Green Arrow's History
When millionaire Oliver Queen fell overboard from a yacht, he was washed up on a deserted island where he was forced to learn how to hunt with a bow and arrow in order to survive. He eventually escaped from the island by overpowering some drug smugglers and handing them over to the authorities. Changed by his experiences, he decided to give something back to society, in as exciting a way as possible - becoming a crime-fighter, using his archery skills for good.
With a nickname coined by the press, Green Arrow and his sidekick Speedy made it their mission to protect Star City. He took his cue from Batman and built his own "Arrow Cave," complete with an "Arrow Car" and allegedly a yellow submarine. He and Speedy fought with trick arrows that were designed to be non-lethal. Green Arrow joined the Justice League of America and soon fell in love with member Black Canary (even though he was almost twice her age). Unbeknownst to the rest of the League members, in the early days Queen was one of the major financial backers of the team. He was also the only one that objected when the team relocated to a space station in orbit, feeling that they were too far removed from the people they were meant to protect. In the ensuing year after losing his fortune, Ollie traveled the country with Green Lantern Hal Jordan while his left-behind ward dabbled with drugs that caused the two to go their separate ways.
While Ollie was on the team and they were located in their Sattelite base, the events alluded to in Identity Crisis transpired, although he eventually left the team during this era following the example of Black Lightning, who turned down membership to the group due to similar concerns.
After being together for years, Ollie and Dinah relocated to Seattle and opened a floral shop. Ollie, about to turn 43, was having a bit of a midlife crisis. He wanted her to marry him and to have children, citing that Roy was "not technically" his son, nor was Lian technically his granddaughter, but Dinah objected, citing their career as superheroes as being too dangerous to go to that level. Dinah's warning would become a premonition when she was kidnapped and brutally tortured by sadistic criminal not long after their arrival (Dinah had been investigating drug trafficking undercover when she was found out). When Arrow found her tied up and brutally tortured, his rage led him to shoot the killer--only the second person Ollie had ever killed, and the first under these circumstances. Dinah's injuries were extensive--she lost her "canary cry" and was subsequently found to be unable to bear children. This marked a major turning point in Ollie's life.
Green Arrow patrolled the streets of Seattle, no longer using the trick arrows for which he was so famed, but resorting to normal bodkin and arrowheaded ones. He tried not to kill when he could help it. Early on, he met a Ninja assassin named Shado. When Ollie was injured and being cared for by Shado, she proceeded to rape him while he was unconscious, conceiving a son she would name Robert. When Ollie found out about the son, Shado made it clear that he would have nothing to do with the child. It also caused a rift between Ollie and Dinah, since she despaired at not being able to give Ollie the one thing he had always truly wanted (not withstanding Roy and Liam).
After many adventures around the globe, Ollie and Dinah began to grow more distant, resulting in her breaking up with him after she caught him kissing their assistant.
With the depature of Mike Grell, Green Arrow was brought back more in line with traditional DC superheroes (although he still used real arrows, not trick ones). Ollie traveled for some time, running into Huntress, Catwoman, and even Deathstroke before being called to act for Zero Hour. Ollie refused to believe that Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), his oldest and closest friend, had indeed become the murderous Parallax. Ollie initially refused to fight against Hal, until the full depth of the former Green Lantern's madness became all too clear. In the final battle, Ollie shot Hal in the chest, being the crucial attack that stopped Parallax and saved the universe. Ollie was distraught, however, at the thought of having killed one of his best friends.
Coping with his loss, Ollie withdrew to an ashram where he had spent some time earlier in life. There he met Connor Hawke, a young man who was also a skilled archer, and who would soon turn out to be Ollie's illegitimate son from a romance that predated his relationship with Black Canary (Ollie didn't know for sure that it was his son until Hal Jordan turned up, still crazy, but attempting to reconcile with Ollie). Connor joined his father and left the ashram for more adventures. On one such case, while stopping a militant group called the Eden Corps from leveling Metropolis, Oliver Queen was killed in an airplane explosion that even Superman failed to prevent. After Queen's death, Connor Hawke, the son whom he had barely known, picked up the bow and continued the good fight as the second Green Arrow.
