Oliver makes a move to try to clean up the Police Department. Dinah makes a move that take Anatoly off the table. Dig makes a move that no one sees coming.

This is the episode that Arrow has needed all season. After Roy and Thea dropped away, Team Newbie were driven away by the idiotic attempt to replicate Civil War and Oliver was forced to come back to Green Arrow full time, this was always going to happen. The only problem is that it’s taken this long. Arrow has been a hard show to love and a very hard show to watch this half season but along with last week, here, at last, the show appears to be turning a corner.

And that’s across the board too. The cast, who have always been fantastic even the scripts often haven’t been, excel here.  Now, at last, Kirk Acevedo’s Diaz is allowed to run rampant again he’s having colossal fun being the shadowy king of the city. Likewise Katie Cassidy whose Laurel is the closest thing the show has to kitschy. It should be disastrous but Cassidy is so good you can see the emotional turmoil she’s going through even when Laurel herself can’t look it in the eye.

Then there’s Stephen Amell, who has the most thankless task on the show. Not only does he have to be in very nearly every scene but he has to make us sympathetic for a man who has alienated everyone around him, put a friend in hospital and is still absolutely convinced he’s right. Amell is an extraordinary performer and he manages to be so here, again and again. The episode highlight is the argument with Dig and one particular moment that’s chilling. You can see Olly figure out what to say, figure out how much it will hurt Dig and what that will mean, and then… do it anyway. This is Oliver hurtling towards his lowest ebb and Amell still, somehow, makes him sympathetic.

But this episode is David Ramsey’s all the way down. Ramsey’s physicality is used to great effect here as Dig, always the rock in the room, always the big, calm guy tries his best to explain to his best friend why he’s a disaster. That final confrontation, shot still and quiet with the rails of the cave’s central console looking a lot like the ropes of a boxing ring, is the show finally getting out of its cast’s way and letting them work. Both men, especially Ramsey, do an exceptional job of showing how much they care for one another and how far apart they are. Diggle has been the grown up in the room for a while now. Now he’s the grown up out of the room and that’s the right call for him, Oliver and the show.

Behind the scenes the episode impresses just as much. Mark Bunting’s direction is unobtrusive and clever throughout. The closing argument/fight is a season highlight but the rest all works brilliantly too. The show has, often, fallen down in this regard before now. The disastrous, and basically invisible, fight in the forest a few weeks ago springs to mind. But here, at last, the direction, script and acting are on the same page,.

Sarah Tarkoff & Jeane Wong’s script could, and should, be a blueprint for how to write this show from here on out. Dig and Oliver are front and centre and they work endlessly to make sure their conflict is the driving force behind events. Subplots (including a smart move involving Curtis and his new boyfriend) all stem from that and the episode moves and feels exactly like what Oliver and his colleagues hasn’t been on screen for a while now; a team.

Verdict: There are minor quibbles, there always are, but this is a return to form that the CW flagship has desperately needed for weeks now. With the stage cleared and things finally in motion, it’s looking like Arrow season 6 is going to finish very strongly. 9/10

Alasdair Stuart