatwave (the actors who were cast to play the Flash’s two lead rogues Wentworth Miller and Dominic Purcell played brothers on the popular hit series Prison Break) and recruited with their own agenda to plunder the most prized artifacts history has to offer. Together, these legends will confront the insidious evil of Vandal Savage as they journey through time in an attempt to stop the tyrant from planting his seeds.
The legends of today and tomorrow first gathered to defend the newly introduced Hawkgirl against the immortal villainy of Vandal Savage.
What Hunter does not reveal to his intrepid team of adventures is that unlike some of their more colorful costumed counterparts, these individuals that he has brought together will bare little remembrance in times to come. In other words, these legends of tomorrow are hardly that at all. Rip Hunter is giving these heroes an opportunity to change their fates, in effect inspiring them to be greater as a whole, effectively preventing a hopeless future from ever transpiring.
Next: Now that the Legends have been gathered, we’ll take a look at their first adventure together in a review of “The Pilot: Part 1”.