It appears that Detective Comics is bringing back Batwoman, whom DC killed off in 1979 and whom you shouldn't confuse for Batgirl. But there's a twist: Batwoman is now a lesbian*.
Now, I've always been a detractor of the various Bat-family characters: Batwoman, the various Batgirls, and especially all the Robins. I feel that they undermine the central character of Batman. Further, I'm always irritated with female characters that are simple knock-offs of male characters**. Despite my own misgivings, I expect that this new, black-clad lesbian Batwoman---compare this rendering with these of the original, purse-carrying version---will be embraced by the fanboys. I mean, she's a lesbian, and look what she's wearing. In fact, I predict that, after Batwoman's initial success, she will "turn" Catwoman and there'll be an issue devoted entirely to the two of them making out.
Mmmm...Catwoman.
* This change seems to be part of a broader, ongoing effort by DC to increase the ethnic and sexual diversity of its superfolk.
** See also Spider-Girl and all the versions of Spider-Woman.
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Yeah, did you read "the Death of Robin", where the fans actually voted to kill Robin off?
ReplyDeleteYep, in "A Death in the Family," the second Robin, Jason Todd, was killed off based on a fan vote:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman:_A_Death_in_the_Family
I enthusiastically endorse this brutal murder.
Apparently, the writers felt that Batman needed a lighter-hearted character to throw his dark, brooding persona in to relief*, because there have been 2 more Robins after Todd in the canonical continuity: Timothy Drake and Stephanie Brown. (Brown was, as you might guess, a girl.)
* I've always thought, some would say pessimistically, that Batman kept the brightly clad Boy Wonder around to draw fire away from his darkly caped self. As evidence for this theory, I point to the on-the-job deaths of Robins 2 and 4 (Todd and Brown).