This painful story of death and tragedy presented a vulnerable relationship which displayed that a queer romance is no less fraught than any straight romance, and that queerness itself is far from its only character. But as early as 1996, Gaiman was finding reasons to revisit the troubled couple of Hazel and Foxglove with Chris Bachalo and Mark Buckingham in Death: The Time of Your Life, which brings the two back for a misadventure with Dream’s older sister. Neil Gaiman and Shawn McManus’s The Sandman: A Game of You was a groundbreaking story in 1991 for its inclusion of a lesbian couple and trans woman in the main cast-although not without problems for its age. Fortunately, going forward, there would be a little more competition in the field. This spotlighting of a queer hero was enough to resurrect the award for Outstanding Comics for good. But for four issues in this limited engagement, Superman would be playing the role of Maggie’s backup. In due time, Sawyer became Superman’s own Commissioner Gordon, as he liaised with local law enforcement to curb super-crime in the City of Tomorrow. Her girlfriend, reporter Toby Raynes, would debut in Superman #9. The head of the Metropolis Special Crimes Unit, Maggie Sawyer was introduced into Superman’s world in 1987 with Superman #4.
was a four-issue limited series by Cindy Goff, Peter Grause and José Marzan, Jr., the first mainstream title to star an openly gay woman. There were no other nominees.įrom 1993-1995, no further awards were presented in this category, but in 1996, it was taken out of retirement for another DC title, without any competition.
In 1992, the third GLAAD Media Awards ceremony, The Flash won their first ever recognition for outstanding comic. This open and frank discussion of sexuality and queer coding in mainstream comics was unprecedented, all while presenting us with an openly queer character in a hero’s supporting cast. In The Flash #53,reformed Flash villain Pied Piper calls this out, while confessing to Wally West himself that he actually is gay.
In 1991, Flash writer William-Messner Loebs addressed a long-standing elephant in the writer’s room: the tendency in media to assign stereotypically homosexual traits to bad guys. Here, I’d like to share the stories of each comic under the DC banner to win this prestigious recognition to date. Since the prize’s debut, the company has garnered eleven GLAAD Awards for Outstanding Comic Books, nearly twice the number of any other publisher. DC has been in the running consistently ever since, too. In 1992, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation founded a new category in their annual GLAAD Media Awards, recognizing achievements in the comic book field-and DC received the very first one. Pride Month is designed to show those struggling to simply be themselves that they are not alone, and that the parts of themselves they’ve been made to fear are worthy of celebration. It’s why visibility in media, in literal parades, and yes-in comics-is so important.
It’s an act of self-declaration to a culture that ignored and resisted them for years. Pride Month is a joyful, celebratory occasion where for thirty days, every stripe of the queer community bands together to present themselves to the world without reservation.