By MEGHAN O’CONNOR
Staff Writer
Four weeks ago, “Arrow” fans were got a pleasant surprised when Oliver Queen came back to Starling City to protect his city. He returned in a very heroic fashion and saved the day, as one would only expect from the Arrow.
However, what fans might not have been expecting was the mixed emotions all the characters had about Oliver Queen’s return. The next two episodes, “Canaries” and “The Return,” deal with the aftermath of Oliver’s return, the choices everyone has had to make to keep moving forward, and who they will all become.
Three weeks ago, episode thirteen dealt with Oliver and the Arrow Crew facing the cold hard truth that while Oliver may be back, things changed while he was gone. Everyone will have to decide if they can deal with this or not. Oliver confronts Laurel almost immediately about her becoming Canary and furiously argues with her that she should not be doing this. He also makes the unpopular decision that himself and the Arrow Crew need to work with Malcom Merlin.
However, in order to do this, Oliver has to reveal a secret to his sister Thea, one he has been keeping to himself for three seasons: the he is, in fact, the Arrow. Though he goes back and forth about telling her, as do the other characters, he finally decides to tell Thea.
When he reveals this to her, he is met with unexpected acceptance and love from Thea. She has admiration for what he does, even going so far as to thank him for protecting the city for so long.
While Thea feels this way about Oliver, she does not have the same loving feelings for her biological father, Malcom Merlin. She feels as if she has been manipulated by him while he tried pushing her away from Oliver.
It’s not only Thea, Malcom, and Oliver who are facing problems with their family in this episode. Laurel continues to lie to her father, Detective Lance, about the fact that her sister Sara is dead. When Zytle, the current creator of the drug Vertigo, is released, Laurel goes to fight him as Canary and gets a dose of the drug, causing her to have hallucinations of Sara and her father. It’s through this haze that she starts working out her issues with this situation and decides to confront her dad and tell him the truth.
While Laurel thinks she is going to have two things to confess, Detective Lance already knows one of them. He came to the conclusion on his own that Laurel has been going around fighting crime as Canary. He has had it figured out for quite some time.
However, what he didn’t know was that Sara had been killed. Completely shocked is an understatement for Detective Lance’s reaction, and it leaves the audience unsure about where his relationship with Laurel will be as they move forward.
At the end of “Canaries,” Oliver tells the Arrow Crew that he is going away again for a little while, but this time, it has to do something with Thea. The episode ends with Thea and Oliver leaving for their trip and it’s revealed that they’re going back to island where Oliver was stranded.
What I personally loved about this episode was that it did not shy away from emotions. Oliver is back, and clearly everyone has their own issues to deal with on top of the feelings that they’re having about him being back. This episode did a fantastic job showing this.
As usual, Stephen Amell gives an amazing performance as Oliver Queen, especially when he reveals to Thea that he is the Arrow. He really makes the audience feel everything he is feeling and I personally found myself on the edge of my seat waiting to see how Thea would react. It was also great having Caity Lotz come back and reprise her role as Sara/Canary, even if it was only for a single episode and as a hallucination.
Something that did not work, in my opinion, was bringing back the drug Vertigo and its maker Zytle. I understand why it was done, but the episode lacked a real villain. “Canaries” was more about the characters and their emotional growth than anything else, and because of this, it felt like the villain was taking a back seat. However, they did a fantastic job setting up the next episode and the end of this one, leaving the audience very excited for the next week.
Two weeks ago, the audience got what they were anticipating at the end of “Canaries” with episode fourteen, “The Return.” Thea and Oliver are training on the island where Oliver was stranded.
Being back on the island brings back some painful memories for Oliver and the viewers get to see flashbacks from when he was back in Starling City for a little while during the period of time he was supposedly stranded on the island. The audience also gets to see what it was like for Detective Lance the first time that he thought Sara was dead. Another flashback is of Oliver seeing everyone’s reactions when they thought that he was dead.
It’s not only painful flashbacks that Oliver finds while on the island, though. He discovers that Slade Wilson, also known as Deathstroke, has escaped from the island prison where he was confined. To make matters worse, it was Malcom Merlin who released him as a way to test Oliver. However, it doesn’t look promising after Slade has captured both Thea and Oliver.
It’s not only Oliver who has to deal with things while on the island, either. Thea finds out that she is the one who killed Sara. By the end of it, both Oliver and Thea have a lot to think about.
After the episode the week before, fans weren’t just wondering about Thea and Oliver on the island. They were also wondering what was going to become of Laurel’s relationship with her father after revealing her secrets.
Detective Lance is distraught with grief, not only for his deceased daughter, but for Laurel as well. He cannot believe that she would lie to him, not only about something so important, but for as long as she did. He reveals to Laurel that he considers their relationship as father and daughter to be broken and this leaves Laurel to wonder if she will ever be able to repair the damage that she has done.
Something that “Arrow” does very well is balance the action and the drama. They know how to place both so that it feels natural and has a solid flow to it. Recently, I was discussing the show with someone. I told them that one of the things I love about this is show is how much character development happens throughout every season, and I stand by that.
I care about every character on “Arrow,” even if I don’t like them. I at least care enough to have hatred towards them. This is what makes “Arrow” stand out in the world of superhero television shows, and these two episodes have tons of character development throughout.
This is one of the reasons that “Arrow” is one of my favorite television shows on right now and why I continue to go back every week.
