'Legends of Tomorrow': What Impact Could "Guest Starring John Noble" Have on the Arrowverse Timeline?

Tonight's episode of Legends of Tomorrow directly set things up for next week's season finale, but [...]

By Nicole Drum

Tonight's episode of Legends of Tomorrow directly set things up for next week's season finale, but the events of "Guest Starring John Noble" saw some developments that might very well impact the Arrowverse timeline in serious ways.

Spoilers for tonight's episode of Legends of Tomorrow, "Guest Starring John Noble", below.

In tonight's episode, Amaya (Maisie Richardson-Sellers) returned to Zambesi 1992 so she could stop the destruction of her family and her village. Saving Zambesi would make major changes to the timeline, but more than that would create a huge anachronism that would free Mallus from his temporal prison. Initially, Nate (Nick Zano) and Wally (Keiynan Lonsdale) went after Amaya to stop her, but as the episode unfolded, the Legends decided to let the anachronism happen. Freeing Mallus was the only way to kill the demon once and for all.

With Mallus revealing his true form at the end of the episode, it's clear that Amaya was successful. Mallus is free, Zambesi is saved, and that means that the warlord Benatu Eshu didn't destroy her family. Kuasa was never left behind. Mari likely was never adopted, never grew up in Detroit, never became Vixen. Erasing Zambesi's demise also erases the events that led up to the events of the CW Seed program, Vixen, and means that so many small parts of the Arrowverse timeline are now likely to not have happened.

Or does it? There are a few things that hint that the protection of Zambesi may not create lasting damage to the timeline. The first clue is Mallus himself. Earlier in tonight's episode, Nora Darhk (Courtney Ford) tells her father that once Mallus is free he will destroy history. Well, Mallus is free. If he goes on his history-destruction spree, the impact on the timeline won't matter because there will be no timeline. That, in theory, doesn't serve Mallus so what's more likely is that Mallus will play with history on his own terms and we have no way of knowing if that negates the impact of a safe Zambesi on the timeline. After all, totems are not Mallus' friends. He might well mess with things to gain control of them which could still lead to Mari ending up in Detroit and as Vixen.

There's also the possibility that while Zambesi's salvation was enough of an anachronism to free Mallus later events still create a situation where Kuasa is left behind and Mari becomes Vixen. With Amaya being so focused on saving her family and her village we've never seen any indication that she has examined what might come after preventing the major tragic event. Mallus notwithstanding, sparing Zambesi in 1992 may not completely prevent the village from being destroyed. It may have simply delayed it. That would have minimal impact on the overall Arrowverse timeline.

It is also possible that no matter how things play out with Zambesi not being destroyed it simply doesn't change anything. With the timeline so fragile already, one would think that a major historical change would be enough to have dramatic and immediate impact. Yet, nothing appeared to change, even temporarily. Under normal circumstances it would take time for changes to take effect, but that doesn't appear to be the case, especially since we saw Mallus break out of his prison the instant Zambesi was safe.

Of course, there's always the possibility that next week in the season finale we will see dramatic timeline changes that will require fixing -- and it's always possible that once the Legends defeat Mallus they will reset time once again.

Legends of Tomorrow airs Mondays at 8/7c on The CW. The season three finale "The Good, The Bad, and The Cuddly" airs April 9th.

What do you think will happen with the Arrowverse timeline? Let us know in the comments below!

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