Q. You are known for creating or developing a number of iconic female characters – Tara Chase in Queen & Country, Carrie Stetko in Whiteout, the Kate Kane Batwoman, etc. Is there any particular reason why you tend to write so many series with women in the lead role?
A. I wish I had an easy, simple answer for that, and I’m not sure that I do. It’s true that I was raised in a feminist household – I never grew up in an environment where it was permissible to apply a gender standard to what men could do or what women could do.
Second, I like women. I genuinely like them. I say this as an ostensibly straight guy, who can say that I like women and I don’t necessarily want to sleep with every one I meet. So, there’s that.
But, I think, in all honesty? In all sincerity? I female-identify. I like writing about female characters. I can even go back through my writing – and here I’m talking about the stuff I wrote when I was in my teens, stuff that should never, ever in a million years see print – and those stories almost universally have female leads. Now that I think about it, the very first thing I wrote of merit – and I say “merit” only in that it won a short story contest and got me out of school for a day – had Mrs. Claus as the lead character.
I can cite these various reasons, but I honestly can’t tell you exactly why I’ve gravitated toward female leads. There are, certainly, points where my writing evolved and I gained what, for me, were pretty crucial understandings of how to write women as my point-of-view characters. But I wish I could say, you know, “Well, I nearly drowned and was saved by a squad of nuns.” It’s nothing like that, it’s just that I like women, and I like writing female leads.
Q. Your writing has also demonstrated an affinity for lesbian, bisexual or otherwise queer-gendered female characters. Is a portrayal of non-hetero orientations important to you?
A. I think there are two things going on there. The first is I don’t like – and in particular I don’t like comics – that have been so tragically misrepresentative of the world. Maybe it goes back to my interest in Kitty Pryde. It mattered a great deal to me that she was Jewish, and although Marvel may not have realized it, it really did buy me as a faithful reader for the next four years.
Also, inasmuch as I have always been aware of feminism and interested in feminist politics, I’ve been very aware of sexual politics and issues of sexuality. And, not to be glib about it, but if I female-identify and I’m in a heterosexual relationship, what does that make me? I’ve always been comfortable in my own body, enough that I’m pretty content being biologically male. But certainly intellectually, and emotionally, I’d say that I’ve always identified far more as female than male.
Part of it, again, is really just wanting to hold up the mirror in such a way that more accurately reflects the world. We write these very fantastic stories where the Batmobile never gets caught in traffic, and yet, we don’t see guys kissing guys. That’s problematic! The more we fail to represent the world, the easier it becomes to say this doesn’t matter, or this isn’t normal, or this isn’t right. Instead, we should be putting it out there and saying, “This is part of life, this is what happens.”
Q. Can you give us an example of your efforts to better reflect the non-heterosexuality in the world in which we live?
A. When I wrote Whiteout, I very deliberately wanted to play with female homoeroticism. I’d been watching a lot of John Woo, and one of my favorite films is Hard Boiled. There’s that moment when Chow Yun-fat and Tony Leung – I think it’s Tony Leung – are in the morgue, right? And there’s that speech about:
“When this is over, I want to go someplace. I want to go to Antarctica.”
“Antarctica. Is it not always cold there?”
“Yes, but it is also always light, and that would be nice after so much darkness...”
... and then there’s this poignant moment when they’re looking at each other, and you just scream at the screen, Kiss him!! You know?
I came out of that film thinking that we have all these buddy cop stories, and they’re always two guys, so I thought about doing a buddy cop story with two women and playing with that homoerotic subtext. It wasn’t until I was working with [Whiteout artist] Steve Lieber that the subtext actually became text, with him adding in things like the Dykes to Watch Out For mug – which, in retrospect, I kinda wish we hadn’t done, because it turned into something far more overt. Carrie Stetko isn’t supposed to enter that story queer – she may be bi-curious, but she doesn’t know it in Whiteout. After all, she’s come out of a marriage with a husband who’s died, so she’s entering the story believing she is hetero.
Q. Was that the case with Renee Montoya, whom you featured prominently in Gotham Central and later made into the new Question?
A. I knew from the start that Renee was queer. I really don’t know why. She always read to me as queer and in the closet, so I always wrote her that way. I finished my first story with her knowing that at some point down the road, eventually Two-Face would say to her, “I love you,” and she would be like, “Good luck with that!”
Q. What about Bridget Logan in the Atticus Kodiak novels?
A. I knew she was bi, but I also knew that her bisexuality was somewhat insincere. Bridget does a lot of stuff in the early novels for effect and appearance, because that’s the character. It was her statement of rejecting everything from this working-class Bronx, Roman Catholic cop family background. The best situation for her, if she could have gotten away with it, would have been finding herself a nice African-American lesbian to bring home to dad.
In the same series, Dale is gay. And it mattered a great deal to me that Dale’s relationship with his partner Ethan is stable from the moment Ethan enters the series. They don’t share a lot of screen time, but I really wanted to make it clear that, of all the dysfunction that’s going on in the Kodiak series, Dale and Ethan are not part of that. In fact, they have the healthiest relationship.
Q. At this point, we have to finish off the list... what about Kate Kane as Batwoman?
A. I was given Kate – she was gay when she started. And God bless DC Comics for that. I mean, there are many things you can perhaps lay a torch at that building for, but DC said from the start that they were bringing Batwoman back, and she was going to be gay. She’s going to be gay. We’re not going to say maybe she’s gay, we’re not going to do a Very Special Episode of Batwoman where she comes out. She’s queer from the start, and she’s perfectly fine with it. Any other trauma in her life notwithstanding, she is not at all troubled by her orientation.
At the time, I was writing the Renee-and-Charlie storyline in 52, and the story dealt with Kate, so I ended up with the character as a result. And I’m very glad and proud, I hasten to add, of what [editor] Michael Siglain and [artist] J.H. Williams III and I did with the character. When all is said and done, there will be a short list of my works for which I will be remembered, and I hope Batwoman: Elegy will be one of them. I’m very proud of that one.
Q. About three years passed between Kate’s introduction as Batwoman in 52, and her becoming the star of Detective Comics, in the Elegy storyline. Were there any unexpected stumbling blocks once it came time to give Kate her own series? Did DC’s support for the title come and go in the interim?
A. I have two things to say on that particular subject. The first is, I wrote the first issue of Elegy at 22 pages of script; it was really tightly done. But as I was reading it over, I went, “Oh my god, nowhere in here do we know she’s queer!” I’d written an issue No. 1 for this character that needs to introduce all these things, and this fairly crucial detail is nowhere evident! Never mind the fact that this issue was going to get some attention from the queer community, because they were going to want to see how Kate was represented. It would have been a horrible mistake to release the issue and not make that clear.
But it was tightly scripted. I was scripting specifically for [J.H. Williams III], and if you’ve seen Elegy, you know how those pages are laid out. There is not a lot of wi
ggle-room. I called my editor – it wasn’t Michael Siglain at the time, it was somebody else – and said, “Look, I need two more pages. I never ask for extra pages, I never do. But it’s a first issue, I think it’s justified, here’s why.” And the editor in question said, “No way, we can’t do it, you’re just going to have to make it work or leave it out.” I said, “No, you don’t understand. This has to be in there, and I don’t have any room, you’ve gotta give me two more pages.” And he said, “Well, I’ll talk to [then-executive editor] Dan DiDio.”
So I got off the phone and called Dan, right away, and said that I needed two extra pages and here’s why. Dan sort of laughed and said, “I’ll do you a deal, you can have your two extra pages if you get me the script for the second issue of Final Crisis: Revelations by next week. And I said, “Hah! It’s already in!” To which he said, “Well, then you’ve got your two pages.”
The editor in question emails me half an hour later with, “I talked to Dan, and there’s no way we can get you those extra two pages.” I wrote him back and said, “That’s really funny, because I just got off the phone with him.”
I know there are people who will throw really big stones at Dan DiDio – but when I explained the situation to Dan, there wasn’t a moment’s hesitation. He was like, “Hell yes, take the two pages and let me know if you’re going to need two more.”
The other thing worth mentioning is that Jim and I would have these conversations while we were working on Elegy, and wonder exactly how much we could get away with. The big one that worried us was the scene when Kate and Renee have been in bed together, and Renee’s coming out of the bathroom. And they’re having what, to me, was a very honest sort of new-in-love-giddy-moment – Kate was saying, “Don’t go to work today, stay with me.” Jim drew the kiss on that page, and it is without a doubt the best kiss I have ever seen in a comic book. But when I saw that page, I did wonder if we’d get flack for it.
So the editor, Michael Siglain, submitted the page to DC and we didn’t hear anything and we didn’t hear anything and we didn’t hear anything. Finally, I called up Mike and asked, “What’s going on with the book?”, to which he replied, “Oh yeah, it’s fine. Why, were you worried?” I was like, “Yeah, kinda,” and he was like, “Nah, nah, nah, we are past that benchmark, miles past. You guys are good to go.”
So. There was support at DC for Elegy, and I will always grant them credit for that.
Q. Did you have any thoughts on what might have come next for Kate and her cast of characters?
A. My initial plan, if I’d stayed on the book, would’ve gone the better part of a year with Kate and Maggie Sawyer circling each other and getting closer and closer to trying a relationship. At which point, of course, Renee would come back! Just after Kate and Maggie had their first kiss, Renee would be knocking on the door saying, “Hey, I’m back in town!” As a writer, I try to never make it easy for the characters – my feeling from the start was that Kate and Renee are madly in love, but they’re horrible for each other. They bring out the worst in each other, they burn too hot. One of them is eventually going to have to grow up and say, “Okay, that’s enough of that.”
Q. Batwoman: Elegy is often recommended to non-comics readers – and women in particular – along the lines of, “You think you don’t like comics, read this.” But actually, quite a few of your titles appear on lists of books that women who are new to comics should read. Do you think this has affected your career? If so, how?
A. In all sincerity, I have a horrible, horrible sense of my career at any given moment. Apparently, I’m pretty well known in the comics industry, but that’s kind of like saying, “Well, you’re the biggest tadpole in this pond!” It’s not a big pool. When our bestselling comic book barely breaks a hundred thousand copies, that’s not a lot compared to a readership that should be, frankly, in the millions.
Look, you know how the Internet works. The people who don’t like stuff are loud about not liking it, just as there are people out there who say, “Rucka’s got an agenda.” If that affects my numbers, then it affects my numbers. I don’t know, and I frankly don’t care, because at the end of the day it comes back to one thing: I want to tell the best stories I can tell about the characters I am writing.
Q. It sounds as if your interaction with the Internet, from your standing as a working professional, has left a bit of a bad taste in your mouth. Has it?
A. The Internet has made it impossible for me to read a review. For the most part, comics criticism is a fictional beast, it doesn’t really exist. There are very few people writing comics criticism who apply a critical standard to it. Most people write comics criticism on the basis of, “I didn’t like this and here’s why...”, and normally, the “here’s why” comes out to “... because I wasn’t the guy who wrote it.” There’s a common phrase in the industry – and I’ve heard it most often attributed to Mark Waid – that there are no fans, only people who want your job. There is, I think, a certain truth to that.
There’s a difference between looking at the Internet for ego gratification and looking at it for fan and audience interaction. The problem is that those boundaries can get real, real thin. I want to be able to talk to people about the work, yes, and I want to make myself available to people who want to talk about the work. But I have no interest in making myself available to be a punching bag, and I don’t think that’s unreasonable.
Meeting people in person is entirely different. You know, I like going to conventions to meet fans. The only good thing about going to Comic-Con this year is that I’m going to see some fans – there will be some people who will want to talk to me about what they’ve read. Those are the reasons that make the trip worthwhile. Otherwise, I would not go to San Diego. I really wouldn’t go.
Q. You’ve written quite a few creator-owned comics, but also DC and Marvel titles where you inevitably have to surrender the characters involved to the next creative team in line. In what ways do you go about making a particular character and situation yours for the duration of your custodianship? Conversely, when it’s your turn to leave the book, how hard is it to let go of that character?
A. It’s very hard. There are very few books that I’ve left of my own accord. The gaping wound in my soul that is my Wonder Woman run comes close to healing every now and then, only to re-open. I was removed from that book, and because of that, I wound up doing what in my opinion is a capital crime to do to a character: the equivalent of a drive-by. I wrote a story where Diana killed a guy [Maxwell Lord, to free Superman from his control], and there was a lot of story to follow that. But pretty much as soon as we had Diana kill Max, we were told, “Okay, you’re done!” But – but – but – but –
Talking about the things DC didn’t do well, they in essence tried to hush this up. They loved that I sold books, but they didn’t want to use the story. And I was like, “You can’t do that!” I hate it when writers come onto something for two, three, or four issues just to chop off a character’s arm and then leave again. If you do something that fundamental to a character, you need to own it and answer it. There was a long answer to what Diana had done, and I wish I’d been able to write it.
When I left Detective Comics the first time around, the editorial situation had deteriorated so badly that the editor at the time pretty much didn’t have the balls to say, “I want you off the book.” So, instead, he made me as miserable as he possibly could. He succeeded. He made me perfectly miserable. With Checkmate, at least, I left because of workload issues.
You asked me about what’s involved in writing this stuff while you’re there – and the answer is, you need to invest, and that’s an emotional process as much as an intellectual one. You become the character’s advocate. For that reason, departure is always going to be painful.
Q. Is it fair to say that if it doesn’t hurt when you leave, you weren’t doing it right in the first place?
A. I actually think that’s an entirely fair way to put it. My daughter’s been doing
theater, and will tell me that she’s very, very nervous before a performance. And I’ll tell her how that’s a good sign – the fact that you’re nervous means that it matters to you. Be proud of that, and use it. It’s not going to make you less nervous, but investing in what you’re doing is a fine thing, and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Q. Since you mentioned your daughter, are there any ways in which being a parent affects your writing and the kinds of stories you want to tell?
A. Not in the way I think you’d think. Before I became a parent, I could sit and watch episodes of Oz for hours on end.
I find that I can write some very dark, very scary things. Walking Dead, which is an Atticus Kodiak book, is pretty dark! It involves a lot of exorcism writing. Prior to having kids, I was aware of how a work would be perceived should children of a certain age read it, but I’m even more aware of it now. My 11-year-old son keeps asking, “When can I read your novels?”, and I keep telling him, “Not yet! A couple more years, but not yet.” Of our two kids, he is, in many ways, the more emotionally sensitive. Dashiell is very tough, very fierce – she externalizes, and doesn’t hide what she’s feeling at all. Elliot is much quieter, and internalizes things much more directly. He’s very much a still-water-running-deep.
Q. Do you have any advice for female creators trying to get their start in the industry?
A. Oh, God. I’m really leery of answering this one, because I’m a guy.
Nobody enters comics the same way... that’s No. 1. I got into comics because I was a novelist, which isn’t a route that’s feasible for everybody. It’s not like I can recommend, “Go and get your first two novels published, and then get a deal for another two, and then hopefully know somebody who works at a comics company.”
Chicks Dig Comics: A Celebration of Comic Books by the Women Who Love Them Page 16