Culture

Broke-Batwoman Beats Crime, Ex-Girlfriend

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The folks over at To The People call attention to the latest news from Gotham City: Batwoman, nee Batgirl (Yvonne Craig invented Spandex before it ever existed), is out of the closet, kicking ass, and taking names:

DC Comics is unveiling a new, lesbian Batgirl. One who "introduces herself to comic book readers by striking her ex-girlfriend right across the jaw," according to Out.com.

Ka-Pow! Whole thing, with links a-plenty, here.

More power to DC, Batwoman, and alternative lifestyles among costumed do-gooders. But what took DC so long? Ever the Avis to Marvel's Hertz, Stan Lee's minions already outed the Rawhide Kid years ago.

And of course Dr. Fredric Wertham outed Bruce Wayne years and years ago (give Wertham this much credit: his 1973 book The World of Fanzines was the first treatise on the subject). As interesting, his opposite number, Willam Marston, also an insane doctor (albeit a Ph.D.), created the oh-so-sapphic Wonder Woman partly in response to Wertham's denunciations of comics as gender-bending crapola. Read all about it here.

How will California textbooks deal with it all?

Bonus question: What sort of revelation would Aquaman need to cough up in order to make him interesting to ground-dwellers?

Update: Apologies to Batfans everywhere for confusing Batgirl with Batwoman, which is like confusing Alfred the Butler with Edwin Jarvis, fer chrissakes. Sentence me to a lifetime subscription to The Forever People.