Carrie Ann

Huh, I've never read anything that indicated that RT was THAT adamant about V/D. If you know of interviews where he (or others) talked about that, can you send them my way? My impression was that he had certain plans for how V/D would play out, but because of TD's performance problems, and the chemistry between KB/JD, he started writing toward LoVe from episode 4 (I think?). And that didn't mean he was ready to let go of his plans for Duncan, and it kind of took awhile to switch tracks, but I think RT was well aware that it was the best choice for the show to go in that direction. I mean, when they were working on the movie and he was rewatching the series, he broke into tears .

A lot of those characters were intro'd as villains, which is why they were initially "hated," but I'd argue that many of them weren't even hated that much. People loved Jaime Lannister from the jump; same for Katherine on TVD. I'm not sure I can think of a character who was intended to be a protagonist who received the level of hate Laurel does, and come back from that. Maybe Dawn Summers on Buffy? Some people always liked her, others came around on her by Season 7 (some never did, obviously). Anyway, I agree that a heel turn like the one on AoS would probably be the best possible option, but it's unlikely given comics and given KC's one-track-mindedness when it comes to this "character." In that TVLine interview, I found SA's reasoning for not telling Thea suspicious. Oliver can be a little smug sometimes, but I don't think he was by any means convinced he was going to win in this duel, unless our speculation is right and the fix was in before the fight.

I think @dancingnancy's suggestion that the weird wording could be because it's a rebuttal is one good option; I also considered it being a part of a litany of things she doesn't want/want to be. I think that option works whether she's talking to Oliver or to Ray. As for the spec about this whole death thing being faked by Oliver in cahoots with Malcolm, there's no way he could have prevented Oliver from dying, right? Even if he gave him some sort of magic herbs that slow death down in some way, I mean, Ra's could have just beheaded him if he wanted to do that. So like @dancingnancy, I've considered that his death was intentionally faked, but that Ra's was actually the one in on it. I wondered about it as soon as he didn't stab him through the heart. Like, he knows a million ways to surefire kill someone, and he seemed to sort of like Oliver, so I don't think he'd want to give him a slow, painful death if he could avoid it. The sticking points are: it doesn't work with what the producers are saying about how Oliver will long for the days of Slade when he sees the shit Ra's will put him through. And also, if Ra's is involved with keeping Oliver alive, I don't think that explains Felicity's rage, because I'm pretty certain Oliver and Ra's did not have a chat about this in advance. But, both of those issues can be waved off with the fact that the EPs intentionally mislead pretty often, and secondly, they could just easily show that some sort of conversation/communication did occur before the duel. On the other hand, my reasons for not believing that Malcolm and Oliver planned all of this rely on logical storytelling, and I should have learned by now not to speculate on this show based on that.

I've watched it *cough cough* times, and yeah, she says, "Oliver, are you--?" and then bomb.

I mean, writers can do whatever works best for them--and many of those collections have tons of kudos and hits, so it's clearly not a problem for most of the fandom. But as someone who didn't start reading anything until this summer, I'm not going to wade into a 77-chapter drabble collection to see if by chance I have any interest in one of them. I had a thing I was writing during the hiatus, and I could see the appeal of the drabble collection, because I'm just not sure how I feel about it, and it'd sort of be nice to just have a place to put things that are kind of...disconnected or odd or minor, but I could also just publish it as a one-shot. And I am the type who is more likely to click on those. Thank you! I did that once before and maybe I formatted wrong or it was just a glitchy day or something, because it didn't seem to work and I didn't try again. Still leaves the stuff that isn't tagged right, but it does make things easier to skip.

I know--I honestly would never have believed that I would say the word "intrigued" in the same sentence as Finn. But I just love him so much now. Yusuf Gatewood is incredible. And I see what you're saying--yeah, the "beautiful moment" of introducing Cami to Hope is a little much. Especially because I just don't feel like they've been pushing the Cami/Klaus bond that hard, that it would be so monumental. I mean, he shouldn't let her meet the baby at all, but if he's going to, it's not like he's introducing the love of his life to his daughter. If the show is trying to sell that kind of relationship...well, they're not selling it, let's leave it at that. Or maybe my eyes are just glazing over in those moments.

That is hilarious. I haven't noticed the mewling thing, but I'm going to keep an eye out for it. When I was first combing through AO3 for this fandom, I noticed a lot of not-so-common motifs/language that would pop up in many popular works. I'm sure a lot of those writers read each others' stuff and it rubs off subconsciously. But I feel like my FF tastes are way different from most of (this) fandom, generally, so I think I miss a lot of those things too. For instance, I just don't really read AU stuff (serious AU, not canon divergence), and if we're sharing pet peeves: I deeply wish people were better about tagging their work, and more importantly, that AO3 had an easier way to filter out tags, because man I could skip reading a ton of summaries if I could just eliminate AUs. And another thing is that unless I know and love the writer, I don't read drabble collections, and if you combine drabbles + AUs and eliminate them from the Olicity tag on AO3 on any given week, you're actually left with a fairly small pool of work. Some of the writers I've been appreciating in the hiatus are the previously-linked fabiola, wagamiller, MachaSWicket, and Anna__S (don't think I've seen her linked here, but her stuff is in the internal/emotional study vein, and I like it).

Huh, I didn't read anything there that seemed over-the-top w/r/t Cami. I'm used to seeing showrunners talk up their less-successful performers/characters/storylines in a super effusive way, but this just seemed like a description of what Cami will do in the next few episodes. It wasn't like, "Leah Pipes just knocks it out of the park! She's so amazing and they have such great chemistry and Cami is the most fascinating character!!!1!" Which is basically what the Sleepy Hollow and Arrow showrunners do with their failed characters/performers. :) I do see them trying to shove her in with the other characters in sort of non-organic ways, but that's nothing new for JP. She picks faves and they get the attention and that's that. Elsewhere in that article, I am intrigued by the Finn stuff, and by Hayley and Marcel working together more. What happened to Gia, by the way? There's no mention of her there, unless I missed it, and she was basically MIA toward the end of 2A. I liked her and her chemistry with Elijah.

Stephen's Collider interview was obviously just a part of that post-TCA panel "scrum" that was already reported in many places, but this wording was a little different than what I'd read before, and it set my teeth on edge: It's that "leading roles" part that makes me itch. This is a show with one lead, which is, you know, a pretty common and winning formula in the history of storytelling. I certainly don't want this to be a co-lead show with BC/Arrow, and I don't think anyone who started watching it thought that's where it was going. If they planned for that, why did they name it Arrow? Why not name it "Starling City" or something, if it wasn't intended to be about Oliver primarily? Second part that's bugging me about this comment is "if we don't give other characters an opportunity to shoulder the load, then we give nothing for the viewers to attach themselves to." Uhhhh...first, I've been sort of attached to Oliver's story all this time? And also, I've been attached to Diggle, Felicity, Moira, Sara, Thea, even Roy this season. I don't need any of those characters to be at the center of the show in order to be attached to them and to the story. Guess I'm just doing it wrong, somehow.

Phew! I felt kinda like I was going crazy when I looked at his timeline, but I remember some of them really specifically. So I'm glad to know that he just does this deleting thing periodically. Yeah, he didn't delete the one from last night (yet, anyway). I'm talking about the tweets about Sherman from earlier this season and last.

Dudes--I follow football, I follow the coverage about Sherman. I understand why people dislike him, and I'm not a Seahawks fan, so it's not like I have my hackles up or something. I never should have brought it up--I only found SA's ire at him to be "weird" because he was barely on Twitter at all until the last few weeks, so it struck me as odd that he would make it a point to tweet about his hate for Sherman several times this season. Particularly for someone who doesn't like it when random people on Twitter throw hate around. But, um, looking over his timeline, it looks like he deleted those, so that's...also weird.

I know many people felt that way after that post-game "interview" with Erin Andrews last year, but then there was a lot of follow-up, and I think it put that particular moment into perspective and many of those same people seemed to get over it. Stephen didn't--or maybe his dislike pre-dates that interview, who knows--and like I said, whatever, we all have people we just don't like. Like, for example, after this and the last few months of interviews, I'm just finally, firmly, officially on the side of finding KC to be Not For Me, on-screen or off. Cuz man, this is just super tacky.

Stephen has some weird hatred of Richard Sherman--I've seen him tweet about it several times this season alone. It kind of bugs me, actually, but whatever, we all have athletes/celebs we just don't like. So I don't think he was joking in his initial tweet, and I suspect he wasn't being snotty to Erin Andrews by @-ing her in that tweet; it seems like maybe they're acquainted, and he was just hoping someone would ask, but as she says in those tweets, she didn't talk to Sherman. So then KC asking why Erin wasn't doing her job...yikes. I had no idea about any background with KC, and that's just...really icky that she's basically encouraging her fans to tweet at someone like that. I don't think she was joking because she continued to argue with Chrissy Teigen about it, and is faving her followers' tweets...I think she would jump in and say something like that, maybe even apologize to Erin, if that were the case. I have no idea whether Chrissy Teigen knew who KC was when that convo started, but I follow her because she's hilarious, and she has randos talking shit about her constantly, so I wouldn't be surprised if she just jumped to that conclusion without looking at her profile.

I'm starting to get the feeling that Laurel and Thea will train together after Laurel finds out (maybe with Nyssa too), based on KC's comment, and Marc's teasing about these great scenes between ladies coming up in 3B. And that does fit Laurel's character--she would totally turn this to her advantage, to have Thea help her learn how to fight.

When they talk about Laurel's six-month addiction being her "crucible" or her "island," it's just like...those weren't just tough times for Oliver, Sara, and Diggle, even Roy (if you include the years he was street-fighting in The Glades). Those crucibles involved fighting, acquiring weapon and tactical skills, surviving, fighting for their lives and the lives of others, repeatedly. It's not just that they went through a challenging time, and that's the magic key to becoming a vigilante. I can get past the motivation issue--if we're going to buy that Roy does this mainly because he feels like it's the right thing to do, then okay, I will pretend that I believed in Laurel & Sara's bond and that she feels driven to take up her mantle--but I don't buy that she knows Thing 1 about doing this, or that she would after four months of boxing training a few nights a week. No one will buy that. The best thing they can do--aside from ditching her altogether, which they really should but won't--after the BC arc is make her hang it back up, and then she should leave with Nyssa at the end of the season to go train. It's a slap in the face to her parents and to her sister's memory to choose that life, but whatever, at least I could handwave that she could come back pretty kick-ass if she were training for that long and that intensively. We're handwaving it about Thea, so why not Laurel too?

But we don't know if Laurel and Thea know. Or if Sin even knew Sara was dead at all. Probably not, I'd guess, because Laurel has no respect for any of Sara's relationships with anyone outside of herself.

I didn't mind that interview either, aside from the taking the reins part because hell no, but I don't think that's what's actually going to happen. The "more scenes" with EBR, DR, and CH wasn't surprising either, but it does make me itchy. Can't wait for her "incredible" scene with Emily in 313. In my dreams, it's Felicity telling her she's not Sara and never will be, but there's no way KC would ever see positively a scene in which Laurel is taken down a notch.

Booooooooooooooooooooooooo.

I would love Kat's look--it's a lot less crazy then a lot of things she wears--but yeah the lipstick isn't a great choice. Nina's hit and miss for me, and this one's not great, but I almost think she pulls it off.

Victor Garber is 95% of the reason I'd love it to be Martin Stein. (The other 5% is that it would be cool if there were additional ties to The Flash.) I love Donna Smoak so much, I want Felicity's dad to have equal weight. I don't have to love the character, but I want him to have an impact, to add depth and heft, and there's no one better than Victor Garber. (Oh God, especially when he's playing Dad to a daughter who doesn't trust him...! And he has to rebuild that trust and sometimes his chin quivers a bit with the withheld tears! And he'll do all sorts of shady things as long as it means she's safe, even if it threatens their relationship! OK, I just really need it to be Victor Garber now.)

That's about where I landed with it too. It seems like she's not going to be able to be fully honest with how devastated she is, or how it's affecting her life, because he doesn't know about any of this stuff. Which is fine, I don't want them bonding over their grief. But yeah, I feel almost sure he'll be the spark for her staying in the fray, which SUCKS because she would come to the same conclusion on her own and giving it to Ray to mansplain it to her is just another way they will use Felicity to prop him up. HATE SO MUCH. Hmmm--what's that you say? None of this has happened yet and I'm getting mad about nothing? Shhhhhh.

I don't really know how she's going to talk to Ray about Oliver. She can't really be specific, can she? I can't really remember how much Ray implied he knew about the Arrow stuff. But I don't see her saying she would no longer work with Dig and Roy, and then continuing to help Ray with his attempt to be a vigilante. That makes no sense...which sounds about right for S3, so it's probably going to happen. Or in this scene, Ray will be inspiring and convince her that the fight continues and she'll pull herself together and help both.

It feels harder to write off the Laurel-centric noise this time around because Oliver is gone. In the past, when they've said "Laurel-centric" or AnyoneElse-centric, it really hasn't amounted to much because it's usually still all about Oliver (305 was an exception, IMO). But without him, who knows? I do think they'll probably still be pretty balanced, with maybe one episode leaning heavily on Laurel. 311, if I had to guess, just because 310 does look like a team episode, and Oliver returns at some point in 312. And if they all are, then, you know, it's just going to be a failed experiment. I found Stephen's wording at the TCA panel interesting. He said this was giving others an opportunity to acquit themselves, and he was happy about those opportunities. He was being kind as usual, but I don't see all the characters succeeding in that attempt. Edit: jinx, Sakura12.

Totally agree. I feel like fan response should be taken into account only in the sense that if there is sort of a consensus about certain things--if you're hearing negativity from critics and fans alike, then it probably means whatever you're trying to do isn't working. Some things work on page and don't translate to screen, and I think it would be stupid and stubborn to ignore that (or vice versa, if you're surprised something works so well, then explore that further maybe). But other than that, you know, I hope you're a strong enough storyteller to shrug about what fans want and go where the characters take you. And some people won't like that, but it's your best chance of creating a good product. Anyway. When it comes to The Originals, I really don't think there's much that has reached that level of critical/fan consensus. The only thing I can think of that many fans and critics brought up as a negative was how terrible the witches were--they were weak characters, played by weak actors, and they were truly abhorrent people. Which sucked because they should have been a stronger, cooler force on the show, and it would have been nice not to actively root against a group of women. But, the show course-corrected by doing away with all but Davina, and then replacing those witches with the dead Mikaelsons. And I know a lot of people don't like Cami or Hayley, but I don't mind them. I think the actresses could be stronger and the characters could have been better conceived (Cami especially, since she wasn't a heritage character and they could have done anything at all with her and instead...). But otherwise, other than the Klaroline people, I don't think there's a strong contingent of fans on any one side of anything, which is kind of refreshing.

Oh, I think that was Carina Mackenzie, and she's an interesting case, because up until like two years ago, she was a TV reporter for Zap2It. And she covered TVD for them, among other things. This is going to sound catty, but even in my crazy-about-TVD days a few years back, I never followed her on social media or read her articles because I found her schmoozing with the people she reported on to be unprofessional and tacky. I mean, she kissed so much ass, and then just became a personal friend of JP's and some of the cast members, and then suddenly she was a writer for The Originals. And, I mean, good for her, that strategy worked I guess. (Jarrett Weiselman of Buzzfeed is friends with her and does the same thing, but not quite so publicly.) But anyway, because of her weird position as reporter but also TVD insider (even prior to joining the staff), she used to get a lot of questions from fans who treated her like she had influence or authority or whatever. So I can see how people would turn on her, because she was super defensive of the show and its staff, and could be rude to people who were critical. But then when you become an actual member of the staff, you need to disengage a bit, and she probably didn't. And yeah, you know, don't go trolling in the anti-Your Name tag on Tumblr unless you want to see hate. And when you do, don't complain about it.