ARROW Season 2 Episode 22
Episode Title: “Streets of Fire”
Writers: Jake Coburn & Ben Sokolowski
Director: Nick Copus
Previously on “Arrow”:
There’s apparently a downside to having 23 episodes in a season instead of 22 episodes. “Streets of Fire” loses some of the momentum from last week’s episode as it gets sidetracked in a few subplots that don’t offer much advancement to the story.
However, there are a handful of strong moments throughout the hour which keep the episode from being a total wash. I just can’t shake the feeling that this week’s episode of “Arrow” could have easily been merged with last week’s installment into of the greatest episodes that this show has ever pulled off. Instead, it’s been one borderline fantastic episode followed by one that was simply good.
From this point on, there are full spoilers ahead for “Streets of Fire,” so if you missed last night’s episode of “Arrow” then you should probably skip this review or else Mayor Blood won’t get a recall election.
The bulk of this episode revolves around Team Arrow’s attempts to get the Mirakuru cure from S.T.A.R. Labs after the courier (whom we’ve never met before) is badly injured while trying to deliver it. This “cure” essentially fell out of the sky courtesy of a few supporting characters from “The Flash” whom we won’t see again until next fall. It’s not as if we had any time to become attached to those characters, but seeing them in jeopardy would have been far more effective than this nameless man who meets his doom.
I know the Flash is being saved for his own TV series, but it could have been a very powerful re-introduction for Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) to have made the delivery himself… by superspeed. From the ending of this episode, it seems that the siege of Starling City is the coming out party for superhumans in this world. What better time would there be to introduce the world’s first superhero?
The Deathstroke army of Slade Wilson (Manu Bennett) manages to get to the cure first, which allows Sebastian Blood (Kevin Alejandro) to get a very telegraphed turn against Slade once it’s clear that the Deathstroke army will simply destroy Starling City to hurt Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell). These last two episodes have been the first time that Sebastian has had any real signs of humanity under his madness, but it was too late to make me care for him when Isabel Rochev (Summer Glau) fatally stabs the Mayor for his betrayal.
It was amusing to see that Sebastian really thought that he could remain in office after this fiasco and it was especially funny to see John Diggle (David Ramsey) and Oliver simply register their disgust before leaving Sebastian to his fate. The weird thing about Sebastian’s last episode in office is that D.A. Kate Spencer (Chelah Horsdal) was unceremoniously killed off. I guess that she’ll never be Manhunter now.
With Kate dead, that probably means that Laurel Lance (Katie Cassidy) is the acting D.A. of Starling City. This episode continues Laurel’s redemption tour by putting the Arrow’s bow into her hands to free herself from a collapsed tunnel. After somewhat illogically leaving Team Arrow behind to walk to her father’s police precinct, Laurel is reunited with Black Canary (Caity Lotz); whom she finally calls out for being her sister, Sara.
The Laurel and Sara scenes were kind of pointless, as they existed only for Laurel to help Sara overcome her guilt and recognize that she’s a true hero. Even random cops start singing Black Canary’s praises in one of the episode’s most groan worthy moments. I do wish that the “Arrow” creative team felt like the show could support both Lance sisters, but I highly expect Sara to die in the finale so that Laurel can take over her superheroine persona. Laurel has been more tolerable lately, but Sara is still the more interesting Lance sibling.
Meanwhile, Officer Quentin Lance (Paul Blackthorne) is repromoted to Detective after helping to take down one of the faux Deathstrokes in the police precinct. Detective Lance even gets his fellow cops to sign off on his plan to rely on the Arrow to get them out of this mess. Presumably this means that Lance could eventually have a leadership position at the Starling City P.D. that would make him even more of a Commissioner Gordon clone. But that would be tough if Lance was still personally investigating every crime in Starling City in the same way that he has for the last two seasons.
It’s hard not to see the echos of The Dark Knight Rises as the police rally around the Arrow while an outside military force closes off the city and threatens it with destruction. I was hoping that the constant use of Amanda Waller (Cynthia Addai-Robinson) meant that we’d see the Suicide Squad one more time this season. But instead, Waller is hell bent on destroying Starling City at dawn if Oliver hasn’t found a way to stop Slade by then.
In the episode’s slowest moving plotline, Thea Queen (Willa Holland) is saved by her estranged father, Malcolm Merlyn (John Barrowman); who offers his protection to get her out of the city. It seemed like only minutes passed for Malcolm and Thea while every other storyline appeared to take place over a couple of hours.
I’m actually in favor of Thea running off with Malcolm to become his apprentice because that would finally give her something meaningful to do. Plus, Barrowman is just damn entertaining as Merlyn, especially when he offered Thea tips on how to fire the gun she was aiming at him.
The flashbacks for this episode barely moved the dial at all, as Oliver said goodbye to Anatoli Knyazev (David Nykl) and he reunited with Sara on the Amazon right before Slade showed up. If any plotline this week needed more screentime it was this one. Now, next week’s finale has to deliver an epic conclusion on two fronts and there’s not much time left to escalate the battle on the Amazo.
A few drawbacks in this episode weren’t enough to derail the excellent work on “Arrow” this season. If the finale can live up to everything that came before it, this could be something special.
