#Arrow Sees Another Villain Join Season 4

See what role a Sons of Liberty star will play opposite Oliver Queen.

Story by Matt Cummings

Season 3 of CW's Arrow is the books, but audiences weren't happy with the results, although it did start off strong. Focusing on the death of Black Canary (Caity Lotz), the destruction of Oliver Queen (Stephen Amell) by Ra's al Ghul (Matthew Nable), the rise of Atom (Brandon Routh) and his on-again/off-again relationship with Felicity Smoak (Emily Bett Rickards), the season still left audiences with mixed feelings. Producer and Co-Creator Greg Berlanti are hoping to change that by adding a series of new villains for the now-defunct Arrow to hunt.

Thursday saw the signing of Sons of Liberty star Jimmy Akingbolais to play Baron Reiter, who will appear in flashbacks. While only comic fans will know of his character, Baron Reiter is the Nazi super villain Baron Blitzkreig, leader of the criminal organization Shadowspire. The organization first made their appearance in Deathstroke No. 53, operating much like Marvel's Hydra, supplying weapons, transportation, technology and intelligence to the highest bidder, in this case South American drug cartels.

It appears the days of Oliver's flashbacks are not going away, as Akingbola's character will step into that role as an adversary for Oliver, perhaps in a series of missions that will (finally) lead up to Season 1. This means we probably won't see Deathstroke and the Baron matching up against Team Arrow, although Co-producer/writer Marc Gugenheim did have to clarify which version of Baron Blitzkreig that Akingbolais will be playing:

We wanted a really great villain for Oliver in the flashbacks. We took the name Baron Reiter without any intention of turning him into Baron Blitzkrieg. Baron Blitzkreig is the evil Nazi super villain. Baron Reiter is not going to become Baron Blitzkreig in the show.

Akingbola joins a growing number of new actors to join Arrow Season 4, including Neal McDonough (Damien Darhk), Alexander Calvert (Anarky) and Echo Kellum (Mister Terrific). Arrow returns to The CW on October 7 at 8 PM.

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