After escaping last episode on Arrow, Sara Lance is on a killing spree. Oliver Queen runs into Sara during one of her attempted murders, but is unable to capture her. After learning the details of her resurrection, Oliver and Felicity Smoak conclude that Sara’s body was revived, but not her soul and Sara is focused on hunting down the one that killed her, Thea Queen. The team successfully captures Sara by using Thea as bait and Oliver calls his old friend, John Constantine, to return Sara to normal. John, Oliver, and Laurel Lance travel to another dimension to rescue Sara’s soul and the mission is successful.
Meanwhile, Damian orders Captain Quentin Lance to upload a virus in a security company. Oliver has John Diggle go with Captain Lance as backup. The virus was designed to delete files on military personnel and John discovers one of those people was his brother, Andrew Diggle. After deleting the files, Captain Lance confronts Damian to find out why Andrew was killed. Captain Lance later arrives at John’s place with files that reveal HIVE assassinated Andrew because he was a weapons and drug cartel leader during his time in Afghanistan.
Back on the island, Oliver meets John Constantine for the first time and he is searching for a grimoire called the Orb of Horus. John is on a mission to collect magical items to keep them in a safe place and away from bad people. Before he leaves the island, Constantine casts a spell on Oliver to protect him which is marked by a tattoo on the right side of Oliver’s stomach.
After finally deciding to listen to Ray Palmer’s final words, Felicity has difficulty deciphering the background noise in the message. With help from Curtis Holt, Felicity is finally able to listen to the message and learns that Ray is still alive.
One of the biggest focuses of “Haunted” was Laurel’s character development. For most of the season so far, Laurel has been making very poor decisions. Laurel selfishly resurrected her sister and is now responsible for the people that Sara killed, yet no one has held her accountable for it. Now similar to Thea, Laurel will have to figure out a way to quench Sara’s thirst to kill.
Felicity’s story line gets taken up a notch with the discovery that Ray is still alive. We may finally get to see Ray in action again with the powers he is known for and not as the DC version of Iron Man. I’m glad to see Ray returning to Arrow and ecstatic to see what role he will play throughout the season. Curtis Holt is getting great character development becoming the go-to tech person for Felicity, especially with Curtis’ character being both black and homosexual. It is great to see that DC isn’t afraid to cast a diverse set of characters and not reinforce the stereotypes.
The DC television universe grows bigger with John Constantine, played by Matt Ryan, guest starring on “Haunted” and creating a bridge with the short-lived Constantine television series. While Arrow has shown some supernatural scenes with Damian Darhk abilities and the Lazarus Pit, Constantine’s guest appearance was a great way for Arrow to transition to the supernatural realm. Constantine is the first to use spells and introduces the realm where Sara’s soul was being captured.
Arrow is doing an amazing job bringing in characters that most hardcore DC fans will know, but still enjoyable for people new to Green Arrow. “Haunted” did not go too deep into Constantine’s backstory but gave viewers enough to know what they needed to for the episode to go smoothly. With magic finally being introduced, expecting to see characters such as Zatanna Zatara and Doctor Fate may not be a longshot.
Summary
Great crossover with John Constantine and magic may be focus in future episodes.
