ARROW Season 2×12, “Tremors” recap

29 Jan

Welcome back, Arrow-heads! Sebastian Blood’s running for mayor and has just removed one problem in Laurel Lance. Now she’s revealed to be a pill-popper and been fired from the DA’s office. Also, Roy’s attempt to be a vigilante ends badly, which leaves Ollie as Arrow with one option: train him to control his super-anger. After all, he did so well with Slade when he got the Mirakuru in him. You know, the guy who’s missing an eye and nursing a serious hard-on for revenge against Ollie. Oh right, that’s not good. Sooo….

Tiger Out of a Cage. Iron Heights isn’t the most secure prison even after the calamity in the Glades, but to be fair, this breakout is kind of hard to have seen coming. A new inmate is put in with Bronze Tiger (surprise, he did get busted earlier this season), and gives Tiger instructions on how to escape and how to meet who’s helping him escape. Then, he pulls one of Tiger’s claws out of his body…piece by piece. So Tiger escapes and meets his rescuer, who wants him out of jail to retrieve a specific item. A specific item that could kill a lot of people.

Jeez, can’t that stuff be smuggled through an anus like things regularly are in prison?

Anger Management. Arrow has been spending some down time with Roy, teaching him to control his anger, which is going, um, not so well. So, Arrow tells him about a friend of his who got the Mirakuru in him and turned into a different person, and then, got an arrow put through his eye. Probably not the most inspirational story to pass on, Ollie. Anyhoo, Roy wants in on a mission, and when Ollie gets wind of Bronze Tiger escaping and making his way to the old Merlyn mansion, he lets Roy tag along. When they get there, they find what Tiger was supposed to retrieve: a prototype of the earthquake device that trashed the Glades. They fight, Roy loses it beating on a henchman, and Tiger gets away with the device. Well, that team-up went bad.

Roy On His Own. After warning Thea to get out of town for a few days (and accidentally bruising her arm), Roy wants to find the earthquake device, which Arrow is not cool with. Too bad for Arrow that Roy is super-powered and takes off on his own anyway. Felicity figures the trade off for the device is going to happen at the docks, and Arrow arrives only to get a few blades in his back by Bronze Tiger. Roy didn’t need Felicity’s super skills to find the meet, and shows up to fight Tiger while non-descript bad guy arms the device to go off. Of course, its behind the door of a storage container and Arrow can’t get to it, so he needs Roy, who’s occupied beating the stink out of Tiger. So, Ollie lets Roy onto his secret and gets him to focus long enough to destroy the device before it activates. Diggle and Felicity aren’t all cool with the idea of a still unstable Roy knowing this, but they still get introduced to Roy, along with the Arrow HQ. Team hug? No? Team handshake, then?

“OK, I apologize for calling those claws back scratchers! OW!”

Moira Queen, Mayor? Moira goes to a dinner with Walter and Alex Krycek from The X-Files (look, I know he has a name, but let’s just refer to him as that for the moment), who talk about how Blood’s plans for being mayor will run the banks of the city into the ground. Their solution? Ask Moira if she’ll run against Blood. Nope, not a desperate idea whatsoever. She consults with Thea about this, if her platform will be “I won’t intentionally destroy most of the city if I become mayor” or just to not bother. She accepts but has a problem she needs to consult with Walter about before she accepts: knowing how people will dig into her past, Moira is fearful that someone will learn about Thea’s true parentage. But luckily only her OBGYN knows, so that shouldn’t be a problem. Oh, its going to be a problem, isn’t it?

Slade Has A Target (And Seven Missiles). Back in our island flashbacks, Ollie and Sara look for Slade, while Ollie wrestles with telling his buddy the truth about what happened to Shado. What part of “unstable super-powered buddy” did not understand, Ollie? Well, they head back to that cave with the creepy skeletons and find some recent drawings, kind of like the ones used for the missile launcher Fyers had. Only this target is Ivo’s freighter, and the duo find Slade about to unload the remaining missiles onto it. But, Ollie talks Slade down by using his love of Shado to shame him into stopping, then offers another solution in taking the freighter for themselves. Also, Ollie never told Slade about Shado’s fate, but its clear he learned it somewhere down the road. I’m sure on reflection, it probably would have been better to blow up that freighter.

Damaged Goods. Laurel’s not in the best place following her firing from the DA’s office. Things aren’t improving even with Quentin trying to get her into an AA meeting, and her blowing it off. Then there’s that job interview with Joanna (You remember her right? From season one? No?) and her new law firm, which is shot down because Laurel is being investigated by the state bar, and likely to be disbarred. This news sends her to the Verdant, where she drinks herself silly, with Ollie and Thea trying to help. When that doesn’t work, Ollie makes a call to someone to help her, who we think may be Quentin, but we find out isn’t. So, Laurel stumbles home and almost passes out on the floor, but not before seeing Sara standing above her. I’m pretty sure that reveal may get Laurel to grab more drinks once she comes to.

Felicity: “Welcome to the Arrow HQ, Roy. Over here, we have a salmon ladder if you want to do some exercises…if you want to…”

–Comic book connections: Oh hey, I forgot to mention that Amanda Waller visits the re-imprisoned Bronze Tiger in prison and offers him a chance to get out of prison by joining her special team. Her “suicide squad”, you might say? Does this mean we may get a return of a certain assassin?

–Hey, that rather unusually long shot of some guy watching Laurel at Verdant is probably not good news for the Laurel clan, is it?

–Felicity calls them Team Arrow. How nice. By the way, Felicity’s coping strategy for learning Ollie’s secret? Pint of mint chip ice cream. This doesn’t really surprise me.

–You know, Diggle could have come along on Ollie’s trip to the docks. Just saying, he’s available at the Arrow HQ.

–Salmon ladder exercises have returned!

–“I’m not trying to Monday morning quarterback here… it’s Wednesday…”

–“You actually think I’d kill my sister’s boyfriend?” “Well you did shoot me in the leg. Forgiven, by the way.”

So, what did you think? Leave your thoughts and theories below as we come back next week for “Heir to the Demon”…