Present Tense

"Someone told me the only way to change the future is to start doing things differently now."

—Rene Ramirez on changing the future.

"Present Tense"
Information
Season 8 » Episode 4
Episode number	164 of 170
Original airdate	November 5, 2019
Written by	Oscar Balderrama Jeane Wong
Directed by	Kristin Windell
Chronology
Preceded by	"Leap of Faith"
Followed by	"Prochnost"

"Present Tense" is the fourth episode of the eighth season of Arrow, and the one-hundred-sixty-fourth episode overall. It aired on November 5, 2019.

Synopsis

When a mysterious new Deathstroke appears in Star City, Oliver and Team Arrow insist on taking down this villain themselves. Meanwhile, reeling from the loss of one of their own, the future Team Arrow figures out a new way to try and stop JJ.[src]

Plot

Oliver takes William and Mia back to his loft and the three have a go at getting up to speed. Naturally stirred up by the new turns of events, Mia makes some hard memories grappling with what's happening. As William comes out to his dad, an obscure hired fighter dressed as Deathstroke bombs the medical clinic. ARGUS illuminates Oliver it's not Slade or his child, driving Team Arrow to give finding a shot who's co-picked the Deathstroke mantle.

As they're working, Curtis (Echo Kellum) makes his Arrow return since he was called by Oliver. The last requests that Curtis figure out some texture taken from Earth-2 in order to come up with a barrier component against the world-eating vitality. Funnies, isn't that so?

2040 Team Arrow set out to really focus and visit the HQ of the Deathstroke Gang in right now. There, they reveal the character of the new Deathstroke — Grant Wilson, the other child of Slade that Oliver and Connor had recently met. The group unintentionally sets off a trigger for a bomb, driving Oliver, Laurel, and Dinah to show up and spare them. They discover Grant's attempting to level the city.

The two crews' failure to cooperate from the outset prompts a fracture, where 2040 Team Arrow gives everything away about the future — how Star City is in low quality, how JJ is the new Deathstroke, and how JJ slaughters Zoe. The groups split up to do different parts of the examination — Laurel and Mia head to the emergency clinic while Curtis, Oliver, and William chip away at unscrambling information they figure out how to reveal. This permits Diggle and Rene to invest energy with their youngsters after the ongoing disclosures.

After the information is unscrambled, the reveal Grant's full plans. The two groups present appropriate reparations (just as superheroes would) and takedown Grant and his system of bombs. Subsequent to bringing down the trouble makers, everybody offers some kind of reparation in the group. Rene reports his bid for city board, Diggle begins preparing with Connor, and Dinah and Laurel begin laying the preparation for a system of Canary vigilantes.

Cast

Main cast

• Stephen Amell as Oliver Queen/Green Arrow
• David Ramsey as John Diggle/Spartan
• Rick Gonzalez as Rene Ramirez/Wild Dog
• Juliana Harkavy as Captain Dinah Drake/Black Canary
• Katherine McNamara as Mia Smoak/Blackstar
• Ben Lewis as older William Clayton
• Joseph David-Jones as older Connor Hawke
• LaMonica Garrett as Mar Novu/The Monitor

Special appearance by

• Katie Cassidy as Laurel Lance/Black Canary

Special guest star

• Echo Kellum as Curtis Holt

Guest starring

• Jamie Andrew Cutler as Grant Wilson/Deathstroke
• Venus Terzo as Dr. Elisa Schwartz

Co-starring

• Keri Adams as Bethany Snow
• Andrew Chin as Perp
• Jason Day as Cop
• Eliza Faria as Young Zoe
• Susan Hanson as Evelyn Fairfield
• Bill Morris as Macmillan Fairfield
• Kyle Mosonyi as Uniform

Trivia

• While not having as many as the previous episodes of Season 8, this episode has some callbacks and references to previous seasons.
  • Slade's attack on Star City and the events from episode "City of Blood" to "Unthinkable" is referenced multiple times during this episode.
    • Curtis jokingly names Grant's attack "Siege 2.0", but instead of Mirakuru soldiers, it's bombs.
    • Grant mentions how his father attacked Star City 6 years ago and how he is planning to do the same.
    • When the criminal in SCPD takes a seat, he asks an officer what the time is, then puts a bomb under the seat, puts on a Deathstroke mask, and begins taking out cops. A very similar thing happens during "City of Blood", where it is similarly the start of a siege.
    • Diggle mentions that they need a new strategy, instead of going to the tunnels to fight Deathstroke's army, as they did in "Unthinkable".
    • After Mia defeated Deathstroke, Oliver uses a rope arrow to tie him to a wall, similar to what he did in "Unthinkable".
  • During Rene's speech, Laurel prompts Dinah to try dipping fries into her Big Belly Burger milkshake, which Laurel (Earth-1) also told Nyssa to do in "Al Sah-him".
  • Diggle talks about his failure on Andy as he was killed by John in "Genesis".
  • Rene says to Diggle that at least he didn't throw up like he usually does. this refers to Diggle vomiting in "Legends of Today", "Invasion!", "Crisis on Earth-X, Part 4" and "Think Fast".
  • Laurel mentions to Mia how she used to be a bad guy, referencing to how she worked for Zoom in Season 2 of The Flash, Adrian Chase in Season 5 of Arrow, and Cayden James and Ricardo Diaz in Season 6 of Arrow.
  • Curtis' return in this episode is a throwback to when he first appeared in the Season 4 episode "The Candidate".
  • Mia and Oliver's conversation at Robert Queen and Emiko Adachi's grave is a bit similar to when Oliver's conversation with Barry Allen took place at Laurel Lance's grave in the Season 4 episode "Canary Cry".
• Though there are numerous meanings to "present tense", the inspiration behind the episode's title actually came from the Pearl Jam song of the same name according to co-writer Oscar Balderrama.
• This is the final episode of the Season 8, and Arrow to feature every main cast member of the season.

Production

Preparation ran from August 6 until August 14, 2019. Shooting ran from August 15 until August 27, 2019.