Carrie Ann

Yep, I think we might have to accept the fact that the best part of the season is over, and it's back to business as usual.

I watched his Facebook Q&A with this in mind, and he had a few other number-related mistakes, probably for the same speaking-on-the-fly reason. Such as: his daughter is 1/3 American, 1/3 Texan. (Pretty sure he meant that she is 1/2 Canadian, and then 1/4 American & 1/4 Texan via Cass.) Anyway, he is so adorable. I've mentioned this before, but he's one of the only celebs I follow on social media because he generally pays attention to grammar, and even corrects his mistakes after the fact sometimes. So I just assume he's more of a language guy than a math guy. I can relate. Also, on that Q&A, in case others didn't watch it: Stephen says his favorite scene in the crossover happens on The Flash episode and reiterates that Ep 9 is the best they've ever done in his opinion. OK! Big stunts ahoy, basically, right?

Yeah, I don't think the darkness is in response to The Flash. It's always been dark, but I think it got pretty grimdark in the last third of S2. I mean, the end of that season is just a slog through pain. Slade beats Oliver over and over and over. It was relentless. That's why I was hoping this season would actually lighten up a bit, but it's tough to do that when you murder Sara in the premiere. My pop cultural preferences tend to veer toward dark stuff with some brightness around the edges (Orphan Black, VMars, Arrow). And I can stick with the mostly-dark stuff for awhile, but eventually I get exhausted by it (Battlestar Galactica, Luther, maybe The 100). I think Draw Back Your Bow had some brightness--Cupid herself was pretty kicky--and The Secret Origins had Donna Smoak who is actual human sunshine. Here's hoping 3B (uh, post-BC miniseries) has more of that in store.

I agree on that--or at least, I feel like I have to agree if I'm to like Tommy at all. Tommy seemed very different to me with Laurel than with "Ollie," at least in the first part of S1. I don't think Tommy was really that guy anymore either, but he didn't really know how else to be with Oliver and he knew Oliver was keeping things from him, and was trying to hold onto him in whatever way possible. I never had much use for Tommy and I don't miss him from the show one bit, but I do think I could have come to like him more after he got to know Oliver again, and they formed a new friendship based on the people they grew up to be.

I'm relieved to see other people feeling this way...I'm feeling very protective of precious, broody, grim Oliver these days and Barry is not helping.

Oh yeah, I definitely think that's true of a lot of casual viewers, but that's kind of my point. I think they draw conclusions or have reactions about characters based on what's onscreen. So if my reaction isn't "Hey, this doesn't make sense to me based on what I know about Felicity," but instead "Hey, Felicity's kind of easily impressed and shallow" then that's probably not what the writers intend. And I should have said in my previous post, I'm sure some or even most casual viewers DID react the way they intended--that the dress, necklace, date, and kiss were all cute and dreamy. And regardless, I'm sure that one episode wouldn't be enough for casual viewers to be totally turned off or anything. But I still think it's a risk to leave it up to your audience to play Madlibs with your plotlines.As for your second paragraph--like I said, I can totally understand why this stuff didn't feel weird to some of you. My immediate reaction was and is that it feels weird for me. So I think it really was just a MMV situation, and I appreciate the way you all laid out why it makes sense, because I can accept your reasoning. Going forward, I can accept that she is attracted to Ray ("I have a type" does make it seem that she was attracted to him before the kiss), that she sees him as a great man who wants to do great things, and that she is proud of Palmer Technologies and the work they do.

Felicity has my sympathy and love, and I'm still 90% on her side when it comes to how her non-relationship with Oliver is unfolding. But I think the writers are being way too loose with characterization this season in general, and while Felicity has enjoyed a greater focus, she has suffered for it too. I felt she was mostly in character in Eps 1-5, including her harsh remark to Oliver that he has no feelings, and her strained relationship with her mother. That showed me the writers WERE willing to show her flaws, her insecurities, her mistakes. And I mean, this is a character that we are still getting to know, so there is definitely room for things that surprise us or seem off. Those things can reveal parts of Felicity we didn't know or understand before. But not when they either go against what we already know about her (Ep 6), or when the viewer has to make leaps (however small) in order to make sense of what is onscreen. This season has repeatedly put it on the viewer to supply the relationship and character development that the writers can't be bothered to spend time on. Those who see her actions in Ep 7 as in character have made persuasive arguments as to why. But I DO think it requires a bit of fanwanking and filling in the blanks, and that's not good storytelling. We have to choose how to fill them. We could think: well, she's been working with him for two months, presumably she's privy to some of his plans and is excited; she's looked at him every day for eight weeks and realized he's hot, and she finds him funny and trustworthy. Done. Or you could think: well, she barely goes to work and we've never seen her show any sort of romantic interest in him--we've only seen irritation, bafflement, and at best, a professional cordiality--so why assume things changed that dramatically off-screen? Apparently Felicity is shallow and gullible. Or you could fill in the blanks with something in between. And the problem is that you have an immediate reaction to something, and then you're required to backfill to either FIX the way you feel about something or to make that feeling make sense. It's making headcanon into canon, basically. I don't need to be spoon-fed by the writers; in fact sometimes I like that we skip time and you can imagine what might have happened. Like, it was not hard for me to see how Oliver and Felicity progressed from the beach in 2x23 to flirting over a fern in 3x01. I'm sad we didn't see it, but I get it. It's when I don't get it--when I see something I don't like, and my immediate reaction is "No, that's not right," that the skipping over character/relationship development becomes a problem. Because then I'm stuck wondering whether the writers agree that this is problematic, or an indication of a character flaw, or whether they think it's all wonderful and charming and great. And yeah, I do think the fact that many viewers aren't charmed by Ray makes a difference. We didn't see the moment Felicity BECAME charmed by him, you know? If I had just seen that, even if I didn't feel the same, at least I could understand. We needed ONE good scene in a previous episode wherein Ray simultaneously showed how amazingly benevolent he is AND Felicity appeared attracted to him and excited about the future of Palmer Tech. That's what it would have taken for me to feel like her scenes in DBYB were the natural next step in the story. And I think about these damn characters A LOT, which tells me that the casual viewer was probably left scratching their head or feeling annoyed.

I don't want to go too far into the Laurel thing specifically because no need to pile on, but I think it's an interesting question w/r/t this season in general. I keep doing this--trying to give the writers the benefit of the doubt, trying to find a reason for the choices that seem questionable or just BAD to me. And I do think it would help if I knew that at least some of it was intentional--that there would be some reveal later, some payoff, something that would make me say, "Okay, I see why they had to do X in 3A, even if it was painful or irritating at the time." (Examples: lack of Team Arrow, iffy characterization on Dig and Felicity, whatever they're doing with Ray, KILLING SARA, not telling Quentin, Laurel in general.) But even if this does end up being the case, and a number of these things make more sense when you take the season as a whole, it's still a very risky proposition and one that likely won't be worth it. If I were binge-watching the series, maybe it wouldn't end up seeming so off, and if we do get some payoff in 3B, then maybe Netflix viewers of the future won't even really notice the dip in quality or the questionable decisions. But as a loyal viewer, a person who used to regularly rewatch the episodes a few times before a new one would air...I am pretty certain that no matter what happens in 3B, I'm going to look back at 3A with a fair amount of distaste. As I've said before, all the spoilers we have are doing nothing to make me excited or hopeful. At this point, the best I can hope for this season is that they use the viewer/critical response and apply it to Eps 14-23 to try to pull out of the tailspin.

Yes, or even sort of ending the line of discussion about their relationship, and then asking what she could do to help. So many ways they could have accomplished the same thing without those connotations. Oh well. Maybe the writers of the next eps will do better, and I'll be able to write off that scene as an anomaly. I do agree that this season is more enjoyable than the last two.

I think the "knows where he is; knows where he isn't" just means that she knows he's not in Starling (and probably knows he's with the LoA). That it's not easy on her. On a slightly related note: I really don't want them to rebrand Starling City. I assume it's Star City in the comics, right? But a major city renaming itself because it went through some tough times? That's far-fetched, in the modern age, and it's also kind of...anti-American? Something? I don't know. It doesn't sit right with me. I think the citizens would be more defensive of their city, their identity. If some rich dude swooped into town and said, "Ugh, 'Detroit' is a turn-off for people. We're calling it DeLIGHT now!" people would not be having it. Even if it was something cool, I don't think people would want that change. Regardless of what's happened in the city, changing the name is stupid.

I'm having a lot of trouble keeping post-hiatus spoiler info straight, and I think it's because I know I don't have to care. I mean, I will watch those episodes at some point because of Felicity and Dig, but it is kind of nice that it's just a big chunk I know is unnecessary viewing. More convenient; hiatus just lasts until February. Though of course I still think it's a terrible idea to do this.

From the 608 episode thread, regarding why we have to return the focus of the show to Delena: I disagree that Delena are the #1 reason "a good majority" of the audience watches. I think they are popular online and with younger viewers especially, but the ratings have been steadily tanking since they got together and the show focused on them. So I'm not willing to grant that that's a reason the show should so quickly return its focus to that relationship. If anything, that relationship helped take the show down in the ratings, as well as creatively and critically. But I understand that fandom is loud and aggressive with the EPs. As for the second part: I know that Damon was searching for Bonnie independently. We all know that. Elena doesn't see it that way because she's awful. And the show doesn't know how to write their relationship without this dynamic--where Elena is the Good One (compared to Damon ONLY, let's be clear), and Damon is the fuck-up who tries to be Better For Her (sometimes, when it's convenient for him). So they're reframing what's actually happening on screen, in order to shoehorn it into their shitty relationship dynamic. That's why this is disappointing. If they need to revisit Delena, I was so hoping they would do something different with it, but they don't seem to know how to write for Damon and Elena together without weakening them both, so. Honestly, in my ideal but still realistic world, Elena would have gotten her memories back but decided not to be with Damon for awhile anyway, because she received some clarity during her time in Lala Land and realized that she wants to be more than just a Vampire Girlfriend for the rest of her life. Then Damon goes on his quest to find Bonnie, because she is HIS friend, because he cares about her, because he misses her. Elena could be aware of what he's doing, but not directly involved. Damon gets Bonnie back; they are best friends. They cling to each other, having both been abandoned by their SOs, but yeah, because we can't have nice things, they don't get together. Eventually, Bonnie moves on with some non-Jeremy dude, and Damon and Elena get back together someday. Both of them have changed and learned something about themselves and each other in that time. Namely, Damon has learned that he values and needs relationships outside of his love life. He doesn't need that one relationship as desperately as he used to. He knows how to live and be a "good" person without that as a motivating factor, and that person doesn't exert undue influence over his entire life and being. Elena, similarly, has realized that she can live without Damon. She wants to do something with her lifetimes. She cares about her friends and family again, and won't sacrifice those relationships for Damon anymore. She has her leverage back in the relationship, because she knows she can and will leave him if necessary, so she can enforce her expectations. And he has his leverage back, because he can be a good person with or without her. Their dynamic is balanced. I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if something approaching your first sentence actually did happen on the show, because he's said something just like that a million times before, but even if he doesn't, this is what Elena's reframe has done. It's made it so that this is implied, and I wish it weren't. But to your second point, I don't think he'd be bringing Bonnie back so she can tell Elena to be with him. In the past, when he's done things like this "for his girl," the implication has been that he's doing it to make Elena happy, or right some wrong that he's done to her. But regardless, I do think Bonnie's feelings about him have clearly changed in their four months together. And she definitely wanted him to get back home, and that included being with Elena, so I would be surprised if she is against their relationship anymore (except because she's into him herself, of course, which is the truth that exists in my heart and in the fanfic I will read to avoid canon).

Replying in the Relationships thread.

I want so much for them not to think he's dead that I'm willing to believe he agrees to go to the League until they can provide the identity of Sara's killer. (Based on the spoiler that the League is threatening the people of Starling until Sara's killer is found.) And I think the team could put up with it for awhile, while they're working on that, but eventually, they're going to want to pull him out.

Ugh. Someone go help Bonnie. And when she gets home--someone needs to put her first. Someone needs to sacrifice themselves for her for once.

Daniel Gillies was a series regular in S1, and still is in S2, so I'm not sure what you mean by him being recurring. Also, his other series only airs in Canada now, IIRC, and the shooting schedules must line up properly for this to work. Had Nate's series made it to air, it would have been on The CW and he would have been the lead. It would have been impossible for him to also play Kol. Period. There is a huge difference between those two situations. But anyway, NB's series not getting picked up wasn't decided by the time S1 wrapped, and I'm not sure it was decided by June/July when the show started filming again. But even if it was, they'd already signed Daniel Sharman, because NB was unavailable, so I'm just not getting the outrage. They came up with this clever storyline so that they could bring back three Original family members with different actors. If they recast Rebekah, I won't be surprised or outraged either. (If DG left and they recast Elijah, I wouldn't be outraged. I'd just drop the show.) Anyway, now they decide how to proceed for the rest of this season or next, depending on the contract with DS and whether NB is actively booking new projects, or if the TO people have communicated some plan to him and his team.

I agree...I mean, NB appeared in flashbacks this season. Appeared on TVD last season. He was attached to that Supernatural spinoff pilot for The CW for this season, which is presumably why they went with Sharman. I personally prefer DS as an actor, but I like both of their portrayals of Kol, and would be happy to have Nate back.

Not sure about that set, blixie, but that would make some sense. I still think "amends" is a clumsy way of saying that he's going to address the date/kiss. Maybe he's been kind of MIA since then, and Felicity calls him on it or something, and then the amends could be revealing what he's been working on and bringing her in on it? But if not, it just seems like a lot for Felicity to learn that Ray is working on a superhero suit and deal with that, while also dealing with Oliver leaving with the LOA. But I suppose she could learn about him removing that dwarf star mineral stuff from the land she just helped him acquire, and she could be angry that he IS using the land for some sneaky purpose, and he has to make "amends" by revealing the purpose.

I tend to think the Atom/Ray stuff will be kept separate from the Team Arrow stuff for the time being as well. Ray still has to reveal all of this to Felicity in the first place, and finish work on the suit, and we only have Episode 9 for that to happen. And after that, I imagine it might take some time before he's just out in the field. And even with Oliver gone, for whatever reason, it's still his secret--all of their secrets, actually--and I think Felicity would keep it that way if she could. Now, if Ray already knows about Oliver as many of you suspect, then that point would be moot. But I still think Ray would want his own space, because that's the kinda guy he is. And using the Palmer Tech facilities means they don't have to build a new set.

I agree--Silas got a lot of great lines last year, but that ended early, and no one else really picked up the slack. I truly loved Damon's Miss Cuddles "and my brain's made of cotton!" thing. I'm still laughing about it today.

This episode was fun and scary and funny, but felt a little all-over-the-place and expositiony too. I suppose it was smart to have Kai and Bonnie in Portland at the same time as Deflaric were there, and those parts were definitely the strongest, as many of you have noted. Friendsgiving was very classic Caroline, which I loved, but she's the only person in that room I give a shit about, so it's hard to stay interested. My sadness at Elena's immediate regression to S5 Elena continues apace. Of course she wants to throw away everything in favor of Damon again. Of course the show is going to ruin the best thing it's done in years, which was Bamon (and Damon deciding to care about things other than himself and Elena, and sometimes Stefan and Alaric, but only when they don't interfere with the first two) by framing Damon going after Bonnie as though HE is helping ELENA. Give me a damn break. He was already out in Portland looking for her, you dim bulb. Anyway, as predicted, this is how she'll fall back in love with him and all will be status quo again by February. YAWN.

SA made a comment that indicated that by the end of the Arrow ep of the crossover, Oliver and Barry would leave on good terms. He said something like, "He's basically buying him a toothbrush and giving him his own drawer." So whatever tension there might be, it's not on a personal level between Oliver and Barry. But I agree with your last point.

Ha, on the other hand, that was exactly the reaction I expected, and I was shocked that their "estrangement" lasted barely two episodes, because all of my previous TV-watching experience told me they would drag out the angst for awhile. I was delighted when he came around by the end.

Just gonna quote a bunch of you expressing my reservations about this episode. I found it actually painful to watch, and only some of that was the good kind of pain. I was dearly hoping that that Salmon Ladder/Dress scene was going to be the only annoying bit of the episode, but I was wrong. Felicity for me...was all wrong this episode. To start: that "I have a type" line was cute and EBR delivered it well, but this is the FIRST hint we've had that she was attracted to Ray. The rest of that scene, I can't even address, so I thank the rest of you for dealing with it. Next: Probably my least favorite moment was her beaming at the Palmer Technologies reveal. I just...no. Even if she warned Oliver in advance and we didn't see it, like so many other important scenes this season, it still doesn't mean she wouldn't feel a twinge of sadness about it. I would have liked just a tiny little slip of that smile. Just any indication that she was conflicted. And then: the scene where she tells Oliver she needs the night off. I see many of you reading that as baiting Oliver, trying to get him to respond, and I wish I'd seen it that way. It's an issue of nuance, and I just don't think EBR sold it correctly, if that was the intent. To me, it seemed like sort of careless or intentionally goading Oliver, and...that's not a good look. AND THEN: the "Oh, RAY, well, he is basically a saint and you should give him your land for free" date speech came out of absolutely nowhere. I mean, all we've seen of him being charitable is that he wanted to donate the excess power from QC back to the city grid. Which is fine, lovely, but not like stop-the-presses amazing. I like y'all's interpretation that she's just projecting her Oliver feelings onto Ray, but to me that wasn't obvious enough, so it sort of came across like starry eyed girl, and that in combo with the dress and the necklace situation...it all just gave me the shivers. I did appreciate that she put Diggle back in his place w/r/t Oliver, though again, that might have been the time to show her feeling a little conflicted about the rebrand, and instead she came off sort of cold to Dig, and cold about Oliver, and at the end of the scene I just felt sad. Man, remember when they were all friends? And finally, to wrap up this insanely long comment: I liked EBR's face acting in the comms scene, but that scene just had NO relation to any of her reactions or behavior in the rest of the episode. I see all of your awesome interpretations, and I'll probably come up with some of my own, but my initial take is that it just didn't compute, and I ended up feeling like I don't understand what's going on with Felicity. And that's tough, because she's my girl.

Yep, it's actually worse than I feared. Because he bought it in order to get her to go with him, which is wrong on at least three levels, and because she said yes just because she likes the dress??? Are you kidding me? Just a bad news day for Arrow, all around.