As we've seen in Season 5 of Arrow, Oliver is desperate to put an end to Prometheus' reign of terror. So desperate, in fact, that he apparently calls on one of his greatest enemies, Deathstroke, to help topple Adrian Chase. Will that end up being a bad call for Queen given the "promise" Slade Wilson made so long ago? Showrunner Wendy Mericle seems to hint as much in the statement below:
With Deathstroke, you never really know who you're dealing with, in a similar way with Malcolm, but with a little bit more of an edge, because the history between Slade and Oliver is as deep and troubled as the one between him and Malcolm. Slade is definitely coming back. We're definitely going to be thinking he might be on Oliver's side. That's all I'm going to say about that, to quote Forrest Gump.
In case you forgotten Season 2 of Arrow, Slade Wilson made a promise to Oliver Queen back when they were on the island, shortly after Wilson learned that Oliver jumped in front of Sara to save her life, thus causing Doctor Ivo to kill Shado, whom Wilson loved. Knowing his ally wasn't in the right state of mind due to his Mirakuru injection, Oliver kept the death a secret, which only angered Wilson more when he learned the truth. Blaming him for the death of Shado, Deathstroke swore he would bring "complete despair" to Oliver before killing him. This seems to be the reasoning behind Wendy Mericle's quote to EW.
One would assume that Slade Wilson fulfilled a chunk of that promise once he executed Moira Queen, but both Thea and Oliver took the death of their mother fairly well. Now free, Deathstroke will not only get a chance at real escape, but also a chance to further exact his revenge on Oliver should he choose to do so. Given that he's spent the past few years in a Lian Yu ARGUS prison I can imagine revenge will come up even if he does at first appear an ally to the archer. Should Deathstroke turn foe at a critical moment in the battle, we could see lots of casualties in the Arrow world. Oliver had a hard time taking on the suited up Deathstroke their first go around, I can't imagine what would happen should he flip the script and align with Prometheus.
Now that Wendy Mericle put the bug in our ears that Oliver could be making a mistake joining Deathstroke and maybe letting him walk free, I'm internally screaming and wishing I could take back all my excitement for Manu Bennett's return! Let's hope that if Slade Wilson does turn coat, it's not specifically during a battle with Prometheus, because I can't see that going well for Team Arrow at all.
This is definitely some good food for thought as Arrow makes it returns tonight at 8 p.m. ET on The CW. We could be losing more than characters in these final weeks of Spring so make sure you're keeping up with our renewal guide to ensure your favorite shows will be returning and visit our summer premiere guide to find new ones if they aren't.
