Arrow: Season 5 will mark the end of flashbacks on the show as we know them, but they will remain a device on the show moving forward into Season 6.

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As they work on the show's fifth season, Executive producers Marc Guggenheim and Wendy Mericle told IGN that Season 6 will move on to explore flashbacks from different character perspectives beyond Oliver, and also might feature some flashforwards in time. Guggenheim confirmed during the 2016 summer TV Critics Association press tour that Season 5 will be the last Arrow season to use flashbacks as a regular device."Last year, when we sort of realized we're going to go past Season 5, we basically made a collective decision that Season 5 would be the final year of flashbacks," said Guggenheim. "Next year, in Season 6, what we'll end up doing is we'll do some episodes without any sort of flashbacks. We've [also] established over the first four seasons of proof of concept that we can do flashback stories that don't involve what I call the island narrative, even when he's not on the island."We still want to make that part of our storytelling, because we do like them. We like when those non-island flashbacks sort of illuminate what's going on in the present day. That'll always be a part of the show and a part of the show's storytelling structure. It just won't be telling a serialized story."Since Arrow has spent five seasons showing flashbacks for Oliver and also done some for Diggle and Felicity, Guggenheim said "we would totally do other characters," noting that Echo Kellum's Curtis (now a series regular) would be a good character to center flashbacks on."We might even do a flashforward. You never know!" Guggenheim said. "I think it would be fun to do it with Oliver. It might be fun to do it with Diggle."Mericle noted that she and Guggenheim have focused more on choosing new characters for flashbacks versus discussing how flashforwards would fit."At least for the immediate future, we haven't talked about flashing forward as much as we have flashing back from different character perspectives," Mericle said. "The nice thing is we've used the device on the show for five seasons. We have it in our tool kit now. I think we'll use it whenever it's appropriate, whenever it feels right. For me, I think it would be really fun to do a villain and see it from a villain's point of view, because that's such a shorthand for getting inside the head of the bad guys."The flashbacks in Season 5 will mark a shift in their own way back to how flashbacks were implemented in earlier seasons. Guggenheim took responsibility for the way the Season 4 flashbacks didn't directly connect to the main Arrow storyline and were largely criticized by viewers and critics."In the first three years, we always tried to connect the flashbacks with what was happening in the present day. This is my bad: I sort of felt going into Season 4 that that was tying our hands, that oh, we could only tell stories that tied up with the present days. So I told the writers in the beginning of Season 4, let's free ourselves of that burden, and it didn't work," Guggenheim said. "People were only interested in the flashbacks if they did connect up with the present day."We've also been very cognizant to make sure we're pushing as much story as possible," he continued. "The other thing that Wendy and I were talking about the other day is because you're telling basically a story in four to five scenes, there's really no time for emotional development. It's got to be just adrenaline-fueled action, like danger... it's just got to be very visceral and not emotional. We're trying to write the flashbacks with that in mind."The Season 5 flashbacks will focus on "Oliver becoming Oliver" as he completes his journey to the person viewers met in the present day storyline in Season 1. With the casting of people like Dolph Lundgren for the Russia-set flashbacks as Oliver becomes a member of the Bratva, Arrow will be delivering "high adrenaline, visceral" stories."What's nice is Oliver is himself a recruit to the Bratva at the same time in the present day he's recruiting all these new people. There's a very organic, natural parallel between the two," Guggenheim said. "There's a nice organic parallel with what Oliver is going through in the past as a trainee, and what Oliver's going through in the present as a trainer."Arrow: Season 5 premieres Wednesday, October 5th at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.

Terri Schwartz is Entertainment Editor at IGN. Talk to her on Twitter at @Terri_Schwartz