Team GATV Roundtable: Talking Arrow Season 6 So Far

Where do you stand on the OTA/New Team Arrow conflict?

CRAIG: I feel like we’ve seen this story before, but I’m also kind of sad that OTA would spy on their friends and allies. It made them all look bad, which is also unfortunate since it was only a few weeks ago that, say, Dinah kept a secret for John Diggle. I understand conflict makes the show move, but I’d really like to see more unity.

Obviously the original members of Team Arrow will always mean more to me, but I think that story really made them look bad.

MATT: It’s tiring. Yes, we can see there were legitimate reasons why Oliver would have trouble trusting either Dinah or Rene. Yet, it can’t help but feel manufactured, which does seem to fit with Cayden James’ plan. You kind of wish both were built better. Sure, they have history behind them, but it seemed to occur over a single episode or two rather than feel earned. Rene’s betrayal in particular feels forced. It’s not necessarily the wrong note, but it feels like it’s not being played right. And then Curtis just feels like the odd man out.

STEPHANIE: Having been betrayed twice by new members of his team, I can see why Oliver might not give them unwavering trust, but like Craig said, it makes him and the whole of OTA look bad if they don’t trust the newbies but expect the newbies to trust them. I wish the divide between OTA and NTA would cease to exist because they’re all working toward the same goal. Just because they joined the team at different times doesn’t mean they deserve different treatment or have more or less of a reason to betray the others.

MELISSA: The midseason finale attempted to portray the conflict fairly even handedly, but I accept none of it. I’m Original Team Arrow all the way.

Given the circumstances, the new team members are acting like absolute babies. Oliver, Felicity, and Diggle didn’t randomly surveil them. They had solid fact that one of the three had betrayed Oliver and Oliver’s exposure – as the show put in context again and again throughout the season – meant it was only a short leap until the whole team was exposed. Searching for the one ratting Oliver out was to protect the whole team, not just the original members.

One evening of looking into the new team member’s behavior and tracking their movements is not in my opinion an unreasonable response to the threat. Diggle suggested perhaps confronting the team and letting the guilty party step forward instead, but he also backed off that suggestion because they had no reason to think someone that duplicitous would own up to their betrayal if directly confronted.

I also found the hurt feelings over Oliver having more faith in the original team members absurd. Of course the two people who had proven themselves to Oliver again and again for the last six years – aka his brand new wife and the man he called brother – had earned more of his faith than the ones that had been on the team for at best, not much more than a year. And Oliver and the other team members did trust all the new members implicitly UNTIL they had proof that one of them HAD betrayed them.

Dinah and Curtis’ hurt outrage was wildly out of proportion given the circumstances. Dinah was actually lying and hiding contact with Vigilante, an enemy of the team and Curtis just the previous year had done worse to Felicity when he tricked her into EATING NANITES that he then used to track her. I’m outraged that they left feeling more betrayed by the original team than they did Rene, the one actually in the process of selling them all out.

Speaking of Rene. His betrayal is couched in terms of Rene having to do it in order to protect his relationship with his daughter which I found painfully ironic since practically up to that point Curtis, Quentin and Oliver had all done more to fight for Rene’s relationship with his daughter than had Rene. Why did he cowardly turn on his biggest supporters? Where was his faith and loyalty to his team? Why did he take Samanda Watson’s claims at face value without ever tapping into the team’s vast resources and contacts to verify her claims or look for a way out?

Instead, he told himself that Oliver was going down anyway so his betrayal didn’t matter which makes him a fool not to realize that if Watson really had independent proof that Oliver was the Green Arrow, then she’d have no reason to offer Rene a deal for his testimony.

Despite all of this, Oliver still finds it in his heart to allow Rene back on the team, but Rene immediately goes rogue, leaving to do his own thing even though it put Oliver’s life at risk. How is that supposed to help Oliver relearn to trust him? And yet, Rene acts like he is the injured party when Oliver kicks him off the team for good this time.

I fully expect the OTA and the New Team Arrow to mend their current rift but even if they let Rene back on the team, I don’t see how anyone could ever trust him again. Perhaps what he’s done might be forgivable if you accept he acted foolishly out of fear, but how could anyone on the team ever expect him not to make the same self-serving choices the next time his loyalty is tested? And how can the original team member ever fully trust the team members that backed Rene’s betrayal over the integrity of Team Arrow?

I do not have answers for these questions. I hope the show does.