After what seems to be the longest hiatus ever (I think I say this every year) Arrow returns tonight and with it they are bringing on some new faces, and some returning ones as well.

Who’s returning? Well, unfortunately it’s not Deadshot (seriously, dude can not be gone forever, that would be a crime) but it is Helena/Huntress! Let’s all gather in prayer and hope that they don’t try to revive the love interest angle because that was just slightly more annoying than the Thea swooning over Tommy bit. However, I do like the character of Huntress and think she has a lot of potential, so I’m glad to see her back.

As if Huntress wasn’t enough, there are quite a few new faces showing up in this second part of the season. Right off the bat with last night’s episode titled ‘Burned’, we meet Firefly, or as Marc Guggenheim (for some reason) calls him, Firebug.

Not gonna lie, that looks awesome (check the coming review to see more on that!) but even more exciting (for me at least) is it looks like we return to the island which means there’s a chance for a Yao Fei sighting! Yay! I’m still taking applications for the Yao Fei fan club if you are interested.

All the fun wasn’t limited to last night’s return episode however, because as we reported a few months back, Count Vertigo (Seth Gabel) is coming to Arrow. Well, a Starling City version of Count Vertigo at least. The CW people have released pictures and we’ve gotten our first glimpse of what this pill-making villain looks like.

In that episode, coming January 30th, it appears as if we get to meet Roy Harper/Speedy/Red Arrow as well. Marc Guggenheim has said that Roy will end up being a love interest for Thea. And in case you were wondering, they’ve also said that Thea is going to be less annoying going forward. Music to my ears.

There haven’t been any official pictures released of Roy Harper, but there is always someone around with a camera, so here is Colton Haynes as Roy Harper.

All that really tells us is he is going to wear a red hood. I hope they fully explain why Thea is called Speedy rather quickly because that has bothered me since the beginning of the show.

Even with all these new people, I think there are a lot of people, myself included, who just really want to know what is going on with Moira and Malcolm Merlyn. Not to mention Walter. Oh, and Felicity!

Thankfully we’ve got seven straight weeks of Arrow episodes to learn more! Tune in tonight to the CW at 8/7 central and come back here tomorrow and we’ll discuss. Until then!