Friday, November 18, 2016

My Review of Legends Of Tomorrow's 2x06: "Outlaw Country"


Written by Matthew Maala & Chris Fedak
Directed by Cherie Nowlan

Sara (to Jonah): "I'm starting to think screwing up is an essential part to surviving."

If Westworld wasn't enough for you fans of the Old West and sci-fi, then this episode may have filled your boots. I do love a good return to a well received character and this week, it was time to catch up with Jonah Hex, who this week managed to get saved from a hanging by the team while at the same time in hot pursuit of an old enemy of his own.

Jonah's surly disposition with both Sara's leadership and desire to get revenge on Quentin Turnbull (Jeff Fahey) forms most of the basis of this episode as his casual sexism gets in the way of initially taking Sara's leadership seriously. Sara had a good plan with Mick and Turnbull and Hex waded in and caused a bar fight that saw Nate getting shot with some dwarf star alloy.

I liked the Sara and Jonah scenes from this episode. Both Caity Lotz and Jonathon Schaech played off each other pretty well as the two discussed their own revenge quests on both Turnbull and Darhk. Both of them also came to the realisation that killing their respective targets wouldn't help either of them and both worked well in order to bring Turnbull down.

Speaking of Turnbull, for a guest baddie we've had stronger ones and we've also had worse ones. Jeff Fahey pulled in a decent enough performance and I found his scenes with Sara, Mick and Jonah pretty engaging enough even if I drifted in and out of his actual plot for the episode. I did like that there was some continuity from Jonah's episode history though in this one.

With Sara largely paired with Jonah for this episode, the rest of the gang were split into two groups - Amaya spent her time with Mick and the two of them connected a little over their own animal instincts while Jax, Ray and Nate for an amusing enough pairing. The budding bromance with Ray and Nate took a few more steps this week when the latter was given his own suit and name by the former. Nate can still be a little annoying at times but I did like his moments with Ray in this one.

As for Stein, he was mostly taken out of the action as we saw him experiencing visions with another woman and a child. The theories for this seem to be that he's either had enough wife and a child (Flashpoint, anyone?) or possibly a daughter and grandson but either way, I'm interested in seeing how this all plays out.

- I like that Rip got a mention in this episode. Jonah also brought up the events of the town both him and Rip were a part of as well. Mick made a point of referencing Sara's sexuality to Jonah too.
- By the end of this episode, Nate got the name of Steel. I guess Citizen is being dropped here.
- So, now might be a good time for Stein to tell Sara and the gang about that future message from Barry.
- The episode ended with a lead in for the four way Invasion! crossover in two weeks time. Chronology for this episode was 1874 Colorado.

Not quite as good as the previous western episode we've had but Outlaw Country certainly had it's moments though. The mixing of group members per week continues to work and Jonah was as good to watch here as he was back in The Magnificent Eight.

Rating: 7 out of 10

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