In the wake of the revelation that the new Batwoman is a lipstick lesbian, AfterEllen.com turns its attention to the character of Susan Veraghen, “one of the few straightforwardly butch lesbians in comics today.”
Veraghen first appeared in 1992’s Grendel: War Child #1.
Much like mainstream television, comic book superheroes, even those who are gay and lesbian, are drawn to reflect traditional notions of gender expression. Therefore, gay characters like X-Men’s Northstar will always be handsomely chiseled, and lesbian characters like Batwoman/Kate Kane will always be curvaceous femmes. Comic book readers are only likely to find more realistic depictions of characters when they look away from the mainstream publications.
The popularity and demand for the character of Susan Veraghen, however, which catapulted her from bit player to featured role, indicates that her nontraditional appearance is simply irrelevant. In fact, her identity as a butch lesbian is presented in a refreshingly nonchalant manner. Unlike Amazon, Marvel Comics’ appallingly offensive, militant feminist who used the moniker Man-Killer and made no secret of her hatred of men (Amazon was never explicitly referred to as a lesbian due to Marvel’s ban on LGBT characters, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to read between the lines), Susan does not hate men and is only militant with regard to the grendel inside of her.
Veraghen also appears in Grendel Tales: Homecoming and Past Prime.
August 14th, 2006 at 1:04 pm
I wonder what After Ellen thinks of Past Prime, or Rucka’s fetishization of lesbians in general.
Amazon, IIRC, wasn’t revealed to be a lesbian until a few years ago, wasn’t she? Still I can see how many might be offended by it, since Nicieza hammers the reset button on her- will she turn good? No!