'Arrow' Review: "Vigilante"
Nora Dominick ‘17/ Emertainment Monthly Executive Stage Editor
Arrow’s fifth season continues to reshape the comic book show and for us it’s not for the better. Coming into the season, many storylines looked promising and hoped to provide our actors with some incredible moments of heartache, tension, and maybe some slivers of happiness.
Arrow seems to be turning on its head and focusing more on plot rather than characters, a harsh reality we can’t wrap our head around. Arrow’s latest episode “Vigilante” introduces another masked vigilante, takes a few steps backwards, and gives a shocking twist ending.
We never thought we would say this, but we don’t recognize Arrow anymore. For the TV show that started The CW’s “superhero revolution,” it’s straying further and further from the show we fell in love with. Prior to season five, Arrow boasted that it would “get back to basics” after a rocky season four. The problem with this slogan is that the show seems to be so focused on recreating the feel of season one it forgets we’ve gone on a bigger journey. We simply can’t retreat for the sake of appeasing half of Arrow’s fanbase. Our characters have come too far and sacrificed too much to simply take a few steps backwards towards their season one selves.
In season one, Oliver (Stephen Amell) was focused on killing those who had wronged Starling City, Diggle (David Ramsey) struggled to help Oliver, Thea (Willa Holland) was a partying teenager blind to her family’s corruptive nature and Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) simply worked in IT at Queen Consolidated. While these starting points allowed us to fall in love with them, their character growth allows us to stick with them. We think Arrow is forgetting this.
Season five just seems to be an endless hole of new characters. Every episode Arrow intros a new character without expanding on previous ones. That being said, the new character this week actually makes sense. This week Team Arrow goes up against a masked vigilante aptly named “Vigilante” (Cisco Ramon clearly didn’t name this one). He arrives in Star City to clean up the streets and kill those that have done wrong. Vigilante shows up at a great moment because he perfectly mimics a young Oliver. Like young Oliver, he has a “take no prisoners” mentality. Everyone he goes up against ends up dead. His introduction allows for a nice juxtaposition between the man Oliver was and who he has become.
This season, Oliver struggles with determining what kind of hero he needs to be. Is it better to kill or not? Vigilante’s introduction comes at a great moment for the audience and for Oliver. We can see, clear as day, how far Oliver has come during his epic fight sequences with Vigilante. Amell’s brightest moments this week come when he’s trying to buck against Vigilante’s form of justice and search for a reason to keep fighting. Also, although he wasn’t unmasked we are 100% certain DA Adrian Chase (Josh Segarra) is Vigilante.
On the subject of Oliver, his characterization in season five has been a bit of a mystery to us. He began the season killing again after Laurel’s (Katie Cassidy) heartbreaking death. Then he pivoted to training the new Team Arrow, but now he’s kind of running in circles. His relationships to other characters seems off this season. After breaking Diggle out of prison, the duo haven’t shared many moments together and his relationships with Thea and Quentin appear to be strictly professional. Arrow is too concerned about giving Oliver equal moments of being Green Arrow and the Mayor that his relationships with other characters are being marginalized. This, in turn, points back to Arrow’s pivot to the importance of plot over characters.
Now, it looks like they can only have conversations that involve them butting heads over Team Arrow or if Felicity is cracking a joke. Even in a previous episode this season, they could barely talk constructively about Oliver breaking Diggle out of prison. It appears we are supposed to believe Felicity and Oliver didn’t share this friendship or romance. This is detracting from both Felicity and Oliver’s storylines. We knew they wouldn’t be together going into the season, but we are re-writing their characters so much it’s like they never even liked each other.
Unless we had a marvelous fever-dream last season, Oliver and Felicity did date. Arrow is trying to erase this so much they don’t even pan to Felicity when Oliver announces he’s getting a drink with Susan (Carly Pope). A moment that would be awkward for any ex-girlfriend to hear. If Arrow is that worried we can only see them as a romantic ship as opposed to characters, then Oliver could’ve also talked to Diggle or Thea or heck even Quentin (Paul Blackthorne). Nope, that would’ve been too easy and made too much sense.
Off of this, Oliver goes to Susan for advice and of course it’s made to look like the duo will be a couple soon. This also falls into the category of “women and men can’t just be friends” and also causes Oliver to go against his previous character structure. Last time we checked, Oliver has some major trust issues. He has such big trust issues that he wouldn’t let Laurel join Team Arrow, a person he grew up with it. In fact, he had trust issues at the beginning of this season when Felicity suggested he recruits some new people for Team Arrow.
So, why all of sudden has he decide to trust people, especially Susan who earlier this season published articles exposing his mayoral flaws. For us, this leads back to Arrow not wanting Oliver (or Felicity) to be single. They are trying so hard to force these new romantic relationships that Felicity and Oliver go against their previous character developments.
Another growing relationship we’re excited to explore is between Diggle and Rene (Rick Gonzalez). After Diggle helped Rene overcome his kidnapping, the duo have taken a shine to one another. This week, it’s Diggle who needs help as he struggles to accept his new reality of being a fugitive. His breaking point? Missing John Diggle Jr’s 2nd birthday (Side note: If John Diggle Jr. wasn’t so adorable we would be extra bitter about Baby Sara). Ramsey and Gonzalez create a great relationship on screen. Similar to Thea and Quentin, Diggle and Rene need each other to move past the turmoil that has happened to them. Not that Diggle couldn’t work through his issues with Oliver, but we think Diggle needs a fresh perspective and Rene is perfect for that.
Now onto the biggest shocker of the night. At the end of the episode, Evelyn (Madison McLaughlin) is seen on a roof in Star City. Suddenly, out of the shadows, Prometheus emerges and Evelyn says something along the lines of, “don’t worry, they don’t suspect a thing.” We don’t know about you, but we are shocked by this revelation. Honestly, we are most surprised by this because nothing has alluded to her having villainous tendencies. So, we’re thinking she’s a double agent, sent by Team Arrow to figure out who Prometheus actually is.
If not, we would be extremely shocked that Oliver, Felicity or Diggle haven’t suspected a thing. Although this is a shocking moment for Arrow it almost feels like they are giving her something to do. As we’ve said before, Arrow is overcrowded with characters this season (particularly in the Arrow Bunker). By making Evelyn a spy for Prometheus or a double agent it gives her something to do.
This week’s Arrow sadly doesn’t feel any better than the last two weeks. With an over abundance of new characters, old characters are being pushed into the background and becoming shells of their former selves. We never thought we’d say this, but thank god the big crossover episode is next for Arrow. Hopefully the crossover, coupled with Arrow’s 100th episode, will resuscitate season five.
Well said and written! I totally agree. The biggest thing that is bugging me about this season is they are asking us to forget all of last year. If they were going to make Oliver and Felicity basically strangers to each other (after selling the “love of their lives” angle for 2 years) they should have killed her off last year instead of Laurel. It would have had a bigger emotional impact on Oliver and they would have been in the same place now with him moving on and less of an awkward transition to them being apart. I don’t agree with the people who think they will be getting back together at some point. I think the producers of this show got such a backlash about that relationship “taking over the show and social media” from some persons and some media outlets that they are letting it die and fans of it are starting to drift away from the show which is a shame. Watching it is no longer a priority for me, the Oliver and Felicity relationship “Olicity”, which has become a dirty word to the actors and producers of the show this year, was what got me watching regularly in Season 1 when it appeared and it is why I want to keep watching but with the rushed new boyfriend and the show driving Oliver into a relationship with a person that his character would never choose based solely on what she did to his sister it just makes me sad now to watch and life is too short. It is really a shame.
you right , this chapter was’nt my favorite either. But I enjoyed the 6 last chapters. I just hope the relationships between Felicity /Malone and Oliver/ Susan have an inexpected answers and whys, because I think if Oliver return dating with other women, it Wii be an playboy Oliver again. And then he is not growing Up how the Arrow tried to show us in the last seasons.