cover story
Holy diversity Batman!
‘Batwoman’ premieres on CW
By Breanna Henry
TV Media
I
may or may not own an over-
flowing stack of comic books
that’s getting dangerously
close to weighing more than its
current shelf can handle, so it’s
safe to trust me when I say that
Batwoman, a.k.a. Kate Kane, is
a fantastic character with a ton
of incredible story potential.
As someone who’s already a
fan, I’m very interested to see
how CW’s “Batwoman” recre-
ates, reimagines or reinvents
the title character, and luckily I
won’t have to wait long. With
the beautifully androgynous
Ruby Rose (“The Meg,” 2018)
at the helm (or cowl) and Ra-
chel Skarsten (“Acquainted,”
2018) playing the totally
twisted Alice, CW’s newest
prime-time addition to its DC
Comics-based Arrowverse —
“Batwoman” — premieres
Sunday, Oct. 6.
Not everyone seems to
be as excited as I am about
CW’s “Batwoman.” Many of
the preemptively negative
thoughts are likely the result of
people being afraid. After all,
Batwoman has a lot of fans,
and people may be worried the
show will portray the iconic
and beloved character poorly.
Much of the online negative
sentiment about the show
revolves around lead actress
Rose, whose credits include a
few less-than-stellar films.
Rose’s castmate Skarsten is
no stranger to caped crusaders.
The Toronto native played the
super-screeching Black Canary
in “Birds of Prey” on the WB at
just 16 years old.
Joining the two lead fe-
males are Dougray Scott
(“Departure”) as Batwoman’s
father, Jacob, Elizabeth Anweis
(“NCIS: Los Angeles”) as her
stepmother, Catherine, and
Sam Littlefield (“The Mes-
sengers”) as Mouse. The cast
looks fantastic, the trailers
seem cool, and it seems hard to
go wrong when you have such
great source material with
which to work.
2 | Screentime
Rachel Skarsten stars in “Batwoman”
to have been carried over to the
The fact that Skarsten has
new TV series, but other such
been cast as the “Through the
DC Comics television programs
Looking Glass”-quoting psy-
(“Arrow,” “The Flash,” “Super-
chopath Alice actually provides
girl,” “Titans,” etc.) really seem
a big hint as to where CW’s
“Batwoman” creators Caroline to love dark, gritty and grey
post-processing, and the look
Dries (“Smallville”) and Greg
feels right for the city of Go-
Berlanti (“Titans”) drew their
tham. Still, fans likely hope the
inspiration for the show. Those
show will attempt to pay some
who’ve read the divisive 2010
homage to the source material
Batwoman comic “Elegy” by
with a bit of outlandish cinema-
Greg Rucka probably know
what to expect from Batwoman tography at some point.
It’s already become a topic
and Alice’s on-screen relation-
of conversation when it comes
ship. For those not familiar
to this series, so it’s worth men-
with Rucka’s work, just know
tioning that both Batwoman
that you’re in for some of the
and the woman who plays her
“Batwoman” comic books’
on TV are gay. Somewhat comi-
most outrageous, unexpected
and disturbing twists and turns. cally and incredibly ironically,
the original Batwoman (Kathy,
The psychedelic imagery and
not Kate) was introduced way
mind-warping colors for which
back in 1956 solely to discour-
the comic is known don’t seem
October 2, 2019 | East Oregonian and Hermiston Herald
age a controversy that arose
in the previous year regarding
Batman’s own perceived homo-
sexuality. After the Batwoman
character was written out of
the DC Universe in 1964, edi-
tors refused to bring her back
despite demand from readers,
calling her a “hapless female”
who would be “gone for good.”
It wasn’t until 2006, 50 years
post-debut, that DC announced
Batwoman’s rebirth. In addition
to swapping the old-fashioned
name Kathy for the more mod-
ern Kate, editors revealed that
today’s Batwoman would be a
Jewish lesbian. Far from the lip-
stick-toting Batman-iac she was
in the 1960s, Kate Kane was a
directionless party girl, lost in
life after being discharged from
the military under the don’t ask,
don’t tell policy that discour-
aged homosexual service mem-
bers. Whether it was the murder
of her mother, the loss of her
partner, the thrill of breaking
some bad-guy bones, or Bat-
man himself, we may never
know why Kate was inspired to
put down her drink to pick up a
cowl, cape and bright red wig,
becoming the Batwoman fans
know and love today.
The character’s sexuality is
more than just a gimmick or
attempt at placation. Despite
DC bigwigs saying Kate was
made a lesbian for little reason
other than differentiating her
from other members of the
“Bat-family,” it meant enough
to series writers Williams and
Blackman for them to leave the
job when DC refused to allow
Batwoman to get married to
her longtime girlfriend, Maggie
Sawyer. Long and storied char-
acter history aside, Batwoman
is amazing, and you should
think about adding her to your
pull-list the next time you visit
your local comic book shop.
If you’ve enjoyed CW’s
Arrowverse television adapta-
tions of comic book characters
so far, you’ll likely want to
keep up with “Batwoman.” On
Sunday, Oct. 6, “Batwoman”
premieres on CW, and it will be
interesting to see how online
sentiment changes once the
show has actually aired. CW
is bringing a kick-butt LGBT+
icon to the mainstream of the
small screen, and if you aren’t
a comic book fan already, you
may very well become one.