TELEVISION EPISODE REVIEW: Arrow S6 Ep23 'Life Sentence' (Season Finale)

The FBI comes to town to help Oliver and company take down Diaz, but at what cost? Join us for the season finale of the 6^th season of Arrow.

Arrow – “Life Sentence”, Season 6, Episode 23
Airdate: May 17^th, 2018
Director: James Bamford
Writer: Greg Berlanti & Marc Guggenheim
Based on the DC Comics Created by Mort Weisinger & George Papp

What You Should Know:

Oliver outed himself as the Green Arrow to FBI Agent Samandra Watson in exchange for the FBI’s assistance in taking down Diaz and reclaiming Star City, despite Agent Watson’s furious push earlier this season to take Oliver down for vigilantism.

What You’ll Find Out:

The episode opens on Team Arrow, fully united against their common enemy, and the FBI raiding the Star City Police Department and taking away Diaz’s army of corrupt cops. Diaz is not there, of course, so Oliver sets about contacting Anatoly for any tips as to where Diaz may be. Diaz interrupts the phone call, climbing into the backseat of Anatoly’s car, full of thinly veiled threats and skepticism, and informs Anatoly that he has recruited a sect of mythical assassins called The Longbow Hunters (a classic Mike Grell Green Arrow tale from the late 1980s, although the relationship between the characters in the show and the comics series of the same name seems tenuous at best), and gives Anatoly an address to meet them at in an hour, which Anatoly promptly relays to Team Arrow and the FBI, inevitably leading them all into a trap that nearly costs the team Agent Watson, another agent, and Rene. Rick Gonzalez’s performance in this scene was one of the most powerful of the episode, as Rene calls his daughter to tell her how proud he is of her, for potentially the last time. The performance was so compelling that I was convinced Rene was about to die.

Following the raid, Mayor Quentin Lance informs the team that Diaz contacted him and threatened to kill not-Laurel if Quentin doesn’t force the FBI to leave the city. This moment is the precise point where the episode begins to go sideways and never quite recovers. While it is, in the way the narrative has played out this season, not unreasonable for Quentin to fear for not-Laurel’s life and be willing to place himself at risk for her life, I did not see Oliver’s reaction, one of conviction and assurance that they will be certain to save the life of Quentin’s criminal not-daughter (who, lest we forget, has betrayed them at nearly every turn and killed a potential ally of theirs, Vigilante) at all costs. And make no mistake, the cost of saving not-Laurel will prove to be great.

In the midst of all of these occurrences, Oliver begins a long string of one-on-one conversations with those closest to him, mending old wounds with Rene, Diggle, Quinten, Dinah, and the lot, very much signaling the fact that, as a part of the deal to gain FBI help, Oliver will be going to prison by the end of the episode, leading to what will clearly be a story akin to the cancelled Green Arrow Movie from David Goyer, Green Arrow: Escape from Super Max. As Quentin goes off-script in his attempt to locate Diaz by establishing “proof of life” for not-Laurel, the team tracks his location via the pacemaker he conveniently/intentionally told Oliver he received after the Mirakuru incident several seasons ago (although I believe this is a first heard for the fans as well as Oliver). And track they do.

Prior to the team and the FBI raiding yet another facility in the hunt for Diaz, Diaz threatens Quentin and not-Laurel at gunpoint, demanding that Quentin order the FBI out of the city, eventually leading Diaz, who is clearly becoming more and more unhinged at this point, to shoot Quentin in the gut. As Diaz prepares to shoot not-Laurel as well, the raid commences, distracting him and serving as further proof that Diaz is not as unflappable as the writers would like us to believe. If Diaz were truly the ultimate villain, he would have pulled the trigger and shot not-Laurel the moment the breach explosions started going off. Instead, Diaz flees for the rooftop, while the good guys sweep the building. Dinah finds not-Laurel and Quentin, frees not-Laurel and proceeds to try and get Quentin to medical care. Diaz reaches the roof only to be confronted by Oliver, and the two have another round of solo combat, this time leading to Oliver gaining the upper hand (as should always be the case), only to have not-Laurel abandon her not-father and come to the rooftop in time to canary cry Diaz off the building and into the water, a move that Oliver is quick to point out might have worked on somebody less tough (read: write-protected) than Diaz, but certainly not enough to kill Diaz. The only bright side is that Felicity managed to fit a new digital sniffer into Oliver’s glove, so the team at least was able to clone the list of everybody on Diaz’s payroll and root out the corruption in the city.

As we move to the hospital, we begin our tearful goodbye to Quentin with Rene and move through Oliver (who has a very touching father/son moment with Quentin, another remarkable performance). Despite the optimistic doctors, the writing is already on the wall for the septic Quentin, particularly given that, a few weeks ago, Paul Blackthorne’s departure from the show was announced. Quentin’s other daughter, Sara, arrives after Quentin is already in surgery, and is deprived of the proper goodbye with her father that not-Laurel presumably had (a cruel twist of writing, given that she arrived via time travel).

Before Quentin is even announced dead, Agent Watson arrives to make good on Oliver’s bargain, which comes as a shock to the team despite all the signs. Oliver traded his own freedom for immunity for the rest of the team and is arrested. Awaiting transfer to a Super Max facility, Watson allows him to meet in private with Felicity (who already has a plan to break him out, which Oliver rejects), and eventually with William. On the steps of the Federal building, confronted by reporters, Oliver admits that he is being arrested for being the Green Arrow and sends an impassioned plea to all his friends, allies, and the people of the city to continue his fight to make Star City safe. During the scene, viewers see Diaz, shirtless with a large dragon tattoo, watching as well in the company of four other men (so presumably not the reported three Longbow Hunters). The very final sequence sees a newly publicly outed Oliver being locked into his cell at Super Max. Fade to black.

What Just Happened?
All season long, the signs have been clear that the writing team intended to end this season with Oliver in prison, no matter what they had to do to get him there. In that, they certainly accomplished their mission, regardless of what sorts of shoddy writing they had to resort to in order to achieve that goal.

But to every cloud, a silver lining. Although things look grim for Team Arrow, Beth Schwartz was promoted from the writing room to showrunner. You may know Schwartz from some of her work with Legends of Tomorrow. Recently, she wrote “The Thanatos Guild” episode, which was one of the few well-written episodes this season. She also worked on Hart of Dixie for CW, a delightful show that introduced this viewer to Cress Williams as the character Mayor Lavon Hayes, who would go on to star as Jefferson Pierce/Black Lightning.

Despite a wicked mess that left us saddled with not-Laurel moving forward, Diaz still at large, no Quentin, and Oliver in jail, at least the foresight was taken to have Oliver give Diggle a suit, and the promise of Colton Haynes’ return to Roy Harper as a regular character (Haynes reportedly stepped away from the show for mental health reasons, so let us all be thankful that he must be doing better). There is a lot of work to be done to recover from this season, but at least our favorite hooded vigilante and his motley crew of a family are in good hands.

Rating: 6/10
Final Thought: Although I am disappointed and sad/mad at the time of writing this, I do have to admit that there were some really good moments in this episode despite the mess. I am most disappointed that the “exciting comics-related news” teased by Stephen Amell at the CW Upfronts today turned out to be a disconnected reference to “The Longbow Hunters.” C’est la vie.