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Recap / Arrow S 7 E 4 Level Two

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Oliver is in Level Two, but finding the Demon is harder than he thinks. Meanwhile, Felicity gets more and more unhinged in her quest to find Diaz while Dinah is frustrated that people have more faith in the new Green Arrow than the police.


  • Ambiguously Evil: It's made deliberately unclear if Dr. Jarrett Parker is actually trying to rehabilitate Oliver and help him reform his criminal ways, or if he's trying to Mind Rape him as part of a larger conspiracy. However, even if his intentions are pure, at least some of the techniques and tools he uses are horrifically unethical, making him a Well-Intentioned Extremist at best.
  • Armor-Piercing Question: Whatever his motives, Dr. Parker's questions manage to actually get under Oliver's skin, even without the drugs.
  • Bad Future: Something happened in the future which caused the Glades to rise up, which later basically turned Star City into a police state.
  • Bad Liar: In the future, when the police catches William and Roy in the abandoned Smoak Technologies building, William says that he wanted to meet up with an investor there.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For: Oliver wanted to be sent to Level Two, to find the Demon. What he didn't count on was being examined by the unethical prison psychiatrist and being locked in solitary.
  • Big Damn Heroes: The New Green Arrow saves Zoe from a burning building.
  • Brainwashed and Crazy: Oliver thanks to Dr. Parker.
  • Call-Back: Oliver is forced to relive the moment where his father asked him to right his wrongs.
  • Call-Forward: The Star City Roy and William return to is the one seen by the Legends in the future, though with one difference - Dinah Drake is roaming the streets. Apparently it went to hell even before Grant Wilson arrived (although graffiti of a Deathstroke mask is seen in the background when Roy and William arrive); something happened in the Glades and they built a wall to protect them from the rest of the city - with the police being their hired thugs.
  • Cops Need the Vigilante: Diggle more or less brings up this trope with Dinah. He tells her how no path to justice is 100% perfect, and that an ideal solution might be cops and vigilantes working together - citing the decision Quentin Lance made to work with Team Arrow all those years ago. This ultimately leads Dinah to work alongside Rene and the new Green Arrow to stop the arsonist who's been running amok in the Glades.
  • The Cameo: Beebo the One True God finally makes an appearance on Arrow, rounding out His tour of all four current Arrowverse series.
  • Dark and Troubled Past:
    • Silencer alludes to one, defiantly telling Felicity and Laurel that they have no idea what she's been through.
  • Defiant Captive: Both Oliver and Silencer, though the former is eventually apparently broken.
  • Dramatic Irony:
    • In the present, Dinah is very adamant about enforcing the vigilante law. In the future, the corrupt cops are out for her blood because of her past vigilantism.
    • Silencer is being held captive in a similar way to Oliver, both of them being tortured and deprived of food and water.
  • Everyone Has Standards: Even Black Siren (a Nominal Hero at this point) is taken aback by how far Felicity is prepared to go to find Diaz.
  • Future Badass: Zoe of all people is shown to be the new Black Canary in the future.
  • The Guards Must Be Crazy: Invoked, as Felicity and Laurel stage an argument that gets Felicity to throw down a screwdriver near Silencer and then leave, so after she escapes they can follow the tracker in her equipment.
  • I Did What I Had to Do: Throughout his painful interrogation, Oliver makes no excuses for his actions. Although he is clear on not wanting William to end up like him.
  • In Spite of a Nail: Black Siren describes Earth-2's Oliver as having been "murdered", suggesting that, like on Earth-1, the wreck of the Queen's Gambit was no accident. Who was responsible is left unnamed, although Black Siren makes it clear that she took revenge for her Oliver's death.
  • Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique: When simply asking doesn't work, Black Siren gets a little more... insistent with Silencer, who is next seen bruised and bloody, although no more cooperative. Black Siren has to talk Felicity out of making a similar effort with a rusty screwdriver.
  • Jerkass Has a Point: Ambiguously Evil though he may be, Dr. Parker isn't exactly off the mark when he accuses Oliver of having "violent tendencies".
  • Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Felicity continues her downward spiral - enough that even the usually apathetic Black Siren is freaked out and has to talk her down.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: What Rene thinks happened to him. For torturing a captive, he got tortured himself by Tobias Church.
  • Legacy Character: The flash-forwards to the future reveal that Zoe is the new Black Canary - making her the fourth woman to hold the mantle (that we know of - assuming that Earth 2 Laurel or anyone else didn't also take up the mantle between Dinah and Zoe).
  • Mind Rape: Regardless of intentions, the conditions Dr. Parker subjects Oliver to are nothing short of torture, apparently designed to break his will to allow Parker to remove any tendency towards violence.
  • Mythology Gag: It is revealed that the third man on the life-raft with Oliver and Robert whom the latter shot dead was Robert's bodyguard Hackett. Hackett, incidentially, was the name of Oliver's right-hand man in the Green Arrow: Year One mini-series who ended up betraying him and was responsible for the shipwreck that stranded him on the island.
  • No Honor Among Thieves: Told that Diaz will inevitably betray her, Silencer replies that she'd do the same to anyone who got in her way.
  • Noodle Incident:
    • Rene alludes to the reason for him being dishonourably discharged. It apparently involved torturing a captive.
    • In the future, there is an ominous uprising in the Glades.
  • "Not So Different" Remark: Black Siren sees much of her former self in Felicity, as she underwent a similar Start of Darkness after losing loved ones.
  • Pet the Dog: Dr. Parker gives Oliver the photo with his wife and kid. Even tells him he has a lovely family.
  • Police Are Useless: Discussed, as the people in the Glades are very unhappy with the police work and as such are very receptive of the New Green Arrow in spite of the anti-vigilante law.
  • Protagonist-Centered Morality: Dr. Parker calls Oliver out on just glossing over his father murdering his bodyguard Hackett on the lifeboat years ago.
  • Psycho Psychologist: Evil or not, the conditions Dr. Parker has Oliver subjected to are a blatant human rights violation; he's deprived of sleep through bright lights and loud noise, deprived of food or water, drugged when he resists questioning, and strapped to a machine that induces hallucinations when he continues to resist Parker's "treatment". That he's allowed to do this and even assisted by the guards goes to show how corrupt Slabside really is.
  • Revenge: Black Siren alludes to having avenged the deaths of her Earth's Quentin and Oliver (presumably killing the drunk driver responsible for Quentin's death and whomever was responsible for Oliver's), and accuses Felicity of only being after revenge in her zeal to hunt down Diaz.
  • Slashed Throat: Future Dinah has a scar over her throat and a noticeably raspier voice, strongly implying that she suffered one of these at some point. It seems to have crippled her Canary Cry; she only uses martial arts to subdue the police and save William and Roy.
  • Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist: Dinah, who is forced to arrest Rene for continually interferring in her investigation against the new Green Arrow. They then work together to stop Cortez from starting another fire and in the end, she lets the new Green Arrow go after he helps extinguishing the fire.
  • Techno Wizard: William in the future, having taken a few inspirations from Felicity.
  • Took a Level in Kindness: Following her Character Development so far, Black Siren actually tries to comfort Felicity and stop her from going too far in her pursuit of Diaz, although she seems more than a little awkward about it.
  • Tracking Device: Felicity implanted one on The Silencer, then "left" a screwdriver within reaching distance when Laurel II called her away.
  • Truth Serum: What Dr. Parker injects Oliver with, forcing him to tell him about his past.
  • Ungrateful Bastard: Subverted, despite the city overwhelmingly voting for the anti-vigilante law, people are beginning to miss Team Arrow - at least the people in the Glades are; and as such they appreciate the New Green Arrow in direct contrast to the mayor and Dinah.
  • Wham Line: Future Dinah tells William that Felicity is dead.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Even Black Siren is quite shocked at Felicity's new ruthless attitude.
  • You Are Number 6: After getting defiance on the first two attempts, Dr. Parker is finally satisfied when he asks Oliver for his name and hears "Inmate 4587" in response.
  • You Remind Me of X: Aside from the "Not So Different" Remark in regards to herself, Black Siren also sees much of her own Earth's version of Felicity in Earth 1 Felicity, who is notably ruthless.

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