DC Comics

DC Comics, Inc. is an American comic book publisher. It is notable as one of the largest as well as most popular comic book publishers today. DC Comics produces material featuring a large number of well-known characters, including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Arrow, and others.

DC Comics owns the rights to Green Arrow and Flash, and so has power over Arrow and The Flash show, allowing the showrunners to use only particular characters on the show.

Elements from DC Comics brought into Arrow and The Flash
See: Characters from the DC comics

General impact of Arrow and The Flash in DC Comics and other media
In Green Arrow #25 (January, 2014), which takes place six years in the past, Moira Queen made her debut in the New 52. The character's history was noticeably revised by the writer of the comic book to be on par with the most recent version of the character in Arrow, which was the first to feature the character prominently. Elements like, her outliving her husband, running the family's company and knowing her son's secret life, which were featured for the first time on the show, were added to the comic book canon (prior to the New 52 both Moira and her husband were killed by lions in a safari in Africa when Oliver was just a child). As it was later revealed in Green Arrow #28 (April, 2014), Moira passed away from an illness during Oliver's first years as a vigilante. This is similar to the show, where Moira died during the second year of Oliver being The Arrow.

Executive producer Andrew Kreisberg and writer Ben Sokolowski have been tapped to take over DC's Green Arrow comic, beginning with issue #35.

“We really want to bring the old-school Oliver Queen voice back to the character,” Sokolowski says. “In other words, the opinionated, liberal Robin Hood-esque hero that has fallen through the cracks a bit, both in the comics and TV models.” “Some of our favorite Arrow characters will feature prominently in the comic,” Sokolowski says. ''“Though they may not necessarily be clones of their TV personas. I think our goal with this comic is to make it an echo of the TV series.” As for Oliver Queen, “I think the version Ben and I are going for now is an amalgamation of the TV version and his comic book persona,”'' Kreisberg says.

Kreisberg also notes that he and Sokolowski approached DC about writing the comic. “We thought there was a real opportunity here not to do another adaptation of the TV show, but infuse the comic world of Oliver Queen with some of the stronger elements of the show,” he says.

Characters

 * Original characters
 * John Diggle (introduced in Green Arrow vol. 5, issue #24)
 * Character Revamps
 * Tommy Merlyn (reintroduced, based in part on Arrow's version of Merlyn, in Green Arrow vol. 5, issue #0)
 * Felicity Smoak (reintroduced, based on Arrow ' s version of the character, in Green Arrow vol. 5, issue #35)

Miscellaneous

 * A Green Arrow skin based on Arrow's Oliver Queen appears in the 2013 video game Injustice: Gods Among Us. The playable skin was given as a bonus reward to the first 5000 voters of Injustice's promotional Battle Arena competition, but was later released as a free download. Stephen Amell also provides the voice-over for that particular skin.
 * Just before the first season finale of the show DC Collectibles released an ARROW Oliver Queen Statue, based on the likeness of actor Stephen Amell and available for purchase in specialty stores, as well as an Oliver Queen vs. Deathstroke action figure Two Pack Set. On SDCC 2014, DC debuted new series of ARROW figures of Oliver Queen, The Canary and Deathstroke, as well as a lone Barry Allen figure based on the Flash TV series.
 * The drug, "Vertigo", that is originated from Arrow is featured in the comic book Smallville Special: Titans, when Rose Wilson uses it on Mia Dearden a.k.a. Speedy, Green Arrow's protegee, during a battle.
 * The one-shot special Harley Quinn Invades Comic-Con International: San Diego features an appearance of Arrow star Stephen Amell, one of many real life people associated with DC Comics who are used in the issue as Easter Eggs. In the comic book Amell, who is wearing a green tie and jacket, attends the convention and while he is interviewed and answers questions for his fans, he is approached by Harley Quinn who seemingly wants his autograph but at the end she passes him by and pushes him down, revealing that the people she wants an autograph from actually are Paul Dini and Bruce Timm, the character's creators.
 * In NYCC 2014, TT Games announced an Arrow-themed DLC pack for the upcoming video game LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham that will include Stephen Amell once again voicing Oliver Queen. Besides Arrow 's version of Green Arrow, other playable characters from the show, who were included in the game are: Arsenal, Sara Lance, Slade Wilson, John Diggle, Felicity Smoak, Huntress and Malcolm Merlyn.
 * On November 11th, 2014 Warner Bros. and DC released a series of custom-illustrated character bio cards for each of the main characters of the first season of The Flash, which were created by comic book artist Ivan Reis (Justice League, Green Lantern, Aquaman).