The 'Legion' Weirdness Index: Season 2, Chapter 9

The following article contains spoilers for the season 2 premiere of FX’s Legion

In its first season, FX’s Legion challenged conventions familiar to the superhero genre and dazzled with opulent visuals. The season explored how superpowers can act as a mental illness. It also featured Aubrey Plaza tearing apart a room soundtracked by Nina Simone, a man dancing in a giant ice cube, a silent horror sequence, and countless other weird moments.

Season two of Legion premiered on Tuesday night and the opening instalment was just as visceral an experience as the first eight episodes. Throughout the second season, the weirdest, wackiest and trippiest moments from the show will be ranked in the ‘Legion Weirdness Index’:

10) Syd Ponderosa

The first shot of Syd (Rachel Keller) in the new season shows her licking her hand like a cat. Apparently, she’s testing out her body-swapping superpower on household animals since teaming up with Division 3. A certain woman in It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia would be extremely jealous.

9) A Don Draper Cameo

If the nauseating opening seconds of season two drew you in, the following narration immediately takes you out. When the screen cuts to black in the show’s opening moments, the first thought is ‘Wait, is that Jon Hamm?’. Hamm’s pair of voiceovers in the season two premiere draw from the tone of Don Draper’s best pitches in Mad Men.

8) Melanie Gets High

The season 2 premiere reintroduces us to the Summerland gang and their leader Melanie Byrd (Jean Smart). When we meet Melanie again, she is….not doing so great. Melanie is reeling from the reunion and sudden departure of her husband Oliver (Jemaine Clement), taking hits from an elephant bong and hallucinating(?) a weird Noah Hawley creation.

7) Welcome to Division 3

The set designs in Legion have been strange from the start. From the mental hospital to Summerland, each frame is filled with lavish colour and weird choices. The trip to Division 3 was no different. In most films and television shows, government buildings are bland and economical. But Division 3 is the exact opposite. The walls of the building are filled with bright colours, literal boats of food, and hexagons—so many hexagons. The unfamiliar designs help keep the show’s time period vague, but it supports the theory that this is all happening in David Haller’s mind.

6) Clattering Teeth

The recurring room of clattering teeth might be the creepiest part of the episode. The mental virus spread by the Shadow King leaves people trapped in their own minds, completely still except for their teeth. The shot of the room is similar to “the basement” full of retired hosts from season one of HBO’s Westworld.

5) The Maze

The episode provided another reminder of Westworld with Jon Hamm’s voiceover about the maze:

“There’s a maze in the desert, carved from sand and rock. A labyrinth of pathways and corridors a hundred miles long—a thousand miles wide. Full of twists and dead ends. Picture it. A puzzle you walk and at the end of this maze is a prize just waiting to be discovered. All you have to do is find your way through. Can you see the maze? Its walls and floors, its twists and turns. Good, because the maze you created in your mind is itself the maze. There is no desert, no rock or sand. There’s only the idea of it. But it’s an idea that will come to define your every waking and sleeping moment. You’re inside the maze now. You cannot escape. Welcome to madness.”

“Welcome to madness” would be a good tagline for Legion. The show itself is like navigating a labyrinth of twists and turns. Hamm’s anecdote was a good primer for the balls-crazy episode that followed.

4) Delusions

Jon Hamm’s second voiceover is about delusions, and it’s presented with the flair that you would expect from Legion. The tale of ‘Albert A’ is the second time a Noah Hawley show uses a story about a man giving up body parts to portray a larger idea (the previous coming in season one of Fargo).

The thin line between ideas and delusions was a major theme of this episode. “Beware of ideas that are not your own,” can be heard on the P.A. system in Division 3 throughout the episode. In the end, David gives in to a pretty big idea that isn’t his own: to help the Shadow King.

3) The New Boss

David Haller (Dan Stevens) said it best: “Was there a guy with like a basket on his head? Was there women with moustaches singing?”

2) “This is a conversation about time”

The episode’s closing sequence in the orb introduced time travel to a show that is already full of crazy ideas. An older one-armed Syd tells David to help the Shadow King with the search for his original body. The revelation leads to a lot more questions than answers. Is this really Syd? Why doesn’t she have an arm? Has David been aware of this the whole time? Is he still under the Shadow King’s control? The questions will surely be answered as the season progresses, but David may need to beware of ideas that are not his own.