After last night’s debut of The Flash, we have moved across the CW-verse landscape back to the dark, dank setting of Star City. Will Arrow best The Flash‘s somewhat lackluster mid-season premiere? Keep reading to find out!
1. Team Arrow is doing stuff!
Holy shitballs! Did you guys notice this? The various members of Team Arrow are doing things that only they can do! That means that Laurel is using her DA status to bust criminals, Diggle is using his A.R.G.U.S. training to beat the tar out of someone, Thea is…well, two out of three ain’t bad. This is the most cohesive the team has been in some time, and it is down their tech genius – imagine if they were at full strength? Whoo boo. Speaking of full strength…
2. Laurel’s sonic scream needs an upgrade
Tonight was one of the few times this season that Laurel has used her sonic scream, and you can see why it is sparingly used – it is about as effective as a stiff fart. Anarky, when screamed at, made a face like he was in the high school auditorium before a battle of the bands and someone’s guitar was loudly feeding back – sure, it’s unpleasant, but it isn’t exactly deadly. Remember when Sara first showed it off, and it shattered more glass than Pavarati over a lifetime? The show has a steady stream of tech geniuses – let Holt take a look at it and make it truly devastating. Otherwise, why even give it to her?
3. Anarky’s slightly disfigured face
Anarky and Thea’s interaction reminded me of this scene from Being John Malkovich – Anarky is supposed to disgust Thea, but his face really isn’t that disfigured. Sure, no one is dying for that burned face look, but it isn’t disgusting, or even worthy of his creepy Police Academy 3: Back in Training mask (I can’t find a single image of the villains from the end of that film online, but trust me, that’s a perfect reference). I get that they needed to give him some sort of look, but this is a really weird one. Thea and he having history together gave him enough of a standout moment to begin with, there was no reason to do any more with him.
4. A Darhk path
Having Ollie + co save Darhk’s family was, of course, the right thing for the show to do, but ran in direct conflict with the rest of the episode, which had Ollie telling everyone that would listen that he’s going to kill Darhk and that the ‘old’ Arrow was back. I get that Oliver is in love, and so Darhk shooting his special lady is really bad, but remember when Slade Wilson painted his sword red with his mom’s guts? Or when Malcolm Merlyn killed thousands of people? Or when Ra’s al Ghul threatened to destroy the entire city? This isn’t Ollie’s first encounter with a coldblooded villain who threatened what matters to him, is it? So why is this the time he breaks his word to stop killing? They really need to give him more motivation in this way – show us how Darhk literally can’t be stopped unless killed, because so far, we’ve seen him taken down a few times, and it seems plausible with all the artillery at Ollie’s disposal (The Flash, Firestorm, the Atom, John Constantine, etc) that Darhk could be stopped some other way.
5. Felicity is safe
I think everyone expected Felicity to be in that grave, and for all of us to cry ourselves to sleep for the rest of our pathetic lives. Well, now that’s been disproven – first of all, thanks CW gods. Secondly – who is it? I’m torn between Thea and Diggle – I’m going on record today saying Thea, which will also get Colton Haynes back on the show as Arsenal, to avenge the death of his ex-gf.
What did you think of the episode? Let me know in the comments!
