Arrow Episode Guide: Season 4, Episode 12 - Unchained

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Team Arrow is stunned to find that the new cat burglar who is running them ragged is a familiar face - Roy Harper! But Roy hasn't returned to his criminal ways but has instead been found out and blackmailed by a dangerous mastermind called The Calculator. Meanwhile, as Thea languishes in her sick bed  (her refusal to kill now causing the curse of the Lazarus Pit to drain her own life force), Nyssa Al Ghul escapes from the dungeons of Nanda Parbat and Felicity prepares the presentation that will save or doom Palmer Technologies.


Influences

Green Arrow: Year One (the flashback sequences on Lian Yu), Green Arrow #75 (Roy Harper being forced to act against Oliver Queen), Gail Simone's Birds of Prey (The Calculator vs. Oracle fights mirror Felicity's fight with Calculator) and the Geoff Johns' run on Teen Titans (Calculator had a heroic daughter - Wendy Harris - who was a master hacker and paralyzed in the same fashion as Felicity.)


Goofs

It's a minor point and will probably be explained in later episodes but Calculator doesn't seem to have any motivation for his actions in this episode. More than likely he'll turn out to be a hired gun brought in by Damien Darhk but it's odd he didn't make some reference to it being nothing personal - he's just in it for the money.

Malcolm says that Sara Lance was completely cured of the blood lust brought on by the Lazarus Pit thanks to John Constantine's magical ritual. Yet it's a major plot point of Legends of Tomorrow that Sara is suffering the same problems as Thea.  (Maybe Malcolm is wrong or John Constantine cocked up the ritual?)


Performances

Katrina Law, as usual, steals the show in her brief scenes in this episode.

Colton Haynes often didn't get enough to do on Arrow when he was a series regular. This episode ot only allows him more of a chance to play the smartass Roy from the comics - it gives him a chance to show some true character development. And it's always a treat to watch him and Willa Holland play off of each other.

On the same note, Willa Holland absolutely nails her scenes here playing a slowly dying Thea.

Tom Amandes nails the manic detachment of The Calculator from the comics. He just loves proving his intelligence and revels in the harm he can cause in an intellectual way.


Artistry

All of the action sequences and stunts in this episode are great, even by the standards of this show. This should be the episode submitted for consideration for the technical Emmys this year.


Trivia

The assassin who helps Nyssa escape from her cell and later travels with her to Japan is named Talibah, which means "seeker of knowledge" or "student". She first appeared as a supporting character in the Suicide Squad storyline in the Arrow 2.5 comic book series, where she was a school girl abducted as a child bride by the followers of the terrorist leader Khem-Adam. She was rescued by Sara Lance and Nyssa Al Ghul, and recruited into the League by Nyssa's father after being offered a chance to kill Khem-Adam.  This may be the first instance of a character appearing in the Arrow tie-in comic before being introduced into the TV series.

The first company that Roy Harper robs is Amertek.  In the comics, Amertek is a military industrial firm that employed John Henry Irons - the engineer who became the technological hero Steel.

The second company that Roy Harper robs is Cadmus Tech. In the comics, The Cadmus Project is a government-sponsored group - originally formed as The DNA Project - who engage in genetic research, including cloning and genetic engineering.

Roy Harper says that he build a new life for himself in Hub City.  In the comics, Hub City is the home town of the superhero The Question.

Noah Kuttler, a.k.a. The Calculator first appeared in Detective Comics #463.

In the comics, The Calculator started out as a petty criminal armed with a power suit that allowed him to create hard-light constructs. He fought several members of the Justice League, using his suit's computer and his own genius intelligence to devise ways of overcoming every hero after fighting them once.

Later, The Calculator was revamped into an evil parallel of Oracle. Whereas Oracle offered technical support and information to the superhero community for free, Noah offered advice to super-villains at $1000 per question. He later become part of the inner circle of The Secret Society of Super-Villains during Infinite Crisis and took over leadership of the group afterward.  He was revealed to suffer from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder - a condition he normally controlled with medication.

Katana is seen in this episode as the guardian of The Lotus and Nyssa remarks that being a member of The Crescent Order suits her. This is probably not related to The Order Of The Crescent, which - in the comics - is the highest honor that can be bestowed upon a foreign citizen by the nation of Kahndaq.  This may have been inspired by a real-world honor created by Sultan Selim III of the Ottoman Empire, exclusively for honoring his non-Muslim allies. The first man so honored was Lord Horatio Nelson.

It's worth noting that it was revealed in the Geoff Johns run of Teen Titans that The Calculator was the father of Wendy Harris - a girl who acted as tech support for the team in a capacity similar to what Felicity does for Team Arrow. Wendy was later paralyzed and sought out by the master hacker Oracle, who decided to mentor the young woman.


Technobabble

The item stolen from Amertek is a network mapper - a piece of tech designed to scan all nearby digital infrastructure for potential vulnerabilities.

Malcolm explains that unless someone restored to life by The Lazarus Pit continues to take lives, their own life force will eventually fade away. This is what is happening to Thea, since she refused to keep killing people.

When asked why Sara Lance has not had the same problems Thea is having now, Malcolm explains that the ritual John Constantine used to restore Sara's soul also restored the balance.

The item stolen from Cadmus Tech is a triode capacitor bomb. Felicity describes it as a tiny device which makes a really huge boom.

Felicity determines that the network mapper and the triode capacitor bomb can be combined to create a web nuke - a device capable of destroying the entire internet. It would need a substantial power source to run it , however - one like the new power cell being developed by Palmer Technologies.

The new Arrowcave contains a Faraday cage - a grounded enclosure used to block electrical fields.

The Calculator equipped Roy with a contact lens in his right eye that acted as a camera/microphone. According to Felicity, it contains more computing power than the average high-end laptop.

Felicity borrows a "battering ram" from Palmer Technologies - a program Ray Palmer developed that can be used to crash through cyber-security.

Palmer Technologies new revolutionary item isThe Power Cell. It is an advanced battery that is 100% recyclable, capable of powering an electric car for thousands of miles as well as an entire high-tech skyscraper like the Palmer Technologies building.

When Thea falls into a coma, her doctor says that she's barely a 3 on The Glasgow Scale, which is used to measure the intensity of comas. A Level-3 coma is marked by opening the eyes in response to verbal stimuli and uttering random words.

The Lotus is an elixir created by the enemies of The League of Assassins to counteract the effects of The Lazarus Pit.


Dialogue Triumphs

Ollie: She told me the blood lust came back two months ago and I didn't even know. I've been focused on the campaign. And I've been running back and forth to Central City....
Felicity: How is it that you always manage to blame yourself for everything?
John: It's his super power. Guilt Arrow.

Roy: I don't want to hurt you.
Curtis: I don't want you to hurt me either!
Roy: Well, I'm going to need to take that. (gestures to the power cell)
Curtis: Oh. I think you might need to hurt me, then.

Roy: Maybe next time we can do something that doesn't involve me getting stabbed or shot at?  Just an idea.
Ollie; I'm sorry that I put you in this position.
Roy: Pretty sure I put myself in this position. I remember you not being all that happy that I faked my death to protect your secret.
Ollie: I never should have let you.
Roy: Do you ever get tired? You know, carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders all the time?
Ollie: (laughing) You sound like Feliicty. And Diggle.
Roy: Well, great minds...

Felicity: I found a tiny flaw in the OS Code, I'm pretty sure I can exploit it to open a backdoor into his main computer system.
Ollie: Right, but wouldn't that risk exposing us?
Felicity: (pause) My pride that you understood what I was saying is slightly undercut by your lack of faith in me.
Ollie: I have nothing but faith!  Just do it.
Felicity: (smiling) I already did.

Calculator: Why would I want to take down The Net? Not only is it where I work, I'm addicted to funny cat videos.

Calculator: If you want to make a statement, you don't take down a system - you take down a city.

(As Ollie describes his plan to offer Darhk a favor in exchange for his help saving Thea.)
Thea: Ollie, that's insane!  Not to mention stupid and... I can't let you owe Darhk a favor!
Oliver: And I can't let you die!  I won't.
Thea: That's not up to you. I know how you take everything on... everyone's problems. It's one of the things I love the most about you. But you can't fix this one, Ollie.
Oliver: I have to try.
Thea: No you don't. It's my choice. It's my life.

Malcolm: Oliver, sometimes the greatest act of love is no action at all.

Felicity: I did get a look at his protocols though and if the web nuke goes on-line, he could kill 8,000 people.
Calculator: I'd say that's a conservative estimate. Blowing the gas mains alone would kill 3,000. Just wait until you see what I've got planned for the subway cars!

Arsenal: I'm the one who brought this maniac into your lives. I need to do this! This is my choice! It's my life.

Roy: You know, I thought about staying anyway? For you.
Thea: You know what you could do for me? Go live an amazing life. Get married. Have a couple of kids. Get a minivan. Just go be normal. There's nothing in this world that would make me happier than that.
Roy: You know, if I could do all of this over again, I would do every single one of those things with you.
Thea: Me too.
Roy:  I love you, Thea Queen.
Thea: I love you, Roy Harper.


Continuity

Nyssa Al Ghul appears for the first time since 403.

Malcolm refers to the events of 405 and John Constantine's restoring Sara Lance's soul.

Thea tells Oliver about how Damien Darhk's death-touch in 407 temporarily stopped her blood lust.

Ruve Adams - the new candidate for mayor - is Damien Darhk's wife, last seen in 410.

Roy heard about Felicity's paralysis on the news.

In the flashbacks, Oliver mistakes the Shado in his vision for Mei - the twin sister he met in 318.  The vision Shado tells Oliver that he must learn to forgive himself and fight through his darkness.

Katana appears for the first time since 322.

Roy Harper also appears for the first time since 322.

As the episode ends, Roy goes back into hiding.  Felicity erases all the data Calculator had on Roy's new identity.

In the flashback, Oliver tells Taiana the truth about how he was the one who killed her brother.

It is revealed that The Calculator is Felicity's father.

Thea is hospitalized with a coma.

Nyssa offers to give Oliver the Lotus Elixir that might cure Thea... if he will kill Malcolm Merlyn.


Location

Nanda Parbat and Kyushu, Japan.


Untelevised Adventures

We don't get to see precisely how Nyssa talks down Katana.


The Winick Factor

Ollie's going to go chasing after a burglar in his street clothes seems mindbogglingly stupid, given that he's in the middle of running for mayor.


The Bottom Line

One of the best episodes of the season so far. Everything is firing on all eight cylinders here and the only real weakness to the episode is that you wish they'd had more time to explore certain aspects of the script, like nearly all of Nyssa's subplot. We could have done with more of her and Tatsu and less of Felicity feeling unconfident because of her wheelchair but those scenes aren't bad - just a subplot that could have been scrapped without depriving us of anything.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 19 - Broken Arrow

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot

Roy Harper's sacrifice has bought Oliver Queen his freedom... for now. But Quentin Lance is still determined to see Oliver Queen behind bars. Looks like a good time for The Arrow to lay low. But that's impossible with a new metahuman villain threatening Starling City. Reluctantly, Oliver will have to turn to Ray Palmer and his ATOM Suit for help. But can the inexperienced hero save the city in The Arrow's place?

Five years ago, Oliver Queen discovers that it is The US Army - Not ARGUS - that has been hunting him and The Yamashiro family. And that unless he moves quickly, the Alpha/Omega bioweapon may be unleashed on Hong Kong!


Influences

The Fall of Green Arrow and The Rise of Arsenal by J.T. Krul.


Goofs

How did Oliver wind up at the police station before Roy and Quentin?


Performances

Colton Haynes gets a wonderful send-off episode, if this really is good bye for Roy Harper. Frankly, I'm Scooby-Dubious, even if the news says Haynes is out for good. But if this is his final bow, it's a hell of an episode to go out on.  Between a great fight scene, a great death scene, some wonderful scenes playing off Ollie, Thea and Quentin and riding off into the night... there's a lot of great Roy moments in this episode and Haynes plays them all perfectly.


Artistry

The shot of Ray high-fiving Oliver, with his twitching ATOM gauntlet in the foreground.

The fight scene between a handcuffed Roy Harper and several inmates is very well executed.


Trivia

In the comics, Deathbolt was a wanted murderer named Jake Simmons, who acquired electricity-control powers after the biplane he was flying was struck by lightning.

This origin is similar to how both of the Mardon brothers acquired weather-control powers in the DCTVU.

The DCTVU version of Deathbolt has similar powers, though he seems to generate plasma rather than electricity. Also, this Jake Simmons is a serial bank robber rather than a convicted killer.  He most frequently manifests his powers through his eyes with a red blast of focused energy reminiscent of Superman's heat vision.  He proves capable of absorbing the electrical power of Ray Palmer's compressed light beams and thanks Ray for "topping him off".

Quentin Lance is described as "going Ahab" after Oliver Queen. This is a reference to the vengeful captain from the novel Moby Dick.

Felicity quotes The Wizard of Oz when saying farewell to Roy - "I'll miss you most of all, Scarecrow."

Cisco mentions that Deathbolt was in prison in Opal City on the night of the particle accelerator explosion.  Opal City is the home of the superhero Starman in the DC Comics universe.  Perhaps not coincdentally, one of Deathbolt's last appearances in the comics was attempting to kill the first Starman, Ted Knight, during the DC One Million event.


Technobabble

Ray says that the injection Felicity gave him injected 6.2 billion nanobots into his epithalamus.

Ray develops a neural network for The ATOM suit, allowing him to move the suit just by thinking. This is later used by Oliver to turn Ray into a puppet he can fight through.

Ray used enhanced resonance scans to take "photos" of Deathbolt's crime scene.  These, interlaced with the news footage of the robbery, allows them to get a clear picture of Deathbolt and determine his identity.

During the first fight with Deathbolt, The ATOM suit recorded over 10 terabytes of data, which were transmitted in real-time to a geosynchronous satellite.

Ray creates a transponder that can be uploaded to a power source and used to track Deathbolt.

Roy fakes his death with the help of an ARGUS agent trained in cutting a person in just the right way to make them bleed a lot without cutting anything lethal. The knife was laced with a beta blocker that slows the heartbeat to a crawl, creating the illusion of death.


Dialogue Triumphs

Roy: Oliver, ever since I found out that I killed that cop, I've been trying to make it right as Arsenal. Maybe what I need to do is make it right as The Arrow.
Ollie: No, Roy...
Roy: I killed a police officer. Mirakuru or not I should be punished for that. I should be in prison.
Ollie: That won't bring the officer back. This city still needs you!
Roy: It needs you more. For the first time since I remembered what I did... I'm okay.

Roy: When we got back together... hell, even before that... I... I made a promise to myself that I'd never lie to you again.
Thea: Okay.
Roy: That's why I didn't want to see you. I didn't want to break that promise.
Thea: Why would you?  Roy?
Roy: Thea, please... just... know that I'm gonna be fine.
Thea: Is that a lie?
(Roy just snorts and hangs up the phone)

Ray: How many abandoned warehouses do you think there are in this city? No, no - I'm genuinely curious!
Ollie: Stay focused, Ray.
Felicity: (nervously) Maybe Simmons isn't in there?
Ollie: Do you get this anxious when I'm out in the field?
Felicity: I honestly can't think of an answer to that question that doesn't get me in trouble.
(Ollie glances to Diggle, who shakes his head)
Ray: Still nothing. Not a visual sighting or any other reading at all from The ATOM. And when I say ATOM, I mean the suit. Not myself in the third person.
Ollie: (To Felicity) There's a decent chance that you and Palmer are related.
(Felicity glares daggers at Ollie)

(After fighting off several prisoners with his hands cuffed together and being challenged to show how good he is without his arrows)
Roy: Just remember - that was without arrows.

Diggle: You have to throttle this back, Oliver! You have to! Before you lose everything.
Ollie: I've already lost everything. I'm not going to lose Roy.

Quentin: Look, I know you've got to be doing this because you think you owe Queen something, but you don't.  You don't deserve to be here!
Roy: Patrol Officer Gabe Vincent. Left behind a wife and a nine year old boy.
Quentin: I know.
Roy: I killed him!  I stabbed him in the chest with an arrow. So don't think for a second that I don't deserve to be here.
Quentin: No.  You don't think for a second what you're doing here makes up for any of what you did out there.

Oliver: You did all this without asking?
Roy: How many times have you saved one of us without asking?  This time we had to save you.

Felicity: (To Oliver) I just think sometimes you're so focused on the people you love, you forget to see that there are people who love you.


Continuity

Roy refers to the events of 212 and how he found out Ollie's secret identity.

Roy Harper has previous convictions on charges of breaking-and-entering, petty theft and grand larceny.

Felicity makes reference to the events of F118 to explain why they can't call The Flash for help.

Ollie refers to what Maseo told him in 301 about a man not being able to live by two names.

Quentin refers to the events of 120 and how he once showed Roy Harper the body of a man killed by The Arrow to scare him away from trying to find him.

By the episode's end, the public thinks Roy Harper was The Arrow and that The Arrow died in Iron Heights prison.  Roy Harper hits the road to start a new life, with an untraceable satellite phone Felicity gave him and a red sport car.

When Ray drops Deathbolt off at STAR Labs, Cisco makes an amazing discovery.  Namely, that Deathbolt - despite having a last known address in Central City - was in prison in Opal City on December 11th, 2013.  This means that some people outside of Central City have metahuman powers.

Ra's Al Ghul kills Thea Queen in her apartment,.


The Fridge Factor

Laurel shows up just long enough to spring Ollie from jail and then disappears for the rest of the episode.

Felicity briefly handles The Idiot Ball, not thinking something is odd about the masked man (Deathbolt) at the power plant.  At least she's redeemed by tricking him to get away later.

Thea is killed, purely to push the plot forward and give Ollie more to angst about.


The Bottom Line

Like All-Star Team-Up, the actual team-up aspect of this episode falls flat. Not through any fault of the actors, mind you.  Doug Jones is menacing enough as Deathbolt but he has too little to work with. And the interplay with Felicity and Ray works even better with Oliver rolling his eyes and biting his lip in the background.

What really sells this episode is everything involving Roy Harper and it's seemingly a shame that the writers just now seem to have turned Roy into an amazing character only to push him off-stage.  Of course, TNT is working on that Titans series...

The last 10 minutes of the episode are some of the most powerful we've seen yet. And it ends with a cliffhanger that left me screaming.  Next week can't come soon enough!

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 18 - Public Enemy

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot

The League of Assassins have framed The Arrow for the murder of Mayor Castle and Quentin Lance is out for blood!  As Ray Palmer (who was also wounded in the attack) languishes in critical condition and Felicity debates defying a doctor's orders to use untested technology to save his life, a revived SCPD Anti-Vigilante Squad hits the streets with one goal - bring in Team Arrow, dead or alive! But this is only Ra's Al Ghul's first attack on Oliver Queen. And by the time he is done things will never be the same!


Influences

The Black Arrow Saga by Mike Grell and The Fall of Green Arrow by J.T. Krul (both stories in which Oliver Queen becomes an outlaw and his secret identity is revealed to the world), The Over The Edge episode of Batman: The Animated Series (both stories deal with a grief-stricken police officer turning on his vigilante comrades after said vigilantes cause the death of the police officer's daughter) and every Robin Hood legend where Robin sacrifices himself to save his friends.


Goofs

I can see why - in spite of everything -  Lance might not arrest Laurel for what she's done as Black Canary.  But why doesn't he go after Roy or Felicity?  He knows both of them work for The Arrow. And granting that Roy's house in The Glades might not be in his name, Lance knows where Felicity works and could probably find out where she lives. Hell, Felicity doesn't make any effort to stay hidden, staying at the hospital with Ray Palmer, even though we're told that warrants have been issued for all of The Arrow's known associates.

Even by the standards of comic books, Shado having an identical twin sister whom Ollie just happens to run into in his time of need is a hell of a coincidence.


Performances

Paul Blackthorne has a difficult task in this episode.  On the one hand, he is the Javert to Oliver Queen's Valjean, and we are meant to see him as the villain who is letting his personal feelings get in the way of his judgement. On the other hand, his conflicted emotions regarding every situation in his life right now are completely justified and he isn't totally wrong when he asks if people might not have been better off if Oliver Queen had died on Lian Yu seven years earlier.

Charlotte Ross returns as Felicity's mom and while her main role here is to lighten up what could be some otherwise dark moments, she also proves capable of offering some surprisingly wise words regarding the one thing Felicity has never been particularly smart about - her emotions.

Colton Haynes doesn't get much to do as Roy Harper in this episode. But he makes every moment count as we see just how much Roy has gained in his rebuilt relationship with Thea, how much he has lost in his guilt over what his heroism has cost others and how far he is willing to go to save his mentor.


Artistry

The extended action sequence taking up the second sixth of the show - with Team Arrow trying to escape the entire SCPD - ranks among the show's best.


Trivia

In the comics, Ray Palmer is frequently called in as a nanotech specialist to assist with difficult surgeries.  Of course in the comics he usually assists by shrinking to go inside the patient rather than by using nanites.

This is not the first time Oliver Queen had his secret identity revealed to the world after being framed for a crime he didn't commit. In Mike Grell's The Black Arrow Saga, Oliver Queen is framed for espionage and high treason by covert elements of the U.S. Government and his secret identity is revealed as he is forced to go on the run to clear his name.

In more recent times, in the post-Infinite Crisis DCU, Oliver's secret identity was revealed to the world in The Fall of Green Arrow.  In this miniseries, Oliver killed the super-villain Prometheus and went on trial for murder.  Oliver was honestly guilty of the crime, committed as revenge on the man responsible for killing his adopted granddaughter Lian Harper, but was acquitted on all charges despite the efforts of a corrupt police commissioner whom had long-standing grudges against both Oliver Queen and Green Arrow.

This episode bears some resemblance to an episode of Batman: The Animated Series called Over The Edge. In that episode, an enraged Commissioner Gordon pursues a vendetta against Batman, after his daughter Barbara Gordon (aka Batgirl) is killed in action and he learns her secret identity. The action of the episode is later revealed to have been a Scarecrow-gas fueled nightmare that Batgirl had after nearly being killed.

Oliver's sacrifice at the end mirrors several Robin Hood legends, where Robin Hood surrenders himself to his enemies in order to buy the freedom of his friends.


Technobabble

Ray Palmer is diagnosed with a thrombus - i.e. a blood clot. If left untreated it could cause an ischemic stroke. But due to his injuries, a craniotomy could do more harm than good. Harm, in this case, meaning permanent brain damage.

Ray developed a series of nano-tech robots that could be injected into his bloodstream, travel to the clot and shrink it.


Dialogue Triumphs

Laurel: You don't understand what's happening here and I need you to trust me.
Quentin: I used to.

(As The Arrow drops Maseo and aims an arrow at his face, Ra's Al Ghul steps out of the shadows)
Ra's: (slow clap) Clearly I chose well, selecting you as my heir.
(The Arrow raises his bow to aim at Ra's Al Ghul)
Ra's: Killing me will only win you the mantle you reject.
Arrow: It will stop you!
Ra's: I have legions who live only to see my will done. No, boy. You have but two choices. You either ascend to the calling of Ra's Al Ghul.  Or you will spend the rest of your days in a cage.
Arrow: You're not going to take me prisoner!
Ra's: No. I'm not.
(Ra's steps into the shadows as a group of police helicopters focus their spotlights on the rooftop)

Arrow: Hello Captain.
Quentin: I got three men in the hospital because of you.
Arrow:  I understand that you feel betrayed. But you can't be so angry as to think that I'm just running around taking aim at innocent people.
Quentin: I don't think anything! I know!  I know this madness has to end! And if you don't want any more people getting hurt, you turn yourself in.

Ra's: I apologize for the coarse treatment. I didn't think I'd get you to speak to me of your own accord.
Quentin: (scoffing) You're him.
Ra's: Ra's Al Ghul.  It's an honor to meet you. Sara spoke with such love about her father.
Quentin: Don't say my daughter's name! If she'd never met you, she'd still be alive now!
Ra's: If Sara had not met my daughter, she would have starved to death on the shores of Lian Yu.
Quentin: She was never on Lian Yu.
Ra's: You suffer a false perception. One of many, I'm afraid.
Quentin: Listen, what do you want?
Ra's: To help the city as your daughter did. You hunt for the man they call The Arrow.
Quentin: Yeah. What, you're gonna help me find him?
Ra's: You'll be able to find him easily... once I tell you his name.
Quentin: Now why would I believe just any name that you throw at me?
Ra's: Well... because with this revelation everything will become clear. And you will realize the man you've been looking for has been right in front of you the entire time. The same man who lied, telling you he wasn't with Sara on Lian Yu. Oliver Queen is the Arrow.

Laurel: So what? Now Oliver's to blame for Sara's death?
Quentin: Oliver? The Arrow? Either way, it's the same guy.
(Quentin sighs as he catches Laurel in yet another lie and sits down)
Quentin: On some level I think I always knew. When I thought he was doing good, it didn't matter to me. You know, when that boat went down and we thought Sara was dead? I blamed Queen. And it's funny how things come full circle, right?

(Thea and Roy are watching the news)
Thea: I can't believe this is happening.
Roy: The line forms behind me.
(They continue to watch in silence for a moment)
Thea: I'm sure those cops that were chasing you are fine.
Roy: I shot them with arrows, Thea. When it was happening, there was a part of me that... felt relieved.
Thea: Relieved?
Roy: That I'd finally be going to jail. And that I would get what I deserve.
Thea; Roy, listen to me. The only thing you deserve is to be happy.

Felicity: I'm just glad that you're alright.
Ray: Thanks to you.
Felicity: Oh, I think your nano-tech deserves some of the credit. All I did was stick something in you. (pause) Do you think there will ever come a time when everything I say isn't some weird double entendre?
Ray: I hope not. It's one of your more charming traits.

Mei: You have no idea how powerful The Truth can be.

Quentin: Lian Yu.
Oliver: What about it?
Quentin: This, ah.. Ra's character. He told me that Sara made it to the island with you. You didn't feel like sharing that with me? Huh? I mean, I am only her father. Well, I was. (Pause) When did you decide that you knew what was best for my family?
Oliver: I love your family-
(Quentin punches Oliver in the face)
Quentin: (angrily) You have a right to remain silent!  Take it.
Oliver: ... just ask me what you want to know.
Quentin: (scoffs) What do I want to know?  Well, was it worth it? All that pain and misery you brought back from that island? Merlyn. Slade Wilson. Wouldn't it be better if you just died there?
Oliver: The reason I came back was to try and save the people of this city.
Quentin: I hate to break it to you, but saving people isn't your specialty. Tommy. Hinton. Your mother. My daughter. And now you're set on killing Laurel too.
Oliver: (shaking his head) I didn't want her to be involved in this. I didn't want anyone to be involved in this.
Quentin: But you involved me. You spent a year making me look like a fool. You spent a year making me your accomplice. You have any idea what you've done, huh? What you've done to all of us? To the people that you claim to care so much about? You've made us criminals. You've made us liars and victims! You, Mr. Queen, are not a hero. You're a villain! But you know that, don't you?


Dialogue Disasters

Mei: Why are the police shooting?!
Ollie: Because they're not the police!


Continuity

We see the assassination of Mayor Castle from 317 again as the episode opens, but this time we see Ray pushing Felicity to safety and taking the arrow that was meant for her in the chest.

Captain Lance reinstates the Anti-Vigilante Task Force, which he closed down back in 301.

Roy and Thea are officially a couple again.

Thea suggests that she and Roy runaway somewhere together - like they originally planned in 223.

Ray is treated for his injuries by Dr. Lockhart, who was previously seen in several other episodes including 301, 220, 219, 211, 204 and 117.

Donna Smoak appears for the first time since 305.

Roy refers to his feelings of guilt regarding killing a cop while on Mirakuru in 220.

Ra's Al Ghul reveals Oliver's identity to Captain Lance.  Lance, in turn, exposes Oliver's secret identity to the world.

Lance makes reference to every vigilante who was inspired by The Arrow, including The Huntress, "the freak in Central City" (The Flash) and "a new guy flying around the city" (The Atom).

Roy Palmer and Felicity Smoak are both fans of Doctor Who. Ray is said to know the plot of every episode across 34 seasons.

Reference is made to how Oliver threw the SCPD off his trail back in 105.

Roy refers to when Diggle last dressed up in The Arrow costume to impersonate Ollie, which first happened in 105 and happened more recently in 310.

Felicity realizes she does not truly love Ray Palmer and still loves Oliver.

Oliver turns himself in, in exchange for a promise of immunity from prosecution for Diggle, Roy and Felicity.

The episode ends with Roy, in Oliver's costume, attacking the police convoy transporting Oliver and turning himself in, claiming he is the real Arrow.

In the flashbacks, Oliver runs into Shado's twin sister Mei while fleeing Waller's men on the streets of Hong Kong.

Oliver uses the name Tommy as an alias, in honor of his friend Tommy Merlyn.

When asked about the last time he saw Shadow, Oliver has a flashback to her death in 209.

Oliver does not give Mei the full details of how her sister and father died, but he does confirm their deaths.


The Bottom Line

A thrilling episode which leaves you on the edge of your seat throughout.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 15 - Nanda Parbat

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Malcolm Merlyn has been captured by the League of Assassins and Oliver is ready to storm the League of Assassin's headquarters at Nanda Parbat to rescue him, though Thea is content to leave her father to face their rough justice. And Ray Palmer readies his ATOM suit for battle, despite Felicity's objections.

Five years ago, Ollie and The Yamashiros are cleared by the US Army to leave Hong Kong. But Amanda Waller doesn't let her pawns go so easily...


Influences

The Fall of Green Arrow (Ollie loses the respect of his family and colleagues due to his lying) and the Batman comics of Dennis O'Neil (Ra's Al Ghul looking for a worthy heir to replace him).


Goofs

While it is high time that somebody took Ollie to task for his manipulative ways, Laurel is absolutely the last person who should be giving anyone lip about lying to someone for their own good. Instead of knocking Oliver down a peg, her confrontation with Oliver only serves to make Laurel look like a complete hypocrite considering her disgraceful behavior towards her father. Frankly, it seems like this scene was added because they needed to give Laurel something else to do in this episode besides fail to ambush Merlyn.  It's the one weak spot in an otherwise strong script.

Nanda Parbat is said to be in the Hindu-Kush mountains, which are located in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Yet previous episodes have said Nanda Parbat was in Tibet (Possibly the previous information was a ruse?)


Performances

David Ramsey steals every damn scene he's in.  From his subtly telling off Merlyn to his calling Ollie his brother and asking him to be his best man.

Katrina Law plays Nyssa Al'Ghul with just the right combination of menace and sympathy.

Colton Haynes doesn't get much to do as Roy Harper this time around, but his interplay with Willa Holland is wonderful and the scenes where he tries to comfort Thea by showing how he's coping with the blood on his hands are well-played.

Like last week, Willa Holland rocks her brief appearance, truly selling Thea's anguish regarding what she has done.

Finally, Matt Nable perfectly captures the grace and poise of Ra's Al Ghul.


Artistry

The action scenes of Oliver and Diggle fighting the League of Assassins, as well as the flashback sequences of Ollie and the Yamashiros fighting ARGUS are excellent even by the standards of this show's fight scenes.

The scene in which Ray Palmer first dons the ATOM armor and uses it to fly is well-shot and thematically everything comic books (and their adaptations) should be.


Trivia

Ray Palmer wears a red and blue plaid shirt when we first see him in this episode.  Red and Blue are the primary colors of The Atom's costume in the comics.

Roy refers to Mission Impossible when examining the ARGUS-designed security system Diggle installed in Verdant and the laser-grid on the club floor.

Diggle makes reference to Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid as he and Oliver face down The League of Assassins.  The movie ended with the titular heroes in a stand-off with no way out.


Technobabble

At the start of the episode, Ray is having trouble getting the gauntlet modulator to interface with the helmet system of the ATOM suit.

Ray uses a subsonic ionizer in building the ATOM suit.  Felicity notes that if you try to use it on quad-band circuitry (as Ray nearly does) it could result in a catalytic reaction that could destroy an entire building.


Dialogue Triumphs

Malcolm: You've spent years preparing to bring a bow and arrow to a sword fight.

Malcolm: John.
Diggle: My friends call me Digg. (beat) You shouldn't even speak to me.

Roy: You know last year when I kinda went off the rails for a bit?
Thea: Yeah?
Roy: I was also under the influence of something. And just like you, I killed someone. A cop.
Thea: Roy...
Roy: They didn't tell me either... and when I found out-
Thea: -you wished that you didn't know?
Roy: Look, I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that the feeling ever goes away. But I can tell you that it gets easier, Thea.
Thea: You don't see that cop's family nearly every single day. I can't imagine that it's going to get any easier. And I don't think it should.

Ollie: I told you not to tell anyone!
Thea: I guess I'm just not as good at keeping secrets as you are.

Laurel: No. Oliver...Merlyn murdered my sister and corrupted yours and now you want to save him?!
Ollie: I'm trying to save Thea's soul.
Laurel: You are out of your mind.
Ollie: And you don't need to be here.

Roy: Look, I may not agree with it, but I understand what you're trying to say. You don't want Thea to live with the guilt of getting her own father killed. But how is getting her brother killed any better?
Ollie: I don't plan on dying.
Felicity: (angrily) That's what you said the last time you want to face Ra's and how did that turn out for you?!

Felicity: You have two options, Ray.  Option One: You can find a way to break through the encryption I used to lock up your server, which, by my calculations, will take you roughly 6.25 hours. Or you can use that time to eat a proper meal, take a shower and get no less than five hours of sleep at  the completion of which I will give you the password.
Ray: I see.
Felicity: It's your choice but I highly recommend Option Two.  Because... this whole situation has gone from endearingly eccentric to creepily not okay.
Ray: If I had the energy, I think I'd be getting angry right now. But instead... I'll just take Option Two.
Felicity: That's a wise choice. After your dinner and a shower, I am taking you straight to bed. (look of shock) Putting you. (whispering to herself) Why do I do that?

Ollie: I can't ask you to come with me, Diggle.
John: You didn't ask me, Oliver.  Besides, you don't own a jet anymore.

Ra's Al Ghul (To Malcolm) In 1854, I encountered an illusionist in Vienna. He was dazzling. Magnificent. Powerful.  And then, nearly half a century later, I stumbled upon this man again. He was withered. Broken. Dying. You see, a magician can cheat many things... except one.

Ra's Al Ghul: Al-Saher, face your death with honor. Or at least dignity.

Ollie: Surprise is our own advantage.
(Suddenly, several flaming arrows hit the ground at his and Diggle's feet)
John: I'd say they spotted us.

Ollie: You know, every time I close my eyes, all that I can see...all that I can hear, feel is... just The Fall. I couldn't live like that.  Couldn't live knowing that... there was someone out there that beat me.
John: Yeah.  That makes sense.
Ollie: No!  It's egotistical and insane!
John: So is putting on a mask and jumping off rooftops, Oliver.

Thea: (To Nyssa) There's something that I need to tell you. I can't live without you knowing. The guilt is far worse than anything you can do to me. I lied to you. And you believed it. When I told you that Malcolm killed Sara. He wanted her dead. To put certain things in motion. But I am the one that fired those arrows into her chest. And when I made the deal to give up Malcolm, I promised you your vengeance.
(Thea unlocks Nyssa's cell and holds out a sword)
Thea: So take it.

Ra's Al Ghul: You tasted death. And you wanted more. The truth is... everyone and everything must come to an end. Even for one such as me.
Ollie: Kill me. But spare John Diggle's life. Let him go. I will beg for it.
Ra's Al Ghul: You have shown tremendous strength. Fortitude. Power. No, Mr. Queen.  I don't want to kill you.  I want you to take my place.  I want you to become the next Ra's Al Ghul.


Dialogue Disasters

Laurel: How do you do that?
Ollie: Do what?
Laurel: Lie. Right to my face.


Continuity

Roy Harper refers to how he went "off the rails" for a little bit last year (A220) and tells Thea of how he came to kill a police officer.  He also reveals how he, Diggle and Felicity knew about Thea killing Sara.

Ray refers to Brick's men taking control of part of the city, as seen in A311.

Laurel finds out that Thea killed Sara.

Oliver refers to Laurel's attempts to kill both Malcolm Merlyn (A304) and Simon LaCrois (A302) when explaining why he hid the fact that Thea killed Sara from Laurel.

Ray Palmer has an extensive classic art collection which he cycles between his apartment and the Starling Museum.

Oliver refers to the events of A309 and his defeat by Ra's Al Ghul and how he has nightmares of falling off the mountain.

Roy Harper has been giving financial support to the widow and son of the cop he killed, giving them money and groceries anonymously and even buying the boy a Boba Fett toy at Christmas.


Location

Nanda Parbat, under the Hindu-Kush mountains.


The Fridge Factor

Laurel continues to prove incompetent and terrible in every respect.  Bad enough that she's back to being a total hypocrite regarding Ollie's manipulative behavior but her attempt to kill Merlyn is poorly-planned and idiotic.  The most groan-worthy aspect of this is Laurel's attempt to fight Merlyn hand-to-hand despite having a gun.

It's hard to believe Felicity would ever use "password" as a password, even as a joke.


The Bottom Line

A step down from last week but overall a strong episode. While slow to start, it becomes more thrilling as it progresses and the final ten minutes are some of the best the series has ever offered. And we're left with not one but two cliffhangers!

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 13 - Canaries

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

Oliver Queen is used to calling the shots and making the rules. But in his absence, Team Arrow has grown past him and is reluctant to return to the way they were before.  This is especially true for Laurel, who Oliver doesn't see as being part of the team at all.  But when the new Count Vertigo escapes and starts putting his drugs out on the street again, The Canary will take action - with or without The Arrow.  At the same time, Oliver makes a fateful decision regarding Thea that will change their lives forever even as The League of Assassins make their first move in coming after them.

In the flashbacks, Oliver and Maseo plan their escape from Hong Kong - needing to flee both Chien Na Wei's followers and ARGUS.


Influences

The Green Arrow/Black Canary comics of Andrew Kreisberg


Goofs

As Assistant District Attorney, Laurel has no authority to speak on behalf of a convicted criminal who is speaking to the press and say that he has no comment.  If she was defending him, it would be another story.

Thea's turning on Merlyn seems somewhat abrupt, given that last week she was defending everything he'd done - even The Undertaking - because Merlyn had risked his life to save her during The Seige of Starling City.

For that matter, Roy's agreeing with Thea's sudden change of heart is quite a change from last week when he was the one person on Team Arrow willing to suggest that Malcolm could be reasoned with.

Felicity's analysis of Sara's motivations vs. Laurel's motivations seems hopelessly flawed, with Felicity claiming that Sara wore a mask to hide her demons but that Laurel (whom Felicity has barely interacted with until recently) has some kind of light inside of her. This in spite of Laurel's motivations being entirely driven her inner demons - i..e. rage and guilt over Sara's death

Oliver tells Laurel that there is something he can tell her that she doesn't know. We never do find out what this is, though.


Performances

Willa Holland steals the show this time around, as Thea finally learns the truth about Oliver's secret life.


Trivia

As in the comics, members of the League of Assassins will frequently commit suicide before allowing themselves to be captured alive.  Chase demonstrates this, as he poisons himself before Merlyn can kill him.

Felicity tracks Count Vertigo to Daggett Pharmaceuticals. This may be a reference to Roland Daggett - a corrupt businessman from Batman: The Animated Series. He was the one responsible for creating Clayface.  Daggett also appeared in the movie The Dark Knight Rises, as the businessman who hired Catwoman and Bane as part of a plan to bankrupt Bruce Wayne.


Technobabble

Chlorine Trifluoride is a colorless, poisonous, corrosive and extremely reactive gas.  It is used as a component in rocket fuel and is surpasses the oxidizing abilities of pure oxygen!

According to Merlyn, noblemen frequently used red wine when poisoning someone because the strong smell of the wine can hide the scent of various poisons, particularly cyanide.


Dialogue Triumphs

Illusion Sara: Dinah Laurel Lance.  Selfish Bitch.  You're not a hero.  You're a liar. A fraud. And an addict.

Oliver: Will you think for a second about what it will do to your father if something happened to you?! What you're doing is selfish!
Laurel: Fighting for your city isn't selfish!  It's what a hero would do.
Oliver: You're not a hero.

Oliver: I know that this isn't going to mean much. I've give you no reason to believe me when I say it.. But I've lied all this time to protect you.
(Thea looks at the case holding The Arrow costume)
Thea: You're... you're him.
Oliver: Yeah.
Thea: That night with the- the hoods and... that woman in black... that...
Oliver: Was Ra's Al Ghul's daughter.
Thea: That was you. All those times I got so mad at you for being a flake or telling me something I knew that had to be a lie... you were saving someone's life.
(Thea moves to hug Ollie) 
Thea: Thank you.  Thank you, Ollie.  Thank you.

Laurel: I know what you're going to say. But I risked my life for this city while you were gone. That should earn me some respect.
Oliver: This isn't about respect. And it's not about you risking your life.  I understand that you miss Sara. And I understand that when you go out there like this, all that pain goes away.
Laurel: It's the only time it ever does.
Oliver: And that relief isn't real. It's a drug.
Laurel: If you're implying -
Oliver: You are an addict. And just like with booze and pills, that high you're chasing every night is endangering your life.
Laurel: Go to hell, Oliver! You don't get to play that card with me!  Ever! And if there is anyone who is using adrenaline to hide the pain of real feelings and real life, it's you!

Thea: You smell like smoke.  Korean barbecue?
Ollie: C4.  (pause) Yeah.
Thea: It's nice that we can tell each other this stuff now.
Ollie: It is, actually.

Quentin: Have you heard  from Sara lately?
Laurel: No.  Why?
Quentin: I ran into her a few weeks back and something just felt a little... off.  Then I ran into that friend of her's. You know, the one with the, uh.. boy hair?
Laurel: Sin.
Quentin:  Yeah, Sin. That's it. She said something strange. She said that the woman in black isn't Sara.
Laurel: That doesn't make any sense. 
Quentin: No. (pause) I mean, I just want to talk to her, you know.  Sara or not.

Thea: I felt pretty lame not recognizing my own brother just because he's wearing a hood. I can't believe you knew before I did.
Roy: He saved my life, Thea.
Thea: He saved a lot of peoples lives. (pause) He thinks we need Merlyn's help.
Roy: Hmm.  And what do you think?
Thea: I think I want to get as far away from Malcolm Merlyn as I possibly can.
Roy: Well, there's your answer right there.

Diggle: What I know, Oliver, is that you started something.  Something strong enough to live on past you.  Question is... can you live with what it's become?

Illusion Quentin: You lied to me, Laurel!  Straight to my face!  My own daughter! Sara was my daughter! I deserved to know! I had a right! To grieve! To mourn! Who do you think you are to take that from me, huh? Who do you think you are?!  You keep my own daughter's death a secret just because you think I'm too weak for the truth?!


Dialogue Disasters

Felicity: I think Sara wore her mask just as much to hide her demons as she did to help people. And I don't see that with you. You have a light inside of you that Sara never had. So maybe you should stop trying to be Sara and just be yourself?


Continuity
We see the new Count Vertigo for the first time since A301.

Oliver reveals his secret identity to Thea.

Thea refers to The League of Assassins trying to kill her in A304.

Oliver tells Thea about their mother knowing his secret, which was revealed in A220.

Thea refers to the events of A309 and how Ollie broke the window of her apartment.

Oliver can survive being water-boarded for ten minutes.  Most special forces soldiers do not last three minutes, according to Amanda Waller.

Quentin refers to the events of A311 and A312 regarding his meetings with "Sara" and Sin.

Quentin figures out that Sara is the new Canary on his own.

Laurel tells Quentin about Sara's death.

At the end of the episode, Ollie and Thea travel to Lian Yu.

Maseo turns himself in rather than let Oliver take all of the blame for their escape after he learns of Oliver's capture by ARGUS.

In the flashbacks, Waller escorts Oliver to Starling City.


Untelevised Adventures

Oliver makes reference to running into Laurel in costume sometime between the events of last week's episode and this episode.


The Fridge Factor

Pretty much the everything involving Laurel in this episode is dedicated to showing how she's incompetent as a vigilante as well as being "a selfish bitch, a liar, a fraud and an addict".  And it isn't entirely wrong, Ollie's dislike of vigilantes he hasn't trained to the contrary.  Hell, the only thing that saves her at the end is Vertigo's drug eventually triggering her fight response and her getting the jump on him.

Had Laurel shown any signs of guilt for her past behavior before now, this might have been an effective way of showing that.  As it is, the whole thing comes off as incredibly forced.  At least Laurel finally comes clean to her father at the end but the fact of the matter is that Laurel is still a pretty terrible person whose only reason for being a vigilante is as a means of coping with her guilt and rage over her sister's death.


The Bottom Line

The weakest episode of the series in quite some time. The writing is sub-par, with most of the cast seeming out of character and spouting opinions that are totally the opposite of what they were saying in the last episode. The fact that the episode is called Canaries when most of the action is focused upon Thea and how things change now that she knows all about Ollie's secret life says it all.  Still, at least a lot of the stupider plot points of Season 3 have been resolved (i.e. Laurel's going through increasingly ludicrous ends to hide Sara's death from her feather and Thea's obliviousness to what's going on around her own nightclub.)  and the next episode promises to move the plot along.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 12 - Uprising

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot

Oliver Queen is a long way from healing but he knows that his city has need of him. Brick's gang has been in control of The Glades for a week and Team Arrow is fighting a desperate war to try and keep the peace. Help may come from an unlikely source, but will they be willing to accept the aid of Malcolm Merlyn?

In the flashbacks, we see how Merlyn came to kill his first victim - the man he thought had murdered his wife - and how he came to seek out the League of Assassins.


Influences

The Green Arrow/Black Canary comics of Judd Winick and Andrew Kresiberg and every Robin Hood legend where Robin is presumed dead only to miraculously survive.


Goofs

One wonders why the governor of whatever state Starling City is in hasn't seen fit to do something about a mayor giving away land to a crime boss. You'd also think they would have sent in the National Guard to deal with Brick by now.

For that matter, why haven't ARGUS and Amanda Waller taken action, given what happened the last time some bulletproof madman started tying to take control of Starling City?

It seems somewhat unlikely that Captain Lance can recognize Roy Harper as Arsenal and not make the connection between Oliver Queen and The Arrow at this point.

Laurel apparently votes against accepting Merlyn's help, despite arguing in favor of the idea before Roy tells the rest of Team Arrow about Merlyn's saving Thea from Deathstroke's men.

You'd think, even if Kendrick Weller had reasons for not killing Merlyn after Merlyn tried and failed to attack him, he'd have stolen Merlyn's gun.

Why did all of Team Arrow save Laurel go back to the Arrow Cave once Ollie showed up at the fight with Brick's men? Even if things were under control, you'd expect them to be there for Ollie's big speech to the city.


Performances

Honestly, the entire cast get at least one great moment in this episode.  Here's a list of the best.

Paul Blackthorne: Quentin Lance snarking at Roy Harper's efforts to hide his secret identity.

John Barrownman: Every damn moment of every flashback scene.

Colton Haynes: Roy attempting to convince the rest of the team that Merlyn can be trusted in so far as protecting Thea and Starling City are concerned.

David Ramsey: John Diggle telling off Malcom Merlyn.

Willa Holland: Every scene of Thea trying to convince Merlyn that he is better than he thinks he is.

Katie Cassidy: Laurel's moment of inspiration, using the people of The Glades as an army to fight Brick's men.

Emily Bett Rickards: Felicity's speech to Oliver at the end of the episode.

Stephen Amell: Oliver's wordless response to Feliicty's big speech.


Artistry

The script for this episode may be the best ever, with a lot of quotable lines.


Trivia

One of Brick's thugs asks Arsenal if he's "The Red Streak" he saw on TV.  This is a reference to The Flash.

Ollie mentions Tatsu's skill with a sword - a reference to her identity as the heroine Katana in the comics.

We see a blue neon sign on the outside of Ted Grant's gym that resembles his mask as Wildcat in the comics.

In the comics, Merlyn was known as Merlyn The Magician among The League of Assassins for his near-magical accuracy with a bow.


Technobabble

Felicity says walkie-talkies operate on the FRS (family radio service) somewhere between 462-467 MHz. She uses a frequency burst to triangulate their position.


Dialogue Triumphs

Thug: Looks like we got ourselves a real live superhero here. You that Red Streak I've been hearing about on TV?
Arsenal: Wrong city.

Captain Lance: Arsenal? What, are you guys just pulling names out of a hat now?

Arsenal: (voice deepened by voice modulator) Captain Lance.
Captain Lance; Harper.
Arsenal: I'm not sure what you -
Captain Lance: Look, I've seen you wearing a red hoodie. I've seen you shooting arrows at people. You think I don't recognize you with a little extra leather and lace?
Arsenal: Well, I guess I won't be needing this anymore... (turns off voice modulator)

Tatsu: Only the student has a hope of defeating the master.

Laurel: Do you think that you could - I don't know - use those signals to locate Brick?
Felicity: You haven't been down here that much.

(To Thea, as he finds her leaning on the rail of the balcony overlooking Verdant)
Roy: You stole my idea. I was going to lean here and wish my problems away.

Roy: Oliver is gone. And there's only so much the four of us can do. I just found this out but ...the night of the siege Malcolm saved Thea's life. He didn't have an ulterior motive. He didn't have an agenda. He just wanted to protect what he cared about. He cares about this city.  He just went about it in a completely unimaginable way. So just like Thea did on the night of the siege, we need him.
Felicity: I can't think of a world or a universe or a plane of existence where Oliver would agree to any of this.
Roy: Well, Oliver isn't here anymore, so we need to stop pretending like his is.  We need to make decisions on our own. I genuinely have no idea how else we're suppose to stop Brick!
Felicity: And I genuinely don't know how we live with ourselves if we go about doing it this way!

Merlyn: Has the jury reached a verdict?
John: It has. Guilty.
Merlyn: I guess that means 'no' then.
John: You were expecting something different, Merlyn?
Merlyn: What?  That you'd have some measure of common sense?  Yes!
John: You really thought we'd throw in with you? After what you did to Thea? To Sara? To Oliver?
Merlyn: To save your precious city? Yes.
John: Well, that's the thing. Once we let the ends justify the means, that's just the first step.
Merlyn: Towards what?
John: Becoming you.

Thea: You protected me! Risked your life for me! Just like my mother did!
Merlyn: Thea, I know you want to believe there's more to me than a killer. But the fact is, there's not. That man died with his wife.

Laurel: We made the right choice, right?  By refusing Merlyn's help?
John: I don't know if we made the right choice, Laurel, but we definitely did the right thing.

Felicity: Is what we're doing crazy?
Arsenal: I've learned it's better to ask that question when I'm not wearing a mask.

Brick: My two favorite trick-or-treaters. Look at that - Didn't anybody tell you Halloween was three months ago?
Laurel: Daniel Brickwell....
Arsenal: You have failed this city.
Brick: And you seem to have failed in your maths. Can't you see that there's a lot more of us than there is of you?
(Brick's men line up behind him.)
Sin: Guess again, Brick-head!
(Sin, Wildcat and the people of The Glades walk up behind Arsenal and Laurel)
Brick: Is this little parade supposed to mean something?  I'll tell you what it means. It means that the population of The Glades is gonna plummet severely. Get 'em!

Laurel: (To Ted) You're going to be fine. It's okay.
Ted: It's a good thing you fight better than you lie.

Arrow: Drop the gun! No more death!
Merlyn: That's easy for you to say. You just returned from the grave.

Merlyn: Thea will never forgive me.
Arrow: Then start giving her reasons to.

Arrow: I've been gone and I'm sorry. Sorry for what the city has had to endure in my absence. But you did endure it!  And the evidence of that struggle is lying at my feet. You did not fail this city! And I promise I will not fail you by leaving it again!

Thea: Are you okay?
Merlyn: I am, in fact. I didn't do it.
Thea: For me?
Merlyn: For me. But because of you.

Ollie: I'm sorry.
Felicity: For what?  Maybe you could be a little more specific? For letting us believe you were dead? For weeks? Or for abandoning every principle you claim to have by getting into bed with Malcolm Merlyn?
(Ollie tries to step forward but Felicity shakes her head)
Felicity: Uh-uh.
Ollie: That's not why you're upset...
Felicity: While you were gone, for almost a month... I allowed myself to... fantasize.. to dream that maybe, just maybe, Merlyn was wrong. That you were alive. And that you would come back. And that you would be different. That almost dying would give you a new perspective on life. That you would just do things differently!
Ollie: Things between us, you mean...
Felicity: Before you left, the last thing you said to me... was that you loved me. Now you're back. And the first thing you tell me is that you're working with the man who turned your sister - a woman you're supposed to love - into a killer, who killed a woman you used to love! I don't want to be a woman that you love.


Continuity

As the episode opens, it has been one week since the SCPD were pulled out of The Glades.  Halloween was three months earlier and Oliver Queen has been gone for nearly a month.

After watching Laurel beat up several thugs, Arsenal notes that "Grant must be some teacher."  Ted Grant was last seen in A306.

We see Sara and Roy's friend Sin for the first time since A220.

Merlyn believed his wife's killer was a man named Kendrick Weller.

Felicity refers to herself and the rest of The Arrow's support team as Team Arrow - a nickname she first used in A212.

Quentin Lance refers to The Arrow's support team as The Hood Squad.

Danny Brick used the same gun to kill Alderman Ford in A311 and Rebecca Merlyn - Malcolm Merlyn's wife.

Rebecca Merlyn was killed 21 years earlier.

Malcolm Merlyn planted a hidden camera in the Arrow cave.  It is through this he overhears that Brick was the real killer of his wife.

Thea tells Roy about how Malcolm saved her during the events of A223.

Brick killed Rebecca Merlyn to gain membership in The Orchid Bay Butchers.

Sin tells Captain Lance that another woman is impersonating Sara.

Oliver tells Thea that he was in Bludhaven and in jail for the month he was gone.

Oliver asks Merlyn to train him so that he can fight and kill Ra's Al Ghul. Merlyn agrees.

We find out the origin of Merlyn's League of Assassins' name: Al Su-her - The Magician.  It is because he performed slight-of-hand magic (the coin behind the ear trick) to amuse Nyssa Al Ghul as a girl.


Location

The cabin where Tatsu cares for Oliver's injuries.


The Fridge Factor

Ted Grant is seemingly killed by Brick in order to give Laurel one more person to feel guilty about dying in order to push her transformation into Black Canary.


The Winick Factor

Granting that there's a long tradition of corrupt or incompetent politicians running Star City in the comics, it still seems somewhat unlikely that any mayor hoping to be reelected or avoid serious issues with the state or federal government would ever hand over part of their city to a crime boss.  It seems even less unlikely that the police officers would agree to such a demand.  Especially with Quentin Lance in charge.


The Bottom Line

Logically, very little of the scenario for this trilogy of episodes makes sense.  But the cast sells it through sheer charisma and the snappy dialogue more than makes up for the holes in the plot of this third act.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 11 - Midnight City

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot

Oliver Queen is alive but the League of Assassins is closing in on him and his allies.  Malcolm Merlyn is in similarly dire straits and is ready to flee Starling City with Thea in tow. As Ray Palmer continues the work on his ATOM suit, Felicity struggles with what she can and will do to help the city in its time of need. And Laurel Lance has taken to the streets in costume to take on Brick's followers. John Diggle and Arsenal are quick to try and get her to stop risking her life but when Brick takes several city aldermen hostage, they may be forced to accept her help.


Influences

The Green Arrow/Black Canary comics of Judd Winick and Andrew Kreisberg.


Goofs

Brick says he hates hitting women. He also seems to be reluctant to shoot them, as he doesn't take two perfectly good opportunities to shoot Laurel while he has the chance.  Also, he seems to have abandoned his tick of offering those who oppose him a chance to shoot him from last episode.

Despite training as a boxer, Laurel seems committed to fighting with a melee weapon (quarterstaff) we don't have any evidence she's trained with.

How did Felicity have access to numerous recordings of Sara Lance's voice?

One wonders why Captain Lance doesn't arrest the mayor when she starts talking about literally giving a part of the city to a crime lord.  It has to be a violation of eminent domain, if nothing else and it's not like he could plunge The Glades into further chaos.


Performances

Colton Haynes really steps to the forefront in this episode. He hasn't always been given a lot to do as Roy Harper but he nails ever single scene he has in this episode, from his warning off Laurel after saving her life to his bonding with Diggle after their mission goes south.  Even when he confronts Malcolm Merlyn, Haynes proves capable of holding his own against John Barrowman - no mean feat!


Artistry

The opening nightmare sequence with Ollie and Felicity is an effective bit of horror, made all the more effective by us not being aware at first that it is a dream instead of a flashback and not knowing who the dreamer is.

The best fight scene of the night?  The fight in the Hong Kong nightclub during the flashback. Very well choreographed and well-shot.


Trivia

When Laurel is threatening one of Brick's henchmen, she drops the name of Belle Reeve prison and suggests it is a much nicer place than Iron Heights. In the comics, Belle Reeve  is a notable penitentiary devoted to the incarceration of metahumans. Located in Louisiana, it first appeared in Suicide Squad #1 and probably is a nicer prison than Iron Heights if only because the warden of Iron Heights in the comics was a sadist who performed illegal experiments on the metahumans in his charge.

The press refers to Arsenal as "The Red Arrow".  This was indeed Roy Harper's codename when he joined The Justice League.

Brick claims to quote from Shakespeare's Julius Cesar - Act V, Scene 2. "They stand and would have parley." - when he calls the mayor making demands.  Brick quotes the line perfectly, but the line is actually from Act V, Scene 1.


Technobabble

The ATOM armor does not fire lasers. It fires compressed hard-light beams.

Felicity is able to fake Sara Lance's voice using a symbolic algorithm and recordings of Sara's voice.

The nanite chip for the ATOM armor won't function without a quantum processor.


Dialogue Triumphs

Oliver: If Ra's finds out that you saved me... betrayed him.. he's going to kill you.
Maseo:  Don't waste your breath on worries for me. Your concern should be for your home and what has become of it in your absence.

Roy: (To Laurel) I've had training from Oliver and years on the streets. You have a law degree. (sighs) Look, I get it.  This isn't how you deal with grief, Laurel.  This is how yourself get killed.

Felicity: And by help you mean money and counsel - not a suit powered by dwarf-star alloy that fires lasers at people?
Ray: Well, they aren't lasers. That would be ridiculous! They're compressed hard-light beams.

Tatsu: The line between grief and guilt is a thin one.  Sometimes death is preferable to the agony of life.

Roy: You need to stay away from her. I don't know why you want her to leave Starling City but I'm not letting her go anywhere with you.
Merlyn: Well, thank you for that. I was in need of some humor.
Roy: I wasn't joking. You're a poison. You put her in Ra's Al Ghul's gun-sites. You had her kill Sara.
Merlyn: Thea knows nothing about Sara. And she never will.
Roy: That's where your wrong. I know her. She'll get to the truth, no matter how well you think you're hiding it. And when she does find out that you've been lying to her, you're going to lose her forever. Trust me - I know from experience.
Merlyn: This is a family matter, Mr. Harper. And you are not family.

Ray: When I started The ATOM Project it was all about avenging Anna. But what it's become about is protecting the people I care for.
Felicity: You mean the city?
Ray: No. I mean you.

Laurel: I'm not going to be putting on that mask again. I'm not strong enough to fight for Sara.
Felicity: Maybe you're not supposed to. Maybe it's not about Sara. Or Oliver. Or anyone else that we care about that we've lost. Maybe what we've been doing, we've been doing because there are people we still care about who are... alive. Maybe we're doing it for them.

Felicity: I need the keys to your helicopter.
Ray: How would you even fly it?
Felicity: I've got that covered. Can you please just give me the keys now? I promise, promise I will not crash it.
Ray: I've got to be honest. I''d feel a little more confident in your aeronautic abilities if you knew, for instance, that helicopters don't actually have keys.

Thea: So why run? Why not stay and fight? Seven months ago, I asked you to teach me. To teach me how to not be afraid and how to not get hurt.  So why are you asking me to be afraid now?
Merlyn: I'm not asking you. I'm telling you. You should be very afraid-
Thea: But I'm not! And my father taught me how not to be. He taught me how to stand my ground and how not to give an inch in a battle. I'm not afraid of this man and you shouldn't be either.  He should be afraid of us.
Merlyn: Then we'll stay.


Continuity

The opening nightmare scene opens just like Oliver's goodbye to Felicity in A309.

Oliver never actually died.

Maseo and Tatsu are no longer in regular contact with one another.

Diggle taught everyone on Team Arrow how to suture a wound. Felicity was a faster study than Roy.

The current mayor of Starling City is a woman named Celia Castle.

Roy refers to the events of A220 and how he was responsible for a death then as well as now.

Diggle and Roy make a toast with vodka, as Diggle repeats Ollie's toast from A206 - Prochnost. He admits he has no idea what it means ("Strength" in Russian).

Amanda Waller apparently suspected Maseo and Oliver would attempt to bargain for Tatsu's life with the Alpha, so she replaced it with a fake elixir.

At the episode's end, we learn that Chase - the DJ Thea hired in A307 - is an assassin reporting to Maseo.


Location

A cabin in an unidentified location, within several hours walking distance of the League Of Assassins' dueling grounds.


Untelevised Adventures

We know that something happened to end Tatsu and Maseo's marriage, but we still do not know the details... yet.


The Fridge Factor

Granting that she is new to the whole vigilante thing, very little of what we see of Laurel in action in this episode inspires confidence that she will ever live up to her sister's legacy.  She survives her first action scene in the episode only because Arsenal saved her.  The only reason the Brick doesn't kill her several times over the course of the episode is because he says he doesn't hit women and/or forgets that he's holding a gun.  And yet the largest concern is that Laurel lacks the moral fortitude to be a hero, only just now realizing that her actions are causing other people to come to harm.

Much is made about Felicity being the one to encourage Laurel and eventually drag the rest of Team Arrow out of their doldrums.  A shame her inspiration to do this comes from Ray Palmer's speech about why he's really making The ATOM Suit - to protect her.


The Winick Factor

The entirety of Team Arrow is downgraded for much of the episode. Granting that everyone is shaken up by the possibility of Oliver's death, it still seems to be contrived to make Brick appear to be more awesome than he truly is as a criminal mastermind.  Local politicians and police being made to look incompetent or corrupt is another staple of Winick's Green Arrow run.


The Bottom Line

It isn't as bad as it could have been but it isn't that good, either.  The script is one contrivance after another that serve no purpose other than to pump up the villain at the expense of our heroes. Paradoxically, the best bits of the episode are the ones where we see our heroes bonding together, though the scenes with Laurel interacting with the rest of Team Arrow still feel hollow as there's a presumption of relationships we haven't seen all season. The cast give it their all but there's still a feeling that we're treading water until the big finale next week.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 10 - Left Behind

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.




Plot

With Oliver Queen still missing some three days after he left to duel Ra's Al Ghul, it falls to the rest of Team Arrow to protect Starling City. But demoralized and disorganized as they are, can they hold-up as an aspiring crime-boss makes a bold move to release hundreds of criminals from prison and form an unstoppable gang?  And if they can't, could a new vigilante take flight in the city's time of need?

In the Hong Kong flashbacks, Ollie and Maseo must work quickly to recover the other half of the compound needed to make Chien Na Wei's bio-weapon if they are to have any hope of saving Tatsu.


Influences

The Green Arrow comics of Judd Winick.


Performances

David Ramsey, Colton Haynes and Emily Bett Rickards are each given a good amount of screen-time to showcase how their characters are coping with the apparent reality of Ollie's death.  Felicity takes it the hardest, of course, and has the most dramatic reaction.  Diggle is the most understated, ironically only losing his cool in the fact of an increasingly unsure Roy, who copes with things by looking inward and questioning his actions... just like Ollie in a crisis.  This episode is written as an ensemble piece for the rest of Team Arrow and the actors all nail their parts.


Artistry

The opening chase scene is of cinematic quality and a feather in the cap of the show's stunt team.


Trivia

Danny "Brick" Brickwell is based on a crime-boss from the Judd Winick run on Green Arrow.

Like his comic-book counterpart, the Arrow version of Brick seems to possess some form of  super-durability that makes him resistant (if not immune) to the effects of ballistic weaponry and bludgeoning damage. He does, however, seem to be less resistant to arrows.

Thus far,the Arrow version of Brick does not seem to possess the super-strength that Brick in the comics had. He also lack's the comic Brick's red skin and increased size. He does, however, possess his comic-book counterpart's talent for hand-to-hand combat.


Technobabble

The Omega element has to be mixed with another compound called Alpha in order to create a viable bio-weapon.

Ray Palmer tries to generate a two second electrical burst at 800 volts through a gauntlet..

When Felicity enters his office, he admits to having trouble  modulating the stress energy tensor.

Ray tried over-clocking the magnetic coils but that didn't work.

Ray then asks Felicity to see if she can get a nanite chip to function.

He later asks if the problem is the transplex interface.


Dialogue Triumphs

(On seeing Arsenal chasing them)
Thug One: It's him!
Thug Two: I thought he was green!

Diggle: (defensively) I'm more a Glock kind of guy.
Arsenal: I didn't say anything.

Ray Palmer: Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Start small!

The scene in which Oliver fails to easily break a window even after Maseo shoots it is rather funny given how easy breaking in through a window is usually made to look on TV and in the movies.

Merlyn: Could you put the gun away? They don't scare so much as annoy me.

Roy: Thea just asked me to talk to The Arrow about finding Oliver.
Diggle: And what did you tell her?
Roy: What else? I lied.
Diggle: Oliver didn't want Thea to know.
Roy: That was then. But now, what's the point?
Diggle: I keep asking myself the same question, Roy.
Roy: Then why do you keep going over the case evidence?
Diggle: Because it helps me keep my mind off of Oliver.
Roy: Doing this without him while we're waiting for him to come back is one thing. But doing this without him WITHOUT him? That's a whole other situation.
Diggle: And what do you want me to tell you, Roy?! I can only see one inch in front of me and this is the only thing in front of me right now.

(After Diggle tries shooting him in the head and nothing happens)
Brick: Smart man. Nobody thinks about going for a head shot.

(After shooting Brick in the back while he was strangling Diggle, causing a grunt of pain)
Arsenal: I guess arrows work a little better on this guy than bullets.

Diggle: He's not coming back. Oliver. I know you don't want to believe it, Laurel. God knows I don't. But he's not coming back.
Laurel: Are you?  Are you coming back?
Diggle: I don't know. For the first time since I've met Oliver Queen, I don't know what happens next. I know it's silly but... I still like to think of myself as Oliver's bodyguard. I just couldn't protect him.
(Laurel hugs him) 
Diggle: It's funny. He was worried something would happen to me.


Continuity

As this episode opens, it has been three days since the events of A309 and eight months since Slade Wilson's attack on the city.

Diggle wears the Arrow suit for the first time since A105.

Ray Palmer has hated clowns since childhood.

Roy Harper knows Brick by sight.

The blueprint Diggle and Roy find is of the police evidence storage facility. The list they find is case numbers of all the violent offenders convicted in Starling City in the past eight months.

League of Assassins custom demands that any weapon used to kill someone in a duel be left on the dueling site as a memorial to the fallen.

Merlyn brings the sword Ra's impaled Oliver on to Felicity as proof of Oliver's death.

Roy does not usually drink alone.

Thea figured out on her own that Roy was The Arrow's new partner - the man in red.

Felicity is 25 years old.

Felicity quits Team Arrow and returns the chip Ray asked her to fix.

Laurel takes Sara's wig, mask, gloves and Canary Cry greanades from the Arrow Cave.

Merlyn asks Thea to flee the city with him, never to return.

Oliver plants a tracker on one of Chien Na Wei's men and lets him go so they can follow them back to her base and rescue Tatsu. Maseo swears to repay Oliver for this someday.

In the present, we find Maseo is the one who took Oliver's body from where it fell after the duel.  We find out he took it to Tatsu, whom he did not want to see.  Somehow, she brought Oliver back to life.


The Bottom Line

A solid episode that gives the supporting cast a shot at the spotlight.  As usual, the weak point is Laurel but this is due more to the script than any failing on Katie Cassidy's part. The sad fact of the matter is that Laurel has been isolated from the rest of the cast for so long that she no longer has more than a passing acquaintance to most of the show's important characters.  So there's no chance at the same wonderful interplay we get between Diggle and Felicity or Diggle and Roy because Laurel is absent for most of the episode.  Even when we do see her, she doesn't show any reaction to Oliver's death once she hears about it and does little in the scene where she does find out apart from hug Diggle. Still, we do get to see her in costume for the second time and she doesn't get beaten up this time, so that's something.

Arrow Episode Guide: Season 3, Episode 6 - Guilty

For a summary of the episode guide layout & categories, click here.



Plot

For the past few weeks, Roy Harper hasn't been sleeping well.  After being called out on this for the third time while in the field, Roy goes to Felicity and privately asks for her to conduct a blood test to make sure the Mirakuru is out of his system.  He then confesses the reason he wanted the test and the reason for his insomnia - a reoccurring nightmare in which he kills Sara Lance by throwing arrows into her!

At the same time, a mysterious vigilante is killing gang members in The Glades and all signs point to former professional boxer and gym owner Ted Grant being the guilty party.  Laurel thinks otherwise, having been with Ted when one of the murders occurred but Oliver isn't convinced. Particularly after he discovers that six years earlier, Ted Grant was a vigilante who protected The Glades of Starling City at about the same time another gang leader was killed under similar circumstances...


Influences

Green Arrow: Year One (references to China White), The Cat and The Canary episode of Justice League Unlimited (Oliver Queen and Dinah Lance team up to investigate Ted Grant's involvement in a criminal act) and numerous Green Arrow stories that dealt with Roy Harper failing to live up to Oliver Queen's standards.


Goofs 

The thought occurs with the flashbacks in this episode that Amanda Waller using Oliver as a secret agent in Hong Kong is rather stupid.  Granted it's unfamiliar territory that limits his escape options, it also leaves him sticking out like a sore thumb.

The script tries way too hard to draw a parallel between Ollie's current situation with Roy and Wildcat's falling-out with his sidekick. While it's a nice idea, the differing circumstances of their having killed someone (Roy was under the influence of a mind-altering substance compared to Stanzler being overly-violent of his own free will) are completely different and not really comparable.

The larger problem is that the script has a lot of characters speaking dialogue that it makes no sense for them to be saying.  This includes Stanzler's speech to Roy about Ollie abandoning him, which doesn't make sense because Stanzler knows nothing about what Roy has done or his fears of abandonment.  This also includes Ted Grant's talk with The Arrow later about cutting his sidekick loose before he loses control, which - while well spoken by both J.R. Ramriez and Stephen Amell - doesn't make a lick of sense because Ted Grant knows nothing about what is going on between The Arrow and his sidekick!  Even John Diggle - usually the voice of reason - seems horribly out of character, urging Oliver to cut Roy loose if there's even a chance he really did kill Sara Lance!

Laurel does some truly unethical things in this episode, which are covered in The Fridge Factor.

Oliver does some truly idiotic things, which are covered in The Winick Factor.


Performances

The scenes between Colton Haynes and Emily Bett Rickards are well-acted.  We haven't seen much happen between these two, so it's a nice touch that we get to see that Felicity is the person Roy trusts the most to handle the news of what he thinks he's done without judging him.

J.R. Ramirez is given a good deal more screen time as Wildcat this time and proves to be capable of holding his own against Stephen Amell - both in a fight scene and in a dialogue.


Artistry

The fight between Arrow and Ted Grant in the gym is well-shot and played out.


Trivia

During their storming the gang's hideout, Oliver tells Roy he is on "overwatch".  Overwatch is the name of a new novel by Arrow show-runner Marc Guggenheim. 

Oliver's inability to pronounce the name Chien Na Wei and saying China White instead is a callback to Green Arrow: Year One.

In the comics, Ted Grant is a vigilante, gym owner and ex-professional boxer who fought crime under the code-name Wildcat.  He would later go on to train other vigilantes, including Batman, Catwoman and Black Canary.

In the show, Ted Grant is a lefty who is known as The Sterling Southpaw.  In so far as my research can determine, the comics never specified whether Wildcat was a righty or a lefty.

Ted Grant's gym is located on the corner of 9th and Hansen.  This is a nod to artist Irwin Hasen, who drew the first Wildcat comic back in Sensation Comics #1, which was also the first appearance of Wonder Woman.

Ted Grant's former partner in crime-fighting - Issac Stanzler - is named in honor of Arrow director Wendey Stanzler.

Captain Lance glibly tells Laurel that she knows how to pick them.  Beyond being a reference to Laurel's bad romantic choices on the show, it could also be a reference to the comics, where Dinah Lance has a similar history of dating questionable men.  Even ignoring her history with Ollie, she dated Ra's Al Ghul at one point!

The newspaper in Starling City is The Starling City Star.

Arsenal is the code name that Roy Harper eventually adopted after deciding he had outgrown the moniker Speedy.  It referred to his mastery of multiple weapons - not just arrows.  He eventually became a master of Moo Gi Gong - a Korean martial art based around turning any solid object into a weapon.

Cupid - the woman we see killing a prisoner with a bow at the episode's end - is a villain from the Green Arrow/Black Canary comics and she will be discussed in more detail next week.


Technobabble

Though it is an improvised weapon, Oliver does make use of a boxing glove arrow - a regular arrow thrust inside a boxing glove.


Dialogue Triumphs

Roy: Nothin' much. Just a feeling. A feeling of being not me. Being strong and out of control. But, here's the thing... in those dreams, I killed Sara.
Felicity: And this really had you worried?
Roy: Because the dreams,...they didn't feel like dreams, Felicity, they felt like memories. I actually remember throwing arrows into her. Crazy, right?
Felicity:  (quietly) Yeah. Crazy.

Arrow: That's the second time I've found you with a body.
Ted: I've never killed anybody. I'm being set up.
Arrow: And why should I believe you?
Ted: Because I used to be a vigilante. I used to be you.
Arrow: I've never heard of another vigilante in Starling.
Ted: It was six years ago. I wasn't news; I stuck to the Glades.
Arrow: And these are supposed to convince me? Masks are also useful for serial killers.
Ted: Says the guy currently wearing one.

Arrow: Who else knows about the locker?
Ted: No one. This is where I kept my supplies, a safe place separate from my day job. I'm sure you got one just like it.
Arrow: Mine's bigger.

Arrow: You cannot be serious.
Laurel: I am not on your team. I don't work for you.
Arrow: Exactly. You're untrained.
Laurel: And whose fault is that?!

Oliver: You're playing a very dangerous game, Laurel.
Laurel: I can handle it.
Oliver: No, you can't. Because you haven't realized that it's not actually a game.

Arrow: Ted, your mistake wasn't cutting him loose. It was losing faith in him.

Roy: I'm going to miss this. I feel like I was just starting to get good at it.
Oliver: You are getting good at it.
Roy: That guy? He said I was just another weapon in your arsenal.
Oliver: Well maybe that's what we should call you, then?  Arsenal.

Roy: So I didn't kill Sara. But I am a murderer.


Dialogue Disasters

Stanzler: (To Roy) Don't you get it? He's using you! You're not a human being, man! You were just another weapon in his arsenal! And the second you do something wrong, he'll turn his back on you! He will abandon you!

Roy: Don't abandon me.
Oliver: Never.

Cupid: I'm Cupid, stupid.


Continuity

It is confirmed that Roy did not kill Sara and that his dreams were formed from a jumble of memories and his seeing Sara's face right after he killed a cop in A220.

Oliver learned how to use meditation to clear his head and focus his memory from Tatsu while he was in Hong Kong.


The Fridge Factor 

Again, Laurel proves to have poor judgement in how to exercise her authority as an assistant district attorney. Over the course of the episode, she interferes in an active police investigation where she is the only alibi for a suspected killer. She is somehow allowed to drop all the charges against this Ted Grant without a word of protest from anyone.  And at the end, after it is revealed Ted Grant was a vigilante six years ago, she makes sure he's only charged with crimes for which the statue of limitations has passed.


The Winick Factor

Ollie's hypocrisy regarding vigilante ethics is on full display through this episode. Oliver is contemptuous of Ted Grant when he thinks that Ted was a vigilante who killed people, neatly ignoring just how many random thugs and minions he killed during his first year on the job.  (A major weakness of the script is that nobody calls Ollie on this point). Later, when Oliver helps Roy to remember the truth, he tries to comfort Roy by saying that it didn't matter that he killed some random cop when he was under the influence of Mirakuru... so long as he didn't kill Sara Lance!  To Roy's credit, he doesn't buy Ollie's half-assed justification either.


The Bottom Line

The first bad episode of the season and a serious candidate for the worst episode of the show ever. The script does a lot of good things (the scenes with Felicity and Roy and Oliver and Ted's confrontations, especially)  but it also has a lot of bits where everyone seems out of character, especially Oliver and Diggle. And for a script that is supposed to be focused on Roy, he barely seems to be involved in the action with more time being devoted toward Laurel and Ted Grant than Roy's emotional torment over the revelation that he's killed someone.  Not even the long awaited premiere of the boxing glove arrow can save this one.