A Marvel X-Man has comics' first gay wedding as DC plans to out a hero | Books | The Guardian US news blog A Marvel X-Man has comics' first gay wedding as DC plans to out a hero Northstar proposes in the latest issue of Astonishing X-Men, and fans are wondering if Batman or Robin is about to come out Marvel's Northstar – AKA Jean-Paul Beaubier – has proposed to his longtime partner Kyle Jinadu. Photograph: Handout/Reuters Wednesday 23 May 2012 13.08 EDT First published on Wednesday 23 May 2012 13.08 EDT Share on Messenger Close Wednesday is new arrivals day in comic book stores, and in the batch of storylines that arrived this morning was the news that Marvel's openly gay superhero Northstar has proposed to his longtime partner, Kyle Jinadu. In the issue number 50 of Astonishing X-Men , Northstar gets down on one knee in his civilian identity, Jean-Paul Beaubier, to hold up a ring to his surprised beau. "I'm asking you to marry me," he says.

At Midtown Comics in New York's Times Square, Thor Parker (his real name), said the issue has all the hallmarks of a hit. "You're seeing people come in ask for an issue by name and number, which usually only happens when something like this is going on," said Parker, the store's events director and social marketer. Northstar and Jinadu will be married in a ceremony in New York's Central Park in issue number 51, which will arrive in stores next month. And to celebrate, Parker said, Midtown Comics is actively looking for same-sex couples eager to have their own wedding in the store on the same day. Gay characters are not new in comic book storylines – Northstar revealed he was gay in 1992 – but they are becoming increasingly common. In 2010 the long-running Archie Comics series debuted its first gay character. And DC Comics, which has a gay character in Batwoman, announced days ago that one of its other marquee super heroes would soon come out of the closet as part of the series reboot which launched last year. But which one of DC's heroes – a roster that includes Batman, Superman and Wonderwoman – will reveal his or her secret identity?

Parker demurred from venturing a guess, but pointed out that many household names have already been reintroduced since the reboot – none of them are gay. "Most of the characters who would be of interest to a mainstream audience have already been introduced," he said. "I mean, it could be some random guy from Final Crisis no one has heard of." Several blocks downtown, at Forbidden Planet, a freshly minted stack of Astonishing X-Men number 50 issues sat by the cashier alongside a hand printed sign that read: "limit one per customer". The woman behind the desk, who declined to give her name, expected a lunchtime rush of collectors, investors and people curious from Wednesday morning's media reports. "People will buy it because they know on the market it will go up," she said. It's an instant collector's item. And so, no doubt, will be the DC issue with its own forthcoming reveal. As to which super hero might be the one most likely to come out, the Forbidden Planet employee had her theories. "They can't do Batman, because he's known to be a player," she said. "Superman loves Lois Lane. Aquaman is married to Mera. Green Lantern?

He's been around girls." Nightwing, who is basically just Robin all grown up, had a relationship with Batgirl (not to be confused with Batwoman, who is gay) so that ruled him out in her eyes. Her bet for the likeliest DC hero to be outted: Booster Gold , who debuted in 1986. "He's got all the characteristics, if you look back; it makes sense," she says. "He's a showoff, he always wants to be in the spotlight. But he's never really been around women. I guess it could also be Flash." Forbidden Planet's customers tended to cluster more around the graphic novel section than the comics. But a few had an opinion on the gay superhero trend. "With more of them becoming movies, comics have become more mainstream, so it makes sense that there would be more gay characters," said Todd Corbin, a restaurant manager who worked in a comic book shop while in high school. Because more of them have been made into movies, he said, he's recently gotten back into the superhero comics. But as for which DC character might be the one to come out, Corbin was flummoxed. "They wouldn't do that to Batman," he said.

"There's always Robin. Wait, is the Green Lantern gay?" An older patron, Ronald Bush, was perusing the aisles listening to a vintage Walkman. He has been reading comics, he said, his whole life. But he was largely indifferent to the new Marvel storyline. "It's their business, they can do whatever they want to do," he said. "I'm not going to judge, I've been judged my whole life." Original Green Lantern comes out as gay in DC Comics' 'Earth Two' - CNN.com Original Green Lantern comes out as gay in DC Comics' 'Earth Two' By Matthew Perpetua, Rolling Stone Updated 2:03 PM ET, Fri June 1, 2012 Chat with us in Facebook Messenger. Find out what's happening in the world as it unfolds. In DC Comics' "Earth Two" issue two, Alan Scott, the first Green Lantern, is reintroduced as a gay man.

Story highlights DC Comics' "Earth Two" issue two shows Alan Scott, the first Green Lantern, as an openly gay man "He doesn't come out in issue two; he is already a gay man," writer James Robinson says Scott's sexuality is revealed to the reader in a decidedly matter-of-fact sort of way When DC Comics relaunched its fictional world from scratch last fall, some aspects of the DC mythos temporarily fell by the wayside, such as the notion of parallel worlds featuring different versions of the company's iconic heroes. "Earth Two," a new series by writer James Robinson and artist Nicola Scott, reintroduces the concept by putting a new spin on the original versions of characters like the Green Lantern, the Flash and Superman that diverges notably from the past several decades of DC lore. In the second issue of the comic, in stores June 6, Robinson and Scott prove just how different this world is by revealing that their version of Alan Scott, the first Green Lantern introduced back in 1940, is an openly gay man.

Up until recently, a middle aged version of Alan Scott was one of the stars of "Justice Society of America," a comic series featuring the 1940s versions of DC's heroes set in the present day. The new versions of these characters in Earth Two have all been aged down considerably, to the point that Scott's gay superhero son Obsidian had to be sacrificed. Robinson says he was inspired to write Scott himself as a gay character to make up for that loss. "The logical leap that I made was, oh, why don't we make Alan Scott gay?," he says. "To DC's credit, there wasn't any hesitation. [Co-publisher] Dan DiDio was like 'Oh, that's a great idea, let's do it!'" Robinson's version of Green Lantern differs from his counterpart in the regular DC Universe in ways other than his sexual orientation. "He has a ring which he uses to help manifest his powers, but he doesn't have a lantern," he says, noting that the mainstream Green Lanterns are members of a corp of space police who draw their energy directly from their own willpower.

"He is the receptacle, the conduit for the energy of the Earth, which is this green energy." Unlike previous versions of Scott dating back to the Forties, wood will not be a weakness for the new Green Lantern. "He is the earthly powerhouse, and when you see him in terms of his power level, he's up there close to Superman." Though Marvel Comics' gay hero Northstar is set to face some intolerance from his peers following his marriage to his long term boyfriend in the pages of "Astonishing X-Men," Robinson and Scott are planning on portraying an idealized world in which Alan Scott is judged only by the quality of his character. "He doesn't come out in issue two; he is already a gay man," Robinson says. "Alan Scott is super-heroic, he's super gallant, he'll die for the earth, he'll die for its people, he's everything you want in a hero. I imagine he's such a Type A character that when he realized he was gay, he was like, 'Okay, I'm gay, now I'm just gonna go on with my life.' He's so accepting of it himself and he's such a compelling person that the world knows Alan Scott's gay.

He's such a leader, he's such a good man, that the Justice League don't care. And that's a healthy depiction of a team and how it should be." Scott says her instructions from Robinson were to make this version of the Green Lantern as heroic as possible. "With Alan, the brief was very clear," she says. "He needed to be a big, strapping, handsome man that everyone would instinctively follow and love. Alan strikes me as an incredibly open, honest and warm man, a natural leader and absolutely the right choice to be Guardian of the Earth. His sexuality is incidental." You can click through to check out a preview of "Earth Two" issue two, in which Alan Scott's sexuality is revealed to the reader in a decidedly matter-of-fact sort of way. Comic Books / Values Dissonance - TV Tropes A lot of long-running heroes from both Marvel and DC Comics suffer this. The Golden Age in particular has cringe-worthy racist and sexist moments, taken Up to Eleven in the Silver Age . Superman 's entire history says a lot about this trope.

As has been well-documented, Superman did not originate as much of a "boy scout" (thus making it ironic when people say, "there's no room for a boy scout, this isn't 1938 anymore") and was distrusted by and distrustful of authorities, while his adventures pitted him against people abusing the downtrodden. During World War II, he moved into the role of "boy scout" and was often depicted as fighting enemy spies to the point where by the end of the decade, he was frequently depicted in front of the American flag, and so-forth. Then, of course, by the fifties, everything about him seemed to change to suit the atomic age, from his powers, to his ideals. This, however, didn't stop him from occasionally tackling common prejudices of the time in which he has to battle an Expy of the KKK who are threatening a Japanese boy. Values dissonance began to haunt Superman by the end of the '60s as he had not reverted to his earlier, rebellious form, but remained a symbol of the establishment, despite the youth movement moving that way.

Attempts at "modernizing" Superman were often scoffed at, and between the '70s and the '00s, Superman was often used as an example of the right and virtuous old-fashioned superhero for better or worse, though besides "I don't kill," they're rarely specific about what "morals" of his are supposed to be outdated. That's not to say Superman never had any high points during this period, they just tended to be more about the overall plot or spectacle. Lately, they seem to be trying to get away from this. Many Superboy note Superman in his youth comics had the main character, Clark Kent, being subjected to corporal punishments, usually in the form of spanking, by his adoptive father, Jonathan. However, Jonathan discovers the hard way why he would be called Man of Steel , even with a spanking machine, which it too gets destroyed. One even has it in a school! Now, think about that for a moment considering corporal punishment of any kind in school... at least state ones, would not go well with today's view. Many modern collections of Golden Age stories have taken steps to try removing content that would be deemed offensive.

For instance, many of the Wonder Woman collections remove the painfully racist caricatures of black people, replacing them with more natural-looking black characters. Wonder Woman from the Golden Age had a particular problem because her creator, William Marston, believed that dominance, submission, and a very bondage-oriented culture were all needed in today's world. Wonder Woman at one point extols the virtues of being a (consensual) slave. And while Marston had very progressive ideas about women's empowerment for his day, he also seemed to think that women were "naturally" prone to things like vanity and emotional outbursts. J. Michael Straczynski 's Marvel Comics maxiseries The Twelve contains an In-Universe example. Golden Age hero Dynamic Man sees a woman who's been mugged being chased by a black man. Upon grabbing the black man he finds out that this is the victim's husband. He instantly loses interest in helping either one. Likewise, when he helps out a bar that is being attacked, only to realize it's a gay bar, he disgustedly comments that this sort of thing should have been stopped a long time ago before flying away.

The whole series examines the dissonance between Golden Age heroes and the modern world they've found themselves in; while all of them suffer to a degree, Dynamic Man is a particularly ironic example given how he constantly stresses that he's "the Man of Tomorrow." An in-story example occurs in Infinite Crisis , when '70s superhero Black Lightning meets modern black superhero Mr. Terrific. Terrific remarks that a black person actually calling himself "Black Lightning" is ridiculous. (He did wear a black-and-blue costume, and his lightning bolts are often depicted as literally black, but still.) Lightning replys that when he began his career he was "the only one of us out there" and wanted people to know that. Tintin in the Congo has often been criticized as having racist and colonialist views, as well as several scenes of unnecessary violence against animals. Hergé said that he was portraying the naive views of the time. When the album was redrawn in 1946, Hergé removed several references to the fact that the Congo was at that time a Belgian colony. This failed to mollify critics. Because of its controversial subject matter, the album was previously only published as a facsimile black and white edition in English.

However, a color English edition was finally published in September 2005, by Egmont Publishing, with a foreword explaining the historical context (a similar move had been employed for the 1983 translation of The Blue Lotus) and a collectors'-edition banner in red covering the main image over the front cover. When the album was to be published in Scandinavia, the publishers objected to a scene on page 56 of the color album, where Tintin blows up a rhinoceros with a stick of dynamite. They asked the page to be redrawn, and Herge complied. Instead of blowing the animal to pieces, the rhino accidentally fires the gun of the sleeping Tintin, gets scared, and runs away. This page was also used in the English- and German-language translations. When discussing racism in the Tintin comics series one should also mention the fact that Hergé was forced to redraw black characters in "Tintin in America" and "The Crab With The Golden Claws" and change them into Caucasian characters under pressure of American publishers. This happened way in the 1950s! Hergés early albums were mostly drawn for fun, without much documentation.

The Blue Lotus was the first story where Hergé actually did a lot of research. He had met a Chinese exchange student who told him a lot about Chinese culture and the Chinese-Japanese war that was going on back in 1934. This motivated Hergé to put more research into all of his stories. "The Blue Lotus" actually has a section where Tintin discusses various racist stereotypes about Chinese people to Chang, who laughs and says "people in your country must be crazy!" Hergé later lost contact with his Chinese friend and wrote arguably the most beautiful and touching album in the entire series, Tintin in Tibet, just to express how much he missed him. They finally met again two years before Hergé's death. In his earliest appearances, Black Panther was often called "Jungle Man" by Hawkeye and Goliath . While the name was in reference to his beast motif, calling a black man that name would justifiably be considered highly offensive in the 21st century. Quite a few people didn't think it was appropriate in the 20th Century.

In the introduction to Fagin the Jew (his own confrontation with the anti-Semitism in Charles Dickens ' Oliver Twist ), Will Eisner recollects how he created Ebony as a one-dimensional comic relief black sidekick for The Spirit because it was common practice at the time. After serving alongside other Americans of different heritage in World War II , Eisner was more enlightened and gave Ebony more depth and gravitas. Not quite a comic book, but near enough: This 1815 cartoon ◊ is meant to be a funny, comic portrayal of how to deal with your wife. By strapping her into bed so that you can do whatever you want with her , using gags and thumbscrews, if necessary. Ultimate Captain America is another in-story example. In order to maintain his World War II origin story for stories in the 1970s and beyond, the original Cap was said to have been frozen in an iceberg and thawed out years later. The Ultimate version goes into depth about the kind of culture shock that would happen if a man, frozen in the 1940s, actually woke up in the 2000s. Unfortunately, Ultimate Cap actually doesn't feature enough values dissonance.

At one point, when talking about possibly surrendering, he asks insultingly if any one thinks that the A on his forehead stands for France. Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys is a modern stereotype and during WWII, Cap actually fought beside dozens of French resistance fighters who regularly gave their lives to complete a mission or save Cap. The Actual Captain America proved this point only a few issues later, during Civil War, when he makes a rather more intelligent and eloquent speech about the bravery of the men and women he fought besides in occupied France. In Ultimate Avengers , Cap was in custody of some French soldiers, who just happened to be mentioning how brave the French Resistance was. About a page later, Cap's free and kicking ass... whilst the soldiers are cringing, giving up without a fight. That's Mark Millar for you.note He licks goats , after all. Cap also got hit with that particular stick in Nextwave , solely for comedic purposes . Nextwave Cap: Close your eyes, go back to Avengers Mansion, and make my dinner .

'60s-era Cap featured many similar views played straight, with Cap nudging his career-woman girlfriend Sharon Carter to resign from SHIELD so that she could be his wife; back then, that was pretty normal. Nowadays, it makes Steve look like a dick. As such, Steve is now far more progressive with his views (including bowing leadership to Wasp and serving alongside many female Avengers without questioning their abilities), and his relationship with Sharon is modernized into a Battle Couple with Sharon being the one who proposes to Steve. The entire early run of Cap's stories from WWII fit this category, most especially the ones featuring villainous "Japs." Similarly, in the '50s there was a run where Captain America and Bucky came back and fully embraced the idea of the Red Scare . This was later retconned to be a replacement Captain America and Bucky who went a bit paranoid after getting a bad batch of the Super-Soldier Serum. Ultimately , the differences between original Captain America and "Ultimate" Captain America are a values dissonance between the comics industry of the 1940's and the modern day.

At the time, the industry was all about big patriotism and sticking by your country in times of trouble because hey, it's your country. Nowadays, comics are more willing to stick it to the man. Thus original Cap attempted to symbolize everything best about America, while post- Silver Age Cap tries to fight everything that's worst about it. Captain America 's sidekick Lemar Hoskins briefly took up the mantle of Bucky , Cap's Golden Age sidekick. When it was pointed out that the term "Buck" was once used as a derogatory term for black men, Lemar changed his Code Name to Battlestar. The Young Allies member Whitewash Jones was depicted stereotypically enough to be retconned as a stereotyped depiction of the real character in Young Allies Comics 70th Anniversary Special #1. In the case of the Argentinian comic strip Mafalda , there are several examples. While Mafalda's ideas on women's rights were advanced by the standards of The '60s , they come as more rude and stuck-up than well-intentioned to modern readers.

Specially when she says that her Housewife mother Raquel is "useless" and "mediocre" because she chose to raise Mafalda at home than juggle with work/college and motherhood . Manolito's parents' quick willingness to use corporal punishment on their son is also quite cringeworthy. It's worth pointing out, though, that this is still shown in a very negative way. Also, one strip shows that mentioning divorce during dinner is a big no-no. Early X-Men comics have some inevitable casual sexism that can be jarring to the modern reader, all the males (including Xavier) spend much of their time making crude remarks about Jean Grey and in one early issue the maid is ill so it falls to Jean to make everyone dinner (nobody questions this, least of all Jean). Similar to the treatment of Sue Storm throughout most of the early Fantastic Four stories. Even tales that tried to demonstrate her value to the team - like " A Visit to the Fantastic Four " in FF #11 - come out painfully sexist now (as for the old running gag with Namor... let's not even go there...).

One early issue showed the team training in the Danger Room, with the male members fighting a robot while Jean - who went into combat alongside the men all the time - practiced using her telekinesis to sew. One very early issue showed that every male member of the team was lusting after Jean, even Professor Xavier, who believes the biggest obstacle to a romance between them is his wheelchair, not that he's her teacher and twice her age. This has almost never been mentioned since then. This idea was played with in X-Statix Presents: Dead Girl , where the Golden Age heroine Miss America was portrayed as an unapologetic racist. Ironically, she ended up in a romantic relationship with Anarchist, a black superhero she had earlier hurled a vile slur at. Miss America's racism was later used by artist Nick Dragotta as part of a justification for making the new Miss America a Latina . He pointed out the delicious irony behind making the successor of an out-of-touch bigot a woman of color. The climax of an early Constantine story dealing with a serial killer who targets the hero involves the hero getting a gun. Given that the killer is a Knife Nut , the confrontation is a bit uneven.

For a British audience, the pistol was presumably an unexpected and shocking twist. For any nation where pistols are perfectly legal and commonplace, this is both an Anti-Climax and a bit of a What an Idiot moment for Constantine who did not think to use a gun on many previous occasions. Chick Tracts either stubbornly ignore it, or simply don't realize it in many tracts which contain outdated values (one example is in "The Little Bride" , when the Christian Suzy insists that Mohammed was not a man of God because he married teenage girls and had slaves). In the Gargoyles " Bad Guys " series, it's revealed that Dingo was raised by his stepfather, who showed visible shock when the teenaged Dingo came home with a mohawk. You'd think someone who'd kill his wife, lie to her son about it and raise said son to a life of crime would be more understanding. Writer James Robinson talked about this when explaining some of the character changes in the New 52 reboot of the JSA .

He pointed out that while the team's all-white , all-heterosexual ( and mostly male ) line-up was to be expected back in the Golden Age , there was no excuse for it remaining that way in 2012. To that end, he slotted in the black Mr. Terrific and the Latina Hawkgirl as founding members of the team, and made Alan Scott/Green Lantern an openly-gay man. DC Comics trend of returning characters from the Legacy Character inheritors to the versions the writers grew up with has had the unintended consequence of removing/killing off dozens of minority characters from the DCU. Because back when they were reading, all the major heroes were white. An odd version of this occurs with the Flash (Barry Allen). Barry was previously treated as something of an optimist and a good-natured fellow, with cheerful science lessons for the readers. In the decades since his death, this almost became Flanderization, with Barry being treated something close to a saint whose only flaw was spending too much time on heroics, showing up late on dates with his wife. The problem with his return? Barry was intended to be a nerd hero, so his day job was a police scientist.

In the 1950s, nobody thought much of it. In 2010, CSI, profiling, and forensics investigations are the subject of nightly television drama, so Barry's happy attitude was jarring on a character who'd retroactively seen more death than the Joker. Although there is such a thing as Gallows Humor ; it's common for people in jobs like Barry's to develop strong (albeit often somewhat dark ) senses of humor as a psychological defense mechanism to counteract the grime and misery they're confronted with on a day-by-day basis in their careers. This tends to not make it into said dramas because angst is generally more dramatic and makes those involved seem less insensitive. And with an increasing number of more comedic elements in forensics shows ( Autopsy Snack Time , just as an example), the modern reaction to this is ITSELF subject to this trope,. The typical climax to many strips in British Comics like The Beano in the '70s would involve a child doing something naughty and being given, as some stories put it, 'six of the best' - in other words, being bent across Dad's knee and whacked on the bum with a large slipper.

It can be pretty surprising to a younger reader (ie. a reader not old enough to remember the time when smacking wasn't controversial) to realize that not only was that considered a moralistic plot element, you were supposed to laugh. Of course, recent (for example, 1990s-present) comics don't do that. Racial stereotypes, especially black and Chinese caricatures, were also pretty frequent in British Comics back in their early days although no strip with these sort of characters were particularly longlasting. Some racial caricatures appeared in British Comics as late as the 1980s. Dave Gibbons recalls encountering this trope when writing Powerman for a Nigerian audience in the '70s. In particular, he had difficulty with the idea that a fat stomach indicated success and power rather than gluttony and greed . In the Mortadelo y Filemï¿½n comics by Ibañez, most non-white characters are drawn and speak as typical wartime caricatures, complete with accents, which raises more than a few eyebrows in the present day.

That said, Ibañez's black characters tended to be universally more competent or at least less suicidally stupid than the white protagonists, so maybe it was just him catering to the drawing style expected at the time. In Mexico, long-running comic Memín Pingüín features a blackface as the main character. And over there it is not seen as offensive at all.note Mexico doesn't have much racial discrimination nowadays, since most of the discrimination there is more based in socioeconomic factors. Though, there has been times when Black Mexicans have been stopped at the streets by policemen due to them misidentifying them with illegal Cuban inmigrants, but that's a story for another day... However, in 2008, when the Mexican Postal Service announced they would publish a series of postal stamps with the image of Memín, many American civil rights groups noticed the character, and criticized both the stamps, the comics, and the Mexican society as a whole as being obscenely racist, to the point it caused a minor international incident between Mexico and the United States, while the Mexican postal service was more or less left wondering why they were making so much of a fuss since these stamps weren't really intended to them.

Whether it was deliberately done by the postal service or not , the stamps were sold out within days, reignited interest in the comic , and the stamps were also found on auction sites being sold at many times its face value. And for the record, the comic actually called out on the U.S. segregation issues in the 1960's, and spoke very harshly against racism. It doesn't help that the titular blackface character looks more like a monkey due to the artist's drawing style, and in fact some issues have other characters think he's a talking monkey. Shortly after Supergirl's introduction, there's a Superman story in which (for typically contrived Silver Age reasons) he has to pretend to be engaged. So, he spends a good part of the story making kissy-face with the mysterious new superheroine Mighty Maid. At the end of the story it's revealed she's Supergirl in disguise, and thus Supes has been making out with his 15-year-old first cousin.

(A later story makes it clear that this is not Kryptonian-Earth values dissonance; first cousins couldn't marry on Krypton.) Fact Note: in most US states first cousins can legally marry, doesn't lessen the squick though. Superdickery is something of a sub-trope of this, as the "humor" of the time now comes off as manipulative, abusive, and all-around in bad taste in these heavily-P.C. times. One arc in Runaways has the kids travelling back 100 years to 1907. New character Klara Prast is depicted in a number of ways that are very different to the modern kids, notably her reaction to the lesbian relationship between Karolina and "Negress" Xavin (actually a shapeshifting alien, which is a whole different set of things). Not to mention Klara's rather squicky relationship with her middle-aged husband. Klara, for reference, is twelve. Fortunately, Klara herself was somewhat displeased by the latter, and eventually got over the former a bit, after spending some time with Molly and her modern-day worldview.

Speaking of Xavin, s/he was a product of Marvel's reluctance (at the time) to put openly gay characters in a series that they had hoped to market towards teenagers, which is also why his/her first appearance created a pretense for the newly-outed Karolina being put on a spaceship , and why, after Xavin and Karolina returned, Xavin kept assuming a male form. If Marvel had tried imposing such rules in modern times, they'd probably be subject to the kind of public-relations nightmare that DC faced when it vetoed Batwoman 's lesbian marriage in 2013. The dissonance in comics is mocked in the videogame Comic Jumper: The Adventures of Captain Smiley . When he travels into the Silver Age , he is immediately paired with a ching chongey Chinese stereotype and put up against a feminist villain. Even Captain Smiley's sidekick Star, who is a complete Jerkass throughout the game, is offended . The game also points out how The Comics Code forbade swearing, but allowed ethnic stereotypes. Wilhelm Busch 's 19th century stories like Max and Moritz feature corporal punishment for kids (by caning).

There are also some anti-Semitic bits in (lesser known) stories. Green Lantern Hal Jordan premiered in the late 1950s with a female boss/love interest who ran a military-industrialist complex air base, and an Inuit sidekick who not only knew his secret identity, but kept Jordan's power source safe and even stood in for him when Jordan was off-world. These concepts were quite progressive at the time , but to modern readers get easily overshadowed by his boss turning to supervillainy to try to force Green Lantern into marriage and his sidekick gleefully accepting a blatantly racist nickname. Fortunately, in the latest reboot, the nickname "Pieface" showed up only on one occasion, and got the speaker pummeled shortly thereafter. A Donald Duck comic from 1949 called "Voodoo Hoodoo" showed, in a flashback, Scrooge McDuck hiring thugs to chase stereotypically drawn Africans out of their village so he could take their land, causing a witch doctor to send a zombie after him.

Most of the sympathy of the story is reserved for Bombie the Zombie (who has had to search for Scrooge for years) and Donald (who the Zombie is currently chasing, mistaking him for a young Scrooge), with relatively little for the African tribe. When later depicted in Don Rosa 's The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck , there is no doubt that his treatment of the natives is Scrooge's Faceï¿½Heel Turn , and arguably a crossing of the Moral Event Horizon . Astï¿½rix : The story Asterix and the Secret Weapon (La rose et la glaive) had a female bard, Bravura, come to the village, and introducing feminism to its women, which causes the men to leave the village in protest of their unfeminine ways. The main plot deals with female legionaries being introduced to fight the Gauls, because Gaulish gallantry insists they can't fight women. In the end, though the women of the village are prepared to fight, Asterix suggests they defeat the female legionaries by turning the village into a combination shopping center/spa, where the women can get mani/pedicures, get their hair done, and buy new clothes.

In the end, the story ends with the men coming back and the women happily going back to their roles as housewives. Bizarrely, this comic was written in 1991, at a point where everyone should have known better. Even more bizarrely, most critical outrage was focused on a scene where Asterix punches Bravura, saying this would normalize violence against women, even though the context was completely different to domestic violence (it was in reaction to the second time Bravura had sexually harassed him publically, using her size difference to manhandle him and completely ignoring him asking her to stop - and he immediately felt horrible about hitting her, and almost all the other characters treat him like crap for the rest of the story as a result of what he did) and the comics rely on silly violent slapstick constantly. The comic also frequently presents black characters in the stereotypical blackface fashion with inky black skin and huge, red lips (in the earliest issues they even had thick "African" accents , although this was fortunately dropped in later volumes and the English translations). Interestingly, they rarely act out negative stereotypes when they have larger roles, behaving like any other character.

A more cultural issue is the frequent use of gentle Alcohol-Induced Idiocy and "funny drunk" archetypes, which are considered innocent in France, acceptable but not particularly child-friendly in the UK, and a thoroughly Discredited Trope in America where heavy drinking is connected in the public consciousness primarily to alcoholism. This may have contributed to how the comics have repeatedly failed to break America. Obelix is usually the one to be given a love interest, though usually it's unreciprocated and takes the form of a crush on a pretty woman which helps drive the plot. In Asterix and Caesar's Gift, he develops another crush on newcomer Influenza, the daughter of an innkeeper, who uses this crush to manipulate him. Influenza is stated to be a teenager; Obelix, though he has a Vague Age , is clearly an adult and is at least in his twenties note He and Asterix are the same age; according to one book, Asterix isn't as young as he looks. Asterix and Obelix could be anywhere between their twenties and their thirties. While it was more acceptable in times past for adult men to pursue teenaged women, to modern readers it's certainly uncomfortable.

The Outbursts of Everett True depict a man with a Hair-Trigger Temper beating up anyone who angers him (or simply yelling at them if they're female). While this isn't so bad (several victims are depicted as Asshole Victims who deserve their comeuppance) one strip features a woman laden with many packages from a shopping trip politely asking Everett to give up his seat for her, which he responds to by yelling at her and accusing her of being one of those women who "gives women's rights speeches". While this may have been acceptable in Edwardian times, nowadays it just comes off as rude and unchivalrous. Newspaper Comics have fallen victim of this since the 1970's, with attempts to modernize strips by the syndicates not doing much to avoid getting them Deader Than Disco . Zipi y Zape : A lot of stories show the twins receiving Corporal Punishment for their pranks. Keep in mind that most of that stories were written in the Spain of the 1940s and 1950s... Nowadays, YOU GO TO JAIL for this kind of punishments.

The only reason the old comics still get away with this (sort of) these days is because it's always Played for Laughs . Polish comic book Tytus, Romek i A'tomek was created when Poland was a Communist country under Russian control. In order to have the books published, the creator Henryk Chmielewski was forced to include elements of Communist propaganda in them as well have his heroes praising current system while being critical of much more western world. In One particular story the heroes meet Fidel Castro who is shown as a very nice and sympathethic person... Hob Gadling from The Sandman is another in-universe example. Being an immortal who has lived for centuries, he's done things in the past that were acceptable then but would be considered horrible in the present. He's especially ashamed of his past involvement in the slave trade. Urbanus has lots of racial stereotyping (one of the characters is called "het Negerke", roughly translated as "The Little Negroid"). This makes export in other countries rather difficult, though the series is already too self-referential Flemish for that. The series did manage to be published in the politically correct Netherlands, though. The infamous One More Day has this.

The point of the story is that it's heroic to do whatever you can to save a life, which a fine moral... Except that "whatever you can" in this case involves making a deal with the devil, so the moral becomes "do WHATEVER YOU CAN to save a life." There's also the reason behind using a deal with the devil to separate Spider-Man and Mary Jane; Joe Quesada wanted them broken up, but believed divorcing them would send a bad message and so used magic to remove the marriage from existence. For those who don't think divorce is a bad thing when you have suitable reason for it (which is a decent number of people nowadays), that makes the decision to use magic devil-deals ridiculous. Especially considering that most of Spider-Man's long-established supporting characters of roughly his own age-group were already divorced or widowed before One More Daynote Cleanly divorced: Randy Robertson (who is a few years younger than Peter Parker) from Amanda, and Debra from Mr. Whitman. Quasi-divorced (not married, but went through a very painful separation): Flash Thompson and Sha Shan.

Widowed: Betty Brant Leeds (but not before her husband walked out on her because of her (second!) adulterous affair with Flash) and Liz Allan Osborn. To cap it all off, the issue immediately following One More Day revealed that Harry Osborn was alive and now a triple divorcé, having apparently married two more women after getting a divorce from his former widow Liz. The follow-up arc, One Moment in Time, compounded this by motivating Mary Jane's decision not to get married to Peter in the altered-by-Mephisto timeline by having her say that she could not envisage raising children with Spider-Man and that marriage without children was meaningless. Which of course is not just out of touch with Mary Jane's established characterization, e. g. her joyful reaction to her pregnancy during the Clone Saga, but also with most readers' ideas about love and marriage. Ever since it became popularized during the 2000s (with stuff such as De Kiekeboes ) Fanservice shows up quite frequently in Franco-Belgian comic books that are targeted towards children (the best example of observing this phenomenon probably has to be Le Petit Spirou ).

This can be quite jarring in countries such as in the United States where this is considered inappropriate for the target audience, but is usually seen as quite acceptable in the BENELUX and France, where kids frequently show up as Dirty Kids in media, although it has been quite jarring for plenty of immigrants in those countries as well. Jommeke can be this towards lots of people who grew up with comics that were not Belgian Comics (be it the American, Japanese or French type) due to how heavily it avoids having even the lightest mature subject matter (such as action, black comedy, flaws about school life, growing up, death, the environment, economy etc.) and thus ends up looking for the plenty who grew up with those comics as material that is so saccharine that they would not even give it to their kids for a reading . Fact is that its heritage dates back from the '50s when there was a genre of Belgian comic books in which everyday families did everyday stuff. Before Jef Nys even worked on Jommeke he even created a comic book with an edgy kid character whose edginess stems from the fact that at times he would be a jerk .

In its native Flanders the comic series does have a very long-lasting demographic and is even popular with Muslim immigrants, something that you do not expect from something that originated in a Catholic magazine. That here being said all of those facts also allow it to avoid Unfortunate Implications . De Kiekeboes : Album #125 Vrouwen komen van Mars (women are from Mars) has in-universe Values Dissonance when the main characters travel to an album so old that it has become a holy grail among comic book collectors called De avonturen van snijboon en zoon through a machine that transports them there. In the album they notice not only that Smoking Is Cool there, but EVERYONE (even the little kids) do it. Justified, as the comic series was given as a freebie if you bought enough packs of cigarettes . There is no female character in the entire album. At the end of the story it is revealed that the creator wanted his characters to search for womankind in the album Vrouwen komen van Mars but it was never finished due to Author Existence Failure .

There's a bit of discussion on Tumblr and 4chan's /co/ boards on how Harvey Comics' "Little Lotta" character, whose entire personality is more or less "hahaha, she's so fat", will never get an animated adaptation due to how relevant body-shaming and self-image issues have become. In Watchmen , the first Silk Spectre not only forgiving The Comedian for trying to rape her , but having at least one consensual encounter with him later in life that resulted in her daughter's birth, can come across as awkward to modern readers. The Comedian in general, who in addition to the attempted rape was also a war criminal and multiple murderer, would likely be portrayed not nearly as sympathetically were he created today. :: Indexes :: The Green Lantern Goes Pink! The Green Lantern Goes Pink! The Green Lantern Goes Pink! More Neil Patrick Harris recently revealed that he knew he was gay at the tender age of six. With the announcement on Friday that DC Comics' long enduring character Green Lantern is gay, I wonder if he's known his true sexuality since the 1940s?

The newly revealed openly gay superhero -- who uses a ring to help manifest his powers -- is being introduced in the second issue of Earth 2 out next week, DC Comics revealed. The writer of the new series, James Robinson, says his character Alan Scott is essentially a retooled version of the classic Green Lantern, who first debuted in July 1940. "This was my idea," he explains, noting that before DC re-launched its lineup last summer, Alan Scott had a son who was gay. Marvel Reveals Gay Wedding for Northstar Green Lantern is the latest comic hero to come out during an expansive year for gay and lesbian characters. Marvel Entertainment recently announced that its hero Northstar will marry his longtime boyfriend in the pages of Astonishing X-Men. DC comics has other gay characters too, including Kate Kane, the current Batwoman. In the pages of Archie Comics, Kevin Keller is gay and proud. Comic-Con's Most Outrageous Fans In response to some criticism about the inclusion of gay comic book characters, Robinson says he isn't worried. He notes that being gay is just one aspect to Alan Scott, whom he refers to as a "complex" character.

"This guy, he's a media mogul, a hero, a dynamic type-A personality, and he's gay." What do you think - could Green Lantern's power source eventually be shifted from a ring to a powerful (but fabulous) handbag? The Flash DC Comics Superman Batman Super Heroes Super Hero Games Slots Movies Comics Websites Media Man Australia Superman Batman Watchmen The Joker Green Lantern The Flash is a name shared by several fictional comic book superheroes from the DC Comics universe. Created by writer Gardner Fox and artist Harry Lampert, the original Flash first appeared in Flash Comics #1 (January 1940). Nicknamed the Scarlet Speedster, all incarnations of the Flash possess "super-speed", which includes the ability to run and move extremely fast, use superhuman reflexes and seemingly violate certain laws of physics.

Thus far, four different characters, each of whom somehow gained the power of "super-speed", have assumed the identity of the Flash: Jay Garrick (1940— ), Barry Allen (1956–1985, 2008— ), Wally West (1986–2006, 2007— ), and Bart Allen (2006–2007). Before Wally and Bart's ascension to the mantle of the Flash, they were both Flash proteges under the same name: Kid Flash. The second incarnation of the Flash, Barry Allen, is generally considered the first hero of the Silver Age of comic books and the superhero has remained one of DC‘s most popular ever since. Each version of the Flash has been a key member of at least one of DC's three premier teams: the Justice Society of America, the Justice League, and the Teen Titans. Wally West has recently rejoined the Justice League, and Barry Allen recently returned to life in the pages of Final Crisis. The Barry Allen version of the character (with Wally West elements) was featured in a live action television series in 1990, starring John Wesley Shipp.

The Wally West version of the Flash (but with many elements of Barry Allen's story) is featured in the animated series Justice League. Appearances in other media Flash in other media Throughout his 60 year history, the Flash has appeared in numerous media. The Flash has been included in multiple animated features, such as Superfriends and Justice League, as well as his own live action television series and some guest star appearances on Smallville. There are numerous video games that feature the character. In the Challenge of the Superfriends series which ran from 1978-1979, he appears in every episode and has spoken lines in only twelve out of the sixteen episodes of the series. He also had two arch enemies from the Legion of Doom, Captain Cold and Gorilla Grodd. The Flash also appeared for one season (1990-1991) on the CBS network starring double-Emmy Award winner John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen.

Produced by Danny Bilson and Paul DeMeo, the series was a mild amalgamation of the Barry Allen and Wally West versions of the comics in that the female lead was Tina McGee (portrayed by Amanda Pays) and Wally's need for large amounts of food after expending so much energy running all over Central City was transferred to Barry. After his lightning-induced chemical accident, Barry got into crime fighting after the death of his police officer brother, Jay; it is presumed that Jay was named for the original comic book Flash, Jay Garrick. A handful of the Scarlet Speedster's rogues gallery made guest appearances throughout the series: Captain Cold (Michael Champion) ("Captain Cold"), Mirror Master (David Cassidy) ("Done With Mirrors"), and the Trickster (Mark Hamill) ("The Trickster" and "Trial of the Trickster"). The Flash also fought a clone of himself who wore a blue costume. A few episodes were written by comics legend Howard Chaykin and the TV costume was designed by Dave Stevens (The Rocketeer). While a critical success and vigorously backed by the network, the series had the dubious distinction of being aired against ratings powerhouses The Cosby Show on NBC and Fox's The Simpsons.

If that wasn't enough, The Flash was preempted by Christmas specials and the Desert Storm war in Iraq and constantly moved all over the schedule that it couldn't find its audience and thus cancelled after its first and only season. Warner Brothers released the series in a 6-disc DVD box set on January 10, 2006. The series' main musical theme was composed by Danny Elfman, with the remainder of the episodes' music being composed by Shirley Walker (this collaboration would also occur on Batman: The Animated Series). When the Flash made a guest appearance in the Superman: The Animated Series episode 'Speed Demons', Walker incorporated some of the themes from the live-action series into the episode. In the music scene, the band Jim's Big Ego released a song called "The Ballad of Barry Allen" on their album "They're Everywhere". The song portrays Barry as a tragic character, whose perception of the world is so accelerated that all of reality appears to proceed at a snail's pace, causing him to gradually slip into depression. The band's frontman, Jim Infantino, is the nephew of Flash co-creator Carmine Infantino, who provided the cover art for the same album.

The Flash is a playable character in the Mortal Kombat and DC Comics crossover game "Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe". The first official render for The Flash was released to the public on Monday July 7, 2008. From his bio we know that Flash in MK vs DC is Barry Allen. Flash is set to appear in the upcoming video game DC Universe Online. Numerous references to the Flash are presented on the television show The Big Bang Theory Rogues Rogues (comics) Like Batman, the Flash has a reputation for having fought a distinctive and memorable rogues gallery of supervillains. In the Flash's case, some of these villains have adopted the term "Flash's Rogues Gallery" as an official title, and insist on being called "Rogues" rather than "supervillains" or similar names. At times, various combinations of the Rogues have banded together in order to commit crimes or take revenge on the Flash, usually under the leadership of Captain Cold. The Rogues are known for their communal style relationship, hanging out together and operating under a pretty strict moral code, sometimes brutally enforced by Captain Cold.

Such "rules" include "no drugs" and, except in very dire situations or on unique occasions, "no killing". Considering the blue collar nature of the Flash's Rogues, more than a few have protested the inclusion of Professor Zoom and Abra Kadabra, often labeling them psychotic, as time travel generally works against their crimes and, at least in the original Zoom's case, they found him dangerous and too willing to kill. In contrast, several new Flash villains have been considered Rogues, including Murmur, Double Down, and Peekaboo, but they play second fiddle to new incarnations of Captain Boomerang, Zoom, Mirror Master, and Inertia (a variation on Reverse-Flash, clone of Impulse). (Credit: Wikipedia) Video Game The Flash is an action video game based on the DC Comics superhero of the same name. It was developed and manufactured by Sega and Probe Entertainment for the Sega Master System in 1993. The game's release followed approximately two years after the cancellation of the Flash TV series on CBS. Profile DC Comics is the largest and most diverse English language publisher of comic books in the world.

Founded in 1934 as National Allied Publications, the company that would one day become DC Comics virtually created the comic book, publishing the first comic of all original material. Then, in the spring of 1938, the first super hero story appeared in ACTION COMICS #1, introducing SUPERMAN. Other soon-to-be icons would follow, including BATMAN, WONDER WOMAN, GREEN LANTERN, THE FLASH and many others. Today, DC Comics publishes more than 80 titles a month and close to 1000 issues a year. DC has several imprints spanning the gamut of graphic storytelling: The DC Universe is the home of DC's peerless roster of super heroes; Vertigo caters to a more mature, literary readership; WildStorm offers a bold alternative take on heroic and adventure comics; CMX brings some of Japan's best-loved manga to American audiences; and Zuda Comics is DC's innovative web imprint. DC is also the home of MAD Magazine, the best-known humor magazine in America. DC Comics is a division of Time Warner, the largest entertainment company in the world.

Profile DC Comics (founded originally in 1934 as National Allied Publications) is one of the largest and most popular American comic book and related media companies, along with Marvel Comics. A subsidiary of Warner Bros. Entertainment since 1969, DC Comics produces material featuring a large number of well-known characters, including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, Green Lantern and the Justice League. The initials "DC" came from the company's popular series, Detective Comics, which subsequently became part of the company's official name. DC Comic's official headquarters are at 1700 Broadway, 7th, New York, New York. Random House distributes DC Comics' books to the bookstore market, while Diamond Comics Distributors supplies the comics shop specialty market. History Origins Entrepreneur Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson's National Allied Publications debuted with the tabloid-sized New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine #1 in February 1935. The company's second title, New Comics #1 (December 1935), was published at a size close to what would become comic books' standard during the period fans and historians call the Golden Age of Comic Books, with slightly larger dimensions than today's.

That title evolved into Adventure Comics, which continued through issue #503 in 1983, becoming one of the longest-running comic book series. His third and final title, Detective Comics, advertised with a cover illustration dated December 1936, eventually premiering three months late with a March 1937 cover date. The themed anthology series would become a sensation with the introduction of Batman in issue #27 (May 1939). By then, however, Wheeler-Nicholson had gone. In 1937, in debt to printing-plant owner and magazine distributor Harry Donenfeld — who was as well a pulp-magazine publisher and a principal in the magazine distributorship Independent News — Wheeler-Nicholson was compelled to take Donenfeld on as a partner in order to publish Detective #1. Detective Comics, Inc. was formed, with Wheeler-Nicholson and Jack S. Liebowitz, Donenfeld's accountant, listed as owners. Major Wheeler-Nicholson remained for a year, but cash-flow problems continued, and he was forced out. Shortly afterward, Detective Comics Inc. purchased the remains of National Allied, also known as Nicholson Publishing, at a bankruptcy auction.

Detective Comics Inc. shortly launched a fourth title, Action Comics, the premiere of which introduced Superman (a character with which Wheeler-Nicholson had no direct involvement; editor Vin Sullivan chose to run the feature after Sheldon Mayer rescued it from the slush pile). Action Comics #1 (June 1938), the first comic book to feature the new character archetype soon to be called superheroes, proved a major sales hit. The company quickly introduced such other popular characters as the Sandman and Batman. 2000's In March 2003, DC acquired publishing and merchandising rights to the long-running fantasy series Elfquest, previously self-published by creators Wendy and Richard Pini under their WaRP Graphics publication banner. This series then followed the Tower Comics series T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents in becoming non-DC titles published in the "DC Archives" format. In 2004, DC temporarily acquired the North American publishing rights to graphic novels from European publishers 2000 AD and Humanoids. It also rebranded its younger-audience titles with the mascot Johnny DC, and established the CMX imprint to reprint translated manga.

In 2006, CMX took over publication - from Dark Horse Comics - publication of the webcomic Megatokyo in print form. DC also took advantage of the demise of Kitchen Sink Press and acquired the rights to much of the work of the renowned creator, Will Eisner, such as his The Spirit series and his acclaimed graphic novels. Starting in 2004, DC began laying groundwork for a full continuity-reshuffling sequel to Crisis on Infinite Earths, promising substantial changes to the DC Universe (and side-stepping the 1994 Zero Hour event which similarly tried to ret-con the history of the DCU). In 2005, the company published several limited series establishing increasingly escalated conflicts among DC's heroes, with events climaxing in the Infinite Crisis limited series. Immediately after this event, DC's ongoing series jumped forward a full year in their in-story continuity, as DC launched a weekly series, 52, to gradually fill in the missing time. Concurrently, DC lost the copyright to "Superboy" (while retaining the trademark) when the heirs of Jerry Seigel used a provision of the 1976 revision to the copyright law to regain ownership.

Although DC appealed the ruling, it is widely believed that this was the reason for Conner Kent (also known as Superboy)'s death during the Infinite Crisis limited series. In 2005, DC launched a new "All-Star" line (evoking the title of the 1940s publication), designed to feature some of the company's best-known characters in stories that eschewed the long and convoluted continuity of the DC Universe, produced by "all star" creative teams.. All-Star Batman & Robin the Boy Wonder launched in July 2005, with All-Star Superman beginning in November 2005. All-Star Wonder Woman and All Star Batgirl were announced in 2006, but neither have been released or scheduled as of the beginning of 2009. In April 2008, the videogame company Midway released the eighth version of its Mortal Kombat fighting-game franchise, Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe, which featured DC superheroes and supervillians as half of the playable characters. (Credit: Wikipedia) Profiles

Question: DC Comics recently announced that what long running comic character, introduced in 1940, is gay?
Answer: The Green Lantern