Arrow Conversations: Who Can You Trust? 

I love the Three Musketeers! No, not the delicious chocolate bar. Well, I love those too, but this time I am referring to my favorite new crime-fighting trio of Oliver, Diggle and Felicity. They have such a great dynamic and not only can Felicity hold her own, but the girl delivers some fantastic one liners, whether it’s showing off her tech savvy or giving the guys dating advice. While I think she definitely needs to learn to restrain herself on missions (shouldn’t she know not to confront the bad guy single-handedly?!), I still stand by what I said last week that I’m thrilled that she’s joined the team, even if it is just to find Walter (or so she claims). And Oliver clearly feels the same way, which is why he trusted her enough to bring her on board.

That leads me to the theme of this week and my favorite one-on-one of the week. After Felicity calls Oliver out on being too focused on the list and not using his powers for the greater good, Diggle questions Oliver about Felicity’s loyalty.

Oliver: She won’t say anything, I know. I had to make the same calculation when you found out about me.
Diggle: Uh huh. And what would you have done if you were wrong and I decided to make a call to Detective Lance?
Oliver: I would’ve put an arrow in ya.
Diggle: Ha! {Pause} No, really, you really would’ve done that? Really?

And once again, I’m reminded why I adore these two together. The smirky smile Oliver delivers. The look of confidence-turned-uncertainty on Diggle’s face. These two are exceptional every time they interact. Nevertheless, Felicity arrives in the nick of time and confirms that she indeed will not be letting the cat out of the bag and that she’s still on Team Crime-Fighting. And when the trio puts together their plan in the diner, Oliver proves that he even trusts Felicity enough to follow her plan to plant on a bug on his “crush with a badge,” McKenna Hall, so he can “flirty flirt” his way to the information needed to take down The Dodger.

But as we later learn, this is not the first time that Oliver has had to determine one’s trustworthiness. In an island flashback, we see Oliver travel back to Yao Fei’s cave to recover his magical herbs and while there, he encounters a beaten, bloodied and tied up man. Now from the second I saw this guy, I was suspicious. Of all the caves, how did he end up in this one? How did he escape if he was tied up? Why do his eyes look so shifty? But Oliver clearly is not as cynical as I am at this point and his humanity nearly gets the best of him as the man pleads for his life and conveys a story about how he was shipwrecked, made it to the island and then was taken hostage by the island bad guys.

Luckily, the red flags are plentiful enough that Oliver’s doubt overpowers his empathy and he leaves the man tied up in the cave, saying “I can’t save you because I don’t know you”. Now we may never know if this guy really was an innocent victim or if he was a well-placed trap, but we did see Oliver begin to lose his innocence and learn not to take everything at face value.

However, Oliver was not the only one to dole out his trust to others. Moira’s conscience finally spurred her to action as she called another member of her elusive group and hatched a plan to kill Malcolm Merlyn, even if it does damn her to hell. I was shocked Moira contacted  Frank Chen (Chin Han) and questioned why she hadn’t employed his help earlier. Granted, it was talking to this man that got Robert Queen killed, but Moira seems to believe that his misgivings of the situation are enough to keep him on her side.

Lastly, following in her family’s footsteps, Thea also put her faith in the goodness of others. After being mugged, she delves in to her own form of crime-fighting and discovers that petty-thief Roy Harper (Colton Hayes, Teen Wolf) stole her purse. While being questioned by the police, he claims it was to support his mother and her rising healthcare bills as a result of her Vertigo addiction. And like a girl who’s been recently guilted by her privileged lifestyle and is face to face with a cute boy (like she said, he looks like an Abercrombie model!), Thea decides not to press charges.

After that, she really goes out on a limb, trusting him enough to knock on his door (perhaps in hopes of a date?) and demand her purse back. I’ll give it to the girl, she’s got courage. But unlike everyone else’s trust-o-meter, which so far seem accurate, Thea quickly learns not to take everything at face value as Roy tells her not to “fall for every sob story a guy like {him} tells the police”. Okay, so he may not have a sick mother, but I still don’t necessarily think he’s all bad and I have no doubt that Thea will be seeing more of him.

By now we know that manipulation is commonplace in Starling City and you never know who you can trust, but that being said, we are eager to see more of Oliver, Diggle and Felicity try to continue taking down the bad guys and cleaning up the city.

Arrow airs Wednesdays on the CW at 8/7c.