As much as Arrow fans have learned about tech whiz Felicity Smoak over the years, there’s still one mystery surrounding her: the identity of her father. During a recent interview, Emily Bett Rickards mentioned that there are plans to bring her father into the show at some point and that he would be rich and “probably a supervillain.” This led to many fans speculating on if her father is Season 4’s main antagonist Damien Darhk, but as it turns out, that’s not the case.
Executive producer and showrunner Wendy Mericle acknowledged that it was a unique idea and a “great teaser” to Comicbook.com, but also said there’s no truth to it. Mericle said:
Unfortunately, no. Damien Darhk is not her father. That's a great theory. Who knows! You guys might have just arc-ed out the rest of the season for us right then and there! No, that's a great idea, but no, he is not. We are going to bring her father in. He will definitely be evil. He's going to be up to no good, but it's not going to be Damien, unfortunately. Great idea though. Huge props to everyone there. That's amazing.
Although Felicity’s mother Donna (played by Charlotte Ross) appeared twice in Season 3 and will return for several episodes later this year, little has been revealed about Felicity's dad. All we know about him is that he’s extremely intelligent (Donna mentions he is probably where Felicity got her smarts) and is some kind of criminal. So whenever we do meet this man, him popping back up in Felicity’s life probably isn’t going to be a joyous occasion.
While Damien isn’t going to be having any daddy-daughter talks with Felicity, he’s leaving his own sinister mark on Arrow. The villain was already responsible for a few incidents Oliver and Team Arrow dealt with in previous seasons, but he’s kicking things to the next level in Season 4. He and his partners at H.I.V.E. have been trying to destroy Star City for something called Genesis. With Green Arrow interfering in his operations, he’s relied on his Ghosts and villains like Anarky and Double Down to take down the Emerald Archer and his allies. Of course, Damien on his own is a formidable opponent, both through his fighting skills and using sorcery to give himself abilities like telekinesis and death touch. John Barrowman (a.k.a. Malcolm Merlyn) also recently mentioned that Damien was resurrected in the Lazarus Pit at one point, though it corrupted him in a different way than what happened to Thea and Sara.
You can catch new episodes of Arrow Wednesdays at 8 p.m. EST on The CW.
