Arrow (3×03) Review – “Corto Maltese”

Team Arrow wants Thea to come home, having to travel to a beautiful paradise to convince her

Last week, Team Arrow mourned the loss of Sara Lance (Caity Lotz) who was shot with three arrows buy an assailant whose identity is still unknown, falling off a rooftop to her horrible death. With all the grief, and any possible leads on the killer gone cold, Oliver (Stephen Amell) thinks it’s time for Thea (Willah Holland) to finally come home, and gives Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) the task of finding out exactly where in Italy she is. Felicity explains that through constant pinging of her phone she discovers that not only is Thea not in Italy, but she’s in Corto Maltese, an island just off South America, hence the episodes title. Enjoying every moment he has with his newborn daughter, Diggle (David Ramsey) is asked by his ex-wife and current girlfriend Lyla (Audrey Marie Anderson) to go to Corto Maltese with Ollie because she needs him to track down an A.R.G.U.S. agent by the name of Mark Shaw (David Cubitt) who’s gone cold for a few days and hasn’t made any form of contact. Shaw’s character is based on DC Comics character Manhunter (not Martian Manhunter folks, if only) and we expect to see more of him throughout the season. The trio of Oliver, Diggle and Roy (Colton Haynes) are traveling, so let’s join them for an adventure and discuss a delightful episode in “Corto Maltese!”

Like father, like daughter

Arrow immediately dives into a flashback of Thea and her biological father Malcolm Merlyn (John Barrowman) six months prior to present day where sitting in the back of a limo, they discuss where they should go and the fact that Thea just doesn’t want to get hurt anymore and feel so much pain, implying that Malcolm’s the one to help her overcome it. We actually get to experience a few flashbacks, which are related to the duration of Thea’s departure from Starling City and the intense training she’s received from Malcolm. Another flashback reveals Malcolm pouring boiling hot tea over his, only to do the same to Thea to see she can’t handle it for long. Malcolm loves his daughter, and explains that everything is his fault. By this, he means he feels he must train her the way he was trained.

Malcolm: “It’s not your fault, it’s mine.”
Thea: “What do you mean ‘it’s not your fault, it’s mine’?”
Malcolm: “I thought I could do this differently but I can’t. I need to train you as I was trained… Treat you as my student, not my daughter.”

He then elbows her in the face, and kicks her again while she’s on the ground. When he’s about to make another move Thea grabs a sword and threatens him with it. With a crude smile Malcolm knows that now he can really begin her training.

Thea’s approached separately by Oliver and Roy, both trying to convince her to come home. Both of these conversations were very pleasant and heartwarming to watch, as Thea was in a surprisingly positive mood and especially happy to see her brother. She speaks with Roy in a tone that establishes a common sense of understanding, which is great to see. There’s also some sentiment here, and Thea keeps it simple explaining that she can’t be around so many secrets and lies. Malcolm becomes aware Oliver and Roy are in Corto Maltese, and simply keeps out of sight, not wanting to reveal he’s still alive.

“All I ever wanted was for you to be happy Thea. I’m sorry I got in the way of that. I’m sorry I hurt you.” – Roy

This trip to Corto Maltese is somewhat of a personal mission for Diggle, and it doesn’t go as smooth as expected

Arrow’s third episode has two ongoing conflicts in Corto Maltese, one being the Thea situation (though the flashbacks are somewhat limited in quality as we don’t yet get to observe the full extent of her training) and the other, Diggle’s very random mission from Lyla to investigate this rogue A.R.G.U.S. agent. It’s quite a coincidence that Lyla had a man stationed in the exact same place Oliver was going (remember Diggle wasn’t going until Lyla brought this up) and something that looked a little awkward for this episode, as if it was sort of just shoved into the plot to fill in.

What this scenario definitely provided viewers with was very solid action sequences. It’s clear that this scene was set up very well, with the perfect angle shots to depict what would be a great fight between Team Arrow and the military of Corto Maltese. The only reason this conflict happened in the first place is because earlier on Shaw, while pretending to be Diggle’s friend, set him up and took the A.R.G.U.S. drive from him to sell it off. This drive features hits and soft targets such as family members of the main targets. Oliver actually hand crafted two bows and quivers with a bunch of arrows for himself and Roy out of simple materials from their hotel room, which was pretty funny when he brought it up but also displays how resourceful Oliver has become because of the island. The trio heads into the action and it’s great to see more action from Roy who looks great fighting alongside his mentor. Oliver, to the complete shock of Roy, also wields a pistol which was just awesome to witness. This secondary story line isn’t one that fans can care for much, but it provided the much needed action in a gorgeous location since we didn’t get to see Malcolm and Ollie come face to face. Why didn’t they discover and engage each other in this episode? It could possibly be the fact that Nyssa al Ghul (Katrina Law) appears at the end of the episode in anger, looking for Sara. Oh boy, it seems we may be in for a much bigger treat next week!

Starling is still purring like a kitten, but not for long…

Meanwhile, back in Starling City Laurel (Katie Cassidy) has been attending her group therapy sessions, still trying to recover from Sara’s death. There’s a lot of anger instilled in her, but she still feels useless in a world surrounded by the abilities of her friends. This is a slow development process towards her becoming the Black Canary, but she has a long way to go. It was obvious that she’s not that far ahead when she attempted to confront a potential witness/suspect in a case as a vigilante only for him to beat her up and take off.

In Starling, viewers got their first true look at Ted Grant (J.R. Ramirez) who seems to be a boxer (a skilled one, mind you) that helps street kids keep their noses clean and learn to defend themselves. Laurel gets into an argument with him about a case for which he doesn’t really cooperate, but does offer her lessons so she can work off her anger. It’s been hinted before that Grant could very well be a love interest of Laurel’s, through a lot more development in their relationship of course.

On the other hand, Felicity has settled into her new job working for the always pleasant Ray Palmer (Brandon Routh). The interactions between these two are also quirky and comical, and a complete joy to watch. In a scene where Diggle and Laurel are separately asking for her help, and Ray standing in front of her desk, Felicity brought some much needed giggles to this episode. She’s also left for Central City, which will be a blast to watch her next week on The Flash.

Final Verdict

“Corto Maltese” provided a nice change of scenery and storyline, moving away from Starling City. The problem with this episode is that it didn’t focus on as much detail in Thea and Malcolm’s six month trek as it could have, namely the flashbacks showing us mostly the beginning of her training. This could change since she’s decided to return to Starling, and may slowly reveal some abilities she’s learned over time as members of Team Arrow could start becoming more suspicious of her new ways and personality. Something to point out is just how gorgeous the island of Corto Maltese is, and hopefully the crew has a reason to go back in the future, because it’s definitely a sight to see.

The split storyline between Thea and A.R.G.U.S. agent Mark Shaw was made up for by a wicked action sequence shot from many different angles, giving the viewers a true experience of the abilities of our heroes put to the test. Oliver’s resourcefulness is a much underrated highlight in this episode as it displays a very valuable skill he learned on the island, and by funny coincidence, having to use it on another island. EP’s Greg Berlanti and Andrew Kreisberg continuously give us action sequences that never fail to impress the viewers, as they’ve raised the bar for TV shows in both Arrow and The Flash.

Ray had a look of dark seriousness as he was viewing the recovered files from Applied Sciences on his computer. There were several blueprints displaying the creation of high tech weaponry and vehicles, which definitely peaked his interest. It’s different to see such a negative look on his face, what exactly is he up to?

Something that must be pointed out is how open the DC Universe has become in Arrow. We have several cameos of lesser known characters that will make more fruitful appearances and develop over time. The big mention that really has viewers, especially fan boys (myself included), is Coast City. We’ve previously seen and heard mentions of Ferris Air which is in Coast City run by the family of Carol Ferris, who is the popular girlfriend/love interest of Hal Jordon AKA Green Lantern throughout many of DC’s Green Lantern storylines. The showrunners have been asked several times about the possible appearance of Hal, and without really giving us a true yes or no, they’ve stated anything is possible. This would make perfect sense as in many comics Hal, Oliver and Barry are all very good friends. Could Hal Jordan be the missing piece in truly forming a fully fledged Justice League on TV? We’ll have to be patient and see for ourselves.

It’s great to learn that Thea’s coming home, but that also means Malcolm will be following her every move after allowing her to go back. With the addition of Nyssa at the end of “Corto Maltese” we could very well see the League of Assassins come into play next week, which could be one of season three’s biggest showdowns.

QUESTIONS, COMMENTS & CONCERNS…

• Nyssa will likely discuss Ollie with her father. How soon will Ra’s al Ghul be in Starling? If he isn’t there already…
• I can’t help but get overly excited every time I hear anything related to Coast City, hopefully CW’s next pilot order can be another spinoff, featuring Green Lantern, though there’s nothing in the works right now
• Ray’s always been a positive person until he discovered the recovered files; Is there a big undercover plot taking shape at Queen Consolidated?
• What’s going on at A.R.G.U.S.? I can’t help but wonder what their reason is for having soft targets