What on Earth just happened? A couple of weeks ago at the City of Heroes fan convention, when asked what he’d like to see change on the show, David “Diggle” Ramsey said Green Arrow shouldn’t be fighting nukes, but crime and corruption on the streets; a veritable modern day Robin Hood. In this week’s finale, Team Arrow stopped nuclear holocaust, saved Star City from a man who by all rights should have been a God, all thanks to the power hope and some copy and pasting. Oh... and producer Marc Guggenheim thumbed his nose at the viewers one last time, because why not?
I’m loath to make the comparison because at this point it’s so easy, but in a week that had such a good finale for THE FLASH, ARROW has sunk to a new low.
The standoff we were left with last episode was resolved almost immediately. Did we see Curtis step up and become the hero he seems destined to become? No. He was thrown into some boxes. Speedy turned up with Darhk’s daughter, a character of zero consequence it would seem because she only existed to diffuse this one fight and nothing more. Sure she’s in the background later on, but Darhk doesn’t seem to care. He just wanted to launch those nukes and destroy the world because of “reasons” (read: his wife’s dead and he has nothing to live for?).
The nukes though, oh my God the nukes; 15,434 launched simultaneously. I don’t think the writers of this show know what that would look like. This goes beyond Bond movie levels of destruction into something from INDEPENDENCE DAY. I feel the problem is that ARROW wanted its stakes to be high.
Whilst THE FLASH threatened the fate of the Multiverse ARROW needed to do something similar, ignoring the fact that finale of THE FLASH was earned, had personal stakes with characters dying in trying to save the day. ARROW, not so much. The world had two hours before it was nuclear toast, but for the sake of drama and the episode’s run time, there was a single nuke headed for Star City in 45 minutes. Felicity, still managing to make everything about her, questions why Oliver wasn’t able to counteract Darhk’s magic like a few weeks ago. You know, after Darhk was empowered by the death of tens of thousands of dead (I still can’t believe they did that) and Oliver was powered by the faith that little old Felicity had in him? Darhk’s power seems to wane, however, as when Oliver faces him it’s all but gone. Tens of thousands dead, for nothing. Despite that though, Darhk is able move a bullet into Felicity’s ex’s spine from across town with nothing but a thought because the plot demanded it. See he was using him to keep the nukes in the air, but once he’s dead, after having hacked for so long his fingers bled (I wish I was making this up).
Felicity is able to save the world, which she does by simply diverting all the nukes into space. We don’t even see this happen, we’re just told. 15,434 nukes just hurled into orbit. There’s a very similar scene in X-MEN: APOCALYPSE, a powerful moment given its proper service albeit for one cringe inducing tonal misstep. Here however, nothing. We’re told instead of shown, which goes against Storytelling101. The one nuke coming to Star City however, we see that though. Felicity is able to hack that once it’s in line-of-sight and send it flying off in another direction. Where to and if it explodes? Never even mentioned.
Whilst all this is going on, Oliver in his civilian get-up gave a rousing speech to the people of Star City to not lose hope. Instead of having his armed soldiers just shoot the people rising up against him, Darhk just had them charge. The people charged back. I get it was meant to be a powerful moment, but it wasn’t. I’d seen it all done before on a considerably bigger budget at the end of THE DARK KNIGHT RISES and frankly, it felt empty then too. Green Arrow, empowered by the hope of the people, represented by the 40 or so extras that he had behind him, somehow overcame the power of Darhk, the thousands of deaths just washed away. Then these two masters of the martial arts proceed to punch each other in the face. A lot. When goaded by Darhk by the fact he wouldn’t kill him, Oliver made the most sensible statement made in ARROW for the last few weeks. With all the death and destruction he had caused, he hadn’t left him with a choice, ending Darhk with an ARROW to the gut.
Some other stuff happened but it was kind of meaningless. Diggle confessed to Lyla him killing Andy wasn’t truly in self-defense. She seemed okay with it. Thanks for wrapping that up Guggenheim, I guess? Then, because Oliver Queen was so popular, he’s offered the position of Mayor, because that’s how politics works apparently.
The flashbacks wrap up this season’s story quickly, with Taiana killing Reiter before having Oliver kill her before the power from the idol consumes her. Amanda Waller make a brief appearance, as Oliver had a way to radio her at almost any time, letting him know she could use a man like him in the field. He declines however as he has one place left to go. To keep his promise to Taiana to go to her home town in Russia and let her family know what happened to her and her brother. With one season of flashbacks to go, the writers are breaking their necks to catch Oliver up to where we see him in the pilot, Russian mob connections and all. I’d be interested to see how they manage it, if I weren’t dreading Season 5 so much.
Then the real kicker. Everyone leaves. Lance leaves because he’s not being reinstated as a cop. Thea leaves to find herself. Even Diggle leaves, seemingly re-enlisting to make use of himself in the army again. All but Felicity, the walking embodiment of everything wrong with this show, who ends Season 4 with the thinnest veiled dig at the viewers.
“You thought I was leaving too? Not a chance?”
Damn.
Written by Nick Whitney, ARROW Beat Writer -- Click here to read Nick's posts
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