Green Arrow #21

I knew it! He's a Hentai Rapetopus!

Sheesh! I get it, Green Arrow! You have secrets! They're probably not even very interesting secrets! I bet the secret is your dad stranded you on that island on purpose to make you grow up. Also, your dad probably didn't say he loved you enough and was always away on business trips and never played catch with you and was drunk all the time and moved to Japan and then to Oregon and then to Arizona and he never kept a stable living environment and he tucked a number of new marriages under his belt and he became paranoid about the government and technology and then he was killed by Komodo! Or maybe your dad is Magus! You know what? I don't even care anymore. Keep your stupid secrets secret!

I hope we learn Green Arrow's secrets this issue! I'm only pretending I don't want to know them in front of Green Arrow because he's been teasing us with his stupid secrets for four issues now. Maybe more! And, um, maybe less. You know what? I didn't bring this up so we could discuss my mediocre math skills.

Last issue, Green Arrow had finally found his way through the desert to a teepee with Magus inside. After a few S'mores and an agonizingly long pillow fight scene, Magus and Oliver begin a game of truth or dare. Even though I really wanted to see the kind of nipple stiffening dares these guys would get up to (especially after the long tease of a pillow fight where most of their clothes remained on), they skip the dares and get right down to the truths.

Oh! Here they come! All the deadly secrets!

Of course no secrets spill out of Magus's face because he's an asshole mystic and they always have to do everything in some half-assed drug-induced magical blah de blah ritual. Green Arrow hallucinates that he's back on the island. I hope he figures out who Jacob really was and why the smoke monster enjoyed kidnapping people and what Dharma was ultimately trying to do and how Locke's father ended up on the island and why the Man in Black wanted to kill Jacob and why Claire's son Aaron was supposed to be so important and why the idiot writers decided the island wasn't purgatory when it so obviously was for the first couple of seasons.

Ollie doesn't hallucinate his time on the island but the time that his father, Richard, was on it searching for some mythical treasure of The Arrow Clan. He's there with Emerson and a guy named Simon that could possibly be Komodo but I'm really hoping it's Simon Stagg! He'd be a great rival for Queen Industries and Richard also mentions that the Outsiders have recently been exploring this island as well. New 52 Metamorpho would be perfect working for a bad guy group of heroes under the auspices of Stagg Industries because Rex wants to marry Sapphire. Look at me! I'm still living in the Preboot world! But the Preboot world is all that makes the Reboot world exciting! Elsewhere tales are always fun because of the changes and games they play with the original universe. And what is The New 52 but an Elsewhere tale out of control?

So the guy with the Totem Fist? Is it mummified? Does he have to cut off his own hand and attach it at the wrist? Is it just a symbolic carving that gives power? I hope it's the mummified fist of the Buddha.

The Simon is simply Simon Lacroix, Komodo. Maybe he'll change his name to Stagg when he markets a Robot Vampire that turns a bunch of people into vampires and they all sue and he loses his business and reputation! And the main plaintiff against him will be Tim Drake!

Simon was a poor kid with drive and determination. He was the son Dick Queen really wanted. So he brought Simon into the secret quest for the Arrow Clan's Magic Arrow. When did Green Arrow become a Young Adult Fantasy Novel? As you probably guessed from having read so many Young Adult Fantasy Novels, Simon winds up killing Dick Queen. It was inevitable. It's exactly what happened to Daddy Warbucks when he took in Little Orphan Annie.

After hearing this story from Magus the man of mystery, Oliver Queen believes it because why not. Emerson did try to tell Oliver something about the island just before he died and it could have been all this fantastic bullshit! And Komodo is pretty good with arrows! And Dick Queen did have a room full of artifacts and maps. Actually, Ollie simply wants to kill Komodo so he figures he might as well buy into the whole story since it'll give him the best chance to find the Outsiders and find Komodo and kill him for being a huge dick.

After the scary story part of the slumber party concludes, Magus introduces Green Arrow to his friend, Butcher of the Axe Clan.

If the Axe is a real weapon, I think I might need a vomit bag when he meets the leader of the Fist Clan.

Ollie heads back to Seattle to gather up Team Green Arrow (that would be Naomi and Fyff) for a trip to Vlatava to meet up with some "dragon" that may be able to lead him to The Outsiders. But more importantly, Green Arrow answers the question I've been asking about the Justice League for some time now. Well, he answers it for the Justice League of America anyway.

I suppose the government would want to pay their employees so they can feel like they have some kind of ownership of them. The normal Justice League is probably more pure and would see paychecks as tainting the entire thing. Maybe Batman just keeps a few hundred thousand dollars of petty cash on the Watchtower for whenever anybody needs a little help in their secret lives.

Green Arrow #21 Rating: +1 Ranking. I'm glad that Queen Industries is done. It was just a distraction and an obligation with which Oliver Queen should not have had to deal. Now he can be a true hero to the disenfranchised! But back to the JLA paying its members! How do they pay Martian Manhunter? I guess they could make a check out to John Jones. Hell, they could make a check out to anybody and J'onn could probably cash it.

Green Arrow #20

Goddammit, Komodo! Tell us your stupid secrets already!

Last issue, Green Arrow was hurt really badly in Seattle while also dying of dehydration in Arizona. Komodo and his daughter were trying to kill him in Seattle and Magus was fucking with him in Arizona. Everybody has a bunch of secrets about Green Arrow's father and the island and what happened to Green Arrow. I suppose the lie was that Green Arrow was partying on an oil rig that was attacked and then exploded and Green Arrow ended up stranded on an island. The truth will have Green Arrow's dad planning the whole thing to make his son a strong, independent man who would finally be capable of helping him search the world for hidden treasures.

Or things could be entirely different because this comic book is really hard to get back into after the gigantic shit Ann Nocenti took on it. Although to be extremely fair to Ann Nocenti, I thought she did a masterful job when compared to J.T. Krul.

This issue begins with Green Arrow, once again, teasing the fuck out of me.

This would actually be a good way to Reboot Green Arrow. Have him lie down to die in the sun and be wracked with death hallucinations. He would dream he was saved and go on to have a crazy new life battling demons and space aliens and the ghost of his father. And then sometime around Issue #135, his eyes would snap open as he stares up into the glaring Arizona sun and dies.

But before Green Arrow gives up, he decides to drink some water outside of a teepee. He also manages, through sheer force of will and his amazing powers of deduction, to find Magus inside the teepee. Imagine that! Wandering in the desert was a test! And there's no better proven test to prove your faith than the wander through the desert test! Although I don't think this was about faith but more about perseverance and stick-to-it-iveness. I wonder if Jeff Lemire is using this as an analogy about Green Arrow fans? They had to wander through a year and a half worth of barren stories without a hint of joy to finally prove their worthiness as Green Arrow fans and allowed to see the glory of Oliver Queen written well! I'm surprised I was allowed to finish the journey since I mouthed off so much and acted like a total Moses.

We're tired of that too! Kind of. I guess I wouldn't mind seeing him get beat up a few more times.

Once Magus begins to explain things to Oliver, the narrative returns to Seattle and one week earlier so we can see how things turned out up there. Komodo reports to his superiors (unless they're partners. But I assume they're superiors since they're not busting their asses trying to kill Green Arrow themselves) that Queen Industries has been acquired but Green Arrow has escaped. That results in a tongue lashing from Golgotha. And then the next page explains their relationship. Kind of.

Perhaps the job of The Outsiders in The New 52 is to kill all of the characters that aren't living up to their potential.

Komodo doesn't plan on going anywhere until Oliver Queen is dead. So he remembers how easy it was to get Green Arrow's attention by posting things on the internet because it made Oliver so angry that people on the internet could become famous for doing nothing! Except for, you know, entertaining thousands of other people. But fuck that! They should go through the proper channels of getting agents and signing contracts and working for a company and not completely speaking their own mind because they have to represent the company signing their paychecks. Komodo begins hosting a live webcam of Naomi crucified on a statue in the hopes that it will lure out Green Arrow and then WHAMMO! Dead Green Arrow! It's a brilliant plan! Except that it didn't work out very well for Rush so I don't imagine it's going to work out for Komodo either.

What do you mean, "Who the hell is Rush?" Have we forgotten the sins of J.T. Krul so soon? Never forget!

Just let the JLA take care of it! Stop being so stubborn.

The trap is set and the bait is taken. Green Arrow recognizes the location of Naomi's crucifixion as the Queen family mausoleum where his father is buried. That's the perfect place for the exposing of family secrets!

Oliver finds that Naomi has a bomb strapped to her that must have been rigged to blow two minutes after the tomb was opened. Of course Komodo is waiting for him and they do their arrow dance across the graveyard as Fyff runs in to try and defuse the bomb. I really don't mind if Naomi were to blow up because of her personal philosophy on video games but Fyff is my kind of nerd. I was hoping he'd stick around with Green Arrow for the long haul.

Poor Fyff. If he were more confident and less socially awkward and much better looking and less creepy, the stalking might have been perceived as pursuing.

Thankfully, Fyff saves his own life by disarming the bomb. Although the comic book isn't over yet and those explosives are still strapped to Naomi's back.

Green Arrow and Komodo's fight ends how most bow and arrow battles end: fisticuffs. That's because you run out of arrows and it's harder to keep a shitload of arrows on your person than a shit ton of bullets. Also, guys that shoot arrows for a living are pretty good at dodging arrows as well, even when they're the two greatest archers in the world (although Merlyn might be better than Komodo).

Still no secrets revealed! Don't worry! I'll let you know when Komodo spills them!

Eventually Green Arrow cheats at the fist fight and just stabs Komodo in the eye with an arrow. That's just great! You might think you're taking away his depth perception but what you're really doing is giving him an excuse to appear in a future issue with a bionic eye that makes him an even better shot than before! Sheesh! When are these comic book characters ever going to remember that they're in fucking comic books!? And you know that's exactly what's going to happen since Komodo uses one of Ollie's smoke bomb arrows to get away.

Oh! Forget the bionic eye! If I were Komodo, I'd get one of my daughter's eyes transplanted into my face! That's what kids are for, right? Free labor and emergency organs!

The partly new team! Naomi sucks!

I should cut Naomi some slack since the Naomi I disliked was J.T. Krul's Naomi. I actually liked her much better when she was being written by Giffen. I'm sure Naomi and Fyff will be an entertaining Green Arrow tech team.

And that's it. Besides the very beginning of Ollie's trek through the desert where Black Magus had a sheriff named "Butcher" knock him out and drive him to the middle of nowhere. Hopefully next time we'll get some of those fucking secrets and truths about Oliver Queen's father and Magus and Komodo. They've been teased and hinted at longer than a Scott Lobdell forgotten foreshadow!

Green Arrow #20 Rating: +1 Ranking. I almost gave it a +2 ranking since this comic is many light years better than it's been in many light-miles. But I couldn't because it didn't tell me any secrets!

Green Arrow #19

I don't even know what the shocking lie about his death was!

Green Arrow is somehow still alive and somehow not cancelled. I think Jeff Lemire is doing a much better job than the previous four writers did with him but too slowly. Stop building a long, convoluted story and just make Green Arrow interesting already! Isn't there a magic short cut to erase the previous horrible issues and then make Green Arrow fun and interesting in a single issue? Use Jim Starlin's fire-headed, reality-bending aliens if you want! Anything goes now in the New 52 thanks to good old Jim! Every book has been freed from the editorial yoke! They can all exist in their own precious timeline within Earth Prime's dimension! So make Green Arrow interesting already, dammit!

Or you could do the Palmiotti and Gray Batwing thing and just start over with a new Green Arrow! I would accept that as well.

Once again, Lemire begins an issue with Ollie wandering through the desert of Black Mesa, Arizona. But now he's not nearly dead from dehydration and fatigue because he had a memory that allowed him to forget about the physical limitations of his body and carry on as if nothing were wrong. And now he's made it to some sheltering rocks where he begins following a trail of green arrows. And he suspects he knows who left them for him.

I wonder if the Baton Twirling Stalker followed him to Arizona? Maybe she'll save him.

I guess I forgot to mention that last issue ended with Green Arrow falling to his death in Seattle. Obviously he doesn't die because he has to live to end up dying in Black Mesa, Arizona. I suppose it's time to break out a trick arrow designed just for this occasion!

Except that would have been more believable than what really happens. He falls a whole bunch of stories and then casually grabs onto a ledge and pulls himself to safety. Lemire must have written that as an homage to all the old serialized adventure cliffhangers they showed in movie theaters in the 1800s.

You know, I can't even make a stupid facetious statement like that "1800s" line above without feeling the need to clarify that I wasn't serious lest everybody think it was a typo or just my constant stupidity. I assure you that this time it wasn't me being stupid. Just me being hyperbolic about how old those serialized things were and also being lazy because I didn't want to check on the decades that they actually ran.

Let's recap! Green Arrow finds out his father was a liar. SWAT helicopters come to kill Green Arrow. Green Arrow slides down a grapple line to safety. But before the safety happens, Komodo shoots the line with an arrow. Green Arrow falls to his death. No, wait! He grabs a ledge! And that ledge just happens to be the one Komodo is standing on a few feet away. And the helicopters are still after him! What a mess! But Green Arrow still has a way to save the day for everyone (as long as everyone does not include himself or Komodo).

If Komodo were to die here (he won't!), would Green Arrow accept responsibility for killing him? Or is this one of those super hero ethical gray areas? "I just stabbed him in the ankle. Totally survivable. Not my fault he couldn't keep his balance and fell to his death. Klutz."

Komodo grabs Ollie and they plummet to the ground. But this time (THIS TIME!), Green Arrow uses his trick arrow to save their lives. It's the Explodes Into Green Jello Arrow and they tumble squishily to safety. At this point, the SWAT helicopter loses them and I flip through and scan a few pages to see if it ever comes back or is completely forgotten like Nocenti or J.T. Cruel would have written it. Spoiler: it comes back to save the day!

I called that a spoiler because the helicopter doesn't come back for six pages. But now that I'm done reading up until the helicopter comes back, there wasn't much more to say besides "some arrows are shot and Ollie loses and then the helicopter comes back." Oh, and one other SHOCKING TRUTH!

Dun dun DUN!

The SWAT helicopter distracts Komodo long enough for Green Arrow to grab Komodo's bow and shoot Komodo in the shoulder. Then the SWAT helicopter flies off to ignore the action once more, giving Green Arrow some time to interrogate Komodo. But the interrogation doesn't last long as one of Komodo's boomerang arrows finally returns to shoot Ollie in the back.

Unless it was something more believable like Komodo's daughter coming to rescue her father after having a conversation with Naomi that caused the deadly girl to worry about dear old dad.

Yeah, that makes more sense. Only Green Arrow would use something as dumb as a Boomerang Arrow!

Green Arrow just got done Narration Boxing about how he beat Komodo because Komodo underestimated him and treated him like a child. So what happens when Ollie goes against Komodo's daughter? Ollie underestimates her and treats her like a child. And, of course, he loses. Ollie escapes by sliding ten stories down a construction waste tube. He lands on the nice, soft waste at the bottom and lies their bleeding and broken waiting for Fyff to pick him up. Meanwhile, Komodo begins killing SWAT Helicopter pilots because the helicopters finally decided it was time to start shooting. That's some serious patience! They actually gave three or four warnings to drop weapons that were ignored and they resisted firing! I know the weapons were only bows and arrows but most police in big cities don't even need the supposed perp to have a weapon to shoot to kill! As long as the person has something in his hand (wallet, skittles, penis), they'll open fire. Heck, a person doesn't even need to have something in his or her hand to get shot lately. Just pull into the wrong person's driveway and you're asking to take one in the brain.

Uh oh. Is there a chink in someone's daughter's trust?

Meanwhile Fyff picks up Arrow before he completely bleeds to death. But Arrow won't let this little girl's arrow shot through his leg kill him! No, he'd rather die by pulling the arrow out of his leg like an idiot and causing a shit-ton more damage!

This is how it went through.

And this is how he pulls it out before losing consciousness and ending the issue. Idiot.

Green Arrow #19 Rating: +1 Ranking. This comic book moves up the ranks because of one panel that sums up Green Arrow's DCnU career:

Green Arrow #18

Why is this guy named after an island? Does he have super island powers?

This cover makes me laugh because Seattle is just fucking lazy. Over on the East Coast, Gotham is spilling out crazies left and right. Metropolis is churning out super villains in gigantic super-villain sausage links. Central City has a club of goofy looking misfits that keeps growing (and monkeys!). And way over here on the West Coast, Seattle has a jerk with a bow. But that's just enough evil power to match their hero: another jerk with a bow. At least the city doesn't take much damage when they battle. A few broken windows. A few dented cars. If Portland gets into the super hero business, our big villain will probably be a slap tagger, stickering the hell out of street signs and mail boxes. Of course if that's the case, we already have a huge problem with super villains!

Oliver Queen is still dying in that desert in Arizona. He almost succumbs to fatigue when a stupid memory with his stupid dad about stupidly not giving up saves his life. Goddammit, you dumb memory! Couldn't you have kept to yourself for another fifteen years? You had to go and ruin the best moment of The New 52 so far!

Three weeks earlier, some guy named Magus played the part of the stupid memory, saving Green Arrow just before Komodo put an arrow in his head. I wonder if that would have been ruled a suicide? Magus left a note for Green Arrow to head out to Black Mesa, Arizona, and to go by way of Emerson's bookshelf. But first he needs to call Steve Trevor (on a pay phone! Oh, Seattle! Do you keep them around for the irony factor?) and check in with the Justice League of America since that's now a thing he's into. He convinces Steve Trevor that he's not dead like he was at the end of Justice League of America #1 (what jerk saves him there?! So many chances to rid the DCnU of this guy in the last month and he's still alive!) and that he didn't shove Emerson out of a window. Trevor calms down and tells him he'll hold off sending the Justice League to help him out of this mess.

Way to emasculate him with the "big guns" comment, Steve. Even though the only member of your new team to carry a gun is your Green Lantern!

Meanwhile Komodo is busy with a meeting of uptight business men as they purchase up majority shares of Queen Industries in the wake of Oliver Queen supposedly murdering his business partner Emerson. Didn't we already read this story but in a more entertainingly badly written way? Big fucking deal! Queen has lost his business. Again! I think the most important part of this scene is when Komodo's daughter Emiko comes in and asks:

Aww! They're so cute and bloodthirsty at that age!

Before Ollie can get to Emerson's bookshelf, he makes a stop to recruit some guy named Henry Fyff that he had to fire from Queen Industries three years ago for being super smart. But now he needs him to stalk Naomi. Unless it was the other way around. I've had a migraine for about 24 hours now and I just can't concentrate anymore. Actually, the migraine finally went away with a few more hours of sleep on top of a lot more hours of sleep. But now I've got a sinus headache on the other side of my head! But at least that's manageable. It's pretty telling how awful a migraine can be when a sinus headache is good fucking news. I used to get migraines fairly regularly until about eight years ago when I took a part time, overnight job and was able to begin sleeping on my own terms and not those dictated by a forty hour job that insisted I be at work by nine in the morning. Now I own the business that I began working part time for eight years ago mainly because it allows me to live by my body's schedule and not a fabricated one based on the society I was born into. In the last eight years, I've probably had less than a dozen migraines whereas before that, twelve was easily a low count for a year.

So now that Jax and Naomi may be dead, Ollie recruits Henry Fyff to be his Weapons and Communications Expert. He immediately tells this new kid that Oliver Queen is Green Arrow! He might as well. If things don't work out, he can always have Katana kill this guy. Henry Fyff is smart enough to realize the footage of Oliver Queen pushing Emerson out of the office building window was doctored, so he agrees to join up with Green Arrow. I guess Lemire didn't want to have to use a couple of crappy characters created by J.T. Krul. Especially Naomi since she was always blaming video games and masturbation and comic books and candy and pornography on violence. Geez. I think I'd be a serial killer if all those things led to violence.

Actually, Naomi and Jax aren't dead! At least not yet! Komodo has them bound inside his office building because he needs their help to find Green Arrow.

Oh that traitorous shrew! I guess I would buy some time by agreeing to help Komodo and his daughter, Hit Girl Emiko, too.

With the help of Fyff, Green Arrow manages to find a way back into Queen Industries and discovers a secret world behind Emerson's bookshelf. Ancient weapons, maps, and photos all revealing that Emerson and Ollie's father, Robert, had a life of adventure that he never knew about. One picture of them shows them on the beach of the island where Ollie was stranded for over a year. There's also a third man in the photo of that beach that Ollie doesn't recognize. It's Komodo.

And then Magus teleports in to tell Green Arrow to get to Black Mesa or he's going to die at Komodo's hands. As opposed to dying of thirst in the desert of Black Mesa which is more preferable somehow.

Ooh! Ooh! I've heard of The Outsiders! Me! Me! They were like only my favorites ever as a kid! With Aparo's goofy looking people and Barr's jokey sense of humor! I need to reread those now that I'm done rereading Shade the Changing Man.

As Green Arrow is busy talking to The Magus, Komodo is busy telling the police that the vigilante that caused all kinds of extra paper work for you on Ocean Parade Day was busy rummaging through the Emerson crime scene. Green Arrow tries to get away sliding down the cable of his grapple arrow but Komodo shoots the line. The issue ends with Green Arrow falling to his death.

Green Arrow #18 Rating: No change. I kind of feel I should give Green Arrow a boost in the rankings since it's actually readable now. But the character has been tainted by all of the previous crap and I'm just not very interested in him now. Maybe that will change over time but when I find myself more concerned with Lemire nearly killing him because I know Ollie will survive rather than being filled with tension about how Ollie will get out of the predicament, I know my interest in Green Arrow (what little was ever there) has nearly vanished.