Arrow Season 8 Synopsis Teases A New Direction For The Series

When you sit down to analyze this past Monday’s season finale of Arrow, you have to admit that it could’ve served as a series finale in various respects. After all, Oliver Queen and his cohorts foiled the Ninth Circle’s plans, and then the Emerald Archer left Star City in the capable hands of his teammates. After that, he and Felicity Smoak settled down in seclusion and began raising their newborn daughter, Mia.

As luck would have it, the hits just kept on coming for Ollie, as the Monitor showed up and said it’s time that they begin their cosmic mission. Not only that, but the flash-forward segments revealed that, yes, our hero will indeed meet his demise during the upcoming “Crisis on Infinite Earths” crossover.

Naturally, this leaves us all wondering what the ten-episode final season will entail, but the official synopsis disclosed at The CW’s fall upfronts may provide some hints:

After a violent shipwreck, billionaire playboy Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell) was missing and presumed dead for five years before being discovered alive on a remote island in the North China Sea. He returned home to Star City, bent on righting the wrongs done by his family and fighting injustice. As the Green Arrow, Oliver successfully saved his city with the help of his team including former soldier John Diggle (David Ramsey), computer-science expert Felicity Smoak (Emily Bett Rickards), former protégé Roy Harper (Colton Haynes), street-savvy Rene Ramirez (Rick Gonzalez), metahuman Dinah Drake (Juliana Harkavy), brilliant inventor Curtis Holt (Echo Kellum) and Earth-2 Laurel Lance (Katie Cassidy).

In the wake of discovering what his future holds, Oliver will find himself pit against his most challenging battle yet, one that will leave the multiverse hanging in the balance. In Arrow’s final season, Oliver Queen is forced to confront the reality of what it means to be a hero. Based on the characters from DC, ARROW is from Bonanza Productions Inc. in association with Berlanti Productions and Warner Bros. Television, with executive producers Greg Berlanti (“The Flash,” “Supergirl,” “Riverdale”), Beth Schwartz (“DC’s Legends of Tomorrow”) and Sarah Schechter (“The Flash,” “Supergirl,” “Riverdale”).

For the most part, Arrow has remained the most grounded series making up the universe it spawned, as it’s always been about a man trying to save his city. But when you factor in everything I discussed in the opening paragraph of this article, season 7’s finale being titled “You Have Saved This City” is incredibly fitting and puts a “mission accomplished” stamp on the original crusade.

Now that more details are coming to light, I’m getting the feeling that the final season will retain the flavor of the show we’ve come to love, yet have a bit of a science fiction twist as it begins setting up “Crisis on Infinite Earths.” At least, that’s what the “Oliver will find himself pit against his most challenging battle yet, one that will leave the multiverse hanging in the balance” tells me.

Arrow returns with new episodes on Tuesday nights this fall on The CW.