1. The addiction plot is back
One of the plotlines that seemed to go nowhere last year was about Detective Lance being an addict. I get why it was there (it humanized him a bit/showed how losing Sara had destroyed his life), but it didn’t really have a clear purpose in the grand scheme. That is until this season with Laurel beginning to pop pills. What was clever about this device was that it wasn’t in your face, but rather subtle up until tonight. We didn’t see Laurel break down, or go through withdrawal, or sing “I’m So Excited” – we just saw a weakness exposed. It was a subtle device for a show that doesn’t always handle subtlety all that well.
2. Sebastian Blood is a bad dude
I know we knew this ahead of time, but this week he really went full on terrible villain – killing your mom in a run down nursing home is about as low as a dude can get. Add into that his seemingly flippant regard for human life, by letting one of his “brothers” take the fall for him, and we are starting to see a really capable villain for the show.
That fact was reinforced by the fact that he is pretty much off scott-free now – sure, Slade thinks he’s a fuck-up, but Oliver and Laurel are both off his case. On so many other shows, this would have been the end of Blood and the start of Slade Wilson as the big bad on the show. But no, they are keeping Blood around, as a mirror image of Ollie, a romantic foil for Laurel, a whipping boy for Slade, and an adversary for the Arrow.
3. The Slade Switcheroo
Having Slade be the one who stole Blood’s file was a twist I did not see coming. This episode showed how cunning he is, how good of a villain he is, both because of his skills with his hands and with his brain. He is the puppet master behind this entire season, and no one is the wiser. He is also a badass with two swords, a real nice homage to the classic incarnation of the character. This episode brought back the mask, as seen above.
4. Sara Growing / Laurel Shrinking
For the first time since the show started, we are seeing why Ollie had chosen Sara over Laurel – mainly, because Sara is getting some space to grow as an actual character. She has more spunk, more sweetness, and more compassion than Laurel has. This season’s island flashbacks have all been about Sara growing into a fully formed character, instead of just the “other” Lance.
While she has been blossoming, Laurel has been falling apart. Now jobless, off her prescription drugs, shamed in the eyes of Blood, and embarrassed by what she had become, she has hit rock bottom. What will happen when she finds out Sara is alive?
5. Enter Arsenal!
Roy Harper is one of my all-time favorite comics characters, so seeing him on Arrow has been a bit of a mixed blessing so far. He isn’t exactly the Roy I grew up with, but he is going to be quite the Arsenal, isn’t he? Mirakuru’d up, trained by Ollie – this is going to be fun to watch.
And that’s the best part about this show – just how fun it is. Remember when DC Comics were fun? For an hour a week, it still feels that way.
