Arrow Season 2, Episode 7 “State vs. Queen”
Written by Marc Guggenheim & Drew Z. Greenberg
Directed by Bethany Rooney
Airs Wednesday nights at 8pm ET on The CW
Never a fan of The Count in his season one appearances, seeing his face in the opening flashback of “State vs. Queen” didn’t appear to be a promising sign. Fortunately, the writers of Arrow used the familiar face – one of the only living testaments to the notion Arrow has control over who he kills or doesn’t kill – to make a very interesting point about its protagonist. By the same token, the return of Malcolm Merlyn raises a number of other intriguing stories for Arrow to explore moving forward – something it doesn’t initially appear to be, given the context in which his character is brought back into the fold. Simply put, “State vs. Queen” does a much better job executing stories than it does introducing them, finding fantastic moments away from its soapier elements (which continue to be the most frustrating parts of the show, though noticeably less so than in season one).
In season one, The Count was a horrible, over-camped and underpowered villain – but here, he takes on a very Joker-like role to Arrow, taking full advantage of the new knowledge that Arrow no longer kills his enemies. “Why deny yourself life’s simple pleasures?” he asks, adding an unhinged darkness to the character that season one’s attempts threw fully into caricature territory, reducing Count Vertigo (as he was known then) to a cackling idiot who didn’t serve much purpose outside of simple dramatics (and Thea taking drugs… ugh). In “State vs. Queen”, he’s the criminal world’s middle finger to Arrow’s newfound morality, eventually pushing him over the edge when he threatens to inject Felicity with a huge dose of Vertigo 2.0 (which he’d been distributing through flu shot trucks, infecting Diggle along the way).
In those moments, Arrow predictably stumbles, falling victim to the hormonal soap opera elements all-too-common on The CW’s shows. Arrow’s new moral code is broken the minute some hot girl is in danger? Yes, him and Felicity have “chemistry” – but forcing Arrow’s character to kill Count for no reason except “he’s attacking a girl I have a crush on, but can’t date because this shit always happen to her” is a bit of a cheap way to bring back the darker side of the Hood’s vigilante side. There’s certainly interesting material to be had between the Count and Arrow – besides the now-obvious connection to Brother Blood, the Count’s obsession with exploiting chemistry makes a nice parallel to Dr. Ivo – but instead, “State vs. Queen” frames it in the context of giving meaning to his relationship with Felicity: in other words, Arrow won’t kill to save the city anymore, but he’ll kill to keep some potential buns alive.
A little bit of an odd move – but certainly no odder than revealing that Thea is the love child of Malcolm and Moira, a twist that (for the first time this season) had me smacking my head in frustration. This one little plot choice has some really disturbing repercussions for Moira: by proxy, it gets her off for letting 500+ get killed (although her getting out of jail wasn’t a big surprise… can’t leave main billing on the sidelines forever) – but more disturbingly, it paints her out as a bad person, even though her husband had affairs on her for years. It’s not crazy to think she’d be attracted to Malcolm, a distinguished businessman with a devious smile and a well-thought out plan for everything (not to mention his “athletic” skills), especially with a husband chasing tail and involving himself in increasingly dangerous activities.
Making her a liar and a cheater is a very odd move for Arrow: all season, the show’s rewarded her pride and strength in accepting her own fate as a way to redeem her character a bit in the light of her evil ways in early episodes. The events of “State vs. Queen” undoes a lot of that, pointing the finger at her for a weak moment in what sounds like a very difficult period of her life – instead of passing judgment in any way on what happens after (the innocent verdict she receives), the writers condemn her for cheating on her husband, turning her into a liar in the eyes of her children – and in the case of Thea, probably catalyzes a long stream of the annoying, whiny Thea we all grew to hate in season one.
But this isn’t to say “State vs. Queen” is a bad episode – at this point, it’s much easier to embrace the many things this show is doing well, then the few places isn’t (especially when those moments are quite obviously influenced by the network it airs on). As long as Arrow continues to embrace both its exploration of morality in a corrupt world without falling too far into the trappings of its comic book roots, the first third of season two makes it quite clear the writers are on the right track: improving on previous story lines and characters (most notably Deadshot and the Count), while slowing drawing out the bigger overarching stories for season two (that particle accelerator is right on schedule, folks!).
Other thoughts/observations:
– next week, we’ll meet Barry Allen for the first time.
– Laurel again makes no sense in this episode: “I don’t want this case (and legally, could never really take it on), but I’ll give it everything I got to destroy the people who’ve always loved me!…. aww, I lost, let me make a pouty face and run away when someone tries to console me.”
– why are police officials keeping prisoner escapes secret?
– Felicity: “Try heroin sometime… wait, don’t try heroin.”
– The Count has a few great lines, but “Quiet, please… I’m threatening” exemplifies the changes they made to the character to make him that much more of an interesting, magnetic presence. Sad to see they killed him off (not like Malcolm’ed him off).
– Moira, your lawyer (who is also known as The Atom’s ex-wife, apparently) sucks.
– The thing with Oliver saying “There was never a choice” about saving Felicity and killing the Count is that it undermines the entire plot point: if Arrow really doesn’t feel he has a choice, what does that say about him being a “hero”? Can a man who can’t control the impulse to murder someone ever be considered a “good” guy? These are the kinds of things the show needs to get into moving forward to make this episode’s events worthwhile – and the return of a man Oliver thought he’d already killed might be just the venue for it.
— Randy
