Diaz declares war on Team Arrow and Oliver and Felicity clash over how best to fight back.

Much of this episode is great. The opening mass assault, the ways everyone reacts and the real sense of threat all really hit home. Plus the stunt team do amazing work, especially in the opening scene where Oliver decimates a kill team using, for the most part, a lamp.

Yes.

The rest impresses too. The Oliver and Felicity conflict is especially well handled. It punctures Oliver’s macho lone wolf balloon, gives Felicity the sympathetic dimension and likability the writers have utterly failed to provide her for most of this season and leads to another fantastic action sequence. Felicity sneaking through the police precinct as Lyla, Oliver, Diggle and the others fight their way out is a superb combination of character and action. Even the fact that they ultimately don’t get what they need is a pleasant, for us, surprise.

And then the ending hits. And it does so in a manner that is so clumsy it negates a vast amount of the good will the episode builds and does in two different ways. Not only are we required to believe Oliver would be very specifically stupid in a way he’s never been before, but it sets up a cliffhanger that is completely cheap, manufactured and annoying.

Verdict: The season finale is still going to be fun, but this episode fumbles the lead in when it should stick the landing. It’s not a show killer, but it’s not the ending this episode deserved. 8/10

Alasdair Stuart