DC Comics says they’re getting unprecedented orders for Superman: Son of Kal-El #5, the issue where Jon Kent comes out as bisexual. (DC Comics)
A Superman colourist has sensationally quit over changes to the new bisexual Man of Steel’s motto.
DC Comics announced earlier this month that Jonathan Kent will be a different kind of Superman to his famous father. He combats climate change disasters, protests against the deportation of refugees and is going to be in a relationship with a man.
But Gabe Eltaeb, a colourist who helps produce the Superman: Son Kal-El comics, said he is going to quit the company in protest against the overhaul, he said on comic creator Ethan Van Sciver’s YouTube livestream 13 October.
“I’m finishing out my contract with DC,” he told Van Sciver, who was ousted from DC Comics and since rallied against comic books that deal with themes such as cultural diversity. Oh, the horrors.
“I’m tired of this sh*t. I’m tired of them ruining these characters – they don’t have a right to do this.”
Superman colourist whines about ‘America’ being replaced with ‘better world’ in motto
For Eltaeb, the studio’s move to tweak the superhero’s motto was the final straw.
“What really pissed me off was saying t’ruth, justice, and a better world’,” Eltaeb fumed. “F*ck that it was truth, justice, and the American way.
“My grandpa almost died in World War II; we don’t have a right to destroy sh*t that people died for to give us. It’s a bunch of f***ing nonsense.”
But he sought to stress that it’s not Kent’s sexuality that was the reason he departed.
“It’s not about gay or anything else,” he said, before recalling the time he pushed Jerry Robinson’s wheelchair at a Comic-Con convention in 2009.
“That’s the man who invented the Joker,” he explained. “I would work the DC booth back then. I remember bending down to his face and telling him, thank you for creating these characters, so people like me can waltz in and get a job.”
Having Superman, one of America’s most archetypal superheroes, come out as bisexual was met with cheers from fans.
Kent took the mantle of Superman in the franchise this year after being introduced to in 2015 – Clark Kent first donned a red cape back in 1938.
“The idea of replacing Clark Kent with another straight white savior felt like a missed opportunity,” said Tom Taylor, who writes the series, in an interview.
Superman, he said, “has to have new fights — real-world problems — that he could stand up to as one of the most powerful people in the world”.