‘Arrow’ 1.15 Episode Recap And Review: Dodger

Dates and Dodgers on this week’s episode of Arrow!

Recap time!

Oliver’s Hood plans for the evening go a little awry when Felicity does some actual research into the guy he’s targeting. Ken Williams is a widower with a 10-year-old, and Felicity doesn’t want to be any part of this if that’s the kind of person that Ollie’s going after, especially when there are criminals like The Dodger (James Callis) in town. Ollie, seeing Felicity’s point, decides to go after The Dodger, whose M.O. includes putting bomb collars on hostages to make them do his dirty work.

Dodger is out making a name for himself in Starling City. He steals a massive ruby, then kills the fence who tries to rip him off. Ollie’s old friend McKenna has been put on the case, and Ollie bugs her phone in order to stay in the loop. The cops run a bust on Dodger’s new fence, but he manages to, well, dodge both them and the Hood. Felicity, Digg, and Oliver set a trap for the Dodger at a charity auction when the Queen family donates a GPS-tagged gem from his preferred era of thievery. Things go sideways when Felicity gets bomb-collared. Ollie chases down Dodger, retrieves the trigger, and leaves the criminal for the SCPD.

Meanwhile, Thea’s on her own manhunt. Her purse gets snatched by a fast-running petty thief in a hoodie. Her investigation leads to Roy Harper (I know!!), whose sob story about a sick mother who’d kicked a Vertigo addiction leads Thea to skip pressing charges. She does, however, trace him back to his home in the Glades to get her purse back. He gives it to her with a piece of advice about believing smooth-talking pretty boys in police stations. Yeah, he’ll be back.

In a great set-up for next week’s episode, Moira gets to meet with an old friend who also happens to be part of the Undertaking. Mo wants out of the whole thing, and is willing to do quite a bit to keep her family safe. To that end, her friend points her in the direction of China White, who she hires to take out Malcolm Merlyn.

The island flashbacks are almost too short to recap, but since we had a major turning point for Oliver’s character, I’ll attempt it. Slade’s bullet wound has become infected, so Ollie treks out to his old cave to fetch Yao-fei’s “superherbs.” While there, he encounters a heavily beaten “college student” who evidently escaped from the soldiers with his hands still tied behind his back. He begs Ollie to untie him, but Oliver decides that he can’t trust the kid and leaves him tied up in the cave.

Well done on the island flashback this week! I appreciate that there’s an island-based storyline that is, as yet, unconnected to the current conspiracy in Starling City. I still haven’t really regained interest in that storyline, honestly. But this week’s flashback really illustrated how time on the island started to change Oliver as a person, and that is what I want to watch when we aren’t in the big city.

Back in Starling City, I think I’m really going to enjoy Felicity becoming an integral part of the team, if for no other reason than being able to watch Digg’s smug expressions every time she calls Oliver out. I’ve talked before about Digg being a humanizing influence on Ollie, but I think Felicity will be even moreso. Digg is still carrying some scars from his time in Afghanistan, which makes him a little more willing to follow Oliver’s lead when he shouldn’t. Felicity still has an innocence that she’s pretty determined to keep. I’ll enjoy watching her get drawn deeper and deeper into the Hood’s world.

Best Quotes:
Ollie: “I’m not Robin Hood.”

Digg: “War is easier than dating.”

Things to Ponder:

  • I can only assume that we’ll be seeing Roy Harper again. Besides the fact that he’s Green Arrow’s original sidekick, The CW wouldn’t hire someone that pretty unless they were going to be a recurring character.
  • I’m still thinking that the random college student on the island was a plant of some sort. Your thoughts?
  • I’m interested to know what the original version of The Undertaking looked like. Building new community centers in the Glades, maybe?

Responses

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  1. Great recap as always.

    Question for you about another show. Are you still doing recaps of Continuum? Last one I saw was from last month and couldn’t find anything else about Continuum on the site. Continuum is a great sci-fi show! Thanks!

  2. I’m afraid I’m not. With Being Human and Lost Girl on the same night, there just aren’t enough hours in the day to get three recaps done. If they’re at Comic Con, I’ll do my best to get that coverage posted, though!

  3. Nice recap of this week. There are so many storyline threads that are only briefly explored in the show and they will probably eventually be fleshed out. I assume this is to build suspense and tie in future episodes, but it seems choppy and incomplete to me. I like the show and the characters and hope it lasts.