Arrow: Every Major Green Arrow Villain Who Didn’t Appear

Stephen Amell’s Oliver Queen battled a long list of villains from the Emerald Archer’s rogues gallery on Arrow, but there were some that never appeared. There were a few – but not many — major Green Arrow villains who were left out of the show entirely.

Over the course of eight seasons, the CW series notably brought to life numerous characters associated with Green Arrow to life on the small screen, many of which being heroes and villains who had never been used in live-action before. A few, such as Prometheus (Josh Segarra) and Ricardo Diaz (Kirk Acevedo), were villains who menaced Oliver and Team Arrow for entire seasons, while others, like China White (Kelly Hu) and Cupid (Amy Gumenick), were simply recurring foes who would cross paths with him on an occasional basis. There was also the Dark Archer (John Barrowman), who was the main villain of season 1 before slowly evolving into an on-and-off enemy and reluctant ally. Plus, Arrow didn’t just pull from Oliver’s rogue’s gallery. More than one of the show’s villains originate from Batman’s comics. Among them were Ra’s al Ghul (Matt Nable) and his daughter, Talia (Lexa Doig).

With Green Arrow being a character who has 80 years of history in DC Comics, the Arrowverse had no shortage of big-name and C-list villains to choose from when picking enemies for Amell’s character to fight. However, despite the fact that Arrow ran for more than 150 episodes, it was never able to use all of his biggest comic villains. Here are the ones who Arrow skipped, and why they may have been avoided.

Onomatopoeia

Created by Kevin Smith and Phil Hester in the early 2000s, Onomatopoeia was a serial killer whose attacks on street-level superheroes put him in conflict with Green Arrow. What made him unique was his tendency to say out loud the sound effects that went along with his actions. For example, he would say “BLAM” when firing a gun, because that was the word that was typically used in the comic panel. Back in Arrow season 1, there was actually a plan for him to be used, but it didn’t end up happening.

Instead, Arrow created Mr. Blank (J. August Richards), a cold-blooded assassin who used a silenced pistol. He was chosen to take Onomatopoeia’s place in the story because of comments that Arrow producer Andrew Kreisberg heard from an interview with Kevin Smith. Apparently, Smith had talked about how Onomatopoeia wouldn’t work on TV or in a movie because his signature way of talking only made sense in comics where you can read the words for the sound effects on the page. After this, it was decided that it would be best for Onomatopoeia to be swapped out with someone else. That being said, Smith did eventually change his mind, as he has since expressed a desire to write an episode of Arrow with Onomatopoeia as the antagonist.

Rainbow Archer

Rainbow Archer aka Albrecht Raines clashed with Oliver on several occasions, beginning with his first comic book appearance in 1958. Known for his colorful costume and color-coded arrows, Rainbow Archer was a counterfeiter whose criminal activities made him an enemy of both Green Arrow and his crime-fighting partner, Black Canary. He never battled Stephen Amell’s Oliver Queen in Arrow, and when taking into consideration his name and costume, it’s not hard to see why. A character like him certainly wouldn’t work with Arrow’s dark tone, and that’s possibly the same reason why there doesn’t seem to be a place for him in modern comics, either. He was mostly an early Silver Age villain.

Slingshot

One of the names on the list of enemies left for Oliver by his father in Arrow season 1 was David Drayson, but viewers never saw him target this character onscreen. His addition to the list is interesting, given that he’s an old foe of Green Arrow in the comics. In DC Comics, David Drayson is better known as Slingshot, a villain with a deep hatred for all police officers. As his name implies, his primary weapons were slingshots. Armed with them, he proved to be a formidable adversary for Oliver. His presence on Arrow being limited to a name on Oliver’s list suggests that the writers only wanted him to be an Easter egg, and had no intention of even leaving the door open for him to appear in the flesh. It could be that his choice of weapons would have made it difficult for him to come off as a menacing villain.

Natas

Natas, whose name is “Satan” spelled backwards, was an experienced assassin who was brought to Star City to help Oliver prepare for a fight with Deathstroke, a character Natas himself trained. As it turned out, Natas preferred to use rather unorthodox methods in getting his students ready for combat. Natas put Green Arrow through rigorous trials that taxed him physically and emotionally. He even sent armies of assassins to kill him, forcing Oliver to fight off his forces for weeks. Natas could have fit into Arrow season 2 when Oliver was in the midst of a conflict with the Arrowverse’s Deathstroke (Manu Bennett), but Arrow clearly had other ideas on how this storyline should play out. Oliver had multiple mentors in the Arrowverse, but Natas wasn’t one of them. However, some of his character traits were shared by the Arrowverse incarnation of Yao Fei (Byron Mann), so it’s possible that his character was at least partially inspired by Natas.

Everyman

In a single-episode story of The Flash, Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) had to contend with a shapeshifter called Everyman (Martin Novotny). His inclusion stood out, as he was a character with strong ties to Green Arrow. In the comics, he had the ability to mimic a person’s appearance by consuming part of their body. At one point, he took Oliver’s place and stood in for him during his wedding with Black Canary. Due to a bout of amnesia, he came to believe that he was the real Oliver Queen for a time. Though he was a Green Arrow villain, it actually made more sense for him to be adapted onto The Flash, simply because of his abilities. Arrow is a much more grounded show, and it was very rare for the series to work in a metahuman opponent. With this being considered, it’s not surprising that he was borrowed by The Flash.

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