#im not here looking for subtext I promise (okay im a little bit am) but I wasn’t THIS TIME

[therewas-a-girl]

Hey i love the insight you give to Oliver and im not so lucky to be an analytical (😬😊) and was wondering what does Oliver trusting himself have to do with him not telling Felicity? And what does Felicity mean when she says she understands now because of Billy? Those scenes have me very confused.

okay, anon here i am, finally. im so sorry for the  late reply, but i’ve had a couple of bad days preceded by some worse weeks T_T, and i’m in the middle of exams * T_T harder* , so free time is essentially not here for me.

BUT i’m on my break now - 

SO!

first of all, thank you! i find it  a little bit surprising tbh, cause i never saw myself as very analytical - i just sort of obsess over details and some things seem to make sense only to me?  or i just don’t know how to express them clearly enough. but im going to try my best, i promise. but don’t take me at my word, cause honestly, even as i write this, im still trying to understand this myself, so i’ll just… take with with a grain of salt

im going to take up the easy one first: felicity. mostly because, where felicity’s ‘i understand now because of Billy’, of all things, is concerned, my reaction is basically this :

im just not here for it, and i dont care to bullshit my way into circular meta/rationalization over it, because the subtext of it as an idea alienates and, frankly, enrages me.

Oliver… 

So, the first thing i thought when i heard Oliver say, ‘i dont trust myself’ is the fact that, this whole conviction he has right now (that he enjoyed killing, and that everything that is and went wrong in his life, stems form this truth he hid from himself)is based on his supposed clarity about himself and his nature that he gained when he was holed up and tortured by Adrian for 7 days. Aka, not to be trusted.

my messy reasoning goes kind of like this: 

in the flashbacks, we saw Felicity tell him that she still felt like he didn’t trust her, or anyone.  That she didn’t understand why, and ‘maybe you don’t understand why either’. Leaving us with the hint  that, until he does, and deals with it, he will keep making the same choices. 

Oliver did not contradict her - which makes me think he, in part, agreed with her. 

(the writers use characters for this kind of ‘truth exposition’ thing, so i’m guessing they wanted to tell is that yes, Oliver does think this, and doesn’t understand this about himself*) 

so he has this insecurity, this… missing understanding about himself. A secret, so to speak. A truth about himself that he is so afraid of, that he has buried it so deep inside that is not even buried; It’s suppressed at this point. Which is why he didn’t understand himself. 

Adrian kidnaps him. 

Now, i thought it important to remember that he is the villain. (and here is where the text and my interpretation of it mix a little) Adrian is super smart and intuitive about people, and also - important! - a lawyer. He knows how to ask questions, how to lead people on. All the while Oliver was there, Adrian was in his suit, walking back and forth like in front of  a jury, totally calm, asking one leading question after another; plus a lovely side dish of torture, because why not trigger all the lovely trauma. 

And he got what he wanted. He got Oliver to tell him exactly what he wanted to hear!

Basically Adrian made Oliver look at his deepest fear, and admit it as truth. (and it’s not that i think the whole ‘i liked it’ about killing is a lie. but i think its more complicated than ‘you’re a dangerous crazy person who enjoys killing. who knows what you might do’) . A truth that Oliver has, apparently, always known on a subconscious level. Something he has  never faced but always feared. 

(which is, ironically, what makes it so easy to believe. It’s always a lot easier to believe the bad things about ourselves - but even more so when you take into account how self-deprecating Oliver is. hello depression how are you?)

This truth he admitted has been behind his every hesitation, his every insecurity. The fear that goes kind of like this: ‘You are a bad person because you did horrible things, monstrous things, and it’s not that you’re not sorry. You  liked it’.  

To someone like Oliver, whose sense of morality, right and wrong, is mostly internal, personal, (but also informed by conventional understanding of good and evil ) and who relies on ideals, motivations, reasons, to help him navigate his daily life, this is basically shattering the ground he walks on.

Oliver has always seemed to me like he needed to believe that his actions were right. Extreme, but justifiable, doing the right thing. (i remember his whole speech in s1 when he made an offer to John about joining him. about how the rich people of Starling were stepping on the city’s throat and not caring who they hurt and if nobody was going to stop them, then ‘its going to be me’. it was to fulfill a promise, a duty - something he sometimes even seemed to resent. but to do that, he had to believe he was doing the right thing, though in flawed ways) 

…that he didn’t even think were that flawed since, in season 1, he was having some SERIOUS adjustments issues when it came to adapting to civilian life. Every time he went out there, he was ‘kill or be killed’ mentality of a war-zone, which had been his reality for 5 years. Took some time to shake that off and even be able to see that he didn’t have to kill to survive. (and holy shit am i digressing)

Now, it seems to me that Oliver took this admission when he was in that cell, and did not stop to examine the ‘why-s’ and ‘how-s’, or even doubt the conclusion Adrian led him to, based on who was ‘holding his hand’ trying to get him there. Because Oliver says it himself - ‘Adrian did not make me a killer’. He frees this truth from circumstance completely. (either the circumstances of his admission, or even, before that, his behavior/violence) 

I don’t even think circumstances matter to him; they’d probably sound like justifications and he’d feel even worse for trying to justify himself, when he thinks so lowly of himself. 

Obviously Felicity puts it in far better context than he is capable - or rather, willing -  to do, reminding him, in 5.20, of things that he maybe knows to be true, but that he thinks have no bearing on his actions, or his judgement of himself. (’Five years in hell did that. Five years dealing with this city’s worst criminals did that’). She immediately gives him context, that Oliver probably feels either guilty for considering, or like it has no bearing, because he still chose murder, and who does that? Bad people who are not to be trusted. The kind of people he used to kill, in fact. (a belief reinforced by the accidental murder of Billy Malone, actually, while we’re at it. Like, in Oliver’s head it probably sounds like this: ‘if you weren’t so fucking monstrous and a murderer, Malone would still be alive’.)

The crux of the question seems to be the clash (a push and pull) between the love and compassion he is capable of, all the good parts of him, moral parts (and judgments); and the violence he knows he is capable of. (and righteousness, the satisfaction he felt while enacting that violence.**). 

He probably thinks that this ‘truth’ Adrian ‘showed’ him/led him to, is something he’s “known” all along, but just been too much of a coward to admit to himself. 

Like, suddenly that ‘unknown reason why he doesn't trust anyone’ has a logic, and a clear definition. He was afraid to face it, but now he does, and it makes perfect sense! He is the problem! He doesn’t trust himself because – the goodness (to simplify it) inside him, the part of him that feels guilt now, never let him get close to people he loved, even though he wanted to, even though he needed them. It always made him hesitate, because essentially, he was protecting everyone around him, instinctively, from what he knows to be violent and dark inside him. 

He also lied to himself and others he got involved with (John and Felicity, for starters)  about why he was doing what he was doing. That he is no better than the people he used to murder, and he even got his best friends involved 

and he forgets that his ability to feel all this guilt over this kind of thought is, essentially, what makes him so different, and sets him apart from this person he is so afraid he is. 

EDIT: i almost forgot that you asked me about how this relates to Oliver not telling Felicity about William - and I’m guessing, it’s not specifically about William. That omission was generalized as a lack of trust, and this ^^ whole thing, seems to be aimed to explain why. I think Oliver thought she would for sure explode in his hands, a conviction fueled by Barry’s ‘you broke up’ idea. And that he thought she would for sure leave him, not love him enough to forgive him? Not love him enough, essentially, because why would she? 

The feeling of being a failure for missing out on his son’s life (were it anyone else, i wouldn’t say he takes this blame too on his shoulders, because its so clearly Moira’s and Samantha’s doing for keeping him away, but this is Oliver! Of course he would) probably added to the guilt and the certainty that he wasn’t good enough for her to hang around. 

A self fulfilling prophecy, in truth, and a also a deep misunderstanding of Felicity’s character. More than the lie/omission, i find this, the reason behind it, to be Oliver’s real mistake. 

A mistake of course that is, sadly, in character, because Oliver has historically had trouble believing that the people he loves actually love him back. Which leads us back to ‘why would they’, and the reason why he thinks that, which is basically that he thinks he’s a shit person not worthy of anyone’s love. Not always, but most of the time.

It’s such a BRILLIANT manipulation really, because on someone who is like Adrian, this kind of lie wouldn't work! (Adrian killed his wife. In cold blood. he has exactly zero problems being the way he is.) 

It takes someone like Oliver for this  to work. Someone who is essentially ALL HEART. Who is kind and good and who, on a deep human level, abhors the violence that was done to him and that he has done to others, despite knowing that ‘it is a violent world and - as the world has taught him - it only responds to violence.’ It takes someone moral enough that, even while enacting murder, even while feeling that killing evil men was good, would still know it is wrong. And hate himself for it. For being capable of it, for looking at the world in the  face and thinking it is necessary. 

You can be led to think something is necessary, and still hate it. I think Oliver is an idealist, so it fits that he would hate having to lower himself to the level of nastiness the world around him responds to. (it’s so good for him that he is a mayor, actually. he can affect change, without employing ‘talents’ that came to him though pain and loss and tragedy. skills - violence - that he probably hate using by now, at this point in his journey) 

I really hope I’m making at least some kind of sense. Im sure this is like, only a portion of what is really going on with Oliver; or an angle into it? idk… 

Personally, when I imagine Oliver’s mind, I usually think of him floating on the surface of a really deep lake. And this lake is his personality/psyche, the exploration of which has been affected by his history. Said history has been such that he has explored corners of this lake that to most people, remain obscure all their lives. This is not a good or bad thing. it chance. Some people are pushed to the extremes and learn new things about themselves. Some never have to. Oliver was pushed, and he knows the depths of this lake, the hidden caves, the scary wildlife in the dark. It’s not like he went to those depths because he wanted to - but that doesn’t matter. What he saw there, he cannot unsee, unlearn***. 

Now he is on the surface again - but he knows the geography of himself. Most people whose feet dont touch the soil think the depth goes a couple of feet more. Oliver knows it doesn’t. And he knows that, if necessary, he could go to those depths again, if he has to. 

I mean, people rarely know what they’re capable of in extreme situations. Most people think choices made in these kinds of cases reveal you. And Oliver thinks those choices revealed a killer. And despite how balmy the surface waters are, he knows that down there it’s ugly so, he puts up these limits. You get to swim up to here where its safe, but not further out. Even if you want to. Felicity totally wanted to know all about him, but Oliver thought, wow no. Down there its ugly and gross and if she sees that, she will not just leave. She will also hate me. And to Oliver, being someone who feeds so much on the opinions of the people he loves - that  is basically his worst nightmare. I swear some of his most radical actions have been because he was so resistant to someone he cares about thinking badly of him. 

Anyways, this got ridiculously long. 

* the next time anyone tells me Arrow is good representation for someone with PTSD and mental illness, I’m gonna fucking FIGHT that person, because this is prime example of these asshole writers mystifying this illness. Why, you might ask. Because Oliver’s trust issues can directly and unequivocally be traced to his trauma. Its not that hard. it is not a mystery and treating it as such, and making everyone around him ignorant of this simple fact, demonizes (so to speak) his condition, instead of ‘representing’ it in any positive way. 

At this point Oliver’s isolation is beyond logic - or suspense of logic. As of right now there are two soldiers, two geniuses and a cop on his team! it makes them all into either idiots, or nasty, cause they have either trained to expect this (Dinah, as a cop, i imagine knows what PTSD is) or been through it (John, Rene) or are fucking geniuses who can fucking google (Felicity, Curtis). By now even nonexistent baby Sara would be able to understand the reasons behind Oliver’s patterns of behavior. It is not rocket science AND EVEN IF IT WAS - FUCKING GENIUSES IN THE HOUSE???!!!

I’m just so tired of Oliver’s trauma and violent re-traumatization being used (exploited) and some ‘so hard to understand’ baffling plot point, instead of being dealt with.

** I dont think Oliver ever stopped to consider that his life during those five years was hell, and that that means a lot of things. It means that it was out of control for a long time. that he was prey for a long time. and that it is absolutely normal to feel a sort of satisfaction when you are not the prey anymore. and that its normal to feel good when you ‘replace evil with death’ like he did in season 1. and that plenty of veterans would be able to tell him that soldiers hate war and t lohe ve war too, and that this is what happens when you live in this… almost liminal violent reality for so long. we are human and we adapt to whatever we have to, to survive. 

***I actually think this is what’s happening with Felicity too, only instead of a lake, with Felicity I imagine a road. Like those that stretch through the desert. She only sees this one road and she is so sure that she has to walk it, because it feels righteous to her. Necessary. 

Oliver and John though, they know where that road leads. They know that the choices she will make along the  way that will feel necessary - that they may even BE necessary - but she may eventually regret making them. Because this extreme, ruthless clarity she’s living, and which they have lived, pushes away all reasons why some things are wrong, but those reasons, John and Oliver know, eventually (if you’re lucky) will come back. And the  choices made during that time might give Felicity insight into things she is capable of that she is probably going to hate. And hate herself for making them. 

And they’re just trying to warn her that this road she is walking on is literally the middle of nowhere. That there are no stop signs to tell her when she’s gone too far and that she will know only when she is too deep in it, and she will hate herself for it, just like they hate themselves for some of the things they  have done, that they wish they  never had to do. 

I’m going with this interpretation, instead of the weirdly sexist-vibe of ‘you’re too pure to be fucking human’ angle.

#arrow meta #oliver queen #felicity smoak #arrow thoughts #oliver queen thoughts #felicity smoak thoughts #s5 #this is probably full of typos im so sorry #Anonymous