Seeing as how this past season of Arrow was deemed a return to form by many longtime viewers, it was quite pleasing to see that last night’s finale was one of the best in series history – if not the best. Thanks to it being the final phase in Prometheus’ deadly game along with featuring a slew of guest stars and effectively capping Oliver Queen’s five-year backstory in the flashbacks, it truly felt like everything had come full circle. But one aspect will undoubtedly cause conversation to run rampant from now through October: Death, and lots of it.
By now, we’re all aware that season finales present the most opportune time to kill off characters due to shock value and the reality that every actor’s contract has to expire at some point. With that, it came as no surprise that a few characters got the ax last night, but it remains unclear as to which.
From what we could tell, Malcolm Merlyn made the sacrifice play, blowing himself up along with Captain Boomerang and a handful of assassins. Still, it’s important we not overlook the fact that we saw the explosion only from a distance, nor did we see any charred corpses. But if Merlyn is truly dead, we can’t rule out seeing an alternate universe version of him in the future.
As for the rest of Team Arrow, well, that’s where it gets a bit trickier. When Adrian Chase shot himself in the head and triggered a dead man’s switch connected to a litany of bombs scattered throughout Lian Yu, Oliver and his son, William, were forced to watch in horror.
To be honest, if anyone is safe, it’s Wild Dog, the new Black Canary and Black Siren because Rick Gonzalez, Juliana Harkavy and Katie Cassidy have all been confirmed as series regulars for season 6. That said, we should brace ourselves for the reality that Slade, Thea, Diggle, Felicity, Curtis or Quentin won’t be coming back – and we likely won’t know for certain until the season premiere arrives.
Arrow airs on Wednesday nights on The CW.
