hogwash

I can't believe Year of Diggle is real. I'm so happy.

I love this shaman lady. Most of what she's saying is nonsense but she works it.

Are we sure this is really Arrow? I count 4 new sets...

Combining Zoom (the best thing about the first half) with Jay Garrick (the worst thing about the first half) then building the entire season around that was a bad choice. None of the Jay Garrick stuff was good. NONE! I can't believe that stupid and bland romance with Caitlin actually became a major plot point. Hopefully, they'll stick the landing??

It's nothing like Laurel/Oliver where the issues were obvious from the pilot (her SISTER???) so I don't get this screw-up with Iris/Barry. They're way past showing at this point so I'm even cool with a sudden confession. Instead, it's like pulling teeth getting Iris to say outright that she has romantic feelings for Barry. What are the odds that Iris will be more involved in the main plot if she's Barry's girlfriend? Anything's better than the BFFs who don't actually talk to each other but after the last couple of episodes I'm not so sure. The sausage fest is too strong!

This is the second(?) time Iris has prefaced with "the universe says so" and I have no idea what the heck they're trying to do that.

Cisco had some stupid lines today. Whatever, I'm willing to ignore that cause the rest of the episode was amazing. Yay, Baby Speedsters who (hopefully) don't need pep talks! I'm so excited.

Did the flashback at Laurel's apt feel like the Ghost of Lauriver Yet to Come to anyone else? A weird glimpse at what could've been the start of Laurel becoming the Black Canary alongside Oliver becoming the Green Arrow if Oliver hadn't secretly been a vigilante/spree killer who had just failed horribly at his life's mission...

It does look like that but I don't think her alcohol arc started after she admitted that she really blamed herself for Tommy's death. Her first response was trying to use her ~connection~ to the Hood (Flash's "homage" to those damn rooftop withe the clueless love interest scenes was so cute. Go Wally!) to try to have him arrested.

Sliding a Dear John letter and the sweetheart picture from the maiden voyage of the douche cruise under her door? The lengths Oliver goes to avoid dumping Laurel in person are kinda funny.

The Flash's inability to incorporate more than 2 female characters at a time while simultaneously using 4+ male characters with no issues is my favorite running gag from the show. I love it almost as much I love watching characters giving Barry pep talks...

I liked Baby Canary and her mini version of Laurel's S03 arc. Wow, Ruve Darhk is an opportunistic piece of work. I liked that outing Laurel as the Black Canary made sense. The first time the anti-vigilante task force has made sense since Lance in S01. The Darhks are great villains. I'm excited for more of them. I hope they get scenes together soon. I liked this episode way more than 418 even with the retconning. I liked how the previous funeral scenes fit so seamlessly in the episode.

I'm not completely watching LOT but every time I've tuned in so far the team stands around talking about their newest plan to (not) stop Vandal while Kendra is off alone thinking about her relationship with Ray. I don't hate them together but I don't get all the focus on their relationship. I did like her old West self though I wish they talked about something other than Ray.

I don't know anything about comics but turning the cool Black Canary/Dinah I've vaguely remember from a couple of animated cartoons and movies into Rachel Dawes was stupid as hell. Rachel Dawes shouldn't be used as inspiration for anything (I swear she only existed to get fridged). Who wants to watch Rachel Dawes fight crime? Sara was an amazing fix for that. No idea why they went back to the Rachel Dawes fighting crime plan only to scrap it yet again. Back on the current topic: I really really liked Oliver and Felicity in 401. Everything before the BMD in the crossover worked for me but intimacy and teamwork in 401 was so true to the characters I watched S01 and S02 and was pretty much exactly how I thought a relationship between them would look within and outside the team. So there hasn't that much Olicity drama this season but the steadily climb to the BMD explosion since 408 did not make a good impression. Then to top it off the 415 breakup and the 416 angst didn't even kinda live up to the "hype".

I'm not expecting much on Iris's feelings and POV. It's as if they blew it all on the tsunami episode that got erased. I hope the actual relationship is handled better. Anyway, this episode seemed more like a sausage fest than usual. Went out of the way to exclude Iris and Caitlin. That conversation about Wally wanting to move in should've been between Joe and Iris.

I hope Flash has something else up their sleeve with this Jay/Zoom/Hunter cause the only thing of that worked for me was Caitlin begging for Barry's life. Just bleh. Does one of the Flash writers have a grudge against the Jay Garrick character? Having someone beat their wife in his iconic costume was a giant wtf.

Finally got around to watching this. Lovely finale. I laughed so hard at the end of the episode (and kept going back and forth on whether it was real). Great teaser for S02. Is it bad that I want Josh and Rebecca together because it's/they're funnier than Greg and Rebecca?

Another OC Canary? I appreciate that they've taking steps to reverse the boneheaded/nonsensical decision to kill Sara so Laurel could take over the mantle but we're quickly reaching overkill territory...

Wait. Seriously?? Who came up with that? No wonder these movies don't work.

Very true. The execution was wonky in 418 but I get what they were trying to do after the 419 stills/blurb, and came out.

It does make sense that it was supposed to be ambiguous and look like a typical Arrow "death" but this time it sticks. Though me and several others joked that it looked like Oliver offed her because the transition was so bizarre. We'll see. Hopefully, they have a better handle on it than usual.

Everyone knew that they weren't gonna kill Oliver. Just get him out of the way for a couple of episodes (like @lemotomato mentioned) so Laurel could become Black Canary and get on Team Arrow without Oliver's interference/approval. But his death was awesome but the aftermath and resolution got flubbed hard (barely any reactions from Team Arrow and penicillin tea). It doesn't help that they based S03 around Sara's death then announced several episodes before the finale that she was coming back (you had one job, Ray!). No one who died in S03 stayed dead except the bad guy. So, it's no surprise it's become a joke. Like Barry and pep talks (you can do it, me!). Got really make this one stick.

Oliver's death is what really made death a joke. Sara would die and come back two more times to top Oliver getting stabbed with a sword, falling hundreds of feet down a mountain, then bleeding to death shirtless in the snow for several hours.

I always thought it was weird that S02 opened with Oliver back on the island but it makes sense. He had all these ideas and plans when he decided(?) to leave Lian Yu but literally none of it worked out. His first year back in Starling was kind of a disaster. Tommy died, he failed horribly at stopping the Undertaking, he had no reason to the Hood anymore, and his romantic relationship with Laurel didn't work for ~whatever~ reason so he said screw it and went back to what he knew aka Lian Yu.

Yeah, he's not that person anymore. But I was responding more to the entire comment where it's the object of the unrequited feelings has no reason to feel bad about not reciprocating but does anyway because of the circumstances.