apinknightmare

Like Ben Wyatt and Leslie Knope - most perfectly handled relationship on any show I've ever watched. I agree that the show runners are tempted to tease and drag out until no one cares anymore. But I suppose the point of my original post was that O&F was just made canon 15 eps ago, so I figured people wouldn't be so tired of the teasing yet, haha.

I also had a thought that making Oliver the new Ra's and letting him have access to the Lazarus Pit would be a way of dealing with the metahuman aspect since it looks like they might be bringing them onto the show. That way Oliver has "powers" without really having them. Yeah, he's a mortal, but he has a get out of death free card. It's such a ridiculous notion that I'd normally dismiss it, but with this show at this point I guess anything's possible. Although I'm not even remotely interested in watching a show like that. I do think though that we're going to watch Oliver lose the battle for his humanity in the past, but win it in the present - so if he takes Ra's up on his offer, he's going to only do it with the intent of beating him (and maybe consider keeping the mantle after he does it, but ultimately he won't).

Both of those were ensemble shows. Arrow isn't. Or, well...it wasn't. Not having the actor who plays the character your show's named after attend seems like a thing.

I'm convinced that all this "only the student can defeat the master" BS means that Oliver is going to take Ra's offer, learn from him, and then beat him that way. Although why they'd off him as a villain at this point in the show I don't know, unless they plan on bringing him back for vengeance later, or Oliver does something stupid like put Malcolm in charge of things.

If he was going to do that, wouldn't they still have announced him?

Could BR still show up as some kind of surprise special guest?

I think it's more likely that this is the dark part before the dawn. Even if they never, ever, ever completely go there with Oliver and Felicity, they will tease it until they die to keep shippers coming back for more.

Oh, I agree, I just was replying to the previous poster's assertion that Oliver was the only hypocrite between the two of them. Oliver definitely needed to be called out by her for the way that he's treated her, no doubt. I was glad that she did it.

My problem with Felicity isn't her behavior or the decisions that she's made (I haven't really disagreed with her thus far), it's when she's making them that are making me uncomfortable. Like that whole thing with her cleaning Ray's cuts that was not flirting but not NOT flirting while Oliver was dead. Going in on Oliver right after he came back from the "dead." And then last night, choosing to be with Ray while Oliver and Diggle were on their way to Nanda Parbat. Granted, she slept with Ray on the night Oliver decided to leave, but he did have to go to India, so she likely wasn't still with him while Oliver was doing whatever with Diggle in Nanda Parbat, but narratively it does come off that way. And that doesn't make her look so good. Not that she should put her personal life on hold for them or anything, but they should've at least taken a second to show that she was sitting in the foundry watching them via satellite or by tracker or something while they were infiltrating the League. Because they made it look like she doesn't care.

Yeah. She went there the first time looking for him because he'd been MIA for a week working on his suit. Then she locked his system. I think she left and then came back again, although I can't remember exactly what about, so maybe she only left once. But anyway, she brought him some food and then told him he needed to take a shower, so he did, and then he came out into his living room after the shower in only a towel and they kissed which I guess led to the sex which thankfully they spared us having to watch in any way, shape or form.

I don't think Ray is a stalker per se, but his past behavior towards her (coming to her home uninvited, walking into her home uninvited, pinging her cell phone to talk to her after she told him she didn't want to talk to him) puts some of this "romantic" stuff in a bad light. Like, maybe in some other scenario Ray walking into his living room in only a towel knowing Felicity was there might have been cute, or maybe believable that he just forgot to get dressed. But given the things he's done to pursue her and the way he talks to her, everything that led up to the sex in this ep just seemed so not genuine and squicky and IMO a little predatory? I mean, Felicity didn't do anything she didn't want to do, and I'm not trying to suggest that he coerced her or gave her unwelcome advances, it's just difficult to watch that when a character that I've legit come to love and care about over the past two seasons so obviously falls for a line (that I'm pretty sure wasn't supposed to come off as a line, but so did). And not only that, Ray took off and left her in bed to try out his suit that he specifically went to her for help with. She provided the chip to get it to work and fucked him into mindless oblivion enough for him to be able to clear the mechanism and figure out the last thing that had been stumping him, and he couldn't even be bothered to ask her if she wanted to see it work? I wish his Tony Stark wannabe ass had just crashed right into the ground without even a cab to break his fall like Count Vertigo v. 1.0. I don't really care that she slept with him - I get why she did it, I guess, but I just wish she had gotten something better.

From the Behind the Mask thread, regarding Felicity sleeping with her boss: Yeah, this was a dynamic that I didn't particularly care for last season with Oliver. And now that they rectified that, they're doing it again with Ray. It's somewhat better in that she's not the cliched assistant nailing an executive, but Ray does still sign her paychecks, and I'm just never a fan of that workplace dynamic. My mother was a big fan of workplace romances, and had to relocate several times because of it once they went bad. But, Felicity won't suffer any of the real-life consequences that people generally do when things go sour between a boss and employee, so I can go with it here. I just wish Ray didn't have that power over her (not that I get the impression from him that he's vindictive at all in a way that would make her pay for this professionally when they break up).

I'll take my response to the Relationships thread, because I forgot where we were for a sec.

It's never okay, but people do it all the time. But it's very rarely a good idea, and I really wish they hadn't gone there with Felicity.

It definitely seemed like displaced feelings - she mentioned Oliver to Ray (not by name) more than once, and went to him for the final time (she'd been to his apartment twice before IIRC) right after Oliver decided he was going off to NP again but that he would most definitely for sure not be killed this time. I think she was trying to get Ray out of the "all ATOM all the time" mindset ("saving him") because she was genuinely worried about him, but as far as the kiss/sex goes, it definitely seemed to be in reaction to Oliver's choices.

Nah, I don't think so, at least not ship-wise. He was pretty optimistic about it in the summer, and I'm assuming he knew the general paces Oliver and the gang was going to be put through. And he said positive things about Oliver and Felicity at the Dallas con which was just a few weeks ago, and he had to have read up to episode 19 at that point. It's just the typical ship stall, will they-won't they, let's frustrate the audience kind of thing, which is kind of what happened after they stalled the Olicity train last year with Sara. I just think it's a little bit of a strange tactic.

I wonder why he felt the need to answer that question that way? I mean, I get it, the Raylicity train is leaving the station, all aboard or whatever. But they know the ship base is HUGE and I just don't understand not only pushing the Ray/Felicity storyline on the show but also actively trying to kill any hope of it in the future? Wouldn't it make more sense to give people a little something to hold on to, even if they really don't ever intend on going there with Felicity and Oliver again? They did the same thing last year after the Sara lunge, and it's just kind of stupid in my opinion.

And Laurel, a liar, lectures Oliver about being a liar.

So here's what I'm thinking: I always figured that Oliver was going to turn Ra's offer down and that Ra's was going to rain down hellfire on him, but what if Ra's rains down hellfire on him in order to get him to accept his offer? And Oliver actually does it - that's the business with the suit change? Then I'm guessing Ra's is going to get inside jobbed by Oliver or something, so the "only the student can defeat the master" BS actually comes true. Then Ra's can come back at a later date to get his revenge or something. Except that doesn't really do much for the Oliver Queen v. Arrow BS identity crisis they're selling this year, and it's not like Oliver can go to the League and make them a bunch of do-gooders who don't kill. But it would get him out of Starling City so they could have their own little Justice League (sans Arrow, until he gets his head on straight or whatever) - maybe that's what SA was talking about when he said that the number of heroes in the city influences how he feels about things at the end of the season? Maybe he gives up Arrow AND Oliver Queen? It's a ridiculous theory, but this show is getting ridiculous, so...

Someone from DC reviews their scripts - if they had an issue with any of this I suspect they'd say so.

Regarding the extended promo I just posted, I love that Ra's let Oliver go and take Malcolm with him despite the fact that Oliver obviously didn't give him an answer about being his "heir" yet. I know it's the kind of thing you need to sleep on, but as a villain you should never give someone time to think on that. I wonder if he laid out some kind of consequences if Oliver said no? Maybe the whole thing about his city turning on him was a promise and not just a list of pros for becoming the next Ra's that he was reading off of a white board?

I actually thought that he was living AT the office in a suite or something. Didn't he finish the suit at home? Then did he drive over to PT to get on top of the building to fly off of it? Or did he fly off his own apartment building over to PT and then fly off of that? Why am I asking, I don't even care about Ray.

Not until Nyssa teaches her how to get someone in a proper choke hold and then lets her go and they kiss a lil bit. Well, I meant "almost immediately" as he would make his decision during the ep. :) But you're totally right.

I feel like Oliver has to turn Ra's down almost immediately (and it seems like he will based on what Ra's said to him about his city hating him or whatever in the preview) in order for Ra's to make his life a living hell for a sufficient amount of time this season. We've only got 8 eps left, Ra's needs to get to destroying some Oliver Queen!

I'm actually surprised that more people don't seem to be angry about this. Seems like most of the people I follow who would get up-in-arms over it responded with a resounding "meh." Maybe TPTB did a good job of preparing everyone? Or maybe Ray is just that bland. ETA: I realized this might come off as me trying to talk you out of your irritation with Felicity - not my intention. I'm just genuinely surprised more people aren't angry/riled up about it.