As the penultimate episode to the season, "The Ties That Bind" has a lot of ground to cover in a way that even the past five or six episodes couldn't really handle or provide for us in the way this hour could. The episode opens with a set of flurried action sequences showing the danger that all our heroes are in, and it acts as a rallying cry for Star City's vigilantes. If they weren't back together last week during Oliver's trial, they certainly reunited now that Diaz has thrown all caution to the wind. Amidst all the action, there's a small thread that runs through as Oliver starts to find it too dangerous for Felicity to stick around because he wants at least a parent to survive the upcoming ordeal. It's an incredibly action packed episode that excites, but manages to more or less sputter out near the end, despite the fact that the show is heading into the finale.
The main line of "Ties" is fairly straightforward even as the reunited Team Arrow jump from plan to plan to try to take down Diaz. While trying to attack Diaz en route to the SCPD (with some help from Anatoly), the team discover some kind of vital USB key that Diaz has on his person, and they end up trying to copy the data over. It's an exciting and focused chase to try to take him down, but with Diaz having the resources of the city at his disposal, it's not long before he assaults their last stronghold and stops the heroes from decrypting all his finances and personal data to be used against him.
It's an interesting way to go about to be sure, but having the plan end in failure is a little interesting moving straight into the finale. It's likely what drives Oliver to seek help from FBI agent Samanda Watson (who we haven't seen in a long while) and reveal his identity, but it also leaves the audience and our heroes back at square one. Where do they go next? For once it does seem like the odds seem insurmountable as a good lead must be abandoned to fight another day. Perhaps the FBI already have something that will help, though Felicity suggested if they had fully decrypted the data, everything would've ended in fairly quickly. It seems like a duel of wits might be off the table for the final showdown.
As for Oliver and Felicity's troubles, it's something of a natural conclusion of Oliver's arc coming off "Brothers in Arms", if not as far back as "Collision Course". As I had argued back then, Oliver was left to overcorrect as Diggle's parting advice before quitting Team Arrow. The show works to walk back and explain that Oliver needs to draw strength from his allies instead of alienating them. It's just that the mayor day job really didn't do much for either the show or the character. Oliver's alienating default state is something the show has fundamentally argued against through its run even as its principal character continues to work against that single theme. By the end, he's learned his lesson and apologized to everyone for everything that's happened, though it's hard to say if he's truly learned his lesson.
Of course, a part of what drove the middle portion of season six is Oliver's mistrust of his allies. If only the execution of Team Arrow's fracture had played out better, maybe the audience as a whole might have been more receptive to the idea. The fact that reuniting the team isn't enough to save the city in a day or two speaks to the level of corruption and control Diaz has in Star City since he was able to run unabated, which I assume was the entire point, and at least by this point in the season, feels like something the show has at least executed properly on.
The Quadrant on the other hand, seems like a misused plot point at this juncture. It's one thing to turn the League of Assassins into a bunch of weekend warriors straight out of preschool, but the show doesn't really sell the whole country-wide criminal cabal without everyone coming off as foolish in their endeavours. Of course, Cassamento is the only real member of the Quadrant with any real speaking lines to give Diaz any sass. At least the show has some self-awareness about the fact that Diaz just stopped caring and decided to shoot everyone up to get rid of Oliver and his allies.
Diaz, of course, murders two Quadrant members fairly casually by the end of the hour and demands to be taken seriously - as if The Quadrant was that serious to begin with. I suppose it's meant to be interpreted as Diaz now having the full might of the country's underworld behind him on top of the Star City police force in his pocket, but when The Quadrant can't keep someone like Diaz from killing two of their leaders in front of everyone like they're a henchmen that messed up the coffee order, I don't know if I can believe The Quadrant was ever competent at all. In retrospect, it takes all the development out of "The Dragon" if you can believe it. It almost feels like that episode should've been a more focused on the formative aspects of Ricardo Diaz than about him chasing a plot device that doesn't have much teeth behind it three episodes later. It makes Diaz out to be the idiot going after fool's gold instead of this pragmatic strategist.
But rest assured, a final showdown will be had next week, and with Diaz flying off the handle, it's at least sure to entertain.
Miscellaneous thoughts:
- Not quite sure exactly how Oliver managed to get his costume with all of Diaz's thugs trashing the Arrow bunker. Maybe he just has a spare at home or something.
- Two bases blown up in the span of a single episode is quite the record. Wonder what a new base of operations will look like next season.
- On the other hand, the new SCPD set looks like it's been getting a lot of work in since its introduction.
- Of all the action sequences in the teaser, Dinah's was by far the most fun of them and made her feel less like a mopey anti-hero and more of something come to life from the pages of a comic book.
- I don't hate Curtis at all, but Nick is like the equivalent of fetch for me. It's just not happening, and maybe because it's the way the show doesn't do any work to convince us they're that great together, no offense. Five scenes a relationship does not make, at least not one where Curtis is diving into danger for vengeance.
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