Superman’s son bisexual as DC Comics embraces diversity, following Aquaman, Robin, and Marvel’s Captain America
- New Superman will have a romantic relationship with a male friend
- The coming out comes as more comic books embrace diversity
Faster than a speeding bullet, change is coming to the Superman comics.
Jon Kent, the son of original Superman Clark Kent and journalist Lois Lane, turns out to be bisexual in DC Comics’ latest iteration of the superhero’s adventures.
The young man kisses reporter Jay Nakamura in issue five of the comic book Superman: Son of Kal-El, which will be released on November 9.
“It’s not a gimmick,” the writer, Tom Taylor, said in an interview from Melbourne, Australia, wearing a T-shirt with a rainbow-striped Superman logo.
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“When I was offered this job, I thought, ‘Well, if we’re going to have a new Superman for the DC Universe, it feels like a missed opportunity to have another straight white saviour,” he said.
National Coming Out Day is observed on October 11 to support lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
“We didn’t want this to be ‘DC Comics creates new queer Superman’,” Taylor said. “We want this to be ‘Superman finds himself, becomes Superman and then comes out,’ and I think that’s a really important distinction there.”
Reactions have been mostly positive, Taylor said.
“I’m seeing tweets of people saying they burst into tears when they read the news, that they wished that Superman was this when they were growing up, that they could see themselves,” he added.
“People are saying for the first time ever they’re seeing themselves in Superman – something they never thought was possible.”
Jon Kent cares about climate crisis and refugees.
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“He is as powerful as hope, faster than fate and able to lift us all and he’s a very new hero finding his way, fighting things his father didn’t as much,” Taylor said, who wants this to be the new normal.
“I hope this isn’t a headline in a few years time. I hope this isn’t trending on Twitter. I hope this just something about a person and good rep for everybody that that represents.”
The coming out of America’s most famous superhero comes as more comic books embrace diversity.
In March, Marvel Comics announced its first gay Captain America and “Aquaman” introduced a black, gay superhero earlier this summer.
The latest Robin in the Batman comics came out as bisexual in August.
While the new Superman is not the first LGBTQ comic book character, he is arguably the most recognisable.
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“Nowadays, we live in a less closeted age. That’s an absolute good,” said Ben Saunders, director of comics and cartoon studies at the University of Oregon.
“One consequence might be that the mainstream culture has caught on to what some people have known all along: superheroes have always been, at least potentially, a bit queer,” said.
Additional reporting by Tribune News Service and Agence France-Presse
