Arrow season 7, episode 14 review: Brothers and Sisters

“There’s a right way and wrong way to do this.” Minor spoilers for Arrow season 7, episode 14 follow.

The Suicide Squad is back so that A.R.G.U.S. is able to use them to find the mysterious Dante that they’ve been hunting all season, separate from Team Arrow. The only problem is that Ricardo Diaz is on the team, much to the anger of Felicity.

While the Squad is on the hunt, Oliver goes to help Emiko find the man who murdered her mother.

The Ghost Initiative

The A.R.G.U.S. storyline has been one of the most lackluster storyline lines throughout the entire season. It honestly felt like it was a story just to give Diggle and Curtis something to do rather than anything important. The show has tried to make Dante feel like this grand, mysterious villain, but there’s never actually been shown as to why he should be an intimidating presence.

Sad to say, but that is also the case for this episode. It’s always fun to see the Suicide Squad in action on this show, so after being absent for several seasons, it was exciting to see the team again. The team itself is also great with Diaz, China White, Cupid, and Grant Wilson. The problem is though, they don’t have chemistry. The team feels very bland when together which is sad to say.

Everything about this story feels bland actually. The team, the story itself, and the action. There’s really no excitement or suspense when it comes to any part of this episode dealing with the Suicide Squad, except for the final scene when only Diaz is involved. They’re portrayed as protagonists, but after being portrayed as both minor to major antagonists, it’s hard to root and care for them due to the fact that we haven’t been with them enough to care about any of them which really hinders the impact that the story is trying to have when involving these characters.

The only part of the episode that dealt with the Suicide Squad that was good was Felicity’s turmoil and need for revenge. It’s great to see Laurel advise Felicity to be better and has a great amount of emotion behind it. It looks like Dante is going to be playing a much bigger role going forward though meaning that maybe this story wasn’t as much as an afterthought as it seemed.

Emiko on the hunt

The better story in this episode though is Oliver’s story. It’s definitely the B-story of the episode and doesn’t have as much screen time as the Suicide Squad story, but it’s so much better. It’s tenser and has better action to it and immensely more emotionally charged.

Oliver trying to connect with Emiko is both very emotional and funny at parts simply because of who Oliver is. As much as he’s grown over the seasons, he’s as stubborn as ever. Trying to lecture Emiko on following the law when tracking answers is key in showing that. Oliver always thinks he’s in the right even if his stance on what has right has changed drastically recently. It honestly makes him seem so hypocritical, which is pretty consistent with his character.

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Emiko’s hunt is so reminiscent of Oliver’s hunt in season one of Arrow and so when he comes in and tries to control her, it hurts so much more when he loses her trust. You want her to trust him because you know Oliver means well, but he goes about everything in the worst way, so hopefully he can get through to her and change himself, which he seems like he’s starting to do.

The search for Felicity

In the future though, William seems to have learned from all of his father’s mistakes and rather than controlling everything around him, he wants to connect with those around him. It very much helps that he’s a better “people-person” than his father too because it does help move the plot along.

As for that plot though, the flash-forwards are very slow moving as to where it’s heading due to the lack of screen time, but it still presents interesting developments almost every episode that they’re featured in. This really helps keep the momentum moving forward on this storyline. There are some great jokes about technology here too.

Despite a lackluster A-story, the B-story and flash-forwards are compelling enough to make about half of this episode of Arrow interesting enough to be enjoyable.