I really liked this TPB. But that's because Green Arrow and Red Arrow/Former Speedy/Arsenal/ are my favorite couple of DC heroes (other than Batwoman and Barbara Gordon's Oracle of course).

In this TPB both Arrows aren't at their bests. Green Arrow has killed someone, and Roy is starting to spiral into an abyss after losing his arm and more tragically his daughter Lian.

And of course since this is the comics, they both only start on their journey's during this TPB, but still, I can't wait to read where they go in the next TPB. ( )

Rise and Fall is a direct sequel to Cry for Justice, though the timelining is a bit wonky: Blackest Night happens between the last chapter and epilogue of Cry for Justice (and the last chapter of Five Stages happens during Blackest Night). Despite the intervening events, everyone is acting like Roy Harper was only attacked and Star City only just devastated by Prometheus-- so they're searching for him. Only Green Arrow, as anyone who read Cry for Justice knows, has secretly already killed Prometheus.

This book deals with the repercussions of that-- in perhaps the stupidest way possible. Green Arrow is found out, arrested, and revealed as Oliver Queen, and quickly put on trial by a Star City court for murder. Why? First, Oliver killed Prometheus in a location outside of our own universe, where I suspect a Star City court has no jurisdiction. Secondly, this is like putting SEAL Team Six on trial for killing Osama Bin Laden... only Prometheus killed more people than Osama Bin Laden, and has consistently been portrayed (no matter how stupid I might find it) as someone who just by living is immensely dangerous.

Then, he is found not guilty, but sentenced to exile from Star City anyway, as though this is a thing that could actually legally happen.

All of this is made worse by the fact that the rest of the Justice League acts like complete dicks to Ollie, as though they cannot understand his actions at all. Oh come on! Now, there's an interesting story and potential real drama to be created from a setup like this, but it's not going to be found when the Flash shouts things like, "Well, I never liked you anyway, Green Arrow!" Also, Green Arrow somehow moves so fast that the Flash can't catch him. Yeah, I don't know either.

Also, Green Arrow and Black Canary break up. I'd complain that such an action is horrendously out of character for both of them, but comic book writers are so bad at marriage-- and especially this marriage-- that we're probably better off.

This book also contains a story about Green Arrow's old sidekick, Speedy-cum-Arsenal-cum-Red Arrow-cum-Arsenal again trying to put himself back together after his daughter died in Cry for Justice. This story is also stupid, for so many reasons. It features:

• heroin doing things that I suspect it cannot actually do
• a drug treatment facility where they just strap you on a table in an empty room and leave you there
• a significant plot point being Arsenal's inability to get it up
• Arsenal cradling a dead cat while fighting Batman

Really, Chris Sims says it better than I can, though.

The art ranges from inconsistent (one chapter is drawn by three people who have apparently not consulted each other on whether or not Green Arrow's mask hides his pupils) to stiffly posed (Black Canary looks like she came out of Maxim at times) to just flat-out terrible for most of the book, though the Arsenal story looks surprisingly good, aside from the superround butts and boobs. I don't know who drew it, though, because there's no credits on individual chapters. Bleh.

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