Board Thread:Arrow discussions/@comment-35031453-20180413084126/@comment-35031453-20180422100847

First of all, they wouldn’t have killed Laurel off if she was popular. She was killed off, because at that point, most of the fandom hated her and the writers didn’t know what to do with her anymore.

Secondly, Olicity was being hinted pretty much since 1B, but especially since Felicity joined the team. The writers pretty much gave up on Lauriver like halfway through season 1 and only continued the story to the end of season 1 because it was too late to backtrack it.