statsgirl

Given how smart she is, and how much she babbles, and her father abandoning her, I can see Felicity growing up as the girl who was on the outside, who would look over at the 'in crowd' and wish that she could somehow join them and be popular too, if only for a little while. With Team Arrow, she probably felt that at last she belonged. As long as it was Diggle and Oliver who were fighting and taking scars, both big, muscular and male, she could compartmentalize the team -- the men fighting, herself at the computers. But then Sara came and she was fighting alongside the men and trading scars with them and it made Felicity feel left out again. That's probably why she put on an exercise outfit and started to beat up the punching bag till Oliver came down and disapproved of it. (It still makes me want to smack him.) You're right, Sakura12, that being upset about someone else being a better hacker would have made a better story. I think the writers wanted to show that Felicity was jealous of Sara not because she was sleeping with Oliver but because she was more useful in the Arrow cave and they handled it clumsily.

That is a cute baby. I'm glad they're jumping into her already born rather than the mess most shows make of late pregnancy and birth stuff. I hope Laurel and Felicity won't be written to be friends. For thing, Felicity is Sara's friend not Laurel's, just as Sin is Sara's protege not Laurel's. (I think Sin would be smart enough to see through Laurel.) From the comments about Laurel's fans being happy about what's going to happen with her (didn't they say that about last season too?) it's possible that they've realized that the character doesn't work with Team Arrow in the lair as Sara and Roy do and they're going to put her off into her DA bubble rather than in the new cave even if she is wearing leather now. Saying that what's going to happen with her is has been what has been building up over the past 46 episodes may well be true if she becomes Manhunter, and equally true that it's not what the EPs had in mind originally. After all, he does refer to himself in the third person (weirding out Diggle). I like the idea that the Arrow is finally 'together' while Oliver Queen is still a hot mess. Now that as the Arrow he is a hero rather than a killer, the next step is for Oliver to integrate the two parts of his personality and, as the EPs said, to decide how much of his humanity he wants back. If Oliver feels that he's not okay to be in a relationship with Felicity (we assume from the spoilers), I doubt he'll be wanting custody or even a face-to-face connection with his kid since fatherhood requires a lot more health and emotional availability than being in a relationship. That's the feeling I got too, which is why I don't think Felicity will realize that Oliver likes her when the date fails to come off as it should. (Such a small word, 'likes' to express their relationship.) If she did, she wouldn't give up on him so soon as to be going out with Ray by November sweeps. A guy she likes finally likes her back? She'd give him time to see if he came around. This is the Felicity who sat for days by Barry's bedside even though they were both second choices for each other.

Traci is my favourite character, which made it hard to watch how stupid she's become this season. How does the actress still manage to act like she cares? I still hate Andi/Sam but at least it's not as dysfunctional as it was before. I think the only person I liked in this episode was Dov because he's been there, done that, but he's still trying, and Oliver when he gave Peck the go-ahead for the raid.

Yes. Since the Church still considers them married, why go through getting an annulment (which can take 3 years) only to get married in the Church again? It was a stupid subplot, although nice to see how much Donnie loves Kate. (I'm worried they're going to kill him off so she can end up with Daniel.) The tumor was fun, although I'd seen it on Remedy a few months ago. John Glover rocked.

Me too, I'm ashamed to say. Generally PIerce's lectures are 100x better than the neuropsych ones I got but it was fun to see him being insulted, I'm pretty meh on the 'A' plot (because really, he could have waited a little while longer to commit suicide, he still had lots of brain cells to spare) but I really like Pierce's father's story, something many of us are going through, and Peter Coyote did a great job.

Coming from a couple of fandoms (NCIS and House) where people who didn't like the ship repeatedly and adamantly said it didn't exist, it's nice to have Guggenheim acknowledge that yes, there is chemistry and attraction between the two characters and the show will be exploring that. Quite possibly, but if they do, there will be more story to tell later in this season and the next ones. it is still the start of season three and much too soon to get them together because the alternative is the 'get together/break up/get back together' spinning wheel and I hate that. I find that "our friendship is too important to risk by getting into a relationship" is usually code for "I'm too scared to try". I'm hoping that Laurel will be happy with her new love interest and she'll finally move on from Oliver..

Mark Pedowitz, saying pretty much nothing (but it's a little spoilery so I'm putting it here): The Arrow EPs must be thrilled to have created this universe on CW. (But The Flash wasn't a planted spinoff last spring, I think, it was planned to but never shown on TV.)

I liked that she was passionate about protecting her family and her secrets. Often the wrong decision, but a lovely complex character and a good match for Malcolm Merlyn.

Sara: The ideas of 'princess', 'essence' and 'pure' have possibilities. Since it's Sanskrit or Farsi, there may be something connected with the LoA. I think it's a hoot that they're talking about Laurel's fans being very happy with what will be happening to her. It's a good idea to know your target audience. Have they given up on the rest of us at last?

Matt let me down, along with AK and MG. I don't care so much about Felicity's backstory, what I want to see is her having a current storyline that's all about her and not as a love interest to the next male superhero she has to prop. Maybe there's hope in the storyline that she has with Roy. Ed who? (kidding) I hope you're wrong because I wouldn't like that at all. If they're going to make Felicity's father someone out of the comics, then let it be someone worth writing about. Sara gets the LoA, Thea gets the Dark Archer as her father, Laurel is possibly being trained by the Wildcat and Ra's al Ghul is hovering in the background but all Felicity gets is a character so minor character he isn't even in wikipedia? That would be shafting her character yet again. The EPs probably thought so too. That was probably the plan .... and then there was the execution. Yeah, and I have a bridge in Florida that I just bought. I'm not surprised that they're pushing Laurel, especially in a legal role, because this season may be the last kick at the can to save Laurel since KC's contract is up at the end of it. I wouldn't be surprised at all if at the end, she turns out to be Manhunter and the EPs are all "yeah, this is what we were going for all along, fooled ya!" That's kind of funny. These are the writers that made Arrow into a substantial TV show and away from the CWs Gossip Girl image and made Arrow a better reviewed show than Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. I doubt they're going to be replaced. She wasn't showing (Diggle didn't know) so no more than four months. With a seven month time jump, the baby could be 2 months old, leaving out the rush to the maternity ward (which is a very good thing) and jumping into Diggle coping with fatherhood and how it affects the other members of the team. Roy could go out and fight with Oliver but who will be the one giving well-thought advice?

Thanks for finding that. That was really nice of him to respond so fast. I wrote that while I was freaking out at these spoilers just in case he or Ausiello noticed. If he asks about Felicity's backstory first, hopefully AK and MG will assume we want to know more about Felicity as a person rather than as arm-candy. So his inbox was filled with the ILU scene? I guess it was a good move to leave that and the jacket hand-over for people to talk about over the summer. But why let KC keep talking about becoming BC if they're going to move her into Manhunter? CL was sworn to secrecy about her role on the show next year. The EPs are probably saving it all up for a big Sara announcement at SDCC. Given how upset he was after Tommy died, wouldn't he be worried about Thea's emotional state with Moira dead and knowing now that (dead) Malcolm is her father, not to mention her lack of money and few job skills? The guy really doesn't do emotional stuff well. Or at all.

The only two non-Oliver characters that the TV Guide writer asked about were Laurel and Thea. Thea I can understand since there's no picture section on her but Laurel grrr. That makes the third place in the article that gets a Laurel mention .. Laurel's picture, Felicity's picture and the interview page. You'd think she was a big draw to the series. On the other hand, saying "If she undergoes hero training" sounds like AK has finally got it that we're not all salivating to see Laurel in fishnets.

For those going to SDCC, there will be Arrow backpack swag.

It's the same old thing -- Diggle has his family and a lot of meaty emotional stuff, Quentin has being chief and working with the Arrow, Laurel has her work in the DA's office sending criminals to prison and Felicity? her feelings for Oliver and rivalry with Laurel. No storyline of her own, yet. Ever.

I'm hoping that Felicity will contact Nyssa to remove Laurel. Or maybe her mysterious father can do something about Laurel. Maybe Felicity can hack into a data base and get Laurel a job offer in Central City. Any chance that "specific end point" for Laurel could be off the show? I suppose I should have realized it though -- Felicity is a very popular character and they've tried everything else to make Laurel work. We don't know that about Felicity though. We don't know if her mother cares about her, and we have to assume her father didn't because he left. I'm not saying we should have less story for Sara, I like Sara. I just used her as an example of how little we actually know about Felicity even though she's been on almost twice as many episodes as Sara has. Even Roy, far less prominent than Felicity, has friends and a life outside Team Arrow.

There are no words obscene enough to say how I feel about using Felicity to prop up Laurel now. Oliver, Barry, Ray and now Laurel -- she's the show's catalyst, used to affect everyone else's storyline but never having a story herself. We had flashbacks to how they were pre-island. Laurel was the star child but both Quentin and Dinah cared about and loved Sara. We don't know all that much about Sara's relationships with Ivo, Nyssa and Sin but we know nothing about Felicity's relationships with anyone other than Oliver, Diggle and Walter.

This is Laurel we're talking about. The only two times she's ever acknowledged she was wrong was when she finally stopped blaming the Arrow for Tommy's death, and when she apologized to Sara after Oliver gave up on her. I doubt Laurel will ever admit that she never really knew Oliver I don't even think she'll even say he's changed from the person she knew because she's not the type of person to see her own flaws much less acknowledge them in public. As for wanting him in her life, I'd guess she wants him even more now that she knows he's a hero. That's an interesting idea. I assumed that he was a guy who pre-island always took the path of least resistance, possibly because there was nothing he wanted badly enough that he didn't get to actually have to fight for it, so he cheated on Laurel because girls were willing and it was fun to do. When Laurel wanted them to get an apartment together, he may have deliberately picked Sara, as opposed to another girl, to cheat on her with because it was the most likely thing to blow up on him and then Laurel would back down. Maybe he thought she'd be back when she cooled down, or maybe he didn't care enough if she didn't. Don't believe anything you hear on Criminal Minds. Serial killers (of which there is probably more in one season of US television than there has been in the last century of the country) and rapists often lack the capacity for empathy and more judgement. (If you want to read a book on it, The Psychopath Within by James Fallon is good.) I remember back to when the double-bind theory was in vogue and schizophrenia was thought to be caused by bad mothering. Those poor, poor mothers. From the Spoiler thread: He wouldn't be the first guy who did. But I don't think he really loved Laurel in the past when he was cheating on her with 12 different women. With Shado, it was more connecting to someone he liked and admired rather than being in love with her. The picture of Laurel seems to have disappeared as soon as he hooked up with Shado. I do think he loves Sara, but not in the way he feels about Felicity. What is in his favor is that he hesitated when Sara asked if he wanted to 'move in together'. To do that, let her assume that they're a couple while he has feelings for Felicity, would really be a douche thing to do.

If Quentin is being named Chief in the season opener, he's probably recovered and been back at work for quite a while. I still have a bet with one of the people commenting on Natalie Abrams' review that we will find out who Oliver really cares about next season. She's convinced that it's Laurel and he was willing to sacrifice Felicity to save Laurel. It may be something special about Sara that we don't know about, or it may be an episode devoted to her missing years. There have been flashes of backstory for other characters (Diggle, Laurel) but never a whole episode. I agree, it would be nice if she could just be a her own person rather than defined by a comic book hero or villain. But the problem is that on this show, if you don't have the extended connection, you got nuthin'. After appearing in 42 episodes, all we know about her is that 1. she graduated from MIT in 2009; 2. her father left when she was young; 3. she doesn't get on well with her mother who is a cocktail waitress in Las Vegas; 4. she dyes her hair; and 5. she's Jewish. Two facts from s1, three from s2. Compare that to Sara, who has been in 22 episodes and we know about her family and her relationship to each one, her relationship with Ivo, her time on the Amazo and how much she hated being in the LoA , her training sand her relationship with Nyssa and Sin. The show could go for another 3 years and still not give us any information about Felicity herself unless her family ties into the comic book world. Taking the rest to the Heartaches thread.

That's a subgenre of fanfic known as 'mpreg'. i never really understood the appeal, especially as it often seems to turn a male character into a female stereotype. He would have remembered since it was soon after his mother died and you don't forget those sorts of things. Thea's birthday is early in the new year so Moira would have got pregnant March 1994. On the tombstone it states that Tommy was born in 1985. Probably when they wrote Tommy saying his dad left when he was 8, Barrowman hadn't pitched making Thea Malcolm's daughter yet.

It's not unknown on the show to name an episode after a character. 'The Scientist' was Barry Allen, 'Heir to the Demon' Nyssa, and 'The Man Under The Hood' Slade. Season 1 had 'An Innocent Man', 'Dodger' and 'The Huntress Returns'. It may be that Sara is so popular they're naming her directly in an episode about her her to promote s3. We don't know what there is to explore in Felicity's background until we find out something about it which is another reason why it's so frustrating to know next to nothing about her. Sin seemed disconnected from everyone till we got the Sara flashback with her father on the island. Even Sara was just Laurel's sister who drowned on the Queen's Gambit until they connected her with Ivo and then the LoA. It's been speculated that Felicity's father could work for Ra's al Ghul, or even that he is Ra's himself (unlikely) since he abandoned Felicity and her mother many years ago. Or someone else significant in the DC world. If her background wasn't big, why push it off until s3 instead of telling us more last season? Not to mention, it would be a waste of storytelling potential to have it be nothing. It would make sense for it to be at least one episode, and better yet to push the story in the second half of s3 when the Ray story arc has been resolved.

It was released before the s2 finale aired but they said that this was something they would look at in s3. Let's say 'not associated with Oliver'. Felicity hasn't slept with him yet and she's weighed down more than anyone else.

No, no, you do them an injustice! There is a spoiler that her lying to Roy that he did nothing bad while under the mirakuru is going to come back to bite her. That's a spoiler that's about Roy. I'd say it's because they have trouble writing for women but look at Sara, who has the LoA, Nyssa and Nanda Parbat as well as her relationship with Oliver, Thea has going evil with Malcolm, Laurel has job and boyfriends and family, even Dinah has a teaching career and a man. Felicity, who is acknowledge to be a strong woman by all three EPs, is defined on the show by her hacking skills and her relationships with others, the men including Diggle and Sara.

Are there Felicity related spoilers? There is the description of 'Daniel' (Watch for this formidable fella to be a love interest for Felicity and a rival of Oliver’s – both personally and professionally) who we now know is Ray ("An unparalleled scientist and inventor, Ray will play an unexpected role in the lives of Oliver and (rumored love interest) Felicity as the new owner of Queen Consolidated.") There's the line from the show's pr "Oliver believes he can finally have a private life and asks Felicity (Emily Bett Rickards) out on a date.” And there's the scene with Oliver and Felicity walking down the steps of a building, Oliver talking and Felicity listening. Once again, everything is about how Felicity fits into Oliver's life, the rivalry with Ray professionally and personally, Oliver deciding he can ask her for a date, Oliver dealing with losing QC. There's nothing, again, about Felicity herself. Roy got mirakuru and Thea, Sara has LoA, Nyssa and her current life as an assasin, Diggle has Lyla and baby and Suicide Squad, Laurel has her law practice, Quentin in now Chief, but there's no spoiler about Felicity that isn't about Oliver or her plot contrivance to introduce Ray as they used her last season for Barry. I don't think Felicity's story was too big, I think that they preferred to spend the time on the Lance family drama and then they ran out of time because they needed to set up the big finale. The EPs figured she was a fan favourite and people would stick around for her no matter how little she got. For all their talk about loving the character of Felicity, they take her for granted. With practically zero information on Felicity, fans were desperate. The statement that two things from her speech in Heir to the Demon would come into play in the finale had people speculating all over the place. As it turned out, only one did. But I think that the number of theories and how crazy many of them were shows how much people want to know more about Felicity as a person rather than as a shadow of Oliver. Even Sin has one parent, Sara and Laurel have two, Thea had four (including Walter and Malcolm), even Roy has told us about his mother but we still know absolutely nothing about Felicity's and (going back to the topic of this thread) we have no spoilers about them, still.

That was pretty good. Normally I don't like tenors (tm It Takes a Thief) but I really liked what he did there. Here a song he wrote with Travis-Atreo Graham. I'll be looking for the Arrow: The Musical episode now.

No, certainly not the rest of her life. But this idea that he can't be with anyone he really cares about is b.s. and she should know that especially after he was just with Sara (and if Felicity doesn't already know it. Diggle will be happy to tell her). So she should at least hold on for a couple of months to see if he gets his head out of his ass. Then, if he's still being stubborn, she can move on. Ray comes on in the first episode of the season as the person who now runs Oliver's company and is booked on for 14 episodes. Presumably he's a good guy but Felicity just being his friend is already problematic because she should have some loyalty to Oliver even if it's only in a best friends kind of way. Immediately dating him when she knows Oliver reciprocates her feelings makes her seem shallow at best and deliberately hurtful at worst (Oliver pushes me away, I'll show him!). The way this show burns through storylines, even if Ray's episodes are spread out through the whole season, a 'dating Felicity' one will start early. If Oliver gives Felicity the "I can't be with" line and she starts dating Ray soon after that, it's going to be like Laurel, who really wanted Oliver, and then Tommy treated her well and she dated him, and then she found out Oliver was available and she flipped to sleeping with him right away. It was like for Laurel, Tommy was just a place holder till she got the guy she really wanted. I don't want Felicity to be like that. For me it's the timing.