Oh “Betrayal” how you kill me! So much happened in this episode, but first things first, let’s all take a moment and revel in how awesome this picture is.
AAAGGGHHHH!!! Excuse me, there was no keeping the fangirl battle cry out of this one. Seriously though, how exciting is it that Captain Jack and River Song will be on-screen together? Well maybe not together, but they are in the same show, finally! There are plenty of Doctor Who/Torchwood fans who have longed for those two to meet up. This isn’t quite the same, but cool nonetheless. If you don’t follow John Barrowman’s twitter, you should because he is often posting fun pictures from the set. Of course while you are over there, might as well follow Grizzly Bomb as well.
Back to this week’s episode. Oh man, so much going on. It seems like David Anders is everywhere these days. Granted I did just happen to inadvertently watch his episodes of Charmed and Warehouse 13 this week which plays a part in it but still, he’s on Once Upon a Time as Dr. Whale and then Arrow this week as the bad guy du jour, Cyrus Vanch. Of course he’s also been on Heroes and Alias which I watched quite religiously so maybe he’s just everywhere in my TV universe.
It was nice of Vanch to remind us that there was a huge mafia presence in Starling City known as the Triad and that Huntress’ father, Frank Bertinelli was involved with, and his leaving prison provided a nice storyline involving Laurel, her father, and Arrow, but I think we can all agree his greatest contribution to the this week was the line, “Lose the bow, Merida.” If you aren’t one to keep up with Disney characters, Merida is the main character in this summer’s Brave. A very cute movie that leads to a very funny line.
I’ll admit I really enjoyed Vance as the bad guy because he’s not a DC villain that will have his one episode and then be done. Also, he did a really good job advancing the story between Laurel, Detective Lance, and Arrow. One does have to wonder, did Lance really think Laurel would be okay with the bugging of the phone? Seriously? I mean come on, yea he’s a cop and he’s made Arrow his white whale, but there is no reason on Earth for Laurel to be okay with all his hijinks.
Speaking of Laurel, how long are they going to continue to allude to her being the Black Canary? They’ve mentioned her love of sushi numerous times, she’s mentioned the fishnets, her firm is called CNRI, and the martial arts badassery! I imagine to people who don’t know about Black Canary it’s just a little quirk (Oh she really likes sushi), but for those of us who do it’s like dangling a donut right in front of our face. Just give us the Black Canary already! I can only hope that with her mom (Alex Kingston) arriving soon they’ll wrap that into her storyline.
The island also provided quite a bit of advancement. So Yao Fei slips Ollie the map with someplace circled on it. He goes to the circled spot and finds a (extremely attractive Manu Bennett) man who promptly tries to kill him. In a move that I was not expecting, it appears as if Slade Wilson is on the island with a partner to rescue Yao Fei? Not only that but his partner is the guy we previously thought was Deathstroke, who beat the crap out of Oliver back in episode five. Yao sends Oliver to help Slade take the airstrip that’s going to get them off the island, but why is Slade not mentioned at all in the rescue? Not to mention that shot from the pilot with the “Deathstroke” mask that had an arrow through the eyehole. Okay, the island provided advancement, but really it just offered up more questions and no answers.
I think we can all agree though, the Diggle/Oliver/book storyline was the best. Oliver decides to tell Diggle about the book his mom had, given to him by Felicity. Of course Diggle isn’t on board with just letting Moira be cagey about the book’s origins so he decides to go a super secret spy mission, as Moira’s driver. Of course “Lose the bow, Merida” wins as funniest line of the night, but Diggle walking in to the birthday party surely wins funniest moment. Just the look on his face! It was a winner. Of course things were a little bit more on the suspicious side when she met up with Malcolm again which led to the “That did not just happen” moment.
Before the episode aired, Andrew Kreisberg tweeted this.
I’ll admit I sort of rolled my eyes. Seriously best cliffhanger ever? That’s stretching it a bit. While I still don’t think it was the best ever, it was pretty damn surprising. After Oliver had talked to his mom the first time about the book and SHE THREW IT IN THE FIRE!!!!, when he had no reaction I didn’t really expect him to do anything. Yea he told Diggle he needed to talk to her, but I figured it’d be another dinner at Big Belly’s Burger and nothing would come of it.
So imagine my (and apparently everyone else watching) surprise when this happened…
Seriously?!?! I was stunned. Of course, as a cliffhanger, that’s where the episode ended. I’m not one who usually seeks out the next week’s preview, but I couldn’t help myself this time and now I can’t wait.
This episode was great and I think it is just going to build up from here. Going to have to go with a four out of five. About half of a star was for the ending alone!
Until next time Arrow fans!
Grizzly Bomb 