Arrow: Burned

"Arrow" is back after several weeks of holiday hiatus and we find that Oliver has given up his double identity since his defeat at the hands of the Dark Archer, as played by John Barrowman, six weeks prior. Well, perhaps not given up, but his confidence has certainly been affected as has his performance. Oliver has put his stepfather's kidnapping ahead of acting out as Arrow. In other words, he's making excuses. We do get a good dose of Stephen Amell's bare chest in the opening sequence to make up for it however.

Island flashbacks return as well. More whiny poor list coward Oliver, more Yao Fei, more Deathstroke, and as usual some answers and more questions. Show of hands here, who'd like to see a whole episode on island? I would. Nothing could be wrong with more Deathstroke.

Meanwhile, in the case of the week, Laurel's best friend and co-worker Jo believes her firefighter brother was murdered by an arsonist, so she calls The Hood for help.

Our villain this week is the Firefly. In the comics the Firefly, alias Garfield Lynns, is a high tech Batman villain who dates back to the 1950s. Here he's a low tech realistic arsonist with a firefighter outfit, a tattoo, and a kerosene squirt gun. Kinda takes all the fun out of it, especially when you have guys like Deathstroke around in costume. And sadly, this version visually is more Two-Face than Firefly.

Starling City must be some sort of inside joke for the producers. In this episode there was no recognizable part of the Philly skyline used in the night time shots. Are they using different city skylines for day and night?

For the comics fans we got a nice shout out to Stagg Chemical. For the uninitiated, Simon Stagg was the billionaire arch-nemesis of Metamorpho, who could transform his body into any element or chemical substance.

The end was a bit disappointing however. After an entire episode of Oliver doubting himself, feeling sorry for himself, basically being a whiney little b- well, you get the picture. When the time comes to be the hero, fight the bad guy, he does nothing. Firefly takes himself out. Pointless.