Anarky in the S.C.
Season 4, Episode 2:
The Candidate
A family friend of the Queens announces her candidacy for Mayor, but her daughter is kidnapped by a man looking to join H.I.V.E. Meanwhile Thea's bloodlust goes too far to be ignored.
- Aesop Amnesia: Laurel seems to forget about the lessons she learned from Season 3 when it comes to keeping secrets from her team. Then again, she probably rightly guesses that there's no way Ollie would agree to what she's planning.
- Blood Knight: Thea begins losing herself in combat, becoming unthinkingly brutal.
- Body Horror: Sara's already withered corpse is... not a sight for sore eyes.
- Bomb-Throwing Anarchists: Lonnie Machin is an Ax-Crazy Psycho for Hire who Darhk quickly decides he doesn't want anything to do with, and reference is made to his previous employers the Bertinelli crime family, who also wanted nothing more to do with him. No mention is made of Anarky's more nuanced views from the comics, or even any desire to tear down the government or empower the people. He's just crazy.
- Call-Back
- Machin used to work as an enforcer for the Bertinelli crime family, who sired The Huntress.
- Madison's kidnapping can't help but make Thea think of what her mother went through when Slade Wilson kidnapped her.
- Oliver gets Felicity a fern, hearkening back to the third season premiere when she got a fern for the Arrowcave.
- Came Back Wrong: Oliver explains that he thinks Thea's resurrection from the Lazarus Pit has made her become more bloodthirsty in combat. Thea herself realizes this seems to be the case.
- The Chains of Commanding: One of the first thing Felicity has to do when she goes to work as CEO is fire two dozen employees even though she really doesn't want to.
- Chekhov's Gunman: The first appearance of Curtis Holt. He designed an algorithm designed to develop more equitable pay for Palmer Technologies employees, but it gets used to identify those who can be fired. Ironically his own name is on the list, but Felicity chooses to rehire him (and the other employees) in the hope he can invent something special before the stockholder's meeting in six months. Which would be really terrific...
- Code Name: Oliver comments that Diggle really needs one if they're going to be out fighting crime together, and Felicity pouts that she doesn't have one either.
- Comic-Book Movies Don't Use Codenames: Lonnie Machin is never referred to as Anarky, but we do have foreshadowing of his role as a future supervillain when he escapes from an ambulance despite his injuries, leaving a symbol painted in blood on its side. Earlier Darhk had derided Machin as "only representing anarchy". Machin clearly decided to make it an Appropriated Appellation.Cop: I'm not sure what that symbol means.Captain Lance: It means anarchy.
- Creepy Souvenir: Machin is tapping a tooth on the table which it turns out is the false cyanide tooth of a HIVE agent he captured and interrogated for information.
- Crimefighting with Cash: Felicity buys the truck that Machin put his hand on, to preserve the fingerprints.
- Dynamic Entry: When Team Arrow do a Super Window Jump through a skylight, Machin petulantly asks why they don't just try the front door.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Darhk believes Lonnie Machin kidnapping an innocent teenager to be tasteless. Subverted then however, as he threatens Quentin to take Laurel from him if he doesn't continue to cooperate. It is a more pragmatic objection, as he thinks Machin is just complicating things. Machin is quick to lampshade this, noting from what he heard Darhk and H.I.V.E. weren't exactly big on morals.
- Expy: Since Lonnie Machin's set up as a minor mob enforcer with Ax-Crazy Bomb Throwing Anarchist tendencies, a wild fighting style, Slasher Smile, and a disfigurement by the end of the episode, rather than his comic book personality and views, he's a strong Expy for (his possible father in the comics) The Joker.
- Famed In-Story: Oliver, as a missing member of a billionaire family who was lost at sea, is recognized by the leader of the troops on Lian Yu. This, ironically, makes his infiltration easier because he has a believable reason to be on the island.
- Foregone Conclusion: Although in the flashbacks Oliver gets his hair cut to resemble his present-day self, we know he will ultimately once again grow out his hair (and a beard) when he is finally rescued.
- I Have Your Wife: Danforth has her daughter Madison kidnapped by Lonnie Machin. Even though Team Arrow saves her, she decides to withdraw from running for Mayor rather than endure that fear again.
- Hidden Eyes: With no-one else in Team Arrow taking his concerns seriously, Oliver provokes Thea until she attacks him in a berserker fury, with her hood falling across her eyes to show she's literally Blinded by Rage.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Thea sets Machin on fire with his own electricity weapon.
- Hypocrite:
- Captain Lance is not in good form this episode. When Oliver gives him Machin's identity, he scoffs, assuming he got it through horrible torture or something worse (actually Felicity just managed to unscramble the fingerprints). Later, he gets Machin's location as part of his ongoing Deal with the Devil with Darhk.
- Within Team Arrow, both Laurel and Diggle seem to have forgotten their qualms with Oliver keeping big secrets from them, and start operating exactly the way he did.
- Important Haircut: In the flashbacks, when Oliver successfully infiltrates the soldiers on Lian Yu, he gets to shed his long and messy blond locks in favor of his present-day haircut (presumably because Stephen Amell was tired of the wig).
- The Infiltration: In the flashbacks, Oliver does this with the soldiers occupying Lian Yu.
- Internal Reveal: Diggle tells Laurel about the connection between HIVE and his brother's death, but refuses to tell Oliver.
- Inexplicably Awesome: No explanation is given as to how a young delinquent anarchist is able to have fighting abilities so great he can get the better of the man who defeated Ra's al-Ghul. Presumably Oliver is out of practice whereas Thea has been in constant combat over the past few months.
- Ironic Echo Cut: When Felicity finds that Oliver has bought her a fern and packed a lunch to celebrate her first day back as CEO of Palmer Technologies, she jokes, "Who are you?" Flashback to a mercenary on Lian Yu holding Oliver at gunpoint, asking the same question.
- Keeping Secrets Sucks:
- Laurel advises Diggle to tell the others that Darhk is the one who hired Deadshot to have Andy killed, having learned this lesson hard in Season 3. She then decides to ignore her own advice when she makes the decision to resurrect Sara via the Lazarus Pit and not tell anyone.
- Oliver can't tell Captain Lance what really happened with Machin due to his Big Brother Instinct to protect Thea, but at the cost of making Lance think he's gotten worse instead of trying to change his ways.
- Layman's Terms: Subverted when Felicity is able to summarize Curtis Holt's exposition despite not fully understanding it.
- Lighter and Softer: Oliver's decision that he really doesn't want to be "the douche" Arrow is becoming much more apparent in his personality which is significantly more easygoing in and out of costume.
- Locked Out of the Loop: Oliver really has no idea what's going on Lian Yu when he gets back.
- Love Makes You Stupid: Even though she's seen the negative effects the Lazarus Pit had on Thea, Laurel decides she wants to use it to bring Sara back to life anyway, taking Thea with her without telling anyone what she's about to do.
- Make It Look Like an Accident: Flashback-Oliver throws the body of the man he killed on one of Lian Yu's many landmines to blow it up and hide the stab wound. After being captured, he's then offered the man's position.
- Man on Fire: Thea knocks Machin into a shelf full of bottles, then uses his own shock stick to ignite the spilled contents, sending him up in flame while she watches with a manic smile. Ollie arrows an overhead water pipe to put him out.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Thea realizes with horror that she nearly burned someone to death and that Oliver was right about something being wrong with her.
- Mythology Gag: In the flashbacks, Oliver discovers that the villain is cultivating poppy-fields on the island, using slave labor, reminiscent of the main conflict in the Green Arrow Year One miniseries (which is one of the major influences on the show).
- Bombs and an electrical weapon being used by Anarky? Sounds like a shout-out to Batman: Arkham Origins.
- At the end of the episode, Oliver decides to run for mayor of Star City, a position that he had in the comics after the events of DC's Infinite Crisis miniseries.
- Obligatory Joke: "Sorry to leave you hanging."
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Oliver is shocked on seeing his sister putting the boot in during the Batman Cold Open, then breaking the arm of a drug dealer during an overly aggressive interrogation. Back in the Arrowcave he deliberately pushes her until she attacks him in a Berserker Rage.
- Order Versus Chaos: Darhk claims he represents order, while Machin represents chaos.
- Rogues' Gallery Transplant: The episode introduces Batman villain Anarky into the Arrowverse.
- Selective Obliviousness: No-one else on Team Arrow noticed the change in Thea's behavior because it happened slowly over months. To Oliver, who had been away all that time, the change was obvious.
- Shout-Out: Machin is said to have once worked for Rick Pinzolo.
- Slasher Smile: Par for the course with Lonnie Machin, but Thea also has a disturbing grin as she burns him alive.
- The Team: Although they've been nicknamed Team Arrow, the opening fight sequence establishes they really have become a one, beating down H.I.V.E.'s mooks fairly easily which causes Oliver to pause and smile at how simply awesome they all are.
- To the Pain: Machin does the second degree version, showing Madison the tools he's going to use to torture her.
- What the Hell, Hero?:
- Thea chews Oliver out for not telling her about the side effects of being in the Lazarus Pit.
- Captain Lance assumes Oliver was responsible for burning Machin alive and tells him if had died from his injuries, he'd have no problem arresting him for murder.
