'Arrow' Review/Recap: "The Brave and the Bold"

Nora Dominick ‘17/ Emertainment Monthly Staff Writer

Since the CW announced a spin-off series for everyone’s favorite fast running superhero, The Flash, an Arrow and Flash crossover event was bound to happen. This week the CW did not disappoint and created two incredible episodes of television.
In part one of the crossover, The Flash Team received some interesting visitors when The Arrow (Stephen Amell), Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) and Diggle (David Ramsey) helped them catch Roy G. Bivilo (Paul Anthony), a metahuman with the ability to cause extreme anger. In Wednesday’s episode of Arrow entitled “The Brave and the Bold,” Cisco (Carlos Valdes), Caitlin (Danielle Panabaker) and Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) made the trek to Starling City.
In this episode of Arrow, Oliver and the team battled Digger Harkness (Nick Tarabay) aka Captain Boomerang, a former member of the Suicide Squad. During his time with the Squad, a mission he was a part of went wrong and Lyla (Audrey Marie Anderson) ordered the entire Squad to be killed. Harkness clearly escaped and is now out to kill Lyla. Diggle and Oliver quickly spring into action and try to protect Lyla and catch Harkness at any cost. Tarabay perfectly executed the evil and hatred within Captain Boomerang. Although, The Arrow and The Flash capture Harkness by the end and imprison him on Lian Yu, Tarabay portrayed the perfect villain and allowed this classic character to come to life on screen.
Picking up a week after The Arrow visited Central City, Caitlin and Cisco arrive at Palmer Technologies to see their favorite tech nerd, Felicity Smoak. Cisco apparently hasn’t stopped thinking about the Arrow and wants admission to “The Arrow Cave.” Much to Oliver’s dismay, Cisco and Caitlin are granted access to the illusive Arrow Cave where Cisco acts like any Arrow fan would if they were granted access. With Cisco and Caitlin automatically comes Barry Allen. The Flash soon shows up in Starling City to assist Oliver and Diggle on their quest to capture Harkness.

If every episode of Flash and Arrow could be a crossover, I’m sure fans would not disapprove. Barry and Oliver work extremely well together and so do the actors. Amell and Gustin play off of each other perfectly. The characters act as foils to each other and manage to bring out the best in one another. Barry is able to help steer Oliver back towards his humanity. In a heart breaking scene, Oliver tells Barry he tortures people because he lives “In a city where my best friend was murdered. Where a woman I love was shot full of arrows and sent tumbling off a roof. Where my mother was murdered right in front of me.” Barry reveals to Oliver that Oliver Queen isn’t lost, he is the reason The Arrow is here today. Gustin and Amell produced some of the best scenes on television this week and fingers crossed there will be more crossover events in the future.
The ladies on Arrow this week were nothing short of magnificent as well. Caitlin and Felicity are tasked with watching Lyla in “The Arrow Cave” while the boys hunt down a possible lead on Harkness. When Harkness instead shows up at The Arrow Cave, it’s up to Felicity, Caitlin and Lyla to take him down. In a heart pounding scene, Lyla goes toe-to-toe with Harkness. As shots and boomerangs fly through the building, Felicity quickly sneaks around and grabs an explosive arrow however, she is seconds late because Harkness weals one of his boomerangs and hits Lyla directly in the chest. In a heart stopping scene, Felicity and Caitlin try to stabilize Lyla before Barry shows up and runs her to the hospital. Similar to Amell and Gustin, Rickards and Panabaker have very good chemistry on screen. Their scenes together are always engaging and allow the audience to see a strong female friendship on both shows.
If anything was going to come out of The Flash and Arrow episode it would be to knock some sense into The Flash Team. After Lyla is delivered to the hospital, Caitlin, Cisco, Roy and Felicity have a much deserved drink at Verdant. While there, Caitlin and Cisco realize that they have not been taking their duties as a superhero team seriously. The fact that they’re dealing with metahumans made it clean and less real. Cisco and Caitlin take some pointers from Roy and Felicity on how to take the job seriously. This small scene allowed both teams to grow. Cisco and Caitlin learned how difficult and challenging the job can be while Roy and Felicity gained an extra pair of shoulders to lean on.

Arrow isn’t known for its lighthearted moments but occasionally one or two will creep out of the darkness. In this episode, Diggle goes and visits Lyla in the hospital and proposes to her! The once married couple will be tying the knot once again. Although Diggle and Lyla’s relationship tends to take a back seat to other romantic pairings on the show, Diggle’s simple but emotional proposal was a perfect full-circle moment for the couple. Now it’s time for fans to start scrapbooking the perfect Arrow wedding. All we ask is that The Flash Team makes an appearance.
By the episodes end, Cisco makes Oliver a new hood as a gift for staying in The Arrow Cave. In a sweet moment, Cisco reveals that he “wanted to replace the hood, but Felicity said it had sentimental value.” Oliver flashes his signature perfect smile and he finally says that The Flash team is welcome back anytime especially with Caitlin now investigating the DNA left on the arrow that killed Sara (Caity Lotz). That’s an open invitation for another crossover event, right? Lets keep our fingers crossed.
To close out an amazing two-day crossover event, The Arrow and The Flash leave their teams and travel to an abandoned parking garage to finally see who would win in a battle. In a perfect ending to this mashup, Barry and Oliver joke around, share some laughs and battle it out the way siblings would.
Arrow continues to raise the bar in terms of episodes. With jaw-dropping, heart pounding action scenes and small moments of intimacy, Arrow hooks fans over and over again. Although there were flashback sequences in this episode, they took a major backseat to the excitement happening in the present. All we can say is The Flash and Arrow crossover events need to happen on a regular basis.
Arrow airs on Wednesdays at 8/9c on the CW.
Overall Episode Grade: A+