Arrow – “The League of Assassins” (S2/EP5)
- Airdate: 11/6/2013
- Director: Wendey Stanzler
- Writer(s): Jake Coburn & Drew Z. Greenberg
THE PLOT
Sara’s whole “I can’t tell you about my past because it’s so shameful” hand is forced when Al-Owal (Navid Negahban) from the League of Assassins attacks her and Oliver in broad daylight at Queen Manor. Oliver’s super-confused why a guy dressed like Malcolm “The Dark Archer” Merlyn attacked them, and sets about assigning tasks to Felicity and Diggle as part of his investigation before Sara finally fesses up about her past with the League.
In a more innocent time, Sara’s response to meeting Felicity might simply have been to inquire about her gorgeous black dress with pink and white flower patterns.
Because of course they have, both Diggle and Oliver instantly understand the reference, Diggle explaining the League of Assassins to Felicity (and, by extension, the audience) while Oliver stews in anger. When Oliver and Sara attack Al-Owal at his hideout, they get their butts whooped, and have to Batman-grappling hook (just with a trick arrow) their way out. They split up to protect her now-threatened family members, Sara with her father and Oliver with Laurel (who has a seriously embarrassing “wait, this wasn’t a date, or at least a hook-up?” end of evening moment with him).
Al-Owal, catching unseen arrows from hitting the back of his head since 1997.
Sara and Oliver eventually defeat Al-Owal and his fellow assassins with an assist from Quentin, who then has to watch his long-lost daughter run away again with vague “I have to go for your own good, and for their own protection you can’t tell my sister and mother I’m alive.” Tough night for ole Quentin.
Meanwhile, the District Attorney seemingly laughs at conflict of interest by placing Laurel as the second on the legal team against Moira. Laurel gets the DA to offer Moira a plea of life in prison with the possibility of parole, which Moira is going to take until her kids convince her to fight for her freedom regardless of what new secrets a trial might uncover. This level of stress can’t be helping Laurel’s emotional issues, which have now eliminated alcohol and gone to pure pill addiction.
6 years ago, after the Queen’s Gambit crashed Sara was discovered afloat in the ocean by the same Amazo pirate ship Oliver would find himself on a year later. We see Sara taken in by Dr. Anthony Ivo (Dylan Neal), who is not the Captain of the ship but has a position of authority. He makes a vague reference to doing research with human subjects on the ship that will save the human race.
THE REVIEW
For better or worse, Arrow‘s storytelling this season has become so hyper-charged that I didn’t even bat an eye when a freakin’ assassin propelled through a window into the main foyer of Queen Manor. While an assassin infiltrating Queen Manor is not unprecedented on this show (“Home Invasion”), something about a man dressed like the Dark Archer practically dropping in from the sky to interrupt Sara and Oliver’s conversation in the main foyer of the mansion felt completely out of step with what the show was but totally in-keeping with what it’s becoming. And what is that? A show that fully embraces soap opera (i.e., the long lost dead ex-girlfriend/sister returning) while loosening their once firm adherence to Batman Begins’-aesthetics.
For the most part, it’s working. Oliver looking up and seeing someone dressed like Malcolm and having no clue what was going on was a thrilling moment, and not just because the ensuing Sara/Oliver/Al-Owal fight scene was Raid: The Redemption-style awesome. It was the rarest of rare Arrow moments where Oliver was caught utterly off-guard and operating several plot points behind the audience. The rest of the episode was mostly devoted to catching Oliver up with the rest of us on Sara’s connection to the League, and finally giving us Sara’s background, although anyone expecting her entire tutelage under the League to be depicted here walked away disappointed. Instead, poor Caity Lotz was asked to wear nothing but a nightgown and bra and panties for all of her flashback scenes and still come away looking dignified, something she pretty much pulled off.
In the present, Lotz brief reunion with her father was touching, although mostly because Paul Blackthorne is an actor capable enough to overcome some awkward editing. Their diner scene together was particularly exceptional, with Quentin’s status as a good detective upheld as he put together Sara’s identity as Canary instantly and made the connections to Arrow without any help from her. Plus, Sara’s overreaction to the stray noise, i.e., she jumped straight to attack mode, and the look on Quentin’s face in response said all you needed to know about how much she’s changed and how much Quentin is confused by still loves his daughter no matter what.
The idea behind the entire episode was to use Sara’s story as a lesson for Oliver about the downside of keeping so many secrets from loved ones. This lead to a rather lovely end-of-episode conversation in which Oliver appeared to start opening up to Diggle about his past.
Unfortunately, the overall episode was slightly clunkier than the season average so far. Why exactly Al-Owal and his men so easily walked into Sara’s trap when they could have easily attacked at any prior moment is a question the episode prefers you not ask. It also retroactively weakens Oliver’s first season quarrel with the Dark Archer if it only takes Sara one episode to dispatch of the man who supposedly trained Malcom Merlyn. There was also a slightly higher quotient of awkwardly written dialog than normal, e.g., Oliver advising Sara how she can’t get forgiveness without actually asking for it, Sara’s overly expositional explanation for why Diggle would be no match against League of Assassins members. Plus, what on Earth are they doing with Laurel? Maybe it’s a natural progression to transition from guilt to self-pity, but Laurel’s “why do people keep leaving me?” speech felt dangerously close to the writer’s having lost grasp on the motivations behind her descent into self-abuse. Also, I’m sorry, you already played the “Moira has a huge secret which threatens to undo this family” card all of last season. Please don’t hinge her entire trial story line on the promise of new secrets this season.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Last week’s episode was all-out crazy with the bombshells it dropped that this week was bound to be a let-down. The Moira story line resurfaced mostly just to remind us that she’s in deep crap but is holding on to more secrets. Laurel is getting worse, but we didn’t see much of it this week. The majority of the episode, however, belonged to Sara, and then Sara and her father in the second half. Luckily, this proved incredibly compelling with stellar performances from Lotz and Blackthorne. The implication of last week’s epiosde, i.e., that the Lances will hate Oliver once they find out the truth about Sara, was pretty much non-existent this week, though is likely to resurface again at some point.
THE NOTES
1. Comic Book 101: Professor Anthony Ivo
Professor Ivo and Amazo, as depicted in the animated series Young Justice.
First Appearance: 1960
Background: Oh, just your run-of-the-mill comic book mad scientist who is clinically terrified of death so he devotes his life to cybenertics in search of an immortality-granting breakthrough. This leads him to create the superpower-mimicking android Amazo to either collect specimens for him or collect so many superpowers Ivo might be able to harness an immortality serum. Amazo is the more notable character of the two, and the rest of Ivo’s story mostly involves building more robots, finally getting immortality and then wishing he hadn’t, and being other characters (good and bad) go-to guy for robots expertise. The New 52 continuity has maintained Ivo’s fear of death and status as the creator of Amazo, but it has switched the location of his actions to S.T.A.R. Labs.
The version of Dr. Anthony Ivo on Arrow is still a mystery, although we know his ship is named Amazo and that he believes his work will help save the human race somehow.
2. Comic Book 101: Ra’s al Guhl, Talia al Guhl & The League of Assassins
First Appearance: 1971
Background: If you’ve seen Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy you know the gist of the Ra’s al Guhl story – terrorist leader seeking to return balance to the world by killing most humans. The comic book version of Ra’s is pretty much immortal, rejuvenated for over 100s of years by the life-giving liquids of the Lazarus Pit. In the comics, he did not train Batman but did deduce his secret identity (i.e., Bruce Wayne) on his own. As with the films, Ra’s has a daughter named Talia who engages in a love affair with Bruce Wayne, except Talia is far more of a conflicted character in the comics than in The Dark Knight Rises. In fact, in the comics, Talia and Bruce have a son together named Damien. It’s worth noting that although he is a Batman villain, the comics have made Ra’s so powerful he has been a villain to the entire Justice League on occasion. Heck, he’s even had a consensual one-night stand with Black Canary before.
It’s unclear if Ra’s al Guhl will ever actually show up on Arrow. Tonight’s episode introduced a new wrinkle with Al-Owal telling Sara “the child of Ra’s Al Guhl awaits your return.” A reference to Talia?
3. They’re Laying On the Ominous Shado-Slade Foreshadowing Pretty Thick
It’s been over a year since Oliver has returned from the island, and he has yet to mention either Shado or Slade to anyone in the present. Clearly, crap went down, and those two are either dead or villains out there who might show up to seek vengeance or friends who became villains who are now dead. Sara dropped two pretty big hints tonight when she observed Oliver’s hood and said, “I remember when I first saw that hood. Shado was wearing it.” Amell’s slightly melodramatic headturn in response to this mention was kind of unintentionally hilarious. Plus, of Felicity and Diggle Sara observed “Oliver is lucky to have you both as friends. He hasn’t always had the best luck in that area.”
4. If Your Ship Crashed and Stranded You on an Island for 5 Years, Would You Keep a Framed Photo of That Ship in the Main Foyer of Your Home?
Well, Oliver did, mostly just because the writers wanted Sara to see it and wince when snooping around Oliver’s mansion during the episode’s first act.
5. Who’s Tougher, Patrick Swayze from Road House or Sara Lance?
Famously, in the cult classic 1980s action film Road House Patrick Swayze sagely observes that “pain don’t hurt” when asked by a female doctor if the procedure she is performing on him without any anesthesia hurts. Tonight, when Felicity marvels at Sara’s complete lack of reaction to any apparent pain she should feel from Oliver’s stitching of a wound on her back she observes, “Pain and I came to a little understanding a few years back.” Who’s the bigger badass in this scenario, Swayze or Lance?
6. What Was that Mini-Episode with Boss During the Commercial Break?
For those who didn’t see, there was a mini-episode featuring Felicity and Roy during one of the commercial breaks. It mostly involved Felicity listening to music through Boss earphones at work, and getting interrupted by Roy who’s there to talk to Oliver about Thea. Felicity manages to trip all over herself with her words, accidentally indicating she might love Oliver and also complimenting Roy’s model-good looks. It was odd in that it had no apparent connection to the plot of tonight’s episode, but the plot it began will be continued in another mini-episode next week. The stuff with Felicity probably annoyed her detractors to no end as with the mini-episode having such little time all of her characteristics were dialed up to 11.
TRAILER FOR NEXT WEEK
Am I crazy, or does that kind of look like Isabel Rochev smiling up at Oliver from what appears to be a hotel room bed in that trailer? That can’t be right. And what the hell do you mean Diggle has a wife? Did I completely miss that last season, or this is another “oh, Sara’s not really dead…and Oliver knew that, kind of” twist? Frankly, this trailer has me worried for the quality of next week’s episode.
What did you think? Like it? Hate it? Let us know in the comments section.
Second Opinions
- “Arrow: League of Assassins” 11/6 (lezgetreal.com)
