Posted in: Movies, TV | Tagged: arrow, entertainment, New York Comic Con 2014, stephen amell, tv

NYCC 2014: Stephen Amell's Q&A Does Not Fail New York City

By Paul Gullas

With Arrow's season premiere airing the night before NYCC began, it may have been a little surprising that there wasn't an official panel for the hit CW show at New York Comic Con 2014. But there was a panel devoted to the show's star Stephen Amell that ended up being a de facto one-man Arrow panel, as he demonstrated to the crowd packed inside the Empire Stage that he makes a fantastic spokesperson for the show…

Amell was a big presence at NYCC weekend, including being in the Photo Ops area and having been part of another NYCC panel to announce that he was voicing Oliver Queen in Lego Batman 3.

I had arrived too late to catch the start of the panel, but thankfully, there were screens set up outside the Empire Stage where we could see & hear what was going on.

Some tidbits (with some minor **SPOILERS for upcoming episodes) from the Q&A:

• He was "weaned" on the Christopher Reeve Superman films. "I bought the 4-pack on iTunes one night…at 33 years old…this is probably the right room to say that in, " but it was General Zod who was his favorite character. "So, I used to yell at my sister to kneel, growing up." He always gravitated towards villains, so he was happy that Oliver wasn't too much of a "do-gooder."
• He named Hulk Hogan as one of his childhood heroes.
• They're filming episode 9, the fall finale, which will have the "biggest fight in the history of our show. It's not a fight with 40 people. It's a fight with 2 people, and I was shirtless the entire fight, " he revealed to huge cheers from the women in the audience. It's not a fight with bows-and-arrows, but with swords [I'm guessing Rila Fukushima's Katana will be involved]
• Ollie's lovechild may appear.
• Moira's death scene was physically and emotionally very hard to shoot, but was one of the very best moments of the show.
• When asked about Nightwing ever appearing on Arrow, he brought up Harley Quinn's surprise cameo, and mentioned that when a show like Gotham comes around, they become more restricted in their ability to use characters like Nightwing or Harley Quinn. But they don't necessarily have to use the "big guns," and can use more  niche characters.
• Regarding the flashbacks: "Being in Hong Kong is much warmer than being on the island." At the midway point of this season, we'll also be at the midway point of Oliver's five-year journey (in the flashbacks), and we'll be closer to the version of Oliver that we met in the pilot ("that dude's a killer–I miss playing that guy!").
• Is he ready to face Ra's? ("Probably not"). He also declined to name a favorite love interest on the show, and he likes the audience to have their own favorites. He tells a story about how he was sitting next to Colton Haynes (Roy Harper) during the cast & crew premiere screening. During a scene where Oliver & Diggle hug, Amell heard an "awww" next to him, looked over and saw an "kind of emotional" Haynes smiling at the scene.
• All the superheroes popping up in both Starling City and Central City (in The Flash) will be an important theme, especially for Oliver's development by the end of the season.
• He tries to keep the mood light on set because the hours are long.
• It was brought up that he had tweeted at WWE to host Monday Night RAW. He would need to have time and to train, so he would want to do it during hiatus. He still really wants to do it.
• He doesn't know if Ted Kord will be introduced on the show. He points out that Kord Industries has been mentioned on the show and has appeared on a Flash promotional poster.
• Regarding the dynamic between Oliver Queen & Barry Allen, "I love playing Oliver as sort of the older, curmudgeonly non-superpowered superhero with this little…dickhead zipping all around me," he said to laughs. They were filming the crossover episodes at he same time The Flash's premiere was airing and he told Gustin that he hoped that they opened bigger than Arrow did. To Amell, the fact that it did speaks to both the popularity of the Flash and the audience's faith in Arrow's creative team.
• Colin Donnell (Tommy Merlyn) made a surprise appearance on the panel. Amell told the audience that he had sent Donnell an e-mail a few months ago saying "you are crashing my panel, for sure."  Donnell responded that Amell is a tough act to follow.
• Donnell is appearing on the new Showtime show The Affair, and appears as Tommy Merlyn in the second episode of this season.
• One of the reasons that he voiced Green Arrow in Injustice: Gods Among Us and Lego Batman 3 is because he's fiercely protective of the character,  and has to live and represent this show.
• Will the show ever stop doing flashbacks? He doesn't think the show will exist without some kind of flashback story. They tried it in the 7th & 8th episodes of Season 1, and those are among the producers' least favorite episodes of the series.
• Amell is a fan of knowing in advance when a show is going to end.
• The writers are working on the "macro elements" of season 4 right now.
• He's happy to share the spotlight with other characters. One of his favorite episodes from last year was the Suicide Squad episode, where Oliver wasn't featured as prominently.
• Will Captain Lance learn that Oliver is the Arrow? Paul Blackthorne is happy that he can wear a buzzcut now.  The first thing he would do after every season would be shave his head. Oliver's secret identity is one of the writers' least favorite things on the show. He points out that on The Flash, everyone knows that Barry is the Flash.  Amell thinks that the secret identity aspect IS interesting between Oliver and Captain Lance, so it'll probably remain this way for the time being.
• Unlike on The Flash, there won't be too many superpowered characters on Arrow this season. Introducing powers (the Mirakuru's superstrength) last season was to help establish things for The Flash. Amell thinks that keeping Arrow more grounded gives each show a more distinctive identity.

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