The CW: New Green Arrow TV Show ( with new actor)

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APR 7, 2016 @ 12:13 PM37,770*VIEWS

Arrow Is Dead, And Olicity Killed It

Erik Kain

CONTRIBUTOR

I write about the intersection of entertainment and technology.

Spoilers through Season 4 of ‘Arrow’ follow.

Credit: CW

Much more than a beloved character died for me in last night’s*Arrow.

No, Laurel wasn’t the only victim of this atrocity.*Arrow,*the show itself, just jumped the shark so badly I’m not sure it can ever recover.

What a joke. What a bad joke. What a disservice to a character who we’ve spent the last four seasons getting to know, one of the only characters with a truly heroic arc, going from spurned lover and idealist, to crime-fighting vigilante and stable force in Team Arrow. A character often wasted, given too little screen time, and pushed to the background—but one who deserved better.

And how does she shuffle off her mortal coil? By telling Oliver that she still loves him, but that she’s so happy he found Felicity. Her dying words are about*Felicity!

Well, not quite. She says something to Oliver after that but we don’t hear it. It’s a mystery. And then just like that, she’s gone.

It’s a shame, really, because this wasn’t a terrible episode other than its terrible ending. They had us guessing a bit with Andy. The prison break was intense. But everything to do with Laurel was just awful. She just very suddenly decides she’s giving up on Team Arrow because…I guess her entire four season character arc is just meaningless.

And while all the actors did a great job—you really*feel*Quentin Lance’s pain here; Paul Blackthorne is terrific—I can’t help but wonder if their talents would be better used elsewhere.

Honestly, killing off Laurel isn’t just an insult to her character, it makes a mockery out of everyone. Especially Quentin. He lost Sara, but then she’s back! Then she’s killed for real by Malcolm for really stupid reasons. Then she gets resurrected! But now his other daughter is dead! (Will Sara hear about this over in*Legends of Tomorrow?)

You have to wonder*if they’ll bring Laurel back from the dead, too, though it won’t matter at that point. I’m almost as sick of the fake-out deaths as I am of the Olicity pandering.

There’s no resurrecting a show that’s fallen so deeply in love with its own mistakes. It’s a kind of*twisted vanity. The producers and writers have stopped caring at all about making a vigilante show.

Now, as critics of the Olicity trainwreck term it, we’ve got “Felicity and Friends” the charming tween soap opera about a playboy billionaire and his hot fiance.

Will they finally tie the knot? Or won’t they?!? Let’s get that pesky other love interest out of the way now…




*

A while back I wrote that for*Arrow*to survive,*Olicity must die. Instead,*Arrow’s*producers killed off the Black Canary, removing the last “obstacle” to Oliver and Felicity’s eventual reunion. The Black Canary, a cornerstone of the Green Arrow stories, was killed off so that we could have more relationship drama. (Or she wasn’t, and Laurel and Oliver are in cahoots with some secret plan…but then, what a cruel thing to do to Quentin, and another lie Oliver would be telling everyone…it doesn’t add up.)

The Black Canary is dead, and she didn’t even go out with a bang. Her death wasn’t even about her.

I’ll keep watching and writing my reviews, but I’ve moved past annoyance at this point into a realm bordering on apathy. Suffice to say, whatever enthusiasm I once had for this show—and I had quite a lot—has evaporated.

The Flash*and*Legends of Tomorrow*are far better shows, in any case. At least we have them to look forward to.

There was a big death last night, that’s for sure. RIP*Arrow.*What a great superhero show you could have been. Here’s to Katie Cassidy moving on to bigger and better things.