Arrow S04E18 Review: A Death in the Family

Arrow, Season 4, Episode 18: Eleven-Fifty-Nine

Oh, hey, we finally know who is in that grave in the season's prologue flash-forward thing. Damian Darhk finally comes back as a big threat, and, well, finally manages to kill someone after eighteen episodes in and it's not the one you thought was going to die. It's a huge catalyst for getting Team Arrow to finally, well, stop dicking around with romantic subplots and finally gear up to fight HIVE and Darhk. I mean, you'd think after three seasons' worth of experience under their belt it would be obvious, but no....

I didn't follow the promotional material (which honestly were quite frontal in going all 'someone gun die!') and the episode honestly played out quite normally, with the focus of it seemingly being on Andy Diggle. Who's a great plot device to shove in between John Diggle's loyalty to his estranged brother, or to his team. It's a nice way that the episode keeps even the audience second-guessing on whether Andy is an actual HIVE spy, or if Oliver is being extra-paranoid... and let's be honest, it would totally be an Oliver thing to be extra-paranoid. John Diggle gets a fair amount of mileage after once more being underused for a good chunk of the season, with his newly-repaired friendship with Oliver being once more torn asunder due to his insistence that Andy Diggle is on their side despite all of Oliver's paranoia...

And you know what? Oliver was right for once! Andy Diggle was Merlyn's inside man, and wasn't double-double-agenting on Team Arrow's behalf. Except that for a moment it seemed that Oliver and John had pulled a fast one on Andy, going all 'you were right, Oliver'... except, they didn't do anything. And, whoops, Laurel died as a result. The scene was sudden, with Damian Darhk stabbing Laurel in the chest with an arrow... and honestly Laurel did have a couple of death flags with her going all 'I need to go out one last time as the Black Canary'. But, well, I don't know who I expected to die, but it sure as hell isn't Laurel Lance.

They had to pull a dick move too, going all 'yeah, she survived' in the hospital... before Laurel signed her death warrant by talking about how she has always loved Oliver all along... and, whoops, she subsequently goes into shock and dies. And... it honestly doesn't strike me as the boldest choice to make. I mean, it will probably utterly destroy Quentin and I bet we'll get a lot of heartwrenching scenes from both Quentin and Oliver next episode, but as far as the audience is concerned she's never really been the focus of the season (the fact that she's such a controversial character all throughout the first three seasons doesn't help either), relegated mostly to just another fighter in Team Arrow. She wouldn't have the same impact we would get if, say, Felicity kicked the bucket in the mid-season episode way back when.

Laurel was still a big character to kill off, though, I just felt that she really could've done more in the season to build up to this more. I mean, all she got was some 'man I gotta get Sara back' moments, and the raw, unbridled conversation she had with Oliver in this episode about their complex relationship that's gone long enough to be difficult to qualify into just a single word. She was a big enough character who went through so much in the first three seasons, it didn't feel right that she didn't have a proper character arc in the season where she dies. It isn't nearly as bad as Sara randomly getting shot for shock value, and it was drawn out rather agonizingly. I've grown from hating Laurel in the first two seasons, to laughing at her when the show made her butt monkey, to eventually liking her once she embraced her role as Black Canary... and I can't say that I don't feel sadness with her touching final conversation with Oliver.

Now the question, well, is that how long will Laurel Lance's death stick? With so much supernatural mumbo-jumbo in play throughout this season, and considering all dead characters other than Tommy Merlyn and Moira Queen eventually do find their way back to life, how long with Laurel's death stick? It's a beautiful, poignant death scene that finally paints the mortality of the characters fighting against Darhk, and it's not that I particularly hate Laurel, but I would like this death scene to at least stick.

Meanwhile, in the sub-plot side of things, Thea once more fights with Malcolm, and in the flashback, Reiter's forces and Oliver continue to shoot it out. The audience rolls their eyes with boredom. The flashback does give us another heartwrenching moment about Oliver calling Laurel his 'home', which honestly was a bit telegraphic of what was going to happen in the present day, but eh, it made the flashback a wee bit more relevant. 

Yeah, Laurel's death scene was great, and Laurel's scenes in this episode was great, but the events that facilitated said death -- the whole Andy Diggle business, Darhk's escape, the stupid business about the idol -- not so much. But hey, you get your victories where you get them, and the second Black Canary death is definitely far better-written and well-executed than the first Black Canary death.