Mia Smoak's story is finally told as she and her brother, William make a dangerous journey into the Glades.
- Absurdly Youthful Mother: Emily Bett Rickards, who plays Felicity, is only four years older than Katherine McNamara, the actress playing her daughter, and her makeup is still much the same when playing future Felicity, as opposed to, say, future Dinah's.
- Berserk Button: Being lied to is a huge one for Mia, due to being lied to for almost her entire life. The second she finds out that Connor is a secret agent for Knightwatch, she furiously attacks him.
- Big Bad: Keven Dale is fully revealed to be this for the Flash Forward storyline of the season.
- Bond Villain Stupidity: Keven Dale leaves Mia alone with several mooks, trusting that they are more than capable of dealing with her. Naturally, they fail, and naturally, Mia escapes to foil Dale's evil plan.
- The Bus Came Back: Nyssa in a cameo appearance. Felicity had her train Mia in combat from when she was old enough to walk.
- Calling the Old Man Out:
- Mia gives Felicity hell for lying to her and continuing with her vigilante activities.
- Zoe calls Rene out for having given up on being a hero and working with the villainous Galaxy One.
- Chekhov's Gun: The small cube that Keven fidgets with when William speaks to him proves to be a key element in the climax—specifically, the device that controls the bombs.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: Mia points out that Felicity just can't stay away from being a vigilante. Felicity agrees, saying that it is her true calling to help other people.
- Clean, Pretty Childbirth: Mia's birth is pretty clean, with Felicity only sweating a bit.
- Continuity Nod: William asks if Knightwatch is the "good A.R.G.U.S."; Legends of Tomorrow has shown that around this time, A.R.G.U.S. has become an oppressive and anti-metahuman organisation.
- Cross-Referenced Titles: To the Legends of Tomorrow episode "Star City 2046".
- A Day in the Limelight: While the flash-forwards up until now have typically had William as the central protagonist, this episode puts Mia front and center, though William still plays a significant role.
- Disappeared Dad: After Mia is born, Oliver is noticeably conspicuously absent from her life.
- Distracted by the Sexy: William distracts Keven Dalev not only with business talk but also with a flirty attitude while Mia steals some DNA. Dale takes the bait; Mia even comments that he sure seems like he wants to "keep in touch"
- Generation Xerox: Mia (a stoic, grumpy archer), Connor (a government agent and voice of reason), and William (a friendly, motor-mouthed tech genius) have a similar dynamic to the original Team Arrow. Fittingly, they're all children of the original team members (although, ironically, William has more in common with Felicity than Mia, her biological daughter, does).
- The Ghost: Oliver is mentioned intermittently during the main plot, but aside from the opening scene, he's completely absent.
- Heel–Face Turn: After finding proof that Galaxy One is going to destroy Star City without evacuating first, Rene reconnects with his old friends and helps them stopping it, even though he publicly has to set up a bounty for them to keep up appearances.
- History Repeats: Like her father before her, Mia is trained by a daughter of Ra's al Ghul - in this case, Nyssa.
- Like her mother, Mia was in a relationship with a man who kept secrets from her.
- Eden Core's plot to destroy Star City is basically a new version of the Undertaking. And Rene being a Well-Intentioned Extremist who initially supports the plan but backs out once he realizes that it will kill countless people mirrors Robert Queen's decision decades ago.
- Felicity infiltrating Eden Core by becoming the Calculator mirrors Oliver's infiltration of the League of Assassins by becoming Al-Sahim.
- Idiot Ball: Rene honestly thinks Galaxy One's plan to destroy Star City after the population has been evacuated is good idea. Lampshaded by everybody. He doesn't realize the truth until they plan to bomb the city without evacuating anybody.
- Internal Reveal: Rene finds out about Mia being Felicity's and Oliver's daughter.
- It's All About Me: Mia tries to guilt trip Felicity into stopping her heroic activities and taking care of her family instead.
- Masquerade Ball: The celebration where the team targets Keven Dale.
- Moral Myopia: Mia's issues with neglect and being lied to skew her priorities; she's angry at Felicity trying to "play hero" (i.e. save millions of innocent lives) instead of putting her family first.
- My Beloved Smother: Felicity had Mia homeschooled and tried to keep her away from Star City for as long as possible.
- My Greatest Failure: Felicity creating Archer, since it was hijacked by Dale in a way she never imagined.
- My Secret Pregnancy: Felicity had Mia at a secluded cabin, instead of a hospital — she didn't want anybody to know she and Oliver had a child.
- Mythology Gag: It is implied that Eden Corps has something to do with whatever happened to Oliver. In the comics, Oliver died stopping Eden Corps from destroying Metropolis. He got better.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Archer, the surveillance program that has turned the Glades into a police state and threatens to do the same to the entire world, was originally Felicity's invention.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Roy, in a fit of anger, gives one to the cop who punches him when he and his friends try to question him.
- Not Quite Dead: Rene assumed that Eden Corps was defunct by 2040. Turns out, they just got a new name and a more respectable demeanor.
- Older Than They Look: Felicity has barely aged a day since the late 2010s. It is much more noticeable than other versions of this, while theirs at least have new hairstyles, more wrinkles, or a Time-Passage Beard.
- One-Man Army: Like her father before her, Mia has no problem taking on armed, armored opponents when they outnumber her ten to one.
- Putting the Band Back Together: Team Arrow minus Oliver, John, and Curtis reunite to stop Eden Corps.
- The Reveal:
- Connor is an agent for Knightwatch.
- Eden Corps, an environmental terrorist group is behind the coverup of Felicity's faked death, using the company Galaxy One as a front, run by Rene's benefactor — Keven Dale, likely a relative of Veronica Dale, an Eden Corps member from 2018.
- Mia's combat prowess isn't due to simply being Oliver's daughter; without her father around to train her, it was actually Nyssa who did it for years on end.
- The Scapegoat: Eden Corps kidnapped Felicity to blame her for their plan to destroy Star City.
- Shout-Out: Connor quotes "With great power comes great responsibility" to Mia and even directly names Spider-Man as the source.
- Show Some Leg: William flirts mildly with Keven Dale to distract him when he and Mia meet with him to obtain a DNA sample.
- Skewed Priorities: In the middle of the mission, Felicity tries asking Mia about her dating preferences, much to the annoyance of the latter.
- Snark-to-Snark Combat: William and Mia, once again, keep trading mild insults throughout the episode.
- Surpassed the Teacher: During their last session, Mia is shown overpowering Nyssa and holding her own sword to her throat.
- Took a Level in Kindness: At the end of the episode, Mia seems to mellow out a little bit, realizing that her hatred for vigilantes may have been unjustified.
- Training Montage: There is one of Mia over several years, being trained by none other than Nyssa al Ghul.
- Ungrateful Bastard:
- Connor saves Mia from being busted. Mia proceeds to slam him into a wall. Somewhat justified as Connor hid the fact that he was an agent of Knightwatch, "the good version of ARGUS".
- Averted when Rene makes a speech to put a bounty on Team Arrow's head; it's just part of his cover so he can stop Keven Dale from the inside.
- Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The last scene flashes back to the present day, and shows Felicity inventing the Archer software, implying that her own creation will eventually be the undoing of Star City.
- Unwitting Pawn: Rene has been one to Keven Dale and his plan to destroy Star City all along.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Galaxy One is a respectable front for a terrorist group called Eden Corps.
- Was It All a Lie?: After finding out that Connor is an agent for Knightwatch, Mia asks him if their entire relationship has been a lie, which he denies.
- Wham Shot: The final scene of the episode shows what Archer is (or what it becomes): Felicity's updated surveillance system.
- What Happened to the Mouse?:
- Oliver only appears at Mia's birth; his status after that remains unknown, and even when Felicity and Mia mention him in conversation, they give no hints as to where Oliver is or what happened to him.
- Nyssa disappears from the story and from Mia's life with no explanation after the training montage; no word is given on her status or location during the events of the main plot.
- What the Hell, Hero?:
- Zoe again chews her father out for refusing to see his new partners for who they really are. Fortunately, Rene sees the error of his ways.
- Mia towards Felicity, first a few years back when she accidentally stumbles into her secret room and learns that she is also a vigilante, and the second time when she plans on continuing to operate as one the first thing after being freed.
- Whole Episode Flashback: Inverted. This entire episode takes place in the Flash Forward arc; a prologue showing Mia's birth and transition into adulthood. Only the final scene takes place in the present day.
- You Remind Me of X: Mia being similar to her father gets pointed out several times.
