Tonight’s episode of Arrow saw the return of a fan-favorite character, and that return included a take on a popular Green Arrow story from comics.
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Spoilers for tonight’s episode of Arrow, “Doppelganger”, below.
The episode saw the return of Roy Harper (Colton Haynes), but it wasn’t exactly a happy Team Arrow reunion. Just as Oliver (Stephen Amell) thought he was going to have the charges against him dismissed, the Star City district attorney that they had a new witness — Roy. Considering that Roy took the fall for Oliver the last time he was accused of being Green Arrow, this could have been a huge betrayal.
Instead, it turns out that Ricardo Diaz (Kirk Acevedo) was behind Roy’s reappearance. Diaz has his crooked Star City police officers kidnap and interrogate Roy in a hotel room, and it’s a brutal interrogation. The team attempts a rescue which sees Thea (Willa Holland) suit up again, but that doesn’t go as planned. Thea gets into the room via the vents, but the henchmen are just outside, and there are too many for her to take alone. Before Thea can attempt the fight, Oliver uses a trick arrow to yank her out of the window and to safety, leaving Roy behind.
Many fans hoped that, when it was revealed that Diaz was the real big bad this season, Arrow would be taking on the “Broken” storyline from the New 52 Green Arrow comics and while it doesn’t appear that the show is following the story exactly, that hotel appears to have served as a nod to the story. In comics, Diaz kidnaps Diggle as part of his plan to humiliate him and Green Arrow and take back the city after they ruined his father. Diaz beats Diggle — who reveals to Diaz that he had been the Green Arrow in disguise — severely, and then tries to kill him by throwing him out a window. Diggle survives, and he and Green Arrow team up and defeat Diaz.
Tonight’s episode doesn’t see anyone thrown out of a window per se, but the beating of Roy makes for a solid stand in for Diggle in the comics. Fans may recall that Roy turned himself in and claimed to be the Arrow to keep Oliver out of trouble making Roy’s predicament a clever parallel. As for the window, when Oliver pulls Thea out of the room with his trick arrow, it’s another nod to that panel in the comics. When all put together, the whole scene is a nice nod to the comic books, something of a deep Easter egg of sorts for fans.
Of course, that wasn’t the only sly nod to the “Broken” story arc. Early in the episode the new police chief says that she can raise $30 million for the city by selling things the SCPD had seized in the past. In “Broken”, $30 million just so happens to be the bounty that Diaz puts out on Green Arrow.
Did you catch any other nods to “Broken” in tonight’s episode? Let us know in the comments below!
