Arrow - League of Assassins - Review

Intro

Took a short break from reviewing things yesterday and found out, annoyingly, that my internet or computer hates me. I managed to watch last week's episode of The Originals, with many stops for loading and things. When I went to watch Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, I was too annoyed to wait while it did much the same. It even stopped an annoyingly long time to load while I was watching Once Upon a Time last night, luckily, though, I was able to watch most of that episode unhindered.

Today I had better luck watching Once Upon a Time in Wonderland on Chrome so I think I'll just use that to watch everything else I have to. However, I do have to work today so I've just got this one review for you.

If you actually read that little rant, thanks. If not, well, it was rather inconsequential so... meh.

SPOILER WARNING

The following review is for Arrow, Season 2, Episode 5: "League of Assassins." If you have not seen the episode, you should go do that before reading this review. Even my character lists contain spoilers.

Arrow - "League of Assassins" - Review

Characters:

• Oliver Queen - Played by Stephen Amell. Main character. Also known as "The Hood" or "The Vigilante" or "The Arrow."
• John "Dig" Diggle - Played by David Ramsey. Oliver's bodyguard/driver.
• Felicity Smoak - Played by Emily Bett Rickards. Oliver's Executive Secretary/techie.
• Thea Queen - Played by Willa Holland. Oliver's younger sister. Roy's girlfriend. Runs Verdant.
• Moira Queen - Played by Susanna Thompson. Olly and Thea's mother. Currently in jail.
• Dinah "Laurel" Lance - Played by Katie Cassidy. Oliver's ex-girlfriend. Works for the DA.
• Sara Lance/Black Canary - Played by Caity Lotz. Laurel's sister. Olly's ex. Currently vigilante-ing around Starling City.
• Officer Quentin Lance - Played by Paul Blackthorne. Laurel's father.
• Adam Donner - Played by Dylan Bruce. The District Attorney. Laurel's boss.
• Jean Loring - Played by Teryl Rothery. Old friend of Moira's and her attorney.
• Al Ow-Al - Played by Navid Negahban. League of Assassins member. Trained Malcolm Merlyn. Deceased.
• Dr. Anthony Ivo - Played by Dylan Neal. Runs the boat off the Island.

Review:

I was actually really happy with this episode. It had a lot of what I was expecting and some things I wasn't. I enjoyed getting some Sara back story, but I'm glad we didn't get everything all at once. In my opinion, Caity Lotz did a better job portraying her younger counterpart than Stephen Amell does. That's also really saying something since Stephen does an awesome job portraying young Olly. I honestly can't wait to see what happens/happened to Sara down the line.

Speaking of which, I really ended up liking Sara. I've heard people talk about how Caity Lotz's portrayal is rather wooden, but it works for me. I figure Sara's been through some really horrible stuff and been trained as a warrior so her emotions had to get buried deep. Olly, in comparison, hasn't been through as much, or at least not the same level of stuff, and is better at playing up his "civilian" persona when need be. He's also got Dig and Felicity to help soften him. The place where both Olly and Sara allow their true emotions to be seen is around their families, which Sara did.

"League of Assassins" was lousy with fight scenes. When I say that, I don't mean that the fight scenes were horrible, I just mean there were a lot of them. As usual, the fighting was very well done and showcased the skills of each character without going over the top. I felt like the fights carried more weight this time around, mostly because we could worry about Sara or Officer Lance getting killed. I'm pretty sure Olly's not gonna get killed any time soon as he's the title character so... that always takes a bit out of the suspense for me.

I'm back to being really annoyed with Laurel. It's great she's mostly off The Arrow's case, but this grief/guilt kick she's on isn't doing her any favors. The fact that she's ended up on Moira's case is annoying. Apparently there wasn't really another way to keep her relevant to the story. I honestly don't have anything more than that to say about Laurel.

Miscellaneous Notes:

• Sara being at Olly's was initially weird. Can't wait to see how he explains the destruction.
• I love that Felicity is awkward around more than just Olly.
• I'm glad Lance had a conflict of emotions over Sara leaving.

Favorite Lines:

"She always did have the worst taste in friends." - Lance

"Guns are a coward's weapon. What are you without your side arm?"
"A guy with a spare." - Al Ow-Al and Lance

"Who do you think you raised." - Thea

Housekeeping

Uh... I'm only really putting this here because I need a breaker-thing before I sign off.

Love ya, Jessie