Legends of tomorrow S03 E02

Legends of Tomorrow Season 3 Episode 2 Review: Freak show

A little wariness and a little historical context make for a mixed episode of Legends of Tomorrow.

 

I'm...not sure how I feel about the new status quo on Legends of Tomorrow. The show has generally leaned into the humor and absurdity of the fringes of a superhero universe - it's one of the things that made it maybe the strongest superhero show on television. But the shift from last season's desperate, frantic sprint to save the universe from permanent alterations at the hands of three psychopaths that led to broken rules and more broken timelines, to this year's "gang of lovable screw ups" has been pretty jarring.
"Freakshow" was a little bit of a mess of an episode, one that helped crystalize my concerns. It was a product of multiple factors, but the biggest one was that the show stopped having fun alongside the characters and started, a little bit, having fun at their expense.
The heart of the episode is spent on Amaya's return from 1942 Zambesi, brought back by Sara to deal with a sabretooth tiger being shown in PT Barnum's freakshow in 1870s Wisconsin. We find out why and how she ghosted Nate - she saw news about her granddaughter, Mari, fighting crime in Detroit and realized she needed to go back. And we find out that her powers are on the fritz, turning her into a killer every time she accesses them. This is fine, and fairly typical Legends stuff.