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Diggle had already said that working with Merlyn was the first step to becoming him, the end didn't justify the means. That was on Oliver. He spent more time talking to Diggle and Roy than he did to Felicity when he got back (and had spent far more time with Thea and Malcolm). And then he immediately dropped the Merlyn bomb, knowing that Felicity and Diggle would be mightily opposed. He could have said "I'm working on that" or "I have an idea" rather than "Malcolm and I are working on that." The way Oliver has jerked Felicity around this whole season (never letting her get close to him, telling her he loved her and immediately walking away from her every time), he deserved what he got. Felicity, who tried to keep the honor of Oliver alive even when she thought he had died and dreamed quiet dreams that he would come back and be with her, didn't.

I don't think Nyssa will replace Ra's during the time of the show. Ra's is too important a character in the comics. As much as I liked Tommy and hate that they killed him off, I would rage if he came back. Tommy is the only male character who died and didn't return back alive again like Slade, Malcolm, Oliver and even Cooper did. Meanwhile Shado, Moira and Sara, three great characters the show really could use, remain dead dead. It's too bad there isn't a character currently on the show who could become the Dark Archer #2. I'd say Roy but he's a nice guy and he has his own comic book heritage. Possibly Thea but I get the feeling the show wants her to be good albeit clueless. From the episode thread: Yeah. If Ra's is so bad and Oliver has to pull out all the stops to defeat him even to making a deal with Malcolm, why not really pull out all the stops and get Barry's help? Surely by not Oliver knows Malcolm Merlyn can't be trusted. Just ask Diggle and Felicity. Just ask Sara or Robert .... oops, they're dead.

Why are they dumping Diggle and Felicity in the comics? The characters have the potential to bring in new readers from the TV show. I hope they're not going to reinforce the GA/BC duo. It's already bad enough with the comics Canon! insistent viewers.

I admit I have fears about Felicity's relationship with Ray. I wish they would leave it platonic, it would be great for Felicity to mentor Ray in how to be a superhero as Oliver mentored Roy. To try to help him avoid the mistakes Oliver is making, to be his Diggle to Ray's Oliver. Yes, they could reduce her to Ray's cheerleader. I hope they don't but it all depends on how the writers do their scenes. I liked Laurel's friendship with Joanna. I loved Felicity's friendship with Sara, and now with Caitlin and hopefully Lyla. I am against a Felicity/Laurel friendship because they are too different; these woman would never be friends in the real world unless they were the only people left on a desert island and then Laurel would still be snapping at Felicity. Felicity can't take Laurel under her wing because Laurel refuses to be there; as Laurel said "Because I've been paying attention", dismissing Felicity out of hand. Let Oliver be the one to fight that battle with Laurel.

I think they are making her the star of her own life and now that she's no longer a 100% Oliver cheer-leader and is making choices for herself, that's when the hate comes. She's working for Ray Palmer because she didn't want to die in the lair with Oliver, she left Team Arrow (so did Diggle but Felicity's getting the hate) and now she's disagreeing with Oliver after everything he went through. Even though she's still as much a part of Team Arrow as she ever was, people aren't happy because she's stepped out from Oliver's shadow and making decisions about her own life and how she wants to live it. Up to the point of Felicity's speech, it really was all about Oliver, what he wanted vs what he was willing to give her. (It's noteworthy that in his dream, he wants to give up everything and stay with Felicity. In his life, he gives her up and keeps everything else.) Felicity had dreams when he was gone but when he got back, it was the same old thing again. No surprise she finally gave up on him and decided to live her life on her own terms. I think it was not powerlessness but disenchantment with Oliver that did it. Although being powerless in his decisions may have contributed. Felicity signed on to find Walter but stayed for Oliver. She bought into his crusade, his dreams, his vision, his nobility of purpose. When he 'died' she stayed on for that. Her line that "There is no universe in which I can see Oliver agreeing to to work with Malcolm Merlyn" shows her vision of who Oliver is. And when he comes back and his first action is to sign on with Malcolm, her vision of Oliver is crushed. This isn't the man she thought he was, this isn't the man she dreamed of being her lover. Everyone talks about how hurt Oliver must have been in that scene, including SA, but Felicity must have been very hurt too. I'd argue that Moira was passive in her death too because she didn't really have a choice. It was her or Thea, but Slade was going to execute one of them. It's not like Moira had a gun or even a sword and could fight back like Oliver, Slade or Malcolm did, or had any say at all except whether it was going to be her or Thea who he was going to kill.

I think a Lauriver lunge will be a massive turn-off of the show not only for Olicity shippers but for anyone who likes Felicity. They'll be left with the fans who only want what's in the comic books.

Tatsu may have had an ulterior motive in pushing Oliver to Maseo in that she wanted Maseo to rejoin the world and her. Still, a much better alternative than Malcolm. Exactly! Oliver beat Malcolm by out-thinking him (killing Malcolm with an arrow through his own body), and he beat mirakuru'd Slade by out-thinking him too. Why would he believe that the only way to defeat Ra's is to copy his techniques? I get very annoyed when Oliver gets this stupid.

I've read people saying that it's only the student who knows the tricks of the master so that he can defeat him. Yeah, I didn't buy it either. It makes more sense to me that someone with different tricks would be able to do better. Go find someone else to train you, Oliver. I forgot to say earlier how much it amused me that Ted Grant didn't think she was good enough yet to be a vigilante either.

I think episode suffered from the EPs decision to rush through everything. There were so many emotional beats here that should have been emphasized and weren't. Felicity got an origin episode after more than 2 seasons of being on the show. Ray had more than that by the time we got to The Secret Origins, and there are several more to go. Laurel has two seasons to developing into the Black Canary plus this season where Sara was murdered to make it happen and then a number of episodes showing how she finally got to being out on the street now.. Sara worked for me because we didn't have to see her become the Canary, she arrived in black leather and kicking ass. Later we got glimpse of how she got there but the show didn't take the time to have it play on screen in real time for us. Roy's origin story has been building for two seasons now but he still hasn't had as much time with it as we've had for Laurel and Ray this season. If this were season 6 and Oliver was already the Green Arrow, I wouldn't object to time being spent on someone else's origin story, as I don't mind it being spent in The Flash because Barry is already the Flash so they have room to develop other characters. I'd probably still object if they were doing two at a time like they are with Black Canary and Atom. He is making his own decisions but at the start, they're often stupid ones. That's part of his journey that is the show -- he makes a decision, sometimes it's right and sometimes it's wrong and he has to learn what the right thing to do in the end is. That's why Diggle and Felicity are there, and it used to be Moira too, and even Thea who told Oliver to he had to open up to someone. Other characters present different points of view and then Oliver learns if he made the right choice or not. I find it interesting that Felicity gets so much shade after this episode for being angry at Oliver for joining up with Malcolm Merlyn and no one ever comments that Diggle holds the same views as she does. We need a look at the Oliver/Diggle bromance now that Oliver has thrown his stakes in with Malcolm.

Making it even more stupid that now they appear to be trying to rehabilitate him. He had to say that. Because she's such an awful fighter. It's the 'Laurel is wonderful' arc.

It is still about Oliver's journey primarily, or it should be, this season has been rather a mess trying to shoehorn in origin stories for Laurel's Canary and the Atom. But early in season 1, it became a better show with the addition first of Diggle (finally getting rid of the dreadful voiceovers) and then Felicity to the Team. More complex, better storytelling when it wasn't just only about Oliver but added stories like Diggle having to deal with his old army buddy. Many reviewers such as Maureen Ryan and Alan Sepinwall say they watch for the Oliver/Diggle/Felicity team even now. By then though, the title of the show had been set

I liked Quentin's comment to Roy about Sara, not to tell her he wanted to see her but to watch her back. Gave Roy an out too. A lot of the time I'm angry about the writing for this show but I think Felicity's reaction at the end was well done for two reasons, first that it's the only think I can think of that would make me sympathetic to her looking to Ray, and second because it makes perfect emotional sense. While Oliver was away, and later 'dead', Felicity kept going with the crusade because that was what Oliver wanted and fought for and she was doing it not because she was the kind of person who would take up a crusade like this but to honour him. What he wanted and died for was what kept her going, hence the "I can't imagine a universe in which Oliver would team up with Malcolm Merlyn". Then he came back and the first thing he did was team up with Malcolm. She's got to be questioning everything she thought about him, his values, his priorities as well as his love. He loved Sara, he said he loves Thea but he's getting into bed with the man who killed one and brainwashed the other. Who is this person that she thought was Oliver Queen? It doesn't seem fair that people are dumping on her now for what is a perfectly normal reaction.. I am, however, angry that Oliver and Felicity couldn't have even five seconds of joy before MG broke them up again.

If Oliver joins the LoA, doesn't that leave Starling City undefended? Or is that going to be the end result of all those new superheroes in SC, when we thought it was Oliver finally going to be able to have a relationship with Felicity? Ditto Felicity and the Ray-propping. Not to mention the line "I don't want to be a woman you love", which EBR totally sold, by the way. I think a number of the characters get crap writing, the difference is in the quality of the acting. Willa Holland and Emily Bett Rickards can make you believe it up to a certain point untill it gets too much, KC doesn't. They needed him gone so she could bond to Malcolm If I were Oliver, I'd be calling Walter to spend some time with Thea so she wouldn't be so obsessed with Malcolm. And that's not just the Oliver Queen part, it would also be the Arrow past to diffuse the situation. I'd actually find that more interesting than this crap they're trying to pull. Then Felicity could get a therapist of her own to match Oliver's. It's the bubble-headed blonde look, which kind of says it all about Raylicity. EBR's feet must be freezing in those non-shoes given they're all bundled up in coats. ETA: in the pictures were her feet aren't in the shot, she's wearing calf-high boots. It's not easy being an actress.

One thing that's been consistent about Thea is that when she's pissed off, she goes off on a tangent and ignores coherent thought. It's not all her fault but this is the Thea who refused to speak to her mother for months because of her complicity in the Undertaking. Roy was wrong for lying to her going off with the mass murderer who is her biological father, who murdered the man she knew as her father for most of her life and caused the deaths of 503 people, is a bone-headed thing to do. And then she lied to Oliver about it for months, not to protect Oliver (which was his reason for lying to her) but to protect Malcolm. Now she's ignoring Malcolm's actions and painting him like a good guy because he saved her when the mirakuru soldiers attacked and Roy had run off. Sorry, Thea, Roy was busy trying to save the city as you now know. Malcolm was just in it for his own agenda, to get you on his side. I had high hopes for Thea at the start of this season but she's really still all me! me! me! Maybe Oliver should have taken 5 seconds to tell Felicity that he came back for her instead of "we didn't have cellphone reception" and then leaving her to walk to Diggle and Roy and drop his bomb. Felicity was riding a rollercoaster of emotions seeing him back and then hearing that he was going to team up with the man who brainwashed Thea to kill Sara. On Saving Hope this season, when Alex got out of the coma, she left behind her love for Charlie. Maybe Oliver left behind his brain in the snow. I blame MG for not letting them have any time to be happy.

I think it's a major mistake not to give us any happiness, and especially not to give Oliver and Felicity 2 seconds of happiness before they get torn apart. It's a true thing that you can bear the crises better if you have some happy moments to remember. (That is why twice as many marriages who never had honeymoons break up than those who did. You need a reason to remember why you bought a ticket for this boat when the storm hits.) Seriously, it makes no sense. And the idea that only the student can defeat the master makes even less. I hate what they're doing to Oliver. On the other hand, I'm happy that they're not doing it to Diggle and especially not to Felicity. Oliver can take the hit better. I want to see this so bad. Bring on Mommy Amanda to smack some sense into her.

I think for Felicity, it was a disillusionment, that Oliver isn't the person she thought he was. I don't understand MG saying that Oliver chose to be The Arrow at that point rather than Oliver Queen -- personally I thought he chose to be a near-sighted idiot. In terms of the men vs women ratio, Tommy was the only really well fleshed out major character. Robert we saw in the occasional flashback and Yao Fei and Sebastian Blood were basically plot contrivances. We never even met Helena's finance as he died before the series started. Of the men who were thought to be killed, Malcolm Merlyn, Slade and Oliver all came back from the dead. For the women, Shado, Sara and Moira had held major roles in the show. Isabel was like Blood and Yao Fei, or even less since she had fewer appearances. Ray's finance and Rebecca Merlyn also died before the show started. So of the prominent good characters, Tommy, Shado, Sara and Moira, one man and three women died. Merlyn and Slade both survived even though they were bad guys. I can't believe the posts complaining that Felicity hugged Oliver tightly and why doesn't she have any consideration for him being skewered? Maybe because she doesn't know????? Only Oliver is allowed to be a self-centred asshole. And Thea I guess. I don't like Thea at all right now, but she's not getting the hate Felicity is. Diggle and Felicity both think the same thing, they both quit in Left Behind, but only Felicity is getting hated. One thing that is consistent in terms of fandoms, that when a female character is complex and fallible, she gets excoriated especially when she admits to weakness. Abby on ER, Cameron on House, I remember someone at TWoP came up with a list of female characters who were disliked because they were complicated and realistic rather than pushy and self-assured. As I was typing this reply, a friend of mine who teaches at university called to complain about problems she has teaching. In the conversation, she mentioned a study that was done recently, comparing teacher evaluations for an on-line course with the same replies but one group thought it was a male prof and the other thought it was a female. With identical responses for the course, the ratings for the 'male' prof was 8% higher than for the 'female'. No surprise there, just sadness.

People tend to hang in for a long long time. Force of habit or sometimes they get enough to keep them watching. It's pretty much conventional wisdom that the first three seasons of House were the best. When the original team left, ratings stayed good but somewhat lower because there were other elements of the show people enjoyed. Some more left during the Cuddy seasons but it wasn't till season 7/8 that enough people gave up on it that it wasn't renewed.

As opposed to the illegitimate ones? ;-)

I think Malcolm will be the one to die this season, not Ra's. Or maybe he won't die since you have to be Tommy before you're a man who dies on this show. When Tatsu said that Oliver would have so sacrifice the thing he loves the most I figured it was Felicity he was going to lose, especially as soon as he announced he was teaming with MM, Felicity walked out, But it's always possible that it will be the Oliver who is a hero that he will lose. I find this "it takes a student to defeat the master" a horrible plot contrivance to get Oliver working with MM. You need someone with new ideas and new techniques to do that. After seeing the episode, I like that they tried to soften Merlyn and it was a good episode for Barrowman but I'm still on the "Malcolm Merlyn is a scorpion" who won't change his ways" train. I think he's do something heroic in the end to redeem himself as he dies but before that, Oliver is going to have a sharp lesson in 'be careful who you ally yourself with', as he watches Felicity get closer to Ray because she's so disappointed in Oliver. Yeah, Barrowman is great in small doses. I liked him in Uprising but I'm afraid if that if they over-emphasize him (as these EPs are wont to do) I'll be fed up fast. Less is more, people.

Felicity is about the mission, just as Diggle is. But they were also aware that you can lose your soul in the mission, or die as Tatsu put it earlier. All three (Tatsu, Felicity, Diggle) were making the same point, that the cost may be huge, and for Diggle and Felicity, it's not worth the cost to lose your soul. This was echoed by Malcolm who said that killing makes you lose a piece of yourself you can never get back. For Diggle and Felicity, teaming up with a mass murderer will do that too. I had hope that Thea was playing Malcolm but I don't think that's the case any more. At this point, both Thea and Oliver, along with Roy, want to believe that there is still goodness in him. I think what's going to happen is that they will both learn that he's gone too far down the path to be redeemed and he'll die a heroes death saving someone. Because Felicity got emotional and Diggle didn't doesn't mean their logic was wrong. Thank you. That's the reason the four shouldn't have equal votes with each other, much less with Oliver now that he's back. Laurel's always gone for the short term outlook rather than the long term one. Sometimes it's useful (getting people in the Glades to fight)(and shouldn't they have had guns too?), sometimes it's not.

There are many forms of death, Tatsu tells Oliver. To defeat a man like this Ra's al Ghul you must be willing not just to die but what you have to sacrifice in order to defeat him..... It will be whatever you hold most precious. This is the line that makes me okay with this plot twist in terms of the show although not in terms of Oliver who is being an idiot. What he holds most precious is the hero that he could be, the guy who does the right thing because it's the right thing (to echo Diggle's words) and that's what he's going to lose by teaming up with Malcolm. Oliver's 'no killing' rule is getting annoying. He should have let Malcolm take out Brick, maybe then Malcolm would have stopped his need to vengeance. With Brick still alive, it can't really be put to rest not even for Thea. "Killing changes you. It takes away a piece of your soul and you can never get it back again." Can Malcolm be a good guy again? I hope not. I think Oliver is trying to save him. Maybe so he can save himself. I understand Oliver's position, he thinks he needs to team up with Malcolm because it's the only way to defeat Ra's.and for that he's willing to sacrifice his relationship with Felicity which may be what he thinks if important to him. But after watching the episode, I see Felicity as the one who had the bigger shock. When you're in love with someone, you see them in the best possible light (I think it's a necessary condition for being in love.) Maybe if Oliver had spent a little more time with her before walking over to Diggle and Roy and dropping his bomb, she might have reacted differently. But right now she's wondering who this person is that is Oliver Queen and was she wrong about him all along? So kudos to the writers and the EPs because this is the one way I can accept Felicity looking towards Ray as a possible love interest -- if she's so disappointed that Oliver isn't the person she thought he was. She won't quit the team because they still need to save the city, but Oliver as a person is not the Oliver she fell in love with. Stay tuned for all sorts of disillusionment. Laurel to Ted Grant: "You're going to be fine." Nice consistency, Laurel feels that she can't lose someone else she cares about. Also, nicely done show, to account for the actor's absence while he's shooting his other show. I like Jessica Breaux's reviews (runs off to read it)

I'm with you, completely. I think (hope) that will be Oliver's lesson this season. I'm sad Thea talked Roy into believing Malcolm was a good guy who could help them. "He saved Thea's life, he didn't have an agenda. He cares about this city." Oh Roy, you poor fool, Malcolm always has an agenda. It's the logic of their arguments, not the emotions. Felicity argues against teaming up with Malcolm because he's a mass murderer, crazy and has deliberately hurt of killed people she cares about. The best version of Oliver which is the one that she sees wouldn't do it (this is consistent because she's always seen what Oliver could be at his best and encouraged him to be it), and she doesn't know how they live with themselves doing it this way. Diggle, who has experience with Amanda Waller, turns him down, saying "It has. Guilty... You were expecting something else, Merlyn? " "That you'd have some measure of common sense, yes. " "You expected us to throw in with you? After what you did to Thea? To Sara? To Olivers?" "To save your precious city, yes." (Here Malcolm is equating Diggle and Team Arrow with Oliver. Mistake.) "That's the thing, once we we let the end justify the means, that's the first step. "To what?" To becoming you." If Moira were still alive, she'd be supporting Felicity and Diggle. RIP, Moira, we miss you. Roy asks "So how does this work? Do we vote?" I resent the idea that they get equal votes. Diggle and Felicity have been there longer and have more experience as well as more wisdom, their opinions should count more.

Oliver should check on Thea, partly because she is his sister and partly because she's hanging out with Malcolm. But it's made more problematic that this whole mess happened because Thea was making bad decisions. Had she not joined forces with Malcolm, he couldn't have brainwashed her and Oliver wouldn't have needed to fight Ra's. So the rightness of Oliver's need to make sure she's okay is weakened by her actions. Felicity may have started out as light entertainment but over the course of season 1, she joined Diggle as a point counterpoint to Oliver's obsessions. She's not Dawn, she's the opposite voice to him, the verbalization of the path that he must follow, just as Diggle in s1 and Felicity in s2 told him he was not alone and Felicity from the start was against the killing. In that sense, she's more Giles than Dawn (as is Diggle). She didn't go through what Oliver did but she went through a lot in the month he was gone and now he's going to throw everything way not only because it's not what she wants but because he's going to screw up his life and Thea's and god know what else. Hopefully it's not for nothing that it's Felicity and Diggle who are opposed to Oliver joining forces with Malcolm. Now to thoughts about the episode: There were three must watch moments on the website that I watched before I saw the whole episode: the two Oliver/Felicity scenes and Arrow's speech. Thank you, CTV, for knowing what's important. David Ramseys' facial expression as Felicity leaves saying she needs some air is priceless: "Oliver, you fucked this one up good." I was so glad then the Black Canary showed up when the two goons had Roy. I was afraid Roy and Laurel were stupid enough to go out patrolling alone. Quentin takes his heart medication under emotional stress not physical. (Reminds me of the early days of House when it still made sense.) I like that he didn't want Roy to tell Sara he was looking for her, he trusts his daughter to make the right decision about when the contact him. Poor man Why is Laurel being an idiot about not wanting her cut sutured? Scar aside, what about infection? "Only the student has hope of defeating the master." To be honest me, but that seems pretty stupid to me. Wouldn't someone who knew different techniques have a better chance than someone who fights the same way? "I truly believed I could change the Glades and prevent what happened to my family from happening to anyone else." He is still, and always was BSC. Listen to that, Oliver. The man does know how to make an entrance though. Why didn't he just kill Brickwell at the start when he had the chance? I thought he was a better archer than that. Oh Thea, don't take the evidence to Laurel ADA. Don't you know she's given up being lawyer.? There were some good lines, mostly Felicity's "Great, we can add irony to the list of charges against Brick." With Brick's "You know the deal boys, you take me down first you walk out alive", he's a lot like this version of Ra's al Ghul. Thea's speech to Roy about it meaning so much that Malcolm was the only one who cared about her to save her during the siege shows that she's still very self-centered. Roy was out there trying to save the whole city but her only concern is that Malcolm was there to save her.

From the spoiler thread: Well that answers my question as to who is steering the boat.

We'll know next week if it's about the superheroes or for Oliver's return as it's titled "Canaries."