Arrow, Season 4, Episode 6: Lost Souls
Well, after all the praise I heaped upon Arrow after reviewing the previous episode, it seems we take a step back from being great to being... well, just your run-of-the-mill good. It's not a bad episode by any means, filled with powerful scenes and plot development, and it disguises its 'preparing cast members for Legends of Tomorrow' far more elegantly than the Flash did, actually taking time to work the Ray Palmer and Sara Lance plot threads into the season's story and have them gradually develop bit by bit before having an episode focusing entirely on them. Compare it, with its sister show, where it just goes 'here, have a Captain Cold episode. Then have a New Firestorm episode'. Credit where credit's due.
And this episode, well, focuses mostly on the search for Ray Palmer and who's holding the shrunken ex-Superman. From Felicity's point of view. And having someone confront their relationship definitely could lead to great emotional points, and the fact that her ex-boyfriend returns from the dead and is apparently at the hands of Damien Darhk (of course) makes some nice emotional challenges where Oliver and Felicity clashes. And, yes, I get that television shows need these kind of romantic relationship clashes to survive. It helps feed the hardcore shippers and romantic relationships do have a place in most works of fiction.
But honestly do we need yet another reminder to why season three was so bad? Felicity is just angsting and being angry at Oliver for not apparently putting his biggest game, and some talk about 'I'm not the kind of woman who falls head over heels over a man!' and some bullshit like that. She does have a point about Oliver taking things easy -- even if there's nothing else you can do, you don't just go around planning big cordon bleu dinners when your friend's life is in danger.
Thankfully, though, that kind of tacky 'I'm an independent woman damn it' plot isn't the sole focus of the episode, and Felicity shows herself to actually be independent, something that's far more important for feminism and gender equality than just insisting on these facts. We get her going on a mission that's partly caused by her guild over what she sees as abandoning Ray to go off have some fun with Oliver in Ivy Town.
Ivy Town, by the way, is Atom's hometown in DC comics, adding a hilarious layer of meta-irony.
It's great that Felicity is given far more things to do instead of just angsting over her relationship with Oliver and Ray, with all the stuff she's gotten managing the company with Holt and actively trying to get Ray Palmer back. It's far more interesting to see that, and Felicity's interactions with her airheaded mother is always fun. I honestly didn't expect Donna to return again, but we get at least a couple of funny -- if unnecessary -- scenes between the two.
And Oliver, well, he may seem callous but it at least comes from a good heart. We get some insecurities from him, too, thinking about how he thinks Ray is technically the better man for Felicity... but Diggle goes the 'she chose you', and Donna gives a 'you cannot let this chance for true love escape' speech and... it's still better than how it was handled in season three but I still don't much care for these kind of pointless drama.
That scene with Oliver and Diggle talking about how they missed the bottle of vodka in the Verdant Arrowcave, though? That was a hilarious, heartwarming moment of bro-hood as they just point at each other with that 'yea man' look on their face.
Ray Palmer himself, despite the focus of the episode being on him, doesn't really get much to do since he's just in distress for most of the episode, they assault the Latin Building, we get awesome fight scenes, and we get him back. He does give a couple of hilarious talk scenes with his 'cool! ... but that's bad' shtick and some fun jokes about giant cockroaches and Spectre and shit -- rather hilariously this episode came out in the same week as Spectre did. He chooses to remain dead and figure things out, leaving Palmer Industries to Felicity, and it's probably going to tie into the whole 'lost souls trying to figure out what to do' theme that Legends of Tomorrow is going to have.
Olicity drama aside, though, we have some genuinely funny scenes like Felicity and Oliver having a bit of a lover's spat while apparently everyone can hear it. Thea's grin, Laurel and Sara going in with a synchronized 'so can we', is both hilarious.
Also funny is Curtis Holt, and his reaction when Oliver comes in -- 'he's straight, you're married' -- made me laugh so hard, a way to use sexuality as humour without degrading the gay people. Holt also gets to contribute here, using the 'Bronze medal Olympics' skills he talked about last episode (something that's also common to his comic-book counterpart) to parachute into the building and get Felicity to do stuff. Also the scene where he tries to pull a Silver St. Cloud and study
Also, thanks to Curtis Holt, Diggle gets an improvised code-name courtesy of Felicity, namely Spartan. A quick google shows me a Wildstorm character with the same name, who has nothing in common with Diggle, so it might just be a tongue-in-cheek ad lib by Felicity, or something more permanent and original. Either way...
We get some more hints that Sara Lance, well, still isn't quite herself. She gives in to the same rage that Thea did, except, well, being an actual assassin for a good chunk of her life she actually snaps a dude's neck. This leads her to leave town (and the show) to figure things out after a tearful farewell to Laurel. Also do like the short moments that she has with Quentin and Laurel while in civilian getup. Short and sweet.
Darhk has some weird plan and can control chains to choke Oliver's neck, but still haven't impresses me as the Big Bad of the season. He talks about using the reverse-engineered power source from Ray Palmer's dwarf star thing to power up... some weird fold-out board. Whatever.
In the flashback, the jackass mercenary leader tries to get some random dude to kill Oliver. Of course he fails because duh. Reiter explores the mystic nexus place that Constantine found the Egyptian staff last episode, confirming that he's after something bigger and most likely HIVE-related. Don't care.
Overall a slightly weaker episode thanks to all the pointless insertion of the stupid drama, but still solid thanks to its own merits. We're still in full build-up phase, though, with Damien Darhk still being kept in mystery and his big game plan still mysterious and shit. We're just setting up character pieces for both Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow, resolving some outstanding plot threads from season three's climax, and finally putting a close to both the Ray Palmer and Sara Lance arcs. I think in the next episode or two we'll have some actual progression for the Damien Darhk thing... which depending on how it's handled might change my opinion on the season.
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