Arrow Season 3 Episode 21 - Al Sah-him Review

Arrow Season 3 Episode 21 – Al Sah-him Review

So many twists, so little time.

 

Episode 21 followed Team Arrow as they try to contend with Oliver being gone after joining the league. Meanwhile Oliver returns to Starling in order to eliminate the one threat to his reign, Nyssa.

 

I really enjoyed this episode. Episodes with a lot of Nyssa are always good and this one was no exception. She’s a great character, one who’s not really in the show enough for my liking. It’s interesting to see a complex character who for her whole life has only known one thing is suddenly thrust into a new situation. She is badass but also interesting as we see her struggle between doing the right thing fear of Ra’s and her right as heir to the Demon. It’s strange that daughter of the Demon would be so honourable. Also I must say that the scene with the milkshakes with Laurel was really funny.

 

Speaking of Laurel she has truly won me over. I prefer her like this, she seems happier and more upbeat which means when things get serious we care more about what happens to her. While it is strange to think she has become the voice of reason I like that she has become string and loyal. This is the sort of character I expected Black Canary to be. Furthermore I really enjoy her friendship with Nyssa, it builds on Nyssa’s humanity as well as adds to Laurels character, both as the Canary and the person under the mask. I do also appreciate being shown how Laurel has suddenly become so good in a fight.

 

Al Sah-him is menacing. Stephen Amell did a great job with the subtleties of showing very slight glimpses of Oliver Queen behind the mask of Al Sah-him. I also enjoyed watching Oliver in full flow this episode with the fight scene. We haven’t really seen that for a while on Arrow and it was great to see him fighting. The fight with Diggle was my favourite, we all knew there was no way Diggle could possibly win but at the same time seeing these two guys who are practically brothers fighting to the death was very powerful. One other thing was just a little thing in the opening, My Name Was Oliver Queen. That set the tone perfectly.

 

Arrow does a great job with its powerful scenes and this episode was no exception. For me the best in the episode was the one when Diggle and Felicity confronted Laurel and Nyssa over freeing Lyla. It’s very rare we see Diggle lose it but he slammed her into that wall with such a rage. I love that Diggle is being bought back to the forefront towards the end of the series, he’s such a strong and all around great character as we all know. He’s like the glue that holds both the team and really the whole show together and when for that brief moment I thought he was dead my heart sank. Plus how funny was it when he told Felicity no costume? Maybe I’m just easily pleased but that cracked me up.

 

Thea is an interesting character for sure, she went from whiney to awesome back to sort of whiney and now is awesome again. She was really enjoyable in this episode, I love the determined and almost aggressive Thea. It’s like Malcom said, she’s a warrior and there is some real fight in there. I really liked her moment when she shot the arrow at Oliver and I thought it was great when she talked to Malcom who by the way makes every scene he’s in infinitely better. This is the Thea I want to see in season 4 when she will likely be more of a focus. Strong sure but the cracks are still there and she’s certainly hurting and not as hardened as some of the others.

 

While I thought Thea was great I do want to address something and that’s the so called negative side effects of the Lazarus pit. It’ll probably be more of a focus next season but so far she’s been different for about 30 minutes and I was really hoping to see some conflict and problems come from a supposedly warped mind. The writers did this well with the Mirakuru plot and I thought they were doing something similar here. They probably will, it just seems like something to mention.

 

In these reviews I always have my time to moan about how the flashbacks aren’t very good but this time I won’t simply moan about the flashbacks. I’ll say Katana is really cool … and now moan. They just don’t work as well as last season, they feel kind of disjointed and they barely relate to the main plot. I will be really disappointed if the whole point of the flashbacks was to introduce the virus and kill Akio. I won’t go on too long, the flashbacks just take me out of the really interesting present day plot.

 

Now to talk about the big twists. I hear wedding bells. The look on Oliver and Nyssa’s faces said it all, I was NOT expecting that. It’ll be interesting to see where this is going, obviously they’re not going to get married but it does pose quite the conundrum. Also Ra’s wanting to kill everyone in Starling City is an interesting development. Very reminiscent of Batman Begins, it seems likely this will be the thing that is too far for Oliver and bring him back to himself. Finally Oliver was perfectly willing to kill not only Nyssa but Diggle too. Without Thea he would have stabbed Diggle through the chest. This for me was a big moment and perhaps the moment team Arrow lost faith in him. It was like watching another character, one who would kill his brother.

 

I really enjoyed this episode, not only for its good character development and powerful scenes but it had some great action and set up the rest of the season for a fantastic climax. Can’t wait for next week!

Arrow Season 3 Episode 16 - The Offer Review

Arrow Season 3 Episode 16 - The Offer Review

After an annoying break Arrow returned with a slid episode to start the push to the end of the season.

 

The offer focused on well, the offer made by Ras al Ghul to Oliver to take over the league of assassins and become the next Ras al Ghul. The flashbacks followed Oliver and Akio as they evade their attackers through Hong Kong.

 

I really did enjoy this episode as I like what it is setting up. Its main job was to set up the bigger things happening towards the end of this season and I think it did its job very well.

 

I think my biggest positive was Ras al Ghul. I like that they make it very clear he is the most dangerous villain Oliver has ever faced, both in terms of skill and his mind. I really enjoyed the scenes of him talking to Oliver in the Nanda Parbat. You could see how clever he is and how easily he got under Oliver’s skin, to a point where Oliver very nearly accepted his offer. It was both the little subtleties and how royal and authoritative he always appears that really define his character and I like he never shows any sign of weakness or panic. We also see how conniving he is and I look forward to seeing him more. He hold and exhibits real power just with his presence on screen and it’s fun to watch.

 

I really enjoyed the scenes with the original team Arrow members, being Oliver, Diggle and Felicty. It was great that it was them who convinced Oliver to not to take up Ras on his offer and it shows that no matter how many new characters they introduce, these will be the big three of team Arrow, a trifecta of awesome. Diggle’s great and his advice is as good as ever but the real enjoyable scenes were with Felicty. We had been missing these scenes between Oliver and Felicty lately and while she’s great with Ray it is nice to see them connect again. Their scenes always have a slight comedic edge with Felicty (Evil incorporated made me laugh) but they are always very heartfelt and meaningful. It shows us how much Oliver relies on Felicty and I will continues to enjoy their scenes. They’re two great characters that really complement each other perfectly and I don’t even mean in the romantic aspect, rather in terms of a bond and how it brings a real connection to the characters.

 

I’ve really come around to Laurel, I think she’s great which is not a popular opinion. I like that now she’s the Black Canary she is very relevant but she doesn’t take up too much focus. Kind of similar to Roy I think they’re using her the right amount and for me personally she really works. She’s pretty badass in a fight, she has some sass about her. She can be slightly overly emotional but so can everyone else, it’s just part of the drama. I no longer find her whiney, instead she’s more proactive and I like that she’s not trying to be Sara. I also find some of her dialogue quite funny, with the sass and occasional sarcasm and I think the writers are admittedly finally doing a god job with her.

 

It looks like we’ll be getting more of Nyssa and that is fine by me. I enjoy her character a lot, sure she does some cool assassin stuff but more importantly she is a very interesting character. She has obviously been very torn up by Sara’s death and her Father’s neglect and I’m looking forwards to seeing her motivations without following the league. I also enjoy her friendship with Laurel, they do have genuine respect for each other they do seem to find some comfort in each other of Sara. They’re both having a tough time and I hope and I hope this isn’t some fake out thing and Nyssa is just using Laurel, the friendships in Arrow are always really great, whether it’s within team Arrow or like when Tommy was still alive. The other thing that makes Nyssa interesting is she believes she is doing the right thing despite how many she kills. She does believe in justice and honour which is why I think she did seek out Laurel just for a friendly face and somewhere to go. Seems like we’ll get more of her and I can’t wait to see.

 

As always Merlin (That one big happy family line cracked me up) was great, Detective, I mean Captain Lance is very enjoyable to watch. I really felt the pain he was going through watching this, he was harsh but understandably so, he was lied to by everyone he trusts about the death of his own daughter. I also really enjoyed the action scenes in this episode, they were very well done as was the dialogue as always.

 

 

I did have some weak points though. The flashbacks were pretty pointless, pretty much nothing happened until we saw Shado right at the end. I’m sure it’ll be explained but I doubt that really was Shado, we saw her clearly dead and buried in a grave. It is interesting to see who that is but having Oliver and Akio walk around Honk Kong talking about nothing in particular and basically just filler wasn’t very interesting. It’s a shame as the flashbacks have been pretty weak lately but then again they do seem to be leading up to something so at least it’s not just wasted time, or at least I hope not.

 

Thea was also pretty weak here. She wasn’t awful but she did seem to whine quite a lot, similar to how she was in season one. The only saving grace was that she is going through a lot and it would probably send me crazy too, I just think they spent a little too much time with her as all she did in this episode was complain about how awful everything is. It’s not that they shouldn’t have shown this, just not quite as much.

 

The villain wasn’t very strong but then again he was by no means the focus. He just wasn’t very interesting, all he was there for was something for Oliver to save people from to get his realisation. He didn’t really serve much of a purpose, he could’ve been replaced with any random thug. I also didn’t really like Oliver’s realisation. He realised that he was doing this to help people? Isn’t that obvious and wouldn’t that be even easier to do as head of the league of assassins. Also he says about how there were casualties before saying he’s doing this to help people. I’m pretty sure a lot of people were shot, so a lot of the policemen didn’t make it home like he was saying. Maybe a bit of a nit-pick but I thought it was worth mentioning.

 

So where do I think the show is going? I think Roy is going to die. He’s coming into his own, he knows his place, things look okay for him and now he’s back together with Thea, it seems like they’re setting up a tragic death and I admit it would be tragic as Roy’s a great addition to team Arrow. However I think he’ll die so Thea can take the ‘Speedy’ mantel as well as heap more regret and tragedy onto her character to push her towards bigger things. Maybe it’ll make her do good or maybe it’ll unleash her inner darkness but I think it will happen.

 

Overall this episode was really good, then again I always say that about Arrow. It was enjoyable, it opened a lot of doors for what they can do and set up what is looking like it’ll be a really great climax to the season. Next week’s episode see’s Dig get married, the return of the suicide squad and the Atom learning the identity of the Arrow. I can’t wait.