Welcome to the Legion!

Legion contributor Andrea Levine is recapping and reviewing Arrow for us this season. Follow her on Twitter @wysefyre!

Who Are You? picks up immediately where What We Leave Behind left off, with Oliver in the Arrow Cave seeing Laurel standing there. Oliver is stunned, but goes to hug her. Laurel tells him Sara brought her back and was somehow able to prevent causing an aberration. Before too much happens, Felicity arrives and is also shocked but happy. She decides they’re going to have a welcome home party for Laurel.

Team Arrow joins up with them at the loft to celebrate Laurel’s return, but they do find it a little weird, since they haven’t even buried Billy Malone yet. Curtis also seems a little off, but we’ll get to that later, because now it’s time for a toast. Oliver discusses the importance of celebrating the miracles and not just acknowledging the bad times. They toast Laurel’s return and drink (Laurel drinks water).

Felicity takes Laurel’s glass back to the Arrow Cave, and is startled by Rory. He realizes she’s running a DNA analysis on Laurel. It comes out to be a match. Rory makes a joke about her being Laurel’s evil twin, and a light bulb goes on. Laurel does have an evil twin, Earth-2 Laurel aka Black Siren, but before she can get in touch with Cisco, Laurel, now sporting a septum ring, emerges from the shadows, applauds Felicity for figuring it out, and blasts them with her sonic scream. She runs and later, after Team Arrow convenes at the Cave, it’s confirmed she is Earth-2 Laurel and was broken out of confinement by Prometheus. He was able to do it without tripping any security alarms. How? That’s for another day.

Black Siren goes to meet with Prometheus. He’s pissed at her. She failed to maintain her cover. She either needs to follow his orders and not question him or she will pay dearly.

Black Siren calls Oliver. She claims she was forced to do things under duress. She’s willing to give Oliver intel on Prometheus. They schedule a meet at the Black Canary statue. Team Arrow also goes with him. Oliver tells them they’re there to be extra eyes and not to interfere. Felicity privately tells them to light her up if it looks like she’s going to attack.

Black Siren and Oliver talk, but before they get to the good stuff, Felicity gives the order to attack. Oliver is able to subdue Black Siren, but not before she shatters the Black Canary statue.

Oliver is furious at the team, but Felicity takes responsibility for her actions. She thought Black Siren had a weapon. It was phone, but it still looked suspicious. Oliver knows this is not their Laurel, but she had intel he needed and now it’ll be harder to get it.

Oliver goes to talk to Black Siren. She gives a story about how her Oliver is dead on her world. She let the darkness in and has been giving into it ever since. Oliver tries to convince her there’s another way. Circumstances can be changed. She can decide if she wants to be the nectar or the poison. So, who is she?

Oliver leaves and finds Felicity training. She’s still upset. Oliver has to keep telling her he knows she’s not their Laurel, but he still wants to try to help her. Felicity thinks he has blinders on.

Felicity brings Black Siren water, and they have a little chat. Black Siren tries to taunt Felicity with Oliver and his love of sisters. Felicity isn’t having it. She tells Black Siren to get used to living in cages, because while Oliver may see her as a form of guilt and redemption, she doesn’t. Just then the power goes out. Black Siren uses the opportunity to break out.

Oliver wants to know what happened. Felicity set the whole thing up. She put tracking nanites in the water and let her out. Oliver wants to have faith in her, but Felicity doesn’t. She wants to use her to get to Prometheus. She wants justice for Billy. Oliver watches the security footage and admits everything Felicity said about him was true, but he really does know she’s not their Laurel. He just sees her as his last shot at helping her. He promises they will get justice for Billy.

While that’s happening, Curtis devises a portable sonic dampener. It still needs work, so Felicity helps him, while they all head out to the building where Black Siren is heading to.

Team Arrow arrives in time to see the security guards rushing out. Prometheus is also there. The team splits up. Rene goes after Black Siren, but she gets past him. Prometheus appears behind Oliver and they fight. Oliver tries to slow him down with a tranq, but Prometheus has developed a tolerance to it. He gives Oliver a choice – they can keep fighting or Oliver can go and help Felicity, who is facing off with Black Siren.

You know who he chooses, though to be fair, he didn’t really get a choice, because Prometheus puts him through a wall.  Oliver runs to help Felicity and covers her ears, as Black Siren is blasting her, but then it’s Curtis to the rescue! The sonic dampener works!

Black Siren is sent to an A.R.G.U.S lockup. Oliver hasn’t given up hope on getting through to her and wants her nearby.

Meanwhile, Diggle is in a dire situation. He’s in lockup. Oliver goes to visit him and offers to break him out, but Diggle wants to face this head on. He wants to show General Walker he messed with the wrong soldier, but he is in need of a good lawyer. Oliver knows just the guy.

Oliver enlists the help of DA Chase. Chase is hesitant at first, but he quickly comes around. He goes to visit Diggle, and Diggle tells him his story. Before they can come up with a game plan, General Walker comes in with transfer papers. Diggle knows if he goes with Walker, he’ll die. Chase tries to stall, but Walker threatens him with disbarment. Chase knows for certain Diggle was set up.

Walker gives Chase 24 hours to get Diggle ready for transfer, but Chase didn’t get to where he is by being a dummy. He instructs Diggle to punch him. Diggle complies, and because of that, Chase is able to use his authority to keep Diggle in Star City. The punch happened under his jurisdiction. Walker is furious and leaves, swearing he’ll get a letter from the President to get Diggle released. Chase is cool with that. He’s always wanted the President’s autograph. Diggle and Chase are in for one heck of a fight.

Who Are You? ends with Oliver and Felicity watching as a cleanup crew takes away the pieces of the Black Canary statue. Instead of rebuilding it, he decides it’s time to find someone worthy of the Black Canary mantle.

Then we go to a bar in Hub City, where a waitress is being harassed by the clientele, and a woman sends them through the window using a sonic scream. Next week is going to be fun.

Other points of interest

~ Curtis is struggling. The stress of being attacked, put into a coma, constantly getting beat down, and worst of all, losing Paul (NOOOOOOO), has caught up with him. Rene notices and tries to figure out what’s going on. He teases Curtis, which only makes him more upset, to the point where Curtis attacks him, and lays out all of what’s on his mind. Rene later apologizes for making things harder for Curtis.

But that doesn’t help Curtis’ feelings of inadequacy. He knows he’s not the best fighter, and he doesn’t have superpowers, and he doesn’t believe he’s living up to the Mr. Terrific name. Rene scolds him for focusing on what he can’t do instead of what he can. No one else could have made a Black Siren sonic dampener. After the battle with Prometheus and Black Siren, Curtis agrees with Rene and vows to start paying attention to the ways he can contribute to the team.

~ The flashback is all about Oliver getting beat down. If you’ll recall Oliver tried to kill Kovar, failed, then found out the Bratva leader, Gregor, was working with Kovar. I guess Kovar gave Oliver back to Gregor, because we see him taking Oliver to an empty room and wailing on him.

One punch knocks out Oliver’s picture of Laurel. Gregor picks it up and he and Oliver chat for a moment. Gregor is trying to understand why Oliver is carrying around her photo but in Russia trying to avenge another woman. Oliver says the man he’s become would be unrecognizable to Laurel. Gregor realizes Oliver believes he’s a monster who let the darkness in. But he points out to Oliver that had he not gone to the island, he would have stayed the rich American douche he was so good at portraying. Oliver was a victim of circumstance and he had the ability to choose what he did.

Oliver calls Gregor out for selling out the Bratva to Kovar. Gregor implies he might be trying to play Kovar, and that there is a lot more going on than just Oliver’s petty need for revenge. He’s willing to keep Oliver on, but Oliver needs to learn obedience. If not, he’ll die.

Before any decisions can be made, gunshots fire above them. Gregor sends his men to check it out, but they’re put down too. Gregor goes to hold Oliver hostage, as an archer busts in. It’s Talia al Ghul, and she’s been looking for Oliver.

~ Thea is at a conference. Black Siren calls her to tell her she’s alive.

~ Quentin is still in rehab.

~ Felicity enjoys giving orders a little too much.

~ The team’s faces when they realize how unfazed Felicity and Oliver are with Laurel’s return is hilarious. As Oliver says, the Lance sisters have a way of coming back from the dead.

~ Rene calls Black Siren “Trinity.”

~ Chase informs Oliver about the circumstances surrounding Malone’s death. He believes he was set up and the Green Arrow was manipulated into killing him. He’s covering it up, because if the public found out, they’d panic. Oliver agrees.

So now we have Earth-2 Laurel. I’m okay with this. At least it’s a believable reason as to why she returned. I like her a little better than the old Laurel, but that’s not the old Laurel’s fault; that’s the fault of the writers. It’s much more fun to write for the bad guys. It’ll be interesting to see if and how they use her again.

I like how Chase is being used. I still can’t figure out the end game, though part of me still wonders if he’s Prometheus (I hope not), but having him interact with other members of the team will be good for later on.

Overall, it was a good way to get back into the swing of things. Still could use a little work, but the pieces are falling nicely into place. What did you think?

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Andrea Levine

Andrea Levine is an East Coast based geek, who has more fandoms than she cares to admit. When she isn't talking about the latest geeky news, she's obsessing over musical theater. Her dream is to successfully bring geekdom and musical theater together (I'm looking at you, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark). You can read more of her exploits as Wysefyre over at [insertgeekhere].