![]() ![]() ![]() Manu Bennett does good work showing a Slade that never really could turn the killer side of his life off. Even though he’s trying his best to keep his head level, all this is clearly making him uncomfortable that he can’t just go in guns blazing like he subconsciously wishes to. Despite the episode’s title, we’ve mostly got Slade to deal with, and he’s much more subdued than we’re used to. The real trouble is just how long Oliver can go without Slade finally snapping and doing what he does best, and it’s there where the episode shines. (Which, to be fair, is how he’s become friends with Kara, Barry, the Legends, and Roy, so it’s not that much of a stretch.) Like Felicity says, this truly is Oliver helping out a friend…just one who has, on three separate occasions, tried to kill him. To his and the show’s credit, he never tries to tempt Oliver or remind him of the glory days, even when the former archer is completely ready to throw down. Instead of spending half the episode having Oliver debate whether or not he should help, it’s resolved almost immediately: Slade doesn’t want Oliver to go around killing people, he just needs his political power to speed things along for a quick and painless process. Still, Oliver does technically owe Slade a favor after those events, so of course he helps Wilson try to find his long lost son, Joey, in Kasnia after being imprisoned. Even Diggle and Felicity don’t think it’s a good idea, especially since Slade left them on Lian Yu to get nearly blown up. I don’t blame anyone who saw Slade’s heel turn at the end of last season to be a massive stretch cured or no, Slade was still a pretty dickish guy when Oliver first met him, just one with two eyes. The Mirakuru may have messed with his brain and drove him mad, but that sort of reasoning only goes so far. After all, while he was genuine friend to Oliver on Lian Yu, and saved his life on several occasions, there’s no denying that Slade’s also been responsible for some of the truly worst moments of Oliver’s life, directly or not. It’d be easy to lump Slade Wilson in either category. Or they could go the route of Captain Cold on Legends, someone who genuinely does have a heart of gold, but got severely corrupted in life and is trying to find their back. They could go the route of Fate of the Furious from earlier this year, which saw Jason Statham’s character take a bizarre turn towards heroism that flat out ignores all the evil things he did in prior films. Whenever a show takes an infamous villain and makes an attempt to turn them into a good guy, it can go one of two ways. ARROW “DEATHSTROKE RETURNS” REVIEW BY JUSTIN CARTER Arrow - “Deathstroke Returns” - Image AR605b_0186b.jpg - Pictured: Manu Bennett as Slade Wilson/Deathstroke - Photo: Cate Cameron/The CW - é 2017 The CW Network, LLC. ![]()
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