“The Flash”: Stephen Amell on his return as Green Arrow at the helm of The Arrowverse – Q&A

SPOILERS WARNING! This post details this week’s episode of The CW’s The Lightning.

In Wednesday’s episode, Barry enlisted the help of an old friend to save the day The Lightning.

The episode begins on a positive note as Team Flash throws Barry a surprise birthday party, but things go horribly awry when Ramsey Rosso ruins the celebrations. After Ramsey incapacitates the rest of Team Flash, Barry believes he is alone in the fight.

But instead, he is visited by Oliver Queen, aka Green Arrow (Stephen Amell), who has been watching the group since becoming Spectre. He returns to Earth once again to help Barry stop Ramsey (in the iconic Green Arrow suit, of course).

Below, Amell talks to Deadline about his return to the Arrowverse for his swan song.

Reporter: How did Oliver/Green Arrow return for this episode of? The lightning?

STEPHEN AMELL: Well, Greg Berlanti called me and he and I had more of a general chat. He actually said, “This is the last season of The Lightning, and you are one of the people responsible for getting the show there in the first place. So you want to come back?’ And I said, ‘Greg, I can’t believe I’m actually going to say this because it sounds so cliche, but it really depends on what the story is.’ Greg said, “Okay, in that case, let’s get you on the phone with Eric Wallace.” He is the showrunner The Lightning, and I really liked what he had to offer. I thought it was kind of cliche for Oliver to be back for the actual series finale just because I wanted to make sure that the focus of that episode wasn’t on the recurring character and more on the end of that series… I thought the fact that it was a regular episode as part of the show was really exciting.

Reporter: Did you work with Eric at all to figure out how Oliver’s return couldn’t feel forced, or was the plot already mapped out?

Amell: I wanted to make sure we alluded to Oliver’s departure, but then we have this kind of mythic version of him as the ghost that I think we all understand just exists somewhere in the multiverse. But what I loved about Eric was that I let him figure out the logistics of how it all worked with the multiverse and the Specter and coming back from the dead — because, believe it or not, the people, the shows in the Arrowverse write, do It. have some experience with people coming back from the dead. So we wanted to come up with a cool idea that would honor the story and make sure we honored everything we put into it Arrow. When I came back, I wanted to come back and I wanted to be the Green Arrow.

Reporter: Let’s talk about the story then. Why do you think Oliver was the right person to help Barry at that moment?

Amell: I mean, it hit him at a very interesting point. He met him at the beginning of his journey. So I think when they talk there’s always something that Barry expects from Oliver and there’s always something that Oliver expects from Barry. I think in Oliver’s case he enjoys Barry’s recklessness and I would think in Barry’s case he just enjoys Oliver’s mentorship. So that’s nice. I always liked the scenes between me and Grant, there was always a nice bit of hilarity. I don’t know if he as Barry was always allowed to do something unique with Oliver, but I felt like Oliver always had to do something unique with Barry.

Reporter: What was it like going back on set as Green Arrow?

Amell: It all felt very, very strange. I know a lot of people worked on it the lightning, but more on the part of the crew who were very glad for my return, for there were many of them Arrow. Danielle Panabaker directed the episode and was very excited. She and I met over Christmas break while she was fixing and talking about the scripts and things like that. So overall the experience was easy, it was really nice. I couldn’t have asked for more.

Reporter: I’m sure some fans were hoping for an Olicity reunion. Do you think Oliver’s explanation that he hasn’t seen Felicity means that he and Felicity’s story, at least in this timeline, has ended?

Amell: I didn’t really see it that way. I’ve seen him say a few times, wherever they are, they’re good – which I credit to what we did last episode of Arrow.

Reporter: You broke up with Arrowverse daily a while ago, but does it feel different now that the franchise is ending for good?

Amell: I think I got off at the right time to clear the podium and get everyone to the finish, but I think it ends on a good note. I think things are falling apart because of the pandemic and the postponement of shooting [schedule] and all that stuff is kind of frustrating, but it was like that with everyone. It’s been an absolutely incredible run in terms of an interconnected universe of superheroes on television. If they go back and write a book about it, hopefully they’ll say we stuck the landing.