SPOILER WARNING: This article contains majors spoilers for "Green Arrow & the Canaries," the latest episode of Arrow.
The first post-"Crisis on Infinite Earths" episode of Arrow finally confirmed which version of Laurel Lance survived the crossover. As revealed in "Green Arrow & the Canaries," Earth-2's Laurel still wears the mask, as she has since Season 6.
When the episode picked up, Laurel was on a tear. She attempted to prevent the kidnapping of Bianca Bertinelli, an event that would send Star City spiraling in just a year's time. When that didn't work, she sought out her fellow Black Canary Dinah Drake, then recruited Mia Queen by "waking her up." In other words, she used a device that caused Mia to remember her pre-"Crisis" life, where she had taken up the Green Arrow mantle from her father Oliver.
Laurel went hard on Mia and tried to bully the younger vigilante into becoming the new Green Arrow. Dinah picked up on this and finally demanded to know why Laurel was so invested in it. "Look, I wasted a lot of time pretending to be something I wasn't because it was easier, and I don't want Mia making the same mistake," she explained. At that, Dinah insisted she go talk to Mia one-on-one about the perils of heroism, and Laurel followed through.
"Mia, I spent so much of my life choosing the easy path and, for me, that meant becoming Black Siren and destroying things and killing people. It's not a good look," Laurel told Mia. "Can you honestly tell me you were happy with your life before I woke you up? Truly?"
When Mia acquiesced, Laurel continued, "I am not going to sugarcoat it for you: being a hero kinda sucks, and it never gets any easier because it is the hardest thing that you can do... For me? It gave me a purpose. And that's why I woke you up -- so that you could have the chance to realize your own. Mia, this is your city, and you're the Green Arrow."
As it turned out, this was exactly what Mia needed to hear. She decided to join them after all, and the trio rescued Bianca from the clutches of the Deathstroke Gang.
However, there's more to the story than Laurel let Mia know. "Sara said, when the city falls, someone's at the center of it all," Laurel admitted to Dinah. She showed her a newspaper clipping that featured a photo of Mia and the headline, "The Woman Who Failed Star City." Judging by the way Laurel reacted to it, it seems as though she believes Mia could break bad. Dinah mused that they had already changed key pieces of that timeline, but Laurel didn't seem terribly convinced, setting up a possible storyline for the Green Arrow and the Canaries spinoff if it is ordered to series by The CW.
Since the events of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" made such drastic changes to the Arrowverse, fans had good reason to believe Earth-1's Laurel Lance -- who was killed by Damien Darhk in Season 4 -- could be resurrected for the spinoff series. However, this backdoor pilot firmly put those questions to rest by revealing this Laurel was, indeed, the villain-turned-hero from the past couple seasons.
Arrow stars Stephen Amell as Oliver Queen, David Ramsey as John Diggle, Rick Gonzalez as Wild Dog, Juliana Harkavy as Black Canary, Katie Cassidy as Black Siren, Katherine McNamara as Mia Smoak, Joseph David-Jones as Connor Hawke and Ben Lewis as William Clayton-Queen. Arrow’s final episode will air Tuesday, Jan. 28 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.