S01.E02: Honor Thy Father

[formerlyfreedom]

Oliver heads to the courthouse to get his death certificate repealed and is pleasantly surprised to run into Laurel, who is there prosecuting Martin Somers, a criminal with ties to the Chinese Triad. Oliver recognizes Martin’s name from his father’s book and sets his sights on taking him down. Martin orders the Triad to "take care of" Laurel so they send their top mercenary -- China White -- after her. Meanwhile, Moira and Walter ask Oliver to take over the company.

 

Again, may I profess my love for Diggle? I love how he just doesn't take Oliver's crap.

 

John Diggle: I'm not the man you wanna take for a fool, Mr. Queen. You understand me?

Oliver Queen: Yes.

John Diggle: I think I'm just beginning to understand what kind of man you are.

Oliver Queen: Shouldn't take you very long. I'm shallow.

[Lisin]

I mean! This show!! Such a great second episode! We get Oliver acting like a douche canoe at the press conference, the Island Archer introduction, Oliver finding the list in his dead dad's pocket,

I really miss the list you guys

shirtless rope climbing! The original Recurve Bow not the compound hybrid (I like the old bow best). So many great things! One of the things that drew me in initially was how this show moved plot along very fast, I hope they get back to that. 

[icandigit]

I really loved having Tommy there in the beginning to remind the audience what Oliver used to be like.Love Tommy.

 

The whole thing of Oliver being legally resurrected really affected me. What do the kids these days call it "feels". So him seeing Laurel after that was off putting.

So they thought they could gain viewers by showing SA shirtless frequently. I think it was a solid marketing strategy.

"I've been alone for five years, mom, alone." hee. hee.

"You don't even come close to my definition of grief".Diggle is made of win.Oliver and Diggle were enough to keep me invested in the show in the earlier episodes.

 

I don't know why but I love the scene at QC, where's trying to pretend to be who he was. Loved that he's still pissed about Walter and Moira.  I know it took a while for the show to find its footing, but I really fell in love withe show at the beginning. Binge watching could have something to do with that.

He's not ready to talk about it, back up off him Thea.

 

I remember expecting so much at the beginning of this ice cream scene and being disappointed. I thought we'd have Laurel and Oliver reminiscing and really getting a sense of what their relationship was like. And none of that happened.This was the moment I was looking to be sold on Laurel and Oliver.

 

I was barely tolerating the island flashbacks in the beginning. Glad they got more entertaining.

[quarks]

Ah, yes, the episode where I started to hate both Laurel and China White's wig!

 

I watched the Spanish (Castellano) dub, since this is the third time I've seen this episode. Some things I noticed this time around:

 

1. We have a new winner for worst actress on Arrow: whoever is dubbing Joanna in Castellano. Just horrible. Flat intonation that has absolutely nothing to do with whatever Joanna is saying at any given moment.  The other dubs, however, are pretty good - although amusingly whoever is voicing Oliver gets a lot more passionate than Amell does, and whoever is dubbing Laurel sometimes seems to be incredulous at the lines she's being forced to say, especially during the Laurel vs. Quentin police protection scene. Thea's dubbing is very good.

 

Amusingly I find it slightly easier to follow Quentin in Spanish than in Blackthorne's attempt at what I think he thinks is a Chicago accent.

 

2. Yikes, China White's wig is terrible.

 

3. This episode really focused on the shirtless moments and Thea touching Oliver everywhere, didn't it? 

 

4. And also

started the great tradition of people breaking into Laurel's apartment! Let's start counting!

 

4. Interesting blocking: when Laurel and Oliver are not really bonding over ice cream they are far apart: only after she's physically threatened do they move together.

 

5. Ok. Obviously, I'm not going to get out of this episode without complaining about Laurel. I forgot just how bad that scene where she runs into Oliver at the courthouse - that actually involves four people (the client, Joanna, Tommy and Oliver) that Laurel is making feel uncomfortable. Followed by her horrible scene with Quentin where she's acting as if she's 16 because he wants to put police protection on her. Grr. 

 

Her second confrontation with Quentin is much better, but still.

 

6. I love the little tape recording arrow.  Who cares about illegal wiretapping?

 

7.

No wonder Isabel was able to take over the company a year and a half

after Oliver's little moment there. 

 

8. I checked and didn't see

a hatch. So...are we to believe that Argus built it within the last three/four years, after Oliver headed to Hong Kong, and just antiqued up the place to make prisoners feel worse?

Edited May 31, 2014 by quarks

[statsgirl]

quarks, maybe 

the hatch was on another side of the island. ARGUS was already there, the high heeled black Loubitons that Fyers was reporting to were the same shoes Amanda Waller was wearing in Hong Kong.

 

I liked seeing Oliver and "Digg" gradually grow to respect each other.

 

While always entertaining, I think sometimes Oliver's training sessions get a little ridiculous. When he deliberately dropped the five blocks of concrete and they broke, I thought 'Not a good idea, now you're going to have to go out and bring in five more so I can keep working out'.

 

Laurel kept ping-ponging from crusading lawyer with the client to petulant child every time she was in a scene with her father.  The ice cream scene with Oliver was weird because it was neither fish nor fowl.  She snarked at him quite a lot but then she gave him the advice on how to present himself to his mother.  I wonder if the problem with it was that the purpose was to have Oliver in her apartment when the Triad made the hit but there wasn't a good way to write Oliver there.

 

When Oliver first walked into Laurel's apartment, he commented that it looked the same as it had looked five years before and she replied "I didn't have time to redecorate", as if she was too busy doing important things to have the time to do something to her apartment, superior to mere mortals.   I don't know why but Laurel just rubs me the wrong way.

 

Loved that he's still pissed about Walter and Moira.

It actually makes a lot of sense -- he was idolizing his father at that point in order to "honor his memory" by cleaning up the Glades. That his mother could marry someone else was dishonoring Robert's memory.

Edited May 31, 2014 by statsgirl

[quarks]

statsgirl,

 

I think it's the same beach. The Blu-ray says the problem is that they have a very limited location and angles to shoot the island in - it's surrounded by private homes - and that's the one beach where they can pan out and only have to digitally remove one house.

[BkWurm1]

When Oliver first walked into Laurel's apartment, he commented that it looked the same as it had looked five years before and she replied "I didn't have time to redecorate", as if she was too busy doing important things to have the time to do something to her apartment, superior to mere mortals. I don't know why but Laurel just rubs me the wrong way.

Wait, I thought Laurel was living with her family before she and Oliver were looking to live together. I guess I'll count that as a little continuity problem unless Laurel is living in the same apartment her family had?

[Tangerine]

Wait, I thought Laurel was living with her family before she and Oliver were looking to live together. I guess I'll count that as a little continuity problem unless Laurel is living in the same apartment her family had?

 

I think it's a continuity error. In the Lance family flashback we saw in Season 2, she was still living at home, and it wasn't that apartment. I suppose you could hand-wave it to say that in the season 2 flashback she was just visiting her parents and that she had been living in that apartment during university. Which is a pretty darn nice place for a college student. 

Edited May 31, 2014 by Tangerine

[MsSchadenfreude]

I love rewatching Diggle in these early episodes.  The expressions he gets on his face whenever Oliver pulls one of his stunts crack me up.  And you just know whenever he refers to Oliver as "sir" inside he is really saying "jackass"  The fight and knife throwing scenes in Laurel's apartment were awesome though.  Diggle and Oliver are both realizing there is more to the other than they originally thought.  I like that growing sense of respect between them.

 

Oliver does play a nice drunk.  "It's Walter, my new dad"  And the ever classy Walter just smiles sadly and sighs at Oliver's antics.  Moira telling Oliver his slacker ways used to be charming when he was younger, but are not any longer made me laugh.  Because big tough Oliver looked just like every little kid who's ever been scolded by his mom.

 

I don't remember being WOWed by the Oliver/Laurel ice cream scene the first time, but when people talked it up, I thought I missed something.  But nope, on rewatch it doesn't seem to be anything special to me.

 

Part of my problem with Laurel from the beginning is that she comes across as cold or obnoxious in all of her scenes.   Rolling her eyes when she meets Oliver in the courthouse and then whining about her dad putting her under police protection made her sound like an immature brat and not a strong woman who can fight her own battles (which I think is what the writers were going for in those scenes, but that didn't come across at all).  Even her scene at the end with Oliver when she tells him the next time he wants to connect to bring rocky road showed nothing remotely warm or inviting about the character.  I would have been perfectly fine if Laurel wanted nothing to do with Oliver after what happened (that would have made sense and she could have been as cold and hard as she wanted in those scenes), but if these two are supposed to be re-connecting you have to give me something because right now I have zero interest in watching those two characters together.

 

Thea I realize you had a bad time with things, but I don't think a week is enough time to expect Oliver to be ready to open up to you.  Ease up on him a bit.

Edited May 31, 2014 by MsSchadenfreude

[statsgirl]

Thea is such a selfish brat the first episodes.  I can understand why, she was rich, she'd virtually lost her family when she was 12 and her mother was still letting her get away with everything, but she's not a pleasant person. I wonder why I still feel sympathy for her, maybe it's because Willa Holland sells that Thea really does love Oliver even when she's complaining about him.

 

 

Rolling her eyes when she meets Oliver in the courthouse and then whining about her dad putting her under police protection made her sound like an immature brat and not a strong woman who can fight her own battles (which I think is what the writers were going for in those scenes, but that didn't come across at all).

I think the problem with Laurel has always been that what the writers think they are putting across for her isn't what we see.  When people complained about her 

in Sacrifice, foolishly going to CNRI to get the papers when everyone told her not it, Guggenheim said that we would understand why she had to when the deleted scenes came out. The reason was that she wanted to gather the paperwork so the criminal they were prosecuting wouldn't go free, but she still seemed stupid for having the information on line and backing it up.

 

Thanks, quarks. It's such a beautiful island, the people who live there must be lucky.

[Danny Franks]

Ah, the beginning of the (thankfully) brief 'Thea clearly wants to jump her brother' subtext. It goes to show, even as early as this, people saw less chemistry between Oliver and his supposed great love than they did between him and his sister. I remember saying on TWoP that, if the showrunners had a lot of balls, they could explore the idea of Thea having a crush on her brother, due to the extreme circumstances of their relationship. Glad they didn't, though.

 

I did think they pushed Thea too far into bitch territory, with her getting annoyed and giving up on Oliver so quickly. She was starting to see how messed up he was, and yet kept making things about her, and how she needed him to be something he wasn't being. It was tough to like Thea, in these early episodes.

 

One thing I really liked about the episode was how Oliver took Laurel's words about showing Moira who he wanted her to see him as, quite literally. He wanted Moira to see him as the wastrel, drunk at public events and rude to one and all, so she'd stop expecting him to take a role in the company. And so that was exactly what Oliver showed her. It was a nice little twist on what was set up in that ice cream scene.

 

The fact that Laurel forgave Oliver again (is that twice in two episodes, now?) and invited him in for a chat over ice cream, is still something that irritates me. How was anyone ever going to like this doormat of a woman? Especially when she can't even make her own mind up about how she feels about someone, unless they tell her to feel a certain way. From 'If you need a shoulder to cry on' to 'he told me to stay away from him and he was right' to 'let me give you some well-meaning advice while you share your burdens with me'. Just... whiplash writing that sacrificed Laurel's characterisation at the expense of moving Oliver from A to B.

[slayer2]

It is in character with Black Canary and Green Arrow's relationship though. I mean he cheated on her more times than could count and was just an overall lout. It's a wonder she ever stayed with him and no wonder they got divorced, so the dysfunctional Ollie/Laurel relationship makes a lot of sense to me wrt to that, it's pretty true to form. They both keep on circling back to each other all the while probably wondering what the fuck is wrong with them.

[BkWurm1]

I just wish the show would show "in show" the reason why they keep circling back to each other. It's implied that she's his first love, but the show hasn't gone out of its way to show their past relationship as something good and the disconnect is very confusing. One of the fanwanks I'd constructed for myself the first time I watched this episode is that Oliver and Laurel were buddies as little kids before any boy/girl stuff started to complicate things which to me explained why he'd go eat ice cream with Laurel, trying to recapture some of that innocence lost, but the show hasn't supported my early explanations.

[statsgirl]

I know they kept going back to each other in the comics but on TV, that would be pure soap opera.  Different medium, different requirements IMO.

[Password]

It doesn't translate well because on tv we like to see characters grow. Everything about Laurel and Oliver is stagnant and even regressive when they circle back to one another and it becomes unpleasant to watch. The show does itself no favours by not allowing us to see why exactly they circle back. In particular, Laurel has zero reason to even like Oliver. Whilst we see other relationships grow and mature and be healthy, their annoying dynamic is so full of past angst that it's hard to see them as anything but toxic.

[statsgirl]

It also makes no sense.  In Damaged, Oliver hired Laurel to defend him on charges of being The Vigilante because she believed  that he was just a rich playboy, he couldn't possibly be the guy saving everyone so she would fight to get him off, in Sacrifice he told her that she always saw the best in him, and in City of Blood, she's telling him that she knows him in her bones even though she missed entirely that he was The Hood.  Which is it, show?

 

It doesn't translate well because on tv we like to see characters grow.

I definitely do.  When characters stagnate or worse regress, I wonder why I am wasting my time with them.

[Danny Franks]

It is in character with Black Canary and Green Arrow's relationship though. I mean he cheated on her more times than could count and was just an overall lout. It's a wonder she ever stayed with him and no wonder they got divorced, so the dysfunctional Ollie/Laurel relationship makes a lot of sense to me wrt to that, it's pretty true to form. They both keep on circling back to each other all the while probably wondering what the fuck is wrong with them.

 

A relationship that I consider pretty irrelevant, given that neither Oliver nor Laurel, in this show, resemble Ollie and Dinah in any way, shape or form. Comic book Ollie is more of an aging lothario, smooth talking and shallow, and Dinah has far more strength and grace than Laurel could muster if her life depended on it. For what it's worth, their relationship has only worked in comic books when it's been forced by writers, in my view. Never cared for them, nor understood why Dinah would be so hung up on the old asshole. 

 

But that's besides the point. Whatever their relationship in the comics, it doesn't translate well to television where, as mentioned, viewers don't really want to see the same mistakes being made, over and over again. In this case, the repetition had begun by the second episode of the show. Laurel couldn't even muster the strength of emotion to be angry at Oliver for a week. He said sorry, she invited him in for a nice chat. They scuppered her as a strong character, right out of the gate.

Edited June 2, 2014 by Danny Franks

[catrox14]

Neither Laurel nor Oliver have any reason to be together now no matter what their past was in the show or in comic books.  They both have done things to the other one that make them completely incompatible now.  There is quite literally nothing the show can do to ever sell them as a couple again. Nothing.

 

I will start actively resenting the show if they try to make me buy in.  I'm pretty sure if the Lauriver is the end game here, they will lose me as viewer :(.

[wingster55]

Tommy offers his arm to Moira on the way to the courthouse. She just gives him a look..hilarious.

"That happens to you a lot doesn't it?" heh

 

Pretty good scene between Oliver and Laurel in her apartment.

Edited September 17, 2014 by wingster55

[Wayward Son]

A decent second episode! I think my favourites so far are Oliver, Laurel and Diggle! Although it’s still too early to truly tell. 

 

Favourite Line of the Episode: Sometimes to honour your wishes I’ll have to dishonour your memory. 

Edited March 13, 2018 by Wayward Son

[tv echo]

I didn't transcribe much because I was bored by the second episode of Arrow...

102 (Honor Thy Father) – Oliver Queen’s voiceover intro:
Oliver (voiceover): "The day I went missing was the day I died. Five years in hell forged me into a weapon which I use to honor a vow I made to my father who sacrificed his life for mine. In his final moments, he told me the truth that our family's wealth had been built on the suffering of others. That he failed our city and that it was up to me to save it and right his wrongs. But to do that without endangering the people closest to me I have to be someone else. I have to be something else."

102 (Honor Thy Father) - Oliver visits Laurel at her apartment and ends up saving her:
Oliver: "Hey. Are you okay? (Laurel is silent) There are two cop cars outside."
Laurel: "How am I supposed to stay away from you if you won't stay away from me?"
Oliver: "I -"
Laurel: "What are you doing here, Ollie?"
Oliver: "My sister took - she pointed out to me that I have been distant since I got back and that it would probably be a good idea if I let somebody in."
Laurel: "So you thought you'd start with the first person you pushed away."
Oliver: "I did that to protect you. And then I saw you yesterday and I realized that I hurt you."
(Laurel lets Oliver enter.)
Oliver: "Thank you. This place hasn't changed in five years."
Laurel: "I haven't really had time to redecorate."
Oliver: "I'm a jerk. Before the island I was a jerk, and now I'm just a - I'm a damaged jerk."
Laurel: "What's in the bag?"
Oliver: "I thought about many things on the island, but there was one thing I thought about every day. I actually dreamed about it, and I promised myself that if I ever got a chance to do it again, I'd do it with you. (Pulls out ice cream carton) Eat ice cream."
(Cut to them eating ice cream.)
Oliver: "This is as good as I remember. My mother wants me to join the company. Yeah. Take my rightful place."
Laurel: "I can't exactly picture you as the master of the universe."
Oliver: "You know, after five years, I have plans. I have things that I have to do. But I can't do that if I'm - I don't know, attending board meetings and stockholder briefings."
Laurel: "Oliver, you're an adult. You can say, 'no.'"
Oliver: "Oh, I tried. Didn't take."
Laurel: "Well, then, don't tell her. Show her. Be the person that you want her to see you as. Trust me, I have plenty of experience with disapproving parents."
Oliver: "I have been on the receiving end of your father's disapproval."
Laurel: "He blames himself more than he blames you. He thinks that, you know, maybe if he and Sara were closer, she would have told him about the boat trip. And he could have stopped her from going with you."
Oliver: "I am sorry."
Laurel: "You apologized already."
Oliver: "And it'll never be enough. (Long pause as she looks at him) (Noise) Did you hear that?"
Laurel: "What?"
Oliver: "There's someone on the fire escape."
Laurel: "Wh - what?"
Oliver: "Come on. Come on!"
(He grabs her hand and they dodge men with guns firing at them as they search for an escape. Then China White confronts them and they're surrounded. But Diggle bursts in and shoots at the intruders. Diggle fights China White, but she's stronger. Then Oliver throws something at China White and she escapes. Laurel runs into Oliver's arms.)
Diggle: "Are you hurt?"
Oliver: "No."
Diggle: "Are you hurt?!"
Oliver: "No. No!"
Diggle: "Mr. Queen, this is why it's a good idea to have a bodyguard!"

Edited February 4, 2020 by tv echo

[tv echo]

102 (Honor Thy Father) - DELETED SCENE: Laurel reams Oliver for faking it with his mother:
(Inside the Queen Mansion)
Moira: “Did you find the aspirin I laid out for you? I imagine you were quite hung over.”
Oliver: “Mom.”
Moira: “No. I was wrong to push you, Oliver. You’re not your father. I need to accept that. And you have to find your own path in life. And wherever that leads you, I will love you just the same.” (Leaves the room)
(Laurel enters the room.)
Oliver: “What are you doing here?”
Laurel: "That was some speech."
Oliver: "Yeah. Not my finest hour. But you said I should be the person I want her to see me as. So I did."
Laurel: "No, you didn't."
Oliver: "What do you mean?"
Laurel: "I've known you nearly half my life, Oliver. And while that speech was an outstanding effort to piss everyone off and keep your family and friends at arms' length, I could tell. I could see that it was an effort. So when you're done keeping secrets and you're done trying to push everyone away, that's when you should show up at my place with ice cream. (Pause) Oh, and when you do? Rocky Road."

Edited April 20, 2020 by tv echo

[Featherhat]

I wonder why they cut this one? I've gone back and looked at it and whilst it wasn't brilliant, Laurel had a right to be pissed off if she knew Oliver was faking it but not why. But it is supposed to show that she knows him better than anyone, including Moira which is what they were trying to establish in early S1.

It would have represented her 3rd abrupt swing in feelings for Oliver in one episode though and again KC doesn't play any layers and the writing really doesn't help her out in realising Oliver probably has a reason to go from sensitive and grown up to drunken jackass in a few hours, unlike his mother. 

Moira comes off as a loving mother here despite being humiliated and upset. And shock-realising you can't stuff him into a business suit 2 minutes after he got back from a "deserted island". ST was so good at this. 

Edited February 10, 2020 by Featherhat

[lemotomato]

With so many of the deleted scenes being Laurel or L/O-centric starting in this episode and beyond, I wonder if a) the showrunners had originally planned to bring Laurel in on Oliver's secret earlier but changed their minds (all the references to her knowing Oliver better than anyone else seem pretty meaningless considering she doesn't find out he's GA until the end of season 2) and/or b) the showrunners realized as early as 102 that Laurel was not going to work out as Oliver's love interest and started deprioritizing their scenes together. 

Edited February 11, 2020 by lemotomato

[statsgirl]

I thought it interesting that in this scene Laurel actually does seem to know Oliver better than other people do; she knows that he was faking being what Moira wanted and just pushing people away.

[Featherhat]

5 hours ago, lemotomato said:

the showrunners realized as early as 102 that Laurel was not going to work out as Oliver's love interest and started deprioritizing their scenes together. 

If you believe rumours they realised as early as the pilot they had a problem on their hands. But that's why I was curious they cut this out of ep 2, it would have shown some actual awareness of who Oliver was, even if she didn't realise he must have had a good reason for such an abrupt switch to drunken clown. Unless it was something that used to happen regularly with them. 

By the time they were editing this they already had footage from ep 3 and Felicity and were putting her into the narrative right away so they already did have an alternative both in potential love interest (at least for a brief romance if nothing else) and to bring down to the foundry mid season. 

So many Lauriver scenes ended up on the cutting room floor that it had to be a deliberate choice, but none of them really make me think "Oh they should have kept it in" because they're all more of the same we got anyway, except this one. 

[tv echo]

The big flaw for me is that, if Laurel knew Oliver better than anyone else in S1, then she should have been the first to suspect that he was the hooded vigilante. Instead, she was almost the last person to know - and she had to find out from Slade Wilson. In fact, Moira figured it out on her own, which undercuts the premise that Laurel knew Oliver better than anyone from his pre-island life.

Edited February 11, 2020 by tv echo

[tv echo]

102 (Honor Thy Father) - DELETED SCENE: Laurel reams Oliver for faking it with his mother:

(Hermandat)

[tv echo]

Quote

Here was my thinking going into 1x02:

The Laurel & Oliver love story is off to a rocky start. Oliver cheated on Laurel with her sister. It’s bad. Real bad. Super bad. But…every relationship has their problems. Maybe I can get past it (spoiler alert: I can’t get past it). Sure their first scene had the chemistry of tumbleweeds, but I’m willing to overlook it. Let’s chalk it up to pilot jitters. Arrow’s been picked up. Full season order. Episode 2. We’re gonna get to the good stuff. Episode 2. That’s my episode to fall in love with Laurel & Oliver.
*  *  *
Sweet holy Zeus. Look, I get that “Ollie” (I shall now refer to past Oliver as Ollie to differentiate from present Oliver. Also I hate the nickname Ollie. Except when Thea uses it. Because it’s Thea and she’s my little cream puff) was an insufferable jackass and gives new meaning to the word douche bag. I also understand that Oliver was the superhero version of a complete dick to Laurel at the end of the pilot. Totally get the anger Laurel. You do you girl. But the man just told you he was in court to bring himself back from the dead. Perhaps, we could reign in the anger a tad instead of airing all our personal dirty laundry to a complete stranger. Just a thought.

I think this was one of the early problems with Laurel. I think the term my mother used was “vitriolic”. Laurel just seethed in anger and she was constantly on the attack. It made it difficult to connect to her. Understandable anger of course, but when Laurel is angry and Oliver is struggling with coming back from the dead…Oliver wins my compassion. The issue is this: Laurel is not the only one who lost someone on that boat. Oliver lost his father and he lost Sara. Laurel is not the only person to suffer loss. So, while her anger is understandable, her vicious attacks on Oliver are not. Those need to stop.
*  *  *
The intent of this scene was clear. Oliver’s made his choice. The person he’s decided to let in is Laurel. Arrow is firm in its love story position at this point. Laurel Lance is Oliver Queen’s true love. Except…until Oliver tells Laurel the truth about who he is (The Vigilante), he’s continuing to keep her at arm’s length. Until Oliver decides to tell someone the fully story he’s not letting anyone in. Not really.

It begs the question…who will be the first person to really see who Oliver is?
*  *  *
The limo & knife discussions are vitally important in establishing the connection between Oliver & John.  Oliver returned to his family. A family he loves desperately. Oliver loves Moira, Thea, Tommy and Laurel more than life itself. He’s missed them. For five long years he survived in hopes of seeing them again, but Oliver is having difficulty reconnecting to them. His secrets, his pain and their expectations are like a wall between them. A wall neither side knows how to take down.

Oliver is connecting with John Diggle. A stranger. Why? Because a stranger doesn’t have any expectations. Not really. John Diggle didn’t know Ollie Queen and quite frankly he’s not expected to know Oliver Queen. Diggle can see Oliver’s pain and loss because he’s experienced it himself. Diggle can see there’s more to Oliver than meets the eye. Why? John Diggle has no expectations of Oliver, so he can see him clearly.

Sometimes your family are not the people who can see the real you. So you strike out on your own and begin creating a family of your own choosing. A family who’s only expectation is for you to be yourself.
*  *  *
Watching Oliver bury his father was vitally important because we understand now that the only thing Oliver has left of Robert Queen is his memory and his request that Oliver honor his wishes. Robert Queen’s expectations are the only ones Oliver is trying to live up to. His promise to honor his father means disappointing so many others that he loves. It’s painful. Much more painful that Oliver ever realized. Failing to reconnect with his mother, Thea and even Laurel, to a certain extent, has revealed one certain truth about Oliver. His pain is real, which means he wants to reconnect. The desire, the match, is there. He just needs a spark to ignite the flame.

But who will be that spark? (I know. You know. I know that you know I know that you know).

 

Edited August 9, 2020 by tv echo

[tv echo]

Two more 102 deleted scenes...

Arrow 1x02 Deleted Scene - "Shoot to kill"

(Hermandat)

Arrow 1x02 Deleted Scene - Laurel helps Emily Nocenti

(Hermandat)