Some dude gets himself arrested and thrown in prison, where,
conveniently for his purposes, he ends up sharing a cell with Bronze Tiger
(Michael Jai White). Turns out a mysterious benefactor has paid him a great
deal of money, to be used to provide for his son after his death, to smuggle in
Bronze Tiger’s metal claws. The dude extracts the claws from inside his body
and dies.
Bronze Tiger promptly uses the claws to kill a whole bunch
of guards, then escapes. He meets up with his mysterious benefactor, who turns
out to be a black-market arms dealer. The arms dealer offers to pay him ten
million dollars to break into Malcolm Merlyn’s repossessed mansion and steal
the prototype of the earthquake machine used to destroy the Glades last season.
In The Stupidest Plotline Introduced on Arrow to
Date™, Moira’s ex-husband Walter Steele and campaign consultant Mark
Francis (Nicholas Lea, Krycek on The X-Files) try to convince her to run
against Sebastian Blood for mayor. Theorizing (wrongly, I hope) that voters
won’t hold Moira’s recent criminal trial for MURDERING 503 PEOPLE against her,
Mark says, “You were a lioness doing what she had to do to protect her cubs.”
Nope. See, no, she didn’t have to do any of it. Arrow, let’s shut
that narrative down right now. You don’t get to murder hundreds of innocent
people to protect your kids (which, in Moira’s case, would be just Thea, since
Oliver was presumed dead during the five years she spent conspiring with
Malcolm to commit mass murder, and since Thea is Malcolm’s daughter, it’s hard
to believe she was ever in much danger from him). That Moira conspired with a
group of her fellow billionaires specifically to murder as many of the city’s
poor people as possible makes her actions seem even more unsavory. There’s no
chance the citizens of Starling City would forgive Moira, much less vote her
into a position of power.
Moira hems and haws about Walter’s proposition before
finally deciding that, yes, she will run for mayor. One possible
problem, though: Her obstetrician knows the true identity of Thea’s father, and
Moira doesn’t want that knowledge coming out during the campaign. As she tells
Walter, “If we’re going to move forward, we’ve got to make certain he won’t be
a problem for us.”
Er… Is Moira suggesting they should have her obstetrician
whacked? Even if she’s just planning on bribing him into keeping her secret,
it’s weird that Walter—who, up until now, we’ve only seen as a good guy—seems
willing to go along with this.
This stupid-ass plotline makes me cranky. Let’s just move
on.
Quentin drops by Laurel’s apartment to take her to dinner.
When he notes that the place is a mess, newly-fired Laurel snipes, “Can’t
afford a housekeeper without a job.” Oh, Laurel. I like you, but you can be
tedious. Keep your apartment in whatever condition you want, but bear in mind
that if you don’t have a job, you have plenty of time to do your own damn
housecleaning.
(When Quentin arrives, by the way, Laurel is sitting on the
couch reading a book: Awakening Intuition, by Dr. Mona Lisa Schulz. From
Schulz’s author bio on Amazon: “Dr Mona Lisa Schulz is one of those rare people
who can cross the borders of science, medicine and mysticism.” Oh.)
The dinner invitation turns out to be a trick to lure Laurel
to an AA meeting (Laurel: “I’m hungry”). She stalks off in anger, and as
pain-in-the-assy as she’s being this episode, my sympathies are with her.
Dinner first, Quentin, and then, over crème brûlée and coffee, gently
broach the subject of maybe taking in a meeting. Anything less is just mean.
Oliver, keeping his true identity hidden, starts training
Roy. It’s not going well: Roy, who is approaching Laurel-esque levels of
pain-in-the-ass behavior, gripes bitterly about the sub-Karate Kid
exercises Oliver makes him do. Oliver stresses that he’s teaching him to
control his mirakuru-induced fits of rage. He brings up his experiences
with Slade, who never learned how to master his mood swings: “I had to put an
arrow through his eye.”
Mid-training, Felicity notifies Oliver that Bronze Tiger
murdered an architect and stole the blueprints to Malcolm’s mansion. Oliver
heads off to confront Bronze Tiger, bringing Roy along for backup. He orders
Roy to wear one of his omnipresent red hoodies as a disguise.
This seems like an exercise in futility, since:
1. Roy always wears a red hoodie, whether he’s
fighting crime or not.
2. Roy’s hoodie does not cover his pretty face.
3. Roy’s face is probably familiar to the people of Starling
City, since the Savior broadcast his attempt to kill Roy live over the internet
and on all television stations last season.
4. It’s a memorable face. Kid looks an Abercrombie model.
Oliver and Roy try to stop Bronze Tiger in the act of
stealing the earthquake generator. Roy goes into super-rage mode and pulverizes
a henchman; while Oliver tries to prevent Roy from killing the guy, Bronze
Tiger scampers off with the device.
Furious, Oliver fumes to Diggle and Felicity about how Roy’s
a lost cause. It starts looking like maybe Roy will take an arrow to the eye by
the end of the episode.
Island flashbacks: Oliver and Sara discover Slade is
planning to use the rocket launcher from last season to blow up Ivo’s
freighter. When Oliver tries to stop him, a mirakuru-crazed Slade
threatens to shoot him. Oliver calms him down by reminding him of Shado’s love
for him.
These island scenes. Man. They’ve taken a turn for the
terminally dull in recent weeks. There’s not much forward motion, and there’s
even less suspense, since the present-day scenes have already filled us in on
what will eventually happen here in the past: We know Slade will eventually
find out that Oliver protected Sara instead of Shado, we know Oliver will
eventually shoot Slade in the eye with an arrow, and we know Oliver will think
Sara, Slade and Ivo all died on the island.
Freaked out about the earthquake machine, Roy tries to
convince Thea to leave town. When she balks, he gets angry and manhandles her a
little. Even though he immediately backs off in horror and apologizes, even
though we know Roy is a good kid, even though we know he’s out of control
because of the mirakuru, it’s ugly.
When Roy tells Oliver he tried to warn Thea, Oliver orders
him, in no uncertain terms, to leave Thea out of it. Roy gets pissy, they get
into a scuffle, and Oliver ends up trying to strangle Roy with his hoodie. I
adore Roy, but I’ve sort of wanted to strangle him this episode, too. Anger-Management
Issues Roy is not my favorite side of Roy. Roy uses his super-strength to rough up
Oliver a little, then flounces off in a huff.
Upon learning that she might be disbarred due to her recent
behavior, Laurel goes on a bender. She sidles up to the bar at Verdant: “Can I
get something with olives? I don’t care what it is, as long as it has a lot
of olives.” She then sets about drunkenly insulting Thea, Oliver and Felicity,
and while I don’t love Laurel’s whole substance-abuse plotline—there are far
better uses for this character—Katie Cassidy has been pretty great in the role
lately. Fed up with Laurel, Oliver makes a mysterious phone call to someone:
“Laurel needs your help.”
Bronze Tiger meets with the arms dealer to hand over the
earthquake device. Oliver intervenes, but Bronze Tiger gets the drop on him,
and in the resulting chaos, the arms dealer activates the device. Roy shows up
and beats the crap out of Bronze Tiger. The activated device is kept in a
locked shipping container of reinforced steel; Oliver needs Roy to use his
super-strength to penetrate it, but Roy is having another rage episode and
won’t listen to him…
…until Oliver drops his hood, removes his mask, and reveals
his identity.
Aw, man. I have problems (so many problems!) with this
episode, but that’s a great moment.
Oliver talks some sense into a stunned Roy, convincing him
that he needs to calm down, focus, and stop the device in order to keep Thea
safe. Roy smashes open the container, and Oliver blows up the device. Once more
calm and rational, Roy shakes Oliver’s hand and thanks him for giving his life
purpose.
Denouement: Amanda Waller, head of the shadowy association
A.R.G.U.S., pops by the prison to recruit Bronze Tiger for a new squad she’s
putting together.
Oliver shows Roy the secret lair beneath Verdant for the
first time (Roy: “Is this the part where you kill me because I know your
secret?”) and introduces him to Diggle and Felicity. We see Roy and Digg
shaking hands, and then the scene ends before Felicity and Roy have to
awkwardly explain that, thanks to those Bose®-sponsored minisodes that aired
last year, they’ve actually already met.
And then we end on Laurel drunkenly staggering around her
apartment and passing out, only to be awakened by… Sara.
Didn’t love the episode, but the nice interaction between
Oliver and Roy at the end redeemed it somewhat. I’m a sucker for a dramatic
secret-identity reveal. If we’ve seen the last of Anger-Management Issues Roy,
it’ll all be worth it.
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