With the ‘Arrow’ mid-season premiere coming up on January 21st, the big question on the minds of fans is who exactly will Emiko Queen be in the series. In the comics, she is a relatively new character introduced during the “New 52” run that fans seem to enjoy, a somewhat murdering, talent warrior, who fits in well with the Green Arrow world. So it makes sense to see ‘Arrow’ bring her into the fold, though some have wondered if there were ulterior motives to bringing her on as well, especially since Thea Queen (the other Queen sister) so recently left the series.
During a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, show-runner Beth Schwartz weighed in on the notion that Emiko was brought in to replace Thea, who left the series last year:
“The intention wasn’t to replace Thea, or once one sister left to introduce a new sister. We were just excited about this character from the comic books, and we just felt like it was time to bring her into the fold. [The fact that] Queen secrets are still happening from the grave, I thought, was really interesting, and that there was a whole hidden life that Oliver that didn’t know about.”
Schwartz also spoke on the mid-season premiere, titled ‘My Name is Emiko Queen,’ which will fill in a lot of the knowledge gaps about Emiko, including getting to know her personality a little bit more:
“We’re gonna really be seeing a lot from her perspective. We have a really cool, fun opening where we learn about her mission [and] why she’s taken up the Green Arrow suit. We’ll explain in this episode who her parents are…She is very similar to Oliver, which is fun and different, obviously, from Thea as well, who had her own sort of thing going. But we kind of love making those parallels of her to Oliver.”
I know I will be tuning in for that parentage reveal, as that is a big question because in the comics Emiko’s mother by Robert Queen is Shado, who we have already seen in the series as a former love of Oliver, and we know Shado has died, all of which would make it hard to retcon her into Emiko’s mom (not to mention Shado was relatively young, which doesn’t fit with how they aged up Emiko to be in her twenties in the series, as in the comics, she was in her teens). I’m hoping they make Emiko’s mother someone memorable and do not just make it some random woman Robert Queen slept with, as I feel that would be a real disservice to all of the characters involved.
Schwartz also shared that the episode will continue to develop a kind of partnership between Emiko and Rene, who has supported this new Green Arrow since meeting her earlier this season. In Schwartz’s words:
“He’s kind of been her number one supporter even from the beginning, even when he didn’t know who she was. He just always believed in the mission and he’s the one that’s been pushing from the beginning that vigilantes are important. They find out they have a lot in common, and so he’s fully onboard to support her.”
Which does make me wonder about that future Star City where Rene seems to be a position of power in the Glades… could it be that he and Emiko work to build their own bastion of security in the glades in the future? Could that be why the other vigilantes do not get along with Rene anymore because he and Emiki have their own little empire? That’s just a thought of mine, but feel free to share any you might have in the comments below!
