Arrow: Season 3, Episode 19

Arrow

Episode Title: “Broken Arrow”

Channel: CW

Director: Doug Aarniokoski

Writers: Ben Sokolowski and Brian Ford Sullivan

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

Runtime: 42 min

Rated: TV-14

Original Air Date: April 15, 2015

Beware of Spoilers.

In “Broken Arrow” Oliver has been neutralized by the scrutiny Capt. Lance has leveled in his direction. Aside from harassing Oliver in the Arrow Cave and at his and Thea's home, he's making life for Oliver very difficult by keeping a very close eye on him. Lance knows Roy isn't the Arrow, but he can't prove it, so he's waiting for Oliver to slip. As if being unable to fulfill his quest to deal with crime in his city Oliver found himself at the mercy of those around him. They did a great job of conveying Oliver's feeling of helplessness in the face of a metahuman threat robbing banks in Starling City.

Oliver's inability to suit up and go catch the bad guy led to Ray Palmer entering the fray in the ATOM suit. There were some humorous moments involving Ray and Felicity's interactions with the rest of the team. Ray's first encounter with the metahuman goes very badly for him and when he returned to the team's backup control center Oliver gave him a pretty uplifting pep talk. I was a little disappointed that instead of learning his way and getting into a better mindset for the job Ray's second encounter with the villain involved him putting on the suit and ceding complete control to Oliver. I think it would have been more effective to have him achieve victory on his own, but I guess they had to keep the Arrow involved in the action somehow.

The conflict this week was two fold. On one hand we've got Roy. After confessing to being the Arrow he's in serious trouble in prison. Colton Haynes really shined this week. In what has to be one of the best action sequences of the season we got to watch a handcuffed Roy take out several fellow inmates. His arc very smoothly shifted gears after that with Thea's visit to prison. It was an emotional scene that seemed to foreshadow something big coming for the character, although I didn't anticipate it happening so soon. Another attack on Roy left him dead, in anticlimactic fashion, and it was revealed quickly that Lyla's contacts in ARGUS allowed the team to fake Roy's death and get him out of prison. Oliver's guilt over the situation before he learned the truth was one of Amell's better acting moments in the series so far. With Roy dead in every legal sense he left Starling City to start anew. The send off could have used a little something more, but overall it played out pretty well.

Lest we forget about Ra's and his plan to force Oliver to accept the mantle of the Demon's Head, Ra's popped up at the end of the episode to confront Thea. She tried to go toe to toe with him, with predictable results. When it was all said and done the leader of the League of Assassins had stabbed Thea and left her for dead. Clearly it was an attempt to force Oliver to accept his offer and take his place, surely with the promise of a Lazarus Pit capable of saving Thea's life as a major bargaining chip. It appears that Ra's has backed Oliver into a corner with little choice but to accept his new role.

Other odds and ends in the episode: the Hong Kong flashbacks improved somewhat this week. It at least appears that there something for the last few episodes to work towards on that front, even though even in her present condition I don't trust Amanda Waller at all, especially after Diggle revealed that ARGUS has in its employ a man that specializes in stabbing people in such a way that they bleed a lot but survive. The writers did a good job this week of incorporating almost everyone in the cast. Besides the tension relieving presence of Ray and Felicity, Diggle and obviously Roy got moments to shine, with the sole overlooked character being Laurel, who was only in the episode briefly. The final scene involving Ray and Cisco at S.T.A.R. Labs metahuman prison was good for some laughs, and revealed very important information. Apparently there is something else out there causing metas to pop up, meaning we may be seeing more super-powered villains in Arrow.

Conclusion: Ra's plan has reached a new level of insidious and there doesn't seem to be any way out of the situation for Oliver. It was interesting seeing Oliver nearly powerless to act in such a dire situation, hopefully pointing to better integration of the supporting characters into his plans going forward. It's hard being too concerned for Thea's well being, if nor no other reason than the show already relieved itself of Roy and I can't imagine them shedding two characters in the same episdoe.

Rating: 8/10