Even though ratings for last week were a little lower than they had been, there’s no need for alarm because this week ratings were back up, way up. As a matter of fact they matched the ratings from the premiere! Not only that but over on TVGuide.com, Arrow is #1 in their “popularity contest” of fall shows. I’ve said it before, it’s not going to be long before the CW announces a second season. If they continue to put forth episodes as good as last nights, then I think we are in for at least a couple of years of Arrow.  Sounds good to me!

Because there wasn’t a lot of time spent on the bad guy du’jour, it left a lot of time for them to work on advancing character storylines and just the story in general. 

Instead of immediately picking back up with Oliver getting arrested, the episode started off back on the island. Yao Fei strengthened his status as my “favorite person ever” when after he let Ollie shoot the bow for the first time he feels the need to tell him “You will die badly.” Seriously, where is the Yao Fei fanclub and how can I become it’s president? Because that shit right there is funny. Edward Fryers makes an appearance as the guy chasing after Yao Fei, who then tortures Ollie to get info. How on earth is this going to lead to Fryers and Oliver becoming friends and the introduction of Shado? How? I do not see it and that makes me sad. I mean, I figured they weren’t going to even touch the “I raped you while you were drugged, oh, and this is your kid” thing, but to not even have her in the show at all? Bummer.

Okay, bone to pick. I can agree to ignore Laurel’s ridiculous multifaceted law career. I suppose in an alternate universe, a legal aid lawyer would have all the time in the world to take on clients that are arrested (with zero evidence I might add) and then brought to court in a matter of hours in between the her time spent on cases involving millionaires and death row residents. However, are we seriously supposed to believe that she did not even go to law school until after her sister died and her mom left? Seriously? That would mean that at best she’s been practicing law for about two years. At best! Well, let’s see; yacht goes down, let’s say that mom stuck around for only a couple of months afterwards before getting fed up with Detective Lance and hitting the road. It was then that Laurel decides to go to law school which I do believe is three years. So we’re looking at three and a half years of the time Oliver is gone. So Laurel has been a lawyer for less than two years and she is already taking on this huge workload. I’m calling bullshit. The least they could have done was said she had already been in law school when Oliver and Sara took off on their fateful three hour tour.

Moving on before I rupture a blood vessel over a TV show.

IT’S DEATHSTROKE!!!!!!!!!

Yes, that was necessary. Deathstroke appeared for the first time ever in live action and that dude is frightening. Were I tied to a pole and that guy came at me with a knife? I’d be telling whoever was asking, every single thing I’d ever known, ever. Without the slightest hesitation.
What you should take away from this is, don’t rely on me to keep a secret under duress. Not going to happen.

Thankfully Oliver (we are led to believe) is not so weak willed and dealt with the torture. For a show that is more entertainment than it is “high quality” there was a great set up in this episode between the interrogation on the island, complete with Deathstroke and his knife, and the interrogation back in Starling City with Detective Lance and his polygraph machine. Just goes to show that even though it isn’t Breaking Bad or Boardwalk Empire or shows of that caliber, they can still have nice moments like that. I hate when people start talking shit about a show like Arrow because it isn’t something that is Emmy worthy. Sometimes entertainment for entertainment’s sake is a welcome escape. Sakes alive this episode is getting my dander up.

Going out on a limb but I have this feeling that Deathstroke isn’t going to lose his eye to a gunshot from his wife, but rather there on the island. Why else would they have shown the mask with the arrow through it? So perhaps Yao Fei attempting to shoot him was a bit of foreshadowing. I’m a little bummed because it would have been cool to get into Deathstroke’s back-story with his wife and sons and everything. Oh well.

I’m choosing to ignore the fact that Oliver once again referred to Thea as Speedy. Why would they do that to me? Why not just have Diggle be Speedy? Come on. At least Thea is getting more tolerable in recent episodes, girlfriend was obnoxious as hell when they first started. However I did enjoy the conversation between Oliver and Thea when she thought that because he brought her an arrowhead that meant he was Arrow. He ruses that it’s a good thing he didn’t get the panda shotglass because then he’d be “Pandaman”. I immediately thought of how awesome it would be if someone made a show based on World of Warcraft. I’d watch that all day long. If anyone was wanting to send me a gift you can go ahead and get me that Chen Stormstout action figure. I’m sure if you put “Amanda Denton, Georgia” the post office will get it to me without a problem. Thank you.

Another thing I’d love to open my mailbox and find one day is John Barrowman. I’m not sure how much it would cost to ship him but I’m pretty sure I’d be willing to pay it. That man is incredible. I’m really enjoying how they aren’t coming right out and telling us who he is. We get that he is obviously a bad guy, what with trying to have Oliver killed and then successfully offing the poor security guy Josiah, but outside of that, not much is known. Now we also know that Moria is working for him and not with him like the first couple of episodes led us to believe. Of course that whole killing people thing makes me want to know what is on that boat even more. Intrigue!

Speaking of the boat, poor Walter. When the show first started I really thought he was going to be a bad guy. Don’t know why, just a feeling I had. Seeing his face when he was walking out was just heartbreaking. Granted I’ve never been in the “my wife is lying to me about why she took millions of dollars to get a warehouse to store the wreckage of the yacht her late husband died on and she won’t tell me why” type of situation so I can’t imagine how difficult it is but I really want him and Moira to just kiss and make up. Now that Moira has gone into Momma Bear overdrive, paper cuts be damned, I’m really enjoying her character. I especially liked her and Walter together. It’ll be interesting to see how she reacts to his leaving. Ooooh, what is she going to tell the kids? Can’t very well come out and tell the truth now can she?

When it comes to telling the truth, I guess I’ll have to admit I thought Oliver was an idiot for coming clean to Diggle so soon. He could surely keep up the ruse for at least another month or so, if for no other reason than to watch Diggle get aggravated each time Ollie ditched him. Thanks to this episode, I can now say that I should not have doubted ol’ Oliver because the man has a plan.

A good plan at that! Having Diggle as a co-Arrow really could help keep the spotlight off of both of them. That spotlight being the previously mentioned Detective Lance. Of course, one has to wonder how long Diggle is going to keep it from his sister-in-law. She is going to blow a gasket, and I would really enjoy watching that.

I didn’t enjoy watching Laurel and Oliver kiss mainly because Laurel irks me but that scene was awesome for one reason and one reason only; Laurel mentions fishnets. If you had listened closely on Wednesday night you could have heard everyone who knows about Black Canary squeal in delight. I was one of those squealing while my husband sat next to me thinking I’d sat on a pinecone or something. Highlight of the episode right there.

Another cool part of that scene was the number of Ollie’s “prison uniform” costume. It’s actually the hex code for green. I love it when they put little things like that into shows. I looked up Ollie’s mugshot number as well but all I can decipher is that perhaps the writers are big fans of Gloria Allred as she was born on July 3rd, 1941. I think that would qualify as one of the most random references ever so it probably wasn’t that.

My last thought on this episode is that isn’t all we’ll see of Kate Spencer. I mean surely they have more in store for her so maybe this was just a “I wonder if anyone will notice if we introduce Kate Spencer on the down low and then we’ll come back to her at a later date as Manhunter and everyone will be like “hey isn’t that the ADA that was prosecuting Oliver back in the fifth episode” and we’ll just sit back and laugh because, yea, it is.” type of situation. That’s what I tell myself so I can sleep well at night at least.

Overall, fantastic episode. Loved it. I personally don’t want to see Laurel and Oliver together but I realize it’s going to happen so I just have to get over it. The scene with Barrowman was awesome and prompted so many more questions than it provided answers and of course DEATHSTROKE!!! was amazing. From start to finish, a strong episode.

The only shirtlessness involved Laurel but we have this to look forward to next week, November 17th, in an episode titled, “Legacies”.

Not only that but we’ll get to see Arrow’s take on the Royal Flush Gang, exciting!

Until next time!