Trust But Verify was a return to strength for Arrow. Maybe it’s because Ollie didn’t kill off any “major” villains, maybe because he was back to his usual bad-guy ass beatings, maybe it was making fun of Thea’s voice the whole time, I don’t know but I enjoyed it. Centered around the theme of “trust”, this episode tested the bounds of a few relationships: Ollie and Diggle, Thea and Mama Queen, and Tommy and the Dark arch…er Merlyn…er Malcom. First off, let me address the DC Comics Easter egg, the BlackHawk Squadron reference. It’s nice to see these little nods to the comics, even though it will most likely upset most nerds who don’t have any tolerance for change. The Arrow’s opposition came in the form of Farscape alumni Ben Browder who plays Ted Gaynor, a military face from Diggle’s past and someone he can’t believe is on Oliver’s list. Most of the time you should probably trust the crazy guy who spent WAY too long on an island, but Diggle was being stubborn for most of the episode. After the always welcome help from the beautiful Felicity, Ollie is able to hack into the plans for the heists of armored trucks that have been taking place at the hands of a trained task force. In the end Diggle is wrong and Ollie is right, leading to Diggle not wanting to know who is on the list until the time is right. The team is getting stronger, while Ollie’s family life is falling apart. With the recent “disappearance” of Walter, Moira has been dealing with the weight that she knows that she was responsible and her interactions with Malcom Merlyn have drawn the attention of Thea. To make things short Thea thinks that Moira and Malcom are hooking up, she lets it destroy her birthday leading us to the introduction of the VERTIGO drug into the Arrow world. Now if you have been keeping up with our posts you know that Count Vertigo is on his way in the form of Seth Gable, and Starling City is in for a world of trouble. Thea gets some of the Vertigo drug from her friends and is feeling kinda down so she takes some and goes on a joyride, an you can guess how that turns out. Thea is arrested and we are left to wait to see what happens next week. What I liked about introducing the drug Vertigo into this episode is that it ties it directly into next week and gives the viewers a little insight into the dark future that is ahead for the Queen clan.
Casting News
Black Canary is on her way, well at least one of them, the original one. Dr Who alumni, Alex Kingston will play Dinah Lance aka Laurel’s mother. She is apparently returning to make amends for abandoning her family after the death of Sara Lance. More and more characters are being introduced, but where are our superheros? Will Arrow stick to the original plan?
Also showing up, again, Deadshot who was presumed dead in episode 3, will be returning in the near future. Deadshot will return in an episode titled “Dead to Rights”, written by Geoff Johns, and will make another appearance later this season where he will face David Ramsey’s character John Diggle. Good, because I don’t understand why writers want to kill off major villains. Maybe he will have a new look, maybe even more comic accurate!
Finally, here is the extended promo for next week’s episode “Vertigo“! Get ready for terror Starling City!
Arrow airs Wednesdays on the CW at 8pm EST! Check out all of DFAT‘s previous Arrow coverage here!
Stay tooned 
~CynicNerd
About the Author
This is so exciting for fans of the great new show Arrow! Just the fact that Count Vertigo is going to show up is reason enough to be excited about getting off of work at DISH on Wednesday night, so that I can come home and watch it! Thankfully, DISH’s Hopper makes sure that I can record the entire season, and since it has 2,000 hours of storage available, I don’t even have to delete anything to make room for new episodes like this one!