‘Arrow’ Season 5 Recap

‘Super Week’ has officially returned. With Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, and The Flash. Tomorrow night the show that started it all will return… Arrow!

As we prepare ourselves for the upcoming 6th Season, let us take a moment to recap the events of Season 5.

Following the death of Laurel Lance, Black Canary, Team Arrow was divided. Thea went into ‘retirement’, Diggle reenlisted and Lance drove off into the sunset with Donna. This predicament left Oliver and Felicity fighting crime at night, alone. As Oliver struggled to be mayor by day and vigilante by night, Felicity continued to push her suggestion that Oliver should seek out a new team. As expected, Oliver continued to keep refusing.

When crime lord Tobias Church rises to power, Oliver finally caves and recruits Curtis, Wild Dog and Evelyn Sharp to join his team. Unlike Barry Allen, the trio didn’t exactly agree with Oliver’s training methods. In fact, Wild Dog disobeyed Oliver on countless occasions, stating that he didn’t trust Oliver…. just like Oliver didn’t trust his new team. Oliver eventually came to the realization that this was a completely different team, and he would have to go about doing things quite differently. It took Oliver revealing himself as Oliver Queen to get his team to finally trust him.

During all these Arrow-tacular events, Oliver learns that operating as mayor proved to be particularly difficult. Even with Thea by his side as his aide, and Quentin Lance as his Deputy Mayor. He realizes that when faced with a conflict, he has to handle difficult situations as Oliver Queen, Mayor – not Oliver Queen, Green Arrow.

Enter Adrian Chase. Adrian comes in and introduces himself as the D.A of Star City. Adrian and Oliver hit it off almost right away. Oliver immediately places his trust in Adrian, relying on him numerous times to get him out of various legal situations. He even enlists his help in regards to Diggle, who was framed for a military crime during his deployment.

While Team Arrow continued to take down thugs and recruit new team members (Rory aka Ragman), a new deadly player came into town. Prometheus, who became known to the public as the ‘throwing star killer’. Prometheus was unlike any killer that Oliver had ever faced before. He’d faced the most violent of criminals, but never had he suffered someone as psychologically damaging as Prometheus. As if that was not enough, Team Arrow discovers there is a new vigilante in town… who goes by the name ‘Vigilante’. (The irony, right?) Every time Team Arrow encounters Vigilante, he states that he and Oliver are the same person… except when Vigilante takes out the bad guys, he does it permanently. 

Prometheus begins attacking Team Arrow members outside of their costume, which proves that he knows who they all are. Oliver gets the ‘how’ answer to this question, when he Evelyn turns on the rest of the team, calling Oliver a killer and pledging her alligience to Prometheus. Traitor.

During a later face off with Prometheus, in which Prometheus was able to outsmart Oliver and run into an abandoned building, Prometheus’ voice echoed through the empty halls stating that everything Oliver touched dies.  Oliver spotted Prometheus around a corner, and fired arrows into his chest. When Oliver went to unmask Prometheus, he realized that Prometheus was so twisted and diabolical that he captured and planted Felicity’s new boyfriend in the Prometheus costume. Billy Malone, a detective in the anti-crime unit at the SCPD. Billy’s death causes Oliver to blame himself yet again and send Felicity down a dark spiral.

Oliver seeks out help from an old friend, Talia to assist him in finding out who Prometheus was. However, he is broken when he discovers that Talia’s last name is ‘Al Ghul’ and she trained Prometheus because Oliver killed his father, just like he did hers. She then also reveals that Prometheus is D.A Adrian Chase.

From that point forward, Oliver found himself constantly at a loss with Prometheus no matter what choice he made or path he took. Prometheus was always one step ahead of him. Oliver went to such drastic measures as to try and use Chase’s wife to hang up the Prometheus hood, but even that backfired as Chase wound up killing her. Immediately after this, Talia appeared and together she and Prometheus captured Oliver and brought him to Prometheus’ secret lair.

He broke Oliver in ways he had never been broken before. Torturing him with thoughts and photos. He broke Oliver to the point that he truly made Oliver believe his entire quest as ‘The Arrow’ wasn’t started to honor his father, it was because Oliver ‘enjoyed’ being a killer.

As Team Arrow was unable to find a concrete solution to stopping Chase, Felicity took it upon herself to join an organization called ‘Helix’; a group of super hackers who thrived on intelligence and secret operatives. Despite both Diggle and Oliver’s pleads to back out, she continued. The information she gathered proved to be rather useful, as she and Helix were eventually able to gather video footage taken from a rooftop camera of Adrian Chase unmasking himself from being Prometheus.

So, naturally this video going out would cause Chase to surrender, right? Not a chance. Chase moved forward with his plan, even going as far as to contact Oliver’s son William. He then ‘surrendered’ to Oliver as the Green Arrow, all too easily. While Chase was held in his specialized ARGUS cell, members of Team Arrow started disappearing… all thanks to Black Siren and Evelyn Sharp. Oliver states over and over that he is not going to kill Chase, so he can stop playing games. As Chase is about to be transferred, Oliver receives a video on his phone in which he discovers that Chase has William.

Oliver is forced to fight ARGUS agents so that Chase can be set free in order for William to live. Oliver asks Chase why he involved William, as he is just a boy and is innocent. Chase retorts with the fact that his wife was innocent too, but Oliver chose to involve her.

The battle between Oliver and Prometheus culminates in a final epic battle on Lian Yu, where it all started. Due to recent events, Oliver came to the realization that he needs more help than he cares to admit and recruits a group of unlikely allies- Nyssa Al Ghul, Malcolm Merlyn, Digger Harkness and Slade Wilson.  Oliver succeeds in freeing all of his team members, including William’s mother (Samantha) and continues his chase on Adrian Chase.

After a very intense battle between Team Arrow and Team Prometheus, Oliver runs after Chase as he attempts to escape on a boat. There, Chase reveals William as a hostage. He tells Oliver he can either save his son, or he can save everyone back on the island, as it is rigged to explosives and they will all detonate the second Chase dies. Oliver shoots Chase in the leg, saving William from Chase’s clutches.

Chase laughs, stating that it will be ‘pretty lonely without Felicity’, before shooting himself in the head.

Seconds later, the entire island of Lian Yu detonates and goes up in flames. This leaves us questioning…. who survived?

 

Arrow will return tomorrow, Thursday, at 9PM/EST on the CW.