Brandon Borzelli's Geek Goggle Reviews

Green Arrow and Black Canary #2
DC Comics
Winick & Chiang

Another solid issue. This series is two for two in my book. Last issue focused on Black Canary trying to determine what happened to Green Arrow whereas this issue gives the escape. Or at least the attempt.

We open the issue with Green Arrow running buck naked through the forest being chased down by women with spears and swords. My first reaction was: this is going to stink out loud. Page after page of Ollie nude is just comedy I don’t need. Arrow is captured and we move on.

Black Canary and Mia land on Themyscira or Paradise Island depending on your vantage point. Black Canary is responding to an invite to live on the all female Island to lead them. Immediately, the Amazons insult Mia as being unclean. Mia explodes. Canary tries to calm things down. The insults continue and Canary decks some Amazon warrior. It seems the focus here is to retell Mia's past, that she was a prostitute and is HIV positive. This is all good information to reintroduce the character. It felt like it drowned on and on for a bit too much, but I get why it was done. The other focus here is that Black Canary is a badass.

After Canary establishes boundaries the Amazons lay down their deal to Canary and give her one hour to contemplate the offer. Not much time. Especially when Connor, Ollie's son, is trying to spring his dad hidden away in the deeper throws of the Island.

Connor takes out the guards around Ollie and gets him out of his cage. We are thankfully saved from more Ollie nudity. Connor tells his old man how everyone thought he was dead. After Ollie and Connor talk about how Canary is handling all this, the mood get lighter. The banter between the two is very good. It has a Batman and Nightwing quality to it. Ollie asks some questions with his usual level of sarcasm and humor. He realizes Canary and Connor's plan was a terrible one without any backup and before you know it Connor and Ollie are surrounded. That's your cliffhanger. Ollie has a great line to finish off the book.

This comic is great. It moves quick. It has some plot advancement on all fronts. It has some action, although no arrows are fired in this issue. It has some witty banter you’d expect from Arrow. All that it's missing is Red Arrow aka Roy aka Speedy I.

I liked the artwork. I cant say the I loved it. Some of it I really enjoyed, such as Ollie's hair, beard and overall gruff appearance. Some of it I didn’t really care for. The Amazon warriors looked like they were from the 1950s in some cases. I felt like they were at a frat toga party and they were about come out in the next panel with TV dinners.

A new comer to this series might be slightly lost, but not too much. You really don’t need much more background apart from what you already get in this issue. I mean it is only issue two after all. Ha-ha. I suspect the core Green Arrow fans are reading this and saying that its on par with any other good Green Arrow comic. It's nice to see four fifths of the Arrow team together.

5 out of 5 geek goggles.


Green Arrow Black Canary #2
DC Comics
SEP070155D