By Callum Armour
Well the mask is off and Black Canary’s true identity is Sara Lance. Not exactly a shocker if the audience have and familiarity with the comics or have at least been paying attention for the last year. I can’t help but feel disappointed halfway into episode 4 that the mystery is over. The outcome was always going to be obvious but I was expecting a few clues to throw us off or at least for this mystery to go on a little longer. However as always with Arrow it appears that the really engaging mystery lies not in the present but on the island. Exactly the opposite of Lost in that way…
Well the mask is off and Black Canary’s true identity is Sara Lance. Not exactly a shocker if the audience have and familiarity with the comics or have at least been paying attention for the last year. I can’t help but feel disappointed halfway into episode 4 that the mystery is over. The outcome was always going to be obvious but I was expecting a few clues to throw us off or at least for this mystery to go on a little longer. However as always with Arrow it appears that the really engaging mystery lies not in the present but on the island. Exactly the opposite of Lost in that way…
This week’s villain comes in the form of ‘The Mayor’ a gang leader who has seized control of the Glades after the earthquake by importing military grade weapons from a contact in the army. This character is pretty basic, standing in as a standard gangster of the week and reason to have a big shootout and the much awaited team up between Arrow and Canary. In the meantime everyone else seems to do their thing. Diggle uses his informant in the military to give Felicity a lead to where The Mayor is getting his guns and in his civilian guise Oliver Queen sponsors a ‘cash for guns’ initiative in partnership with the new political face on the Starling City scene Sebastian Blood. I’ll refrain for now discussing this character as we don’t see much of him apart from being a smarmy politician/lawyer type but for DC fans, the name speaks for itself, as does the final scene for this episode. Unfortunately the trade in is interrupted by The Mayor himself and Sin (Canary’s would be sidekick and confidant) gets shot in the process. While she recovers in hospital with Thea and Roy the situation gives Canary the push she needs to work with our team of heroes as they work to stop The Mayor before he acquires a delivery of grenade launching machine guns.
While the Canary reveal was a bit of a let-down dramatically, the final battle with The Mayor is the highlight of the episode and includes both the Arrow and Canary fighting together, and sometimes swapping weapons during the combat and then ending with Ollie shooting a grenade out of mid-air. The scene ends with Oliver convincing Sara not to kill the gangster in a sequence that might seem a little repetitive by now. Although for his part The Mayor probably wishes he’d done him in there and then. Instead, after being arrested, he ends up as part of a pretty gruesome experiments at the hands of Sebastian ‘Brother’ Blood.
The events on the island this week centre on Ollie being trapped without his friends on board the ship we saw last week. Ending up shot and forced to remove the bullet and perform surgery on himself. This coincides with some great scenes in the present between him and Sara which establish he knew she was alive during this time and her even asking about Slade before it’s revealed she was also on the ship. Ready to torture him.
One of the problems with Arrow is that with so many characters to feed, an on-going story arc to move forward, a bad guy of the week and the flashbacks to the island and its own story that ties in to the present, some events or characters seem to get lost in the mix. This week it was Moira and Laurel who both seem caught up in their own problems while the world moves on. Moira is still in prison with the death penalty threat looming while Laurel seems to be further descending into a drug/drink aided whining depression. It’s not unexpected considering her recent history losing Tommy and then almost being killed by the doll maker last week but it’s also a stark contrast to her little sister who almost died and now runs around on rooftops in leather.
One of the problems with Arrow is that with so many characters to feed, an on-going story arc to move forward, a bad guy of the week and the flashbacks to the island and its own story that ties in to the present, some events or characters seem to get lost in the mix. This week it was Moira and Laurel who both seem caught up in their own problems while the world moves on. Moira is still in prison with the death penalty threat looming while Laurel seems to be further descending into a drug/drink aided whining depression. It’s not unexpected considering her recent history losing Tommy and then almost being killed by the doll maker last week but it’s also a stark contrast to her little sister who almost died and now runs around on rooftops in leather.
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