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I really like Arrow you guys.Narcissus1916 posted:The pacing has been terrible, largely because Oliver and team haven't actually had someone to punch in the face. Even before season 2 gave us Slade, we had Brother Blood running around. This year, we had "find Canary's killer" which led to "train/protect Thea" which led to... whatever else they've got coming. I'm not trying to single you out, but this post is a perfect example of why I think the main problem with this season is that it hasn't done a very good job of explaining itself, even ignoring the biggest example of it (that is, Oliver's "death" and recovery.) So, let me try to explain it from my perspective of the events. This season actually does have two major connecting threads, neither of which are as clear or intuitive as the previous seasons. First off, there's Oliver himself, in his role as a person and as The Arrow. Secondly, there's the role of the Arrow team, as they relate to the Arrow mission and the nature of the team dynamics. All of those elements that feel disconnected are generally directly connected to one or both of those aspects, and here's how. Ray came around initially to rebrand the city after the events of the first two seasons, and to develop himself as a hero in response to the death of his wife (which happened as a result of one of the season finales, I think season 2?) In the process of this, he took on Felicity as both a love interest and as an employee, leading to a lot of her waffling between Ray and Oliver and not necessarily being perfectly reliable as a member of the Arrow team this season. Then there's the major plotline of the season, Sara's death and the conflict with the League of Assassins. At first this plotline seemed to go nowhere, but that's because the show was working on three threads of this same plot simultaneously. First, the whodunnit mystery, which took a long time to get going because it couldn't be solved before the midseason finale, with the consequence of it being slow and plodding. Secondly, they were using it as a catalyst for Laurel's character arc this season, between her development into a hero (which is still far from complete, as incompetent in combat as she is right now) but also in how she handles her death mentally and how she approaches informing her father about it, with her balancing the need to tell him the truth with the legitimate prospect that letting him know might kill him. Considering she's been involved with the Arrow team directly or indirectly for a very long time now, it's no surprise that her choices impact the team dynamics, which lead to a little internal strife with the majority of the crew, but also serious, consistent strife with Oliver himself. This compounds itself with the League aspect of that plotline, which itself has two major elements. First off, there's Ra's al Ghul himself and the threat he poses toward Thea as a result of Merlyn's actions. However, because Ra's has effectively chosen to hang back and wait, passively, it's already inherently different from the previous seasons, which were active threats, and I feel like there's a good reason for it. That reason is straightforward: this enormous shadow over Thea has led Oliver to make some decisions that are questionable at best, most of which relates to the way that Sara died (ie., having a mind-controlled Thea fire the arrows.) The best decision among these was to finally let Thea in on his role as the Arrow, which was undeniably a good idea, even though Diggle had some legitimate concerns prior to it happening. Even then, though, Oliver tried to continue to lie to Thea about her role in Sara's death, and after telling her the truth he tried to convince her to lie to Laurel about it. Then there's the most debatable decision he made, to work with Merlyn to find some way to defeat Ra's al Ghul, starting with his initial decision to protect Merlyn until the truth was revealed. No one in the crew save for Oliver himself - and to a lesser extent Thea, after she was brought into the fold - agrees with that decision, and it's trivial to understand why. Regardless of why he made his choices, Malcolm Merlyn is an unmistakably evil man. At the same time, as it stands Oliver isn't strong enough to defeat Ra's, and Katana made a convincing argument that the only way he can get strong enough - or at the very minimum into the correct mental state - to defeat Ra's is to figure out how he thinks, which means working with Merlyn. This whole deal is incredibly complicated, and in a lot of ways is causing Oliver and the rest of the team to distance themselves from one another, culminating in Ra's al Ghul's offer at the end of the most recent episode. Secondly, there's Nyssa's role. Her role is a lot smaller and more personal, and it has so far mostly involved her personal dynamics with Ra's, Laurel, and more recently with Thea. There isn't much that I can expand upon here, it's pretty straightforward and very simple, at least so far. However, with Thea's reveal and her father's offer to Oliver at the end of the most recent episode, her personal involvement is almost certainly going to massively expand, presumably with her taking in one or both of Laurel and Thea in as students (with her involvement possibly being what leads to Thea's masking.) Then there's the Brick three-parter, which was connected to everything else in that it directly related to the need for the Arrow to exist and the dynamics of the team. After Oliver returned at the end, the team was different: they decided that the Arrow mission goes beyond Oliver, and that his authoritarian control of the team isn't an acceptable state of affairs. Then the climax of the arc completely changed its framing, with Merlyn showing up at the end and almost effortlessly stopping Brick. If Oliver was around, the situation would never have become so extreme; indeed, on top of examining and expanding on the dynamics of Team Arrow, this arc existed to answer the question of what would happen if Oliver wasn't around to stop the Criminal of the Week. In short, this season is a lot more coherent than it appears at first blush, but it's very easy to see where you're coming from. The biggest flaw of this season isn't that these story elements aren't connected, it's that the season is doing a terrible job of communicating how they're connected.
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Mar 5, 2015 01:58
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Too much blah blah nerd soap opera poo poo, not nearly enough getting through things. It's like they let Hideo Kojima write the thing.
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Mar 5, 2015 02:08
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These last two posts are accurate.
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Mar 5, 2015 02:15
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I never manage to remember how very British Paul Blackthorn is. Oh man please sign him up for the forthcoming Flash/Arrow/Supergirl musical episode. I agree with this, really. Even through all the less-than-quality narrative, there's been a fairly linear theme going on between the characters and their interactions with one another. Even Thea's rando bizarre "But Malcolm, you're really actually a great person!" acid trip, which was super rando and bizarre at the time, turns out to reinforce the betrayal and anger she feels when she learns that, nnnope, he's really not. BrianWilly fucked around with this message at 02:35 on Mar 5, 2015 |
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Mar 5, 2015 02:33
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King of Solomon posted:This season actually does have two major connecting threads, neither of which are as clear or intuitive as the previous seasons. First off, there's Oliver himself, in his role as a person and as The Arrow. Secondly, there's the role of the Arrow team, as they relate to the Arrow mission and the nature of the team dynamics. You are right, but here's the thing: that's not what this season is about, that's what the entire series is about. Every season is about Oliver vs The Arrow and the role of the other main characters, i.e. Team Arrow. That's basically the whole concept of the show. The fact that there's really nothing more than that going on this season is the entire point we're making. I wouldn't say the season has been about nothing; it's had pretty clear central themes. What it hasn't had is a central plot, an external conflict that drives everything, an ever-present enemy tying the whole season together. Without that, the stories end up seeming like jumbled mess. Like, sure Ray's story ties together thematically with everything else, but it still comes off as unconnected because it's not tied into anything in terms of plot. If the whole season had, for instance, a specific "big bad", and Ray also had a vendetta against him instead of just vaguely against "crime" as a concept, then his scenes wouldn't feel like taking a vacation from the plot.
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Mar 5, 2015 03:31
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XboxPants posted:You are right, but here's the thing: that's not what this season is about, that's what the entire series is about. Every season is about Oliver vs The Arrow and the role of the other main characters, i.e. Team Arrow. That's basically the whole concept of the show. The fact that there's really nothing more than that going on this season is the entire point we're making. You're right to a point. The whole series is about Oliver's journey, with the flashbacks explaining how he became the man he was when he returned at the start of season 1 and the main plot explaining how he develops from that person. However, and this is important: unlike in seasons 1 and 2, those major themes for the series are the main plot for this season. That's why everything keeps coming back to internal strife, and how the team seems to be increasingly fractured, and less willing to just follow Oliver's orders. More specifically, that's why they chose to have Ra's al Ghul make his offer instead of being a more traditional villain. In other words, this season doesn't have an external conflict driving everything because they chose to have this season be about internal conflict. I wouldn't be surprised if, in the next few episodes, Oliver chose to take Ra's up on his offer, Nyssa chooses to train Laurel and Thea, and Felicity leaves to work with Ray. It's entirely possible - arguably likely - that the Arrow team will temporarily completely dissolve in the next few episodes. That's why there's no traditional external threat.
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Mar 5, 2015 03:45
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King of Solomon posted:In other words, this season doesn't have an external conflict driving everything because they chose to have this season be about internal conflict. I wouldn't be surprised if, in the next few episodes, Oliver chose to take Ra's up on his offer, Nyssa chooses to train Laurel and Thea, and Felicity leaves to work with Ray. It's entirely possible - arguably likely - that the Arrow team will temporarily completely dissolve in the next few episodes. That's why there's no traditional external threat. If they do that I'd give some credit to the writers. To me, so far, it just seemed like the internal strife was a background theme, rather than something that was driving the entire plot of the season in the same way as, say, a Civil War or something. And I'm still not sure which internal conflict is supposedly the center of the story, besides just "general internal conflict". Again, compare Civil War, where there's a specific conflict at the center of everything. Can you say the same, here? What exactly is the core disagreement, and between who? Maybe the back end of the series will tie everything together in such a way as to make all of this obvious, I really hope it does, and I'm sure it'll be fun either way, but... I'm not holding my breath.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:04
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XboxPants posted:If they do that I'd give some credit to the writers. To me, so far, it just seemed like the internal strife was a background theme, rather than something that was driving the entire plot of the season in the same way as, say, a Civil War or something. The core argument as I see it is that Oliver is working with Merlyn. At least, that's the big one, there are also a lot of other more minor arguments. For example, Laurel is pissed off at Ollie casually lying to her face about Thea, and Felicity in particular has been basically constantly pissed off with Oliver since he returned (though she was definitely annoyed prior to his leaving, it's on a different degree now.) If Oliver leaves to take Ra's al Ghul's place, Nyssa - angry with her father's choice - takes Laurel in to train and do her own thing, and Felicity leaves to work with Ray as this platonic ideal of a superhero, what's really left of the Arrow team? Thea isn't fully in the fold as it is, so it would just be Roy and Diggle, and that's hardly enough to call it the Arrow team. I can't compare this to Civil War, I haven't read it. I just find it kinda hard to see the internal strife - especially since the end of the Brick three-parter - as being anything but front and center.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:11
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XboxPants posted:an ever-present enemy tying the whole season together The big bad of this season is Oliver. I don't know how so many people in this thread have missed that.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:24
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King of Solomon posted:The core argument as I see it is that Oliver is working with Merlyn. At least, that's the big one, there are also a lot of other more minor arguments. For example, Laurel is pissed off at Ollie casually lying to her face about Thea, and Felicity in particular has been basically constantly pissed off with Oliver since he returned (though she was definitely annoyed prior to his leaving, it's on a different degree now.) If Oliver leaves to take Ra's al Ghul's place, Nyssa - angry with her father's choice - takes Laurel in to train and do her own thing, and Felicity leaves to work with Ray as this platonic ideal of a superhero, what's really left of the Arrow team? Thea isn't fully in the fold as it is, so it would just be Roy and Diggle, and that's hardly enough to call it the Arrow team. But that's what I mean about "core argument" - Ollie working with Merlyn only started happening a few episodes ago. So that can't have been the core conflict for the entire first half of the season. What was the core disagreement then, and between who? (I'll even give a pass on the "Death Of Oliver" episodes since they were sort of their own story, where the team had a conflict against Brick, and say they don't have to be driven by whatever the overall "core internal argument" is) I realize there are a whole bunch of minor, unrelated arguments, and that's kind of the point I'm making. There's a lot of general strife between the team, but there's no central, singular conflict that's driving the entire season. I brought up Civil War, and you can use the American civil war just as well - there, you can say the conflict was about the state's rights to have slavery, and most people are happy with that. If you were to say "The conflict that's driving this entire season is the conflict between Mr./Mrs./Group (x) and Mr./Mrs./Group (y) who disagree because Group (x) believes (A) and Group (y) believes (B)" I'm not sure how you'd fill that in.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:28
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King of Solomon is on point. I think there's a lot of stuff that could have worked better with just a few small tweaks. We really needed to see more of Thea being twisted by Malcolm, instead of a single episode based on her training (that itself shared screentime with an ARGUS filler mission). We needed to see a much more coherent throughline with Laurel's training (Wildcat feels particularly forgotten about). We needed to see Ray interacting with someone other than Felicity. It just feels so CONSTRUCTED. No one's necessarily out of character, but there is a lot of having to hurriedly shove characters into positions left and right.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:36
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XboxPants posted:But that's what I mean about "core argument" - Ollie working with Merlyn only started happening a few episodes ago. So that can't have been the core conflict for the entire first half of the season. What was the core disagreement then, and between who? I will grant that there wasn't much of a core argument prior to Oliver's return, that's a fair point. However, it's important to consider that in both season 1 and 2 the main threat didn't really reveal themselves prior to the midseason finale, either. I'll also add that while the core argument is a more recent thing - seeing as it didn't emerge until Oliver returned, and he was out of commission for most of the Brick arc - the seeds for it were sown prior to that. In the midseason finale, Merlyn revealed that he forced Thea to kill Sara, which is the major sticking point for Oliver working with Merlyn (well, that and the fact that he got his rear end kicked.) During the Brick arc, the team was forced to restructure itself, and this restructuring is also a major reason why any of this internal strife is as huge as it is. At the same time, these other elements - Ray finishing his suit, Laurel learning the truth, and Ra's al Ghul's offer - are all directly pulling at the seams.
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Mar 5, 2015 04:39
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King of Solomon posted:I will grant that there wasn't much of a core argument prior to Oliver's return, that's a fair point. However, it's important to consider that in both season 1 and 2 the main threat didn't really reveal themselves prior to the midseason finale, either. I'll also add that while the core argument is a more recent thing - seeing as it didn't emerge until Oliver returned, and he was out of commission for most of the Brick arc - the seeds for it were sown prior to that. In the midseason finale, Merlyn revealed that he forced Thea to kill Sara, which is the major sticking point for Oliver working with Merlyn (well, that and the fact that he got his rear end kicked.) During the Brick arc, the team was forced to restructure itself, and this restructuring is also a major reason why any of this internal strife is as huge as it is. At the same time, these other elements - Ray finishing his suit, Laurel learning the truth, and Ra's al Ghul's offer - are all directly pulling at the seams. Those are all fair points that make sense. If Oliver accepts, then the whole season will have built towards Oliver compromising his ideals by working with Assassins to gain more power, (first Merlyn, then Ra's) while everyone else has been working hard to gain strength and stability as heroes on their own, without having to sell their soul - whether it's Laurel, Ray, Felicity, or the whole group during the Brick arc*. I could definitely buy that. (I'd actually include Thea here too, because while she also worked with Merlyn, she thought he was on the up-and-up while she was doing so, and she wasn't compromising her ideals the same way Ollie was - and when she found out Merlyn was in fact still evil dropped him off at the nearest execution store) This would actually help put the Waller flashbacks into context, too. They'd be showing how Ollie learned this philosophy of working with the devil and thinking that's just a natural, everyday way to get poo poo done. The difference is that with Waller he was forced, but now it's become such second nature that he's doing it on his own. XboxPants fucked around with this message at 04:57 on Mar 5, 2015 |
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Mar 5, 2015 04:52
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Did they ever show what happens to that Wildcat guy (Laurel's boxing trainer) after he gets the poo poo kicked out of him by Brick during that Glades takeover episode?
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Mar 5, 2015 05:35
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Bad Moon posted:Nyssa needs to bag herself another Lance sister so she and Ollie can be double Eskimo brothers. EBDB double score!
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Mar 5, 2015 10:47
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"King of Soloman" posted:Words I think you are right about what this season is trying to be about and I think a lot of people here also get it, but the thing is they haven't pulled it off very well. I still like this show but the quality of this season is below previous seasons. Hopefully the final third will tie everything together in a good way.
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Mar 5, 2015 11:02
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VagueRant posted:
The fact that Oliver is broken as gently caress and Felicity basically worshipped him for two seasons makes the romance a little believable. Basically Oliver will fall in love with anyone that remotely is nice to him because he has such bad PTSD and just wants to feel safe.
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Mar 5, 2015 16:39
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Felicity also consistently told him he was being a good person during times when he had a lot of doubts about that.
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Mar 5, 2015 16:48
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I do somewhat wish Oliver would get a little exasperated with Felicity's moralizing at him. Even a "Sorry I'm not as mentally well adjusted as you" like he shot at Barry would be good.
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Mar 5, 2015 18:44
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Mr Beens posted:I think you are right about what this season is trying to be about and I think a lot of people here also get it, but the thing is they haven't pulled it off very well. I still like this show but the quality of this season is below previous seasons. Hopefully the final third will tie everything together in a good way. To be fair, those previous seasons were a lot more straightforward. It's no surprise that this season's a little rockier in its execution, but I think it's doing alright. It's be hard to judge the season as a whole before it ends - or at least approaches the ending - but as it is I think it's better than S1 was. I guess we'll see.
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Mar 5, 2015 20:26
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Remember when Oliver used to narrate episodes? I kinda miss that.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:07
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Bad Moon posted:Remember when Oliver used to narrate episodes? I kinda miss that. I despise the "I'm Oliver Queen" opening, probably from binging on the whole show.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:12
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Bad Moon posted:Remember when Oliver used to narrate episodes? I kinda miss that. I think that was only the first few episodes, before he had Diggle to talk to.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:16
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That was one of the 1st fixes to the show they made & it was for the better.
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Mar 6, 2015 01:21
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Yeah it probably is for the best but every once and awhile I wish it was still around
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Mar 6, 2015 01:22
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It would probably help right now.
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Mar 6, 2015 04:51
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enraged_camel posted:All that said, I'm curious about how Nyssa will handle Ra's decision to train Oliver. Speaking of this, I like how there's a very subtle context of "Talia's way better than you." Like maybe I'm reading too much into things, but the way they keep going "Well you'll never be the heir" kind of emphasizes Talia's first in line.
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Mar 6, 2015 18:28
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Chokes McGee posted:Speaking of this, I like how there's a very subtle context of "Talia's way better than you." Apparently the producers haven't decided if Talia even exists in The Arrow's continuity. I don't think she has been mentioned during any of the dialogues. http://comicbook.com/2015/02/25/arrow-executive-producer-andrew-kreisberg-talks-talia-al-ghul/
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Mar 6, 2015 19:06
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I miss oliver ruthlessly murdering everyone it was more entertaining
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Mar 6, 2015 20:00
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This season reminds me a lot of season 4 buffy. Its more about the relationships than the bad guys which make everyrhing feel slower.
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Mar 6, 2015 20:22
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Jose posted:I miss oliver ruthlessly murdering everyone it was more entertaining We're still gonna need a lot more with the flashback stuff to get Oliver up to his ep 1 levels of utter sociopathy. He's not even close yet.
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Mar 6, 2015 22:10
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Jose posted:I miss oliver ruthlessly murdering everyone it was more entertaining Yeah, I gotta agree on this. Oliver killing everybody and their dog helped keep the plot moving at a quick pace at least.
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Mar 6, 2015 23:38
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Party Plane Jones posted:Yeah, I gotta agree on this. Oliver killing everybody and their dog helped keep the plot moving at a quick pace at least. I liked it because it neatly distinguished him from Batman. The moment he took a no-killing vow though he became Batman-lite, which is unfortunate.
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Mar 7, 2015 00:53
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Just bring back Manu Bennett cause he is the best thing in the show.
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Mar 7, 2015 02:36
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Invalid Validation posted:Just bring back Manu Bennett cause he is the best thing in the show.
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Mar 7, 2015 03:04
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He came back just recently and it wasn't that interesting. If they can somehow get him back to the "deadliest mercenary in the world" instead of "crazy guy obsessing over Shado" it might be cool
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Mar 7, 2015 06:02
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CharlieFoxtrot posted:He came back just recently and it wasn't that interesting. If they can somehow get him back to the "deadliest mercenary in the world" instead of "crazy guy obsessing over Shado" it might be cool He can't be the deadliest mercenary anymore since he no longer has Mirakuru. I would personally be pretty happy if he went away forever, honestly. I think he served his purpose.
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Mar 7, 2015 06:34
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CharlieFoxtrot posted:He came back just recently and it wasn't that interesting. If they can somehow get him back to the "deadliest mercenary in the world" instead of "crazy guy obsessing over Shado" it might be cool This. Slade was cool when he was staying three steps ahead of Oliver and owning him at every stage, being smug about it, too. The Slade who rants and raves about his 5-year+ dead unreciprocated crush is not interesting, as this latest appearance showed.
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Mar 7, 2015 06:38
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enraged_camel posted:He can't be the deadliest mercenary anymore since he no longer has Mirakuru. But he doesn't need Mirakuru to be as good as Oliver or Ra's or Nyssa or Merlyn or Diggle or Deadshot etc etc etc. He can still be a super deadly enemy, and he's got a slightly different skillset than the martial-arts sword & bow style League of Assassins enemies. Basically, think Evil Diggle. He could have three guns.
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Mar 7, 2015 06:48
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XboxPants posted:But he doesn't need Mirakuru to be as good as Oliver or Ra's or Nyssa or Merlyn or Diggle or Deadshot etc etc etc. He can still be a super deadly enemy, and he's got a slightly different skillset than the martial-arts sword & bow style League of Assassins enemies. Right after he lost his Mirakuru he was defeated by Oliver, an archer, in hand-to-hand combat. To me that seems very un-deadly.
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Mar 7, 2015 06:51
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