“I ran back in time because Zoom and my dad and things and I got to live with my parents and it was all good but then it wasn’t so I came back but everything is different and I want everything to change back.” – Barry Allen during this week’s panicked voiceover
Barry flips his shit so hard that he flips it all the way to Star City. All over Felicity. Who, like us, is like, “You just, like, run back in time? All the time?”
Apologies if you’ve been coming here the last few weeks for our Arrow recaps. I’ve been supposed to be Connie’s back-up, but I haven’t been able to muster the strength to recap a show that, honestly, I’ve been out on all season. Sure, I’ve been watching it (on DVR delay) every week, but this season has been more than disappointing. And if rumors about the death being revealed on tonight’s episode is true, I might be out for good. But more on that later.
On this week’s Arrow, Oliver gets justification for his lies and it still starts to blow up in his face: there’s a debate, an engagement party, and lots of buildings blow up. The episode is full of Darhk’s demolition team, but I actually use it to refer to all the people in this episode co-signing Oliver’s lies, which will clearly hurt him with Felicity, but also with William and who knows how it will play out with Samantha and Darhk’s larger plans. They’re laying down the explosives. It’s all gonna blow soon.
Nearly everyone in this episode suffers from naive notions that they really should be over by now. Oliver naively believes that Malcolm would surrender his power. Felicity naively believes (though thankfully only for a moment) that her returned father has changed. Nyssa believes that Oliver would kill Malcolm for her, after all she knows Malcolm has done to Oliver personally. Malcolm believes that power is more important than Thea. Even Flashback Chick thinks that giving her jailer the stone will make him set her free. Silly rabbits, Trix are for kids.
But I’m gonna focus this quickie review on the two women driving the forces of the A and B story. Nyssa and Thea.
From Felicity’s back and forth with pain meds to the Diggle’s being featured up front, Episode 4.11, “A.W.O.L.” gave its secondary leads lots of screen time. It was one of the season’s strongest episodes on that front, because fans always want more of Diggle and Felicity, and less of Oliver (and the darn island). We did, however, see how the DC Cinematic Universe could be ruining things for their TV properties. Let’s dive in real quick.
Continue reading “NOC Recaps Arrow: A.W.O.L. Stands for Amanda Waller”
We’ve returned from Arrow hiatus to something very familiar. Remember how the cliffhanger had a lead of the show potentially dying in the 9th episode of the season and then they survived in episode 10? And episode 10 deals with the characters figuring out if they can cope without the not-dead character? Felicity’s absence is shorter lived than Oliver’s, but the stakes still feel as false as they did when Oliver “died.”
I love how the show didn’t even pretend Felicity was dead (unlike every promo until this week). Well, they had that grave shot, but marked it very clearly as 4 months from now. Why would this bullet have killed her four months from now with a fresh grave? Anyway, I hope that’s the last midseason finale with a fake death, because I’m over it. On to episode 4×10, “Blood Debts.”
