Wednesday, July 1, 2009

First Gay Superhero Kiss


Well... at least in print, you know Superman power-fucked Robin in his bat cave nightly. Marvel's "X-Factor, one of the most critically acclaimed series, has a same sex kiss in the latest issue between characters Rictor and Shatterstar. This is on of the first same sex kisses in a mainstream comic.


Previous issues of X-Factor hinted at a relationship between the two, but their sexuality remained ambiguous until now. Rictor's bisexuality has not been confirmed or denied, and writer Peter David has said that he doesn't believe it's something that needs to be explicitly addressed.


"I certainly don't think we could say at this point that Rictor is definitively gay. I think we could make the argument that he's bi, but I don't see the point at this juncture in spelling it out -- not because of any sense of homophobia or anything like that but out of a sense that I think it's more entertaining and more thought-provoking if we keep it ambiguous" say David.


While the first openly gay characters in mainstream comics were featured in 1986's miniseries Watchmen, Marvel refrained from writing openly gay characters until the 21st century, hesitant to promote agendas from either end of the political spectrum.

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