Arrow
CW
Season 5, Epsiode 19 “Dangerous Liasons”
This week’s episode of Arrow saw some changes in the relationships of several of the cast. Not the least of which strongly affected John & Lyla’s marriage, but I’ll get to that shortly. In an effort to quickly track down Adrian Chase, who escaped the Federal Marshals who were watching him in the last episode, Felicity makes a deal with Helix to help break one of their tech geniuses out of ARGUS custody. This puts her in direct conflict with Oliver and the team as they have been tasked by Lyla with keeping the prisoner and Helix founder, Cayden James, locked up without the benefit of a trial.
The notion that Lyla (who as you remember is now in charge of ARGUS after the death of Amanda Waller) would deny this man his due process doesn’t sit well with Diggle and a rift forms between the couple. After successfully outmaneuvering Team Arrow with the help of Felicity, Helix frees Cayden James. They deliver the device to Felicity as promised in exchange for her help, but they scrub their base of operations and send Felicity a message telling her that her relationship with Green Arrow complicates things for them too much to be able to have her work with them any further.
Meanwhile, Quentin grills Rene about why he hasn’t ever tried to see his daughter and Rene informs Quentin that he is worried he will hurt her again and he feels that he just isn’t any good for her. Not accepting this, and still reeling from the loss of his own daughter Laurel, Quentin arranges for a surprise visit between Rene and his little girl. Rene decides he will fight to get his daughter back in his life after all. Upon his return to base, Oliver and Felicity discuss her actions and Oliver tells her that he understands why she did what she did and the two seem to reach a new level of understanding. At this point, Felicity uses the device that Helix provided to begin tracking Adrian Chase which pinpoints his location as… right there with them! Cue the huge explosion aaaaaannd blackout.
Starting with the positive notes, I really enjoy how they are fleshing out Rene’s character more in these past few episodes. I am looking forward to him being promoted to a season regular for Season 6. Also enjoyable is the new take we are seeing from Felicity. Her character is expanding this season into something other than Oliver’s love interest and the team’s resident computer whiz (we even got to see her go all “Huntress” in the season finale of ‘Legends Of Tomorrow’ earlier this month). That being said, I am disappointed with the somewhat contrived conflict that has been set up between John & Lyla. John is concerned about a man’s due process being taken away by his wife, yet he hangs out with vigilantes who kill / have killed on the regular. Not to mention the fact that John killed his own brother last season! I don’t recall Andy Diggle getting a trial before you executed him, John.
Other than a possible need by the writers to keep John from being happy (because happy = boring when it comes to our favorite TV characters), I don’t understand the need for this particular plot line. I also don’t feel that Curtis is being utilized as much as he could be in the show, BUT… I am happy where he appears to be headed. He’s got the jacket, he’s perfecting his T-Spheres, as soon as his fighting game gets stronger, I’m thinking that Mr. Terrific will be a true force to be reckoned with in the Arrowverse!! So while I dug the episode over all apart from the seemingly random conflict between Mr. & Mrs. Diggle, it still fit solidly within the realm of what has been happening this season and it ended, literally, with a bang. Now when are we getting an Echo Kellum led spinoff series?!?!?!
