We’ve still been left with a bit of a disappointed taste in our mouths so far this season of Arrow. This weeks episode opened with the new team failing miserably at the taking down of a bad guy missing targets and getting beaten up quite badly. Perhaps Curtis (Echo Kellum) would be better suited to helping Felicity than taking punches.
Rory (Joe Dinicol) after finding out about Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) was the reason that his family died in Haven Rock quits the team, just as Lyla (Audrey Marie Anderson) turns up to team up with Oliver (Stephen Amell) to get Diggle (David Ramsey) out of prison. Lyla wants Felicity to help them locate a new type of technology, but given that she seems unwilling to break a few laws to get an unwilling Diggle out of prison (a vigilante who frequently hacks into government facilities etc in her spare time who won’t help get a friend out of prison? We don’t really get it either).
It results in the two of them fighting over it a few times, Felicity wants them to respect Diggle’s decision, but Oliver doesn’t want to hear it, and for once we are on Oliver’s side. We want Diggle back. He goes off on his own, but the new team aren’t having any of it. They aren’t going to ‘let’ him go it alone. Which is both honourable and stupid. Instead of letting them, Oliver downs them and rides off into the night. We still can’t really warm to the new recruits (bar Curtis who we already love), and its the constant failing and never winning.
Once Oliver gets into the base, with the expert help of Lyla, it doesn’t take a whole lot to convince Diggle that he wants to leave. Oliver is his brother. It’s very heartfelt, and its the most emotion we’ve felt towards this series so far.
Elsewhere and Tobias Church is still causing trouble for the day-team. Once Oliver has beaten the new team off his back, they do kind of terribly, but at least Rory came back after his very brief absence and Wild Dog (Rick Gonzalez)gets up getting taken by Church. Honestly, when Oliver declares at the end that they are going to get him back, it’s hard to get behind his. He might well be better off just leaving him behind…
The sooner than Diggle gets back in the team, and they stop trying to push the new team quite so hard, maybe Arrow will come back to its former glory. As it stands, we’re finding it hard to connect with any of this year’s new characters.
