The mystery of who killed Sara Lance is continuing to deepen on “Arrow.”
Roy Harper (Colton Haynes) recently has had trouble sleeping, and had a dream that he could be behind the death of Laurel Lance’s sister, something that will be explored on this week’s episode, titled, “Guilty.”
With Laurel (Katie Cassidy) training in the gym with Ted Grant (J.R. Ramirez) and suggesting in the trailer that she wants to avenge her sister’s death, AccessHollywood.com took our questions about what’s next to Executive Producer Marc Guggenheim.
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But first, we had to ask about what happened to the leftovers from Oliver and Thea’s movie night popcorn at the end of last week’s episode.
AccessHollywood.com: Who got to eat the popcorn from the end of last week’s episode?
Marc Guggenheim: I feel like there’s a great opportunity for a funny joke there.
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Access: It was a big bag of popcorn. (Editor’s note: The popcorn featured heavily in Stephen Amell’s #MemeMonday last week)
Marc: It was and I think honestly, if you look at the mid sections of both Oliver and Thea, there’s not a lot of popcorn eating going on there. So, I don’t know. I think a couple of Mirakuru soldiers leftover from last year showed up to eat the popcorn. It’s a little known fact that one of the side effects of Mirakuru exposure is you have this real craving for popcorn!
Access: Got it. So, Roy… I’m not believing he killed Sara, but I want to ask you how complicated is this murder story? Are we going to get more answers this week or is it going to lead to more confusion?
Marc: That’s a good question. … I definitely think you’ll get some answers and… to me, the virtue of the Roy storyline or the ending of Episode 5 last week — every time we do something crazy on the show, by now, hopefully people know that we do do enough crazy things that anything is possible on our show. … Certainly I don’t want to spoil whether or not [Roy] did kill Sara, but stranger things have happened on our show before. I would just encourage people to watch. … But, it’s a fun thing for us to be able to tease people, intrigue people, get people talking and hopefully surprise people.
Access: How much more tortured can Roy get, though? You guys have really put him through the ringer, and then you put him through the ringer again, and then again.
Marc: It’s gonna get worse. Yeah, we’re not done torturing Roy yet.
Access: Are we venturing into drug territory with him?
Marc: No. We sort of felt that with his Mirakuru exposure last year, we were sort of doing our version of the heroin exposure from the comics. I don’t know if in the near future we’ll see Roy having a drug problem. It may ultimately happen. You never know, but it’s not in our short term thinking.
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Access: Obviously Caity’s in the trailers. Are we going to get a lot of her this week? Is this episode two of the three she’s doing this season on the show?
Marc: You’re gonna see more of Caity. We’re actually just making our sort of deal with her right now for the third of the three episodes we contracted her for, and we’re gonna bring her back in probably the way you least expect. … Any of the ways you think we’re going to bring her back are not the ways we’re probably are going to bring her back.
Access: Let’s talk about her sister for a second, Laurel. In this week’s episode trailer, Laurel says she wants to avenge her sister’s death. But, for a living, she fights for justice and justice and revenge are two different things. Is she sort of struggling with that right now?
Marc: That is definitely something she will be struggling with and I think if you watch Episode 6 [Wednesday] night, you will hear the phrase, ‘outside the court room,’ uttered by Laurel.
Access: Was there always kind of a three year plan to get Laurel into training in the third season? Was that something you were thinking about at the beginning?
Marc: We had more kicked around the idea that it’s going to take a number of years, and it’s going to be what we described to Katie Cassidy as a ‘slow burn.’ At the same time, whenever sort of pressed for a season or a number, Season 3 did sort of come up, but I would say [it was] written in pencil. But, a lot of times our pencil plans turn out to be what we end up doing, so that certainly seems to be the case in this instance.
Access: What’s the reaction been like? Personally, I’ve enjoyed seeing what Katie can do in this new kind of incarnation of Laurel Lance.
Marc: I think the internet, as the interneters want to be, is split and divided as they are with a lot of things on the show, which I always consider to be good. I like a difference of opinion and I like the fact that people are interested enough in the show to debate various different elements of it and plot turns. I will say for my money the proof is in the pudding that Katie’s done the best work on the show that she’s ever done this year and I think it’s because of the storyline she’s gotten. Laurel’s always been a little bit difficult to connect with the main plot of the show because up until the end of last year, she wasn’t in on Oliver’s secret. So, it’s always been a struggle to find story for her, just as it’s a struggle to find story for any of the characters who are not in the circle of trust. I’m just excited that people are talking about it and I do think that there’s been a lot of really positive reaction to it and we’re only just getting going. We’re really at the beginning of Laurel’s journey, not the end, and that’s exciting.
Access: What can you preview about her relationship with Ted? He seems like he’s going to be a great mentor for her, someone who has got some patience for her as well.
Marc: Indeed. I think one of the things that’s fun about [Wednesday] night’s episode is that their interaction, their relationship, takes a step forward and it develops a new dimension, and I’m not even saying romantically, I’m just saying from [a] just being truthful with each other perspective. They both learn a secret about each other in [Wednesday] night’s episode, I think I can say without spoiling [things]. … Just like there’s a lot more to Laurel than she’s revealed to Ted, there’s a lot more to Ted than he’s revealed to Laurel.
Access: Finally let me just ask you about Ray. … You kind of planted little seeds with him. He’s a do-gooder, he wants to give energy to Starling City. Do you have any hints about where you plan to take him?
Marc: I’m gonna quote Ray. In a future episode, he’s gonna say, ‘I can’t tell you. I have to show you,’ so in keeping with Ray’s show, not tell philosophy, I along with everyone else involved with the show, will show you a pretty good hint of what he has up his sleeve at the end of Episode 7.
“Arrow” continues Wednesdays at 8/7c on The CW.
— Jolie Lash
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