Driven by inner demons, Oliver Queen travels the world and brings outlaws to justice, by breaking every law as the vigilante Green Arrow. Armed with cutting-edge weaponry and illegally gained intelligence gathered by his team at Q-Core, Green Arrow is letting the arrows fly and asking questions once they’ve found their mark.

Writer J.T. Krul is one of the few DC Comics writers to retain the title he was working on pre-New 52. However, this is not a continuation of that Green Arrow even though there were more than enough loose ends in need of tying. Paired with comic book all star Dan Jurgens, the creative team is out to have Green Arrow trotting the globe fighting super villains wherever they may roam.

I want to talk about Jurgens’ art in this book first, as it harkens back to a simpler time of comic books before every character was overly muscular and to slick to stay on the page. Jurgens’ work in Green Arrow #1 is solid but not spectacular and Dave Wilkins’ cover evokes more thoughts of Wolverine with a bow and arrow than Oliver Queen. Of all the gifts Smallville gave us, the look of Green Arrow in this book is one for which I wish I had the receipt in order to make a timely return. Thankfully he’s got a mask rather than green sunglasses (but we do have a green sunglasses sighting, that will have you thinking Scott Summers headed for the border). Basically what I’m trying to say is, for some reason, Dan Jurgens’ pencils left me thinking X-Men when I should have been thinking Green Arrow.

Since Green Arrow is one of my favorite characters, I was excited to see him in a post ‘Brightest Day’ world. The fact that J.T. Krul was going to continue writing the book was also a point of excitement. All of my enthusiasm quickly faded as I fell further into this book. Shouldn’t Oliver Queen have a tougher rouges gallery than what is basically the equivalent to the Jackass crew, only with superpowers? Because that is basically what he has in a trio of villains going around doing villain stuff and posting it to the Internet. Yawn.

I knew not all of the 52 new books would be Eisner Award winning books, but I didn’t expect one with a solid creative team to stumble so greatly out of the gates. Now I’m left with a decision. Do I pick up issue #2 and hope for the best or do I make the walk of shame to the counter at my local comic book store and cross Green Arrow off my pull-list after only one issue? If you haven’t bought it already, this is one to skip.

Green Arrow #1
Writer: J.T. Krul
Penciler: Dan Jurgens
Inker: George Perez
Colorist: David Baron
Cover: Dave Wilkins