The upcoming sequel to 2014’s “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” reboot is set to add one of the franchise’s major supporting characters, Casey Jones, to its roster, with “Arrow” star Stephen Amell set to assume the role.
Amell became a household name in 2012 with the debut of the acclaimed television series “Arrow”, a modern interpretation of the DC Comics character Oliver Queen, aka Green Arrow, currently heading into it’s third season finale. Following five years of being shipwrecked on an island in the South China Sea, Queen returns to his native Starling City a master of archery, martial arts, and survival skills, and makes it his mission to battle the evil elements that have infected his city. The popularity of “Arrow” also lead to a spin-off show, “The Flash”, based on the eponymous DC Comics character, and has already seen two crossover episodes with another crossover to take place in the upcoming season finale.
Amell has the physicality to portray Casey Jones and then some. Over the course of the show’s three seasons, he’s gone toe-to-toe with masters of martial arts like Michael Jai White, Kelly Hu, and the late Darren Shahlavi. Then, of course, there’s that chin up bar that would reduce a lesser man to a wet noodle!
One of the many strengths of the show in terms of its fight choreography has been the way the Oliver Queen frequently makes use of his bow and individual arrows as weapons for close-quarter combat rather than being strictly projectiles, and that should readily translate to Casey Jones’ hockey stick. If you’ve never seen the show, check out the fight clip below, which also happens to have taken inspiration from a certain well-known martial arts flick from Indonesia!
“Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2” is set to be released on June 6th, 2016. Stay tuned for more info as it arrives!
