Recently, it’s been announced that Teen Titans, as part of its New 52 reboot/relaunch, will be seeing a new gay member, in the form of the awkwardly named Bunker:

Bunker, real name Miguel Jose Barragan, is also Mexican, Catholic and camper than a row of tents (at least visually, as we have yet to see him in the pages on the comic actually speaking). He creates some kind of weird purple energy/telekinetic barriers, and his homosexuality is apparently a fundamental part of his character, so it will be focused on and dealt with, whilst still showing that he is heroic and a badass new member to the team.

But wait, what was that one word I used to describe him?

Camp, flamboyant, a flamer, queeny, gayer than the day is long, out and proud and throwing his hands around in such a fashion that there’s a genuine danger they could fling off him and cause a major traffic accident.

Hell, we can see it in one of the first images shared by artist Brett Booth, where Miguel appears to dress when out of his costume in a style of fashion not a million miles away from current famous gay teen, Kurt Hummel of Glee.

Bright, colourful, and a definite statement, it’s still an improvement on his rather garish superhero costume.

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Now, many of you may have noticed that when discussing gay characters in superhero comics, I rarely discuss Northstar, perhaps the first and most well known out gay superhero in mainstream comics. In fact, the few times I have mentioned him have been pretty disparaging.

This is through no fault of the character. I think Jean-Paul is a fascinating character, all bluster and rudeness, and yet a good man at his heart. The problem is that no one seems to know what to do with him. And once he came out...well, that was pretty much it for the character.

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Much like living gay culture itself, gays in comics have power couples, who lead the charge in visibility, finding acceptance and showing the world it’s okay to be gay (characters). But in comics, it’s pretty arguable that there are two major Power Couples (at least in terms of gay men, anyway). The Authority’s Apollo and the Midnighter, who pushed the envelope forward at DC around the turn of the millennium.

Followed, but quite possibly equalled, by Marvel’s own Young Avengers members, Wiccan and Hulkling.

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Link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/4237161/Stan-Lee-to-create-worlds-first-gay-superhero.html

Apparently Stan 'The Man' Lee has created the world's first gay superhero for a new US television drama. The hero in question will be named Thom Creed, a high school basketball player who hides both his super powers and sexuality from his teachers and peers. Well, I'm sorry Mr Lee, I think you're an absolute legend but I respectfully disagree. You are not creating the world's first homosexual superhero and you never will, it's already been done many times over.

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