I saw in the closing credits a credit for "Voice of Vigilante," but I can't rule out the possibility I hallucinated it.

I didn't have a major take on him, though you can pretty much infer my thoughts on him (generally positive!) from stray mentions here and there.

Yeah, I'll admit I'm not thinking this all through as much as I probably ought to. I'll just say this: While the particulars of Batman are not necessarily fascist, the overarching reality of his whole deal — the uber-rich guy taking the law into his own hands and doing things the cops aren't willing to do — pretty…

Even if there haven't been changes made, I bet the fact they're not launching a spin-off show this year (not counting Supergirl's move to The CW) really helps. Having senior people dividing attention between shows can be a real killer — it's never mentioned enough that The Simpsons take its *big* dip right as Futurama…

That's fair! But, on the other hand, Arrow basically got Neal McDonough to play superpowered Robert Quarles for a season, and the Justified megafan in me just can't bring myself to dislike that.

Yeah, Superman as crusader for the forgotten in the pre-WW2 comics was great. It's more Batman who established the fascist mold in the specifics, and just generally the notion of taking the law into one's own hands is really effing questionable, especially for a guy who is also the mayor.

Season 3 might have had a better story, but Matt Nable was just fatally miscast as Ra's al Ghul. Whereas Neal McDonough was a hoot and a half as Damien Dahrk, even if, sure, the storytelling around him wasn't as strong. I was entertained by season 4 in ways I just wasn't by season 3, but I'll acknowledge season 3…

I think seasons three and four are good examples of times when a lot of the specific episodes are very good, even great, but it's just hard to see how they cohere into something more, which makes them tough to feel super good about going forward. Season five already feels a lot more coherent, though obviously there's…

From what I saw, "successfully" is *awful* generous.

I'd be surprised if Arrow doesn't eventually modulate how it presents Oliver as mayor once we start seeing episodes written post-Trumpening. For now it's just really weird.

For sure, Arrow isn't a conservative show, even if it doesn't buy completely into comics Oliver's famously leftwing politics. It's more just there are enough unintentional parallels here that I'm not sure how well this show is going to work as the fun escapism I suspect it would want to be.

Give it time, give it time. We're all going to get there.

Also, I didn't feel like bringing this into the review, because I imagine some people want silly things like Arrow reviews to give them a break from the world around them, but let me just say this as a private citizen or whatever: I'm not sure how comfortable I am watching a show about a fascist vigilante (which all…

Arrow this season feels like it's not wasting time with delaying tactics *without* feeling like it's burning through story at an unsustainable rate. Having Tobias Church around at the beginning helped, but just generally the storytelling has been really well considered this year.

Yeah, right you are. Though that was a minor enough appearance that it'd still be fun to see him properly interact with Bob. It's a bit like we did see Ginger in that one flashback, but we're still kinda waiting on a proper appearance.

I'm up for giving it a shot.

I dunno. I want to see what others are seeing here, but I either needed the episode to show us more than it did, or at least to tell us in a more compelling way than what we got.

Yeah, in fairness, I can't really think of a good example of an Arrowverse show successfully dealing with a topic that complex. I just wished the whole thing hadn't felt quite as stage-y and obviously low-budget, even if it's not going to be any more nuanced than what we got.

I bet Mick would have had some takes on slavery that would make us all think.

For what it's worth, I'm legitimately glad that you (and hopefully others!) enjoyed this episode so much. I'm still really not on this show's wavelength, and the review reflects that, but I'm pleased it's hitting its stride for people.