Inexperienced Arrow has at all times been a hero impressed by the beliefs of Robin Hood. The weather of bowmanship and swashbuckling journey have been inherent to Inexperienced Arrow’s character for the reason that Forties, however it was Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams who introduced Robin Hood’s social consciousness to Oliver Queen within the Nineteen Seventies.
In Inexperienced Lantern/Inexperienced Arrow, O’Neil and Adams’ “Laborious-Touring Heroes” found the trendy plights, pitfalls and injustices of American society collectively, and commenced holding themselves to a better accountability than buying and selling blows and quips with costumed villains. Since then, as Inexperienced Lantern has taken to the cosmos, the mantle of Inexperienced Arrow has come to symbolize a higher involvement in dealing with the trendy problems with our time, in a means that different heroes typically don’t. He’s change into a literal warrior, if you’ll, for social justice.
However at the same time as Inexperienced Arrow started to acknowledge his personal social, racial and financial privilege within the ’70s, the heroes of the DC Universe themselves as represented within the comics on the time remained overwhelmingly homogenous. To really symbolize the broader number of folks and experiences the Inexperienced Arrow champions, it turned clear that he must be greater than only a white man who crashed a ship.
A New Legacy
Enter Connor Hawke. Created by Kelley Puckett, the identical author who would later go on to create Cassandra Cain, Connor Hawke was a Zen Buddhist, enthusiastic Inexperienced Arrow fanboy, and, unbeknownst to the Ashram’s latest arrival, the long-lost son of Oliver Queen. However Inexperienced Arrow was not the one legacy Connor embodied. Half white from his father’s facet, 1 / 4 Korean and 1 / 4 Black from his mom’s facet, and incongruously blond, Connor Hawke represented the confluence of all the pieces from the Zen Buddhism beforehand largely represented by white heroes to the confrontation of racial injustice begun throughout his father’s adventures with Hal Jordan.
From the very begin, Connor believed within the legacy of Inexperienced Arrow, encouraging his father to return to the mantle at the same time as Oliver himself had change into disillusioned along with his life as a superhero. When Oliver refused, and Inexperienced Arrow was desperately wanted, what else may Connor do? He placed on the costume himself and saved a lady’s life in a means distinctly his personal.
Principally, by failing spectacularly at archery.
This ironic character trait—that Connor, the son of the primary Inexperienced Arrow and shortly to change into the second, was higher at shut fight than at archery, was extra than simply an amusing twist: it was one thing that touched on the beliefs of Zen Buddhism itself. Right here, Connor’s want and attachment made him his personal enemy, stopping him from reaching the samādhi, the eighth level of the Eightfold Path, that he present in martial arts.
Heir of the Mantle
Connor and Oliver’s temporary stint sharing the Inexperienced Arrow identify would quickly come to an finish, nevertheless, because of the premature demise of Oliver Queen. Now grieving a father he’d solely begun to know, Connor Hawke was left to hold the mantle alone. It’s right here the place Connor would actually start to come back into himself. His solo run as Inexperienced Arrow launched us to quite a lot of household and mentor figures to Connor, starting from his father’s outdated enemy-turned-friend Eddie Fyers to his tutor and Buddhist monk Grasp Jansen to his mom Sandra “Moonday” Hawke to his grandfather Nathan Hawke.
Nor did the run draw back from addressing Connor’s multiracial identification and Buddhist religion. From the beginning, Connor’s Ashram would function the sequence’ devoted “damsel in misery,” beneath frequent menace from the forces of corrupt enterprise homeowners in search of to purchase it and switch it right into a materialistic resort. In his world-traveling adventures, Connor would think about the right way to discover the center path and steadiness his Zen Buddhist beliefs with the calls for of the superhero life. Connor would additionally discover a frequent antagonist in his stepfather Milo Armitage, an arms vendor and abusive husband who tried on a number of events to have his troublesome stepson assassinated.
Connor’s adventures would additionally take him throughout the globe, together with all through Japan and China. Martial arts, ceaselessly the province of white heroes, would even be a significant factor of Connor’s tales, culminating in a one-on-one duel with Woman Shiva herself. Connor’s Black heritage would even be spotlighted in an earlier arc, with Connor, after a humiliating defeat in opposition to the Silver Monkey which resulted within the lack of the Ashram, licking his wounds at his grandfather’s ranch the place Nathan Hawke would inform him about his personal humiliating defeat through the Korean Warfare, one made even more durable as a result of others blamed it on his unit being composed of Black servicemen.
Maybe probably the most direct confrontation of racism on this arc, nevertheless, would happen within the arc “Hate Crimes.” In it, escaped Love Boat Killer Nicholas Kotero got down to encourage a race battle in New York Metropolis, posing as a number of demagogues with a view to stoke racial tensions and pit members of various ethnicities in opposition to one another, all in a twisted plot for revenge in opposition to Connor’s father, the primary Inexperienced Arrow. Specifically, Kotero sought each to encourage anti-Black hatred and anti-immigrant hatred, on the time closely centered on Asian and Latine immigrants. It was as much as Connor, with the assistance of the primary Latine Inexperienced Lantern, Kyle Rayner, to assist unmask Kotero and resolve the disaster, explicitly utilizing his personal multiracial identification as a name for unity. Connor’s mom, too, would herself confront her white husband Milo Armitage’s personal racism, making it clear that these white supremacists have been on no account very wonderful folks.
Sadly, round this time, Connor’s multiracial identification pale into the background of his appearances in favor of emphasis on his relation to his white father. This took the very seen type of his more and more lightening pores and skin tone, altering from a reasonably darkish brown in his early appearances to pretty light-skinned close to the top of his solo run to easily white within the majority of his appearances after Oliver’s resurrection.
Whereas multiracial people can differ considerably in look relying on what traits they inherit, and any blended one that could also be perceived as white is not any much less legitimate of their identification, the change from Connor being darker skinned with clear Black and Asian options to being apparently white, mixed along with his heritage being talked about much less and fewer, constituted troubling erasure. Though a few of Connor’s later appearances would painting him extra faithfully to his preliminary look, significantly in author Judd Winick and artist Cliff Chiang’s Inexperienced Arrow and Black Canary, the bulk didn’t. In his last look earlier than Flashpoint, in addition to his sole look within the New 52’s Earth-2 sequence, Connor could be depicted as completely white in look.
Convergence
This pattern would lastly change in Convergence: Inexperienced Arrow, written by Christy Marx and drawn by Rags Morales. Right here, amidst an occasion devoted to celebrating older tales and continuities erased within the wake of the New 52, the two-shot miniseries would retell the story of Oliver and Connor assembly within the bubbled cities of Convergence. Nor was the artwork the one means by which Connor’s ancestry was represented: the storyline itself concerned Connor and Oliver collectively confronting a white supremacist hate group, returning to the very themes of confronting hate and injustice from which Laborious-Travelling Heroes had been born.
Connor Reborn
Connor Hawke’s first look after Convergence could be within the Inexperienced Arrow eightieth Anniversary Particular in a narrative written by Brandon Thomas and drawn by Jorge Corona. Right here, we’d see Connor’s Buddhist religion delivered to the forefront in a solo story that serves as a callback to each his first outing as Inexperienced Arrow and his victory over the Key in his tenure with the Justice League. Right down to a single trick arrow, Connor would battle his means by way of a terrorist group holding Queen Industries hostage to save lots of lives, eschewing the usual superhero quips in favor of Zen Koans.
However past the Inexperienced Arrow eightieth Anniversary particular (to not point out final yr’s Pageant of Heroes!), Connor Hawke has now returned to fundamental continuity as a serious character in Robin. Right here, Connor and Damian would come to bond over their related histories and unusual relationships with their superhero fathers.
Robin is shifting into a brand new arc, and Connor stays a serious supporting character. Who is aware of what the longer term holds for Connor? Oh, and we guess Oliver Queen simply died? That looks like it could be necessary, too. In brief, Connor Hawke’s journey by way of the DC Universe has had its ups and downs, however it’s remained each essential and engaging, and it’s clear that wherever this new chapter might take him, it’s solely simply starting.
For extra on Connor’s new buddy Damian Wayne (who, like Connor, can also be of blended Asian heritage), remember to try our dialogue of his new sequence.
Alex Jaffe is the writer of our month-to-month “Ask the Query” column and writes about TV, motion pictures, comics and superhero historical past for DCComics.com. Comply with him on Twitter at @AlexJaffe and discover him within the DC Neighborhood as HubCityQuestion.
