Arrow: Season 3, Episode 5

Arrow

Episode Title: “The Secret Origin of Felicity Smoak”

Channel: CW

Director: Michael Schultz

Writers: Ben Sokolowski and Brian Ford Sullivan

Genre: Action, Adventure, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Sci-Fi

Runtime: 42 min

Rated: TV-14

Original Air Date: November 5, 2014

There will be complaints about this episode. It didn't do much for the overall narrative this season, and it was very cliched, who really didn't know who the bad guy was going to be? In spite of those things, I found “The Secret Origin of Felicity Smoak” to be rather entertaining. It's fun to be given occasional glimpses into the events that forged our supporting characters. It's easy to think of a character only as they are when introduced the the viewers, and not as people with backgrounds and baggage. This week provided a welcome change of pace.

The training montage that opened the episode, with Olive, Roy, Thea and Laurel practicing various forms of combat was a good beginning to the episode; especially when juxtaposed with Felicity's morning routine. The conflict this week is centered on a hacker that has compromised the networks that control Starling City, using a virus that Felicity had written five years earlier. The bad guy is really just an excuse to explore the Felicity Smoak character a little more. There is a lot of mother/daughter drama that allows Emily Bett Rickards to give one of her better performances to date. She's struggling with her mother's expectations, a father than ran off (I'm going to assume he will play a part in a storyline coming up) and guilt for having been the catalyst behind the city's current troubles.

One downside to focusing an entire episode on one supporting character is that the other ancillary characters are left with woefully little to do. Roy, Diggle and Laurel have little screen time, and what they do have doesn't seem essential to the episode. Thea and Oliver have a couple of moments, still lying to each other more often than telling the truth. With Merlyn watching from a nearby rooftop it looks as though Thea and Oliver have put all of their differences behind them, and are planning to live in a loft that Thea has bought with Malcolm's money. This latest develop elicits a bit of a grin from Merlyn, almost as if this was all part of his plan.

The very end of the episode pulled us right back to the ongoing hunt for Sara's killer, and we might have a huge clue as to the culprit. This early in the season I suspect it's a red herring, but there are only so many characters we've been introduced to that could have gotten the job done, especially when Sara's reaction to her killer is taken into consideration.

Conclusion: “The Secret Origin of Felicity Smoak” was a fun diversion that, except for the final couple of minutes, had little bearing on the story going forward. The ending alone seemed to take a season that had been progressing haphazardly and put it back on track. Here's to hoping the writers can use it as a jumping off point to bring the show back to the level of the second season.

Rating: 7.5/10