Well, figuratively — it’s more about the general “help” feeling provided by one English writer during trying times for the Legends as they go on the quest to retrieve the one thing that can seemingly destroy the Spear.
Recap
Possessing three out of the four pieces of the Spear of Destiny and with now disclosed information given by Rip Hunter, the Legends make their way to the Vanishing Point, the place outside of time where the Legion has been hiding all along. Once there, fooling Eobard Thawne, they successfully get their hands on the final piece and watch as the Spear reassembles itself.
As Mick tries to destroy it with fire, the Spear however reveals a secret writing which told them, after Nate’s due translation, that the blood of Jesus Christ could destroy it. After Rip’s warning that visiting historic historical moments like the one where Jesus dies is a serious no-no in time traveling, Nate comes up with the best next thing: a paper that mentioned one Sir Gwaine getting his hands on a vial of the blood and being buried with it in French territory. This paper, as you may have guessed, was written by J. R. R. Tolkien who can be found in the north parts of France during World War I.
So they move along landing amidst war and terror trying to infiltrate the army. Amaya is much more shocked by the horrors of the dying people as she is associating those images with those of her own village being burned in the future. Mick starts having visions of Leonard Snart again and he reveals the whole plan to the vision… except that it is the true Snart who was ransacked from the timeline by the Legion of Doom to help them retrieve the spear. He also starts seeding the feeling on Mick that he is not a trusted and valued member of the Legends.
Ray and Rip find Tolkien as he is falling sick. They bring him aboard the Waverider and cure of his illness besides explaining him the whole situation with the Spear and saving humanity and here’s how it goes down:
Rip: In short, my fellow travelers and I…
Nate: Fellowship, if you will.
Rip: … we are on a journey to destroy an object, one which would bring the bearer an imaginable power…
Get it, guys? *wink wink* Anywho, Tolkien agrees to help out and goes on to do some additional research on the ship’s library. Amaya confides in Sara about her emotional struggles (shoutout to mentions of both Laurel — I miss you!!!! — and Mari). Tolkien locates the burial site in a church. The Legends head over there and find the knight with an engraving in his shield, but are interrupted by Snart, Damian Darhk, and several lackeys who start a fight. Before they leave, Tolkien makes a copy of the engraving.
At the Waverider, the group has a moment of rivalry with Mick as his loyalty for Snart might jeopardize the Legends’ quest. Tolkien has “shell shock” — nice touch — and finds out that the blood is at the center of the battlefield. Mick and Amaya have a moment where both of them reveal that the Spear is speaking to them, asking them to be used in their favor: Amaya to save her village and Mick to never start a criminal life.
The group reunites to discuss how to proceed given they need to reach the blood vial. Sara wants to get both fighting sides to agree on a cease-fire, but Amaya is against it, as she claims they should use it to get rid of the Legion by rewriting reality, but given the group’s antagonistic’s viewpoints, she says can control the spear to lead them where they want (it is supposed to glow bright when close to the blood). The Legends decide in favor of Sara’s idea.
Amaya, Sara, Nate, and Mick head over to the battlefield while Tolkien and Rip head over to talk to the English forces and Martin and Ray try to convince the German ones. Initially, their plan goes south because neither captain wants to cease their fire, but Rip punches the English captain and proclaims the brief peace himself so that both armies can get to their hurt soldiers for treatment.
After making some progress before the cease fire had been announced and punching several people, Sara and co. get to the site where the blood is hidden. However, as usual, Damian and Snart ruin the party by getting Mick to betray the Legends and ruining the cease fire as Snart throws a bomb. As Eobard get the Legion out of the battlefield, the Legends are extracted by the Waverider, but not before Nate stumbling on the ground, dropping the vial, and forever losing the blood of Jesus Christ.
As the Legends regroup, Nate suggests that the Legions must have no idea how to use the Spear. However, during the episode, besides featuring in the Flash/Supergirl crossover, Malcolm Merlyn arrives with the “Kalabros”, his recent object of retrieval, the book that shows how to ignite the Spear. The Legions gathers round, everyone holding the Spear as Malcolm says some stuff in another language and so it begins.
Review
Lately, I’ve been really trying to find some more recent films that could teach me a bit about World War I since history was almost never one of the subjects I excelled at during school. Failing that self imposed task, I actually hoped this episode could do it which, spoiler alert, it didn’t. The thing “Fellowship of the Spear” did teach me, however, is how to pronounce “Tolkien” and that mistrusting one of your friends is always a bad idea. It also was not comparable to the episode which fangirled over George Lucas in the way that the homages for Tolkien were severely more lowkey given the war scenario.
Regarding Mick’s seemingly betrayal, I am on the fence on whether it felt forced or not. As someone who did not fully watched season one (I blame Leonard Snart’s writing which apparently hasn’t improved), I still got the sense that the Legends did have a connection with him. Throughout the season we got episodes whose side story focused on his relationship with other members of the crew — the one with Amaya and the one with Martin are just the first ones that come to mind right now.
However, it is impossible not to mention that he really was the wild card among the Waverider. He was the one who would most likely cause some sort of conflict, either disagreeing with the rest (especially when under Sara’s orders), or being dismissive of the general goal, trying to achieve some personal gain, and the like. I can’t exactly say the Legends’ lack of trust on him wasn’t called for, but it was also something that has been been remedied all season long.
So now Snart is back (ugh) and he got his partner to betray his “friends”, a decision that can be seen as dramatically correct. After all, he is still the Mick who used to burn and rob things in The Flash before being recruited by Rip. The hope is that, now that the Legion is creating “Doomworld”, he will be the one to save everyone as he regrets his actions.
Mick’s conection with Amaya was also severely present in this episode as both of them were shown to be craving a change. Amaya got instantly taken aback by sightings of the war which did get a pullback from the script as Sara mentioned she had seen those things before. However, it is only now that she knows her village is going to go through the same sort of “hostile environment”, to downplay it, that she truly is feeling it in her gut. It also comes to mind her disagreement with Sara, near the end, about Sara’s plans going south and Amaya being furious about it.
Still, this was just another massively impressive episode of Legends of Tomorrow. The atmosphere of sheer terror, suffering, and the futility of war were all present during the fight scenes. The acting was once again top notch and I’m legit sad with how things end. However, I have a lot of faith that the final two episodes will see things back to normal — the question that remains is “how?” as the blood of Jesus got spilled.
Images courtesy of the CW.
