Actress Devon Aoki (2 Fast 2 Furious, Sin City) has been cast in the major recurring role of DC Comic’s Katana for the upcoming season of CW hit show Arrow from Warner Bros TV. Katana may not be as well known as Wonder Woman, Batgirl or any of the major DC Comics heroines, but her recent boost in popularity from appearances as Batman’s sidekick in Beware the Batman and an original member of the Justice League of America in the “New 52” comics has put her on the map as a major player.
Tatsu Yamashiro, aka Katana, has even found her way into Jeff Lemire’s current run on the Green Arrow comic, which recently brought their version of Arrow’s original character John Diggle into the DC Comic Universe. Obviously both the show and the comic are enjoying picking and choosing elements of each other’s mythology and adapting it to fit their story. Could we possibly see a version The Outsiders War brought on to Arrow?
For the uninitiated, Katana is a masked, extremely skilled samurai armed with “The Soultaker” sword as she fights various international evils. The mystic sword literally “takes” the soul of anyone it kills and contains it within the sword itself and allows Tatsu to communicate with them. If I had to guess, I’d assume they’ll drop the mystical part of her storyline and just make her a badass samurai to battle/team-up with Oliver Queen.
Katana seems like a great fit and no-brainer addition to the world of CW’s Arrow and fits into the show’s consistent use of strong female counterparts to Oliver. Devon Aoki definitely has the look and already has the sword skills as evidenced by her work as deadly little Miho in Sin City. Hopefully she’ll have a few more lines than that one though, when Arrow’s third season debuts this fall on CW.
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