How true is the plot of 'Arrow' to the comic?

Question

While I've read a few of the Green Arrow comics, I honestly don't remember much of it including anything about Oliver Queen's origins. Does he even have an origin story? How true is the plot of the TV series, Arrow, to the comic? Are there any similarities at all?

Answer 1

The TV show actually uses a similar origin story to the very first Green Arrow comics from the DC 'Golden Age'.

The only major difference is that in the comic, Oliver Queen was actually the boy's father, Green Arrow himself being Roy Harper.

Here is a quick rundown of the original comic book story from the DC database:

Roy Harper was a young boy whose parents had been killed in a plane crash that stranded him on the isolated Lost Mesa; he had learned to hunt to survive. (His father) Oliver Queen's museum was burned down by criminals he had been fighting during an attempted robbery, and he ventured to the Mesa as a means of finding a new lease on life. Criminals followed him in search of rumored treasure and shot Harper's only friend Quoag, forcing the man and boy to work together. They took their code-names Green Arrow and Speedy from off-handed remarks the thugs had made, and defeated them using bows and arrows. Discovery of the treasure made them very wealthy, and they used that money to fund their crime-fighting careers.