Batwoman comes out to Gotham City

Batwoman comes out to Gotham City
Image: Ruby Rose as Batwoman.

DC comics has taken another step in representation after Batwoman, played by Australian model and actress; Ruby Rose officially came out as a lesbian on Sunday night’s episode of the CW superhero series.

While billionaire Kate Kane, the civilian identity of Batwoman and the cousin of Bruce Wayne (Batman) is already out as a lesbian to Gotham City, Batwoman has also officially come out – making her the first openly gay superhero in history.

In the midseason episode titled “How Queer Everything Is Today!” Batwoman is forced to reveal her sexuality by a hacker in order to prevent her actual identity as Kate Kane from being exposed.

Batwoman then comes out in Gotham’s CatCo magazine during an interview with Kara Danvers (Melissa Benoist) – better known to audiences as Supergirl.

While being comforted by Batwoman,  a high school student who was outed as a lesbian to her parents asks:

“Why didn’t you say you were super gay?”

Batwoman series showrunner, Caroline Dries, who is an openly gay woman herself, revealed in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that Batwoman’s coming out was planned from the beginning.

“Eventually Kate is going to realize that she is comfortable and out of the closet as Kate and then she puts on the suit and hides a huge part of who she is, when she can actually be doing good if she were truthful about who Batwoman is underneath the suit,” she said.

“She’s going to come out and there are going to be consequences.”

Batwoman premiered in October last year as the first superhero series in television history to feature an LGBTQI character as the central character.

However, the Orange Is The New Black alumni faced unfortunate backlash when it was announced she would appear in the show as she was not considered to be “lesbian enough” to play the Batwoman lead due to her gender fluidity.

“When I got cast as a lesbian in Batwoman, I didn’t know that being a gender-fluid woman meant that I couldn’t be a lesbian because I’m not a woman — not considered lesbian enough,” Rose told Entertainment Weekly in June last year.

“My initial response was “Pfft!” And then I was like, “Wait. Let me just figure this one out. How do I right this wrong, because if someone out there is upset by this, I need to know why and how to fix it.

“Maybe I need to make up another term, one that doesn’t step on any toes. One where I can be fluid in my gender, but also a lesbian, because otherwise, I’m not sure what I am.”

 

 

 

 

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