ARROW Post-Mortem: Andrew Kreisberg on Laurel’s Decision, the Future of Laurel and Oliver, and More
April 16, 2014 by Marisa Roffman
[This post contains spoilers for the ARROW episode, “The Man Under the Hood.” If you have not watched it yet, go watch that, and then come back to see what ARROW executive producer Andrew Kreisberg has to say.]
ARROW’s Laurel finally knows the truth that Oliver is the man behind The Arrow’s hood, but, for now — thanks to a heart-to-heart with her father, who was willing to go to prison to keep the mysterious man safe — she’s keeping that knowledge to herself.
“Laurel makes the very classy decision to keep Oliver’s decision in this episode, because she knows that what he needs to right now is not knowing that she knows,” ARROW executive producer Andrew Kreisberg told reporters. “She will discover, later on, there is a time when he does need to know [she knows].”
And while Laurel sought out Oliver to show him (platonic) support at the end of the episode, Kreisberg wouldn’t rule out a romantic future for the duo.
“It’s Oliver and Laurel,” he pointed out. “They can break up, sleep together, break up, get married, get divorced, she forgets him[, etc.]. The best part about the success of the show is it’s always our desire to speed through story…[but] on the other hand, one thing success has enabled us to do is to slow-play some things.”
“We’ve really adopted this mantra of, ‘We give people what they need, not what they want,'” he continued. “Having Oliver and Laurel get together in season 1, I think that’s what people needed then. But then they needed them to go on a break so Oliver could have this storyline with Sara for this season, which is what felt right to us. He has women in his life; he has Laurel, he has Felicity, Helena is doing a 10-20 stretch [in prison]. Laurel will always be one of the closest people to him, whether that’s romantic or not. And that’s why it’s so powerful to us that in his darkest hour, Laurel is the one who pulls him out of it.”
One of the other big moments of the hour was when Oliver discovered that Roy, not Slade, was hooked up to the machine that would take his blood and reproduce the effects of the Mirakuru on the army Slade is building. (And had it been Slade, Team Arrow had hoped Oliver would be able to defeat a weakened Slade.) But, according to Kreisberg, Roy wasn’t always supposed to be whom Oliver found in the machine.
“We were actually going to have him disappear for a couple of episodes and really feel his absence,” Kreisberg admitted. “We were going to have Slade in the machine, and have [Isabel] step out, and she was save him, but I don’t remember who said it, but they said, ‘It should be Roy in the machine. Make that a great twist.'”
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What did you think of tonight’s episode of ARROW?
ARROW airs Wednesdays at 8 PM on The CW.
Related:
ARROW: Andrew Kreisberg on Laurel’s New Insight into Oliver
ARROW: Marc Guggenheim on Slade vs. Oliver, Thea, and More
ARROW: Marc Guggenheim and Jessica De Gouw Preview The Huntress’ Return
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As a woman who watches this show, who has pretty much zero knowledge or interest in the comic versions, but does however fall into a pretty prized viewer demographic, how on earth do the writers/producers expect me to respect Laurel Lance as a strong empowered woman, if she goes back down a romantic path with Oliver Queen? It stretched my credibility the first time, I loved Tommy/Laurel, Oliver and Laurel was to me damaged and toxic, with no chemistry. But revisiting the whole Oliver/Sara thing a second time……when she was supposed to want to reconnect with her sister? I just lost so much respect for all the characters. But if Oliver bounces back between the sisters again…..well he may be a Queen, but this whole Laurel/Oliver/Sara thing feels a little too Lannister for my liking!
Laurel doesn’t pull oliver out of his darest hour she does shit and you chat shit if anyone pulls Oliver out of his shit it’s felicty or diggle. Team arrow. They are the ones that are way more closer to Oliver than laurel will ever be. Sure you have history but times change and it has on the show you have already shown us that diggle and felcity are the closest ones to break things up in his life and get him back down to earth. As much as laurel annoys me I still have hope that one day she will get a storyline of her own. Why does she always have to fall right back to Oliver making the same stupid predictable mistakes and never learns. You want me to believe she can be strong and has will power pssshh. Doubt it she can’t control herself or make any decisions and changes her mind like the weather. I want to like her but you and the writers just don’t give me hope. I don’t want to see her with Oliver but I do want to see her kick ass and have her own story.
I like Laura LAI and I like the relationship that between her and Oliver I would love to see Oliver fall in love with felicity and try I would like to see him play it off like she is not falling for her I feel like she is the underdog Oliver has all these other women wanting him felicity is down to earth kind and warm and a great friend to him I feel she would keep him grounded I would love to see them end up together
Laurel is utterly annoying and I sincerely hope they kill her character. Also, there is no chemistry between her and Oliver.