John Constantine lives to fight another day!
Arrow achieved the seemingly impossible tonight by resurrecting a canceled TV show character, from a totally different network. NBC’s canceled Constantine series lent The CW drama its main character for a totally awesome crossover that honestly seemed too good to be true. But it happened, it was real, and it kicked some serious ass. Can Constantine become a series regular on Arrow?!
Usually we save the island storyline for the end of these weekly recaps, but this week is a little more special than usual. The flashback storyline tied to the present day in a major way: Oliver actually met John Constantine on Lian Yu! Whoa. Mind. Blown.
Baron Reiter’s men found and caught Constantine “spying” on them in the fields, and they brought him in for questioning. Turns out, he came to the island with a map and a mission to find an artifact hidden somewhere on the island. He took out a guard and took Oliver hostage, ultimately opening his eyes to the world of magic.
Constantine found a scepter that is actually a grimoire (or spell book) hidden in a cave, and Oliver saved his life while he wasn’t paying attention trying to retrieve it. As a thank you, he cast a spell on Oliver, giving him a tattoo with the promise that it’s insurance against Reiter and will help him when needs it most. He also warned Oliver that the island is an important place, mystically speaking, and Baron Reiter isn’t only on it for the drugs.
In the present day, after escaping her sister’s custody, Sara has been going around killing people who look a lot like a certain Queen daughter … because she’s on a rampage to get justice for her murder. Oliver and Thea found her attacking women in a night club, and finally understood just how far Laurel went in Nanda Parbat. After escaping once again, Sara later found Thea at home and attacked her, putting her into the hospital. That’s when Thea finally explained to everyone what Malcolm told her in Nanda Parbat about her bloodlust, and how she killed two men to sate it. When Sara attacked Thea again, in her hospital room, Oliver realized that Sara doesn’t have her soul, leading him to call Constantine for help in retrieving it.
With a plan in motion, Team Arrow used Thea as bait, and finally captured Sara just in time for Constantine to arrive in the Arrow lair to perform a restitutionam, aka an anti-exorcism`to restore her soul. He, along with Oliver and Laurel, travel to another realm to free her soul, and they fight their way through and successfully bring her back. As Oliver said his goodbyes to Constantine, he let slip that Damien Dahrk is in town, and Constantine instantly got a look of fear in his eyes. His only advice for Oliver: leave town while you still can. Hey, if a demon hunter as experienced as Constantine is afraid of Dahrk, then you know things are not going to go well in Star City.
Speaking of Damien Dahrk, the HIVE leader ordered Lance to do him a favor: plug in a device in a government building to erase data. Specifically: files on military men, including Diggle’s brother. Oliver made Lance enlist Diggle’s help to complete the task to stay on Dahrk’s good side and Diggle agrees because he knows that having Lance close to Dahrk will help him take down HIVE. They complete Dahrk’s task, but Lance confronted Dahrk afterwards about why he erased a file on Andrew Diggle.
Dahrk revealed to Lance that HIVE hired an assassin to take out Andrew because he became a crime lord while overseas, and began dipping his toes into the criminal world in Afghanistan: drugs, weapons, and murder. HIVE didn’t like the competition, and so they killed him. Lance brought all the info Dahrk had on Andrew to Diggle so he could learn the truth about his brother. To call it a gut punch would be an understatement of the highest degree. Let’s hope this doesn’t set Diggle on a dark path!
On the political front, Thea hired Alex Davis (ladies and gents, please welcome Parker Young to the Arrow-verse!) as a new political strategist for Oliver’s campaign. He’s smart, accomplished, confident… and not so hard on the eyes. Do we detect a spark between him and Thea? Oh yes, yes we do. There are also sparks flying between him and Oliver, but they’re less romantic than angry, after Alex tried to get Oliver to distance himself from Laurel, and by extension, distancing himself from the Queen’s Gambit scandal. He refused, because he won’t turn his back on his friends, bringing his friendship with Laurel to a new level.
Meanwhile, at Palmer Tech, Felicity enlisted Curtis for help cleaning up Ray’s final recording to her since it was too garbled to understand. After about a gallon of energy drinks, Curtis made a breakthrough, and they both listen to Ray’s message. They’re shocked to hear him say he’s alive and in trouble. Time to find the tiny man!
What did you think of the big Constantine crossover on Arrow? Should The CW just hire Matt Ryan full time? The correct answer is yes, but let us know what else you thought about the episode in the comments section below!
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Images: The CW
Arrow airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. on The CW.
