Arrow: S03E23: "I am Oliver Queen!"

Rating: 5

In A Nutshell

I am Oliver Queen! Says the title. Well, I am quite frankly very bored of this show. I didn't expect the finale to save our minds from falling asleep, and sure as a deep throated Oliver shout, it didn't. A good episode to perhaps paint the wall whilst keeping an eye on proceedings.

Let's see, we have our gang of heroes realising they were still alive in the cell. Shock horror. Yes, they'd all been inoculated secretly by Malcolm. Yeah, don't ask. Meanwhile, in a plane heading to Starling City, we've Oliver, his wife and Ra 'al Ghul. Plane ride gets bumpy very soon, as Oliver sabotaged it, and then comes out suddenly with his big reveal "I'm Oliver still!". Woopie Doo. So, they have a battle on the plane with some henchmen and Ra al Ghul. The latter escapes with a parachute (in his hand. he wasn't even wearing it!) and with the virus, thus leaving Oliver to do the impossible; not only survive the plane crash but also fly the plane to safety. Who knew he was a pilot?

A reunion with everyone follows before they find out that Ra Al Ghul has convoluted the plan to release the virus by having four of his men do the job in different areas of the city. Everyone goes about stopping them, including Thea, who is donning the red costume and going all kick-ass. Oliver has a well-shot sword sequence with Ra Al Ghul on the top of a dam. Hey, it looked good although was all over far too quickly and easily with Oliver winning. Sigh. The police watched the whole experience, only seemingly getting a clear shot at the very end, blasting Oliver and leaving him fall off dam ... only to be rescued by Felicity in the ATOM suit. You couldn't make this up. Well, seems you can, and this is quite how it felt. Who knew that she could work the suit quicker than it took even Ray!

The main battle is all over and there's still twenty odd minutes to go. What follows is a long dragged out debrief. Sort of like those warm-downs after sporting events. Ray blows up the first floor of the building, thus leading the way I guess for him to literally become "atom" sized. Oliver and Felicity have already left for the sunset, with Oliver now leaving his Arrow job. Malcolm is now head of the League of Assassins as part of deal with helping Oliver.

What I liked

Near the start, the Flash was involved to help them out. As daft as it was, because it simplified the situation tremendously, it was pretty cool. Barry is a lot of fun.

Yeah, that was about all I really liked.

What I Didn't Like

Crap suddenly reveal by Oliver that he is still Oliver. It didn't carry much umpth. Hard to imagine that Ra al Gal could have been deceived at all, even with all the Malcolm/Oliver work.

Felicity can fly the ATOM suit with less than five nanoseconds experience?

Cops can't shoot Ra/Oliver fight until Ra is dead and Oliver is victorious?

Why try to shock us into having us even think Oliver was "shot" and falling to his double-death off the dam, only to be rescued? Pointless and carrying no credibility.

Huh?

What's all that Ray and Felicity's signiture thing all about from last week?

The Oliver/Flash five minute appearances in each other's shows is far too convenient really.

And Finally

Well, it was hard to care, keep up with all the deception, and believe all the wacky stupidity and character moves this week, as it has been all series. Even the flashback this week was just as stupid as it has been all season, and boring and pointless.

Rating: 5 and of 10 (Thank goodness this is over with).