Green Arrow 1: The Death & Life of Oliver Queen Paperback – January 10, 2017

The New 52 Green Arrow never did much for my tastes. Even at its strongest, it just wasn't what I was looking for in a Green Arrow book. This book is clearly meant for me; like much of Rebirth, this story resets much of what the characters involved lost with the New 52. Oliver Queen very much feels like his old self again; he's political, and a little preachy (thankfully never too much to alienate most people, even if you don't agree with him), but most importantly he's fun again. He's snarky, smart, and capable, a description that could fit the book just as well. The book also restores Black Canary more like her earlier depictions, and while she isn't quite where she was before, it's clear that the author intends it to happen as the series progresses.Also like the rest of Rebirth, though, it doesn't totally disregard the new, but it does refine things. There is just a smidgen of Arrowverse Ollie mixed in now, which comes out at times when it feels appropriate. Diggle and Emi (something of an expy of Thea from the tv show) also continue to gain footing as worthy members of the cast. I'm even beginning to feel more than apathy towards Ollie's tech guy now, which I couldn't really say before.Finally, the brand new additions work well too. Two villain groups, the underground people and the Ninth Circle (or the Burned), pop up here, and both are visually interesting and a little repulsive to look at (in a good way). Hopefully, we will see them stick around for future use; Green Arrow does have a tragically small rogues gallery beyond those he borrows from Batman or the Justice League.Last, the art meshes very well with the story. It's very stylized, almost cutesy at times, but it lends itself well to the macabre and unusual elements present here too.

Really good read and start . A must for gree.n arrow fan . Love see dingle in comics . Awesome .

This is the first book in the suggested reading order of the DC Rebirth series. I'm more a Marvel guy, so take this review with a grain of salt. The story arc, involving human trafficking, is more or less resolved. There's another storyline involving Oliver Queen trying to regain his fortune and control of his company, which ends on a cliffhanger. I think if you really like GA, you'll enjoy this. For those who aren't hardcore GA fans, it's still enjoyabke, and might make them read further adventures of the character.

This was better than when I read it when it came out. A truly interesting cast of characters and storylines. Queen falls short of being the overbearing blowhard he's been portrayed as in the past, which is always good.

Great story line after the Dc52 comics. Spending on what you like for an artist style I’m a little bit more of a fan of this illustration style.

Its a strong start. Percy seems to have dropped or wrapped up the arc he had in his previous books about werewolf people infesting seattle. Meh. So Ollie is off fighting crime, trying to figure out whats happening with the missing population of homeless people. They didn't just die or stop being homeless, theyre being harvested. Who is the culprit? A boring villain. Almost immediately Ollie teams up with Black Canary and they start a relationship and it feels really organic. Something I don't think the writers of Arrow never got was that Ollie is better paired with someone who can fight beside him, rather than sticking safely behind a computer monitor. A good bit of dialogue comes from Dinah critiquing ollie's methods of paying off people to not be evil and thinking that sprinkling money at problems solves them. Ollie's retort is a good comeback in that in order to fight crime as efficiently as he does, to keep track of who is on his payroll, the charities he funds and research he develops REQUIRES MONEY. Green Arrow and Batman are the 2 heroes who always seem to be made fun of for needing money to do the superheroing that they do, but Ollie is right. Its such a shame that the book never seems to come back to this philosophy, and seems to lean toward a bit where ollie questions if he really needs the green to be green arrow.The problems with the volume start around the 3rd chapter which stinks cause its the last issue that has Schmidt's art. They switch artists on the 4th chapter and its noticeable. They added John Diggle from the show in Lemire's run for some reason but it never made sense to me. He's another soldier on the ground helping with Ollie's fight. He left after some time in the new 52 but returns here. He's also mad at Ollie for some personal reason that I cant be bothered to care about. Doesn't even matter much cause they bro it out after like 3 panels of Diggle saying hes mad at ollie. The main plot of this volume is mostly Ollie being betrayed and his company being taken from him, his name ruined and his fortune lost (again).The villains are also pretty boring. The guy who stole Ollie's money is just Komodo minus the insane archery skills and is just a businessman. The guy he works for is even more generic. The book keeps trying to make their organization cool by alluding it to the 9 circles of hell from the divine comedy but ultimately just boring in that its not really a challenge for ollie to take them down. Theyre there really just to challenge Ollie's philosophy. Also Shado makes an appearance, and shes allied with the bad guys but for very unclear/dumb reasons. Feels like they just needed another person for ollie to fight who was another good archer. Wasted really considering She loved Ollie's dad to the point of withstanding torture for months without ever giving up his secrets/information.I'll wrap it up by saying that it had good potential at first with establishing Ollie and Dinah's relationship, but just couldn't use that as a good base, and chose instead to focus on a boring villain, Diggle seems unnecessary, Shado is wasted by being a villain, and ollie's newfound philosophy of caring about the little guy in a liberal way isnt explored in any meaningful way. Hopefully it gets better in the next volume

But it is a comic book was hopping for more a novel type book for my kid to get reading credit

Perfect for my dads birthday. Beautiful art, high quality.