‘Arrow’: Paul Blackthorne Previews ‘Awkward’ Oliver/Lance Team-up and Saving Laurel

How far will you go to protect your own daughter?

Quentin Lance, demoted from detective to officer following the Undertaking, will have to face that question on The CW’s Arrow. In the Oct. 23 episode, he learns a criminal he had put away, serial killer Barton Mathis (Michael Eklund), has escaped from prison and is back to torturing and murdering women.

As Paul Blackthorne, who plays Officer Lance, tells The Hollywood Reporter, “[The police] won’t let him back on the case, even though he’s the one who knows the most about it.”

So who does he turn to? “He goes to his old adversary, the Arrow (Stephen Amell), and seeing that they’re feeling a bit better about each other these days, they go off and work on the case together,” Blackthorne says.

STORY: ‘Arrow’: Stephen Amell on ‘Evolving’ Oliver/Felicity, ‘Errand Boy’ Roy and Flash

Their team-up is rocky at best — at least at first. “They have an awkward dynamic, considering they have been adversaries for a long time,” he says. “It’s not exactly a match made in heaven to go off and work with your old enemy, the same guy you were trying to chase after and put behind bars.”

But ultimately, the two warm to each other, considering the task at hand gets personal very quickly. “It’s a bit frosty,” Blackthorne admits, “but in the end, what they’re both interested in is justice. They have to get through their personal animosity and get the bad guy.”

When the plan to use Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) as bait goes awry, Mathis turns to kidnapping Lance’s own daughter Laurel (Katie Cassidy) as a last resort.

STORY: ‘Arrow’ Books ‘Firefly’ Star Sean Maher in Villainous Role

“When your daughter is kidnapped and threatened with death, most fathers react in a fairly upset way,” he says. “He’s not too happy about it. Once again, Lance’s world is turning in on him. … It’s not a great situation.”

In the midst of the life-and-death stakes Laurel finds herself in, she and her father are forced to deal with leftover family issues and “reconcile where their relationship is at.”

“In one particular scene at the end, there’s a lovely moment where she breaks down and reveals her heart in the midst of all this madness that’s going on around them,” Blackthorne previews.

As for the demotion, Blackthorne says that Lance “is in a good a place as he has ever been within himself. From the public’s point of view, he might have been demoted from detective to officer, but he knows he did the right thing in terms of justice in the season finale [by teaming up with the vigilante].” He reassures that Lance is “perfectly at peace with where he’s at.”

As the season progresses, expect more surprises in store for the Lances.

“The great thing about Arrow is the emphasis on the family dynamic, whether it’s the Queen family, the Lance family or the Merlyn family,” Blackthorne says. “There are plenty of surprises afoot with the Lance family and with the various people who pop up here and there.”

Arrow airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. on The CW.

E-mail: Philiana.Ng@THR.com
Twitter: @insidethetube