Home Features RECAP: ARROW S02E20 “Seeing Red”

RECAP: ARROW S02E20 “Seeing Red”

by Andrew Nguyen

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Seeing Red – Thanks to Oliver, Roy’s been saved except you know his life’s still in mortal danger. Felicity and Diggle happen to discuss that there’s been nothing in the news about Isabel Rochev’s death. She’s been missing for a week and not a single mention has leaked. With nothing else to do but monitor an unconscious Roy, Diggle leaves Felicity to grab them some sushi for dinner, an alternative to their usual dinner from the Big Belly Burger. Roy wakes up and scares a freaked out Felicity, but something’s not right with Roy. Before he leaves, Roy practically flips a table and knocks out Diggle, who had returned after he realized he had forgotten his wallet. Again? Really? Diggle really gets the shaft in almost every episode…He’s always being beaten up so easily…

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Meanwhile, Oliver and Sara are making out and having some sexy time to themselves. In between some kisses, Oliver asks Sara to move in with him, an idea that neither of them seems to have a problem with.

At home, Thea interrupts Moira being interviewed in order to tell her that she can’t have her political rally at Verdant. Thea, being the brat she is, completely forgets that as an adult she had signed a contract and storms off.

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FLASHBACK. Oliver and Laurel are together at the Queen mansion when Laurel questions his sour mood. Oliver makes an excuse that he’s completely tired after a long night out with Tommy. Oliver later reveals to Moira that what’s bothering him is that he got a girl pregnant. And it’s not Laurel. Could this be a pregnant Sandra Hawke  with the future Connor Hawke in the making?

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Sin sees Roy on the street and runs up to him. She notices that his hands are bruised and instantly knows somethings off with Roy. Some guys try to defend her thinking that Roy is harassing her, only to get violently beat up by Roy. A purple-eyed Sin later goes to Verdant, where Ollie and Sara are watching some men set up for Moira’s rally, and she confesses to Sara that Roy had hit her.

Moira goes to see Blood at his political headquarters. She tells him that she believed she owed him the courtesy of informing him that she’ll be dropping out of the race. Blood, already accepting victory, assures Moira that the city will be in good hands (Yeah, right…).

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FLASHBACK. Moira tells  consoles a panicked Oliver. She asks Oliver if he’s 100% sure the baby is his or if the girl’s just trying to take advantage of their family money.

Felicity tracks Roy headed east. Oliver assumes this to mean he’s headed for Queen mansion. But before Sara can head out, Sin calls her. Roy’s at Sin’s house.

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Arrow and Black Canary go to confront Roy at the clock tower. Black Canary is easily knocked out (I mean this in the nicest way, Roy is seriously jacked up). Roy curb stomps Arrow’s knee, seriously crippling Oliver. He then escapes through a hole in the floor. The cops show up and try to stop Roy. Unfortunately for them, Roy’s not in the surrendering type of mood. He kills one of the cops with Oliver’s arrow and breaks the arm of the other before running off.

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Licking their wounds yet again, Black Canary carries Arrow to a late night hospital. Luckily for them, Black Canary had taken him to the right place. The doctor puts a brace on the Arrow’s leg and gives him some medicine, a thank you for stopping the Chinese Triad from robbing their medical supplies.

“Mirakuru won’t do anything against a headshot.” – Sara Lance

Back at Verdant, Thea watches the news and immediately recognizes the man that killed the police officer to be Roy. Underneath Verdant, Ollie and Sara are back from the Doctor’s. Oliver is doing everything he can to heal his leg faster. Sara, tired of waiting on Ollie, grabs a gun and leaves. She’s gone off to hunt Roy, knowing they very well might have to kill him in order to stop him.

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Not being of any help, Oliver goes to Moira’s political rally. Mark Francis, Moira’s campaign manager, tells Oliver of Moira’s plan to drop out of the race. Oliver goes to his mother, hoping he can change her mind. He tells her that now, more than ever, Thea needs to see her mother do some good. In return, Moira reveals to her son that she knows who he is, since the Undertaking to be specific. Again I say, great job at keeping your secret Ollie. Thinking she’d be mad, Oliver braces himself for a beating a stern talking to, but instead Moira tells him she’s proud of him.

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FLASHBACK. Moira and the pregnant girl are seen together at the Queen mansion. Moira reveals to the young girl that she had their investigator look into the girl’s life and has been reassured that Oliver is in fact the father of the girls unborn child. Apparently money can make people be extremely thorough. Moira then hands the girl a check for 1 million dollars and promises another million after the girl tells Oliver that she had “lost the baby.”

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Moira goes up on stage to talk at her rally. Instead of announcing her withdrawal, Moira has a change of heart. She decides to stay in the race, to the dismay of both Thea and Blood. Thea’s next to speak and uses this televised event as an opportunity to lure out Roy. Oliver sees through her plan and goes to the Arrow cave with Felicity. He injects himself with an entire vile of novocaine, hoping to numb his knee and prepare himself for Roy’s incoming.

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“No one dies tonight!” – Arrow

Roy crashes the party and knocks out a bunch of guards. Diggle ushers Moira out with the help of some other security guards and goes to confront Roy. Diggle gets knocked the hell out by Roy. Again. Thea tries to appeal to Roy’s humanity but is met with a hand to the throat and is lifted up off the ground. Black Canary shows up with her gun fully intent to kill Roy. Meanwhile, Thea begs for Roy’s life. As Black Canary is about to fire, Sin steps in the way to beg for his life as well. Black Canary misfires and shoots Roy in the leg. Roy seems to in his right mind for a quick second as he begs Canary to kill him. Before anything else can happen, the Arrow shows up and shoots Roy in the chest with the viper venom arrows.

Sara has a tearful moment with Oliver. She tells him that she was ready to kill Roy and that it’s because being a killer is who she is. She leaves Oliver but not before she tells him he deserves better than her. Sara walks to her bike and runs into Sin. Sara hugs Sin goodbye and tells her she;s going to see an old friend.

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After being questioned by the police, Oliver, Moira and Thea get into a limo. Thea tells Moira and Oliver that everything that’s happen is because of the lies in their family. Moira agrees with Thea. She looks at both of her children and tells them she has something to tell them about Malcolm. Before she can say anything else, their limo is hit by a large car.

Ollie wakes up and finds himself lying on the ground, with his hands tied. He sees Moira and Thea kneeling side by side similar to how Shado and Sara had been on the island. Oliver starts to feel the side effects from the novacaine. Slade stands over them as Ivo had done and holds a gun over Moira and Thea. Slade then forces Ollie to choose which of the two he’d be willing to sacrifice. Moira stands up and offers herself to Slade in place of her children. Slade puts away his gun and looks at Moira. He tells her that she has true courage and that it’s unfortunate that her son did not inherit it. With his backed turned, Slade takes out his sword and stabs Moira through the chest. That’s one way to get revenge for Isabel Rochev…An eye for an eye I guess. No pun intended. Before he leaves, Slade tells Oliver that one more person has to die and cuts Thea’s bonds.

FLASHBACK. Oliver gets off the phone with the pregnant girl. He’s both distraught and ecstatic to discover that the girl lost the baby. Moira enters the room and he tells her the girl plans to go back to school in Central City and move on with her life. Oliver tells his mother he doesn’t believe he could’ve “gotten through something like this without” her, to which she responds, “you’re never without me.”

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The episode ends with a grim and disheartening overhead shot of Thea crying on top of her mother’s open-eyed corpse as Ollie lays paralyzed beside them.

REVIEW
It gave me the chills just seeing Roy in such a rampaging mode. He’s seriously following Slade down the crazy path and is now seeing hallucinations of a loved one. I can definitely see Roy taking up the mantle,  Red Arrow or even Arsenal as a result of this latest development. It’ll be really interesting to see how Roy will attempt to redeem himself after having killed a police officer and causing so much pain to those around him. I mean there’s still hope for him right? He did, after all, beg Sara to kill him.

Now let’s move on to that ending scene–Moira’s death! I expected the season 2 finale to have a major character to die (although Slade did say “One more person needs to die before this ends”) but this was completely side blinded me. I really am sad to see Moira go since this episode really did show how much of a caring mother she is. Although she totally lied to Ollie about his child in the flashback, at least she made sure her grandchild and the child’s mother was well compensated. In my honest opinion, I can say that she definitely died a noble death. Especially when she  told Oliver that she knew he was the arrow and how proud she was.

Speaking about flashbacks,  I’m not surprised at all that Ollie got someone pregnant but I really do hope this possible easter egg gets turned canon somewhere along the road.  If my speculations are correct, the pregnant girl is totally Sandra Hawke.  If you don’t know who Sandra Hawke is, she was one of Oliver’s early flings in the comics that gave birth to his son Conner Hawke, who also became a bow and arrow vigilante like his father and later takes up his father’s mantle in his absence. Are we going to see Sandra and Conner Hawke in the Arrow verse?! I was afraid Moira was going to make the poor girl terminate the unborn child but luckily she didn’t. They never even gave the poor young lady a name in the flashback!

Arrow returns next week with a brand new episode, “City of Blood” on April 30.

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