Warning: Spoilers for Legacies season 4, episode 16, "I Wouldn't Be Standing Here If It Weren't For You."
The most recent episode of Legacies season 4 conveniently forgot that Hope is the Tribrid and has the Tribrid's powers, apparently. Hope (Danielle Rose Russell) fulfilled her destiny to die earlier in Legacies season 4, becoming the Tribrid and killing Malivore with her new powers. With her humanity off as a new vampire, the first half of season 4 has largely revolved around her descent to the dark side with her compassion and emotions switched off.
But the latter half of Legacies season 4 has introduced an even greater threat in the form of the gods. For the past handful of episodes, it's been clear they're being built up to be the final big bads of the season. It makes sense to introduce a new threat; now that Hope took care of Malivore, Legacies' Super Squad needs a new powerful foe. Still, the fact that Hope so easily killed Malivore as the Tribrid made her lopsided fight against Ken (Luke Mitchell), the father of the gods, all the more frustrating to watch.
Legacies season 4, episode 16, "I Wouldn't Be Standing Here If It Weren't For You" finally saw Ken released from his confinement and come to the Salvatore School. There, Lizzie (Jenny Boyd) and Hope faced him down, with Lizzie working to siphon Ken's powers away from him while Tribrid Hope fought him. Except it wasn't a fight: Hope didn't just lose; she didn't even land a punch. It was certain that Ken would always be a formidable threat–he's the king of gods in Legacies' vaguely defined mythology, after all–but Hope being so mismatched against him was unexpected and more than a little eyebrow-raising. Before Ken, Malivore had been built up for over three seasons as the most powerful, indestructible, and terrifying creature to ever have walked the earth, and with her witch-werewolf-vampire Tribrid powers, Hope easily overpowered him. Her suddenly being completely useless against Ken, even with her Tribrid powers, illustrates a problem that has been plaguing Legacies since even before season 4.
It's always been an issue, but Legacies season 4 has made it glaringly obvious how often the show conveniently forgets plot points for the sake of manufacturing drama. It also completely ignores established character history and personality for the sake of moving the plot along, such as Legacies' terribly executed villain twist for Ben in the previous episode. There's an obvious narrative reason for Hope to have lost so easily against Ken–two, actually. First, Professor Vardemus' fight simulation from a few episodes ago showed the students that they could only defeat Ken if they worked together. That humanity-back-on Hope decided to go it alone, save for Lizzie, shows that she still has a lesson to learn about allowing her friends to help her. Two, and this is the clunkier reason, Legacies clearly wanted to show just how powerful Ken is, how much more powerful the gods are in general than any monster on Earth. The problem is that nothing that the other gods have shown, to this point, has indicated that. There's certainly been no indication that Hope's so-far-unbeatable Tribrid powers would suddenly be laughably pointless. Professor Vardemus' simulation factored in Hope's Tribrid powers, but the Legacies episode apparently decided to pretend they don't exist for the sake of forcing stakes into the final confrontation.
At the moment, it's unclear whether or not Legacies will get a season 5 renewal. There are four episodes left in Legacies season 4, and the fun promise of the show has sadly dissolved into a series that doesn't seem to know what it is, where it's going, or what to do with half of its characters. If Legacies season 5 does happen, one thing is clear: there definitely won't be a season 6 if the show doesn't figure out how to be consistent with its stories and characters, starting with Hope.
New episodes of Legacies are released Thursdays on the CW.
