Arrow - S4E4 - Beyond Redemption

Previously on Arrow, ‘Restoration’

This week’s Arrow was not kind to Captain Lance. His officers were out causing trouble (murdering and selling stolen drugs if you want to be specific), Laurel dropped the bomb that his youngest was both newly alive and no longer herself (not very tactfully I might add – although I guess there’s no easy way to bring up a loved one’s imperfect resurrection), and he had to sit through a lecture from Oliver (and a justified one at that!)

Images: The CW

Team Arrow were informed of Oliver’s impending mayoral run – which elicited about as many laughs as you’d expect from such a ridiculous plot line. On the plus side, the new campaign office has a swanky new lair underneath, fitted with fancy STAR Labs tech and impractical costume mannequins for the whole gang. Laurel and Thea decided not to tell anyone about Sara, which will in no way come back to bite them later. And by later I mean that they couldn’t even make it through one episode before Sara’s inevitable escape. This is what happens when you secretly chain your undead sister in the basement (in my experience anyway).

Good

Oliver’s shock at everyone not being immediately supportive of his plan to run for mayor is hilariously accurate. Such a little rich boy.

Felicity and Curtis had some more fun scenes together, although I have trouble believing that a certified genius like Curtis would have trouble figuring out that Felicity’s beefy boyfriend is the Green Arrow. Also, are dead siblings the new dead parents? This show can’t seem to get enough of them. It was nice to see Felicity dealing with her grief about Palmer.

Diggle getting caught by a net gun was pretty hilarious (hopefully intentionally).

Bad

The acting and staging of the first scene between the drug dealers/cops/other cops was pretty subpar, and included the most wooden reading of the phrase “sons of bitches” I’ve ever had the misfortune of watching.

I know that a show like this requires a healthy amount of suspended disbelief, but does Lance really have so little regard for chain of custody? He just handed an evidence bag over to Oliver, which is really not gonna be good for the prosecution.

Felicity is weirdly unperturbed by all of her tech fluctuating around her. It seems like something that would bother her more. On the subject of characters acting out of character, would Lance really go to Darhk for advice about Sara? This conversation did allude to Darhk being a father, which will please the ‘Darhk is Felicity’s Father’ theorists.

Oliver speechifying about how united the city used to be is some major revisionist history.

Best Quotes:

“I don’t have time to respond to something that doesn’t contain at least one ACTUAL word.” – Felicity’s opinion emojis