PLEASE NOTE - This post may contain spoilers to a season episode of The CW hit "ARROW". If you have not seen the season yet & want to avoid all spoilers... do not continue reading or viewing the photos.
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last war

Season 2 of The CW action drama ARROW is now under way as you are aware from my previous blog post. A couple weeks ago, I caught up with them again. This time in downtown Vancouver as they filmed scenes of Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell) and John Diggle (David Ramsey) leaving the iconic Orpheum Theatre for a scene.

In an interesting scene, we see Dig & Ollie have a few less than agreeable words. While neither gets too worked up, the scene clearly was of a disagreement of tactics or philosophies between the two.  It was a brief interacting between the two on the street outside of their car, but it makes me wonder if this is a 1 off bump  in a road that has had many previous bumps on it, or, is this a moment that leads to a larger, pothole size problem with the two.

I also saw an actress leaving that night while they were filming the scenes. I never got a good look at her, and never got a good photo of her either. Guess I'll find out sooner or later who it was.

This past weekend the cast for the CW action drama hit "Arrow" headed down to San Diego for their 2nd Comic-Con.

 I managed to catch the entire cast that went either going down, or returning this year.

On the way down to the Con I ran into the man that is Slade Wilson, Manu Bennett (1st time ever meeting him) & The Hood, Stephen Amell. Both were in great moods. While Manu was signing for us, the 2 people ahead of him in line asked him "are you famous or something"..... as if people are gonna get autographs from a random person. He politely answered them & posted for a photo with 1 of the graphers & their dog. He even picked up the dog & held him in the photo. Cool guy. Stephen was his typical cool laidback self. He was eager to give credit to his shoes maker when someone asked them about them. They actually looked really cool, and I'm not one to usually get impressed by shoes, or art. He tweeted about them shortly after with a photo of his Arrow themed footwear here https://twitter.com/amellywood/status/358189903256883202

I missed hacker extraordinaire Felicity Smoak ( aka - Emily Bett Rickards) by a couple minutes & got in just in time to seeJohn Diggle (aka- David Ramsey). However, never really interacted with him as I was busy looking for EBR at the time.

Added bonus, I also got Celina Jade the day her castmates were headed to Sa

 On the return, with a larger crowd awaiting them, they were all great again. This time I did run into Emily, and after a weekend of signing everywhere she probably went down there, still signed a few for the people who asked her. Got Colton Haynes later in the evening while 1 of the members of the show "Supernatural" peered over the crowds shoulder to see who we were getting. I also got Katie Cassidy, however, due to her coming in on a very busy flight that had lots of people, not just Arrow cast, never got a chance to take pics of her & her obscenely overpaid NHL boyfriend, Jason Garrison.  Stephen returned with his cousing, Robbie Amell, who is filming his new CW show "Tomorrow People" here.

The Arrow panel had a sizzle reel which of course confirmed Black Canary will be coming this season. Caity Lotz has started filming her scenes as the super hero, but of course, they filmed scenes for the sizzle reel prior to her coming in with her stunt double, who I have been told by some fans, also did stunt work for Anna Torv on "Fringe".

Lots of new baddies are expected for this season.

Michael Jai White & Kevin Alejandro have been chosen for recurring roles.

Arrow will air on Wednesday nights on The CW this fall starting October 9th.

The Hood & his posse are BACK!

Filming got under way last week for season 2 of the hit Rookie action drama "Arrow". I caught up to them in an area used by many shows over the years near the Hastings Street overpass in East Vancouver.

The area, which is often popular with film crews because of its ghetto, living under a bridge feel was this time home to part of "The Glades".

After "failing the city" I find Oliver, his sidekick John Diggle & his lovestruck techie Felicity Smoak rolling thru the glades in 1 of Olivers cars.

There was not much to the scene & I am sure the purpose was more to show the devastation the man made earthquake that Malcolm Merlyn concocted did, than anything they were doing in the car.

After that scene, they went to lunch. I managed to get Stephen & David to sign some autographs on their way to lunch, but missed Emily sadly. Stephen seemed excited for this upcoming season, while David seemed more cautiously optimistic. Most shows seem to suffer "sophomore slumps" and David might be thinking cautiously for that reason. But lets face it, even if Arrow does have a slump, it will still be one of the CW networks top shows.

There was a LOT of work done by the art crew of the show to prep this area for the scene. Individual posters, even more specifically, individual messages were written out & posted all over the place. I always am amazed at the detail shows will put into things like this since we all know come the final cut, little to none of it will even make it to the camera & even less will get seen clearly enough to make out the details of it. I've posted a bunch of the photos of these pieces of work that someone put their time into making, up in this post, simply because someone should recognize them for their work.

 There was a lot of messages on these pieces of work. Most common ones were "Remember the 503" which will surely be a common message early in the season, as 503 will refer to the amount of casualties from the earthquake. Another was "Blood for Mayor". Who is "Blood"? Will he be good, or bad for the residents of Starling City?

In the category of not wasting any props. Arrow crew dragged out of retirement the Bishopmobile from "Fringe" to be an abandoned car in The Glades. This is the 2nd time I have seen a Fringe related item on an Arrow set, last season, a sign on top of a Starling City Cab to "Rewardwire" a thing from Fringe season 5 that they never bothered removing.

Later, after lunch, there was another scene being done in an alley that was too far away for me to get a good view of. Stephen Amell was back for these scenes, along with his stunt double Simon Burnett. I also saw Colton Haynes, who was serenaded a couple hours before his birthday by the entire crew & the cast on hand with a round of "Happy Birthday" before they brought in an ice cream cake.

The "wow" moment of the evening was seeing Detective...errr....OFFICER Quentin Lance on Set. Paul Blackthorne was there for scenes, not dressed as his typical self from season 1, but in an Officer uniform. Suggesting after the fallout of The Glades horror, he still is a Police Officer, but has been demoted.

I couldnt see much from the spot I was in, but they had a scene at 1 point where Simon Burnett did a jump up 50-60 feet in the air on a cable.

Here they are...my 1st photos of the season from the set of ARROW from last week.

EDIT - July 18, 10:10 PM
I have just read that "Caity Lotz" has been cast as "Black Canary" YES, you read the character name right.

Reason I am adding it to this blog is the 1st photo in this section of photos below that I, at the time was taking of Paul Blackthorne. When I got home that night I noticed a blonde woman with make up around her eyes that I first thought "that looks like a Black Canary type look".
I saw the girl on set, but never saw her close up enough to notice she had the eye make up on.
I cropped the photo with her in the background, in hopes SOMEONE would see it & maybe ask "is that supposed to be Black Canary" as it was my 1st guess....of course, since everyone assumed Katie Cassidy would be that character I guess no one considered that someone else could be her.

So, is this the 1st photo on set of THE BLACK CANARY?

THIS BLOG POST MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 11 OF SEASON 1 OF "ARROW". Do not continue reading, or viewing the photos if you dont want to see/read any possible spoilers.
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Last Warning
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Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning, the production of The CW new action hit series ARROW took over the area around Terminal Ironworks in East Vancouver.

When I rolled up, they had already filmed some stuff, seemingly including a Starling City Police car, as I saw it being parked off set & they were re-positioning for their next scene.

I was lucky enough to find a spot close to the action.
The first scene they shot when I was there was part 1 of 2 part scene that should all flow into 1 non-stop action scene.

It starts with John Diggle (David Ramsey) standing in the middle of a road, gas mask on, a grenade launcher in his hand, dressed in his trademark suit. A delivery van speeds by him, narrowly missing him. As the truck speeds away off camera, a group of henchmen down the road from John armed with assault rifles & guns yell at him that he shouldnt have done that, and now they were going to have to kill his "girlfriend" as they referred to her in the scene. Carly Diggle (Christie Laing) the widow of John's brother was being heldby the henchmen. John tells them they have made a mistake, they ask why, and he reminds them he hasa grenade launcher, as he fires at them, the front henchmen are knocked to the ground, as John yells at Carly to get out of there, he runs in, takes 1 of the henchmens gun, and proceeds on foot down the street.

A 2nd scene is them prepared. The henchmen still on the ground, 1 of them unconscious, the other 1 gets up, groggily grabs a gun and looks to set his sights on Diggle down the street, when from out of no where its shot out of his hand (I assume with an arrow, although we dont see it)

Arrow (played at this time by stunt man Simon Burnett) then comes rushing in to fight the henchman (played by "The Killing" & "Battlestar Galactica" alumni Colin Lawrence). He runs up, and they both make their first move. Then the action stops, so that a stunt man can come in for Lawrence. The two stunt men proceed to do a fight scene that ends with Arrow taking down the henchman, before he grabs his bow and runs off in the direction Diggle left in.

Stephen Amell comes in to do his Arrow scenes, to do close ups of him choking out the henchman.

These were scenes for episode 11 of season 1. Where these scenes will fit in the overall story arc of this episode, or the full season is yet to be known. Will newly added Seth Gabel's ("Fringe" alumni) character Count Vertigo have something to do with this, or will he not yet be introduced, we will have to wait to see.

I was pleased to finally get autographs from David Ramsey on this night as well. I'm liking his character more & more each episode, and best part, he was exceptionally classy. Even thanked me for watching the show. My night ended at 2:15 AM when I finally got Stephen Amell to sign, as always, the newfound fame of being on a hit show hasnt soured him like others have. He remained classy, even despite being asked at 2 AM on a chilly November night.

Below are photos from the nights shoot. Apologies if you think some of them are grainy/fuzzy, I was shooting from more than 1/2 a block away at times, in the dark, with no flash on a camera that costs less than $500.

MAY CONTAIN VERY MILD SPOILERS. Don not read on if you dont want to see/read anything to do with upcoming possible episodes of ARROW.

Last warning

Late last month, Vancouver became home to a new Super-hero. With the departure of Superman/Clark Kent recently, as the 10 year run of the hit CW show "Smallville" came to a close, the city with the heavy Sci-Fi history was for the 1st time in a decade, lacking a comic-book style hero in the area.

All that changed when Stephen Amell aka... Oliver Queen, better known as The Green Arrow (shhh, dont tell anyone, its our secret) appeared in our city to take on the lead role of the new CW series "Arrow" that will be kicking some Starling City ass on your TV's with a vengeance this fall starting October, 10 (Wed- 8 PM eastern/Pacific, 7 PM Central).

Despite the "Green Arrow" being in "Smallville" (played by Justin Hartley... who happens to be back here in a role on a different TV show now. Small world.), the producers of thisversion of the Green Arrow have been quite matter of fact in saying its NOT a spin off of the character from Smallville, but a new stand alone version.

Stephen Amell has been given the role of the vigilante crime fighting billionaire "Oliver Queen/Green Arrow" & so far all signs point to him doing an exceptional job with the role from all reports.  He certainly trained hard to earn the physically demanding role. Oliver is a billionaire philanthopist who comes back to town after being shipwrecked & pressumed dead for 5 years on a remote island. When he returns he plans to fight crime & injustice under the guise of Arrow.

Arrow has of course a plethora of supporting characters.
- Tommy Merlyn (played by Colin Donnell) is Olivers best friend, and in the comic-books, has generally turned into a villian/nemesis of Green Arrow.
- Dinah "Laurel" Lance (played by Katie Cassidy) the woman who should eventually become Black Canary if they keep close to comic book character stories.
- John Diggle (played by David Ramsey) is Olivers bodyguard & chauffeur.
- Moira Queen (played by Susanna Thompson) is Olivers mother a ruthless woman who is hiding secrets about the shipwreck that Oliver was on.
- Thea Queen (played by Willa Holland) is Olivers sister and is nicknamed "Speedy", a character that those who know the Green Arrow story know her character & her troubled past/future.
- Detective Quentin Lance (played by Paul Blackthorne) is Laurels father & the man who aims to try & bring Arrow to justice for his vigilantism.

Sooo, now that you have a loose idea (I might not have ALL the details that are known about the series so far... you can find out much more at
http://greenarrowtv.com or the official CW website page for the show http://cwtv.com/shows/arrow 

Anyways, a couple weeks ago I caught them filming on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery (pretty much EVERY show and most movies in Vancouver has used this place more than once.). In the scene, Oliver & Tommy come out of a court house to a mob of reporters all wanting a word from Oliver on something that went on in the court house. He steadfastly ignores them, hurries thru the crowd, gets into his car where his bodyguard John gets him in safely & the car speeds off.

Not a lot to go on to figure out what the scene might entail. But here it is... the 1st spoiler peak from us for the new CW crime fighting drama "Arrow".

We will have more pics from Arrow, as things progress. We have some pics & a short video of a stunt scene that went on a few days ago to post still, where Arrow (stunt man, not Amell doing the scene) jumps thru a glass window from outside while gunshots are going off inside. Those will come once I get several other backlogged blogs of other shoots for other shows posted.