If you were following along with the news cycle of DC movies during the DC Extended Universe era, which is coming to an end later this month with Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, then you likely saw Sons of Anarchy actor Charlie Hunnam fancast as Oliver Queen, a.k.a. Green Arrow, at least one, if not multiple times. Well, it turns out that during this period when director Zack Snyder was largely steering the DCEU ship, Hunnam was actually approached to play the Emerald Archer. However, he turned down the part for a specific reason.
Hunnam finally scored the opportunity to work with Snyder thanks to Rebel Moon, with the first half of this two-part sci-fi epic debuting to Netflix subscribers later this month. While chatting about this 2023 movie release to Comicbook, the actor clarified that he never directly talked with Snyder about the Green Arrow role back in the day, but did confirm that others had approached him about it, saying:
Honestly, I don’t remember who… Yeah, it was some people in suits [who] brought the idea to me and thought it would be terribly exciting for me to play Green Arrow, and I did not share their enthusiasm… I don’t know who Green Arrow is, so I don’t want to offend anyone. I just looked at one picture, and I was like, ‘I’m not sure green’s my color, and I’m pretty sure spandex isn’t my material.’ And beyond that, I was like, ‘One image, thanks, not interested.’
So Charlie Hunnam playing Green Arrow wasn’t just a pipe dream on the minds of many SnyderVerse fans; executives at Warner Bros. Pictures did indeed try to cox him into playing the character for the shared continuity that included people like Henry Cavill’s Superman, Ben Affleck’s Batman and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman. Alas, Hunnam’s unfamiliarity with Green Arrow and not wanting to don a green spandex suit resulted in him turning down the role. So not only did the DCEU miss out on the famed superhero archer appearing, but clearly we shouldn’t expect Hunnam to play the role in the new DC Universe’s Chapter One slate.
Had Hunnam agreed to play Green Arrow, he would have been the third actor to bring the character to life, following Justin Hartley on Smallville and Stephen Amell in Arrow and various other Arrowverse shows. Pre-DCEU, David Goyer also wrote a standalone movie called Green Arrow: Escape from Supermax that would have followed Oliver Queen breaking out of a prison filled with supervillains and rogue superheroes, but this project never got off the ground. As things currently stand, while a lot of superheroes have already been announced for the DC Universe, including folks like Guy Gardner, Mr. Terrific, Hawkgirl and Metamorpho all being part of Superman: Legacy’s cast, it’s unclear whether Green Arrow will be featured as one of its crimefighters.
As for Charlie Hunnam, you can see him playing Kai in Rebel Moon: Part One - A Child of Fire on Netflix starting December 21, and Part Two: The Scargiver will follow on April 19, 2024. If you’d like to stream Green Arrow’s past live-action appearances, Arrow can also be found on Netflix, and Smallville can be accessed with a Hulu subscription.
