‘Arrow’ Series Finale Imports A Major DC Superhero Into The CW

Geoff Boucher
·4-min read

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SPOILER WARNING: This article reveals major plot points from tonight’s series finale of Arrow on The CW.

The Green Arrow is dead. Long live…the Green Lantern?

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The 170th and last episode of The CW’s Arrow aired on Tuesday night with a misty farewell to the late Oliver Queen, the stolid bowman played by Stephen Amell for eight seasons on the linchpin show of the so-called Arrowverse. That’s the name of the shared continuity that links The CW’s still-growing list of DC Comics adaptations and, after Tuesday night’s swan song episode, there’s at least a possibility that list might someday include the wielder of glowing green power ring of undreamed power.

A late scene in the finale episode show’s grieving buddy, John Diggle (portrayed by David Ramsey since the show’s 2012 pilot), flattened by the thunderous impact of a compact object that gouged into the ground near the stunned ex-military man. In the crater is an unscathed box and inside of it an emerald ring.

Presumably, that special piece of jewelry is the power ring worn by Green Lantern in the pages of DC Comics. Diggle’s backstory doesn’t mesh with traditional DC mythology regarding the various heroes that have worn the Green Lantern ring but Ramsey’s resemblance to the John Stewart version of the hero has stirred speculation of a superimposed version of the emerald avenger.

Diggle has been Oliver’s trusted confidante and, for a time, Oliver’s substitute when Diggle took on the guise of the Green Arrow to protect Star City. Oliver send the gift from the Great Beyond? Here’s what showrunner Marc Guggenheim tells Deadline about the cryptic scene.

“That was something that we’ve been working our way towards for a good long time now. I think for maybe about a year, year-and-a-half we’ve known that this was a moment we’re going to be able to do, and it made sense to do it in the finale because my attitude is that even though the show ends, as long as the characters are alive the characters continue on. One of the things we wanted to do with the finale was give you a sense as to what their post-show trajectories would be. And certainly, Diggle’s is probably the most intriguing.”

Is this Green Lantern affiliated with the intergalactic Green Lantern Corps.? Will Diggle wear the costume associated with the classic space-faring version of the hero?

“That I can’t really speak to because this moment was, like a lot of things, a sort of negotiation with the powers that be about, ‘Okay, what exactly can we show? How far can we take this?’ I think it’s probably best. To me, the bets approach was to let the moment speak for itself and we’ll sort of see where the future takes us.”

Green Lantern made it to live-action television once before — that was back in 1979 on the campy NBC television special Legend of Super-Heroes. That was the Hal Jordan version of the character, the same one that Ryan Reynolds portrayed in Green Lantern (2011), the live-action Warner Bros. feature film that Guggenheim co-scripted with Greg Berlanti, Michael Green, Michael Goldenberg.

The John Stewart version of the Green Lantern was first introduced in the pages of DC Comics in 1971. The character was the first African-American superhero depicted in any DC Comics adventure. Stewart’s biggest showcase to date was in the animated television adventures of the Justice League.

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