DC’s Legends of Tomorrow Recap With Spoilers: River of Time

The episode opens in Ancient Egypt, where Savage has Rip in custody. He’s delighting in torturing Rip, and threatens to leave him to rot in his cell until the comets strike.

On the Waverider, most of the team wants to kill Savage, but Stein and Kendra are still worried about Carter. Ray and Jax come in to report that Savage had used future tech (well beyond 2166) in his robot, meaning that Rip now believes the Time Council will sign off on getting rid of Savage.

Savage explains that he developed time travel and has been traveling as well. He says he’s trying to save the world the same way Rip is. After Rip leaves him, he orders Gideon to get to the Vanishing Point as fast as possible.

In his cell, Carter knows who Kendra is, but that doesn’t stop him wanting to kill her.

Sara goes to visit Rip in his lab, and is worried he’s pushing the ship too hard. She says that she’s checked with Gideon and that taking Savage out of the timeline didn’t save Rip’s family. He assures her that the ship will hold together — but just then something blows, rocking the craft. Savage smiles.

The time drive has broken down, and Jax is about to start fixing it, but in response to a concern from Stein, Rip assures them that the jump ship has an auxillary time drive to get them back to 2016.

Savage tries to psyche out Sara, telling her that Hunter will be the death of the team, but she doesn’t want to hear what he has to say.

In the engine room, Jax is working on the technology, but the radiation is above acceptable levels. He gets hit with a wave of energy, and after losing consciousness flashes back to a time when his wife gave him his father’s watch. It’s the day he left for the mission, and he tells his mother that he’s going to be on time for dinner after saying good-bye to Stein at the university.

When he wakes up, he’s suffering the consequences of temporal radiation exposure — including rapid aging.

In Rip’s study, Sara comes to him to present him with Savage’s claim that Hunter would sell out the team to save his family. Rip tells her that Savage isn’t wrong: he tells her what happened to Jax, and she storms out angrily.

In his holding cell, Kendra brings Carter a photo of their family, along with baby Aldridge, but he attacks her and tries to kill her when she gets too close. Ray rescues her and punches him out, and then says he’s going to end this.

In Savage’s cell, Palmer demands to know how to free Carter’s mind. Savage tells Ray that the moment he frees Carter, Ray will lose her forever. He tells Ray that they’re quite alike, just like he told Rip. He claims Shayara loved him following her first resurrection, but then he lost her to Khufu. That betrayal is what set Savage’s rampage into motion. Ray says Savage is his only enemy, but Savage says that Carter is their mutual enemy. When he invokes Ray’s first fiancee, Ray walks out. He flashes back to meeting up with Felicity before he leaves for the mission. She tells him that he has a life to come back to, and he promises he will after they take out Savage. He says he became The Atom to make the world a better place, so he has to do this. The two kiss good-bye.

When he arrives at Carter’s holding area, Kendra is reading him the resurrection prayer that she recited during their first death, and caressing his face. Ray sees it, gets upset, and leaves.

Kendra follows Ray, trying to explain herself. Ray rejects her rationalization and tells her that Savage is right: loving her is a curse. She tells him that Savage is just trying to get inside his head, but Ray says that’s true but Savage is also right, and tells her he wants to end things.

In the Med Bay, Jax’s blood chemistry is that of a 63-year-old man. The Rogues decide they’re tired of waiting for the other shoe to drop and that Jax deserves better. They go to confront Rip, telling him that they want to kill Savage, but Rip says that the time drive is rebooting and they’ll be to Vanishing Point soon. Hunter tells them that if they want to abandon the mission, they can take the jump ship back to Central City. The Rogues turn to go home, but Sara says she’s not going to run from a fight.

She flashes back to saying good-bye to Nyssa before leaving on the mission.Nyssa is shocked that she’s her old self again, and brought to tears. She goes to kiss Sara, but Sara resists, saying that she’s going to save Nyssa from the League’s jail. Nyssa tells her to leave Nanda Parbat far behind and live a life unbound by her past. Sara says it’s harder to do than it sounds but Nyssa tells her anything worth doing is.

At Savage’s cell, Stein asks if Savage remembers the night in 1975, when Savage was sharing his immortality with his followers. Savage deduces that Stein wants him to do it for Jax. Savage says it’s Carter’s blood that works the magic, not his own, and tries to position stein and Ray against the Hawks. Stein, though, says that Savage has unintentionally given him a solution to his problem.

On board the jump ship, Stein injects Jax with a sedative; he says that a return trip to 2016 should reverse his condition, and that while he knows Jax wouldn’t turn his back on the team willingly, he’s doing the opposite of what he did when he forced Jax to join him on the trip — sacrificing himself for Jax. He tells Jax to tell her good-bye for him.

Martin flashes back to his lab, where he’s researching something. Clarissa comes in to ask him to come to lunch with her, but she’s figured out that he’s planning on traveling through time. He promises her that he’ll be home before she knows it, and kisses her good-bye.

The Rogues come to find the jump ship, but it’s gone. They’re upset with Stein, who explains he did whatever he had to do to save Jefferson’s life. Now, they have to repair the Waverider and bring it to the Vanishing Point.

Ray goes to see Savage again. He tries to provoke Ray into a fight, and Ray opens the cell and punches Savage. The two start fighting, and Savage manages to get the upper hand, knocking out Ray and using hsi fingerprints to open the cell and make his escape.

Ray informs Rip that Savage is on the loose, and Rip sends Ray and the Rogues to deal with Savage and the now-released Carter. The power goes out, due to Savage tinkering with the Waverider, and Rip has to stay on the bridge with Stein and Sara to manually get the craft to Vanishing Point.

In the battle between Carter and Savage against the Rogues and Atom, Savage almost gets the upper hand until Carter is flooded with memories of his past lives and switches sides, turning the tide. Savage stabs him and Carter falls, provoking Kendra to beat Savage into submission. Both Savage and Carter survive, though.

Later at the Med Bay, Kendra apologizes to Ray for everything while he tends to Carter, but Ray says that having a broken heart has at least convinced him he can love again. With Savage in custody, the team makes their way to Vanishing Point, where they’re brought in by a tractor beam.

At a tribunal of the Time Council, though, they dismiss the evidence that Savage has been manipulating the time stream for his own ends and imprison Rip, releasing Savage to go back to 2166. Druce, it seems, has been working with Savage all along. While Savage taunts Rip about his impending murder of Rip’s family, Time Master forces descend on the Waverider, where Sara and Snart are finding a place to hide.