Recap / Arrow S 2 E 11 Blind Spot

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On the island, Oliver doesn’t jump onboard with Sara’s suggestion to find Slade then take Ivo’s offer. Oliver apologizes for it being his fault she’s stranded, but she accepts responsibility for agreeing to get on the Gambit. While Oliver sleeps, Sara swipes the walkie and contacts Ivo, who says he needs her to “save” him again. Sara confesses she’d rather be dead, so he threatens to find and torture them both.

Blood asks his mom about Laurel’s visit. Maya tells the truth and is killed by a masked Brother. Laurel hears that Maya died and asks Donner to investigate Blood. He won’t. In a meeting set up by Lance, Laurel succeeds in recruiting Arrow. Upon investigation, Felicity finds that there’s only a physical copy of the file on Blood’s father’s murder. Needing help to locate it, Arrow and Laurel break into city archives, only to emerge after a gunfight with an empty folder – Slade stole it.

Blood calls Brother Daily for help, so he gets Laurel arrested for felony drug possession. She’s soon released, and not even her father believes her theory. Back at her apartment with an off-guard Oliver, Blood’s men abduct Laurel. Arrow comes to her rescue and tussles with a Brother. It’s Laurel who stops the fight when she shoots the masked man, who turns out to be Officer Daily. No charges are pressed, but Donner fires Laurel. Slade, clad as Deathstroke, takes out three of Blood’s men and threatens to kill him next if he causes another problem like this.

Roy demonstrates his new strength to Sin, who urges him to tell Thea, but he refuses and wants to save the city without Arrow’s help. As Thea is still giving Roy the cold shoulder, Sin comes to him with a case – the Starling City Slasher cuts prostitutes but gets away with it because he’s a hotshot lawyer. Sin goes undercover as bait, and when they find the Slasher, Roy loses control, almost beating him to death. Sin calls Thea to the hospital and admits that Roy put the man there. Arrow agrees to train Roy so he’ll be in control of his powers.

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Tropes Applying to This Episode

• All for Nothing: After nearly getting shot breaking into the city archives, it turns out the file Laurel found there is empty, having already been removed by Slade.
• Ambiguously Bi: When Roy tells Thea that Sin needs her help looking "slutty" for a date, Thea declares she'll help Sin get whatever man she's after...or woman.
• Asshole Victim: The Starling Slasher, a rich lawyer attacking prostitutes, is picked by Sin and Roy to make a suitable target to test Roy's abilities.
• Bait-and-Switch: Sara sneaks off with the radio to contact Ivo, making it look like she's going to accept his offer. But during their radio conversation she faces up to the monster he is, admitting it was convenient to pretend otherwise because she was just glad not to be one of his experimental subjects, and she would rather die than be forced to help him again.
• Be a Whore to Get Your Man: Roy uses this trope as the reason why Sin needs to dress like a hooker. Thea promises a dress that will guarantee a second date.
• Boxing Lessons for Superman: The Arrow offers to give these to Roy, to channel the rage that is the side-effect of the Mirakuru.
• Break the Cutie: This episode is dedicated to breaking Laurel. From Laurel being proved wrong about Blood to being arrested on drug possession—it's not been a good day for her.
• Broken Pedestal: Oliver becomes really disappointed with Laurel after he discovers the latter's drug addiction problem and when she appears to be wrong about Blood being the Big Bad.
• Call-Back:
  • When the Arrow turns up for a rendezvous with Laurel, she complains that he's late. The Arrow snarks back that he had to check the area to make sure she didn't have another SWAT Team waiting for him.
  • Roy is still very pissed at The Arrow for shooting him in the leg.
• Cassandra Truth: Laurel's warnings about Brother Blood are generally ignored. Even Ollie stops believing her.
• Chekhov's Armory: The Starling City cannery Oliver is seen torturing a drug lord at the beginning of the episode also becomes the place where he (and Laurel) will have their showdown with Daily posing as "Brother Blood".
• Chekhov's Gun: A literal example. Daily drops his first gun besides Laurel when he and Oliver squared off. Later when he's about to kill Oliver, Laurel uses it to kill him.
• Conveniently Timed Attack from Behind: Daily is about to shoot the Arrow with his backup gun, when Laurel shoots Daily in the back using the gun he dropped earlier.
• Corner of Woe: Roy breaks down in the hospital. Sin and Thea are both worried about him, so he runs away, collapses in a corner, and sobs.
• Cover-Blowing Superpower: Roy demonstrates his Super-Strength to Sin by punching through a concrete wall.
• Damsel out of Distress: Laurel is the one who manages to kill the fake Brother Blood who abducted her.
• Deadpan Snarker: Diggle gets a shot in.
  Oliver: Roy's not the kind of guy to discuss how he's feeling.
  Digg: Not like you and me.
• Double-Meaning Title: The title refers to both Oliver's soft spot for Laurel (which was given a Title Drop) and the debut of Slade's Deathstroke costume that famously includes a one-eyed mask.
• Dramatic Unmask: Of the skull mask from Officer Daily, and the Deathstroke mask from Slade Wilson.
• Dueling Hackers: Felicity plants a trojan to take down the CCTV cameras for seven minutes, but the archive guards turn out to have their own skills in this area and get them up and running a lot sooner, catching the Arrow on camera.
• Duel of Seduction: Turns out while Laurel was dating Sebastian to get information on him, Sebastian was dating Laurel as part of Slade's plan to undermine Oliver. However, Slade is not happy over how Laurel is getting too close, and has Sebastian break things off by arranging for Laurel to be arrested.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Averted when Sebastian kills his after she spoke to Laurel.
• Everything Is Online: Averted as the file sought is from too many years ago to be included on any database, and Felicity's attempts to scramble the CCTV footage are thwarted by the tech-savvy security guards.
• Fanservice: A rare instance of this from Sin, when she dons one of Thea's extremely short skirts.
• Fanservice Extra: There are quite a few hookers in the background when Sin poses as one.
• Faux Affably Evil: Once Sara rejects his offer of safe passage, Ivo just drops all pretense and promises to hunt her down and torture her.
• The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry: Sara talks of how Laurel apparently arranged for their father to bust Tommy's party when she knew Sara had snuck in to see Oliver, ensuring Sara was grounded a month so Laurel could make a move on Oliver instead. Sara thus implies she got on the boat for revenge as much as for infatuation with Ollie.
• Good News, Bad News:
  Felicity: I have good news and bad news. I suggest the good news first; it tends to soften the blow of the bad news.
• Heel–Face Turn: Sara finally turns her back on Ivo for good in the island flashbacks.
• Irony: When Roy and Sin take the slasher to the hospital after Roy's No-Holds-Barred Beatdown, the doctor says, "You did a good thing here, Roy."
• Lie Detector: While Oliver is Perp Sweating a lowlife, Felicity is running an audio test back at the Arrowcave to check for deception. She gets Oliver to ask what color his shoes are to get a baseline. Oliver complies despite knowing how silly he's going to look asking the question.
• Morality Chain: Invoked by Ivo who calls on Sara to come back to stop him Slowly Slipping Into Evil. Sara, however, knows he's already there.
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • Roy after beating a man into ICU and hitting Sin when she tries to stop him.
  • Oliver realises he was willing to accept that Blood was a Diabolical Mastermind simply on Laurel's say-so.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Blood's orphanage was named the Zandia Orphanage. In the comics, Zandia is an Eastern European country where the first Brother Blood came from in the early 13th century.
  • Roy had Sin "borrow" slutty clothes from Thea so she can go undercover as a hooker. Thea Dearden Queen's comic counterpart is eventually confirmed to be Mia Dearden, who was also a prostitute prior to becoming the second Speedy.
  • When Laurel was kidnapped, she was taken to the Starling City "Cannery", an obvious Stealth Pun to her comic counterpart.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Lampshaded by Felicity.
  Felicity: His last name is Blood; that can't be a good sign.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • If Oliver hadn't given Blood the benefit of the doubt, Blood wouldn't have known Laurel was onto him, so wouldn't have been able to frame her and thus throw the Arrow off his tracks.
  • Diggle also (unknowingly) plays a part in Sebastian learning that Laurel was onto him by advising Oliver to give Blood the benefit of the doubt.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Roy delivers a pretty brutal one which leaves a man in the hospital.
• Nonchalant Dodge: Roy takes some swings at Oliver at the end of the episode. Oliver dodges all three blows easily.
• Not Helping Your Case: Laurel's alcoholism and drug abuse really bite her in the ass during this episode. Not only does it undermine Laurel's attempt to warn anybody about what she has learned about Brother Blood, but it also gets her arrested and fired.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Roy delivers a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown to a known serial killer who was about to kill Sin.
• Ransacked Room: Subverted when it's revealed to be the police searching it, with a warrant.
• Secret-Keeper: Roy still refuses to let Thea know what's happening for fear she'll Freak Out, but tells Sin because he's going crazy bottling up his secret.
• She Cleans Up Nicely: Sin dolled up in Thea's "slutty" clothes, in sharp contrast to her usual androgynous appearance. She insists that the hair stay the same though.
• Surveillance Station Slacker: Averted; the rent-a-cops guarding the city archive are on the ball and even with Felicity's trojan virus are able to catch the Arrow on camera and bring in the Anti-Vigilante Taskforce. Laurel and Oliver barely make it out alive.
• Thanatos Gambit: Brother Daily gives his life to throw our heroes off the trail. Quentin has identified the Dirty Cop who tipped off Cyrus Gold, Laurel thinks she's wrong about Sebastian Blood, and Team Arrow think they've nipped the Evil Plan in the bud with the destruction of the Super Serum and the death of the Man in the Skull Mask.
• Tuckerization: “Judge Carlin” is a reference to DC Comics editor Mike Carlin.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Roy starts kicking the Slasher over and over, and when Sin tries to stop him, he hits her as well in a rage.
• Who Would Be Stupid Enough?: Sin wants to know where they'd find a hooker willing to act as The Bait. Roy promptly volunteers her for the job.
• You Have Failed Me:
  • After his mother reveals what she told Laurel, Blood says he forgives her and leaves the room, only to suddenly reappear in the skull mask to give her a heart attack.
  • Slade kills three of Blood's minions because he was getting careless, but lets Blood himself live (with a warning that he'll be next unless he gets his act together).
• You Have to Believe Me!: Laurel gives the trope word-for-word when she accuses Sebastian of framing her because she's onto him. He is, but she actually is using prescription pills she isn't supposed to have so everything that he "frames" her with is true. Her accusations are too.

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