30 Surprising Things About the Making of 'Arrow'

He later was added to the DC universe through an introduction in Green Arrow.

Felicity Smoak, played by Emily Bett Rickards, was only meant to appear as a guest character in season one. But Rapaport loved her. "That could have just been a one-line role but she popped,” he said.

The exterior shots of Oliver Queen’s mansion are filmed at the Hatley Castle, located in the Hatley Park National Historic Site located in Colwood, British Columbia. It’s the castle popularly known as Luthor Mansion on Smallville.

...the Los Angeles Public Library was used to shoot exterior shots of the police headquarters.

Skyline shots are actually from a number of various cities around the world, including, Frankfurt, Germany, Tokyo, Japan, and Singapore.

Verdant, the name of Oliver’s club, means "of bright green color." The large V logo also resembles the shape of an arrow. It’s not until Season 2 that the moniker “Green Arrow” starts to be used.

And they're pretty cool. Fun fact: Black Canary’s stunt double, Ivett Gonda, is an Olympian in Taekwondo.

When the show as originally pitched, its characters were all superpower-free. “We tried to make him as real as possible," said Stephen Amell who plays Oliver Queen. That was until they brought The Flash into the show.

Like Smallville, and many other shows, the title of every episode is said at least once in the dialogue between characters.

It’s hard to not see the major similarities between the two shows. Both tell the story of spoiled rich kids who become vigilantes. The visual style is also very similar to that of Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Trilogy.

In one scene, Oliver and Diggle get trapped in wet cement. Juliana Harkavy told Marie Claire in an exclusive interview that they actually used thousands of gallons of oatmeal. “After a couple of days it started to smell putrid, and we were all gagging and laughing the entire time we shot it,” Harkavy said.

The creators intended to downplay the number of Easter eggs in the show, but comic books fans can find tons of them. Keep clicking to see some.

DC Comics did a revamp and relaunch of its entire line of superhero comics, called the New 52. Because news shots are an integral part of the show, the creators decided to give the news station the number 52.

The character John Diggle was named after Andy Diggle, writer of Green Arrow—Year One.

Mike Grell, an iconic writer and artist of the Green Arrow comics is alluded to through a character, Judge Grell, in the pilot episode. Arrow has been known to make mention of its writers in dialogue.

Just another Easter egg the creators of the show threw in. Grell is known for his art in the comic book series, so, of course, they had him sketch “The Vigilante” in the first episode.

“For safety reasons, the actors must have a lesson in safety before they can shoot a bow,” she told Archery 360. “I love that everyone involved with Arrow is fully committed to making the archery as realistic as possible.”

“I’ll get a first draft of the script for an episode and will form an idea of what bow will work for that character or episode. I’ll choose a few bows that will work for the character and then the production department makes the final choice,” Gonsalves told Archery 360.

Patricia Gonsalves, the behind-the-scenes archery technician, said she crafted nearly 2,000 arrows for Season 2 alone.

DC All Access asked the actors how many arrows they thought were shot in Season 1? Their responses were all way off. Guess they weren’t counting.