It’s Cupid, stupid!
Cupid is back! Apparently, ARGUS’ Suicide Squad has a “good behavior” program, because former homicidal maniac Carrie Cutter is back on the streets! You gotta love how local law enforcement nor Team Arrow were given any heads up about this. This is why I can’t be too upset that Waller is dead. God willing, Lyla Diggle will run this agency much better and not let loose dangerous criminals.
Anyhow, Carrie has a new outlook on love and romance. She’s taken her former-love interest’s (Floyd Lawton, aka Deadshot who was presumably killed last season) views on love to heart: Love is a bullet to the brain. Love is dead. There is no such thing as happily ever after, for anyone. She wants to cut out the middle man by abducting newly married couples and killing them. Felicity’s own bitterness over the failure of her relationship with Oliver shows in how she empathizes with Carrie’s mission. That can’t be good.
Here comes the bride
Oliver learns that one of the couples Carrie is planning to target is himself and Felicity. So he suggests they stage a ruse wedding to trap her. It’s a terrible idea but no one but me and Felicity seems to think so. Which leads to Felicity showing up at the venue that Oliver never wanted to cancel, dressed to the nines in a gorgeous wedding dress. Oliver is clearly ready to take this wedding seriously and recites heartfelt vows to Felicity, promising he will never lie to her again.
Cupid interrupts shortly after, threatening to blow the venue up (after shooting Oliver doesn’t work, thanks to a kevlar vest underneath his tux). Felicity tries to talk her down, stalling for time while Thea and Diggle get into position to subdue the crazy Cupid. She recites, in essence, her own vows to Oliver, extolling the virtues of love and how her love for Oliver helped her to become a better person. Her little speech gave Oliver some hope that maybe he and Felicity could come back together.
Not so fast, Oliver
Oliver wants to talk to Felicity about what happened during the “wedding”, the things they said. He gets a chance, late that night at the lair when she stops by the “pick up a few things”, not expecting to find him there. She admits to him that she loves him, that she wants to be with him. But she also admits that she doesn’t believe that Oliver is ready to change from a man who will lie to her when put into a difficult situation. Her trust in him has eroded.
This was as much about Felicity protecting herself as it was anything else. She announces she is leaving the team, because being around him and not being with him is hard as hell and not fair to either of them. She gives him back the ring, again, and tells him not to give it to her again. That he can’t fix it. He doesn’t want to let her go and she doesn’t want that either. But she’s already gone.
It looks hopeless. But it’s actually not. Because Felicity laid out to Oliver what needs to happen. He needs to earn her trust, show her that he can let her in, that he can lean on her and treat her as a true partner. He’s given her the words, and while the words are nice, they mean nothing if she can’t trust the action behind them. Oliver will prove his integrity towards her with his actions in the episodes to come. This is how he further evolves on his heroic journey. This is how Olicity becomes stronger than steel.
Darhk on the defense
Carrie Cutter isn’t the only baddie who had to face the long arm of the law in this episode. Damien Darhk was arrested for his part in the kidnapping of Oliver’s son and at his preliminary hearing, his savvy attorney presented a case that Damien was as much a victim as William Clayton was, that he’s not the “Damien Darhk” who has been evil for all these months after all. It was a ballsy move for his defense, but it became clear to Laurel, who was prosecuting, that there really was very little physical evidence to even prove that Damien was Damien.
Trying to put Diggle on the stand to testify about Darhk kidnapping him, Felicity and Thea at Christmas fell apart when Diggle’s own integrity was called into question. The best chance to prove that Damien was not only who the prosecution says he is but that he’s the architect of much of the evil in the city for the last several months was Quentin Lance. It meant incriminating himself, because of his own involvement with Darhk earlier on, and Laurel is reluctant to do that to her father. She wants to protect him. But Quentin insists, wanting to protect her from Darhk’s evil.
As a result, Darhk is remanded to prison to await trial, but Quentin is also suspended from the force. He has no regret. But Damien seems to have a plan. Is the wedding ring he had hidden in his mouth while being escorted to his cell another magical totem? What does he have up his sleeve?
Were there flashbacks this episode?
Yes, there were flashbacks. And they were dull as dishwater as per usual. In the cavern that Reiter opened, they find a magical totem not unlike the one Darhk had in his possession, that he used to fuel his powers. It seems that Reiter is trying to do something similar in fact, showing how the totem absorbs the life force of a henchman that Reiter shoots. Oliver and Taianna can see that this is bad juju and they grab the totem, running further into the caves with it.
Reiter tells them over a walkie talkie that there is no exit for them but past him. But Oliver and Taianna get some guns off some henchmen who were sent to catch them and appear ready to do battle. Do I really care? Not especially. Still not a fan of Taianna and I don’t expect that to change any time soon.
