‘Green Arrow’ #1 is a love letter to its characters

The return to form the Arrow Family has needed.

April 25, 2023

Today I have the privilege of bringing to you this review of the new Green Arrow book from DC Comics, written by Joshua Williamson and pencilled by Sean Izaakse. This comic is a special one for me. I’ve been a fan of Williamson’s work ever since he took over The Flash starting in DC Rebirth, where he very quickly managed to supplant Mark Waid’s iconic run as my favorite take on the book and the legacy of the Scarlet Speedsters. From that to absolutely killing it on Superman right now and having tackled the larger DC Cosmos overall in books like Infinite Frontier, there’s nobody working in comics right now I would call a more worthy pick to write this story and this character.

Green Arrow is a character very near and dear to me – the Kevin Smith and Judd Winick penned Volume 3 is one of my favorite runs in comics, period. It’s a run rich with strong characterization with a wonderful cast, going through hardships both heroic and interpersonal. It’s the quintessential take on the “Arrow Family” group of characters if you ask me. So, it begs the question:

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How do you live up to THAT?

Well, it’s no easy answer, but I think Williamson cracked the code right out the gate, creating what I would personally say is the best take on these characters since Winick’s departure all those years ago. Put simply, he understands the core appeal of this family: that they are a family. The greatest strength of Volume 3 was, again, the strong feeling of familial love and care all the characters had for each other. They bickered, they fought, they loved and protected each other when goings got tough – at its best, it was very Fantastic Four in that regard. The extended Arrow Family cast and how they bounce off Ollie has always been a wide part of the appeal of Green Arrow, and this book from this very first issue is telling me: “hey, we’re gonna tie up all those loose ends keeping them apart.” That right there is exactly what I, as a fan of these characters, wanted to see. The Rebirth era for the character, while perfectly solid in its own right in trying to get the character back to a recognizable state following The New 52, felt just like that: a course correction. It did its job in setting the pieces back up on the board and establish a strong basis again, and this feels like the full realization of that effort.

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Obviously the full breadth of the plot is going to be revealed over the course of this limited series, but this first issue is off to a great start in terms of setting up intrigue. From the word go we’re already shown that Ollie isn’t exactly in Star City anymore – and that mystery is what drives the plot of the issue with the rest of the family searching for him. The issue does an effective job showing us the situation that the cast is in, and gets us properly updated on where everybody’s been with Ollie’s narration. It’s a good way to get new readers up to speed, and as a refresher for returning fans like me who haven’t seen these characters work as a unit like this in quite a while. Everybody also just sounds right in this issue, like they were plucked right from the pages of Volume 3 and dropped in here, giving the book a great sense of synergy with that run. It really feels like you could jump right from that run into this one without having to worry about anything that happened in between.

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The character moments are what really make this issue for me. The central character (aside from Oliver himself) in this issue is Lian Harper, aka Chesire Cat, aka the daughter of Roy Harper and Jade Nguyen – who’s been popping up in her new identity here and there in Batman titles for a little while now. Seeing her finally back with her family feels so triumphant, righting one of DC’s biggest wrongs in killing her off all the way back in Cry For Justice. It’s something long, LONG overdue for the mainline canon, and Roy’s reunion with her in this issue is genuinely heart-meltingly sweet. This is the kind of love for these characters and their history that I’ve sorely missed. Even with the positive strides made during the Rebirth era, this is the kind of story that Green Arrow needs right now. Togetherness and family against the world. As the series goes on, I hope we get more of this, more re-introductions, more relighting the flames of legacy that makes this corner of the DCU so beloved and unique.

DC Comics

The artwork was also a very nice treat for the eyes, and it was very nostalgic seeing Ollie rendered in his iconic Errol Flynn Robin Hood-styled costume for his recap about his life (hey, maaaaaybe bring it back on a more permanent basis again? Please? Preeeeetty please?). The detail and layout are both very solidly done, and everything flows very nicely from page to page. A seriously breezy read chock-full of little detail and homages to the history of the cast; very nice stuff. And it sounds silly to say this, but given the track record in the pre-New 52 days, it’s nice seeing Connor Hawke with an accurately depicted skin tone. Seriously, that’s more of a blessing than you may think. Every character looks on point and shines nicely on the page; just seeing all these characters together at all again makes something click just right (Black Canary’s current outfit in particular is awesome, for the record).

I could go on and on and on honestly, but I’m trying to be light on spoilers so you all can go and be excited seeing everything for yourselves. I can’t stress enough that I think this is the start of something truly great, and as a massive fan of this corner of DC, it’s so good to see these characters back and working together again. I know this is only the first issue of a limited run, but it’s already reminded me about why I fell in love with this dysfunctional family in the first place. For that, I give my biggest thanks to Williamson and Izaakse.

Great work, team. Now if you bring back my girl Mia Dearden, then you’ll really make book of the year… for me, at least.