#agentsassydirewolf

There's a quote that I feel especially apropos for last night's ep, for many of the characters, but perhaps Felicity Smoak most of all: 

“We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin.” ―André Berthiaume

This episode was largely about peeling back the mask that Felicity donned for the first time in the flashbacks of 3x05 when she abandoned the Goth!Felicity look for the one we are familiar with. I always felt that scene where she comes out fully formed as the blond, bespectacled, cute top and skirt wearing Felicity Smoak was a bit abrupt given the pacing of that particular episode, but here that pays off. Because the Hallucina-goth Felicity comes out to play and it works spectacularly well.

She may be a gimmick to fast track getting Felicity out of her understandable funk after losing the use of her legs ostensibly for life and back in the field, but she's a gimmick that works for me. 

Hallucina-goth Felicity calls Felicity out on her new look and lifestyle, saying that she used to be stronger and that the choices she has made since, with a proverbial mask and armor to be a hero, have cost her being an active participant in the rest of her life. Now, Hallucina-goth Felicity is clearly a manifestation of Felicity's own insecurities, the trauma of being shot and staring down the barrel of a lifetime of paralysis (and the loss of the fiercely independent lifestyle she has built for herself) combined with a few too many pain pills--which I can say from my limited experience with the pills they give you post-emergency room visits REALLY fuck your head up--and she is designed by the narrative to be the devil on Felicity's shoulder here. She's designed to hurt. She's designed to cause drama. But she brings up valid issues, and for me bridged a great parallel with Felicity and Oliver.

When Felicity lost Cooper and made a drastic change in her life, "becoming the world's most overqualified IT girl," she didn't just change her outward appearance--the mask and armor--she altered her behavior in a fundamental way. She went from dangerous expressions of protest by hacking into government databases and creating technology that could be used to wreak havoc on a whim to being someone that helps. She uses her skills to fix problems for people in the IT department. She admittedly does it in a very safe and very small way, but Felicity chooses a different path after that initial brush with real danger and consequences with Cooper. 

It’s a form of penance. Much like what Oliver’s initial goal was after the island--to right his father’s wrongs, as well as his own. 

Then Oliver Queen comes into her life and he offers her a bigger avenue to help people. And once she's part of the team she begins nudging Oliver to more lofty ambitions than just hunting down names on the list and taking money from them. She wants to help people. Just like Dig. 

The two of them see the good that Oliver could do if he allows himself to see beyond the original mission. The more parallels we see with Dig and Oliver and Felicity's individual journeys, the clearer it is that they were all in different stages of their own hero's journey when they meet. Oliver was obviously in a very dark place when he returns from the island, and he struggles to become more than just a vigilante for a long time. In John Diggle, he finds one of the first models for the type of hero he will one day become. Dig is principled, disciplined, and moral. He has a code that he sticks to even when it hurts--like when his own brother violates that code and shatters the image that Dig had of Andy for all this time. Dig is already a hero. He just doesn't have a mask, which a mask does not a hero make. 

Dig and Oliver challenge each other on their beliefs and grow into an incredible team and brotherhood. They each aid the other going forward into their evolution as Spartan and Green Arrow.

Felicity too is her own form of hero when she meets Oliver. She went from being an internet vigilante with Cooper to a hero in her small corner of the IT department at QC to the heart of Team Arrow in the basement of the Foundry when she challenged Oliver to be better. To not orphan a little kid just because his father is on the list. 

Oliver proves to Felicity that he isn't an indiscriminate killer in that episode, but also that he can be the type of hero Felicity and Dig think he can be when he takes on the Dodger. We also see Felicity's own heroism when she stands up to a man that likes to blow people up or shoot them when he's not stealing shiny objects. And Felicity's response when she realizes she has a bomb around her neck is concern for those around her. She orders Oliver and Dig to get away from her. Likewise when Vertigo takes her hostage in S2, she is more concerned with Oliver’s no-kill vow than her own life. 

Felicity is willing to sacrifice herself on many occasions for the benefit of others. A lot like some other mask-wearing, codename-having types we know. 

But now that she's facing a life in a wheelchair, Felicity is forced to truly confront the cost of being a hero. Sara was the first real wakeup call for the team back in S3, that heroes can fall. Heroes can die. That someone so seemingly invincible can just suddenly be gone. But this is the first real injury Felicity has herself sustained that isn't so easily bounced back from. She is looking at a lasting consequence to the team's decision to face Damien Darhk in the light. 

And her consequence is personified as the darkest part of herself. 

Felicity has to face the part of herself she shoved beneath the mask of the IT girl and hero behind the computer screen and tried to forget. Felicity so quickly and so drastically altering her physicality is finally being addressed in the angry Hallucina-goth Felicity and it's perfect. 

This aspect of Felicity never left, and she's still a part of Felicity. That anger. That fear of being weak. Of having to rely on someone else--someone that could leave, someone that could decide she isn't good enough, someone that could die. 

Felicity has abandonment issues that have only been touched on thus far in the show. Her father, Cooper, and even Oliver have all left her in one form or another. So the fear of relying on someone else is a living and breathing thing for her. The way to combat it? DON'T RELY ON ANYONE. 

Felicity has allowed Dig and Oliver and others into her life but she is still a very self-reliant person. Which is not necessarily a bad thing. She has a career all her own and has a brilliant mind. However, Felicity fears relying on anyone too much lest they leave and she be left broken by that loss. We see that in how she pushes Oliver away when she's trying to save Ray, and again when she finds out about the lie in the alternate timeline. 

Better to leave than be left. Better to hurt than be hurt. It's a defense mechanism for her. 

Hallucina-goth Felicity is provoking her to push Oliver away again, and Oliver is accidentally helping her do that. Oliver at the top of the episode is doing everything physically possible to take care of Felicity--which is great. But all of it--the carrying her everywhere, the bringing her her pills, making her food, and pushing her to rejoin the team behind the computer--drives home what she has lost. 

Felicity snaps at both him and her hallucination to leave her alone. She needs to process this in her own time and her own way, so even with Oliver being the perfect, most supportive fiance ever, that's not what she really needed just then. Because Felicity's issues are about HER. They're not about the men who have left, or the one that has stayed. It's about that niggling doubt that she isn't good enough to stay for. Or strong enough on her own. 

And while Oliver is completely well-intentioned by taking care of Felicity and encouraging her to get back in the proverbial saddle, none of that works for her. Getting back out there as quickly as possible is a tactic that has worked for Oliver himself, so it makes sense that he would suggest it. 

Throughout the show Oliver has had bouts of PTSD that hit and seemingly go away, but the biggest bouts always coincide with a defeat of some sort for him. The Dark Archer. Slade. Ra's. My hypothesis has always been that Oliver contains his PTSD with the belief that he is the baddest thing out there. How can he be afraid of dying or being beaten if he's what everyone else is afraid of? 

It's a band-aid for the real issue, which we see be ripped off violently whenever he takes a loss. We even see Oliver deal with some hallucinations of his own in S2 after being poisoned in a fight with the Mirakuru-powered Cyrus Gold. Ghosts of his past that accuse him of failing them. Or encourage him to be better. And in S3 we see Oliver hallucinate his worst fear: Oliver Queen. These hallucinations mirror what we see in Felicity’s own hallucination, she’s facing a version of herself and the ghost of the person and life she left behind. 

In all the above cases, Oliver overcomes his PTSD and his hallucinations and self-doubt by reaffirming his belief that he is bigger and badder than anything else out there. Instead of taking it easy after Count Vertigo 2.0 shoots him up with Vertigo in 3x01, Oliver runs out to fight him again, taking a direct hit of Vertigo and fighting through it. When Ra's kills Oliver in 3x09, Oliver goes running back to Nanda Parbat to face him at the first opportunity. 

Oliver explains this to Dig by saying it's a stupid pride thing, but it's way more than that. It's the only way Oliver can function, by facing the guy that beat him head on and beating him. Otherwise, Oliver can't bring himself to go back out there into a world where he has to face down gunfire and jump off buildings and fight metahumans and immortals. Because to face those larger than life threats, he has to be not only larger than life himself but he has to be the biggest and the baddest thing imaginable. 

Felicity freezes up initially when Oliver tries to force her to rejoin the team before she’s ready. It isn’t until Felicity figures out her own coping mechanism that she will be able to move forward. This is something Oliver cannot help her with, no matter how much he might want to. 

This season is the one where Dig and Felicity both have to face their darkness and come out the other side heroes themselves--as we've seen (and continue to see) with Oliver in his journey to be the Green Arrow, a hero in the light. Dig is in full costume with a mask as his own hero, while confronting his biggest demon in finding out the truth about Andy. This is his island. 

Felicity likewise is facing her own island. The wheelchair. Oliver's lie hanging over them both. And the issue of her father has also been teased as likely coming to fruition this season. So despite the abandonment issue elephant in the room it's very important that Felicity face certain issues on her own. Felicity does ultimately need to learn to trust and rely on those around her for her own personal growth; however, the island made Oliver have to learn how to be strong himself. Diggle is having to learn to forgive his brother and square that with his own moral code. So Felicity too is going to need to do the heavy lifting herself. She can have help, absolutely. Oliver had allies on the island that helped him survive and become the hero we know, but ultimately it was about him becoming self-reliant. He had to fight for himself. 

Diggle has relied on Oliver and Lyla and Laurel for advice on how to handle the reality of who Andy is, but the brunt of moving forward in that scenario is all on Dig himself. 

The same holds true for Felicity. 

Felicity starts regaining her strength and autonomy by choosing to leave the loft and go to see Oliver at the new lair on her own. Yes, Curtis drives her, but Felicity CHOOSES her path and then takes it. This is the beginning of Felicity evolving into her ultimate hero persona. She then helps Oliver and the team with the case of the week with ARGUS and Shadowspire--the flashbacks with Dig and Andy do a great job of linking all of OTA on their hero's journeys by showing that Oliver and Dig have a past connection even they don't know about yet. 

Felicity begins her own path to healing by choosing to ignore Hallucina-goth Felicity and being the hero she wishes to be. Even getting that codename she's been wanting since 4x02 courtesy of Oliver: Overwatch. 

All of OTA receive their hero names this season: Green Arrow, Spartan, and Overwatch. Everyone is on the path to their final evolution as heroes. 

But for Felicity this is a bit of a false start. She still hasn't confronted the issue of her father, or Oliver's lie. She hasn't yet truly had enough time to be as ok with being paralyzed as she is presenting herself to be. She may have symbolically put Goth!Felicity behind her when she banishes the hallucination and burns the picture in front of Oliver, but this is more of the brave face we saw in 4x10. 

Felicity cannot let herself break. And she needs to. Because once you break, you can finally rebuild yourself stronger than ever before. I'm really hoping the show takes the time to really show us Felicity going through this and doesn't fast track it, that way Felicity's final evolution as a hero really feels earned and not like something they rushed through just to get it done and out there. 

We've had 4 seasons just to get to Green Arrow and he's still not there yet completely. And while I understand this is a story about Oliver Queen--hence the show being named Arrow--giving Dig and Felicity's own journeys a little time and attention isn't too much to ask. Especially if we have to slog through the boring as all hell island flashbacks they've given us so far.

OTA is what works, the writers know this, and the show didn't reach it's full potential until that dynamic finally came into being. So keeping the foundation of that dynamic strong and taking the time to really give each character involved in it a good arc isn't a weakness, it's a strength. And, for me at least, for Green Arrow to be a hero in the light, he needs to not only inspire but to support the ones around him. 

Heroism, as Dig and Felicity have shown us throughout the show, isn't just about throwing a punch and looking great in leather pants (although that helps, not going to lie), but about supporting others when they need it. Dig and Felicity have both supported and guided Oliver through some of the hardest times of his life as a person and as a hero, now it's Oliver's turn.

Tagged by @sailorslayer3641 (thank you very much, hon!) 

I’m not sure if I’m supposed to spread them all across different fandoms or what, but here we go! And I’m not listing them in any particular order, just how quickly they pop into my head. 

1. Olicity (Arrow)–This pairing was the first one that got me to ship a couple just through gifs. I’d never seen them in an actual ep, just little moving pictures on tumblr and yet the chemistry was THERE. Then I watched the show. And died and went to feels heaven.

2. Selina Kyle/Bruce Wayne (Gotham/DCU)–I’ve been in love with the dynamic between these characters since I was a kid. From the 90s Batman cartoon to Batman Returns to the comics to today where we have Mini-Bats and Mini-Cats running around being cute and angsty as hell. There will never not be a version of these two that doesn’t immediately have my interest.

3. Alex Parrish/Ryan Booth (Quantico)–DEAR. SWEET. BABY. JESUS. Not gonna lie, but this show had one of the BEST pilots I’ve seen in years. And got me to ship these two gorgeous idjits in no time flat. I love them and their inability to get their shit straight for more than five minutes to death. 

4. Nyssara (Arrow)–Another couple I started shipping just through gifs. The moment I saw the first Nyssara kiss I was like “YEP. I’M SHIPPING THESE TWO TO THE BITTER END.” Then I actually watched the show and now I’m an ugly sobbing mess anytime Nyssa and Sara are brought up. 

5. Vanessa Ives/Ethan Chandler (Penny Dreadful)–So much to love about this bloody period supernatural horror drama, but the hook for me was these two. The slow burn connection that springs up between them and carries them into a relationship of mutual understanding and protection in a world with entirely too much violence (and did I mention the blood? Because there is SO much blood) is just…it tickles my Gothic romance pickle. 

I have a ton more ships, but I’m not even going to do honorable mentions because I’d be here all day and a mess by the end of it. 

The rules: Go to page 7 of your WIP, go to the seventh line, share seven sentences, and tag 7 more writer-bloggers to continue the challenge.  

This comes from an Olicity WIP I haven’t posted from yet, but I’ve been referring to as simply the Wine AU. I’m hoping to get the first chapter posted later this week, but here’s a taste: 

He almost pouted. "You being a genius can be awfully inconvenient, you know that?"

She pecked his lips in apology. "I know. But rushing this feels wrong."

"Yeah," he agreed, closing his eyes. "So should I keep sending you wine and letters to get you to come back?"

She laughed, stroking his cheek. "Not exactly a terrible idea." She nibbled her lower lip. "I haven't exactly taken a vacation since opening the shop...maybe I could do a long weekend, come up to see the beach, get some sun..."

He chuckled. "And I could just happen to be at the same beach that day..."

She gave a mock-gasp. "What a coincidence that would be!"

"Mm hmm." He smiled. "So I bring the wine, you bring a bikini?"

"I'm not sure I have one that would fit you," she joked, and he growled playfully as he kissed her.