The Green Arrow’s training methods prove to be too much for some of the new recruits to handle; flashbacks reveal Oliver’s initiation into the Bratva.

Arrow really gets things going as far as what we can expect this season here as Oliver/Green Arrow must figure out how to properly onboard and train a new team to help him fight crime. The problem is, Ollie is feeling guilty over the death of Black Canary, and folks getting hurt, and generally everyone abandoning him. He’s got some trust issues and since he was trained in a brutal fashion, he thinks that’s the way to go too.

It’s interesting as it really dives into Oliver the person and that he’s not ok from everything that’s happened to him and around him.

What’s also solid is we’re starting to see some bigger issues surrounding the rise of meta humans and a nuclear explosion. People aren’t trusting and it’s escalation to arm themselves more to take on this new “threat.” While things are more “street level” this season, there’s a bigger picture going on, which is really nice.

The episode also introduces Ragman. It’ll be interesting to see what the series does with him as the character is one of the more high-profile Jewish characters in comics and the character is derived from the Golem of Prague of Jewish folklore. How much the show will use in that is a big question, but there’s a statement about how old the rags are that hint they may go pretty far. The fact Felicity is Jewish makes things more interesting.

The episode is an improvement over the series debut which seemed like it had issues with pacing and throwing too much in there to start. The episode takes a few steps back and slows things down while still covering a lot. It’s a bit more character focused instead of action and due to that, it’s improved. Hopefully we get more of this for the rest of the season.

Overall rating: 7.45