Arrow S07E04 Review: Rubik's Cube

Arrow, Season 7, Episode 4: Level Two

A bit of an interesting episode. If nothing else, this time around we're not 100% clear as to where the season is going at this point, which can either be a good thing or a bad thing. And a good chunk of it revolves around the flash-forwards, which finally built around the world of Future Star City. I'm not sure how canon that one Legends of Tomorrow episode where the one-armed Oliver Queen fights alongside Connor Hawke against the Ravager in the dystopian Star City is, or if they're just working on generic 'bad future' concepts, or even if this future won't turn out to be the bad future they must prevent or something, and I'm not 100% sure if the Arrow writing staff  have a concrete plan in mind yet. It's basically throwing around a bunch of vague plot points while being cryptic. There's the Rubik's cube map, Felicity's apparent death, there's Dinah and future-Zoe as part of a vigilante movement, and apparently the Glades is some sort of dystopian wasteland that's seceded from Star City or some shit? I dunno. It's definitely a hell lot more interesting than Roy and William dicking around Lian Yu, that's for sure. 

The subplots in this episode are... a bit disconnected from each other. Perhaps most interesting is the torture that new character Dr. Jarrett Parker is inflicting on Oliver Queen, using your standard Arkham Asylum style inhumane psychiatrist tools to torture Oliver Queen. It's unclear if Parker is just one hell of an extremist or actually part of a larger conspiracy to break Oliver's spirit, but he basically pulls off a Prometheus -- except instead of condemning Oliver's crusade, he's trying to guilt-trip him, noting how his actions and that of his father are the actions of a murderer, and he's going to basically influence his son to become one as well. It's an interesting twist on something we've seen before, and it does follow season five and six's (admittedly ultimately unfulfilling) theme of Oliver Queen being forced to face the sins of his past. It's interesting, though, in that some of the advice that Dr. Parker is giving Oliver are actually sound advice. Now we wait and see what Parker's intentions are.

The rest of the cast... Rene and Dinah go on another one of the "vigilantes are good/bad" argument, although their argument here is executed a lot better compared to the previous three episodes, in that both characters are actually far more restrained and logical in their arguments, and they end up teaming up with New Arrow to bring down a random arsonist. I do like the little justification given by Dinah, where she tells Diggle how she's been pretty traumatized about bad things happening to her "in the shadows", including Vince's death, and that goes a long way for excusing some of her more bull-headed and stupid decisions. 

Meanwhile, Felicity is basically pissed off at all this 'playing nice' that everyone is advocating, and brings in Laurel II to help out torture Silencer. It's... it's an interesting take to move Felicity into especially considering how utterly static her character's been for the past couple of seasons. It's sort of overdone with other characters in this show, but seeing Felicity angry and ready to take the fight against Ricardo Diaz. I'm not sure if I still buy Laurel's sudden transformation into "hey, girl, don't kill this man, you'll become evil", but I guess Quentin's death really affected her that much? 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• He went unnamed in the first season, but apparently the third man on the raft that Robert Queen killed is called Hackett, who, in the Green Arrow: Year One comics (the miniseries that Arrow's first season borrows a lot from) is Oliver's right-hand man that betrayed him and sabotaged the ship, stranding him on the island.
• On the bad future (which may or may not be the one seen in Legends of Tomorrow's first season), graffiti of Deathstroke's face can be briefly seen in the background. 
• The Beebo line of dolls, established to be very popular in the Arrowverse in Legends of Tomorrow, makes its first proper appearance in Arrow in this episode. 
• The canary brooch that Dinah gives to Zoe is the based on the Birds of Prey logo from the comics.