Mania Grade: C-
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- Episode: Vendetta (Season 1, Episode 8)
- Starring: Stephen Amell, Katie Cassidy, Colin Donnell
- Written By: Greg Berlanti (developer), Marc Guggenheim (developer)
- Directed By: Kenneth Fink
- Network: The CW
- Series:
Arrow: Vendetta Review
The Huntress Returns By
Tim Janson
December 06, 2012
Source: Mania.com
The Huntress Returns
© The CW
After a couple of strong weeks our regularly scheduled airing of Arrow is interrupted for an episode of Dawson’s Creek, or maybe its Melrose Place, or choose whatever sappy relationship drama you like. Instead of building on last week’s episode which debuted Helena Bertinelli, AKA The Huntress, “Vendetta” instead drops a melodramatic rock that quickly sinks to the bottom.
Helena is continuing her rampage against her father’s criminal empire but Oliver tries to get her to do so with less violence and threats to innocent people. He makes some convoluted comparison to his own life by taking Helena to the grave of Sarah Lance and confessing his own mistakes. Everything seems to be just peachy for the crime fighting pair. Oliver even designs new Helena’s costume.
But while visiting a swanky new restaurant, Oliver and Helena run into Tommy Merlyn and Laurel Lance everything goes down the crapper. Tommy gets mad at Laurel when she pressures him into asking Oliver for a job. Helena throws a fit because of the way Oliver and Laurel look at each other, both clearly with feelings for each other. Oliver and Diggle even get into it over Oliver revealing Diggle’s name to Helena.
Outside all of the melodramatics we get a few action scenes…maybe about 30 seconds worth. Ok, maybe I’m being a little sarcastic but it certainly seemed like the action this week was an afterthought. But maybe it was for the best. The rich baddies that Oliver has been going after are hardly a rogue’s gallery of villains but even compared to the rest Frank Bertinelli comes off as shallow and as intimidating as your average accountant.
The one intriguing plot this week was Walter Steele’s continuing investigation into his wife’s activities and diverting funds from Queen Consolidated. Walter discovers an exact copy of the journal of names that Oliver got from his father before he died. Let’s hope that next week’s midseason finale goes off on a high note and sets things up for a strong second half.
Ok, shit, now we're definitely on the same page Tim, I was really dissapointed by this ep, good analogy with Dawson's cuz it got pretty cheesy there for a few mins. Are we really supposed to care that much about petty personal relationships in this show? This was the very definition of "filler" with almost no scenes that helped this show stay afloat. I hope it gets back on track with next week's ep where we are promised by the actor playing Diggle himself to prepare for a moment similar to when they killed Rita on Dexter, a show which he was a part of the cast when it happened! I don't know if that literally suggests a major character's death or if it's just a shocker on the same level but we'll find out soon enough..........how does a show fluctuate so far like that? Head scratcher to say the least.........I still say it's "Myles" ahead of Revolution....