I imagine if I were to create a “bucket list” it would include items such as finding a way to convince Julie Andrews to adopt me (sorry Mom) and Gladys Knight to follow me around narrating my life in song. Also on that list would be to attend PaleyFest.
Named for William Paley, the man who took a small Columbia Broadcasting System and turned it into the CBS we know today (one would hope minus the dearth of crappy sitcoms), setting the standard for all modern television networks along the way, PaleyFest bills itself as “The Ultimate TV Fan Festival”. With two weeks filled with panels and autographs and things of that nature, it just might be. Luckily for those of us TV fans who do not live in Los Angeles, the folks over at the Paley Center for Media have teamed up with Hulu to bring the panels to the masses. The day after a panel, it’s been put up on Hulu in both clips and an entire session.
There have been some good shows like The Newsroom, Revolution and Once Upon a Time and even some shows we here at Grizzly Bomb watch and review such as The Walking Dead and Arrow. Panels like this are always fun because you get a chance to see the actors behind the characters and often get some behind the scenes/story info much like this clip for the Arrow panel.
Lest we ever doubt that writers and producers are listening to the fans’ reactions, we played a part in bringing Felicity Smoak up as a series regular! If you were looking for an example of social media having a direct impact on something, that would be it. Had Arrow aired even fifteen years ago, there’s a good chance Felicity would still have been this small character until enough people sent in letters and some email to the studio asking for more of “that blond IT girl”.
Another clip that I found to be interesting is to see Stephen Amell talk about how he approaches “island Oliver”.
These two clips are non-spoilers but there are a few in the rest of the panel session, which you can watch right here, so be warned. If you did not recognize the moderator for the panel, that would be none other than Geoff Johns himself, rocking the Aquaman hat.
The other show of note was The Walking Dead.
Now, I do not watch The Walking Dead (there is no need to tell me how awesome it is and how I’m missing out – I’m a big ol’ wuss and damn near pissed myself watching one episode and I’d rather not repeat that experience) so there is a chance these clips might have spoilers and if they do, I apologize.
However, I did watch the majority of this panel and if I’m honest, it’s because I’ve got a wee bit of a crush on Chris Hardwick. The man is just adorable, I can’t help it.
**Possible Spoilers**
I thought this was really interesting because in a show about the ‘zombie apocalypse’ and when pretty much everyone is on the chopping block at any moment (of course one would assume major characters would be safe, but stranger things have happened), I imagine the thought that they could be killed off is in the forefront of their minds.
Of course once this topic came up, there was no way I couldn’t include it. Living south of Atlanta, I can commiserate fully. Summer down here is awful. You step outside and you immediately start sweating and I can only imagine what kind of hell the makeup people deal with. It’s a good thing the characters are usually sweaty and gross because man alive, if they had to look fresh and clean? Those makeup people would be winning an Emmy each year and rightfully so.
Again, here is the whole panel, there may be spoilers so be warned.
So now that we all know what PaleyFest can include, who wants to go with me? I’m taking names for next year’s carpool, we can split the gas and all share a bag of beef jerky.
February 27th, 2013: the day the Arrow fandom collectively had a fangirl stroke and briefly died only to come back to life sputtering nonsense such as “River Song! Mom! Oh no! The bird! Hot Australian shirtless man!” and “he did that! His hood! Why? What does it all mean?!?!” and the ever popular “John Barrowman’s American accent is so good!” Minus that last one, I pretty much agree with everything there. This episode was insane. After last week’s somewhat ho-hum performance, I had a feeling this week would be killer, but I was unaware how good it would really be.
First off, I need to apologize to Geoff Johns because when it came to episode 7, I said that his writing style did not translate well to television. I wasn’t entirely wrong because Muse of Fire still wasn’t all that great, but Dead to Rights was exponentially better so perhaps he can write well for TV given that the story lends itself to his style. This week certainly did as it was fast paced but it didn’t feel like we were being torn in several different places just for the hell of it, rather it worked well with the frantic actions of the characters and situations.
We started off just like most other weeks with a bad guy coming to town. This time it was Guillermo Barrera, a high price hitman. At first the name didn’t set anything off in my memory but the moment those throwing knives hit the air, I remembered who he was and probably only because I’d just done some catching up on Nightwing thanks to Scott’s Bats and Birds piece over at GEEK. Guillermo Barrera is the name of Bludhaven resident and villain, Brutale. Of course we won’t be seeing any of Brutale as he was dead after the first scene, but it was a nice little shout-out to other DC Universe entities.
The whole “McKenna could have met you at the heliport” thing reminded me of something the show does that I find to be really irritating. They don’t go back and address small things. Perfect example: the bug on McKenna’s phone. Is it still there? Did Oliver take it off? Are we going to find out who the mole is? Granted there have been a few things they’ve gone back to and I appreciate that, but I wish they would address these things as it’s driving me nuts.
Credit to: arrowarcher
The island is pretty good usually at answer some of those little questions and this week it was “was Oliver always in such great shape?” Well the answer is no. Actually that’s not entirely true as apparently he was “more of a runner.” I do love little lines like that, makes the melodramatic ones much easier to take. Outside of that, the island didn’t do a whole hell of a lot this week. Oliver did show off his knowledge of The Odyssey again and fixed a radio while Slade did pullups and discussed Gilligan’s Island escape methods.
This makes two weeks in a row that there has been very little island happenings, and after the big Shado reveal I’m anxious to get back there and see how all that plays out. Of course he was on the island for five years and I suppose they can’t tell that entire story in sixteen episodes.
I’ll give the island a little leeway on not moving things along, the five years thing, but seriously there needs to be a Black Canary post-haste. I feel like I’ve been saying this for months now, just go ahead and slap some fishnets on Laurel and make it happen! All this pussyfooting around with the sushi and the martial arts, and then the picture of her sister and the black canary. Enough already. (While we are on the subject of things that need to stop, Laurel needs to go ahead and never wear that jumpsuit thing again. Might as well just go ahead and burn it.)
This needs to stop!
The only other part of the episode that wasn’t part of the main story was the beautiful friendship that is blossoming between Diggle and Felicity. I don’t think they could get much cuter. Working out together, cracking the arrow shot cell phones of high dollar hitmen together, dreaming of chinese food together… just adorable.
And by adorable I mean, Good god look at his arms!
After the last scene of episode 16, it was obvious that this week would more than likely be about the plan to kill Malcolm Merlyn. I guess China White didn’t feel like she could handle the job on her own, so after Barrera was disposed of, she went and found the person I’ve been saying had to be still alive – Deadshot! Not only that but she ends up giving him his signature red-eye. It’s about time he came back and having China White in the last few episodes has given it more of an ongoing feeling than just the one bad guy per episode thing they had going for a while there.
I’ll go ahead and say it – I want to smack Tommy Merlyn and tell him to shut up. Yea yea yea Malcolm was a shit dad and he probably is still a shit dad but man up son! Either tell your dad to hit the road or take whatever likely half-assed apology he’s offering this week and move on. Man this constant whining is getting old. Of course it did lead to a nice moment between Oliver and him discussing their daddy issues.
Credit to: oliversbow
However I think we can all agree that Oliver blinding some dude with sriracha is the highlight of that scene. Very heads up play on Ollie’s part.
The two big OMG moments were in the second part of the episode. Oliver runs into McKenna as the “Hood Guy” again but is able to avoid her recognizing him with a well placed fire extinguisher. So he makes his way upstairs to where Tommy and Malcolm are trying to escape both the Triad hitmen and Deadshot’s bullets. In a move I certainly did not expect, and that goes very much against his trying to keep the vigilante identity A SECRET, he shows Tommy who he is.
Credit to: arrowtv
WHAT IS HE DOING?!?!?! That’s pretty much my entire reaction. Seriously Oliver, what on earth are you thinking? Not only that but hello, Malcolm was getting ready to show Tommy that he’s the Dark Archer until the grenade hits and then he’s shot and Oliver somehow knows that Tommy and Malcolm have the same blood type so let’s do an impromptu blood transfusion and I felt like throwing things at my TV for a good ten minutes. What is going on here? There’s just too much to process.
So now Tommy and Malcolm are all buddy buddy again and Tommy is pissed at Oliver for not telling him about being the vigilante. When Tommy was first introduced I thought he was basically useless. Now I’m looking forward to seeing how they turn this. Is John Barrowman on board with a long run on Arrow or was this the set up for Tommy to ultimately take on his father’s Dark Archer mantle and battle Oliver, the best friend who betrayed him? Intrigue. I like it.
Credit to: letwinterlightcome
The second WTF moment was the last scene. Laurel had gotten a phone call from her mother earlier, but of course ignored it. Of course like all good mothers, ignore the phone call and she’ll be at your doorstep. Even though I knew that Alex Kingston was going to play her mom and I knew that it was going to be this episode, I still had that immediate reaction of “OMG Laurel your mom, Dinah Lance, is standing right there! She’s the Black Canary and now you can too!!!”
Of course we’ll have to wait and see what all this talk of Sarah still being alive results in. I can’t imagine she really is alive. I mean come on, I saw her disappear off that yacht, we all did. It would be difficult to limp away from that.
Throughout all of this, the biggest thing I took from this episode is Moira has quite the set of steel balls. Even Frank Chan agrees. Even though there were a few moments of slight nervousness, her hand shaking and her obvious ill feelings towards Tommy being at the awards ceremony, she is cold as ice. Standing there as Malcolm declares there to be a traitor in their ranks? I’d probably have pissed myself and started crying.
Even though it lacked substantial island time, this was probably my favorite episode so far. It had pretty much everything else you could hope for. Going to have to give it a solid 4 out of 5. Add in Yao Fei and Walter (I miss you Walter) and it would have easily been a 4.5
Unfortunately we’ll have to wait awhile before we get any answers as Arrow is on break until March 20th, but I think we’ve got plenty to stew over in the meantime.
Probably due in part to last week’s episode being so great, this week seemed a little blah. It certainly had great moments but the overall feel was just a bit of a let down. Not to mention sort of irritating that the writers finally gave in to the CW “norm” and we had an episode all about romantic relationships. It’s not really necessary given that the main point of the show is a guy hunting down people with a bow and arrow who’ve done wrong in the city. If he happens to find love in his off-time, well that’s great, but we don’t need an entire story arc dedicated to it (I’m looking at you Huntress).
However, I really liked this week’s bad guy – the Dodger. I chose to just go ahead and forget everything I know about the actual comic book character Dodger because it would only irritate me as it’s hard to have Dodger be involved in trying to kill Connor (Oliver Queen’s son) when there is no Connor. Also no
Credit to: delena-falling-in-love
Black Canary (I am hoping that with Laurel’s mom appearing soon they’ll address this finally) so yea, best to just let Starling City’s Dodger be his own man. Of course he did have his “electronic mace” which was cool. I could think of a few times in my life I’d like to have had one of those on hand.
Like I said, the real story of the episode was the love lives of both Diggle and Oliver. I do believe I called the Diggle/sister-in-law thing from the very beginning so it was nice to see I was right. How awkward was it though when he started comparing their first date to her first date with his brother? Yikes. I don’t do well with awkward, even if it’s on the TV. I felt like I was standing there trying to scream “SHUT UP DIGGLE!!” but my mouth wouldn’t open. Clearly, I have issues.
Who else has issues? Oliver. Of course he has a reason behind them, what with the whole “everyone thinks I was alone on that island but really I was getting my ass kicked on the regular never mind the constant mind-games I had to wade through” thing. I don’t know what to think about the McKenna situation. After last week I had a feeling she might be the mole in the police station but now she’s being bugged by Oliver so maybe that rules her out? I don’t know. What I do know is it’s not going to take her long (at least I hope so, she is a detective) to find that bug and the shit is going to hit the fan. That will be fun.
Oh oh oh! Another obnoxious point about this episode! The “nerdy girl takes off her glasses and puts on a dress and is all of a sudden hot” trope. I can just imagine how it played out in the writers room.
[quote] Writer A: So we’ve got this gala thing that Felicity is going to go to.
Writer B: We should totally have her take her glasses off and let her hair down.
Every other writer who hates this move: groans loudly
Writer B: But really, it will work. Then the guys will realize how pretty she is! Yay! [/quote]
Ugh, unnecessary. What purpose does it serve? Absolutely none. I love their little trio and how she’s been able to work her way into their lives already and as much as I think I would like to see her and Oliver
Credit to: notenoughducks
together, I’d rather it just be the three of them. ArrowTeam4Lyfe! Now that I got that ridiculousness out of my system, I think the three of them will end up doing quite well together. Already we’ve seen the good influence that Diggle has made on Oliver. Throw in Felicity and her desire to go after bad guys that aren’t on the list as well and how he could go about “talking” to people differently and it seems like Oliver is becoming more well-rounded. One could say he’s going through the vigilante version of a liberal arts education.
The island parts this week were a major letdown. Basically they were only there to drive home the point that Oliver has changed and the island played a major part in it. One has to wonder if the writers think we haven’t seen the previous fourteen episodes.
Back to ArrowTeam- this week we got to finally meet someone who should be making his way into the ArrowCave any moment, Roy Harper!
Credit to: saniday
Let’s just get one thing out of the way – Colton Haynes is 24 years old. I know this will cause many people to breath a sigh of relief that they aren’t dirty pervs. Not saying I was one of them, but there was a Google search done almost immediately.
I can not wait to see how Roy Harper becomes an Arrow sidekick. I imagine it will sadly have something to do with Thea as it looked like they were setting it up as a love connection between the two of them. Much like Diggle and Oliver, I don’t really care who Thea dates. I actually don’t really care if Thea just disappeared one day and never returned but if that can’t happen at least she can get her bratty paws off Speedy. Doesn’t seem too much to ask, does it?
As great as Roy Harper’s appearance was, perhaps the biggest plot movement of the night came from Moira Queen. I think she only had three scenes but there was a lot involved in those three scenes. Some guy named Frank Chan shows up. He is part of this group that is doing, gods only know what, but Moira wants him to help her stop “the undertaking”. Then the final scene of the show we see exactly how she plans to do that – by hiring China White to KILL MALCOLM MERLYN!!!!
I’ve watched enough television in my 34 years to know that this is not a good idea. Not a good idea at all, Moira. This will end badly for you. Very very badly. On the whole, not a great episode. Roy Harper being introduced and that last scene was great (awful idea, but great scene) but the rest of it was blah. Going to have to go with just a 3 out of 5 this week.
However there is much to look forward to as this picture clearly shows… Until next time Arrow fans!
Oh “Betrayal” how you kill me! So much happened in this episode, but first things first, let’s all take a moment and revel in how awesome this picture is.
AAAGGGHHHH!!! Excuse me, there was no keeping the fangirl battle cry out of this one. Seriously though, how exciting is it that Captain Jack and River Song will be on-screen together? Well maybe not together, but they are in the same show, finally! There are plenty of Doctor Who/Torchwood fans who have longed for those two to meet up. This isn’t quite the same, but cool nonetheless. If you don’t follow John Barrowman’s twitter, you should because he is often posting fun pictures from the set. Of course while you are over there, might as well follow Grizzly Bomb as well.
Back to this week’s episode. Oh man, so much going on. It seems like David Anders is everywhere these days. Granted I did just happen to inadvertently watch his episodes of Charmed and Warehouse 13 this week which plays a part in it but still, he’s on Once Upon a Time as Dr. Whale and then Arrow this week as the bad guy du jour, Cyrus Vanch. Of course he’s also been on Heroes and Alias which I watched quite religiously so maybe he’s just everywhere in my TV universe.
It was nice of Vanch to remind us that there was a huge mafia presence in Starling City known as the Triad and that Huntress’ father, Frank Bertinelli was involved with, and his leaving prison provided a nice storyline involving Laurel, her father, and Arrow, but I think we can all agree his greatest contribution to the this week was the line, “Lose the bow, Merida.” If you aren’t one to keep up with Disney characters, Merida is the main character in this summer’s Brave. A very cute movie that leads to a very funny line.
I’ll admit I really enjoyed Vance as the bad guy because he’s not a DC villain that will have his one episode and then be done. Also, he did a really good job advancing the story between Laurel, Detective Lance, and Arrow. One does have to wonder, did Lance really think Laurel would be okay with the bugging of the phone? Seriously? I mean come on, yea he’s a cop and he’s made Arrow his white whale, but there is no reason on Earth for Laurel to be okay with all his hijinks.
Speaking of Laurel, how long are they going to continue to allude to her being the Black Canary? They’ve mentioned her love of sushi numerous times, she’s mentioned the fishnets, her firm is called CNRI, and the martial arts badassery! I imagine to people who don’t know about Black Canary it’s just a little quirk (Oh she really likes sushi), but for those of us who do it’s like dangling a donut right in front of our face. Just give us the Black Canary already! I can only hope that with her mom (Alex Kingston) arriving soon they’ll wrap that into her storyline.
‘Spartacus’ Alum Manu Bennett as Slade Wilson.
The island also provided quite a bit of advancement. So Yao Fei slips Ollie the map with someplace circled on it. He goes to the circled spot and finds a (extremely attractive Manu Bennett) man who promptly tries to kill him. In a move that I was not expecting, it appears as if Slade Wilson is on the island with a partner to rescue Yao Fei? Not only that but his partner is the guy we previously thought was Deathstroke, who beat the crap out of Oliver back in episode five. Yao sends Oliver to help Slade take the airstrip that’s going to get them off the island, but why is Slade not mentioned at all in the rescue? Not to mention that shot from the pilot with the “Deathstroke” mask that had an arrow through the eyehole. Okay, the island provided advancement, but really it just offered up more questions and no answers.
Credit: The Nugu
I think we can all agree though, the Diggle/Oliver/book storyline was the best. Oliver decides to tell Diggle about the book his mom had, given to him by Felicity. Of course Diggle isn’t on board with just letting Moira be cagey about the book’s origins so he decides to go a super secret spy mission, as Moira’s driver. Of course “Lose the bow, Merida” wins as funniest line of the night, but Diggle walking in to the birthday party surely wins funniest moment. Just the look on his face! It was a winner. Of course things were a little bit more on the suspicious side when she met up with Malcolm again which led to the “That did not just happen” moment.
I’ll admit I sort of rolled my eyes. Seriously best cliffhanger ever? That’s stretching it a bit. While I still don’t think it was the best ever, it was pretty damn surprising. After Oliver had talked to his mom the first time about the book and SHE THREW IT IN THE FIRE!!!!, when he had no reaction I didn’t really expect him to do anything. Yea he told Diggle he needed to talk to her, but I figured it’d be another dinner at Big Belly’s Burger and nothing would come of it.
So imagine my (and apparently everyone else watching) surprise when this happened…
Credit: starshipsandjets
Seriously?!?! I was stunned. Of course, as a cliffhanger, that’s where the episode ended. I’m not one who usually seeks out the next week’s preview, but I couldn’t help myself this time and now I can’t wait.
This episode was great and I think it is just going to build up from here. Going to have to go with a four out of five. About half of a star was for the ending alone!
So late this week! I apologize, I was too busy trying to get the Yao Fei fan club back together. That’s right, “Vertigo” has restored my faith in humanity! Yao Fei has redeemed himself in my eyes, as well as Ollie’s but more on that later. Let’s discuss the rest of the episode first.
As we learned last week, there is a new drug in Starling City and it’s a fantastic little trip called “vertigo”. Thea was enjoying it a bit too much as she found herself driving her car into a telephone pole. Of course the driver of the other car involved ended up dying so now Thea has been brought up on vehicular homicide charges. I can not be the only person that was hoping she’d go away to prison never to be heard from again. Especially with this episode! Oh my god they took teenage petulance way too far. You are looking to go to prison probably for a very long time if not the rest of your life and the only thing you’re worried about is if your mom was schtupping her son’s best friend’s father while her husband was missing? Seriously Thea? Just go off to jail and make everyone happier.
Of course Oliver just had to get involved in the case. He wouldn’t be Oliver if he didn’t. So he goes off to the police and meets and old flame, McKenna Hall (played by Janina Gavankar aka Shiva from ‘The League’) who is now a detective. Her name is very frustrating because how cool would it be to have Shiera (Sanders) Hall aka, Hawkgirl, on the show? That would be rather kickass. Of course it would be difficult given their “no meta superpowers” stance but still, it would be cool.
No shocker here, the police aren’t really too keen on having Oliver help them out. Also not a surprise, Oliver goes after him anyway. This episode fully illustrates how frustrating the writer’s decision to have the villains be one and done. Seth Gabel (Fringe) did an awesome job as ‘The Count’. I would love to see more of him. Obviously the way they left the episode certainly left the door open for his return but I’ve been saying that about Deadshot in the pilot so what do I know? Back to Gabel though – I loved him as Vertigo. He was sufficiently unhinged and just a bit manic to make it work. His first scene where he gave the guy the option to shoot himself or suffer the effects of ‘vertigo’? Deliciously evil.
Source: sshay
Another part of this episode I really liked? The call back to the third episode, “Lone Gunman”, when Diggle get’s shot with Deadshot’s poisoned bullet and Ollie takes him back to the Arrowcave to make him Yao Fei’s tea. This time Ollie gets a pretty substantial dose of ‘vertigo’ and Diggle is the one helping him back to the lair and fixing up a nice cuppa. Although Count Vertigo is gone, it looks like we’ll see his effect on at least the next episode as Oliver appears to be feeling a little off as this episode ends.
Of course, it’s no secret that I’m a huge fan of Felicity and she has been great in these last few episodes. The back and forth between she, Oliver, and Diggle have been something to look forward to each week. Of course really it’s the exchange between Felicity and Oliver and then the “you’ve got to be shitting me” reaction of Diggle. He has perfected that “wtf is happening right now?” look. Best look though? When Oliver “killed” the guy during the meet-up with Bratva. Hands down. Poor Diggle looked like Ollie had just punched him in the junk.
I damn near squealed with delight when we found out where Oliver learned the “kill a man but not really” trick. I’d like to say that I truly believed in my heart of hearts that Yao Fei was a good guy all along, but I had my doubts. I apologize Yao Fei, I should have known that you could never betray Oliver like that. I’m still not sure what your end game is but I’m happy to see that you at least have Oliver’s best interests at heart. I imagine it won’t be the last time we see you and your fellow ass-kicker, Deathstroke. I’ll be waiting with bated breath.
Thing I’m most looking forward to? Now that Felicity has given Oliver the book of names, surely he’s going to bring her onto Team Arrow. Right? (SPOILER) It only makes sense for how much longer can he keep up the ridiculous cover stories when he shows up asking her to Google things for him? We’ll just have to keep watching!
This episode wasn’t as good as last week, but was still pretty strong and the return of Yao Fei… going to go with a 3.5 out of five.
After last week’s lackluster episode, Arrow came back this week quite strongly and had a little bit for everyone in ‘Trust But Verify’.
This is for everyone.
So Oliver is back in the swing of things, working out as usual, and keeping his eye on the news. This time a rash of armored car heists catches his eye and shock of all shocks, there is a connection to his list! Diggle and Ollie have always had their little love spats but I really thought this one was going to put them over the edge. What I liked about this episode was the fact this back and forth between Diggle and Oliver[pullquote_right]I won’t let you William Tell an innocent man. -Diggle[/pullquote_right]needed to happen. Seriously Diggle is a saint for putting up with Ollie’s somewhat premenstrual mood swings not to mention the fact that he has gone into this whole superhero-but-not thing with little to no information and does Oliver appreciate that? Up until this week, it didn’t really seem like it. Thankfully they had the Blackhawk Protection Group and Ted Gaynor to bring them together. Oh and if this episode did nothing else, it provided more great one-liners to the show’s repertoire and finally someone (Diggle) named the lair, “Arrow Cave”! It’s about time, only took 11 episodes which means we’ll finally get a real name for the vigilante in about episode 23.
There was a lot going on with the rest of the friends and family, mostly temperamental brooding. Tommy I can understand as Malcolm does seem to be quite an ass using a “family” dinner with the girlfriend to hide his real intention of getting Tommy to sign off on the closing of his dead mom’s clinic. Of course we do find out that it appears as if Malcolm really does miss his wife and isn’t the heartless bastard we once thought but still, that was low. So yes, I think we can go ahead and forgive Tommy for his brooding.
This is Stephen Amell with a puppy- much more pleasant than annoying Thea Queen.
However, Thea? Someone either needs to kick some sense into her ass or just find her a therapist because sweet heavens above, she is messed up and not in that “oh this psychosis is cute” kind of way. She is reaching Dana from Homeland levels of ridiculousness when it comes to her mom. Granted a person’s first thought wouldn’t go to nefarious mystery kidnappings and boat sinking activities but a person can’t even talk to another without it being an affair? Come on Thea. Not only that but she is suffering badly from “I’m 18 and therefore know everything” disease. Sadly it will be at least another three or four years until she realizes she was completely wrong about everything. I don’t know if I can deal with her ridiculousness for that long. So much for the producers promising Thea would be less annoying this half of the season. Not even a car accident can make her less obnoxious. LIES!
As for lies, whoa Malcolm and Moira. I don’t even know what is going on with you two but it seems shady. And dangerous. And scary. What is Malcolm doing to Walter? Does he have him held hostage in some jail cell somewhere without access to a decent razor? Poor man was looking quite ragged. Of course no matter how smarmy Malcolm is, I can’t help but be intrigued by him. Why was his wife killed? Why is he such an ass to his son? Why did he become the Dark Archer? What are his life’s goal and aspirations? Why is he so good-looking? These are important questions that will hopefully be addressed soon.
Easily the most underrated person on the show? Felicity Smoak!
She’s still hunkered down in her dark office (seriously it’s not good for the eyes to stare at a computer that long in the dark) thinking the Queen family is done with her services. But no! Here comes Oliver with a security fob that was obviously part of a search for a box of wine… or armored car heists, close enough. Of course it takes Felicity no time because she’s an intellectual badass. Unfortunately she’s an intellectual badass with no bottle of wine. Poor Felicity.
You cut me deep Shrek.
Which brings me to the most distressing part of this week’s episode. I am hurt and betrayed. As founding member and president of the Yao Fei fan club, I was blind to the inevitable and just went about my days believing that everything with Yao Fei and the island and Edward Fryers and Deathstroke was all hunky-dory when, as we all know now, it was not. As it turns out, Fei is working with Fryers and set up Oliver in a somewhat elaborate and seemingly unnecessary trap. If Fei was working with Fryers from the beginning, why didn’t he just bring Oliver to him when he found him? What was the purpose of “rescuing” him and teaching him cute little lessons all this time? Do we have a Most Dangerous Game situation on our hands? All I know is the fan club is over. Okay, maybe not completely over but at the very last disbanded until we have further information. For now, I’m with Oliver, I’m going to find it difficult to trust anyone. Damn you Yao Fei!
Overall, this was a great episode. Like I said earlier, had something for everyone. Going to have to go ahead and give this one a four out of five.
This episode nicely set up next week where we get to meet Starling City’s version of Count Vertigo- until then Arrow fans!
itself to his style. This week certainly did as it was fast paced but it didn’t feel like we were being torn in several different places just for the hell of it, rather it worked well with the frantic actions of the characters and situations.
However there is much to look forward to as this picture clearly shows… Until next time Arrow fans!
Grizzly Bomb 