Arrow S03E13 Review: All Your Secrets Undone

Arrow, Season 3, Episode 13: Canaries

In this episode, two big secrets that's been dragged on for a while are finally brought out into the open! Oliver finally tells Thea about his secret identity as the Arrow which went a lot better than I expected, and at the end of the episode Laurel finally breaks down and tells Quentin about Sara and good god that was a punch to the gut. A fair amount of things happen in this episode. We've got Oliver and Thea's little dynamic. We've got Laurel wrestling with a couple of issues: Oliver refusing to accept her as the Canary and facing her inner demons courtesy of the return of Count Vertigo the Second. We've got Roy and Merlyn both attempting to win back Thea's favours. We've got the slow buildup once more to Ra's Al Ghul... who apparently works very very slowly. Merlyn establishes that it's been a couple of weeks since Oliver returns. Where are the army of ninja assassins and Ubus? Jeez.

The flashback was another 'get from point A to B' moment, where Amanda Waller threatens Oliver Queen to spill the beans about where Maseo has disappeared off to on the threat of faking Thea's death. Oliver did spill the bins... but Maseo was savvy enough to lie to Oliver, although he gets himself captured trying to rescue Oliver. Waller doesn't kill them (even though we get a bit of Waller's men torturing Oliver and some threats about killing off Moira and Thea) but brings them to... Starling City. To catch China White. I don't... particularly care I guess. Especially in the face of all the big plot-heavy things that happens in this episode.

And secrets have been a big theme of this show, and this season in particular. And while Quentin does confront Laurel in a 'eh, y'know that Canary isn't Sara?' and when Laurel goes into his office at the end of the episode all teary-eyed, Quentin is kind of proud to say that he figured out the secret of Laurel being the Canary... but that's the wrong secret. And it is fucking depressing to see Quentin just break down again when he learns of Sara's death. Mother of fucks, man. I am sad.

Laurel is, I think, has been on a steady way to redemption ever since she donned the Canary mask. I am still ambivalent about her, mostly leaning to the 'seek psychological help already' side, but this episode certainly helps me get attached to her somewhat. I do like the little beef of Oliver trying to control Laurel... even if it's for her own good, and I do like how Laurel actually does have a point in her big arguments this time instead of being a hypocrite. Granted, she nearly got herself killed by going off on her own (does she forget she has Sara's old canary cry grenade things?) and I find that pretty dark how she's just beaten to a pulp all the time. Hella realistic, though, since all the training Laurel had are boxing lessons from Ted Grant. Who I'm going to assume to be alive after the events of last episode. And the little hallucinations brought to life by Vertigo's Scarecrow-drug, how she just sees Hallucinatory Sara yelling at her and beating her to a pulp for pretending to be her... and the second time around, an extremely horrifying angry-Quentin yelling and screaming about how Laurel had no right to hide Sara's death... it's pretty brutal for Laurel, and thankfully Laurel ended up maturing through the experience and finding her own identity as Laurel-the-Canary not Laurel-pretending-to-be-Sara. Which is nice. There's even Ghost-Sara (or possibly another hallucination) nodding at her in approval. Which is nice if not for the soul-crushing Quentin scene that follows soon after.

I thought Felicity suddenly plopping in and talking about how Laurel had a light that Sara never had... made no absolute goddamn sense. What the fuck, Felicity? Sara was one of the happiest people in the show and she was talking about how Oliver shouldn't let the anger and the mask consume him. In contrast, Laurel is a self-destructive adrenaline junkie who jumps into the deep end and somehow didn't get herself killed simply because she's got competent friends.

Though it works to help Laurel deal with her inner demons, I guess.

Count Vertigo himself is still doing his 'dangerous but hammy' attitude that's a stark contrast from the first more insane-dangerous Count Vertigo, but while he gets away at the end of the episode he really is more of a plot device to get Laurel to face her demons and all that. There's that whole filler-y moment where Count Vertigo basically forces a reporter to blow himself up by threatening his family, which I suppose is a parallel to how Maseo and Oliver both would do everything to protect their respective families in the flashbacks except, y'know, it isn't really necessary.

Also, to note, Ray Palmer is completely absent in this episode. Curious.

There's also a big point in this episode about how Team Arrow is more than just Oliver's crusade. Laurel points out how Oliver has been doing the same thing as she is to escape from grief, Diggle points out that Oliver isn't just gone to them, he was dead. And with both Felicity and Roy standing up to Oliver's attempts to throw his weight around regarding Thea and Laurel's involvements... at the end of this episode Oliver seems to have come to peace with the idea of the team being able to operate on their own. Which is nice.

Anyway, as I mentioned before, Oliver finally reveals his identity as the Arrow to Thea, and she's absolutely cool with it, and she doesn't break down about how everyone's keeping secrets to her. She's just so... happy and chill and all like 'you actually are helping people' and stuff. In the opposite direction, she does a big 180 towards Malcolm Merlyn after learning that Malcolm has been actively poisoning her with lies and that there are actual people out there that are protecting her other than Malcolm. Also, y'know, Oliver is her brother and she knew Malcolm for like half a year, blood relations notwithstanding.

Thea also gets to fuck DJ McDouchehole, and right after their sex, Douchehole tries to poison Thea with red wine spiked with cyanide. And Thea realizes it because Malcolm had told her about it... and instead of just stabbing Douchehole right in the gut the moment she realizes what's going on, she goes into this long tirade about how red wine can mask cyanide. Oh, Thea. Douchehole and Thea grapple a bit and he's about to kill her... except Arsenal and Merlyn burst in one after the other to shoot Douchehole one after the other, at which Thea finally realizes the threat of the League of Assassins.

Pretty fucking conveniently for Merlyn's newly-found thou-shalt-not-kill vow, instead of fighting to the death and trying to do some damage to Merlyn or Thea, Douchehole just pussies out and drinks his own poison. Yay, Douchehole is dead!

Also apparently Roy and Malcolm just happen to be hanging out near Thea's apartment while she's getting down and dirty with DJ McDouchehole? That is creepy.

I thought the scene transition with Thea walking down to see Oliver, and the Oliver telling her to go upstairs because, y'know, Laurel is fucking bleeding to death while Oliver and Roy argue about whether Thea is a big girl and Felicity is doing her spiel about how Team Arrow is more than Oliver. The sentiment is good, yes, but, y'know, as much as I hate Laurel you guys shouldn't really be leaving her to bleed to death while arguing.

There's still the big secret about how Thea was the one who killed Sara under mind-controlled drugs, and I can imagine that will be the big fallout between Thea and Malcolm (plus Oliver, maybe). But she's gone a long way from being a prissy little bitch. She's matured a lot in this season, and I like that. And by the end of the episode Thea has finally accepted both Oliver and Malcolm, the latter at least as a necessary evil. And I guess with the amount of times that Oliver calls Thea 'Speedy' -- which is a lot more than usual -- I guess she's going to pick up that mantle sometime soon?

And at the end of this episode, Oliver and Thea head off to Lian Yu to train, because apparently Ra's al Ghul is kind enough to give them whatever time they need to train... but I personally must say that I don't give a fuck because NEXT WEEK IS SLADE WEEK.

It's not a smooth episode and there are parts that I thought could've been done better. Like the whole business with McDouchehole, which I thought was kind of shoehorned in. And the flashbacks were m'eh. Also Felicity's really stupid speech. But a shit-ton of secrets get spilled on the table, we've got a lot of progression both character and plot wise, and I'm definitely pumped for Slade next week. It's a pretty kickass episode.