What to Watch Verdict
A slower episode sprinkled with some all-timer moments that will have fans rolling.
Pros
- +
👽 Passing around an actual football to represent the nuclear football is actually high key funny. What comes next is even funnier.
- +
👽 Behrad's peace song playing over the U.S. preparing for nuclear war.
Cons
- -
👽 JFK's dentures.
This post contains spoilers for Legends of Tomorrow "Bay of Squids"
Check out our last review here.
Cuban missile crisis, anyone? In the continued attempt to get a starting point to find Sara, Mick throws the Legends smack dab in the middle of the conflict. To make matters worse, the misfits manage to steal a nuke instead of the intended alien pod, putting the United States on high alert — one that will turn to defcon 3 thanks to the help of Nate and Zari 2.0.
With World War III nipping at their heels, the Legends split off into two teams. Nate (Nick Zano) and Zari (Tala Ashe) head to Washington in an attempt to calm JFK (Aaron Craven) long enough to stop a 3 way nuclear exchange between Cuba, the SSR, and the United States. Their story caps off with the Harvard boys playing football with the literal nuclear football against the rogue General Kilgore (Nic Bishop). Legends of Tomorrow is known for its nonsense, but this scene left me cry-laughing so hard I couldn't take notes anymore. Absolutely perfect hot nonsense unfolds in "Bay of Squids."
Nate and Zari aren't the only two having fun. Trying to de-escalate his own situation, Behrad (Shayan Sobhian) does a bunch of edibles with Fidel Castro (Tim Perez). Pretty on brand for the totem-bearer, but the real moment is when he sings a song about peace to Fidel as the United States prepare what they think is their counter strike.
"Bay of Squids" is a perfect example of how to make a lackluster episode shine with a couple exceptional scenes. We needed Mick (Dominic Purcell) and Ava (Jes Macallan) butting heads and his subsequent crisis of conscience, but the process of getting there wasn't exactly enjoyable television. However, by playing that alongside the complete and utter nonsense of the episode, we get the narrative drive and the fun.
There's really only one inexcusable situation in this week's episode, and that's John F. Kennedy. The dentures they made poor Aaron Craven wear were clearly impossible to speak around, and they distorted his whole face when his mouth was closed. Makeup team did that poor man dirty.
Once the Legends manage to avoid nuclear war, they find themselves the closest they've been to rescuing Sara (Caity Lotz) yet. Mick teams up with the rescued alien Kayla to remove all the "nuke" from the nuclear warhead that smooshes Kilgore (whose grand plan was to shoot the bomb) and makes a deal: He'll take her to her ship if she takes him to Sara. There are two key points that Mick doesn't know just yet. The first is that Kayla was the alien that kidnapped Sara in the first place. The second is that the alien's human form (played by (Aliyah O'Brien) sure does look an awful lot like the protagonist of one of his novels! Watching him discover the latter is pretty damn fun. Here's hoping the Sara revelation goes similarly.
Though a slower episode than some other Legends of Tomorrow entries, "Bay of Squids" still manages to have some real "all-timer" moments that make it completely worthwhile.
