Last night, we Arrow fans experienced quite the shocker at the end of “Tribute” when Oliver Queen passed the Green Arrow mantle to John Diggle. Basically, Ollie wants to assure that his son, William, has no fear of losing yet another parent. Thus, it only made sense to him that he hang up his bow.
As expected, series lead Stephen Amell weighed in on this gargantuan shift when sitting down with Entertainment Weekly, applying a philosophy somewhat similar to what Bruce Wayne offered in The Dark Knight Rises:
“I give it to him expecting him to be able to handle it. I like the idea that I give it to him because the city needs a Green Arrow, right? The Green Arrow can be more than one person. The Green Arrow is a symbol and his team is a symbol. The fact that we are pushing Star City in the right direction is something that is important to me because I don’t want the city to get destroyed every year, because then what’s the point of what we’re doing? We’re a team of vigilantes that are the definition of insanity, because we’re just doing things over and over again and hoping for a different result. Obviously I don’t know what’s going on with Diggle, but I give it up and there’s not a lot of angst.”
Speaking of what’s going on with Diggle, he’s been off his game since the start of the season due to having taken some shrapnel in the blast on Lian Yu. And thanks to significant nerve damage, he can’t even aim his gun, a fact that only Black Canary is privy to right now. That said, it should be most interesting to see how he handles a bow again.
If you’ll recall, Diggle has suited up in Oliver’s stead a few times in the past, and was the one and only Green Arrow in the Dominators’ Matrix-like world last year. The difference being that now this standard is expected to last a while, as Amell says he’s been “out of the mix” for four episodes at the time of the interview.
“We have an instance where he has to hop back in, but it’s not in the capacity that people would expect him to. It’s in an episode called ‘Reversal.’ He does have to hop back in, but other than the occasional visit, he’s out.”
Regardless of what’s been said here, it’s hard to accept this’ll prove permanent. After all, we’ve already seen Amell decked out in his Green Arrow gear in leaked photos from this fall’s crossover. Plus, simple logic dictates that the viewing audience has grown accustomed to him after five seasons. Granted, torch passing may work in the comic book realm, but serialized television is an entirely different ballgame. Really, all we can do now is enjoy the ride.
Arrow airs on Thursday nights on The CW.
