Will DC Comics’ New Gay POC Hero Go Over The Top?
By Arturo R. García
DC Comics has added to the buzz surrounding its’ relaunch with the announcement that Teen Titans will feature a gay POC character starting with the series’ third issue.
On one hand, this is something to be happy for, and Titans artist Brett Booth has already expressed his support for gay marriage and gay rights in discussing the new character, Miguel Jose Barragan, a.k.a. Bunker. But, as Booth wrote on his blog, he’s aware that he and series writer Scott Lobdell are wading into a complicated issue.
We wanted to show an interesting character who’s [sic] homosexuality is part of him, not something that’s hidden. Sure they are gay people who you wouldn’t know are gay right off the bat, but there are others who are a more flamboyant, and we thought it would be nice to actually see them portrayed in comics. Did we go over the top, I don’t think so. I wanted you to know he might be gay as soon as you see him. Our TT is partly about diversity of ANY kind, its about all kinds of teens getting together to help each other. It is a very difficult line to walk, will he be as I’ve read in some of the comments ‘fruity’? Not that I’m aware of. Will he be more effeminate than what we’ve seen before, the ‘typical’ gay male comic character, yes. Does it scare the shit out of me that I might inadvertently piss off the group I want to reflect in a positive way, you’re damn straight (pun intended!)
Booth also described other gay superheroes as looking and acting “like regular heterosexuals … they just happen to have sex with people of their own gender, under the covers and in the dark.” He did not specify which characters he was observing, but Booth’s view of what constitutes “regular” behavior is problematic, as The Mary Sue’s Christopher Holden points out:
Booth starts out his quote by implying that out “gay people who you wouldn’t know are gay right off the bat” are “hiding” their sexuality, without acknowledging that we live in a society that assumes straight until proven gay, where the attempts of gay men and women to only bring up their sexuality when it is actually relevant to a conversation, as when talking about significant others, and not when it isn’t, as when buying a shirt (a luxury enjoyed by all straight people), is interpreted as “hiding” by those they interact with. Perhaps Booth is self-consciously as worried as he needs to be.
Booth is also not accounting for one of comics’ big limitations as a medium: everything is rendered in still frames, so, while we can see heroes like Obsidian, Batwoman, Renee Montoya, Apollo and The Midnighter, we don’t get their voices and body language. So there’s nothing marking their sexuality other than what the creative team chooses to show us. It’s far trickier to use different kind of characterization techniques – vocal inflection, gestures, etc. – in a comic than in, say, a cartoon or a live-action setting.
Bunker will not be DC’s first “out” gay hero. In 1988, the company introduced Extraño, a character who would refer to himself as “auntie” and was played for laughs more often than not. The character was even infected with HIV by an “AIDS vampire” before his series, The New Guardians, was canceled.
It will also be interesting to see how Bunker’s backstory is addressed. On his blog, Booth mentioned this description from Lobdell:
He was raised in a very small Mexican village called El Chilar. He was very loved by his family and the village as well — and they were as accepting of his homosexuality as they were to his super powers when they first manifested. To that end he grew up in an angst-free environment. He was born out of the closet and so he has a very refreshing outlook on life.
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