Legends of Tomorrow Writers Want The New Season To Bring Fans Hope

In the coming season, DC's Legends of Tomorrow writers and producers hope that they can provide their audience with something that's in short supply right now: hope. At this point, it's trite to even point out that 2020 has been a colossally bad year for almost everybody. With a global pandemic that has killed hundreds of thousands of people around the world, and forced most of the world's population into some kind of social distancing, things feel pretty scary. The economy has slowed down, and even entertainment ground to a halt as TV and film projects had to stop shooting to curb the virus's spread.

Meanwhile, there are demonstrations in the streets of the U.S. calling out institutional racism and police violence, and counter-protests demanding an end to pandemic safeguards that some say infringe on personal liberties. In the United States, all of this comes as a deeply divided population gears up for what promises to be one of the most expensive and mean-spirited Presidential elections in generations.

So when it comes time to sit down and break story for an offbeat, upbeat show about a bunch of people making the best of their own bad situations and coming together as a team...well, that feels right.

"I think we're...as a room really proud of how much joy this show can bring," writer Grainne Godfree said during DC FanDome last weekend. "Right now, it feels like everyone needs to see this show, so it's fun to feel like we have a real purpose right now."

That seems to be something of a mission statement this season; at the start of the year, the Legends will be at their wits' end, with Sara Lance (Caity Lotz) having been kidnapped by aliens for reasons unknown at the end of last season. They will be bringing in a new teammate who doesn't fit in right away, and their usual grounding influence, Ava (Jes Macallan), is in a bad place, since her kidnapped co-captain is also the love of her life.

So it might start at a place where it seems like there's nowhere to go but up -- a feeling a lot of viewers are likely familiar with.

"We all really miss each other," showrunner Keto Shimizu said of the writers. "But especially in the early months of the pandemic, when there was so much uncertainty and so many questions, it was really a great, grounding, daily activity to have to do -- to check in with each other and see each other's faces. This is going to be a season that will hopefully bring a lot of joy and hope to those who watch it."

DC's Legends of Tomorrow is expected to get back into production soon, with an eye toward an early 2021 premiere date.