'Legends of Tomorrow': Did "The Getaway" Just Drop a Major Tease About the Arrowverse's Future?

Tonight's Legends of Tomorrow was largely centered on the past. The heroes found themselves paying 1973 a visit in order to prevent then-President Richard Nixon from telling the truth to the press as an honest Tricky Dick was making a mess of history. However, despite this, The CW series may have just dropped a major hint about the Arrowverse's overall future and it's one that doesn't look so good.

Spoilers for tonight's episode of Legends of Tomorrow, "The Getaway", below.

In "The Getaway", Nate (Nick Zano) and Zari (Tala Ashe) attempt to find out what exactly Nate's dad, Hank (Tom Wilson) is up to. Fans found out during the show's midseason finale that Hank is working with the demon Neron, though the reason was unclear. Tonight, the reason for the partnership remained a mystery, but exactly what Hank is doing with the magical fugitives the Legends bring to the Time Bureau is revealed: they're being experimented on, an operation that is funded by Hank's embezzlement of Bureau funds.

While this is something that fans could have guessed was coming, it's what Zari reveals next that's interesting: she compares what they're doing to the magical creatures to what A.R.G.U.S. began doing to metahumans in her time, taking them against their will and experimenting on them to create super soldiers. We knew previously, thanks to last season's episode "Zari", that in 2021 A.R.G.U.S. had begun taking over the United States with the organization installing a dictatorship as well as banning all religion and metahumans. Tonight's information, however, reveals that the agency is doing something far worse that directly impacts her family when A.R.G.U.S. kills her brother in 2042, taking his amulet and thus his powers.

What makes Zari's revelation tonight interesting is less the truth about what A.R.G.U.S. was doing with metahumans, but more that it may have just connected the dots between Zari's future and the "Star City 2040" timeline on Arrow. You see, Arrow established that it's illegal to be a vigilante and, by extension, a metahuman, especially in Star City. We also know that the Archer program -- developed by Felicity Smoak -- is in use, utilizing DNA to identify heroes. While Arrow's focus on the program in the future centers around Eden Corps and their plans, it wouldn't be much of a stretch to imagine that A.R.G.U.S. is using similar technology to round up metahumans.

If we want to get full conspiracy theory here, you could go even one step further and come to the conclusion that it's Hank's secret side project experimenting on the magical creatures that inspires A.R.G.U.S.' efforts with metahumans. After all, the Time Bureau and A.R.G.U.S. are both government agencies. If A.R.G.U.S. really does install a dictatorship at some point in the future, that same dictatorship could take the Bureau's efforts and apply them to metahumans, creating the dire and dangerous future that is Zari's chronological home.

If all of that is the case, it also makes good on something Zari is told last season about how the only hope she has of preventing her bleak future and saving her family is for her to remain with the Legends on their journey. Because Zari, with her first-hand experience with the issues of the future, is the only person on the team who can make the connection between what is going on with the Bureau and what A.R.G.U.S. was doing, her being around to tell Nate about it puts her in the unique position to potentially stop it with the help of the rest of the Legends' -- actions that may give her the opportunity to go back home two a life not destroyed by bigotry and loss.

What do you think? Do you think "The Getaway" is a big clue about the Arrowverse's future? Let us know in the comments below.

Legends of Tomorrow airs Monday nights beginning at 8/7 p.m. Central on The CW.