Arrow Lost in the Flood Television 

Five Thoughts on Arrow‘s “Lost in the Flood”

By | May 19th, 2016
Posted in Television | 4 Comments

Arrow continues its trend of killing off prominent female characters while wiping out Damien Darhk’s ark (the Darhk Ark? The Darhrk?) and giving us a little more information on Felicity’s past. Keep reading, but beware the spoilers.

1. Smoak affairs

I’m really glad that the show has not resigned itself to making Donna a one dimensional character. Sure, she’s a ditz who just wants to talk weddings and babies, but she’s proven herself to be more than meets the eye (but not yet a robot in disguise). This week continued that, with the revelation that she was the reason`for the lack of a father figure in Felicity’s life, rather than it being Noah’s decision.

This is actually a pretty big deal in Felicity’s story – she has blamed her father her entire life, and it has made her mother seem like more of a trooper/positive figure than, perhaps, she deserved to be. Now, I get it – she was shielding Felicity from the pains of having a criminal father. I don’t doubt Donna’s intentions, but when she, for a second time, requested he leave Felicity’s life, we began to see a different side of Donna.

I’m not advocating for Arrow to become The Smoak Family Variety Hour, but I sort of love what they’re doing with Felicity’s character.

2. Anarky living up to his name

Thus far, Anarky has been played a little light on his namesake. Sure, we’ve seen him do a few edgy things, but true anarchy is a destruction of all systems, leaving chaos. Well, tonight, that’s what he did. By blowing up Tevat Noah, he truly set the stage for the fall of everything, allowing nothing to survive. Now, that’s not the end goal of most anarchic folks, but he’s a supervillain, so I’ll allow it.

He also proved to be one cold mother, coming a hair’s breath away from straight up murdering a child – and not in a “oh, a nuke blew up 10,000 people” way, a literal bullet in the head of a little kid. This show has had a lot of dar(h)kness in it, but this episode is one of the darkest yet.

3. Malcolm Merlyn’s Luke Skywalker hand

Obviously either Malcolm is a Jedi or Luke a member of H.I.V.E., but both still sort of look like these.:

4. RIP Ruvé Adams

This show has a bit of a killing women problem, don’t you think? Off hand, they’ve killed Sara Lance twice, Laurel once, Moira Queen, Shado, and now Ruvé Adams-Darhk – and that doesn’t even count crippling Felicity or the myriad times Thea has been at death’s door. Granted, she’s the most evil and “deserving” of death on the show, but why does Arrow have a near-fetish with killing ladies?

Now, before I hear it from folks – yes, it furthers the plot. A plot written by writers. Writers who have a history of killing women on this show. This isn’t a reenactment of a real event, this is a scripted program, so every death is one that has been decided on and agreed upon by a team of writers and producers. There are other ways to elicit emotions from men rather than killing their women. I’m not saying this is necessarily intentional, but it is something the show needs to look at before next season.

5. What is hope?

When Ollie and Diggle were trying to free Thea, they ran into a family of people who actually believed in Darhk’s plan – he inspired hope in them that the world could be better. This shook Ollie to the core – why can an evil mastermind elicit hope through genocide, whereas a hero can’t get people to hope by literally saving their lives and the lives of their neighbors?

I like that Ollie is asking these questions, as it brings him closer in line with the Oliver Queen from comics, someone who is truly a man of the people, who wants what is good for the masses. The only people Ollie seems to really inspire are his closest associates – he gets Thea un-brainwashed in a hurry, and constantly has Diggle telling him how dope he is.

So where does the show go from here? It actually seems quite simple – they stop Darhk and stop nuclear winter. This is probably the least cliffhanger-y penultimate episode in the show’s run – just due to the fact that two other shows take place on this world, and one of them in the future, we know that the world will not be nuked. But I’m still looking forward to the action.

Let me know what you thought in the comments!


//TAGS | Arrow

Brian Salvatore

Brian Salvatore is an editor, podcaster, reviewer, writer at large, and general task master at Multiversity. When not writing, he can be found playing music, hanging out with his kids, or playing music with his kids. He also has a dog named Lola, a rowboat, and once met Jimmy Carter. Feel free to email him about good beer, the New York Mets, or the best way to make Chicken Parmagiana (add a thin slice of prosciutto under the cheese).

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