Arrow S06E20 Review: Honorable Man

Arrow, Season 6, Episode 20: Shifting Allegiances

Anatoly Knyazev is one of the most under-utilized character in Arrow, and honestly, while watching through the Cayden James arc I really wished at times that it was Anatoly that was the big bad instead. He had everything going on for a big bad -- he's got the whole past with Oliver as an ally and a friend, he knows Oliver inside-out as a mentor, he has the reason for a vendetta after Oliver's betrayal of his trust earlier in the series. In short, Anatoly would be sort of like a combination of Slade and Adrian Chase, someone who knows Oliver inside out. Yet it seems that poor Anatoly is sort of doomed to just be a secondary character. And as much as I like Kirk Acevedo's performance, there's just something that I feel was missed by not having Anatoly be a more prominent antagonist instead of being a glorified thug who drops hilarious Russian-accented one-liners. 

And everything surrounding the Oliver/Anatoly stuff this episode is just golden. David Nykl and Stephen Amell play amazingly off each other, and I really love how Oliver arrives with an attempt to get Anatoly out of this whole shebang -- by apologizing to the other Pakhans and giving him back his seat in the Bratva. But Anatoly's rebuttal actually does make sense -- the Bratva cast him out after a single mistake, and Diaz would come after him regardless. Plus there's the whole point of Oliver betraying Anatoly's trust in... season four, I want to say? The conversations around their shared history is amazingly well-done in a way that the Oliver-Cayden and Oliver-Diaz confrontations didn't feel like they have. Especially the revelation that Oliver had wanted to be captured just to get a one-on-one with Anatoly. Shared history is an extremely powerful tool, and that made this confrontation really impactful.

Likewise, when Ricardo Diaz is brought into this whole this, happy to whack on Oliver while he's chained to the ground and helpless, Anatoly's inner Bratva honour rears its head. He asks that Diaz at least beat up Oliver while he's on his foot, which Diaz obliges... only to stab Oliver with a hidden blade to make sure that everyone gets his whole "life isn't fair" motif. (He also misquotes TDKR's Bane) All of Oliver's talk about how Anatoly was a good and honourable man come back to haunt him, and this causes Anatoly to end up picking the side with the man who had shown honour in the fight, meaning Oliver. Of course, it ends up too late as Diaz immediately let loose his plan to get Oliver indicted for his vigilantism charges and get him imprisoned for life. 

Of course, it's a bit of a shame that the rest of the episode and the other plotlines aren't quite that interesting. I groan and die a little every time the trial or Agent Watson is mentioned, since it's a plot thread I've never found interesting or compelling. The Quentin/Laurel/Diaz storyline is also intensely grating for me. All three actors are some of the best that Arrow has to offer, with Quentin's angry and betrayed screaming at Not-Laurel for seemingly taking advantage of his kindness and emotional issues as a way to use him as a pawn in Diaz's game... and Quentin's eventual relenting as he realizes that the last time he refused a supervillain, a Laurel died. Likewise, Not-Laurel's discomfort about how Quentin is being used and how much she hates this whole situation is amazingly portrayed without that many words. 

It sort of falls apart, though, when Quentin lampshades the fact that Laurel Lance, the Black Siren, is a powerful metahuman terrorist with the ability to unleash sonic screams, and Ricardo Diaz, backup or no backup, is just a man who just happens to be a drug overlord. I really don't buy why Not-Laurel is afraid of Diaz so much just because he 'burns a man for childhood grievances', and that aspect of this sub-plot sort of crumbles for me. 

Meanwhile, John Diggle's now a squad leader in ARGUS, and has recruited the Outsiders as his allies. A bunch of apologies are thrown around (not sure why they so readily forgive Diggle... is it a case of 'oh you hate Oliver now'?), Rene returns after a half-season absence only to suffer from PTSD and back out while he sorts out his emotions, and we get the combined forces of the Outsiders and ARGUS doing battle against the suddenly-super-relevant Quadrant, with Mr. Terrific actually doing something in the field for once. It's pretty neat, if nowhere as interesting as the Anatoly/Oliver stuff. I guess a lot of it is my general fatigue with the Laurel and Outsiders storylines? 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Practically nearly every facet of Oliver and Anatoly's meetings throughout the past 5 seasons is mentioned in one way or another. Likewise, Quentin mentions how Damien Darhk had pressured him into kowtowing to him when he was the main villain of season four, and how 'our' Laurel's death is a result of that. 
• This is the first mention of a Damien Darhk from Earth-2 when Not-Laurel confirms his existence. 
• Not sure if it's unintentional, but Diaz's "I WAS BORN IN IT!" line in reference to Oliver spending five mere years in hell seems to be a bit of a homage to the oft-quoted line said by Bane from The Dark Knight Rises.