Movies / Comics Movie Reviews

Arrow Betrayal Review

By Alexander Jones
February 7, 2013 - 05:39

What a great way to cap off an episode. This was a return to form for the show. Sure Ollie isn’t going to shoot his mother, but what if he did? Is the question so morally compromising to the audience keeping  in mind that Oliver knows for a fact that Moira had a hand in the sinking of the Queen’s Gambit and the death of Robert Queen. More importantly who knew Arrow had this incredible level of quality lurking among the shadows. Not every scene was great but this episode sure had some great moments, villains, character motivations, and over-arching plot threads. In Iron Heights prison we are greeted with David Anders playing the Arrow created Cyrus Vanch. David Anders nailed a good 90 percent of the performance this episode. The ten percent that was lacking was at the fault of the murky writing. While Vanch was an imposing villain some of his dialogue was a bit too on the nose and goofy slighting his imposing portrayal. His assistant also functioned as a poorly portrayed groupie of sorts. Another issue was how completely dumb they made the character of Vanch towards the end. Seriously Cyrus Vanch why exactly have you employed 24 guards? Do yourself a favor next time and make that 25. As poorly thought out at the fault of the writers it is unfortunately above average compared to the two dimensional villains usually represented on the show.

The island subplot had some great new developments this week. The audience were given many revelations of the show such as the inclusion of the second Deathstroke. This second Deathstroke was the actual Slade Wilson character and presumably will teach Oliver how to actually fight. Yao Fei playing such a prominent role in the case of the two Deathstrokes was engaging. Making the Deathstroke characters Australian Intelligence was such a great back story to attach to the two characters. The Island scenes are truly beginning to flesh out Oliver Queen. Arrow has a chance to be truly great television and is still bursting at the seams with potential. A great bit noticed early in the episode was the shout-out to Green Arrow creators Marv Wolfman and George Perez. While the show is not overtly faithful to it’s comic book roots, it doesn’t try to hide them either. Giving creators their due is a great way to build faith in comic book fans.

Amongst the sea of silly character motivations and lies Diggle once again rose up as the voice of reason. We all know how crazy and evil Moira is and for Ollie to figure that out over the course of two simple episodes is completely priceless. It just shows that Arrow is not completely dumb or afraid to take any chances. It simply is not taking all of the chances it could. Thankfully Cyrus Vanch was not murdered through the course of this episode. While David Anders is no doubt a hot commodity on modern day television, his acting no doubt improves the show. Dinah is also starting to treat the saint known as Tommy Merlyn as a good human being. Although this episode answered a few questions it raised some new mysteries. Who is the traitor at the police precinct and who is that mysterious security guard that threatened Diggle? This episode proved that Arrow can deliver the goods with more focus and better villains.

Rating: 9 /10

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12