Team GATV Roundtable: Looking Back At Season 3

What was your favorite episode of Season 3?

CRAIG: “The Brave and the Bold” was fun partly because I just loved seeing the worlds of Arrow and The Flash crossing, but something has to be said for the twists, turns and shocks of “Broken Arrow.” The show CAN still surprise us – I thought Roy was a goner, and then when everything else went down, I was even more surprised – and it was just generally a great hour of TV.

DEREK: I still really like “Sara,” even though I fully recognize that it’s not the season’s best (that’s probably “The Brave and the Bold,” “Public Enemy” or “Broken Arrow”). And it’s tied heavily into the Sara murder mystery, which turned out to be a big misfire of an arc. But I really love how that episode addresses the concept of death, grief, and memorialization through the very different ways Oliver, Laurel, Felicity, and Diggle react to Sara’s murder. Felicity’s line about Sara’s small hands still guts me. It felt “different” in a way I was hoping season 3 would be, in that it’s a smaller, personal character-centric piece with relevant and relatable themes about life and loss. It’s a pity that most of those elements didn’t really carry through the rest of that arc.

STEPHANIE: None of the episodes from the second portion of the season stand out, so I’m going to stick with “The Magician” and “The Brave and the Bold.”

LAUREL: The Flash crossover, “The Brave and the Bold,” was a lot of fun. Same deal for “The Secret Origin of Felicity Smoak.”

MATT: Not entirely sure. I’ll sit down in a bit to go through my annual ranking of the episodes in the run-up to Season 4, and that might give me a clearer picture. Certainly, I enjoyed “The Brave and the Bold,” the crossover with The Flash. There was also a decent run of episodes with “The Offer,” “Public Enemy,” and “Broken Arrow.” I’m leaning towards “Suicidal Tendencies,” seemingly the last episode with Michael Rowe’s Deadshot and notable for the focus on Lawton’s past in the flashbacks. It might also be the last episode to feature the Suicide Squad on the series given the upcoming movie.  And of course, a big shout-out to the boxing glove arrow in “Guilty.”

What was your least favorite episode?

DEREK: My qualms with the season were mostly as a whole, so I can’t say most episodes really dipped in quality on an individual basis — internally, each hour is well-paced and of high-quality production. The season’s faults mostly lied in where they fit as pieces in the grander puzzle. That said, I found myself very disappointed in “Uprising,” which seems hastily cobbled together in a way Arrow never is. It had so much promise — Malcolm flashbacks! The city of Starling fighting back in an all-out war! The conclusion to the experimental Arrow-less arc that was a huge upswing in quality! And somehow, it squandered all of it. Malcolm’s flashbacks were trite, forgettable, and poorly acted; the climactic battle was jumbled and poorly edited; and the Arrow’s return was clumsy and cheesy.

STEPHANIE: With the exception of “Suicidal Tendencies,” the episodes with flashbacks not set in Hong Kong were not favorites of mine. I love learning more about the supporting characters, but the content of their flashbacks this season didn’t come as a surprise.

I was looking forward to “The Return” and “Canaries,” but they were both letdowns. Slade Wilson and Sara Lance seemed like they were in those episodes just to be in those episodes and not for any greater story developments.

LAUREL: While I get the whole “Oliver isn’t the only hero in Starling City” theme, the show is called Arrow. That means the Arrow needs to be doing his thing, preferably around the other characters. For that reason, the two episodes I liked the least were “Left Behind” (where Oliver was presumed dead the whole episode) and “The Return” (just Oliver and Thea hanging out on Lian Yu).

MATT: Some in the running are “The Secret Origin of Felicity Smoak,” “Uprising,” and “The Calm.” I think, perhaps, that “Draw Back Your Bow” might end up the “winner” here. While I liked Amy Gumenick as Cupid, I just didn’t feel much for the story or the episode on the whole.

CRAIG: This is a tough question. There are episodes where there were things that bugged me, but I think I was probably most annoyed during the arc where Oliver was “dead.” It was cool to see Laurel becoming the Black Canary and all, but it just was all so dour. I want to have fun. Which I know goes counter to my love of Daredevil.