One thing abt ben and felicity is that they were never perfect and they're never going to be perfect. They both make bad decisions, do things I wish they didn't, but at the end of the day, I think that was the whole point.
The show showed us time and time again that quite literally no matter what they do, it is ALWAYS gonna be them in the end. No matter how much they hurt each other, they are always going to come back to each other and they will love each other MORE THAN and THROUGH their mistakes (even tho i do think there are things that happened that were ooc, ESP the beginningof 4x18 (yall KNOW)).
And I get being team Noel to an extent, bc trust ben pissed me the hell off too, multiple times, but at some point it's just like, it was NEVER going to be Noel. EVER. In the dream eps (ik some ppl love them and some dont) we see Noel pull that same type of thing with Hannah that we saw him do in s1 and that we have seen ben do, and I definitely think that served a purpose. It was to show that Noel isn't this perfect guy compared to ben, it showed that her and noel wouldn't be perfect and she wanted to be with him because of literally that, thinking that going back and choosing him would make everything better and that that was the choice she should've made. It showed her how choosing Noel wasn't the right choice because he was capable of those kinds of actions as well, and it wasnt worth it.
(and sidenote: she was capable of these actions too as we know because she cheated on ben with Noel)
All this to say is that those dream eps showed us and her that being with Noel or picking Noel was never gonna be an option. He was the second choice, the security blanket, but when it comes to it, he was never gonna be the better choice, the right choice, or even the one that got felicity better than anyone else (which the dream eps showed when ben was the one to believe her).
Do I think some things could've been done way better?? Absolutely. But one thing they did right was show how two people can be tethered for life and how even when they mess up time and time again, love truly wins out. He INHABITS her, like no one else can.
Lastly, I hate having this conversation without prefacing that this show was all about the drama. Everyone was toxic, everything was messy, and bringing that into this conversation is about as useful as talking to the wall. Some of yall just have to accept that everyone was toxic otherwise idek how you made it through the show and want to ship anyone.
