After the very public departure of the original DC Comics New 52 creative team of J. H. Williams III and W. H. Blackman from Batwoman, over last-minute editorial interference and not allowing Kathy Kane – Batwoman’s alter ego – to marry her lesbian fiancée Maggie Sawyer, comes news of the book’s new writer.
Fan favorite writer Marc Andreyko, who enamored fans with his previous DC Comics title Manhunter becomes the new writer on Batwoman. He is also openly gay. That usually wouldn’t matter, but with the anti-gay marriage angle of the previous creative team’s departure picked up by mainstream media, this is not only good news for fans because Marc is an amazing writer, but it seems like a PR coup for DC too.
Here’s what Marc Andreyko had to say via his Favebook account:
And here is the original announcement by J.H. Williams III and W.H. Blackman about their departure. The original is available on Blackman’s website here and J.H. Williams’ site here (although Williams’ site seems down at the time of this writing):
- From the moment DC asked us to write Batwoman — a dream project for both of us — we were committed to the unofficial tagline “No Status Quo.” We felt that the series and characters should always be moving forward, to keep changing and evolving. In order to live up to our mantra and ensure that each arc took Batwoman in new directions, we carefully planned plotlines and story beats for at least the first five arcs well before we ever wrote a single issue. We’ve been executing on that plan ever since, making changes whenever we’ve come up with a better idea, but in general remaining consistent to our core vision.
Unfortunately, in recent months, DC has asked us to alter or completely discard many long-standing storylines in ways that we feel compromise the character and the series. We were told to ditch plans for Killer Croc’s origins; forced to drastically alter the original ending of our current arc, which would have defined Batwoman’s heroic future in bold new ways; and, most crushingly, prohibited from ever showing Kate and Maggie actually getting married. All of these editorial decisions came at the last minute, and always after a year or more of planning and plotting on our end.
We’ve always understood that, as much as we love the character, Batwoman ultimately belongs to DC. However, the eleventh-hour nature of these changes left us frustrated and angry — because they prevent us from telling the best stories we can. So, after a lot of soul-searching, we’ve decided to leave the book after Issue 26.
DC Comics responded to the anti-gay marriage accusation hurled against the company that mainstream media and vocal fans has taken. DC tweeted the following:
- As acknowledged by the creators involved, the editorial differences with the writers of BATWOMAN had nothing to do with the character’s sexual orientation.
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