What was so wrong about Andrew Kreisberg's Green Arrow and Black Canary?

"A new era begins for Green Arrow and Black Canary"

And what an era it was.

Did you ever have a breaking point?

I'm not talking about a breaking point in important matters like life because we all sure as hell had our different difficulties and they most certainly were way more relevant than what I'm going to talk about.

I'm talking about a breaking point as a comic book fan.

You know, the kind of situation where you see no hope in your favorite series and you're completely desperate for a change, of any kind, no matter what?

And no, even though you may not believe it, I'm not talking about Earth 2 despite of my constant criticisms about it recently since at least one could come with the argument that such series is well-written in spite of the terrible direction that is currently having.

No, I'm talking about something that happened to my favorite hero once.

Let me explain a bit about how I became such a fan of Green Arrow to begin with. I didn't know much about the character until the mid-2000's despite of becoming a comic enthusiast in the 90's which is understandable since I was just a kid in that decade so I only cared about the most popular brands (being Peruvian didn't help either due that this was before the age of digital comics and only stuff that could be sold was brought here). I was into Spider-Man, Superman, Batman, X-Men and The Flash (especifically Wally West, maybe one day I will talk more about him), etc.

But I digress, I became interested in the character in the mid-2000s due to how hyped his resurrection was. I knew a few things about Oliver Queen due to his appearances in other titles I read but at the time I didn't even know that he had died at some point so I said "why not?" and tried the first volume of Green Arrow Vol. 3.

This was the book that opened my eyes, I automatically could understand who the character was, his past, his struggles and most importantly, his flaws. I couldn't believe that a person like him actually existed in the DCU since I always considered such universe a place where only perfect people lived and this was a man who committed a lot of mistakes in his life, mistakes that could have made anyone pretty unlikable but somehow you couldn't help but root for him due that he was still immensily human.

Which of course made me continue with the whole volume. As I mentioned in past articles, Kevin Smith did a great job by resurrecting Green Arrow and got his personality really well, then Brad Meltzer came on board and actually explored more of his most flawed aspects and finally Judd Winick arrived with my favorite moments from such series and expanding the cast, rogues and making Ollie the most competent he has ever been as a hero. Such a great volume, I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested about Green Arrow, you don't get a purer interpretation of Oliver Queen.

But I couldn't stop there, I was almost forced to know more about him and so I started searching for previous runs and stories and that's how I eventually found Green Arrow Vol. 2 where I learned about Mike Grell's more realistic approach (which I enjoyed but didn't exactly love) and Chuck Dixon's run on Connor Hawke who quickly became one of my favorite characters from the mythos. This also unfortunately made me look for the series Green Lantern/Green Arrow written by Dennis O'Neil and drawn by Neal Adams which actually made me realize why I didn't pay attention to the character before his rebirth, not a fan of this insufferably douchy version.

As you could imagine, once that they announced that they were going to cancel Vol. 3 I was kinda disappointed but I wasn't so bummed about it since they were going to relaunch it as "Green Arrow and Black Canary" written by the same author I loved so much, Judd Winick with the premise of Oliver Queen and Dinah Lance finally getting married.

Fan reaction was... mixed. Some people didn't exactly love this direction considering that they weren't particularly fond of such idea due that they thought this would somehow undermine Black Canary in favor of Green Arrow (Not to mention Ollie's reputation as a cheater). Me personally, I didn't consider their romantic relationship essential to who they are as characters but I was willing to give it a chance despite of it.

But boy, oh boy, DC was really decided to make this series work. They created a lot of tie-ins to this event including several appearances in other titles, a Black Canary miniseries and a Wedding Special to build-up anticipation for the upcoming title, they were definitely invested in making people like it.

Then the actual series arrived and both critic's and fan's reception was kinda underwhelming.

They didn't love the title, they didn't hate it, there just was an overall lack of interest in it.

Speaking for myself, I used to remember Winick's run as pretty lackluster but now that I had the opportunity to check it out again, I actually think it's not that bad. The opening storyarc was pretty strong aside from an idiotic editorial mandate that forced Connor Hawke to lose his abilities as an archer (most likely to make Ollie the only Green Arrow and therefore more "unique") and although it admitedly got boring towards the end, its worst offense was that it was overall simply average.

However, while some works became better than I remember, others actually became worse.

Welcome to the topic in question ladies and gentlemen, this is what many people consider the dark age of the character. This is Andrew Kreisberg's Green Arrow and Black Canary run.

You would be surprised to know that Green Arrow was a character who had a pretty consistent track record of quality works since his creation in 1941. Sure, some of the early stories were campy but it was more or less what you would expect from their respective eras and were entertaining at least. Of course, that was up until this particular run arrived.

Andrew Kreisberg was an author who had some experience writing T.V. series but barely any at comic books and so DC thought it was a good idea to give him the reigns of the title. This decision actually doesn't sound bad on paper, the series was not exactly a big hit in terms of sales nor quality so what could they lose if they put an inexperienced writer on it?

What could be so bad about it? We're about to find out.

Kreisberg's work starts in Green Arrow and Black Canary #15 with a story called "1.078 Seconds"

(Quite random name for a title which ultimately meant absolutely nothing now that I think about it since there's no way that GA could have calculated the time between when the arrow was being shot and when it hit its target, does that mean that it's a pretentious title? I will let you decide that).

The issue opens with Black Canary being hold by a new villain named Dregz.

Black Canary being hold, by a new villain named Dregz, "as in Dregs of society".

Well, that didn't take too long.

What's so wrong about this scene you ask? Well, Dinah Lance is supposed to be one of the greatest martial artists in the DCU so her having trouble with a no name criminal is kinda illogic.

Sure, you could come with the argument that this same situation happened at the end of the last volume when Deathstroke almost killed her, but that's the thing, we're talking about Deathstroke, the world's greatest mercenary who also has metahuman strenght and skills so her losing to him is at least understandable

Why is this new guy who just has been introduced able to hold one of the world's greatest fighters?

And it's not like they're saying that he's superstrong or anything, they simply say that he's strong and considering what Dinah does to him after Oliver helps her, he most likely is simply a two-bit thug.

But okay, let's be fair and say that's just a nitpick.

Other than that the issue is not too bad. The "seconds" theme and dialogue are pretty heavy handed and the whole story is not really great but let's still say that this is somewhat decent beginning.

Don't worry though, while the first issue could have been considered passable, everything is going downhill from here.

Oh and before we go any further, let's mention that Ollie saves the life of a woman in this particular issue. The audience and him are going to regret that later.

Issue 16 begins with Merlyn killing a group of young scientists because he was hired by one of their associates to murder them.

You know, Merlyn, Green Arrow's archenemy who just in the previous volume was responsible of making Star City descend into chaos and left Oliver for dead?

Now he's killing random people like a cheap hitman.

Why does this bother me? Because Merlyn is part of the League of Assassins, the kind of organization that only uses their members for really important missions that require their services. Even in the case that Merlyn was acting for self-gain as a mercenary he still should have been portrayed like Deathstroke or Constantine Drakon, warriors who only use their skills for the kind of targets where they're truly necessary.

So yeah, huge downgrade in character. Besides, why hire one of the best and probably most expensive assassins in the world to kill a bunch of people who could have been disappeared pretty easily? Common sense please.

But it gets better! Once that Green Arrow and Black Canary encounter him, Merlyn decides to use a gun against Ollie since he realized he couldn't win.

The World's Deadliest Archer using a gun because why do we need him to be especialized in archery if he can always use a gun like any other guy right?

Anyway, Ollie and Dinah end beating him up quite easily, I have some problems with how the fight ended too but let's say that I already complained enough about it. This issue also introduces Lt. Hilton, a police officer who apparently could become Green Arrow's own Commissioner Gordon and most importantly, we see the same red head who was introduced previously doing some crazy stuff after GA saved her.

Now we pass to issue 17 which starts with Lt. Hilton trying to transfer Merlyn to a place more appropriate for him but before that could happen, a truck crashes into the prison killing a lot of people and making everyone inside try to escape. The culprit being the red-haired girl who also drugs and kidnaps Merlyn, before this particular part of the story ends the crazy lady kills a hairdresser after getting a haircut and starts humilliating Merlyn.

So, a brand new villain is treating one of the most iconic enemies from the protagonist like dirt?

Hm, I believe that there's a definition for this kind of scenario...

However, before the proper issue finishes, the author explores a bit about Dinah's past and how she's insecure of herself after almost killing one of her friends with her Canary Cry (which was a pretty forced way to discover her powers I might add). Plus, we learn that after her fight with Dregz, she accidently made a musician deaf with her abilities.

If you wonder if this is going where you think is going then you would be right.

Next is issue 18 which begins with Ollie torturing Count Vertigo for info about who kidnapped Merlyn.

You know, Count Vertigo, one of the most powerful villains from GA's rogues gallery and member from the Suicide Squad who just in the previous volume fought Ollie and almost managed to kill him while at the same time swore to never fight him again?

This wouldn't bother me so much if he was actually portrayed correctly. Vertigo is supposed to be a pretty confident and honorable man with a true royal streak and here he's characterized as just a buffoon, a cowardly criminal if you will, who decides to make silly jokes until Ollie starts hurting him.

Plus, what is he even doing in Star City at that point in costume? His home country is supposed to be Vlatava, the place he rules.

Then again, why should I be surprised after how Merlyn was treated? I shouldn't since things are just going to get worse and worse for GA's old enemies.

This is also out of character for Oliver since he doesn't tend to get this violent unless one of his loved ones gets hurt. Another important point that I need to mention is that this is officially where the writer introduces a truly strange behavior for him, something we're going talk about ahead.

Before Ollie continues with the torture (it sounds pretty stupid at this point), Hilton calls him to deal with a series of murders and the victims turn-out to be his own old rogues gallery starting with Big Game.

You know, Big Game, the guy who... Wait, who the hell is Big Game?

Yeah, even old Green Arrow fans didn't know who Big Game was because he was created in this same issue by Andrew Kreisberg and retconned as one of the first gimmicky criminals who Green Arrow fought.

And now he's dead, but if you're wondering why did the writer make such a strange decision or in case you want to know more about this fellow (which I wouldn't understand at all but no matter), don't worry.

Because as we're about to learn, everything that Andrew Kreisberg created is safe and everything he didn't isn't.

Take for example the next page where they reveal the other victims who turn-out to be Death Dealer, Vengeance and Slingshot. Villains who haven't appeared since the 80's or even earlier.

Just for your information, I didn't know much about Green Arrow's backstory and much less about his enemies when this happened but even at that point I couldn't help but ask myself: Why even do this?

These are guys that the audience haven't seen in years, villains who didn't even have a proper send-off before being killed in such an unceremoniously manner.

I'm not kidding when I say that this actually made me more interested in these characters in particular (much more than the ones that are introduced in this run I can assure you) and so it made me investigate more about them and read the stories where Vengeance and Death Dealer were introduced written by Joey Cavalieri in the backups of Detective Comics and the old World's Finest tales where Slingshot was created.

And it made me much angrier for getting rid of them in that worthless way.

Don't get me wrong, they were pretty goofy villains as you would expect from that time (Lord knows that Vengeance couldn't spend 2 seconds without screaming "Vengeance!") but these characters were still part of Green Arrow's mythos and members of a really small rogues gallery that suddenly became even smaller after they left. Besides, The Flash's Rogues were also pretty ridiculous criminals at one point and it just was necessary a talented writer like Geoff Johns to give them depth and make them some of the most popular villains in comics.

I'm serious when I say that I actually thought in some ways about how these three enemies could work in present day and believe me, it wasn't really hard.

Let this be a lesson to learn from here people: Never waste characters, use them.

No, I don't mean that you should never kill a character under any circunstances, but if you do it it should at least create some kind of emotional impact.

Why should we care about a few corpses that just appeared?

New readers like me didn't because we didn't even know who these characters were. Old readers didn't either because these antagonists haven't been seen in decades and didn't even receive a line that could emphasize the kind of persons they were. If that wasn't enough, Ollie also mentions that he doesn't care about them being murdered, so if not even the protagonist is concerned about this case then why should the audience be?

What was the point of all this?

This kind of situation makes me suspect that they could have been denigrated in such way to fulfill an agenda but which could it be?

But enough about this segment, let's go into the next one. Brick, one of Star City's mob bosses with superstrenght and endurance, seems to be pretty angry due to the sudden murders that occurred due that he doesn't know who the culprit is, but before he could continue investigating the red-haired woman throws a wrecking ball towards his office and well, I'm going to let this image explain itself:

Okay, this is ridiculous already, this shouldn't have happened!

And no, I don't mean that killing Brick, one of the most interesting villains from the last volume, in this anticlimactic way shouldn't have happened (Because it's obvious that it shouldn't). What I mean is that this doesn't make any sense.

Why? Because Brick was the man who survived the attack of a frikking missile without a scratch in the previous volume. I'm not going to pretend that I'm an expert in missile science (or whatever the hell is that called) but I'm going to make a wild guess and assume that if a missile is not even able to hurt you then a wrecking ball shouldn't be able to tear you apart!

God, this is bringing some awful memories. Let's focus on the following scenes where the red-haired freak continues to humilliate Merlyn (Not getting any better) and the writer starts insinuating that Ollie is actually glad that all these criminals are getting killed (few problems with this direction but not enough to keep ranting about it).

We enter to issue 19 which starts with Ollie fighting against a drugged Merlyn who is being controlled by this lady who calls herself Cupid:

Who not only killed most of Green Arrow's villains in pretty easy and unsatisfying manners but is also ridiculizing his archenemy in the most offensive way possib... Oh wait, now I remember how this scenario is called!

Villain Sue

Yes, it all makes sense now. For people who are not familiarized with the term "Villain Sue", is a name given to an antagonist so immensily powerful that it's able to defeat any member from the cast without problem and even the main characters can't help but start agreeing and sympathizing with him or in this case, her.

Not by portraying any of them correctly of course since most of the characters would have to be completely downgraded to allow this to happen which is exactly what we're seeing here, especially in the case of the classic antagonists from this series due that they were heavily mistreated for the sole reason of justifying the presence and importance of this new enemy.

While I'm aware that the whole "Sue" terminology can be used incorrectly by people who simply don't like a character, I haven't seen a creation that it's able to fit such definition so perfectly as this one. Even in a similar case like the Batman story "Hush" written by Jeph Loeb, the rest of the characters were portrayed respectfully to compensate how uber competent Hush was as an antagonist.

But who knows? Maybe she actually has a good motivation for her current behavior and can create an interesting dynamic with Green Arrow.

Nope! She's just doing it because she's in love and wants to prove that she's worthy of him.

So, she's a demented girl who is obsessed with love and also tends to make really awkward jokes. Now, does this remind you of someone el...

Yeah, that wasn't hard was it? Her personality is such a blatant ripoff of Harley Quinn that it's not even funny. This is exactly what Green Arrow needed, more comparisons to Batman.

That's what I initially thought when she first appeared, I thought that she would become merely a carbon copy of that popular character but the true result would be worse, far worse.

Fortunately, Black Canary appears and manages to save Green Arrow from Cupid before she can tell any other lame sex joke. Unfortunately, both are not able to stop Cupid from slitting Merlyn's throat which gives her enough time to escape (which doesn't even make sense now that I think about it because at least one of them could have easily stopped her while the other tried to stop the blood loss).

Then we go to the next scene where the doctors tell Ollie that Merlyn most likely won't be able to talk again and this is also the last time we see him since he didn't appear again until the universe got rebooted. Don't you love such a beautiful send-off to Green Arrow's nemesis?

There are more insinuations about Ollie's change of character before the issue ends and we also see the same deaf musician from previous issues in the final page. Dun, dun, dun...

Issue 20 is next and it opens with both Green Arrow and Black Canary going to a marital therapy in costume.

 

The reason being that both tried it before under their true identities but they never could talk about their real problems because they were related to their superhero jobs.

This is unintentionally hilarious because it makes you realize how stupid is for them to keep having "secret identities" considering that Ollie's beard can be recognized anywhere and Dinah doesn't even wear a mask!

Maybe everyone already knows who they are and just pretend they don't as a sign of gratitude.

Nonetheless, the therapy is interrupted because everyone in the city has suddenly gone deaf.

Oh, you knew this was coming.

We go straight to issue 21, there's chaos everywhere due to the attack while both Ollie and Dinah try to save all the persons they can. However, before we continue let me nitpick a bit about this, Ollie saves a Hispanic family from the crazy Cupid (of course she needed to appear in this arc, what would this series be without such a lovable character like her?) and they speak this way:

"Que hay de malo con esa mujer, es ella loca?"

No Kreisberg, tu estas loco si piensas que tu español es bueno.

Which literally means: "No Kreisberg, you are crazy if you think your spanish is good" (Yes, I know is kinda hypocritical from me to criticize the misuse of an idiom considering that I probably messed-up my english a few times in this same article but I'm not the one getting paid to write here).

We continue with the issue where we learn that, of course, the deaf musician is the one culprit for the attack and the issue ends with Dinah fighting him.

Then issue 22 starts, I should mention that this exactly when the "Second Feature" starts which consisted in dividing the issue in two parts, each one focusing on one of the protagonists, it's going to cause problems I guarantee it.

In this story we learn that the deaf guy loved music but his father disowned him because he wanted to be a violinist instead of pursuing a career (such a tragic backstory) and the only person who supported him was his little brother.

After Dinah accidentaly destroyed his ability to hear, this guy (Yes, I don't even remember his true name, that's the kind of impact he has) invented a way to hear again but since he would never be able to feel music right, he decided to go full supervillain calling himself Discord.

This is a Silver Age villain people, created 40 years after that era ended.

He's so ridiculous that it would almost make me think that is a parody if only the guy didn't take himself so seriously. By the way, before his encounter with Dinah, Discord kills his own brother since he was trying to stop him from causing more damage to the city, yep, no redeeming qualities whatsoever.

Black Canary ends beating him up in a pretty fast and unsatisfactory way which concludes this particular and pointless storyline. Just before this issue can finish though, we learn that Oliver is actually agreeing with Cupid about killing criminals but thankfully the police is able to finally capture her while Dinah thinks Ollie's suffering from anger issues.

Okay, I'm going to start talking about the characterization from the protagonists here. When the Discord storyarc originally started, people were pretty pissed due to the portrayal of Black Canary as a woman insecure of her own abilities and role as a hero. While I really like Dinah Lance as a character and I have followed her in most of the series where she appeared like Justice League of America, Birds of Prey and obviously, Green Arrow, I wasn't that offended by this portrayal despite that it was clearly wrong, it might be because I'm not as invested on her as I thought.

However, if there's a character I do know is Oliver Queen and I can assure you that Ollie does not suffer from anger issues, he has emotional issues, big difference. He should be angry just as easy as being happy, defining his problems just as anger issues is a pretty simplistic way to view his personality.

Bad characterization aside, we start with issue 23 where we learn that the son of Big Game, the villain that the author created for this series and was killed by Cupid, has decided to take his father's mantle and get revenge for his death because why would Kreisberg continue with the legacy of the old villains like Vengeance or Death Dealer when he thinks he can do better with his own creation right?

In case you're wondering, no, he doesn't have any other reason to become the new Big Game aside from "It's my legacy, kthxbye!" which makes him a pretty lackluster villain overall and his only redeeming quality is that he wants to murder Cupid. We will explain later why he doesn't succeeds.

The next segment starts with Cupid being treated by professionals in prison just like she should be while she's telling her usual terrible jokes, but then Big Game Jr. manages to infiltrate into the prison to kill her. Sadly, just when this kid is about to make everyone in the world happy, Green Arrow appears to save the red-haired girl for God knows what reason.

Yes, you heard it right, the protagonist is irrupting into prison and helping escape the same nutjob who has been killing people around the city.

The second part of the story is about Black Canary fighting against an insignificant criminal while still suffering from the same self-confidence problems (getting old). The issue ends with her thinking that Ollie is dead and forced to help Cupid.

Issue 24 begins with Dinah and Cupid interrupting a girl on girl kiss by making the latter kiss one of them, this could have been interesting if I found this crazy freak attractive in the slightlest (I can't believe that she actually ruined this kind of scene for me. See? I can't even enjoy things that I usually do thanks to her). Not to mention that this segment is completely pointless.

The reason why they're running is because Dinah is trying to protect Cupid from Big Game Jr. and at the same time feeling sorry for her due to her supposed issues.

In case you haven't noticed, both protagonists are saving, agreeing and even sympathizing with this murderer. Remember that whole Villain Sue thing we were discussing earlier?

Going on, Dinah manages to beat Big Game Jr. thanks to the recent arrival of Mia Dearden (Speedy) who left the country at the beginning of this run to go to Britain with her boyfriend but after they broke up, she decided to come back to Star City (The boyfriend was also part of Winick's previous run and was unceremoniously thrown from the series here, I didn't even care about him but at least give some satisfying endings for Pete's sake).

The issue ends with Ollie leaving his house for reasons that are not quite well-explained (and they won't be).

Anyway, issue 25 starts with Ollie appearing naked on the streets having no idea how it happened. The attention goes quickly to Cupid (of course) who is now dressing people as Green Arrow while abusing and killing them at the end. It's necessary to mention that she does a lot of lame sex "humour" while she commits these actions.

Now she's culprit of kidnapping, injuring, murdering and it's even implied that she's raping others. At this point I seriously hope that the writer is preparing a really good punishment for this disgusting creature because I don't see any other kind of ending for her.

It's also adorable how the author tries to sexualize her. Sorry, not feeling it.

Ollie continues to wander the streets with no knowledge of what ocurred and just when he arrives to his house, he's stopped by Green Arrow?!

And the issue ends with a useless second segment story concentrating on the rest of the characters that tries to be charming but accomplishes nothing.

The main plot continues in issue 26 with Ollie having a dream about his time on the island. Credit where credit is due, this segment actually works since it focuses on really accurate traits and moments from the character. The thing is that the author keeps forcing the supposed anger issues Oliver has with no explanation for such behavior, they suddenly appeared, no reason behind.

Ollie awakes and realizes that he needs to come back to his family and quickly changes into Green Arrow just to find the other Ollie. The fight ends with the Ollie who didn't remember who he was turning out to be Hannibal Bates also known as Everyman, a shapeshifter who tried to kill both Oliver and Dinah in the past and now thinks he's the real GA.

I honestly think this could have worked, the premise about this kind of villain is interesting enough. However, the problem ends-up being, as usual, Cupid who is drugging, controlling and assumingly raping him.

I swear that not even Doctor Light has sexually assaulted as many people as her.

Just three more to go. Issue 27 opens with both Cupid and Everyman now known as Dark Arrow (because edgy) who start killing a bunch of criminals and at the same time robbing and injuring an innocent couple. Great.

This is where the author finally explores what made Cupid the way she is, it's revealed that she used to be a secret agent from an organization named Cobalt who, after accidentely killing a group of kids, went completely depressed.

The exploration continues in issue 28 where it's also revealed that she used to have a husband but abandoned him because her organization conducted an invasive experiment on her to make her go back to normal (because sending her to a psychiatrist was clearly too complicated) and that turned her into a crazy obsessed woman.

Is this backstory supposed to make me feel bad for her? Because is not working.

Not only because I've lost my ability to empathize with this creep after all the things she has done (her obnoxious personality certainly doesn't help either) but also because it's too convoluted for its own good and creates an explanation so illogical that I would have prefered no explanation at all.

Plus, we don't even know the kind of person she was before that accident happened, there was nothing that could explain her motivations nor her struggles. How are we supposed to care for someone who lacks the most basic aspects of what makes a character a character?

So, we have to settle for either no personality or incredibly annoying personality? I don't know you, but I pick none.

But apparently this "tragic" tale works for both Green Arrow and Black Canary who are still trying to save her and just before the issue ends we discover that Cupid attacked Lt. Hilton and left him like this:

Yeaaaaah, that doesn't look good.

This overlong story finally concludes with issue 29 which begins with the doctors explaining that Hilton is still alive but they can't remove the knife from his head since it's too close to his brain. They also mention that this kind of injury could cause personality disorders (Lord knows how or why) and Ollie decides to leave him in the hospital.

Yep, this is telegraphed as hell.

The final battle against Cupid is about to start and in this segment we discover that she killed Dark Arrow (after raping him of course, or maybe it was before raping him? Oh, forget that! I don't want to know) and she's planning to poison the whole city with chemicals.

Just when it appears that her organization is finally going to take responsibility and do the world a favor by killing her, Ollie and Dinah interfere and once again save her, no matter if that could have put the lives from the rest of the city in peril.

It turns out that one of the scientists who made her crazy has conveniently discovered a cure for her dementia and it ends-up working since she apparenly has gone back to normal after they inject her. Then after she's reunited with her husband, they let her go.

... Wait, they let her go?!

NO! What's the matter with you?! This woman is culprit of crimes that would put anyone behind bars for many lifetimes!

Yeah, she had schizophrenia, just like many of the villains from this universe besides, these heroes have been long enough in this business to know that sanity never lasts. Throw her in jail, put her in Arkham Asylum (where she most likely will escape the next day but whatever), preferably shoot an arrow between her eyes, just don't let her go!

There you have it folks, the definitive proof about why this character is such a Villain Sue. After being guilty of homicide, harm, destruction and sexual assault, they can't even make her pay for her acts!

I was there when this happened and I can assure you, most fans were crying for this freak to receive what she deserved but her creator couldn't even deliver that and so established one of the most unsatisfying conclusions that this series ever had.

Do you know what's funny about this in perspective? Do you know what happened a few months later?

In the miniseries Justice League: Cry For Justice (a crappy one but not the point) the villain Prometheus destroyed Roy Harper's life (former Green Arrow's sidekick) by making a huge part of Star City explode and killing Lian, his daughter, in the proccess (who was basically Ollie's granddaughter). After this occurred, Oliver found Prometheus and shot an arrow through his head.

What was the result?

Both the police and superhero community persecuted Oliver for his actions, once that they caught him he was prosecuted, incarcerated and ultimately banished from Star City and was forced to live in a magical forest outside of the city's limits (it was a crazy time).

So let me get this straight: A hero who not only saved the city but the whole world hundreds of times deserves to be hated after killing a maniacal terrorist, but a psycho who went into a killing spree, hurting everyone who crossed her way and probably costing the city thousands of dollars in damages deserves all the compassion in the world?!

I honestly think that Andrew Kreisberg might be in love with this red-haired abomination he created.

That's Cupid in a nutshell my friends. She wants to be Harley Quinn, she tries, plies and cries to be Harley Quinn, but she's not Harley Quinn. She's annoying at best and despicable at worst, and while Harley does have her own annoying traits, she also has an unique charm and her own difficulties that make people like her. Cupid simply doesn't fall into that category, everything about her is forced, she even appeared in every single issue from this run, there were no possibilities to ignore her.

For those and so, so many other reasons, Cupid is not only the worst Green Arrow villain but also the worst Green Arrow character of all time (and consider that this is a series that had Machiavelli, a criminal "mastermind" who acted and dressed like an European man from the middle ages in the 80s).

We're not over yet though since obviously, that thing that was teased about Hilton having personality disorders inevitably happened.

And now he has become a crazy murderer with a knife on his head named Lt. Hilt.

"I've got a handle on what I need to do"

GET IT?! It's even in bold in case you missed it.

I think I understand what Kreisberg wanted to do here, he tried to give Green Arrow his own Hunter Zolomon/Zoom.

For those who don't know, Hunter Zolomon was a crippled and disgraced F.B.I. agent created by Geoff Johns in his first run in The Flash. Hunter helped Wally West (The Flash at time) to understand the minds of The Rogues and protect Keystone City from them, sadly he eventually lost the use of both his legs due to an attack by Gorilla Grodd which forced him to use the Cosmic Treadmill to try to travel in time and fix his life which ultimately transformed him into The Flash's archenemy, Zoom.

The difference being that we knew the kind of character that Hunter was. We were able to feel both his emotional and physical pain due to the mistakes he made and be invested in him which made it even more tragic when his whole life went to hell and turned him into a villain.

Serious question, what do we know about this Hilton guy to feel sorry for him? Sure, he was a family man but so were many people who lost their lives in this run. In fact, despite that he appeared in many issues from this work he was a non-entity, he didn't have any distinctive personality beyond being a cop, any other person could have filled his role. He suffers from the same problems that Cupid's true persona does.

Plus, I know that I'm asking the obvious here but: WHO THE HELL IS SCARED OF A GUY WITH A HANDLE ON HIS HEAD?! How could anyone have thought that this was an interesting concept for a villain?

The most hilarious thing about this is that I was able to find what the author initially said when he was coming to this title:

"Andrew Kreisberg: To date, there's been a lot of globe trotting and grand adventures with big time guest stars. My goal is to bring things back to Star City and focus on Green Arrow and Black Canary and their life in their city. I also want to populate their rogue's gallery with, as the Joker says in The Dark Knight, "A better class of criminal." Throughout his long history, Green Arrow hasn't had the world's greatest enemies. I hope I can add a few that might stand the test of time."

"A better class of criminal" huh?

What happened to the "better class of criminals" he invented?

Cupid was never seen again thankfully, I like to think that she had another mental breakdown and her husband finally killed her to get rid of his suffering (Yes, I said "his" suffering because I couldn't care less about hers). Same case for Lt. Hilt, I like to think that the guy died from blood loss because dude has a frikking knife on his head and a wound that probably didn't cicatrice. Nobody heard (hey!) of Discord again, he probably understood in prison that becoming a supervillain for being deaf was pretty stupid and that he should have sued Dinah instead. Ditto Big Game who just as everyone here, most likely felt like an idiot after following the legacy of someone who never cared about him. Finally Dregz, who could forget a personality like Dregz? (Everyone did).

Don't worry, we're almost at the end. Ollie and Dinah make love, the Justice League calls him for a job and it ends with this shot of Mia.

Such a powerful image.

I can't believe that I'm saying this but I think that even Ann Nocenti's dull and irrational ending for her run left a bigger impact on me.

So, what was so wrong about Andrew Kreisberg's Green Arrow and Black Canary?

Well, if you can't tell at this point then I don't know what more I can say.

You might be wondering though, are bad characterization and awful, AWFUL villains enough to call this the worst Green Arrow run of all time?

I would say yeah, but let's talk about the story, if there's any. Is incredibly shallow and doesn't achieve absolutely anything. The pacing is erratic, the characters appear in different places for no given explanations and despite of how fast things are apparently happening, you can't feel that the plot is actually progressing due that the characters run constantly in circles around the most terrible creation that this run delivered (Already talked way too much about her). The dialogue is blunt, the twists are predictable, should I continue?

You know how bad this run is? None, absolutely none of the plot-points introduced here were followed later.

Merlyn losing his voice was never touched again, he was supposedly appearing in J.T. Krul's run but the reboot stopped such plans. Ollie's anger issues and Dinah's self-confidence problems were never further explored. The organization of Cobalt was never seen again. Hell, even Brick came back to life a few months later in Cry For Justice!

Oh, but don't think that this run can be considered "so bad is good" (If you want a series "so bad is good" you just need to check the New 52 Mister Terrific series written by Eric Wallace, that book is hilarious at points).

No, it's so bad that is terrible, it's so bad that is infuriating and it's so bad that is detestable. It's even mean-spirited at times because it wants to make the audience believe that everything created before this run was poor and deficient, it destroys most of the past but somehow what it creates is much worse.

However, I would still recommend you to check it out.

Why? Because people, this series is a perfect example of everything you shouldn't do. I'm not a fan of learning from the mistakes of others but this work is a great representation of what writers or aspiring ones should try to avoid at any cost when working in a classic character.

You know, I originally was going to make this a little segment in a Green Arrow retrospective that I'm planning to do in the future but the most recent announcement about Andrew Kreisberg arrival with issue 35 of the current series forced me to write it and obviously, it ended being longer than I imagined.

Still, this gave me hope for Kreisberg's upcoming run for the sole reason that he would have to try REALLY hard to make it as bad as this one (and he would need a hellish miracle to make it worse).

Just like Oliver Queen once said: "Do more, be more" (If you ask where that comes from, is from another series that wasn't well received, but it was still better than the one in question).