ARROW Season 6×12, “All For Nothing” recap

3 Feb

Welcome back, Arrowheads! Star City is under siege by Cayden James as he has taken the city hostage through a series of computer attacks. Add to that that super bomb he’s got, and Ollie has no choice but to pay him a daily ransom of millions until the city is bled dry of funds, which means the bomb will bet set off. It’s gonna take all of Team Arrow to fight this, but with half of them off on their own, that’s easier said than done. And with the loyalties of Dinah’s old partner turned Vigilante, Vince, now in question, can they all get together and stop this threat?

Your New Partner. The flashbacks this time are of Dinah meeting Vince and them going undercover in Sonos’ crime organization. And as we all know, it ended with both getting super powers. There. Pretty straight forward.

Dead In The Water. In the present, it’s been a week since Ollie has been paying that ransom, and he’s waiting to meet with ARGUS scuba troopers ready to help out. But James’ computer voodoo can even reach further than Ollie thinks, as the scuba team gets electrocuted to death. While mulling all those dead ARGUS men still in the river, Ollie talks to Thea about how little funds they will have left to pay that ransom, and how now he’s planning to get as many citizens of the city into bomb shelters for when James will eventually detonate that bomb. Also, Quentin becomes aware he’s being followed by Evil Laurel. Why, though?

Vince ends up meeting with Dinah, and he tells her he didn’t know about the attack on the ARGUS troops until after the fact. His standing in James’ crew is not as clear either, as James is starting to suspect Vince was behind foiling that attack on the safe zone last episode. Eventually Original Team Arrow gets a bead on Vince and are about to take him down, when Faux Team Arrow (as I call them now) shows up to explain he’s their source. These guys really need to have a few weeks of trust building and communication exercises.

“Hello, Laurel, I got the interns to put this collage together for you!”

The Only Play Is The Wrong Play. We go to the noobs’ lair and learn from Vince that the bomb is constantly being transported, so getting a lead on it is going to be tricky. And just raiding the bad guys’ lair is problematic, because James is carrying a trigger for the bomb on him at all times. So pulling another trick from last season, it’s suggested Vince go back in and steal Cayden’s computer files to find the possible locations for the bomb. Dinah is not cool with this after hearing his cover may already be blown, but Vince believes this is worth the risk. She might actually be right.

He goes back to James’ lair, and starts downloading the files covertly, only to run into Cayden. Vince puts up a pretty decent argument to distract James and finish the download. Once he transmits the info back to Felicity, he gets one more visit from James, only this time it ends with Vince being knocked unconscious.

Man, these new American Ninja Warrior tests make no sense!

The Enigmas. Quentin confides in Thea about being followed by Evil Laurel, and she thinks maybe it might be good for him to try reaching out to her. So they lure Evil Laurel into basically Quentin’s big multi slide presentation about his Laurel, and she’s caught off guard. Of course she runs off in horror over this, and considering what happens later, that may or may not be a good thing. Meantime, Vince wakes up to find himself tied up, and Anatoly there, waiting to torture the almost unkillable man.

At Arrow HQ, both teams are there, as is Alena (hello!), and they are waiting to find out what that download of data tells them about the bomb’s location. Dinah discovers Vince hasn’t shown up at their meet up, and his comms come back on just to capture Vince screaming in pain. They manage to trace the source of the comm signal, but Ollie says now that they’ve got the bomb’s location, they need everyone to keep it from getting away. But Dinah wants to save Vince first and eventually Curtis and Rene agree to help her, even though the priority is the bomb. Would you like to guess how that bad decision from the noobs goes before we continue?

Two Fronts. Original Team Arrow arrive at the bomb’s location and try to do what they can, but run into multiple stumbling blocks, like hostages strapped to another bomb, multiple transport trucks, and far too many thugs. As you can guess, the bomb is taken away. At James’ lair, the noobs arrive and free Vince, but learn his comms weren’t turned on by him. Uh-oh. An explosion happens, pinning Dinah under debris and Vince seriously rattled from the blast.

James appears, and decides to really twist the knife by having Black Siren blast Vince into a wall, impaling him to it. Then, while Dinah is watching and unable to do anything to stop this, James tells Evil Laurel to really test Vince’s healing factor, which she pauses on doing until she’s reminded what will happen to her if she goes against him. So she does that creepy sonic scream into Vince’s ear until he straight dies. The baddies leave, and Dinah’s teammates get her out of the rubble, and all she can do is cradle her dead lover. Brutal.

Oh man, she’s screaming this year’s State of the Union address at him! That’s evil!

What You Die For. When Dinah and company get home, they learn about how OTA wasn’t able to get the bomb and that Vince may have died for nothing. Like I said, noobs. Quentin hears from Thea what Evil Laurel did, and that goes over badly. Original Team Arrow aren’t feeling so good either, but Felicity and Alena have some surprising news: the footage of Ollie killing James’ son was doctored, but more importantly, by whoever doctored that evidence of Ollie being the Green Arrow from the beginning of the season. Someone in James’ camp is manipulating him into this mad act of revenge, but who exactly?

Ollie goes to see Dinah at her place, and she is a emotional wreck. He tries to work her through this decision Vince made, but she makes clear all she wants to do now is kill James and all his buddies, starting with Evil Laurel! Are we gonna get a Canary Cry showdown next time?

–Comic book connections: the Vigilante in the DCU on which this is loosely based (named Adrian Chase, by the way) didn’t live long, driven mad by one tragedy after another, ends up killing himself. Bleak stuff.

–Aruba: the destination everyone wants to go to in the Arrowverse.

–You know, maybe hold onto Vince’s body for a few days in case he somehow comes back to life. Weirder things have happened.

–Hopefully with Vince gone we can get more from Anatoly and Ricardo Diaz because they haven’t had much of anything to do after the holiday break at all.

–Remember when he FBI was investigating Ollie and friends? Where the hell did they go?

–“Oh, I love your face, but that is not a good face.”

–“Yeah, we had that turned into a gym…”

That’s it for now, but come back next week for the recap of “The Devil’s Greatest Trick”…