Supermen and Homo Heroes
Strapping on his utility belt, Matt Thomas scales all things gay in the very queer world of comic books.

“You’re supposed to read comic books only up until a certain point and then you’re supposed to become interested in other things…like girls,” jokes openly gay Toronto comic book artist Jason Bone. Currently working for industry juggernaut DC Comics, Bone is one of only a handful of gay creators bringing their sensibility to a universe often thought of as strictly a refuge for awkward, sexually frustrated and straight teenage males. But with all the bulging crotches, rippling biceps, tight spandex outfits, and talk of hidden identities and secret clubs, the world of comic book superheroes seems geared towards a gay fan base.

“The first time I sexualized superhero stuff was the Batman liveaction TV show,” says Bone. “They were always being tied up and put in jeopardy with Catwoman all over them and clawing their chests. There’s nothing sexy about Adam West or Burt Ward but in my mind I guess I just wanted to be Catwoman and have them at my mercy.” Bone insists however that Batman and Robin were originally the product of a more innocent time and don’t deserve to be psychoanalyzed. But the costumed world of Batman and his faithful ward Robin has never been able to escape a gay stigma even before the campy ’60s Eartha Kitt incarnation introduced Bone to S&M.

In 1954 famed psychiatrist Dr Ferderic Wertham read a scathing report based on his book, Seduction of the Innocent, to a US senatorial commission on the comic book industry. In it he accused the dynamic duo of being “a wish dream of two homosexuals living together,” adding “only someone ignorant of the fundamentals of psychiatry and psychopathology of sex can fail to realize the subtle atmosphere of homoeroticism which pervades the adventures. The Batman type of story may stimulate children to homosexual fantasies.” Wertham’s now laughable report was largely responsible for the creation of the Comics Code Authority (CCA), a content watchdog organization for mainstream comics. The CCA curbed explicitly gay content by making any mention of “sex perversion” strictly forbidden until its policy was revised in 1989 allowing only positive representations of gay characters to be approved. Even though there weren’t homo heroes to aspire to before then, young gay readers didn’t lose out on finding sassy inspiration.

“When I talk to my gay friends about Wonder Woman most of them say they wanted to be Wonder Woman, some of them even do her in drag,” says Bone. Phil Jimenez, a man considered the gay poster child for the comic book industry, owes his career to being introduced to comics through Wonder Woman. “Wonder Woman was always about radical sexuality, she represented an incredibly strong, both physically and emotionally, heroic character who was an adventurer and an object of sexual attraction to men, “ says Jimenez. “I didn’t have any other kind of gay role model so I looked for the closest equivalent.” Jimenez, who has drawn for high profile comics like Spider-Man and who co-authored the extensive DC Comics Encyclopedia, still finds it hard to relate to straight characters like Spider-Man’s Peter Parker, despite the fact he filled in as Tobey Maguire’s drawing hand in the feature film. Jimenez notes he had a hard time as a kid getting into most hetero heroes “because they always got the girl in the end.” However, Wonder Woman with her strong morals and kinky magical lasso captured many homo imaginations including Jimenez’s who’s been a die-hard fan since he was a six-year-old addicted to the TV show starring Lynda Carter. Jimenez considers the work he went on to do as an adult on the Wonder Woman comic series some of his finest achievements and a dream come true. Jimenez also works on another iconic franchise he worshipped as a child, one that’s largely considered the favourite among queers for its inclusive agenda and a hairy Canadian Tom of Finland foil with a cigar fetish and a set of nails that would give even the most eager lesbian a heart attack.

“Somebody asked me the other day if I got hot drawing Wolverine,” recalls Jimenez of his work on the New X-Men. “It occurred to me then that I’m too concerned with getting it right to get turned on.” The X-Men universe and its gang of outcast mutants have gone mainstream thanks to the booming movie franchise driven by Hugh Jackman’s snarling portrayal of Wolverine, a character that seems to hit home with everyone. “I hear straight guys say they’d fuck him if they were gay,” points out Jimenez as he talks about Wolverine’s ability to thrill gays, girls and guys with his bad attitude and burly chest. But it’s not just pecs and scruff that endears this comic to its gay fans. “It’s all about something strange and unusual happening to you at puberty that ostracizes you from your friends. Then you find a close network of like-minded people who create a safe haven where you can be yourself and exercise your special powers,” says Jimenez, explaining the obvious gay subtext in X-Men. Fagfriendly politics and hunky heroes aside, Jimenez again was in it for the fierce females. “Whatever little gay gene I had bubbling up in me as I kid made me be like, ‘Look at Storm in her swimsuit and thigh highs,’ I’ve always said superheroes are essentially drag queens: they should always be big, flamboyant, fantastic and larger than life,” revels Jimenez.

“Some comics were kinda like your secret stash of Playboy but you can have them right out in the open in a small town. I could put up posters of beefy Superman on my wall and nobody would be the wiser” says Bone who also notes that the oblivious hetero mentality towards comics allowed him to draw ripped male characters in his early teens without being fingered a fag. “My superpower ended up being that I could draw. I was never picked on at school because I was the guy who could draw demons and girls with big boobs to distract the straight guys,” explains Bone. Jimenez had similar teenage experiences when it came to boy baiting. “I worked through all my crushes and my gay stuff by making people comics,” says Jimenez. “I would show up on his doorstep and be like ‘I just drew this comic book for you, I know your shirt gets torn off a lot but that’s because you’re a superhero and that’s what happens.”

Neither Bone nor Jimenez have had problems with their sexual identities while working in the mainstream comics industry and everyone from Entertainment Weekly to The Advocate and GLADD singled out Jimenez as a role model for a new generation of gay comic fans and artists. Hired by DC Comics at age 22 by openly gay creative director Neal Pozner, Jimenez fell in love at first sight with the 37-year-old who gave him his first break. The pair eventually became a couple but only a few years later in 1994 Pozner passed away due to complications from AIDS. Jimenez went on to dedicate the miniseries Tempest to his late lover via its editor’s letter and in doing so came out to a wide comic audience. “We got hundreds of letters and a lot were from young guys who were feeling very alienated but who were thrilled to find out a comics creator was out and gay.”

“I did one convention panel where I looked down at the end of the panel and I noticed the entire panel was straight, fat white guys, that’s what we’re fighting against,” insists Perry Moore, executive producer of The Chronicles of Narnia films and writer of the Lambda award-winning young adult novel Hero. Hero tells the story of Thom Creed, a high-school basketball player who develops superpowers at the same time that he realizes he’s gay. Moore was inspired to write the story after the first and most famous gay superhero in comics, X-Men and Alpha Flight’s pretty boy and Quebéc native Northstar was killed off three times in one month in separate publications in 2005.

“I don’t think any character should have to carry the burden of being the single representative of gay people,” cautions Jimenez when it comes to Northstar’s historic status and plagued treatment adding, “He always appealed to me not because he was gay but because he was a separatist.” But the shoddy handling of Northstar wasn’t an isolated incident and Moore went on to compile of list of other gay characters in comic history that had met with torture, rape, disembowelment, decapitation, had their genitalia mutilated or who were rebooted as straight. “The way they handle most gay superheroes is that they are either step-and-fetch-its, comic relief or get killed off like the red shirts on Star Trek, they just weren’t characters of consequence,” explains Moore. But as more and more gay fans got in on the debate, mainstream companies started listening.

Bent readers now have some pretty gay options. The gay assassin duo of Midnighter and Apollo in The Authority, despite being married, still kick ass as a famous couple. Young Avengers’ Hulkling and Wiccan are just your average teeanage boyfriends who battle space aliens while trying to deal with coming out. Northstar is also making a slow return and even Project Runway’s gay dandy Tim Gunn has been turned into a comic book hero by Jimenez and gets to don the Iron Man suit to solve crime in the fashionista geared Millie the Model reboot aimed at girls called Models Inc. “Were starting to see a wide variety of different gay characters so you can look to different ones for different things,” says Jimenez, explaining that “it’s like with soap operas in that by suddenly introducing gay characters creators realize they have a whole new dynamic to their the storytelling.”

Moore knew that the mood of the industry was really changing when the godfather of comics, Stan Lee, was interested in his gay teen hero. “My colleague buzzed me and said Stan Lee was on line one and I just snickered and said ‘ya right and Queen Elizabeth is on line two,’” recalls Moore of his fi rst phone call from the man who helped create Spider-Man, The Fantastic Four, X-Men, Iron Man, the Hulk, Thor and countless other classic comic superheroes. Lee had read an advance copy of Hero and wanted to work with Moore to adapt it for television. “He said he was always looking for new ways to approach the superhero but he also said this story would be interesting even if they didn’t have superpowers,” recalls Moore. The pair worked together with Moore’s life and business partner Hunter Hill and pitched the show to the Showtime network, former home of The L Word and Queer As Folk. They are still waiting for a final word but the buzz has been more than positive. Moore remembers appearing at a convention with Lee where after announcing the project to the crowd, people were “on their feet applauding while some were crying.” Gays are obviously passionate about comic books assures Moore while adding that a little positive representation can go a long way.

“Not to sound too PC but I think with the mainstream superhero companies their big issue now with gay characters has more to do with their sales then their sexuality,” says Jimenez. When it comes to a hit mainstream comic book hero who is actively gay, Jimenez thinks for it to succeed “it would take a long standing character to come out who already had brand identity or 40,000 gay people willing to buy an issue every month.” No one loves to fantasize like gay men so if a lavender superhero franchise could display sexual charisma along with a good story then perhaps gays would get behind it in droves. “After all,” sums up Jimenez when it comes to gays and heroic fantasy, “it’s defi nitely a fetish of some kind, there’s that sense of the Clark Kent/Superman thing just like normal by day, leather daddy by night. It’s the sense of infinite transformation in superheroes that excites people.”