Arrow fans have to wait just over a week before the series returns on Wednesday, January 20. But in the interim, The CW has released a new video that should make fans happy, offering a rad look behind-the-scenes of the season’s best stunts.
Stunt coordinator and director James “Bam Bam” Bamford narrates the video and offers his insights into some of the show’s most elaborate stunts to date. This isn’t simply a recap of footage from Arrow:Â Instead, the video showcases the rehearsals with the hardworking stuntmen and stuntwomen. And even the rehearsals look pretty good!
The first fight in the video comes from the first episode of the season—”Green Arrow”—just as Laurel Lance and Thea Queen pursue a big rig loaded with stolen weapons, while John Diggle drops down from the top of the truck. That was followed by a multi-layered fight scene featuring the reunited Team Arrow in “The Candidate.”
Bamford was particularly effusive about the single-take elevator fight from “Brotherhood,” an episode he directed himself. Bamford cited John Woo’s Hard Boiled as his inspiration for that scene, which apparently took 16 takes when the episode was filmed. The rehearsal of the battle reveals that the fight between Thea and one of the Ghosts was originally supposed to spill out of the elevator, go down the hall, and burst into the prison area. Even in this rough form, it’s mesmerizing to watch.
The stuntwomen of Arrow get the bulk of the spotlight for Thea and Laurel’s cooperative fight against a corrupt cop in “Beyond Redemption,” the brutal beatdown that Sara unleashed on Thea in “Haunted” and the reunited Lance sisters fighting side-by-side with Thea in “Lost Souls.”
But the Green Arrow doesn’t go unmentioned! Oliver Queen’s fight against the metahuman Double Down from “Restoration” also makes the cut. It’s also quite amusing to see how the “deadly projectile playing cards” were incorporated into the stunt rehearsal.
What was your favorite stunt from Arrow season 4? Share your picks below!
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Image Credit:Â The CW/DC Entertainment
