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On the island, Oliver retrieves Yao Fei’s super herbs to give to Slade as he recovers from the gunshot wound he took in the last episode. In the cave, Oliver meets a beaten-up man, Alan Durand, who says he was on a fishing expedition when his boat caught fire and he was then hurt by the others on the island. Oliver doesn't trust him and leaves him behind.
While Thea and Laurel take a break from CNRI, a man snatches Thea’s purse. He escapes, but loses a wallet chain, which Thea uses to figure out his name: Roy Harper. When questioned by Lance, Roy says he has no other choice but to steal because of his mother’s Vertigo addiction. Thea feels sorry for him and doesn't pursue charges. Later, Thea visits Roy’s house and asks for her purse back. He eventually gives it to her and warns her about believing sob stories.
Moira tells Frank she wants out of their project to fix the Glades. Frank informs Moira that “they” will meet with him. Moira asks for a clue to where Walter is, even though Malcolm is the only one who knows. Under the suggestion of Frank, Moira meets China White and asks her to kill Malcolm Merlyn.
McKenna Hall warns the city about the Dodger, a jewel thief putting hostages in bomb collars to steal for him. Diggle’s date with Carly doesn't go smoothly. Meanwhile, McKenna leaves early from her date with Oliver to work the case. As the Dodger speaks with a fence, the police raid the place, but the Dodger runs out, even eluding the Hood. At a fundraiser, Felicity sees the Dodger with a stolen jewel, so he puts a bomb collar on her. With Felicity’s guidance, Oliver chases the Dodger and successfully disarms the collar. Lance interrupts McKenna and Oliver’s alone time at the police station to invite her into the vigilante case.
Tropes applying to this Episode:
- Adaptational Villainy: In the comics, the Dodger is a Lovable Rogue Anti-Villain who dates Mia. In the series he's a ruthless Smug Snake who gives his hostages explosive collars.
- Affably Evil: The Dodger seems rather polite, given what he does to his "henchpeople". While some villains would deal with them once their deeds were done, he doesn't. Dodger wouldn't kill them afterwards but merely knock 'em out. The only people he has killed was an art dealer who tries to screw him over, and a hostage in Madrid who refused to cooperate.
- Badass in a Nice Suit: Dodger always wears a suit in his heists (Or rather, when he make someone else do it for him).
- Crimefighting with Cash: When Felicity wonders where they can get an antique jewel of the type the Dodger is interested in, Diggle muses that she clearly has no idea how rich the Queen family is.
- Dating Catwoman: Right when Oliver convinces McKenna to go out with him again, she's assigned to the Vigilante case.
- Decomposite Character: Much of Dodger's more positive qualities were instead incorporated into Roy Harper; specifically being a thief who dates Thea (this show's stand-in for Mia).
- Debut Queue: The first appearance of Roy Harper.
- Eating the Eye Candy: Downplayed, but Felicity is shown taking a peak at a shirtless Oliver working out on a training dummy. It won't be long before she drops the subtlety altogether.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Felicity is not happy that Oliver is going to threaten someone on the List who has a young son.
- Evil Brit: The Dodger is British, and a classy Villain of the Week at that.
- Explosive Leash: The Villain of the Week makes others steal for him by attaching explosive collars to their neck and killing them as soon as they get caught or try to abandon the mission.
- Foreshadowing:
- Roy Harper is first shown wearing a red hoodie.
- Moira talks of the Undertaking laying waste to the Glades.
- The embezzler with a ten year-old son isn't the only person on the List who has children, at least one of whom will grow up to take revenge on Oliver.
- Gentleman Thief: The Dodger sure comes off this way, but he's a bit more of a monster than most.
- The Heart: Felicity urges Oliver to forgo pursuing the List in favor of genuinely helping people. Realising he needs her help (and out of concern she might go to the police after all) he decides to make an 'exception' by catching Dodger. She also convinces Oliver to try more sophisticated methods like hacking instead of intimidation to get intelligence.
- Hero Stole My Bike: How Oliver chases the Dodger after he grabs the Queen Family Jewels.
- Hidden Depths: Oliver is surprised when, after he tries intimidating Felicity with his brooding Death Glare when she objects to him targeting the widowed father of a ten-year old who's on the List, the geeky IT girl just walks out on him, saying she might have made a mistake signing up for Team Arrow. He has to approach her again on her own turf in a more conciliatory manner, agreeing to take on the Dodger case.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Dodger's other signature move is to zap people unconscious. When he tries to use it on Oliver, he gets a taste of his own medicine.
- I Have Your Wife: When Felicity catches the Dodger stealing the Queen jewels, he puts a bomb collar on her as a hostage for his escape. Oliver uses a flechette to paralyze a nerve in his hand so he can't press the radio detonator.
- I Lied: Roy Harper's Freudian Excuse, as he admits to Thea.
- Improvised Weapon: The Dodger uses one of his bomb collars as a grenade to escape the Hood.
- Irony: Thea brushes off Oliver because she's tracking down a criminal while he's going on a date, the reverse of their usual situation.
- I Want You to Meet an Old Friend of Mine: The actors playing Dodger (James Callis) and Claire, the fence (Rekha Sharma) were both regular cast members on Battlestar Galactica (2003), playing Gaius Baltar and Tory Foster, respectively.
- Le Parkour: Roy flees after snatching Thea's purse only to get blocked by a fence. When Laurel and Thea confront him however, he just smirks and leaps over it using the nearby wall.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: When Slade tells Ollie he "won't last an hour out there", Ollie replies "then you'd better hope I get back in 45 minutes". The show ran for an hour... but taking out commercials the actual run time was about 42 minutes.
- Lock Down: Felicity tries locking Oliver inside the Arrowcave, but Oliver just reboots the system.
- Mythology Gag:
- There is a reference made to the Norris Cemetery. Paul Norris was the co-creator of Roy Harper, aka Speedy, for DC Comics.
- The intersection of O’Neil & Adams was referenced in this episode. Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams were, basically, the writers for the Green Lantern/Green Arrow comic book series. They also created the issue where Roy Harper becomes a drug addict.
- The character of Dodger in the comics was a bank robber who used alien technology to pull off heists. He and Mia Dearden (The 2nd Speedy) also briefly dated.
- No Name Given: The villain's only known as "The Dodger".
- No Social Skills: Oliver (who's a bit out of practice) and Diggle stumble over asking the woman they're interested out for dinner, and end up making a mess of their first date. Fortunately the women concerned are willing to give them a second chance.
- "Not So Different" Remark: The Dodger claims this to Oliver as he only steals from the rich. Oliver tells him he's not Just Like Robin Hood.
- Oblivious Guilt Slinging: Subverted when Roy talks of his mother getting hooked on Vertigo, but not having the resources of the wealthy to get proper care. Given that he already knows who Thea Queen is, it's implied he's doing this deliberately to guilt-trip her into dropping the charges.
- Pet the Dog: Roy does return Thea's purse with everything in it, though not her cigarettes as it's a bad habit.
- Phantom Thief: The Dodger can pull heists while being miles away by forcing hostages to steal for him.
- Pop the Tires: Oliver does this to Dodger's car by bursting a tire with an explosive arrow and causing it to crash.
- Rhetorical Question Blunder:
- Diggle asks what Oliver would have done if he'd decided to call the police on learning he was the Hood. Oliver replies that he would have put an arrow in him, and doesn't bother to reassure Diggle with a "Just Joking" Justification.
- Thea snarks to Roy that he knows nothing about her. Given that she's a tabloid celebrity who's recently been involved in a drug scandal, that's not true.
- Serious Business: Thea goes to a lot of trouble to get her purse back. Though the thief's male model looks might have had something to do with that...
- She Cleans Up Nicely: Both Oliver and Diggle are stunned with how good Felicity looks when she turns up at the Cancer benefit in a gold dress with her hair down and glasses missing.
- Shipper on Deck: Felicity and Oliver try to nudge Diggle into asking out his sister-in-law Carly, whereupon Diggle hits back by insisting Oliver ask out McKenna. Unusually for this trope, both men immediately follow up on this.
- Shock Stick: The Dodger uses some kind of electric mace that shocks the heart, causing his victims to become unconscious for 72 hours.
- Snark-to-Snark Combat: Thea vs. Roy.Roy: So I guess you're not pressing charges 'cause you feel like you can change my life? And so you can run and tell your rich prep school friends what a saint you are and how you're helping the disadvantaged?Thea: You don't know a thing about me.Roy: Thea Queen. Trust fund brat. Totaled her car, which she got as a birthday present. Loves designer labels and is usually in the tabloids for partying too much. Did I leave anything out?Thea: Yeah. Dead father, missing step dad, damaged brother, and almost served jail time for that car accident. Plus, she really wants her purse back.
- Spare a Messenger: When a fence has his goons put their guns to the Dodger's head so he can steal the ruby, Dodger stuns them and kills the fence, so the goons can tell every other fence in Starling City that he's not to be trifled with. The next fence he deals with makes it clear she got the word.
- Summon Bigger Fish: In order to get out from under Malcolm Merlyn's thumb, Moira Queen asks China White to kill him, setting up the next episode.
- That Came Out Wrong: Felicity wants to know what Oliver plans to do if the thief absconds with his family jewels, then gives this trope when she realises how that sounded.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: The Dodger believes that The Hood is a Robin Hood wannabe and so doesn't fear for his life at all.
- You Have to Believe Me!: Island!Oliver finds a man who has been tied up and beaten in Yao Fei's cave, claiming to be a recently shipwrecked victim of Fryers mercenaries. He pleads with Oliver to cut him loose, but Oliver can't take the chance of releasing him because it might be a setup, and leaves with the man's pleas ringing in his ears.
- Your Head Asplode: The result when his hostages refuse to cooperate is that the Dodger detonates their collar, taking their whole head with it.
