r/arrow • u/Jbanks08 • 3d ago
Moira is hilarious
This show debuted when I was 22 and the older I get the funnier it gets every time I re-watch season 1 that she was upset he wasn't well adjusted and mature enough to be CEO of a Fortune 500 company only like a week after coming home from being "stranded on an island for 5 years". The general reaction to him being closed off in season 1 gets more ridiculous as I age like let the man reacclimate without the attitude holy shit haha.
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u/Lori2345 3d ago
I didn’t find this funny. I remember being furious she expected this immediately on his return. He just got back from supposedly being all alone struggling to survive on an island for five years. Not to mention he may just not want to do it as it’s his choice what he would want to do for a living.
Later I realized she was must have been pretending to want him to take over. And that she was angry at him for saying no. She wanted to upset him enough to have him make a scene like he later purposely did when he pretended to be drunk and say he wasn’t good enough to take the job at the ceremony for his dad.
After he did that she told Malcolm it was clear Oliver didn’t know anything about the boat being sabotaged. I did think it weird this behavior was proof to the two of them he didn’t know anything but they both did think it was. So she manipulated him into behaving a certain way to protect him from Malcolm.
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u/Jbanks08 3d ago
I like the latter part of that explanation and it's very likely. Finding her hilarious was more a sarcastic play on words for how ridiculous everyone's treatment of him early on in season 1 is considering the circumstances they're all under the impression he endured.
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u/Right_Shine_9808 3d ago
Nah it's pretty accurate if you watch further get more into their characters what makes them who they are, why they act the way they do. Moria was a very loving and protective person when it came to her children.
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u/Jbanks08 3d ago
Doesn't seem very loving and protective to try to force your 27 year old to be CEO of a big company a week after he just came back from the dead
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3d ago
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u/Jbanks08 3d ago
So I don't love the show if I critique a dumb decision by a character? Ok
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u/jarosette 3d ago
Dont listen to this guy. Some people cannot handle any critique of their favorite show. Arrow is one of my favorite shows but this was a pretty dumb character decision.
Honestly though when you rewatch as you get older, even the best seasons (S1 + S2) were very silly and unrealistic. As hard as this show tried, it was never that grounded in reality and a lot of the decisions that characters make is just to push the plot forward or try and make for an interesting episode.
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3d ago
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u/SealTeamEH 3d ago
dude look, it’s a great show but also has complete shit writing, get used to taking criticism about it because there’s lots to criticize lol
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u/Narutofan5th 3d ago
I think you're being rather selective in your recollection.
First of all, Oliver didn't actually have real struggles rejoining society. He had growing pains when starting his double life as the vigilante. Him "readjusting" was an excuse & an assumption people made for his strange or rude behavior.
Moira, however, saw it more as Oliver falling into old bad habits.
She wanted him to take a leadership position in their family company to give hi. Direction and keep him safely away from dangerous things or bad influences (Tommy & the glades).
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u/Jbanks08 3d ago
I'm not at all being selective I'm being realistic. WE know Oliver didn't have struggles but nobody was privy to the side of him that we saw. There's no realistic scenario where throwing a 27 year old into a leadership role of a huge company isn't going to be damaging to both him and the company when to the best of everyone's knowledge he'd spent 5 years isolated and before that he was an immature party boy. It's an irrational, immature stance to take on her part regardless of her intent.
WE know he isnt having any actual struggles adjusting to be back in society but the other characters don't (except Diggle who was quickly on to him). His weird behavior is him keeping up the perception that he's not who he became on the island, and had he not gone through the things we retroactively know he did and he was literally just stranded for 5 years his behavior would be completely understandable and that's why it's hilarious to me that everyone expected him to be totally fine after like a week.
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u/Girizzly_Adams_Beard 3d ago
She’s super hot though. So we can forgive her.
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u/VariationCivil8708 3d ago edited 2d ago
I was 10 or 11 when I started watching arrow and I remember have little to no opinions of Moira but I recently started rewatching it as a 20 year old and was shocked.
Like, Moira honey, what the fuck did you he was gonna be like??? The fact he came back a murderous vigilante with moderate ptsd and not clinically insane and unable to care for himself is already a miracle already...
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u/KonohaBatman 3d ago
I think it's more like, Oliver was 22 when he left. He comes back a demonstrably calmer, quieter, more mature person for his experiences that he won't speak about, and he has knowledge, skills and wisdom he lacked when he left, but has clearly shown growth from.
And then, whenever he's asked to reacclimate in any way, he seems to intentionally and extremely lean into the person he was before he left, and it's inconsistent with how he shows himself to be any other time.
Her expectations were a little high, but she's reading his capabilities well - he just doesn't want it.
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u/Lign_Grant 3d ago
Shut up Thor, go play with Hawkeye.