ARROW Season 3×11, “Midnight City” recap

29 Jan

Welcome back, Arrowheads! So good news, everyone: Oliver Queen’s alive! Maseo and Tatsu are healing him up in a cabin, so he’s not aware of the crapstorm building up in Star City. The rest of Team Arrow seems to be splintered thanks to their boss being gone. Malcolm wants to take Thea before Ra’s shows up. Criminal “Brick” has enough manpower to lay siege to the Glades. But, there is one good thing that happens: Laurel gets into a Canary suit and starts fighting bad guys! So let’s get this party started…

A Night At The Club. In the flashback to Hong Kong, Ollie and Maseo follow that lead on China White to a club. There, they meet China, who asks Maseo if he has the Alpha vial. While Maseo wants to see Tatsu before this, Ollie’s just shocked he’s going to exchange a weapon of mass destruction for one person. As Maseo is revealed, we discover the vial is a fake, and our trio of good guys have to fight their way out of that club. Later at Maseo’s home (and really, meeting there after the events of the last few episodes seems like a bad idea), he admits he had the real Alpha, but Waller must have expected he would exchange it for Tatsu and switched the vials. Ollie’s surprised by what Maseo tried to do, but Maseo counters that “he would do anything for family”, something that the current Ollie is recovering from doing.

In Recovery. After a creepy dream involving Felicity getting a kiss full of blood, Ollie comes to and Tatsu explains how the cold helped keep Ollie from being truly dead (but still, that mountain fall must have broken, like, EVERY bone in his body). Tatsu is planning to return to the League after the snowstorm dies down, and Ollie tries to reason him out of it, knowing it would be a death sentence. But before Maseo can go, some League assassins stop by the cabin, and Maseo tries to wave them off. Once they spot Tatsu, the four assassins get deaded, and Maseo is more convinced to go back, albeit with a new alibi. He stages it so it looks like he found Ollie alive but was wounded trying to finish him off. Not even Tatsu can convince Maseo to not go, which says something really bad happened in the past (once again, probably “dead son”). We’ll see Maseo later, but meanwhile…

“Laurel, where did you get a full on leather getup like that so quickly?” (long pause) “I don’t have to explain myself to you!”

A New Canary In Town. Back in Star City, a mugging is interrupted by Laurel sweeping in as Black Canary, and…well, she needs a bit more training time. Roy takes down the mugger, and later at Arrow HQ, is patching up Laurel, besides asking her what she’s doing. Diggle drops by to join into the “dogpile on Laurel” party, but she’s not having it. And if that’s not bothering her, at a little get together with the mayor and other public officials (like Ray Palmer, who’s still dealing with Felicity not being part of his ATOM project anymore), Quentin has heard about the Canary back in town and wonders why Sara hasn’t talked to her family yet. Man, what she would wouldn’t give for something to interrupt this awkward conversation right now…

A Brick Thrown Into Things. …AND then Brick and some goons show up to bum rush the meeting. He kidnaps the local aldermen and orders the rest killed. After a brief fight with Quentin, Laurel and even Ray, they save everyone else in the meeting. As this is going on, Malcolm is facing some pushback from Thea on leaving town, who’s not satisfied with his vague insistence on leaving. Even Roy confronts Malcolm about how Thea will keep picking at the truth, but is told to butt out because he’s not family. Because you know, family takes care of each other and sets up their own to take the fall for murder just so they can save their own ass, right?

“Hey dad, I know you’re an evil mass murderer and all, but you didn’t have anything to do with my half-brother, who you hate, going missing, do you?”

Pickup Gone Wrong. Felicity helps patch up Ray, who wants to continue his ATOM project, but not out of vengeance, like Felicity thinks, but because he thinks she’s worth protecting. Awwwwwww. Thanks to Laurel pushing a suspect working with Brick, she brings Diggle and Roy a lead to where Brick has the aldermen, BUT…she wants in on the rescue. While Diggle remains at HQ as a surrogate Felicity, Roy and Laurel intercept the van where the aldermen are, and it goes bad. Like, “Brick gets away and kills one of the aldermen in retaliation” bad. But, Brick calls up the mayor and offers to meet her to discuss a trade offering.

Parley. At Laurel’s office, Felicity drops by because she’s figured out that Canary walking the streets isn’t Sara, and Laurel’s doubtful about going back out there. But Felicity seems to be reassuring about Laurel’s newfound vigilantism, which, yay Felicity for being back on the vigilante bandwagon! So an hour after that phone call, Brick meets the mayor and offers his terms: the aldermen for her removing all the cops from the Glades. Quentin calls Felicity upon hearing the news, asking her to get in touch with the Arrow. She says she has better chances getting in touch with another hero.

Team Canary? While Diggle and Roy are about to drink themselves silly over the lack of leads on the aldermen, Felicity and Laurel show up to whip the boys into shape. Step one: Laurel calling Quentin with a voice modulator to sound like Sara and ask for some helpful info. After hearing about one alderman’s pacemaker, Felicity thinks he can use the pacemaker’s GPS to find them. Step two: Felicity asks Ray to borrow one of the company’s helicopters, and despite her lack of flying skills, he lets her have it.

“I’m NOT the Juggernaut, ****h!”

Flying In To The Rescue. Diggle flies the copter and drops Roy and Laurel into the warehouse where the aldermen are. The aldermen are scooped up, but Laurel ends up fighting Brick to a stalemate, but not quite owning him as she escapes. So all’s good, right? Well, Laurel as Canary (using that Sara voice thingie and using some distance and light to keep Quentin from seeing who it is) finds out from Quentin that Brick also knew the locations of the city council and their families, and the mayor caved and gave in to Brick’s demands. So Brick has no cops in the Glades, which means he can rename the place BrickTown or BrickBurg, I guess. Seriously, call in the National Guard, people!

Standing Your Ground. Felicity heads back to Ray’s office to let him know she’s returned the copter (and a few bullet holes for decorative purposes), and had an idea to help get the ATOM project back on track. Elsewhere, Thea lets Malcolm know, even after hearing that Ra’s al Ghul is after them, wants to stay and face whatever Ra’s can dish out. Mind you, Malcolm never says why they both have to run, which if he did, might make her serve her dad to Ra’s on a plate. She runs into Chase (you know, the DJ guy? From a few episodes back? Nothing?) at Verdant to squash the rumor she’s leaving, and after she leaves, he makes a call. Before you can say “I totally saw this coming”, he speaks Arabic and informs the person on the other line that Malcolm’s not leaving. The recipient of this news is Maseo, who will inform Ra’s, right around the time he tells his boss Ollie’s still alive. He’s got a lot to explaining to do!

–Comic book connections: none this week, believe it or not. Really, nothing here.

–So now Laurel is lying about Sara being alive while pretending to be Sara to dad. This is going to go over smoothly with Quentin, I think. I mean, he’s not complaining about his heart much these days, so he should be good with it.

–So Chase is a mole? Because let’s be honest, if we introduce a character in this season, he has to be connected in some way to everyone else besides being some random dude.

–The assassins response to Tatsu might mean she had a personal connection to the League besides Maseo, which may also explain why she seems to be in hiding.

–It is a relief to show Laurel has some skill in a fight, but that she’s not there yet. Although she has enough smarts to keep Brick off guard in that second fight of theirs.

–“They’re not lasers. That would be ridiculous. They’re condensed light beams.”

–“I’m going to hold you to that ‘no crash’ promise.”

So, that’s it for now, but leave your comments below and come back next week for the recap of “Uprising”…