All 7 Green Arrow actors ranked from worst to best

2. Justin Hartley

Appeared in: Smallville

It’s hard to believe that a character who has been around as long as Green Arrow only made his live-action debut in 2006. The good news is that he was just waiting on the right person to play him, because when Justin Hartley brought the Emerald Archer to Smallville, we all sat up and paid attention to him.

Hartley’s performance is the most comic-accurate that we’ve seen thus far. His Oliver Queen was smooth-talking, charismatic, and just the right amount of arrogant to ensure that nobody ever suspected the handsome billionaire playboy of being a vigilante archer. Oliver wears his larger-than-life public persona with pride, and that’s what often differentiates him from fellow billionaire crimefighter Batman; he likes it. And Hartley captured that to perfection.

His performance as Green Arrow was also outstanding. He mixed the character’s natural charm with the slightly more serious tone of Smallville‘s Metropolis-set seasons. The vigilante was feared but never terrifying in the way that Batman is. And that’s the sweet spot for the Emerald Archer.

Hartley became a regular part of the show after that and we saw Ollie become even more like his comic book counterpart as it went on. It’s easy to see why, too, because Hartley’s performance is so good, it was easy to like him. We just wish he got the chance to shine in his own TV series, because that could have been something to see.

As far as comic-accurate Green Arrows go, Justin Hartley is the best.