Arrow spent an awful lot of Season 5 building the mystery of Prometheus. The show tried to tease that Quentin could be the man beneath the mask, and it even gave Prometheus a name in the midseason finale. We finally learned his true identity in Episode 15 when Adrian Chase unmasked himself as Prometheus in a shocking reveal. As it turns out, the Arrow team went to great lengths to conceal the truth for as long as possible. Actress Lexa Doig joined Arrow in Season 5 to play none other than Talia al Ghul, and when recently speaking to CinemaBlend, she shared this story about how the show kept the secret:
So I'll be in for say half a day, and you see on the call sheet the list of the other cast that are in and even when Prometheus is playing there's no cast member listed next to the name of Prometheus, so even working on the show I have no idea who's supposed to be playing Prometheus when I look at the call sheet because it doesn't say and nobody tells me. Which is fine! It's totally fine...I absolutely appreciate the level of secrecy and the need for it on a show like this. But everybody's looking for spoilers. Everybody's looking for the details and how to connect the dots. They've got to be secretive and careful about that stuff.
Evidently, Arrow managed to keep the cast from spilling the beans about Prometheus by keeping his identity secret from even them. There was no risk of an actor slipping up and admitting that Adrian Chase is Prometheus and not Vigilante, as many of us had guessed. There wasn't even the possibility of a call sheet somehow leaking and spoiling fans on the man behind the mask. Lexa Doig's reveal of how the show kept the secret indicates that showrunner Marc Guggenheim and Co. were dedicated to drawing out the suspense for viewers.
Given that Marc Guggenheim has admitted in the past that he thinks "it sucks" when paparazzi leak spoilers, it doesn't come as a huge surprise that the Arrow team would take pains to contain spoilers. After all, the production team may not always be able to prevent paps from snapping pics while filming outdoors, but they can certainly prevent too many people from knowing big secrets ahead of time. Although secrets do still leak from time to time, we at least know that they're doing what they can to keep the big plot twists from circulating on social media before the episodes air.
Interestingly, the Arrow team sometimes even goes to great lengths to keep secrets from actors about the characters they'll be playing. Lexa Doig went on to tell me that she didn't know she would be playing Talia al Ghul until she met with the costume designer the day before she started working on the show. She thought she'd be playing a character named Lindsay, not the legendary Talia al Ghul. Clearly, Arrow does not want its big characters known to viewers ahead of time, and while such precautions must be frustrating for folks who love spoilers, the secrets do build suspense. In the case of the Prometheus reveal, I'd argue that it worked well.
Tune in to Arrow on Wednesday nights at 8 p.m. ET to see more of Lexa Doig as Talia al Ghul, and be sure to check out E! on Sunday nights at 10 p.m. ET to see her on The Arrangement. For a look at what you can watch on the small screen now and in the coming months, take a peek at our 2017 midseason TV premiere schedule and our 2017 summer TV premiere schedule.
