statsgirl

Does anyone know what she's reading? Because I'm nosy that way. (The blurb on the back compares the writer to Nick Hornby and Dougland Coupland,)

There are some pretty good questions there, like when why is Laurel being so bossy in the Arrow Cave, why are we getting so little O/D/F Team Arrow, why doesn't Diggle have a costume, why don't Diggle and Felicity have code names. And is season 3 moving into the GA/BC show. I hope some of those get asked.

Well, that would solve the Laurel problem if she falls for Ra's and goes away with him to Nanda Parbat to train for three years. Then she would be a believable Black Canary.

Done. Plus a question on who would lead Team Arrow if Oliver wasn't around (because forewarned is forearmed).

NumberCruncher, are you going to tweet to the Arrow Aftershow to ask about the light shooting schedule or should someone else do it? Since SA is not stupid or naive, he knows the Laurel question will come up. He'll either have a diplomatic answer prepared (we all work very hard; different people like different aspects of the show) or he'll have gone over the issue with Campea before the show so the question won't get asked. LOL, you're right. One of the women likes Roy but Campea has no time for him. (He's also no fan of Olicity, I think because he likes Felicity as she is now.) I have the feeling it's going to be a bad episode to be asked questions of.

Oyhumbug has a new fic Deputy Mommy with Walter, and I think she does a really good job of getting his voice. And these lines, ouch.

I think it was just before he got on the boat. Moira assumed that it was Laurel who was pregnant when he first told her. So that would make his kid 6 now since it's been 7 years since the Queen's Gambit sank.

Felicity did have a ski mask on when they blew up the Applied Sciences building, along with Oliver, Diggle and Sara. Good times. What would be the point of bringing Ted Grant back in the winter? Laurel will have been trained and dressed as BC and he's certainly no love interest for her unless they really start pushing it in this episode. Another disappointment. It seems like the best I can hope for is some Roy/Felicity friendship scenes, but I'm sure they'll limit those for Laurel and her defense of Grant. At least Laurel and Oliver are still on opposite side. That's Laurel, Insta everything from trying to kill the Sara suspects to defending Grant to donning the leathers. This is a sweeps episode??? I'll be interested in the ratings for the second half of it if it's about Ted Grant and Laurel. Viewers will tune in after last week's Felicity episode but will they stay?

I'm curious which will be the A story -- Roy and the recurrance of the effects of the mirakuru, or Ted Grant being accused of murder. Roy is a character we're watched grow and develop over the seasons of the show, and Ted is tied ito Laurel's story.

Really, CTV? You cancel The Listener and give this partner-switching soap opera another season?

I really hope Magda is still alive. I love her scenes with Lisl. "nd just as soon I find Ava again, I"m going to kill her like I've been threatening to for the last seven months since I kidnapped her. You know how much I care about women." I was so hoping Sonny would finally die. Or go away to prison. Can't I have that much after all these years of being disgusted by him and Shawn? They have a ton of history and having each other's backs. You don't just throw that all away. Maybe that's why Alexis still cares about Ned even after those horrible times when he kept Kristina away from her and she had to dress up as Dodson just to see her own child. When Alexis was telling Julian that she's done with him because he doesn't love her enough to leave the mob for her, I really really wanted him to tell her he tried and his son got shot and her house blew up. Or have the writers forgotten about that already?

Probably. Or it's whatever villain goes from Starling City to Central City in The Flash part of the cross-over. At least Felicity is back in the cave for more than to feel guilty about lying to Roy about the cop killing. Hopefully we get some Diggle time too.

Agree he's cardboard but maybe if they had spent more time on him and Laurel's association with him, I might care. This show has a bad bad tendency to zip through storylines and skip the emotional beats, which causes them to re-do story lines over and over since they run out of new ideas, and do them badly because it's all rushed through. If the idea that Ted Grant used to be a vigilante is important, we should have found out about it earlier. As Alfred Hitchcock said, if you suddenly blow up a bomb, you get 5 seconds of shock. If the audience knows there's a bomb in the box and it's sitting on a bus seat, you get 15 minutes of suspense.

Where can I get a voice synthesizer? It seems like all the cool kids are getting one. Also, I took judo for three years so it's past time I got my vigilante costume. LOL. That's exactly it. I won't care about who killed Sara until I'm over why she was killed. There was a 'ping' of a bowstring with each of those arrows so it's not going to be Roy training for the Arrow-throwing competition. I agree, this is going to be Roy's cop-killer arc. Since CH talked about it at the upfronts in May, it will be in the first part of this season. Is 3x06 the episode where Ted Grant is accused of murder and goes on the run? I was hoping he would stick around longer to draw Laurel's attention away from the lair.

I think it was at Matthew Morrison's Hallowe'en party so the paparazzi were there for the bigger stars and they took her picture because they could get some money selling it. Still, an awful way to have to live. When Johnny Depp was asked about getting $10 million for a picture, he said it was $1 million for the acting and $9 million for the invasion of privacy that came with it.

It's an interesting theory. I can see Oliver being willing to exchange his life for Thea, although maybe not so much if he learns she's been training in the Dark Arts with Malcolm, but I can't see him willing to volunteer his life for Malcolm because it's Thea's decision to trade hers for his, and Oliver doesn't value Malcolm's life except as Thea's bio dad. I also don't see Thea being willing to trade her life for Malcolm. She's become close to him, yes, but she's still the second most selfish person on the show and to give up her young life to save his, especially since Ra's is after him for killing 503 people, that doesn't feel like something she would do unless she was really brainwashed.

Doesn't Roy generally wear gloves when he's fighting? Not to mention, he has red arrows, not black ones. Maybe the LoA has picked up hypnosis as a tool and are sending him a hypnotic suggestion. Since a new suspect shows up in ep 5x9 (?), I expect Roy to be exonerated within the next couple of episodes. I can't believe that the show would put Laurel in Black Canary gear in January already when she's was flailing around the boxing ring in November. Oh, wait, I can. I think I'll make this into a drinking game, which is the only way I'm going to be able to take it.

Ouch, That clip of her in the going through the firing line of photographers -- how can people live like that?

True, but I hope that throwing things at Fernlicity is about Thea rather than Felicity. I think if Felicity does get together with Ray while Oliver is struggling to make his way back, or if there is any sense that she is betraying him, there may be a nasty blowback among the fandom, both pro and anti-Felicity. They need to tread carefully with that. If I were writing, it would be that being the Arrow failed him in some way. Dunno what they will do though.

This is why I come here, so I can prepare myself for the worst,. Then when it happens, it doesn't hurt so much. After the EPs acknowledged that Team Arrow is the core of the show, they seem to be determined to give us less than ever before. I seem to recall a spoiler that Ra's wants to recruit Oliver, although that doesn't seem like now that Oliver has declared war on him by defending Malcolm. Still, I wonder if Oliver is gone involuntarily, or if he decides to go uncover to the LoA. Both seem to have room for dramatic stories, although the way this show has been going, Oliver being forced into it and Team Arrow worried and looking for him seems more likely. I wonder if that may have affected whether they killed Sara or just kidnapped her. Probably not though, given that Laurel couldn't remain a believable BC if Sara returned. I think she'd be more likely to grow closer to Ray if it was voluntary because then it would be deliberate, like her father left, and Cooper faked his suicide, and worse because Oliver promised her she would never lose him. If she thought it was involuntary, she'd be too busy worrying about Oliver to grow closer to Ray romantically. Yikes, no! Instead, have him desperately trying to contact her, as he tried to e-mail from Hong Kong.

I can't remember if the 'we used to date' was a tweet or not but it was quite a while ago. Oliver was pretty amazeballs level of competent when Diggle met him, but he didn't hesitate to tell Oliver when he was crossing lines or not doing his job. In fact, that's why he signed on with Oliver, to make sure Oliver didn't lose parts of himself in the war. I'll be knocking my head against the wall if Diggle just decides that Laurel can be the leader of the group. I think it might actually gain Laurel points with the parts of the audience like me who aren't eager to see her as co-leader with Oliver if she calmed down a bit and let those who know what they are doing lead.

I want Donna to come back and be in a relationship with Quentin. (I tweeted that and one of the writers favorited it so there's hope.) Can you imagine the scenes with Quentin and Felicity eye-rolling at her mother getting all enthusiastic about something? I think they could have done so much more with Walter, as Thea's good father, as Oliver's business mentor the way Diggle is his fighting mentor, and as a father-type mentor for Felicity. But the EPs seem to have no interest in anyone over the age of forty who isn't John Barrowman. I wish they would give Laurel a female friend, or maybe just let us know she's seeing Joanna again. There need to be female friendships on this show but Laurel and Felicity have such different personalities, I can't see them ever as BFFs. Sara was more like Felicity than Laurel, and EBR said that she wanted Felicity to have a friend in Caitlyn, which makes sense since they are both strong, intellectual and caring women. It's too bad they killed Kate Spencer because I could she her as a mentor to Laurel.

Diggle better be in charge of the Arrow cave when Oliver's gone. He's the only one who has any actual experience fighting. And now you've just given me a nightmare that they would do that. It's the only way they could because Diggle wouldn't take orders from her but Felicity and Roy might. 306 is the first Cupid one, right? And the one where MG said that they would hark back to Laurel and Oliver's relationship, presumably when she tells Ted Grant she and Oliver used to date. But they're not necessarily in the same scene though, although it's likely they are. I'm still hoping that they were filming a Sara flashback and a Roy action scene on the same day. Because they think that the reason people don't like Laurel is because she's not in costume, so they're speeding that up. And it's true, when Sara first died there were a number of comments that at last Laurel has a purpose/is going on her journey to being Black Canary. I think those who watch for the action and the comic book characters won't mind InstaCanary. We'll have to see how others react. I could easier buy Laurel suddenly becoming a fighter than I could buy the personality change that would make her accept Felicity or Roy's guidance or leadership. People can learn fighting skills but their personalities don't change that much, not even after five years on an island. She probably still thinks of Diggle as Oliver's black driver and manservant but she might accept his leadership because he's bigger than she is and wouldn't take any shade from her.

The timeline is weird, but if you take it as Diggle sent the ARGUS agent to Felicity's house before Donna showed up at the QC offices, which is why she could do there, it works. Diggle saying that he sent an ARGUS agent just means that someone from ARGUS is now free to be able to go over to Felicity's house and see if she's all right. Oliver just handing up his suit is also strange but since Felicity is on her way to work (presumably Donna slept in) I wonder what she did about the front door that was broken down, did she just go off to work like that, or did someone come by (Roy? he wasn't much) and nail some wood over it. I don't know what it's like in Las Vegas but where I live, servers have a much lower minimum wage than other employees because it is assumed that they will make up the difference in tips. (Which is twisted because they have to please the customers as well as their employers to earn their money but that's a different issue.) I thought what Donna meant was that with just the salary she was given as a waitress, it wouldn't have been enough to support both her and Felicity so she had to wear six inch high heels so she looked really sexy and would get more money in tips. I've been admiring (I know, strange to say about this show) the contrast between the journeys of Laurel and Felicity. Back in Birds of Prey, I think Helena said to Laurel that once you let the darkness in, you can't get rid of it (or something like that). Laurel is embracing the darkness, first her anger at Oliver and Sara, and then at her parents, and now at Sara's killer. She's going dark, choosing black, lashing out in her anger, and now controlling it but still fueled by anger. In contrast, Felicity has had a much harder life, losing her father at 6, her mother working very long hours, growing up with the expectation she would be a cocktail waitress too, Cooper committing suicide, and during the time of the show Walter being kidnapped, not being able to save the man in Salvation, and getting kidnapped and Slade. But instead of darkness, she deliberately choosing light. She's cheerful and funny not because she hasn't had any hardship in her life but because she has and she deals with it by concentrating on the light. You can't get away from the bad stuff, but as Viktor Frankl said, you can choose how you deal with it. I think that's a big reason why I find Felicity's story more pleasant than Laurel's. Their choices remind me of a poem by Ogden Nash. I can't do the graphics here so you have to imagine them:

I think the blonde wig is something Laurel will put on fairly early to hide her identity. After all, she's working in the DA's office, it would cause all sorts of problems to have her be discovered to be a vigilante. It does seem strange how unsexy the outfit is though, given their passion for following the comics.