Arrow Season 3, Ep 22

Oliver/Al Sah-him finishes his training  and is left with two final tasks to become the next Ra’s al Ghul. Ra's threatens Nyssa and delivers some shocking news. Meanwhile, Malcolm makes a surprising offer to Team Arrow and Thea goes to see Roy.

First things first, some of this episode was good. It was awesome seeing Katana, The Atom, Black Canary, and other members of Team Arrow all suit up and murder League of Assassins members in broad daylight. Katana especially, I didn’t expect her to get a costume this season! And Brandon Routh’s Ray Palmer continues to be hilarious and awesome, even if it’s currently just an Iron Man knock off.

However, what the hell are the writers thinking? The episode ends on yet another shocking twist, but are we really supposed to buy it at this point? I mean, the midseason finale was Oliver getting stabbed and kicked off a cliff, and one episode later he was fine. There’s simply no tension in Nanda Parbat, any deaths can be easily undone thanks to the Lazarus pits. Furthermore, Ra’s al Ghul is a moron. He’s completely oblivious to pretty much everything happening around him, twirling his mustache as he arranges a marriage for his daughter.

If there is any justice left in the world, Diggle will reveal that his real name is John “Diggle” Stewart and that he took sculpting classes in college. ARGUS then gives him a Green Lantern ring, setting up the next season to be Green Lantern/Green Arrow. “My sister, Speedy, is a junkie!” I need this.

Arrow Season 3, Ep 21

In this week’s episode of Arrow, Oliver has finally taken up Ra’s Al Ghul’s offer to replace him as the head of the League of Assassins. Oliver undergoes a transformation, coming out the other side as Al-Sah-Him, heir to the demon. The Ollie we knew and loved is gone, replaced with a ruthless killer. And when Nyssa decides to go against the League with the help of Laurel, Felicity, and Diggle, Al-Sah-Him is who they are up against…

I feel like I already heard this one, probably because I did. This whole season has just been Batman Begins, but longer. Billionaire playboy at his wits end enrolls in the League of Assassins, is forced to kill, disagrees with Ra’s Al Ghul, and you can probably guess the rest. Something about destroying a city, only this time it’s Starling instead of Gotham.

Is this really what they should be doing with the Green Arrow character? I wanna see him grow a cool beard and make jokes about boxing glove arrows, not be Green Batman. I’m tired of Batman. If you changed Oliver’s name to Bruce this show would actually make more sense.

Stephen Amell does make a convincing Al-Sah-Him, the man has grown tremendously as an actor since the first season. Matt Nable’s Ra’s Al Ghul is pretty awesome as well, bringing some degree of belief to the 600 year old warlord. David Ramsey’s Diggle is still the highlight of the show, however.

There’s only 2 episodes left in this season. I really hope they’re going to bring Ollie back to Starling City, give him his green hood again, and let him be the Green Arrow in season 4. Not the Arrow, the Green Arrow.

Top 20 Shows of 2013: #10-1

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Arrow

Straight as an ...

by Jim Smith

The new millennium brought us Smallville, a show that followed a young Clark Kent through adolescence.  Darker and more angst-ridden than previous looks into the Superman mythos, Smallville was a smash hit and ran for ten seasons.  One of the principles the producers held to was “no flights / no tights” until the final season.  It set a new tone for superhero TV shows.

The same theme was followed in 2002 in Birds of Prey, but the TV-watching population had only enough geek in it for one show, and BoP died a premature death.  Likewise, in 2006, Aquaman never made it past a pilot episode.

This year, we have a new superhero show to geek out over in the CW’s Arrow.  Arrow will follow the adventures of billionaire playboy Oliver Queen who dons a green hood and fights crime as the Arrow.

The Arrow will be a slightly different character than the Green Arrow character from Smallville and the comics.  To help promote the series, DC produced a 10-page comic book to serve as a prelude to the series.  The cover of the comic was created by iconic comic artist Mike Grell who oversaw the most successful period of the Green Arrow’s comic book existence.

The Smallville iteration of Green Arrow was analogous to the early days of the Green Arrow character in the comics, using a variety of trick arrows to fight crime in a non-lethal, classic superhero-ish way.  In 1987, after 46 years as a co-star and back-up feature in other hero’s mainline titles, Green Arrow got his own title under the leadership of the aforementioned Grell, starting with a three-issue limited series entitled Green Arrow: The Longbow Hunters.  This new series saw Green Arrow abandon his trademark gadget arrows in favor of simple razorpoint hunting arrows.  The series was part of DC’s new “grown up” comic lines, which were printed in a prestige (glossy paper) format, and featured darker themes and more mature storylines, which included the abduction and savage torture of Green Arrow’s super-powered love interest, Black Canary.  Another more mature theme is Green Arrow adopting the belief that sometimes, he has to kill in order for justice to be served.

From the previews, Arrow will draw heavily on the Grell-inspired Longbow Hunters period of the character.  The costume is very similar to the costume adopted by Green Arrow in The Longbow Hunters (for the record, so was the version in Smallville), and the previews I have seen didn’t show any gadget arrows.

While there will have to be some pretty deep backstory in the first few episodes for those who are new to the Green Arrow mythos, the show descriptions seem to promise a good bit of action starting with episode one.  Early episode titles like “Lone Gunmen”, “Damaged”, “Muse of Fire”, and “Vendetta” offer a tantalizing taste of action and super-hero geekgasms to come in this eagerly anticipated series.