I’ve been following the Green Arrow series on-and-off since Jeff Lemire started his run on the series a while back. Now that Benjamin Percy is starting up his run on the series I decided to check out Oliver Queen’s post-Convergence status quo. I’m not very familiar with Percy’s past work so hopefully I can be impressed with what he has to offer Green Arrow. Let’s find out with this review of Green Arrow #41.
Creative Team
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Artist: Patrick Zircher
Colorist: Gabe Eltaeb
Story Rating: 4 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 6 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 5 Night Girls out of 10
Review
With DC Comics publishing so many street-level comic books post-Convergence it has become even more important for each title finds a hook that separates itself from the pack. There needs to be something, whether it’s from the story or artwork perspective, that makes each street-level comic book stand out. Unfortunately that is not the case with Green Arrow #41.
More than anything, Green Arrow #41 reads like a step back to establish where Oliver Queen is in his life. While this is an important thing to establish to bring in readers for a new creative team run it should have been done along the way of making the world feel unique. And that is something that I never felt about the world around Green Arrow. Nothing about Green Arrow’s world or status quo felt special to the character. Instead everything going on felt like it could have been easily given to any street-level DC hero.
In not having anything unique for the world around Green Arrow to play it the by-the-numbers looking artwork stood out as being just average. There was nothing about the world that felt dangerous until the final dog fighting scene. Even then there was nothing about how Patrick Zircher drew the world that made me think that Green Arrow was in great danger. The bad guys he is fighting are nothing more than the average thugs that are easily taken down in one or two pages.
And that is where Green Arrow’s biggest problem lies in. Instead of establishing this greater threat we are given a regular gang antagonist. This is a shame because with characters like Merlyn, Vertigo and the Arrow Clan at his disposal Percy goes the other way. In going the other way it made Green Arrow look like an average superhero and not one of DC’s premiere heroes.
The one positive I did take away from the story is how Percy wrote Oliver’s interaction with his small supporting cast. The interactions between Oliver and everyone showed us how human this version of Oliver Queen is. He isn’t completely consumed by darkness like Bruce Wayne, which is something a lot of writers try to write the character as. His ease of interaction with others will help the character stand out more as long as the threat level he receives as Green Arrow is increased moving forward.
Overall: Green Arrow #41 never went beyond being an average street-level character. As an intro to Oliver Queen’s world it was fine but it never went out of its way to be more. With the current landscape this series finds itself in that is just not good enough. If this creative team is going to be successful they will need to establish a greater reason for you to buy this comic than it just being the only comic book featuring Green Arrow’s solo adventures.