The Flash/Arrow Double Feature: "Gorilla Warfare" and "Brotherhood"

Grodd returned to Central City this week on The Flash and Diggle dealt with a major revelation concerning his brother on this week's Arrow.

The Flash: "Gorilla Warfare" (Season 2, Episode 7)

After two weeks of awesome episodes, The Flash stumbled a bit with "Gorilla Warfare", and that's mostly because I felt Barry's recovery from his fight with Zoom was resolved pretty quickly. We learn early in the episode that Barry's pretty much all physically healed, but is having trouble with healing mentally and emotionally, which is understandable. But I wish this could have been one of those episodes where Barry has to defeat the villain with his brain (as Joe suggests) rather than his speed and rely on the help of his friends. But by the end, Barry's speedy again. Obviously he was going to get his speed back eventually but I was expecting larger and lasting repercussions from last week's Zoom confrontation.

But like I said, Barry's trouble with getting over his defeat was relatable and led to some good performances from Grant Gustin, Jesse L. Martin and John Wesley Shipp, Henry and Barry's conversation was pretty emotional, as Henry urged Barry not to give up after a total defeat. I liked the connection he made to how he felt similar after Nora was killed and he was wrongly imprisoned. However, during the showdown with Grodd, Henry telling Barry to "Conquer your fears!" and "Believe in yourself!" was incredibly corny.

Speaking of Grodd, he looked fantastic and better than he did last season, and he looked pretty fantastic last season too! The scene's where he used his mind-control were pretty chilling, but him making Caitlin punch Cisco, and then Cisco complaining about it, was pretty funny. 

Did they mention in previous episodes that Caitlin was always so nice to Grodd. Yeah, it seems right for her character, but it felt like they made up that detail just for this episode. I could be wrong. Nevertheless, Caitlin's scenes with Grodd were great, and Danielle Panabaker did a good job of making me believe the gorilla was really there. 

Other Thoughts:

• It's good to see Harry and the Flash crew (band name?) are getting along a lot nicer now.
• Why would Cisco make Harry recite the quote from Wells that damaged him the most?
• So a lot of comics fans were apparently freaking out over the Gorilla city Grodd ends up in. Good for them.
• Hawkman! Hawkgirl!
• Speaking of those two, why would Cisco abandon Kendra at the theater just because he got a vibe of Hawkman? What a jerk!

Rating: 7.4/10 flowers and chocolates

Arrow: "Brotherhood" (Season 4, Episode 7)

"Brotherhood" turned out to be a great episode of Arrow for multiple reasons.

First, of course, was the focus on Diggle and the revelation that his brother's alive and an agent of HIVE. It's unfortunate that this was spoiled in the promos, but it was still interesting to see play out here. David Ramsey gave a really great performance and I liked how the writers took Diggle's predicament in a different direction and have him object to saving his brother. Was he really worth saving? Maybe not after him and John's interaction at the end.

Second, the action scenes. James Bamford, the show's stunt coordinator, directed this episode, and his experience in that role really showed when it came to shooting the fight scenes. Instead of the usual jump cut-infested action bits, the camera lingered on the action, giving us some of the most memorable of those scenes in the show's history. Diggle and Oliver's brawl with the HIVE agents and Thea going toe to toe with Andy (in an elevator!) were the big highlights.

Third, Ray got a surprising amount of screentime this week as he caught up with what's been going on since his imprisonment. I really liked Ray's scenes and how he felt his apparent death didn't leave much of a legacy on the city (besides the name, of course), and that he didn't know what to do with his newly found freedom. His entrance into the final battle was awesome, and it was cool to see him fighting alongside Oliver.

Fourth, the flashbacks gained a bit more steam. We finally have an idea of what Oliver was sent to the island to do. But it doesn't look like Oliver's learned his lesson to not keep the deaths of loved ones a secret after the whole disaster with Slade.

Other Thoughts:

• I liked how Diggle brings up how crazy the show's gotten since it started, mentioning the Flash and the Lazarus Pit. 
• Thea's brief confrontation with Darhk was cool, and it looks like Thea has possibly found Darhk's weakness.
• Wow. That creepy dude trying to woo Thea picked a really bad time to do so.
• Do I really need to mention how great Neal McDonough was this week?

Rating: 8.2/10 non-killer brothers

Next week is this year's Flash/Arrow crossover. The two casts will team up with Hawkman and Hawkgirl against Vandal Savage, setting up Legends of Tomorrow.

Noah