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 Buffy’s doing it with girls and the new Catwoman is bi. The world of comic books is heaven for queer women, writes Alice Clarke.
It’s widely understood that comic books are reserved for geeks, dorks and nerds. But, as Willow Rosenberg (from Buffy the Vampire Slayer) once said, “It’s the computer age; nerds are in.”
Believe what stereotypes you will about those who read comics, it’s an awesome time to be one of us – especially if you love Joss Whedon and comic books. If you don’t know who Joss Whedon is, he’s the guy who gave us Buffy, Angel, Toy Story and actor Amy Acker.
So why are things so good at the moment? Well, Joss has been rather busy of late, working on his new TV series Dollhouse, starring Eliza Dushku (Faith from Buffy), and Acker, but somehow he has still managed to find time to write an arc of Brian K Vaughn’s comic, Runaways, write the 25-issue series, Astonishing X-Men and write the eighth season of Buffy, the sixth season of Angel and another Serenity mini-series – all in comic book form.
And he’s done a great job of it, too: he saved Runaways from almost certain suckiness; he managed to make yet another story of the cure for the mutant gene amusing in Astonishing X-Men; Angel: After The Fall is as funny as ever, and he almost manages to make the whole team surviving the apocalypse and the hell that followed it seem not so far-fetched. Almost. And it’s good to see Wash being alive, River being insane and Inara being beautiful in Serenity: Better Days.
But, of course, the best one is Buffy: Season Eight. It’s just like having Buffy back, only this time the ad breaks last a month and their special effects budget is unlimited. For those who didn’t watch Buffy (all three of you), Buffy is a vampire slayer. She has super strength and a destiny to hunt and kill vampires and other assorted evil creatures.
There used to be only one slayer, who is always a girl, with the next one being called when the other one died, but Buffy has never been big on rules, so at the end of season seven she got her best friend, Willow (who is a witch), to perform a spell to turn every girl in the world who could be a slayer, into a slayer.
Season eight picks up right where the show left off, except since they destroyed Sunnydale, California, at the end of the show, they’re now living in a castle in Scotland. As you do. Other big changes include Kennedy (Willow’s girlfriend) being mystically dead and on a soul-searching thing, Dawn (Buffy’s little sister) being turned into a giant, and Buffy now having sex with women.
Well, woman. A new slayer named Satsu to be precise. This is great news, because although everyone always suspected Buffy had ‘leanings’, it had never actually been said in a canon story before.
Finally, everything everyone had assumed to have happened between Buffy and Faith (another slayer) in season three is possible. All the sexual tension and Faith’s being jealous of Angel (Buffy’s vampire boyfriend) and awkward around Buffy’s mum seem to make much more sense.
However, before we go awarding Satsu the mythical toaster oven, Drew Goddard, writer of this particular Buffy Eight arc, has said that Buffy and Satsu aren’t going to start dating and has almost ruled out the possibility of Buffy sleeping with another slayer. However with all but two of Buffy’s sidekicks dating slayers, perhaps there is a chance of Buffy jumping on the band-wagon again in the future. Either way, another gay regular character in the Buffyverse is to be welcomed.
And this isn’t just a good time for the Joss Whedon-loving comic book fans. At the moment, it’s great to be a not-so-straight girl who simply loves comics.
The noughties have been the golden age for women-loving-women in comics: the new Catwoman is bi; dyky bad-ass Gotham cop Renee Montoya starred in Gotham Central, 52 Weeks and Crime Bible (that last one undid most of the good, but still wasn’t too bad) and had a hot relationship with the oh-so-gay Batwoman; Phyla-Vell and Heather finally came out in the Annhilation Conquest series; the I Was Kidnapped By Lesbian Pirates From Outer Space webcomic is now being published in six-monthly issues – and those are just the big names.
Gone are the days where the only women in comics wear impractical leotards and act as beards. Now is the time where they wear impractical sexy catsuits and make out with women in business suits and fedoras. Isn’t it great?
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Photo: Andi Pullar
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