6 Times Arrow Improved Green Arrow Mythology (& 4 Times It Failed)

Improvements To Green Arrow Mythology...

6. Felicity Smoak

Many casual comic book fans may think that Felicity Smoak was purely a creation of Arrow. While Emily Bett Rickards’ incarnation of Felicity is indeed rather different to her comic book counterpart, Felicity Smoak actually first appeared in the pages of DC Comics back in 1984.

She may have been a supporting character who only appeared briefly, but Felicity’s 1984 funny book debut in The Fury of Firestorm #23 saw her positioned as the boss of a New York computer software company. Not only that, but she found herself butting heads with Firestorm… before marrying the father’s hero, Ed Raymond.

What Arrow did so well, is that it took this comic book character and improved her one hundred times over. Sure, Emily Bett Rickards’ Felicity retained her computer smarts, yet Ms. Smoak was made into a pivotal part of the overall eight-season arc of Arrow. To the point that she managed to be one of the few people to calm the wild beast that is Oliver Queen.

Arrow’s Felicity Smoak was far from 100% perfect, but it’s a tough task to write a character flawlessly for seven full seasons and a sprinkling of eighth season appearances. There have clearly been ups and downs in the depiction of the character, yet the job done with Felicity Smoak in Arrow is largely a fantastic one. At least in comparison to what fans had previously seen from the character in the comic books.

Andrew Pollard

Senior Writer

Once described as the Swiss Army Knife of WhatCulture, Andrew can usually be found writing, editing, or presenting on a wide range of topics. As a lifelong wrestling fan, horror obsessive, and comic book nerd, he's been covering those topics professionally as far back as 2010. In addition to his current WhatCulture role of Senior Content Producer, Andrew previously spent nearly a decade as Online Editor and Lead Writer for the world's longest-running genre publication, Starburst Magazine, and his work has also been featured on BBC, TechRadar, Tom's Guide, WhatToWatch, Sportkskeeda, and various other outlets, in addition to being a Rotten Tomatoes-approved film critic. Between his main dayjob, his role as the lead panel host of Wales Comic Con, and his gig as a pre-match host for Wrexham AFC games, Andrew has also carried out a hugely varied amount of interviews, from the likes of Robert Englund, Kane Hodder, Adrienne Barbeau, Rob Zombie, Katharine Isabelle, Leigh Whannell, Bruce Campbell, and Tony Todd, to Kevin Smith, Ron Perlman, Elijah Wood, Giancarlo Esposito, Simon Pegg, Charlie Cox, the Russo Brothers, and Brian Blessed, to Kevin Conroy, Paul Dini, Tara Strong, Will Friedle, Burt Ward, Andrea Romano, Frank Miller, and Rob Liefeld, to Bret Hart, Sting, Mick Foley, Ricky Starks, Jamie Hayer, Britt Baker, Eric Bischoff, and William Regal, to Mickey Thomas, Joey Jones, Phil Parkinson, Brian Flynn, Denis Smith, Gary Bennett, Karl Connolly, and Bryan Robson - and that's just the tip of an ever-expanding iceberg.

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