Nice to see you, old friends … and foes! Arrow flipped the script for its season 8 premiere on Tuesday, October 15, titled “Starling City.”
Oliver (Stephen Amell) once again found himself on Lian Yu at the beginning of the episode. When he returned home, his mother, Moira (Susanna Thompson), and best pal Tommy (Colin Donnell) greeted him with open arms. Malcolm (John Barrowman) was also there, as he was married to Moira. The trio acted as if Oliver had been missing for a decade — ever since his infamous shipwreck.
Fans were likely confused, seeing as the three characters have been dead for quite some time. Moira was killed by Slade Wilson’s (Manu Bennett) blade in season 2, Tommy sacrificed himself to save Laurel (Katie Cassidy) during season 1 and Malcolm exploded back on the island in season 5.
So, how were the fan favorites alive and well? Turns out, Ollie was on Earth-2. The Monitor (LaMonica Garrett) sent him there to retrieve dwarfstar particles as part of his mission to prevent the impending crisis on his earth.
While in pursuit of the item, Oliver bumped into Earth-2’s Green Arrow, embodied by none other than his former rival Adrian Chase (Josh Segarra), who also died during season 5. The big bad took his own life in an effort to kill everyone Oliver loved.
Laurel informed Oliver that Adrian was truly a good guy on her earth, so the two teamed up — with help from Earth-1 Diggle (David Ramsey), who insisted on assisting Oliver after Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) located her husband on Earth-2 — to stop the Dark Archer from carrying out the Undertaking. Funnily enough, the hooded villain was not Malcolm but his son, Tommy.
Tommy ultimately turned himself in to the police after a good talk from Oliver, and Ollie returned to Earth-1 with Laurel and Diggle. But not before a mysterious fog took over Earth-2 and turned Tommy, Moira and more to dust.
Elsewhere in the episode, Oliver sought out Earth-2 Felicity for help with an IT problem. Instead, he found a look-alike chewing on a not-red pen who told him that Felicity was far too busy running her own company, Smoak Tech, to be working for Queen-Merlyn.
The kickoff to the final season also included countless callbacks to season 1, from Oliver’s “I missed tequila” line from the pilot episode to him evading Diggle with a knockout trick that never fails.
Arrow airs on The CW Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET.
