Western

The Ellie / Jake stuff is bugging me, so I did a quick re-look at the last few eps. -- I think they need to divorce because I think the only 'truth' he's said is about being investigated for being a leak or that they're looking for such. (its late here, I'm not well & I was fast watching so might be a lil off on wording etc.). He did give Gibbs? a thumb drive with info on it, so Ellie could be seen as complicit. He was the one who mentioned their favourite lunch place and now eating alone each day, so setting Ellie up to see him with 'IA' lady and jump to the correct conclusion. Then I think he decided it was better to protect her and take all the blame for being an NSA leak. I think Jake's been lying about being 'just a lawyer' for years but its only with them now having distance of different jobs that Ellie's picking up on things not gelling. We know Gibbs' gut is normally fine with men and non red-haired women and that he chats often with Jake. He's seen nothing 'off' in them as a couple, which doesn't make sense if Jake's playing around. -- Plus his 'you know me' to Gibbs when he was being thrown out of the NCIS building, is suspect IMO of something else going on. None of Ellie's NSA friends saw anything 'hinky' to warn her about. I recently watched some Superman and it just clicked that Jake is too 'Clark Kent' when we see him. Dubai -- that seems to have been a real NSA thing, and easy to check up on it being a legit trip for Jake and IA lady. -- I think Jake and IA Lady were there for other NSA reasons. At this point I'm thinking IA is actually the lady's cover as his is lawyer and the heated conversation is Jake wanting to come clean to Ellie, hence putting the idea of their lunches together into her head. -- At that point 'IA' lady could tell him she's heard of the leak so his plans change to 'protect Ellie.' Even though I still think that warrants re-evaluating the marriage / divorce, I really hope the above is what they're actually pulling because 'affair' is just a disservice to Ellie. I do think she has boundary issues with the NSA side of Jake's life (I don't care about McGee's hacking etc. because that can't get a loved one in trouble only himself.), but they could have done a moment of telling Gibbs / Vance to go through channels because she'll not risk Jake's job any more. I've gone from liking Ellie to being annoyed by her for silly reasons that I've decided that no matter what the reality is, I'm going with my 'head canon' because then neither Ellie (or Gibbs' gut) were too gullible / naive. I'm annoyed at the writers for deciding that they can't have a normal, happy marriage for an agent / former agent on the show again after killing off Mrs. Vance. This also makes me worried about Jimmy's family. :( Sorry for the ramble/ rant (if its in the wrong place let me know where to place it.)

I really enjoyed the episode and am thrilled the show's got a third season. :D I'm hoping that Ezekiel actually does recall everything but is not willing to admit it because then the others might actually expect him to act like a grown up. IMO he's comfortable in the 'sometimes annoying younger brother who can't be given too much responsibility' role so would prefer to not give it up. I tend to think that a lot of his personality is defensive so that people don't look further than the 'fun guy'. It'd actually be nice if in one of the next episodes he slips up and they realise he recalls everything.

Loved the Ducky plotline. I found his stepmother all to believable, had a similar sort in my family except she did leave the kid. Though it'd have been more believable if she left with the money and Nicholas. I used to like Bishop, then she would not stop with wanting to know NSA secrets, putting Jake's career in danger when she chose to switch agencies. Then she didn't tell McGee that the weekend away was a surprise and he was the one in the wrong for telling Jake. (Only reason McGee had to apologise was answering her phone.) Now I don't care about her and honestly think it'd be best for Jake to divorce her. This is even though I think the 'affair' was just a line because he's been told 'if your wife pokes her nose in this time for you classified mission we will arrest her'. He knew only way to get her to quit stalking him / nosing into his work was to get her mad enough to leave him. If they want my sympathy for her, they've gone the wrong way about it but then again I'm an adult who understands that 'hubby's work is classified' includes me as well! Back to the good, Ducky! I loved seeing young Ducky and would enjoy seeing more of his adventures.

I'm not well, so a big thank you to all posters for your reviews, so I knew it was a good idea to watch as a distraction without turning into me wanting to throw things. :-) I agree with the good / bad bits that most people have said. I'm also amusing myself with mental images of Merlyn dealing with his 'minions' and them being the yellow ones. Have a lovely weekend everyone, I'm not sure if i'll give this ep more thought than that, since the timeline is wrong for FS being the one in the grave.

I really hope they're not that stupid, but I'm not counting on it. I now 50% of people divorce, but writers that means 50% don't and have mature relationships like you had so nicely started to give O/F. I try my best to not watch soap operas so stop turning an action show into one. I came to Arrow not having seen the later seasons of Smallville and only knowing GA/BC from some comic book reading. You tried to make QL/LL work but couldn't because you'd accidentally turned FS (who in one continuity is Firestorms step mother) into his soul mate. Was I mad, nope because comics have spent decades teaching us about muliverses! F/O work as a normal loving, sometimes bickering and annoyed at each other couple so just run with that.

I'm at the point that I don't care if the show gets renewed. I'll keep watching (in the UK so my veiwing doens't help anyway) because I'm a masochist but its one of a few shows this year that I'm actually leaning towards 'end it now you've had many many seasons'. I really don't like feeling that way about a show I only got into 3? years ago and binge watched to catch up.

Am I the only one also thinking OQ needs to at the least follow the money trail (tell F so she can do it for you) to see if Moira had any more money stashed for dealing with things of a suspect nature? Yay hidden money stash of millions that we can access would be in keeping with Moira and also help to 'fix' the billionaire not billionaire gaping plot point instead of now using Ray / Merlyn's money via Felicity / Thea. Or you know since OQ spent all his money on QC shares, sell a shedload since you're not in charge anyway. I know the value's gone way down with Ray's 'death' but still some money is better than no money.

Just re-watched the scenes and you're right she doesn't out and out say it but if getting her pregnant = bad then to me she implied it. I'm coming from a place of a close family member & a close friend who were both dumped by their mothers as young kids so I see why my brain went to 'ruined my life' for that part of the sentence without me realising that the 'ruined my life' was not explicity said. Re-watching that scene, the writers really need to work on making her sympathetic and all it would have taken was saying Felicity can be told but not meet and so doofus Oliver deciding that that might hurt F worse than being kept in the dark.... Also was the punching paps before or after she got pregnant by him because IMO she's not doing herself any favours with those arguments as to her being a good mother if that's her parenting criteria for not being such and she was with him after the paps incident/s.

The writers totally screwed over all parties in the 'kid' plotline. As you say they could easily have made Samantha sympathetic but they don't and you're right she is contradictory. I'm female but not a parent but even my instinct is 'you get to know the guy for a while, then see if he can behave well in supervised by you interactions after you've got to know him then allow him unsupervised visits.' I'm fed up with the writers either making me dislike a character I like or not being cinsistant so that I hate someone who could be reasonable. -- I thought she was paid twice by Moira one cheque = say lost baby; 2nd cheque when you move far away so to me she seems to have cashed one cheque. I wasn't 100% focused on the episode or too busy yelling at the laptop but I thought she said something akin to 'you ruined my life' which is what really bugs me. -- I'm not really sure I want to sit through it again even to fast forward to find their scenes. She's coming over as vindictive which is not on, instead of protective which I'd 100% agree with. -- I'm actually only suggesting the 'strong arm to see' tactics by Thea after Barry tells because they want to keep the kid in to use as a plot device. As someone who has not had kids to not have a 50/50 chance of passing on a crippling illness my personal take is be a parent and do what's best for the kid which would be to tell Felicity and not see the child because it'd endanger him. I'd have much rather they did what you suggested plotwise since they want the kid as a plot device, that'd make her a good and protective parent and then I could root for her. P.S: trying to get the hang of the site, so please bear with me. Guessing the multi quote we just pick the one we want?

I normally only lurk but this episode bugged me enough to post. *waves and offers cake and throwing tomatoes.* Oliver had the perfect 'out' and he better use it next episode to let Felicity know although honestly his 'honour' is not tainted by not keeping a promise to someone who old him his kid died so she could keep him out of the kids life. I was yelling at the screen. "Barry knows, you didn't tell him 'after' the *beep* made you promise, you can get him to tell Felicity with you standing next to him and giving her puppy face. Then F and tell Thea and Thea can go tell the *beep* that either she allows Oliver reasonable access or they'll go to court and you know what happened to the kid of the last Star City mayorial candidate oh and if you tell anyone about this convo, we'll also take you to court." ^^ that would have at least pretty much been in character and fixed the stupid problem. - Also it'd make up for Barry sticking his oar in re Oliver seeing his son. Barry there is a HUGE difference in your dad being taken from you at around William's age and a kid never knowing his father from birth! -- I really disliked that comment from Barry when his situation is totally different. I don't like Baby mama, if not for not wanting William (was that another Robin Hood thing as in Will scarlett or coincidental?) full time in Star City, I'd want her victim to a meta that I dunno microwaves her. I really hated that she blamed Oliver for her becoming pregnant 'runing her life'. This fully or partly on her. She had consensual sex with a known party boy (I can't beleive he wasn't tabloid fodder). <-- 100% her choice No contraception <-- 50/50 on each of 'em. Telling Oliver she lost the kid <-- 100% on her. (the 'getting him away from the Queens works for this excuse but still its 100% on her for going along with Moira) Having the kid <-- 100% on her Not putting him up for adoption <--- 100% on her (If it was really about putting him first and out of reach of the Queens he'd be with a loving adoptive family, so you being a single mom is totally on you dearie.) Only cashing one of the 1 million cheques <-- 100% on her (I'm a Brit but no way was her home not worth a few 100 thousand $s -- Is she mad because she needed to cash the other one about the time the Queen fortune went poof *throws tomatoes at CW for doing a Fox on billionaires loosing fortunes in nonsense ways*) I'm also pissed that Oliver did not bring up lawyers, don't hire LL and your lawyer should have good arguments (like above) for why Oliver should be on at the least supervised visitation. I was going to also say what someone else typed earlier Oliver standing up to baby mama and saying he's not the guy she knew so of course he's going to tell his SO and his sister about his son so she needs to deal with that. He will promise not to make it public knowledge but his family / friends are allowed to know! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I agree with others that the LOT stuff should not have been in the same episodes as the kid stuff both are 'A' plotlines, honeslty every so often its okay for shows to have the villain / creature / meta of the week as the b plotline. No Quentin, who in season one was a favourite of mine, but given how they keep making me want to smack him, that's probably a good thing. I like Sara, she at least acknowledges and apologised to LL for being OQ's side peice and so 'dying'. As much as I don't like LL and (often) like QL, I am fed up of wanting her to have the 'since St Sara is alive now I can finally vent at since childhood having to be the bigger person when she took my things including my BF' converation with her dad. -- I really wanted part of the Lance divorce to have been QL finding out that DL knew that SL was sleeping with OQ and his finally taking LL's side over the 'babys' but no. I like Sara (who they've actually allowed to grow up from her childhood role of must be protected baby in the family -- now they just need the other Lances to also move on from that mindset -- Please, I really like QL when he's not being a 'daddys lil princess' moron.) *sorry for tangant* -- I sometimes like Ray. The Hawks didn't have me wanting to kill them (although they were also not that engaging), so I'm willing to give LOT a shot. -- Saying that its the 'villains' on the team who are really drawing me into watching the show. I 'want' to see Captain Cold with his action figure, maybe Heatwave can have some he's aiming at and we find out he raided CC's collection for targets. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Best thing in the episode = the donkey. -- (have they never heard of 'never work with children and animals' you'd think that'd also apply to the 'extras' in a scene. -- Although saying that the donkey was the star of the episode so its good they never heard that phrase.) 2nd best thing = daylight! -- I know Arrow is most often in the dark to go with its 'gritty' feel but daylight is good to use sometimes and honestly if as a criminal all you have to do to not meet the Arrow team is work in daylight / dusk then that'd be pretty stupid! 3rd best = Malcom being 'evil' 4th = I liked Thea in her limited role in both parts with her comments. /end ramble. P.S: I loved reading those 'kids comments'. I think that'd make one neat review, the comments of my kids during the episode. -- Although its a bit worrying being in my 30s and the Hawkeye / Hawkman / Marvel / DC comments being familiar with other characters with my own brother... I'd be the 'arggaaaah' sibling there. :D