Plot
Oliver is ready to celebrate the Thanksgiving season - both in public as Mayor and in private with Felicity and William. Twin terrors threaten to ruin the holiday, however - Cayden James' activating the next phase of his master-plan and Agent Watson making a move to arrest Oliver for being The Green Arrow!
Influences
The Green Arrow comics of Benjamin Percy. (Oliver Queen having to be Green Arrow while facing murder charges.)
Goofs
The new SCPD building is referred to both as a new precinct house and a new HQ. Possibly it is acting as a temporary HQ, but either way six weeks seems like an amazing turn-around time on getting a new building refitted.
It is unclear just why in the names of the many ridiculous gods of the DCU Cayden James is employing Black Siren. It beggars belief that a master-planner like James would risk working with a loose cannon like Black Siren. His plans require subtlety and Black Siren is a murderous psychopath who kills when she gets bored and uses her powers around explosives in defiance of his orders.
For that matter, it's unclear why Black Siren is working as hired muscle for James in the first place. He may have saved her from Lian Yu, but nothing in Black Siren's character has suggested any sense of gratitude or camaraderie.
The sudden fight between Curtis and Felicity over their company's resources is unnecessary drama in an episode that is already tense enough. Felicity herself says it best - "We don't have time for this right now."
Felicity says that the new drug used to awaken Thea from her coma was a new form of Zolpidem. Zolpidem is a powerful sedative used to treat severe insomnia - the exact opposite of what one would want a coma patient to take!
Performances
There's several great dialogues throughout the episode. Quentin talking with Dinah. Dinah talking with Ollie. Curtis talking with John. And Oliver talking to John. The ensemble are all firing on eight cylinders this time around.
Trivia
Cayden James steals nano-thermite from a company called Sunderland Corp. In the comics, Sunderland Corporation was a scientific research firm which first appeared in Swamp Thing.
Curtis catches Cayden James breaking into Amertek. In the comics, this was the company which employed John Henry Irons as a weapon's designer before he became the hero Steel.
The bomb Cayden James creates is hidden in Corridor 52 of Starling Stadium. This is yet another nod to the number 52, which shows up repeatedly in various DC Comics properties.
Technobabble
Nano-thermite is a metastable intermolecular composite - a reactive particle. It is highly explosive when combined with the proper accelerate.
A City District Attorney cannot act as legal counsel to a Mayor accused of a crime in Star City.
Black Siren steals 100 pounds of polymer-bonded explosives.
The nano-thermite, when combined with the explosives, creates a thermobaric weapon which disperses a cloud of fire and pressure cooks everything within 200 yards.
Felicity saw one of Cayden James' algorithms that was based on traffic patterns which could be used to extrapolate population movement.
Felicity cross-references the crowd's pattern with the cloud's path of destruction.
Curtis creates a particle cloud sim.
The drug used to awaken Thea from her coma was a new form of Zolpidem not yet available on the market.
Dialogue Triumphs
John: We have to focus. This might be the most difficult thing we've ever had to face. If people think The Green Arrow is in prison, then the flood gates will open. Now, more than ever, we have to protect this city! If the criminals here think that it's open season, then this city will become a war zone.
(Oliver is lying on the bunk in his cell. Dinah walks up to the bars.)
Dinah: Tell me what you need.
Oliver: I need some sleep.
Dinah: I think I can do one better. FBI transfers can be lost. Locks can be left open.
Oliver: I appreciate that. But if I make myself a fugitive, then... obviously I'm making William an orphan.
Dinah: (nods) Gotta do it the right way.
Oliver: Yep. I've gotta do it the right way.
Dinah: Okay. Good night.
(Dinah leaves Ollie alone, as he stares at the ceiling.)
(Felicity has just discovered that Curtis was using their company's implant design on John without consulting her first.)
Felicity: You injected our friend with our company's proprietary technology and you didn't think to, I don't know... involve me in that at all?!
Curtis: I thought "Lone Ranger" was just the way we did things here at Helix Dynamics. You know? The name of the company you picked without consulting me?
(There is a long pause.)
Rene: I'm gonna... work on an algorithm over there, while I figure out what an algorithm is.
(Oliver walks into John's hospital room. He finds him struggling to stand from his bed.)
John: I told Felicity not to bother you with this.
Oliver: Which part? You being in the hospital? The experimental steroid? Or... the nerve damage... that has affected you for months? (pauses) Are you going to be alright?
John: I'll be fine. I didn't want you to worry, Oliver. Which is why I didn't tell you-
Oliver: No. No, John. You didn't tell me because you knew I'd never let you go out there compromised. And that I'd certainly never let you compromise the team. I've been mad at you before John, but this... is the first time I've ever been disappointed.
John: Oliver, you gave up the right to judge me when you gave up that hood.
Oliver: You don't get to claim the moral high ground here, my friend.
John: Oh, I'm not, Oliver! But I apologized to the people who I endangered. The team, Oliver. The team! My obligation begins and ends with them. I don't owe you a damn thing!
Oliver: For the sake of our friendship, I hope that's the withdrawal talking.
(John glares at Oliver and slowly brings himself to stand.)
John: I put on this hood because you asked me to.
Oliver: Don't blame me for this!
John: I'm not blaming you, Oliver. I blame myself. For putting your needs, your goals, even your family above my own. I've done that from the very beginning. That was my biggest mistake.
Oliver: That was your biggest mistake? Mine was trusting you to be The Green Arrow.
(Oliver turns around and leaves the room.)
Continuity
The new SCPD HQ has been completed, after being blown up six weeks earlier in 601.
Oliver refers to the public belief that Roy Harper was the first Arrow - part of the plan to save Oliver from jail in 319.
Curtis injects John with a prototype for fixing his nerve problem, modeled on the spinal implant that cured Felicity's paralysis.
Curtis Holt was a Cub Scout.
The new District Attorney of Star City is a man named Sam Armand.
Jean Loring - who represented Moira Queen during her murder trial - is seen for the first time since 207. She is acting as Oliver's lawyer on the charges the FBI has brought against him.
Oliver is facing seven counts of murder, among other charges.
Oliver is released on $5,000,000 bail and a $500,000 bond.
Felicity is able to pay the bond, using the first round of investments from her and Curtis' company.
Curtis catches Cayden James breaking into Amertek. This is the military/industrial firm in 502 that was the target of Ragman's vigilante acts.
Amertek has twenty chemicals in their possession that could be used as an accelerator for the nano-thermite.
John's implant fails at an inopportune moment.
Felicity was never told about John's condition, following John telling the rest of the team in 606.
Dr. Schwarz guesses that John is suffering from withdrawal from the drug he was taking.
John still has not told Oliver about his condition. Oliver learns about it after Felicity tells him.
Curtis and Felicity determine that James' most likely target is Starling Stadium - a 35,000 seat arena where Billy Joel will be playing that night.
Rene is a Billy Joel fan.
Dinah tells Quentin about how Vigilante is her ex-boyfriend. Quentin, in turn, tells Dinah about how he had a chance to kill Black Siren in 601 but didn't take it.
Oliver apologizes to John for not thinking about John Jr. before asking him to become The Green Arrow.
John's tests show that the nerve damage in his arm spread to his back. If he continues to work in the field, he may wind up permanently paralyzed.
John refers to the events of 508 and how - in a world meant to give him his perfect life - he was The Green Arrow.
Wild Dog is accurate enough as a knife-thrower to set off a fire alarm by throwing a dagger at it.
Cayden James blames Green Arrow for costing him his son and intends to seek revenge on all of Star City for what Green Arrow did.
A boy named Owen Post has Cayden James listed as the father on his birth certificate. Post disappeared two months after Cayden James was taken into custody by ARGUS.
Cayden James leaks the video footage of Team Arrow attacking his men, who are dressed as fake cops, to the Internet and it starts trending. The vote on the Star City anti-vigilante measure is that same day.
Thea Queen awakens from her coma.
William has learned how to cook somewhat.
The Bottom Line
A harmless bit of filler that doesn't do much but end some minor subplots while setting up new ones. The series is basically treading water here but the performances from most of the cast are strong enough you won't care.
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