Arrow S3x06 “Guilty”

WARNING! SPOILERS!

I think before we get into the real meat of this review, we should talk possibly the best moment of the entire series so far, which hands down, improves this episode ten times over just by featuring it. I’m talking of course about the Boxing Glove Arrow. The freaking BOXING GLOVE ARROW. I never expected the grim, gritty and realistic Arrow series to pull off something like this like they have done here. It’s so unexpected and it actually worked, and although it looks like a one time use, it made its inclusion all the more satisfying. This was by far the most awesome moment that this episode had to offer and was a great way of pleasing fans of comic book Ollie.

The episode itself, aside from that huge, important and incredibly significant moment, wasn’t quite up to top notch. It was all about keeping faith in your sidekicks, with Ted Grant’s character having once been a vigilante who let his sidekick go once he turned violent. It was good to see some development behind Ted’s character as well, and the fact that Starling City did indeed have a vigilante before the arrival of the Arrow, even if someone who wasn’t as high profile. (Also, Laurel unwittingly made it easy for Ted to pinpoint the identity of the Arrow easily if he wanted to, by referencing that they used to date.) The fact that Ted also had a sidekick as well played into the theme of this episode, which featured Roy’s own problems as he dealt with trying to deal with the fact that he believed he was responsible for the death of Sara.

As it turned out, the writers pulled another twist on us. I’d forgotten of course that in Season 2, when Roy was under the influence of the Mirakuru he killed a cop, and it’s good to see that the consequences of his actions were being brought back up here. As it turns out, the mystery of Sara’s killer is indeed, still open to debate (meaning Ra’s Al Ghul is back to becoming suspect number one) and it’ll be interesting to see how that thread is resolved going forward.

Roy got a lot to do this episode as he felt the after-effects of the Mirakuru. His revelation to the group that he believed he killed Sara was played out very well indeed, and it was interesting to see its consequences. It was also good to see that Ollie kept his faith in Roy with the use of the “Arsenal” moniker being namedropped as well, and it’s good to see that we have an official name for Roy’s character whilst he’s under the hood.

The murder mystery plot of Guilty was a fairly basic one. Once it was clear that everybody was after Ted Grant it was obvious that he was being framed, and it was interesting to see how they dealt with introducing his ex-sidekick. The episode itself also worked well to tease the new villain (The mother of Supernatural’s Dean and Sam Winchester), and as a result it’ll be interesting to see how things progress going forward.