Arrow's Main Villains Ranked From Worst To Best

After eight years, the CW's massively popular superhero series, Arrow, has come to an end. The show is both the foundation and the namesake of the Arrowverse, spawning several equally successful spin-offs on The CW that have frequently crossed over in huge-scale story arcs reminiscent of comic book events.

Though the DC mainstay's rogues gallery may not be as widely known as the likes of Batman or the Justice League, Green Arrow sees many a threat befall his home of Star City over the course of the series.

From street-level thugs to mystical assassins to beings of godlike power, Team Arrow is never short of adversaries to fight off. Most of them are dealt with in the space of an episode; others aren't about to be beaten so easily, and it's these select few foes that spectacularly put the crime-fighting collective through their paces.

With the verdant vigilante finally hanging up his hood and bow, it is time to look back on the tireless crusade of Oliver Queen, and the roster of archenemies that drove him to become someone else - to become something else.

When Oliver gets himself locked up (again) after revealing his superhero identity, a new Green Arrow sprouts up around the city in the months to follow, fulfilling the same role of protecting its citizens from ever-present criminal threats. The team find a trace of blood at a crime scene, with which they deduce that this new Green Arrow is a woman named Emiko Adachi, Oliver's paternal half-sister.

Eventually freed from prison, Oliver tracks her down and attempts to connect with her. However, unbeknownst to him until much later, Emiko is secretly the leader of a cult-like terrorist organisation called The Ninth Circle, and has been crossing targets off her 'list' much like Oliver himself did in the show's first season.

As it is revealed that Emiko's mother, Kazumi, was murdered years prior, Emiko, fuelled by her hatred of her father, Robert Queen, for abandoning them, seeks revenge on Oliver and his legacy to balance out the wrongs his family have done to her. However, her vendetta is what exposes The Ninth Circle to Team Arrow, and the organisation turns on her, eventually leading to her death.

Emiko's placing in this list is due to her last-minute redemption - something that definitely sets her apart from the entries to come. Before dying, she and Oliver are able to bury the hatchet once and for all, and she is finally accepted as part of the family.