#lose god's influence over your life. and afterwards you realise you still wanna screw your brother silly and you gotta face that part

[tgtbata]

for @wincestwednesdays week two / (will it wash out in the water or is it always in the) blood

[lotrewrite]

As a comment on the general theme of the moral greyness/quandary of time travel and changing time I think at this stage since we have all the episodes now and can see what has progressed in terms of conversations/themes, we need to be careful about repetition (I mean this for all of us writers, and the people who volunteered to beta). I’ve seen in crop up in a few episodes, so I’ll think we’ll all have to be careful about over-discussion of this and other topics.

Also, a note to all writers, at some point are we dealing with/acknowledging the fallout from Rip’s actions in shooting everybody across time at the start of the season/trauma from being hunted/brainwashed/his actions whilst brainwashed? Not to mention we may need to insert Queen B in a few extra places, since she seems to disappear for multiple episodes at time, and pin down when exactly O!Len joins up with L!Len.

We also need to better balance the character attention since some episodes focus a lot on certain characters and then others get left behind overall (I think pretty much all of us have an unabashed Mick and/or Len bias lol). But these are all things that’ll get sorted out by the next draft. :-)

LOTREWRITE: Agreed on many points! We definitely have some repetition issues and need to hammer out how the character plotlines will develop. I think the only thing that I feel strongly about is that O!Len leaves to join L!Len in episode 16 (the maze) and returns in episode 18 (the republic) because the main purpose of him "leaving" is so that he can learn his lesson about how he's not actually as evil as the rest. (We definitely need more Queen B involvement - I think people ended up dropping her out because they weren't sure if we were using her or Merlyn or what.) Anyway - thank you for the comments! As always, very helpful and insightful!

Anywho:

Episode 13

-          There’s a good contrast between Episode 11 and this episode, in that 11 was a quandary about changing something that would have a big effect, and 13 is changing something that would end up having no effect at all. It ties in well with the melancholic ending you’ve set up here – the Legends will be finding that there’s no perfect answer, no certainty, and this is the life they’ve chosen.

-          Just a suggestion, maybe finish on a slightly more decisive note than just leaving the team kind of wallowing in their own uncertainty. Like Mick or someone says something like: “Well, maybe that’s why ‘Legends’ have always sounded more right than ‘heroes’.” It also ties in with Sara’s lessons in what it takes to be a captain, Ray’s lesson about what it means to be a true hero and all the messiness that comes with, etc…

-          I like the premise overall, and that it’s a new setting entirely instead of the well-known ones that are usually represented (however badly – I’m looking at you, LOT S1 Ancient Egypt…)

-          Good point on Ray not being automatically good at researching, that shit takes work

-          I like this dark side of Rip (even though torture is bad ofc!!)

-          Doesn’t Rip already know that Firestorm can transfuse things, so he wouldn’t be surprised?

-          Although I do like seeing Firestorm use this ability, it’s seriously underutilised!

-          Love Queen B and Amaya interacting, it’s gonna be so tense :-)

-          Do we see Legion!Len’s reaction to Mick at any stage? :3

-          I like the idea of Mick having to use his experience as Chronos to treat Rip (I like it on two fronts: firstly, in that it causes my favourite character angst, and two, it gives him a chance to face up to what happened to him and turn it into something useful/positive), although since it was Queen B who did the brainwashing we may need a bit of a handwave on Time Master technology vs magic technique (maybe Mick and Amaya work together on this?)

-          I also like that people check in with him afterwards

-          Could show a little bit of tension between Rip and the others – Rip because being un-brainwashed is unpleasant, and the others because although they’re glad to have him back, he did a lot of damage when he was under the influence of brainwashing – it also mirrors Mick in season 1 (and it parallels Len’s amputation/Sara’s shooting; both serious injuries)

-          On that note I like your point about Rip ‘rejecting family-ish/team dynamic’ contrasting with Mick becoming more accepted/accepting

-          Really melancholic ending, A+

-          I like the way the Legends get Rip back, I like seeing the Legion concede the planning to Len, Queen B and Amaya potential drama, and the team’s interactions with Mick

-          Nice work, thank you!

Episode 14

-          Oh god I love this era. Can’t wait for this episode.

-          Yep, I like that there’s a conflict in Rip without him realising it yet; he’s verbally relinquished control but still has the knee jerk reaction of needing to be the one who gives the orders. As a suggestion, if episode 13 progresses generally as was set out, you could have Sara still feeling the aftershocks of the uncertainty of the mission and the morals from that episode, and is looking for clean answers, which Rip professes to be able to provide, as someone with more experience. So he says he’s got a plan, and Sara agrees to follow it. He’s offering under the guise of friendship and altruism, but subconsciously he just wants to find his footing again after the Legion awfulness and the role of captain/leader is all he knows.

-          I cannot wait for everybody dressed up in Tudor gear. This is gonna be awesome. I can only hope there will be fanart.

-          What’s their cover story/way of getting into court? They might be able to sneak in, but going unnoticed might be more difficult given the fact that all those nobles are all basically interrelated lol.

-          Maybe at first they could sneak in during a masque! Henry threw those all time, especially when he was trying to impress Anne. And that gives us awesome costumes. Or they can claim to be French relatives of some noble or something, since France was all in fashion then.

-          Speaking of, as a suggestion, instead of placing it at a time when Henry and Anne are about to get married perhaps place it at the start of their courtship, making the prospect that Henry will lose interest more easily if Anne and he quarrel since he’ll still have wandering eye syndrome and won’t have been sucked into his creepy version of courting just yet. This makes his attentions to Sara much more pressing, since they can see time already changing the longer the courtship remains uninitiated.

-          On that note, whoo boy, Sara is gonna have a helluva time getting him to stop sniffing around her once he’s got the scent.

-          Personally I think there’s a line to tread between reminding Rip of the good he’s done and accidentally just enabling his behaviour. There were so many moments in S1 I felt could’ve been improved by Rip just clearly saying ‘I’m sorry, I screwed up, and I’ve learned something from this’ – but instead he reiterates his mission or his lost loved ones and goes doe-eyed and teary and says something like ‘So you see, this is why it’s so important blah blah blah’…he never really says sorry, or at least without adding something on to lessen the blame against him. So I’d like Rip to have an epiphany, and Stein and Ray there to not so much remind him of the good he’s done, but the good he’s capable of doing, if he works with them and understands what it means to truly be part of a team, because that’s what they’ve had to learn too.

-          That bit with Legion!Len, Mick, and Oculus!Len is really really really good, I like that a lot

-          I can see Mick shaking his head and just being a bit sick of it all at that point, constantly seeing Len everywhere – yeah, he’d wanna burn something

-          Frikking love that ending.

-          I really like this episode and I’m looking forward to it!

Episode 15

-          Oh man I love Hex, I like the idea of opening with him

-          I like the suggestion that L!Rip visited him earlier so Hex reacts badly – I think this does several things: 1) it shows that L!Rip wasn’t just hanging out with the Legion, he was an active member while brainwashed and he might not necessarily remember everything he’d done whilst under the  influence 2) It gives Hex a good reason to give his friend (whoever it was) the spear piece, once he clicked that L!Rip was evil and looking for it, which leads into 3) it wasn’t just the Legends being unlucky with their timing, there’s a reason they visited Hex and now there’s a lead on reason for why they’re going to NYC

-          Good link up with Stein and Lily and his motivation for taking the spear piece for himself

-          I cannot wait to see the individual reactions of the team when they’re searching a brothel

-          I like the idea of seeing Lily again, she was a pretty cool character and we could always use more women. Also the next episode uses Lily throughout, I’d consider working her into the episode somehow? She could always stay on the ship while the actual riots are ongoing and help coordinate efforts

-          I adore the idea of Carter showing up in a past life (but just mind the Irish brogue part…Hollywood has corrupted our accents, as they’ve done with so much. If you want help with the Irish accent/slang part – since dialects differ from suburb to suburb, never mind county – just hit me up, I’m Irish).

-          I really like scene 4, very heartache-y.

-          Good build up to the riot

-          Great interaction between Legion members (nice throwaway line about Merlyn!!)

-          I like how Carter seems like less of a dick in this (I confess, I never really liked his character)

-          Great escalation to the riot, and showing how easy it is to start and how difficult it is to finish

-          Love the show of strength from the neighbourhood, being directed by Mick and Carter

-          I like the moments with Ray in this episode – seeing all kinds of heroism, and getting through his residual feelings for Kendra

-          I like the ideas for conversations between the crew you’ve had in scene 13

-          Overall this episode builds up really well, though from the outline it wasn’t clear what the actual ending of the episode was (I’m sure we’ll see that next round!)

-          Thanks!

Episode 16

-          I love the idea of this episode

-          With Lily, we may need to look at the previous episode to work in a conversation about how she’s an aberration and Stein makes a mess of the explanation, so that she’s still annoyed and upset with him in this episode – Stein’s learned a few lessons along the way, so ‘she’ll get over it’ will probably be said in a pessimistic tone of voice, instead of a dismissive tone

-          Some of the characters’ reactions don’t mesh well with what we know now having seen all the episodes together – Ray has already seen lots of kinds of heroism and Rip is learning how to gracefully let Sara take the lead. So instead of being sulky, perhaps they’re willingly staying on the ship? Ray is still trying to figure out how best to be his kind of hero and Rip will be reacting against his instinct to take the reins and will want to give Sara room to work.

LOTREWRITE: This is definitely something we should discuss - depending on where they are in their story arcs, they could be in the middle of the learning process or they could be rejecting the learning process (i.e. depressed at not getting to the end result they want fast enough) But hey, that's why we did draft outlines!

-          Love the idea of the hosts obnoxiously reciting the titles!

-          I think there’ll be a line to tread between Stein’s development earlier on in the series and this one where he seems to fall back into his privilege/arrogance – maybe play up the Lily+Stein relationship here as his reason? (i.e. he knows the team can take care of themselves, but now his daughter’s safety is on the line and he won’t trust anyone but himself to lead them to victory – which leads to him saying some hurtful/obnoxious things)

-          Monty Python reference, love it!!!

-          The way Sara, Lily, and Queen B escape is actually so hilarious to me

-          I love the idea of a grudging truce between Queen B and the others

-          I love trial 4 interactions in particular (small typo lists two trial 4s, I mean the first one)

-          Flash museum reference, thank you

-          I love the idea of meeting future incarnations of the personas (CC, Heatstroke, MM), but did you mean that they’re actually the police? Is this a comics thing? I’m not sure about the way they’re introduced, it’s a little confusing

LOTREWRITE: I think in the comics they are actually some sort of organized police-ish force? It can definitely be made more clear.

-          Good move with Stein and his humble pie, and the Legion abandoning Len

-          “What is Batman’s real name?” nice

-          (And in my head I immediately heard Mick say: “Who the hell is Batman?”, since I don’t think we have a canonical Batman yet, aside from S1 Rip saying vaguely “I’ve seen dark knights fall and men of steel something something…”? lol)

-          I can very much imagine O!Len being disgusted by a cop CC

-          I sense that this episode has the potential to be very confusing and could stretch out as quite long, so we’ll have to keep our eye on the pace and editing of it (but that’s what betas and proof readers are for!) - I’d suggest a magic number of three trials before the big finale, just to mind the pace a bit.

-          Overall it’s a mega fun, filled with potential episode and I’m really looking forward to it

-          Thanks!

Episode 17

-          I can’t express how delightful the image of the team taking Jax out for his birthday is to me, especially a team member accidentally flirting with his mother omg

-          I have no ideas for potential girl character Jax gets talking to, but I definitely think it should be an Easter egg or something

-          I know the Legion are the bad guys, but in honesty the torture scene is just a bit jarring to me, unless we specify who it is – maybe a former Time Master turned Time Pirate that the Legion are interrogating for intel on potential spear pieces? Merlyn always struck me as the resident sadist, I never really thought that Dahrk could be bothered what with his magic, and Queen B can just brainwash people into telling her what she needs.

LOTREWRITE: This is a good point, though I think it might work best if we seeded more references to their cruelty and sadism earlier it would work better than watering the scene down now - Darhk certainly likes killing people just because (in canon it was actually Merlyn who kept trying to make him choose NON-murder alternatives, such as in their bank heist scene), Queen B we can characterize at will, and we know Eobard's a cold-hearted psychopath, so if we play up some of those traits, we can definitely set it up well.

-          I can see the Legion turning on Len at the drop of a hat though, yeah, and I like the image of Len running for his life from his former allies

-          Oh my gosh they made Jax a cake

-          Dibs on Mick making it since he likes sweets so much (“Dude! You made this?” “It was from a box. Don’t get emotional about it.”)

-          I love how the Legends are actually having quite a peaceful, happy time of it – meanwhile, the Legion are undergoing civil war lol

-          DUN DUN DUN ending indeed!!!

  This is getting kind of long again so I’ll cap it and continue onto the next and final part of my commentary, which I’ll get done today or tomorrow. Hope this was okay and I’m not stepping on anybody’s toes or anything. Thanks for all your hard work!!