Day 7 (November 26) - Favorite Quote(s)
Felicity giving Oliver advice/inspiring him in “Streets of Fire” (2x22).
Short version of this post: “You honor the dead by fighting. And you are not done fighting.”
So Oliver starts listing all of the people that he’s lost. All of the people that died that he blames himself for. It’s a considerably long list. The show doesn’t do the best job of showing Oliver’s trauma but this is a perfect example of what Oliver has been through.
I’m not saying that we need daily reminders or to fall back on it as an excuse for his behavior, but this man has literally had BOTH of his parents (and his best friend) DIE while he WATCHED. He wasn’t able to do anything to save them, or any of the other people that he lists.
It’s so important to remember that just because the show doesn’t say “hey remember when Moira got stabbed through the heart with a sword in front of her two children?” or “remember when Robert shot himself in the head and then Oliver sat in a tiny boat with his dead body?” doesn’t mean that Oliver doesn’t think about those experiences every day.
I see people being like “how can Oliver forgive Slade!?” But no, he hasn’t. He recognizes that “crazy mirakuru soldier Slade” was not the same man that trained him to fight. That was his friend. He recognizes that the Slade we’re seeing now is more like the Slade we saw before he got injected with mirakuru.
But that doesn’t mean that the images of watching his mother die don’t come to his mind every time he looks at Slade Wilson.
Anyway, end rant for now.
Oliver says that all he wanted to do is honor those people he lost (which, if you ask me, is much more believable than season five’s ‘I did it cuz I like 2 murder #yelling’).
“And you are not done fighting!”
THAT’S MY FAVORITE. Yes, the whole scene. But especially, “You honor the dead by fighting.” Like, that would make a great tattoo or something. Has someone already done this? How lame would it to quote a CW show on my body for the rest of my life? I’m gonna do it don’t tell my mom.
So then it gets even better when Felicity makes a list of her own; all the people that Oliver has taken down to save the city.
One of my favorite things is when Felicity talks and Oliver listens. It’s why I was so mad that they tried to make Felicity play the “you don’t trust me!” game in season 5.
He does. He always has. In moments when Oliver doesn’t listen to anyone else, when he doesn’t think that there’s any way out, Felicity is there and he listens to her. She inspires him, quite literally.
“You are not alone. And I believe in you.”
And then she gives him a damn hug.
This is the kind of quality that we were denied for most of seasons 4-5. Don’t get me started. Just Felicity diverting a nuke to blow up an entire city. No need for shoulders to cry on here. Just her ex fiancee accidentally killing her current boyfriend. Oh well, what two people would need to talk about that? Just Oliver being tortured for a week straight and his psychotic captor convincing him that he enjoys killing people. Meh, let’s wait until they’re trapped in the bunker to talk about that one. (5x20 was pure, unplanned luck because they ran out of money and needed a cheap filler ep and it ended up being the best of the season GOD DAMN IT).
What? I’m not salty about it. Okay I said don’t get me started but I got myself started.
I’m not saying it was an Oliver and Felicity problem. It was a writers problem.
Wait what? I got distracted by 5x20.
Side note: the talk in “Underneath” is probably my second choice. Both of them had beautiful things to say, but that’s a lot longer and I clearly have a lot of feelings about it...so.
Yay! This scene here, this was what Olicity is all about:
What better way to end an inspirational speech than with a hug?
How to Fix a Broke Vigilante by Felicity Smoak, MIT class of ‘09: Tell it “you’re doing amazing, sweetie.” Then you hug it. Give it a real good squeeze until you feel it squeeze back. Then you know its not so broke anymore and can go on vigilante-ing.
