In the first sign of what could be a major shakeup of the DC superhero TV world known as the Arrowverse, Stephen Amell confirmed in a statement on Twitter that Arrow Season 8 will be the show’s final bow.
“Playing Oliver Queen has been the greatest professional experience of my life… but you can’t be a vigilante forever. Arrow will return for a final run of 10 episodes this Fall. There’s so much to say… for now I just want to say thank you.”
Arrow was the first of the CW’s run of interconnected superhero shows, launching The Flash after its second season, and in turn opening the door for even more ambitious, offbeat fare like Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow to join the multiverse. It was the Arrow chapter of 2018’s ambitious Elseworlds crossover that introduced the next player to the DC TV Universe, Ruby Rose’s Batwoman.
But the introduction of a Batwoman show to the Arrowverse lineup raised some questions. How many superhero shows can one network support? And with the promise that after Elseworlds comes Crisis on Infinite Earths, an adaptation of the ultimate DC Comics event, and the one perhaps most notorious for bringing a high body count where no hero or villain is safe, fans immediately began to speculate that Crisis would be the mechanism by which the CW would start cleaning house and making room for the next generation of shows.
Whether that’s actually the case or not remains to be seen. Perhaps Arrow is deservedly being allowed to go out on its own terms. But 10 episodes would coincide almost exactly with the conclusion of Crisis on Infinite Earths, so anyone who thinks Oliver Queen might be given a heroic, self-sacrificing exit, well…here’s your evidence. After all, Elseworlds concluded with Ollie making some kind of mysterious bargain with the Monitor in order to save the lives of Barry and Kara.
And don’t worry, the rest of the Arrowverse isn’t going anywhere.
“This was a difficult decision to come to, but like every hard decision we’ve made for the past seven years, it was with the best interests of Arrow in mind,” showrunner Beth Schwartz and executive producers Greg Berlanti and Marc Guggenheim said Wednesday in a statement (via THR). “We’re heartened by the fact that Arrowhas birthed an entire universe of shows that will continue on for many years to come. We’re excited about crafting a conclusion that honors the show, its characters and its legacy and are grateful to all the writers, producers, actors, and — more importantly — the incredible crew that has sustained us and the show for over seven years.”
There’s currently no release date set for Arrow season 8, but we expect it will arrive, as usual, around the first or second week of October. Expect there to be lots more to this story as well as its relationship to Crisis on Infinite Earths in the coming months.
Mike Cecchini is the Editor in Chief of Den of Geek. You can read more of his work here. Follow him on Twitter @wayoutstuff.
