Legends of Tomorrow Midseason 4 Finale Explained & Unanswered Questions

In DC's Legends of Tomorrow's midseason 4 finale, John Constantine, Charlie the shapeshifter, and Zari Tomaz (who was trapped as a cat) try to repair the timeline that Constantine broke. However, the genre-bending, time-twisty, puppet-laden episode may have broken some fans' brains, so let's make sense of "Legends of To-Meow-Meow".

Last week, Constantine revealed that the Big Bad of Legends of Tomorrow season 4 was Neron, a demon looking to conquer Hell. To banish Neron from our dimension, the rogue demonologist was forced to condemn the man he loved, Desmond Leveau, to Hell because Neron had taken possession of Desmond's soul. John has been riddled with guilt ever since and he decided to travel back to New Orleans 6 months ago to break up with Desmond so that Neron wouldn't target him. However, Constantine broke a fixed point in time, so he unleashed a time wave that altered reality. John was driven insane, Zari was turned into ZariCat, and it was up to Charlie - who helped John break time so she could get her shapeshifting powers back - to do the right thing and fix the timeline.

"Legends of To-Meow-Meow" was an utterly insane, self-referential, and hilarious episode that called back to previous episodes from season 4 while also parodying TV shows like Charlie's Angels, MacGuyver, and Sesame Street. Here's how it all went down and how the Legends finally set reality back on course.

This Page: Why The Legends' Breaking Time Didn't Affect The Arrowverse
Page 2: The Three New Realities Constantine Created
Page 3: How Constantine Finally Fixed Time

Why Didn't Constantine Breaking Time Affect The Rest of the Arrowverse?

The timewave Constantine unleashed only hit the Legends and the Time Bureau and altered their realities. As John tried to explain it to Ava Sharpe, who had turned goth as she mourned the death of Sara Lance (who died by unicorn impaling), the new reality isn't supposed to exist and it hadn't had time to settle in and ripple throughout the rest of the universe - which is why it had to be fixed immediately.

The entire event was centered around Constantine preventing Desmond from going to Hell; because he saved Dez, John never ended up joining the Legends, which created a domino effect: they never traveled to 1970s London and met Charlie, therefore Constantine never magically trapped Charlie in the form of Amaya Jiwe. It was because Charlie wanted her shapeshifting powers back (for fear of growing old and dying) that she helped John break time and save Desmond, but she quickly regretted that decision when she saw the extent of the damage they caused.

The other key thing that happened because Constantine never became a Legend is that the Legends never learned to not kill the magical fugitives or banish them to Hell. It was because Sara had spoken to Charlie in London and came to understand the fugitives weren't all necessarily monsters that the Legends and the Time Bureau decided to start capturing and humanely imprisoning the fugitives instead. Without this moment occurring between Sara and Charlie, the Legends embrace cold-blooded murder of magical beings.

Why Didn't The Legends Join The Elseworlds Crossover?

"Legends of To-Meow-Meow" did a lot, but made time to cheekily address why the Legends aren't in Elseworlds. After the first new reality was created and the Legends turned into the Custodians of the Chronology, Gideon notified Nate Heywood, Ray Palmer, and Mick Rory that they had missed calls from Oliver Queen, Barry Allen, and Kara Zor-El. All three Custodians shrugged it off and Ray scoffed, "Sounds like the annual crossover."

It's interesting that each of Green Arrow, Flash, and Supergirl contacted the Legends but because the Custodians' personalities were altered, they didn't care about the heroes. It's also worth wondering whether Gideon was able to identify who Barry and Oliver were considering they had switched bodies.

In any event, Charlie, ZariCat, and Constantine were stuck in a terrible new Custodians of the Chronology reality, but that turned out to only be the beginning of the damage they did to the timeline.

Page 2: The Three New Realities Constantine Created

What Was The Custodians Of The Chronology Reality?

The first new reality the timewave created was the Custodians of the Chronology, a macho, 1980's MacGyver parody timeline complete with cheesy opening credits. The Custodians were Dr. Nate Heywood aka "Steel", Dr. Ray Palmer aka "The Atom", Mick Rory aka "Heatwave", and Garima aka "Garima" (Garima is the three-breasted amazon warrior Mick magically dreamed up to fight Tagumo in "Tagumo Attacks!!!" and she remained on the Waverider as Mick's... girlfriend). The Custodians made their presence felt by murdering a leprechaun in 1962 Las Vegas.

The key changes are that the Custodians are swaggering, ultraviolent time bros who "shoot fugitives first and ask questions never". They keep a trophy room of the skulls of the fugitives they killed and they turned Mona's friend the Kaupe into a rug. The Custodians became this way because Sara Lance was killed by a unicorn in Woodstock 1969 during the season premiere "The Virgin Gary". Even Hank Heywood, who's now in charge of the Time Bureau after Ava went into mourning when Sara was killed, hates the Custodians (presumably because by killing the fugitives, they're ruining Nate's Project Hades scheme).

Constantine was imprisoned in the Time Bureau for "time crimes" and is going insane, but Charlie and ZariCat found him (Constantine briefly turned Zari human again and then quickly turned her back). With Ava and Mona's help, Charlie and John escaped the Time Bureau (as the Custodians and the Bureau's agents shot and killed each other), stole a Jump Ship, traveled back to Woodstock 1969, and blew up the unicorn before it could kill Sara. They thought that reset the timeline, but all it did was create a brand new one.

What Was The Sirens of Space-Time Reality?

The second new reality was the female Legends turning into the Sirens of Space-Time, a hair-flipping, karate-chopping Charlie's Angels spoof that again came complete with new opening credits. The S.O.S are Sara Lance aka "White Canary", Ava Sharpe aka "Roundhouse", and Gideon aka "Hard Drive", with Hank Heywood as their boss. The Sirens are every bit as violent as the Custodians were but... sexier.

Pretending to be Amaya, Charlie tried to join up with the S.O.S. but Gideon was equipped to sense shapeshifter pheromones and immediately sussed out that she's an imposter. Before she was able to escape, Charlie did learn that this time, reality was changed because the Fairy Godmother killed Nate, Rory, and Ray in 1692 Salem. After traveling back to Puritan times, Charlie shapeshifted into the Fairy Godmother and severed her magical connection to Prudence Hawthorne, the human girl she was bound to. This saved the Legends' lives so Charlie and Constantine assumed they had finally fixed the timeline. However, instead of ZariCat, Zari had turned into a puppet, which means the magical misfits actually created a third reality: DC's Puppets of Tomorrow.

What Was The Puppets of Tomorrow Reality?

The Legends turn into puppets on Legends of Tomorrow

Back aboard the Waverider, Constantine discovered Sara, Nate, and Ray had turned into puppet versions of themselves. This reality also came complete with new opening credits and a charming DC's Puppets of Tomorrow song where the Puppets sang about learning lessons and the importance of asking for help.

As for how the Legends transformed into felt versions of themselves, it turned out that thanks to Charlie and Constantine's meddling, the Fairy Godmother attached herself to Mick Rory instead of Prudence. Mick quickly reverted to his old life of crime and called the Legends "Time Bureau puppets", which the Fairy Godmother was only too happy to oblige him. So now, Mick and his new partner the Fairy Godmother are hardcore bank robbers.

Charlie and Constantine immediately returned to the Time Bureau and actually created even more alternate realities, but in each one, the Legends and the Time Bureau continued to die. Meanwhile, Constantine kept suffering after effects of breaking time that was tearing his mind apart. Finally, Zari talked the stubborn demonologist into doing the one thing he didn't want to do in order to set time back on course: he had to condemn Desmond back to Hell.

Page 3: How Constantine Finally Fixed Time

How Did Constantine Finally Fix The Timeline?

Constantine had to return to the moment in 2018 New Orleans where he forced Desmond to break up with him. This actually resulted in three John Constantines in the same place: the original John from that moment in time who didn't break up with Desmond and left to go to the store; John the Legend who was there to break up with Dez; and the John from the future who had come to fix the timeline. Complicating matters, Charlie (who selfishly didn't want to lose her powers when the timeline is restored) shapeshifted into Ava and told Sara that Constantine was a fugitive so that the Legends - who again, were bloodthirsty against fugitives because Constantine had never joined them - arrived in New Orleans to kill John from the future.

However, it all worked out the way it had to: John the Legend broke up with Dez but John from the future intercepted Dez outside of his apartment, managing to stall him long enough so that the original John returned from the store and ran into Dez. With future John watching, Desmond and the original John kissed, thereby restoring time. This happened just in the nick of time, too, as the fire and energy blast Rory and Ray had shot at future John was just about to kill him. When the timeline was reset, the Legends also captured the Dybbuk, which was still on board the Waverider and trying to murder the heroes while possessing the body of puppet Martin Stein.

Although he reset the sequence of events that doomed Desmond, the timeline is back to the way it was. For his part, Constantine finally had a long and overdue conversation over whiskey with Sara where he fessed up about the mess he made and about Neron. Meanwhile, Charlie had realized that her selfish desires to remain a shapeshifter weren't as important as reality itself. Zari forgave her, noting that every other Legend had also jeopardized time for selfish reasons at some point.

What Is Neron's Plan For Project Hades?

The Legends may be back in business but "Legends of To-Meow-Meow" ended with a huge shock: Neron is not only on Earth but he takes the form of Desmond and is golfing buddies with Hank Heywood. Hank apologized to Desmond/Neron about the delays in Project Hades, so Neron also is apparently the entity at the head of Project Hades, which makes sense as a convergence of the two main threats of season 4. But as for what Neron ultimately needs the fugitives to be "cooperative" for, that remains a mystery to be solved. It's possible the fugitives are part of Neron's scheme to take over Hell or he needs them to steal souls on Earth to give him more power to realize his ultimate goal.

However, while Desmond showed his true demonic face, it's not yet confirmed that this is indeed Neron - it could be a demonized Desmond working on Earth as an agent of Neron, similar to how Nora Darhk was a vessel for Mallus last season. Time - and the remaining 8 episodes of season 4 - will ultimately tell when Legends of Tomorrow returns in spring 2019.