Jessie Robertson reviews the fifteenth episode of Arrow season 5…
Winter Soldier homages, more political speak, and Curtis’ balls on display….what more could you want?
When you stand back and look at the CW’s shows, on the overall scale, it seems the universal opinion that The Flash is the best of them all; I mean, it’s doing amazing numbers and well deserved. The show is fun, just penetrate under your skin and heart fun, it’s warm, it has amazing special effects, and a cast that may not be seconded on television right now. But, for my money, in its comeback season, Arrow tells the most complete, most driven and compelling storylines week to week. Gone is the magic, and mystical and nuclear weapons (those showed up on Flash this week). It’s back to the streets; bad dudes beating up on bad dudes. But, this season, we get political machinations and an evil puppet master pulling the almighty strings; it’s a mystery and adventure. It’s doing its best run since season 2. And no one seems to take notice. People seemed to have given up on Arrow but this show has a lot more life left to live. I love The Flash as much as the next person, but this week, for example, after seeing both episodes, one where Grodd’s gorilla army invade Central City and Barry proposes to Iris vs. Oliver may get impeached from office, and I’m taking Arrow nine times out of ten (who doesn’t want to see gorilla warfare!).
This week the political maneuvering was at an all time high as Oliver faced his impeachment hearing for covering up the Green Arrow’s murder of Billy Malone. DA Chase was ready to fall on the sword, Thea was ready to blackmail anyone on the City Council and Susan Williams wanted to let Oliver burn at the stake. Thea even multiple times mentioned pinning the whole thing on Billy himself, since he’s, well you know, not here. But, no; we get more of the idealistic, honest Oliver Queen as a politician and even if it couldn’t be true and is too fantastical, I for one, still enjoy a character who is a politician who has a code and tries to stick by it, no matter what. I think the writers do a fantastic job of responding to real life during this show but in completely subtle ways by showing what kind of public servant this man would make. It’s unfortunate our old friend Vigilante has had enough of Mayor Queens’ corruption (did he forget about Mayor Darhk? as he tried to blow him up, quite literally in a scene that had serious callbacks to The Winter soldier. Vigilante is packing some serious heat, and his cool visor, it’s interesting he hasn’t been a bigger part of the show, just an underlying presence, which actually works pretty well.
‘Fighting Fire with Fire’ speaks perfectly for this week’s title as it highlights not only John’s speech to Felicity (because if nothing else, this show can’t help but adorably be on the nose), but speaks to the overall ongoing thread of Arrow where these heroes do bad things; not all at once or they’d be the Legion of Doom, but each one, in their own way, crosses the line and uses the dark to combat the dark. John’s speech, while impassioned, actually just feels pointless; as you know sometime in the future he’ll do the same thing again and maybe it’s designed to save Felicity’s soul but she knows, life is dark, she’s seen it herself, over and over again so his speech actually has the opposite effect where she joins Helix, the hacker group who I have a feeling are about to do some very unsavory things.
The major reveal tonight is that Prometheus is….DA Chase? What? I thought he was Vigilante? They duked it out on a rooftop in a cool scene and Vigilante seemingly met his demise by being knocked off a rooftop, as Chase unmasked himself in Prometheus’ outfit. So, where’s this plot going? Tonight’s ep ends with him showing his hand so to speak with Susan Williams of all people, who I agree with Thea about, is total hack trash. Why does Oliver spend so much energy trying to get her back? She was about to expose him – and they don’t have the connection or energy Oliver’s had with literally every other fling from the show.
9/10- Prometheus revealed and political intrigue abound!
Other Notes:
– Curtis finally, finally invents and uses his T-Spheres! They are like the single most defining characteristic of the old JSA Mr. Terrific and I know many fans have been waiting to see them in use. Verdict: They are amaze-balls! And Rene’s endless wealth of material only adds to their effect.
– Could we get a Thea Queen campaign? Because that woman has the stuff to get elected. Also – sad note – looks like we’re on another Thea-hiatus.
– I love how these shows always manage to name drop Cisco when they have a new piece of gear that saves their lives when we didn’t know it was there.
– So, Green Arrow is enemy #1 again? How’s this going to work?
Jessie Robertson
Originally published March 2, 2017. Updated April 16, 2018.
