Jason Howard Green

Jason Howard Green

Monday, August 13, 2018

I'm Excited About Batwoman, BUT . . .


It's just been announced that out lesbian Ruby Rose has been tapped to play the lesbian superhero Batwoman on the CW this Fall.  Several articles I've read have stated this is the first time we will see an LGBT superhero on the small screen.  Now I'm a geek and an out & proud gay man, so I'm super excited about this announcement.  But can we please stop rewriting history just to make this story sound more interesting.  Batwoman will not be our first out superhero.  The Black Canary from CW's Arrow has been out for several seasons now.  And, quiet as it's kept, we witnessed history in the making earlier this year with the phenomenal series Black Lightning. Annisa (superhero name - Thunder) was an out lesbian that show as well.  

While I'm also excited about the fact that we have a member of the LGBT community playing the part of Batgirl, this is also not the first time a same-gender loving actor has put on the spandex to play the role of hero.  The actor that plays Kid Flash, Keiynan Lonsdale, on the CW series The Flash came out as bisexual in 2017. So there's that.

Can we just give a shout out to the CW for taking these bold steps and being inclusive of LGBT individuals in there universe of heroes?  I am proud to applaud the arrival of Batwoman (a girl loving Batwoman at that) to television.  I can't wait to see how she is incorporated in the cast of DC shows I love.  But let's not disregard and disrespect the fantastic heroes that came before her that have already made the realm of CW heroes a welcoming place for queer folks.   

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