Arrow 'Sara' Review: Oliver and Friends Deal with Emotional Death

Last week's Season 3 premiere of Arrow ended with Sara's shocking death when an unknown attacker shot three arrows into her and knocked her off the roof. This week's episode, the appropriately titled "Sara," took us on an emotional journey as most of the main characters found out her fate and got the chance to grieve.

The episode began with Laurel bringing Sara's body to Oliver's hideout where he, Felicity and Roy learned of her death. From there, the chase was on to find the killer, and it looked as though the team had found their culprit in Komodo, a bow-wielding killer in a mask. But Komodo turned out to be a red herring, and the killer is still unknown.

The plot of the episode was typical, but the emotion each scene packed was enough to make Arrow fans reach for the tissue box a few times. The beauty of the episode was that each character got appropriate time to express his or her feelings without slowing the pace, Laurel, understandably, went off the rails. She violently interrogated a witness and nearly took an arrow to the chest in the process. She stole a gun and tried to shoot Komodo, though Oliver wisely took the bullets out of her gun.

By the end of the episode, she had gone from anger to grief, as she cried that no one would ever know how strong and heroic her sister was. Diggle sweetly told her that he and Lyla would name their daughter Sara and that they would all honor her memory through their actions.

Felicity continued to show more emotion and a depth of character when she snapped at Oliver as they hunted Komodo. It's clear that things are not completely normal between the two after last week's developments, and the tension worsened between them this week as they grieved. Oliver asked Felicity to bring her A-game, and Felicity shot back that she was too busy being an actual human being with emotions and mourning the loss of her friend. She asked why Oliver wasn't doing the same, and he went into hero mode. He claimed he couldn't grieve because he has to be a leader, and no one else would be able to mourn if he falls apart.

Oliver then grimly stated that he would spend the rest of his life, however long it lasts, down in his cave until the day arrives that he is the one lying on a table. Felicity wants more out of life, and so she takes Ray Palmer's offer and joins Queen Consolidated (and, seemingly, puts the idea of a romantic relationship behind her).

Oliver comes to the realization at the end of the episode that he does not actually want to die down in his cave, but it remains to be seen if he will be able to follow through on that. Much of Season 3 will be about his identity, and Oliver has chosen the Arrow as his main persona. Sara's death has only made him dig his heels in even further.

"Sara" focused mainly on the titular character's death and its effect on the main characters, but it also contained some other plot developments. Roy told Oliver about Thea's note, and now the big brother is determined to bring his sister home. What he doesn't know is that Thea is in Corto Maltese kicking all sorts of ass with her father, Malcolm Merlyn. Something tells me that next week's retrieval mission is not going to go smoothly for Ollie.

The flashbacks in this episode were interesting, but they ultimately felt out of place among the weighty emotion of the rest of the episode. Colin Donnell's return as Tommy was short but sweet, as Oliver was inches away from his friend and had no choice but to continue his work for Amanda Waller. We're starting to see how Oliver becomes the cold, stoic figure at the start of the series, but we'll have to see how working for Amanda weighs on him as the flashbacks continue.

Notes:

-       Good on the show for bringing up Laurel's former drinking problem. This is exactly the situation that should have sent her to the bottom of a bottle, but thankfully the writers didn't go there.

-       Laurel was about to tell her father about Sara's death, but ultimately decided not to do so. When he does find out, it's not going to be pretty.

-       If Komodo didn't kill Sara, then who did?

-       Thea is apparently a fighting machine now and firmly behind the Dark Archer. Will Oliver be forced to take drastic measures, like revealing his identity, to bring her home?

What did you think of "Sara"? Let us know in the comments section.