As with Manu Bennett's departure from Arrow, Willa Holland is given a two episode stretch to say goodbye to the character. Of course, being a principal cast member means she's given more finality (given the official departure of the actor) to the situation whereas, from how I understand it, Deathstroke as a character is being taken off the table for DCTV, so having Slade Wilson's departure is a little less final, though it certainly still feels that way. That being said, the focus on Thea is an interesting one, but it means it's another detour for the show, robbing any momentum of the last stretch of Arrow (if it has even started) and the story they set out to tell for season six.
To address it first, the Diaz story remains in the background, handed off to Dinah and Curtis to figure out the dirty details. The subplot acts mostly to provide some more world building, and to help our heroes discover exactly how far-reaching Diaz's influence. The only problem is that we, as the audience, already were told of it four episodes ago that Police Chief Hill is in his pocket, so merely catching our heroes up (besides the fact that Diaz is slinging Vertigo, I guess) seems like a long time to do so with nothing really new to add for the audience. Again, unless the Vertigo angle somehow works its way forward to the next episode (more on that later, though, given the preview for next week's episode), it's a disappointing development that doesn't really justify its screentime, except maybe to pair Curtis off with a boyfriend. Hopefully something will come from that.
Otherwise, much of "The Thanatos Guild" specifically tries to tie Thea and Roy together with Nyssa's quest to dismantle the leftovers of the League of Assassins loyal to Malcolm Merlyn. It's a fun romp that tries to squeeze in some final character development for Thea before her departure and provide some complication in a fairly simple departure from Star City. If anything, the episode's saving grace is Katrina Law's Nyssa al-Ghul, whose performance always brings something enjoyable. She gets in some jokes with mocking Oliver and Felicity's marriage, but at the same time carries a certain gravitas that doesn't necessarily come off as cheesy in any sense.
Specifically with Thea (and by extension Willa Holland), she has not been involved in Arrow very much for a while, and it's somewhat plain to see over the period of the last few years. The last-minute development feels a little rushed, seeing as Thea basically was only ever paired off with Quentin for the longest time in smaller subplots this season and the last with little for her to do except acting as a sounding board for whoever she was paired off with. The show goes for broke, and for me, it somewhat works to tie together Thea and Nyssa's legacy (really, just daddy issues) together, bonding them so that the two of them (plus Roy) can continue having adventures elsewhere instead of riding off into the sunset together. It's a little contrived to begin with, but having Thea explore her reluctance to leave after finding the map/puzzle box (you know, besides having the worry about Thantos Guild ninjas behind your back for the rest of your life) through Roy's return, connecting back to Malcolm's final moments in the season five finale, Nyssa's worldview, and connecting to Oliver's reluctance to give up his mantle an interesting exercise, if rushed to get the point across. But it was central to the whole emotional arc of Thea this episode, so from my perspective it worked well enough.
Of course, leaving the departure open-ended, as well as leaving Athena and many Thanatos assassins alive will always allow the possibility that Thea, Roy, and Nyssa will return (or need Oliver and company to help intervene), which is an exciting thing, but hopefully not for now, as Arrow has yet to show me what Ricardo Diaz is capable of, or if providing a catalyst for more infighting amongst Star City vigilantes will be his only legacy after basically manipulating everything in the background to get the season going.
Miscellaneous thoughts:
- Liked that Thea answered Felicity about what type of Indiana Jones traps were implemented by her late father. Raiders!
- Roy wearing the cap was a nice homage to the comic book version of Roy Harper/Arsenal.
- Again, the preview for the next episode brings in the infighting to Oliver and Diggle, which was a long time boiling. I'm sure the writing will work, but if having to break the team apart is what Arrow has to rely on most of the time through this stretch of the season, it will be disappointing indeed.
- It's never not funny to see Nyssa basically troll Felicity at every opportunity, and she admitted to enjoying it.
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