In Starling, a group of Brick's thugs cause some chaos in a local diner. Arsenal and Canary arrive and they stop them from looting the place. Sarah's friend, Sin, sees Canary and thinks that it's Sarah.
Thea trains with Malcolm, and he advises her not to hesitate when she goes if for the kill. He tells her that the first time he killed, the victim was his wife's murderer.
Meanwhile, Arsenal meets with Lance to talk about how they can defeat Brick. Arsenal heads to the Arrow cave and as they sort through Lance's evidence files, they find out that Brick was the one who killed Malcolm's wife. Malcolm hears about it since he took pains to bug the Arrow cave. Then, the team finds Brick's hideout. As Canary and Arsenal are about to square off with Brick, Malcolm appears and shoots Brick with an arrow, but he manages to escape.
They all head back to the Arrow cave, and Malcolm says that they must work together to take down Brick. Roy has a talk with Thea, who tells him that she has been training with Malcolm and that he saved her from Deathstroke. Ray tells the team about what Thea told him, but they refuse to work with Malcolm at any rate.
The Arrow team, along with some Glades residents, storm the streets to battle with Brick and his thugs. In the middle of the battle, an arrow takes down one of Brick's guys, and as Malcolm is about to kill Brick, the Arrow reveals himself and tells him not to do it. Arrow announces that Brick is going to jail and that Starling will be safe again with him back.
Oliver and the team go to the Arrow cave where they have an emotional reunion. He tells them that he will train under Malcolm, and Felicity is furious at this.
“Uprising” is an excellent episode. It pits our heroes in a losing situation, testing their mettle and their moral compass as they seek to find a way out of it. Malcolm’s (John Barrowman) offer of assistance could end the fight with Brick, but it will also cost them a bit of their soul, teaming up with the man who killed their friend and almost destroyed the city. Yet, they are divided on whether to accept. Even when compromising their code appears to be the only solution, some of the team want to take the higher ground, and those people win out, “Uprising” also features the return of Oliver, a.k.a. the titular Arrow. I think this comes a bit too early. Arrow-less Team Arrow has been through many challenges, but they have not gotten anywhere near boring nor played out everything they could. I wish this story would have been stretched out just a few more weeks. If the writers didn’t know what else to do with Oliver in the cabin, he didn’t have to appear in those episodes at all.
As Oliver comes back, he strikes up a deal with Malcolm. He can be forgiven for doing so because he has a very different perspective on things than his team, with additional knowledge about who Malcolm is and was. But it’s also easy to see why Felicity and Diggle would feel betrayed, thinking they were upholding Oliver’s righteousness and being disappointed that Oliver himself will not do the same. Felicity, in particular, doesn’t give him a chance to explain, which again, is understandable because she’s experiencing very strong emotions upon learning Oliver is not dead, as she thought he was. All in all, it’s a messy return.
“Uprising” presents an exciting, engaging story, challenging our heroes and expanding our minds about who some of the characters are. Something ARROW has been doing extremely right this season is deepening the mythology and the players, and I’m happy to see that trend continues.