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[Joni]

Out of all Berlanti's shows Arrow is the one that never had a villain problem. Even if everything else is breaking the villains remain high quality as a whole. They might get some misteps here and there, but it's never anything close to fatal. Arrow easily has the best villains in superhero tv.
In fact, the worst argument you can raise against Arrow when it comes to villains is the show not having enough of them. As the main problem with Ra's was that he appeared a bit too late and Darkh's had to be delayed for few eps, which in reality should have been used to fit mini-villain instead of pausing Darkh. But even when Darkh was running in place he was still pure delight to watch.

Dahrk should have had a couple of luitenants, fighters unlike Ruvé.

sure, just as long as you understand that you're contributing to the shitposting you so loathe by engaging with it instead of doing the simple thing that you're coming up with excuses not to do

I love pointing out people that they're wrong, the internet gives me a lot of place to do so. If you need to talk yourself into keep watching a show you dislike, maybe it is time to give in and say that you still like the show.

 

[WrenchNinja]

i still do like the show though

 

[fallengorn]

Dahrk should have had a couple of luitenants, fighters unlike Ruvé.

They should've gotten to the "Arrow villains as flunkies" sooner. It was neat to see them back, but it was truncated to a few episodes near the end.

 

[Joni]

They should've gotten to the "Arrow villains as flunkies" sooner. It was neat to see them back, but it was truncated to a few episodes near the end.

And let's be honest, a bit higher level than Murmur. I mean getting Brick was cool, but it felt kinda limited in scope when Anarky, The Calculator and Malcolm are on the other side.

 

[KonradLaw]

Dahrk should have had a couple of luitenants, fighters unlike Ruvé.
.

Yeah. I mean...what exactly was the point of him being part of H.I.V.E? That seemed like a supervillain group. And Darkh wasn't even it's leader initially.

S2 did it best. Because it had Blood and then Grundy as mini-bosses before Slade took over. And even when Slade took over he still had that flunky deathstroke girl with him.

In S4 they had a lot of wasted potential. In the end Anarky turned out to be awesome, but that happened at the very end and he was absent for most of the season.

Also..Demolition crew was such a fricking amazing idea that to see them limited to just one episode was a crime. Beef them up a bit, give them shit to destroy and they would be perfect side job while Darkh made his final preparations.

 

[Sephzilla]

I'm not entirely on the Arrow hate-wagon, but I really miss seasons 1 and 2 of Arrow. Tonally they feel like a different show compared to seasons 3 and 4.

I'm also kind of tired of Arrow falling victim to the "raising the stakes" issue where every crisis needs to be bigger than the previous one. Seasons 1 and 2 had way smaller stakes compared to seasons 3 and 4 yet tensions felt a lot higher in the first seasons.

 

[BewareTheBatsie]

Darhk as a character wasn't the problem but more so the execution, having him appear in episode 1 was a bad choice and the team all looked like major idiots with how he always managed to get away.

Arrow's been pretty good with villains over the course of the show, minor or major, except Ra's al Ghul. Ra's was terrible.

 

[Joni]

Yeah. I mean...what exactly was the point of him being part of H.I.V.E? That seemed like a supervillain group. And Darkh wasn't even it's leader initially.

S2 did it best. Because it had Blood and then Grundy as mini-bosses before Slade took over. And even when Slade took over he still had that flunky deathstroke girl with him.

In S4 they had a lot of wasted potential. In the end Anarky turned out to be awesome, but that happened at the very end and he was absent for most of the season.

Also..Demolition crew was such a fricking amazing idea that to see them limited to just one episode was a crime. Beef them up a bit, give them shit to destroy and they would be perfect side job while Darkh made his final preparations.

Indeed, they needed to course correct in the middle. Have someone turn up who looks more dangerous. Maybe even two three hive leaders. But twist, Darhk set them up and had Oliver handle unknowingly them while he took out the others. We would have just as much Darhk but he would grow more.
And they need Anarky back next year, give him an episode or two where he needs Thea to help him.

 

[PHOENIXZERO]

I don't have the energy to even hate watch Arrow TBH, there's just been next to zero enjoyment for me anymore, the show has never come close to something "Emmy worthy" in that regard but at least I had fun and I don't anymore, Laurel being killed off and the poor justification for it was pretty much the tipping point that lead to my giving up with Malcolm making it another season with little to no repercussions was the final straw. No, I don't count his inadvertently killing Tommy as one since Malcolm never seemed to give a shit. Thea should've fought and killed him intercut with Oliver fought Damien and doing more than just trading shitty punches and Bamford embarrassed and I don't really care about whatever excuses there may have been, that was just stupid just as having an army of guys with rifles rushing into hand to hand combat with a crowd.

Arrow needs a season where someone isn't out to destroy the city or commit genocide, some other stakes would be a nice change if pulled off along with a couple other threats before the main villain. As also already said, execution has been one of Arrow's biggest problems, especially since season three and it needs to do whatever it can to fix that issue but I doubt it'll happen with the people in charge or their writers.


On another note, despite Zero, Joni and Static's best efforts to pick up the slack the S4 OT is pretty far behind the S3 one at this point which reached 19,226 posts before Cornballer closed it and we moved to the DC TV off season topic. Granted there's still a week and a half left before the time after the finales line up but I doubt 2,300+ posts are going to be generated. I'm not sure of the "Wall of Shame" indicates less enthusiasm or if just bans had a role to play in it. I was banned for a bit this last season but I doubt that would make up for the 84 less posts I've made but going down the list I do wonder how much less activity the S5 OT will have.

 

[Stallion Dan]

Go back to the beginning of the topic. The Olicity haters got exactly what they wanted: a break-up.

No, we wanted the show to stop such a heavy focus on teen relationship drama, I don't care if they together or not, but that shit needs to go to The O.C 2016 or whatever it is nowdays.

 

[Gothos]

Just catched up on the last 3 episodes. Yea, I think it's time to dump this show.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

No, we wanted the show to stop such a heavy focus on teen relationship drama, I don't care if they together or not, but that shit needs to go to The O.C 2016 or whatever it is nowdays.

It's a CW show, fucking Supernatural has insane amounts of teen relationship drama and it's just the brothers 90% of the time.

Also it's a DC thing by now

 

[Joni]

It is strange to think, but this villain will be the first one not mentioned in the early seasons. DeathStroke is teased from the pilot and Slade appears in the thirteenth episode, League of Assassins comes first in the sixteenth episode and HIVE is in the sixth episode of the second season. Or we just haven't found the hint yet.

It's a CW show, fucking Supernatural has insane amounts of teen relationship drama and it's just the brothers 90% of the time.

Deanstiel!

 

[Mortimer Brewster]

It's a CW show, fucking Supernatural has insane amounts of teen relationship drama and it's just the brothers 90% of the time.

Also it's a DC thing by now

Teen relationship drama when done right is fine. The 100 does it well enough, The Flash is fine with it. Heck it's in Legends and it isn't a problem. With Arrow, Olicity never made sense and it only exists in its shitty form because Uncle Guggie listens to the crazy Olicity shippers that have gone as far as harassing Katie Cassidy and Amell's own wife because they love Felicity.

 

[Familienoberhauptvogel]

Teen relationship drama when done right is fine. The 100 does it well enough, The Flash is fine with it. Heck it's in Legends and it isn't a problem. With Arrow, Olicity never made sense and it only exists in its shitty form because Uncle Guggie listens to the crazy Olicity shippers that have gone as far as harassing Katie Cassidy and Amell's own wife because they love Felicity.

I always liked the prospect of Olicity they went that route too soon though and/or wrong. The teen drama is dumb in Legends and it's even dumber in Flash.

Yes fandoms often end up crazy and they do abhorrent shit but it's usually not those, writers cater too otherwise we'd have a scandal at hand with gay incest on Supernatural by now.
The Felicity hate is getting tiresome, at times disturbing and most often ludicrous. Of course she was better during the first season, everyone but Laurel was, who was always shit if you ask me, and cutting her won't magically get the show back on track.

 

[Joni]

Teen relationship drama when done right is fine. The 100 does it well enough, The Flash is fine with it. Heck it's in Legends and it isn't a problem. With Arrow, Olicity never made sense and it only exists in its shitty form because Uncle Guggie listens to the crazy Olicity shippers that have gone as far as harassing Katie Cassidy and Amell's own wife because they love Felicity.

The 100 fans might be worse than the Olicity shippers and the show has no current healthy relationship outside of

Spoiler

Harper-Monty

, The Flash hasn't actually done a good relationship yet as we have been discussing in that topic, and the love triangle in LoT was widely, widely critized. They goofed with Ray - Kendra and it was squick because Kendra just doesn't look old enough for Ray, even though Brandon-Ciara is about the same as Stephen-Emily. And we cheered when they killed Falk.

 

[BewareTheBatsie]

The 100 fans might be worse than the Olicity shippers and the show has no current healthy relationship outside of

Spoiler

Harper-Monty

, The Flash hasn't actually done a good relationship yet as we have been discussing in that topic, and the love triangle in LoT was widely, widely critized. They goofed with Ray - Kendra and it was squick because Kendra just doesn't look old enough for Ray, even though Brandon-Ciara is about the same as Stephen-Emily. And we cheered when they killed Falk.

There were complaints over that? That's about the last issue I would have thought people would have given Routh looks younger than 36 if you ask me. The relationship was terrible, but I wouldn't think that would be a problem.

 

[Stallion Dan]

There's no enjoyment though. At all. Just people whining about the same shit every week. And yes, it shits up the thread.

Speak for yourself, I see shit on the screen and then opinions that agree with my thoughts, makes me enjoy the thread.

 

[Joni]

There were complaints over that? That's about the last issue I would have thought people would have given Routh looks younger than 36 if you ask me. The relationship was terrible, but I wouldn't think that would be a problem.

That is a personal problem. Brandon doesn't look old, but I never got the impression that Kendra was supposed to be more than a college student-age. We meet her as a barrista. It feels like something she'd do to pay for college. I don't get the impression she is older than Thea, born in 1995 or Jefferson from 1993. Ray on the other hand is born in 1981, so he is 35. She could be like half his age. Compare to Felicity, where we know Oliver is 31 and Felicity is 27, same age as Barry, Iris, ...

 

[Blader]

The problem with Ray and Kendra is that they repeated the same annoying subplot over and over again: Ray has feelings for Kendra, Kendra has feelings for him, decides she suddenly doesn't because of Carter/her past/the mission, then they kiss and make up. Rinse and repeat for 8 episodes.

 

[Stallion Dan]

Kendra in her mid 20s, surely?

 

[BewareTheBatsie]

Willa Holland on Suicide Squad plans.

While I'm against the argument the TV actors should play the characters in the movie, I do dislike that the Suicide Squad characters couldn't exist in the TV verse and movie verse at the same time separately. At least we got Earth-2 Deadshot out of it.

That is a personal problem. Brandon doesn't look old, but I never got the impression that Kendra was supposed to be more than a college student-age. We meet her as a barrista. It feels like something she'd do to pay for college. I don't get the impression she is older than Thea, born in 1995 or Jefferson from 1993. Ray on the other hand is born in 1981, so he is 35. She could be like half his age. Compare to Felicity, where we know Oliver is 31 and Felicity is 27, same age as Barry, Iris, ...

I buy Kendra as around the age of her actress, but I can definitely see where you're coming from.

Arrowverse doing the opposite of Dawson Casting. Katie Cassidy, Grant Gustin and EBR are younger than their characters.

 

[Jonogunn]

How Malcolm is left alive after all the shit he pulls is beyond me.

 

[OdysseusVA]

How Malcolm is left alive after all the shit he pulls is beyond me.

He's important to the Olicity arc. Unlike Laurel. She was in the way.

 

[King Gilga]

I don't see the problem with hate watching a show, it can be pretty fun, especially when you're doing it with other people.

But arrow got so bad it wasn't even fun to hate watch anymore, fun dumb goofy fun bad like legends, just trash that almost made me retroactively regret ever watching any season of the show at all dexter tier bad.

 

[Subpar Spatula]

Because I might want to read their posts in other topics. Because people still quote ignored people. Because ignoring people actually doesn't make the new posts icon go away. Because I think that maybe, they should just learn to quit stuff if they don't like it. I have dropped shows on mass this season, even I'm in a third season or later. I dropped Criminal Minds in season 11 because I wasn't up to watching it week by week anymore. It is not that hard if you truly dislike a show.

People can hate all they want. You're the one with the problem since you seem to want to follow the darkness and give it hope. You're no better than the haters.

You are actually darkness.

 

[Penguin]

Do The CW's Superhero Shows Have a Big, Bad Villain Problem?

Little think piece from TVLine. They're right though, they really need to up the big bad quality to match an ex-CBS show like Supergirl.

I think Darhk was probably the best overall, he had presence and wasn't let down by acting, mostly just the events going on around him.

I think the problem is not knowing what to do with a big bad for the ENTIRE season.

Like think of Arrow season 2/Flash season 1... most of the first half of the season deals with a completely different threat.... then we get the reveal, but even then we still have a ton of build-up.

But keeping them around for the entire run of the show, you either end up making the heroes idiots, the villains weak or their plot non-sensical.

 

[kylecoley182]

damn Willa
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/dc_tv...ms-warner-bros-confirms-studio-forced-a142144

 

[Volimar]

You're basically calling your fans idiots with the "confusion" explanation. Smallville and Superman Returns were on at the same time. I think it's the movie people not wanting to deal with

Spoiler

probably apt

comparisons between the show characters and movie characters, especially if the show characters are seen as better despite the money going into the films.

Also:

 

[Joni]

Willa Holland on Suicide Squad plans.

I'm glad they keep lashing out at Warner for their lies about the lack of an embargo. There is an embargo, and it cost us the Suicide Squad show and Ted Kord.

You are actually darkness.

 

[PHOENIXZERO]

You're basically calling your fans idiots with the "confusion" explanation. Smallville and Superman Returns were on at the same time. I think it's the movie people not wanting to deal with

Spoiler

probably apt

comparisons between the show characters and movie characters, especially if the show characters are seen as better despite the money going into the films.

Also:

It is, Smallville was also at risk of being cancelled had WB Films and especially Singer wanted it but Singer didn't want to do that and ended up inviting, IIRC Millar and Gough to the set and shared some of the designs for the FoS which were used on Smallville.

 

[ZeroX03]

Also:

I'm starting to suspect Barrowman might be a little bit gay. But he's so rugged and manly normally.

 

[Volimar]

I'm starting to suspect Barrowman might be a little bit gay. But he's so rugged and manly normally.

Well sure.

 

[ZeroX03]

Well sure.

That's just some good old fashioned bromance.

 

[Volimar]

That character was such a horndog. Crazy considering his fate.

 

[ZeroX03]

I should watch Torchwood again.

Spoiler

Better than Dr. Who, only really care for the universe thanks to Captain Jack.

 

[Joni]

Someone as Malcolm can't possibly be played by a gay guy. I mean, he is a manly man, like Oliver, Diggle or Roy. Could you imagine one of them being gay?

 

[ZeroX03]

Someone as Malcolm can't possibly be played by a gay guy. I mean, he is a manly man, like Oliver, Diggle or Roy. Could you imagine one of them being gay?

Would a gay guy be ripped and wear Abercrombie? Uhhh, I don't think so.

 

[Volimar]

Someone as Malcolm can't possibly be played by a gay guy. I mean, he is a manly man, like Oliver, Diggle or Roy. Could you imagine one of them being gay?

I couldn't even guess which one it would be. The audience would flip.

 

[jdstorm]

Out of all Berlanti's shows Arrow is the one that never had a villain problem. Even if everything else is breaking the villains remain high quality as a whole. They might get some misteps here and there, but it's never anything close to fatal. Arrow easily has the best villains in superhero tv.
In fact, the worst argument you can raise against Arrow when it comes to villains is the show not having enough of them. As the main problem with Ra's was that he appeared a bit too late and Darkh's had to be delayed for few eps, which in reality should have been used to fit mini-villain instead of pausing Darkh. But even when Darkh was running in place he was still pure delight to watch.

Um.. Season 2's Slade Wilson wanted to kill Oliver's family because shadow didn't love him. It was pretty shit. Even if Manu Bennet made it better then it deserved to be. Season 3s Ras, Fake killing your lead at mid season an underwhelming undercover where Oliver was the big bad for half a season (/Merlins Bitch)
Season 4 was the best Villan since S1 but they clearly didn't set things up very well

 

[XAL]

That's only one Reddit thread, found within the first few comments. There's more than just a little sexism fueling the anti-Felicity and Arrow hate. Some of them are able to hide it better than others, but its still plenty apparent.

?

 

[The Silver]

Deathstroke and Reverse Flash set the bar so high for their respective shows I don't think they'll ever get a villain to equal them again. Ra's probably wouldn't have seemed so disappointing if he hadn't have come after Slade, the guy just didn't live up to his rep and never felt as threatening as Slade. Dark.....I don't know I like the actor but that's about it, I really don't have much of an opinion on him, he's just kinda there.

 

[Volimar]

Reverse Flash will always be the bar that other villains will be judged by, and they'll always fall short because we'll never give the characters the benefit of the doubt if they blindly believe in someone like that again.

 

[Joni]

Um.. Season 2's Slade Wilson wanted to kill Oliver's family because shadow didn't love him. It was pretty shit. Even if Manu Bennet made it better then it deserved to be. Season 3s Ras, Fake killing your lead at mid season an underwhelming undercover where Oliver was the big bad for half a season (/Merlins Bitch)
Season 4 was the best Villan since S1 but they clearly didn't set things up very well

Manu Bennett feels so charismatic every time he appears on screen that you forgive him the weak background, even if I adore joking about it. I also wouldn't put it solely on Shado, he was betrayed by Oliver on the island when he tried to kill him. It is one of the reasons why Slade comes back. Same goes a bit for the Dark Archer, where it is Barrowman's charisma that wins. When we thought the Archer was a henchman, Malcolm still seemed like a cooler threat.

Ra's didn't get enough of spotlight to earn the same credit. Even if they should get it there for trying something different. He actually isn't supposed to be the 'villain', he is the same idealist as Oliver but driven into being a cynic from generations of living. Dahrk and him seem like they are 200-300 years old, clearly losing their family as they go along. Ra's just wants to die, while Dahrk wants to take the world with him. Savage being a psychopath helps in that respect, he doesn't care what happens to his loved ones.

 

[jdstorm]

Manu Bennett feels so charismatic every time he appears on screen that you forgive him the weak background, even if I adore joking about it. I also wouldn't put it solely on Shado, he was betrayed by Oliver on the island when he tried to kill him. It is one of the reasons why Slade comes back. Same goes a bit for the Dark Archer, where it is Barrowman's charisma that wins. When we thought the Archer was a henchman, Malcolm still seemed like a cooler threat.
.

Slade coming back to kill Oliver because Oliver tried to kill him is stil a retcon. When we originally meet Slade he has been betrayed by his best friend and is teaming up with Ollie/Shado/AsianYoda purely for pragmatic reasons. That's Slade Wilson, loner and pragmatist who will just as easily have a beer with you as he will slit your throat, and it won't be personal.

And nothing really changes until the awkward (and stupid) love triangle. Revenge for lost love season final (where felicity is a total badass, way before she became another terrible love interest)

 

[KonradLaw]

Manu made Slade work with his charisma alone.
But late in the flashbacks, when he had Oliver chained and Olie tried to talk him down with logic he has that great "I don't care" line. It coupled with Manu's acting in that scene made the whole thing work. He was just plain crazy and didn't care about reasons for hurting his friend.

It just came too late in the season to recover his motivation. Plus they've lost the ability to strenghten it in S3. Slade without mirakuru, after many months in a cell shouldn't have been as driven to revenge as he was. Heck, if they needed that plot of Slade hunting them on the island they could have just left him stopping himself at the very and saying something "I'm tired. I think I'm done".
Instead it looked like even without Mirakuru Slade was just as crazy, which was ridiculous.

 

[KonradLaw]

I liked Ra's a lot. I think he gets bad rep in a large part because people were dissapointed by the season as a whole, plus he didn't get to star enough to make full impact.

But as a character I loved that villain. He remains the only big bad in Arrowerse who's not a shitty person. He felt dignified and respectable. Fatherly almost to Oliver. And I loved that he just wanted a successor and essentially wanted to help Oliver. Plus he's the only villain who actually succeeded in his plans for the most part.

Which makes the late twist of destroying the city really shitty. Should have been just killing somebody from family, with Thea being the perfect candidate Keeping it personal would have worked far better. Still, despite that twist I still loved how he ended up. With Oliver reciting the same prayer and Ra's looking like a proud father to his successor who just killed him,.

 

[Joni]

Slade coming back to kill Oliver because Oliver tried to kill him is stil a retcon. When we originally meet Slade he has been betrayed by his best friend and is teaming up with Ollie/Shado/AsianYoda purely for pragmatic reasons. That's Slade Wilson, loner and pragmatist who will just as easily have a beer with you as he will slit your throat, and it won't be personal.

It is however clearly personal when he is talking about Billy. He makes a big point on how Billy betrayed him, how they used to be close friends. He also clearly respects Yao Fei, saying he is only training Oliver because Yaoi Fei said so.

And nothing really changes until the awkward (and stupid) love triangle.

Outside of the part where they become close friends, which already happens in the first season. Mirakaru Shado is his paranoid side, just like how Thea appeared when Roy got hit with it. Despite them actually having a chance together he still saw Thea.

 

[ZeroX03]

Ra's is a weird dude who is seemingly torn between tradition and logic. Sometimes he seems pretty reasonable, other times he's like "well some ancient rules say it's time to die". Also doesn't help that so many people speak for him or are just guessing what he'll do. Even in his Legends episode he starts off by saying "kill the intruders!" to "have fun time traveling kids!". It's almost like he's written just to suit the plot.

 

[Joni]

Ra's is easily explained if you remember he is actually the crazy grandfather who lost his mind.