LGBT+ Marvel Characters Discussion

[NewMutant]

I think bisexuality is harder to convey in comics, the LGBTQA characters are not very prominent and given the timeline of comics. Stories that take place in a day can sometimes be a years worth of issues in our time, and so on and so forth. So much of comic cannon and continuity is taken at panel value that subtext is nonexistence or lost on lots of readers.

[Wiccan615]

@Kieran I agree with what you're saying, perhaps I wasn't good at wording what I was saying xD what I meant to say is that Mystique in general is a far more prominent character in the Marvelverse than any other openly LGBT character. So some may view her as the "most prominent" LGBT character simply due to her being bi and having the most appearances. It's just that "prominence" doesn't have any meaning since it's never really explored or discussed at all, especially if you compare her to the bisexual Daken.

Also Kieran is most def not biphobic, I think this has more to do with the lack of portrayal and storytelling and less to do with which letter of the LGBT acronym is getting showcased. Most of us are open to all types of LGBT characters, as long as they're well written and properly handled, and in Mystiques's case her bisexuality is almost never addressed, unlike other bi characters on this list. We're hoping that changes with the new book coming up with her, Daken, Laura and Sabertooth.

[Beetle]

I dont think it has anything to do with biphobia, and more that the whole relationship with Destiny has been footnoted by writer after writer who hasn't confirmed it, explored it or even brought up Mystique's sexuality again as a story point outside of straight relationships.

Calling that fact, and adding up that it equates to Mystique's bisexuality being questionable seen as we've only been told of her having one relationship with a female, does not equal biphobia, and if anything, highlights another oft forgotten section of the spectrum of sexuality, those who are just curious/questioning/one offers, who will go with one person of the same sex, but then never again.

My first boyfriend, he's like that, went out with me for 5 mths when we were 16/17 and when we ended, has never ever slept with a man again and identifies as straight, not bi.

I'm not the one saying that curious or questioning characters don't count, that they aren't good enough. It's bad enough that curious and questioning people in real life are treated with suspicion and accusations from heterosexuals, they should not be treated that way by the LGBT community as well. It is not fair to exclude them, they face hatred and bigotry just as the LGBT community. To say that they are not good enough representatives because they've only had one relationship with someone of the same gender is insulting.

I have been grouping them together with bisexuals for brevity's sake and that may have been disrespectful and that's my mistake.

I am not saying that Kieran_Frost is biphobic. But I feel like this is bisexual (or polysexual) erasure that a lot of people (even those in the LGBT community) take part in, that people will jump through hoops to disqualify women like Mystique or Psylocke as women who like women, just because they have a history of sleeping with men as well. I have no patience for this gold star gay bullshit.

[Wiccan615]

^i don't think you're wrong either Beetle, I've seen people who are questioning get shunned by both sides. Lots of people think that sexuality is black and white, but it's far from that, so I understand your perspective.

I think the thing with Mystique is that it's the authors that always mention that "Mystique is bi" but Mystique herself never really addressed the "I'm bi" or "I'm questioning" scenario that many people who deal with that go through and we never really got to see her relationship with Destiny, it all happened behind the scenes. Because of that, it's difficult to take that side of her seriously since it occurred during a time when censorship was rampant and since then we've hardly seen anything on panel to address it, you know? That's why her "prominence" as an LGBT+ figure is shoddy to some of us but her identity is still what it is, we just want it to be at least addressed and expanded upon in-panel and that doesn't mean that she has to be with another woman, it could be her just passively alluding to her sexuality (Ms. America anyone?) or at least have her recall her love for Destiny again since (to my knowledge at least, I haven't kept up with the books) I don't think she has even mentioned her in a while.

[Tiamatty]

I'm not the one saying that curious or questioning characters don't count, that they aren't good enough. It's bad enough that curious and questioning people in real life are treated with suspicion and accusations from heterosexuals, they should not be treated that way by the LGBT community as well. It is not fair to exclude them, they face hatred and bigotry just as the LGBT community. To say that they are not good enough representatives because they've only had one relationship with someone of the same gender is insulting.

I have been grouping them together with bisexuals for brevity's sake and that may have been disrespectful and that's my mistake.

I am not saying that Kieran_Frost is biphobic. But I feel like this is bisexual (or polysexual) erasure that a lot of people (even those in the LGBT community) take part in, that people will jump through hoops to disqualify women like Mystique or Psylocke as women who like women, just because they have a history of sleeping with men as well. I have no patience for this gold star gay bullshit.

The issue is more that the biggest LGBT characters at Marvel are characters whose LGBT status is essentially never actually addressed. Mystique had a romantic relationship with Destiny, but over the past 20 years, that relationship has gotten only occasional references, and it's still the only romantic or sexual relationship we've ever seen her have with a woman. She sleeps with one man after another - a somewhat disconcerting number of her stories over the past 25 years have revolved around her sleeping with men. She has a history of being written as a male fantasy, and it feels like even her bisexuality is a part of that.

With Psylocke, she had a single arc in a low-selling title that had her become involved with a woman who was splintered off from a man she'd already fallen in love with. And it was never mentioned outside that single arc. If it never gets brought up again, and if no one knows it happened in the first place, it's hard to consider her a great LGBT character.

This isn't about "gold star" stuff. I would have no problem, for example, with a writer deciding to tell tell a story where a character who's always been gay falls in love with someone of the opposite sex; and if it happened, I would still consider the character gay up until the character declared him/herself as bisexual. It's not about putting down people or character who are heterosexual but have a relationship with someone of the same sex. But if a person who does that still says they're straight, then they're straight.

Bisexuality is largely about attraction. A bisexual person may never so much as kiss someone of the same sex, but they are still attracted to people of the same sex. Not just one specific person, but in general. There's a difference between "I like women" and "I like a woman." The former is a bisexual, the latter is not.

And right now, as far as we're aware, the two most popular characters who are LGBT are both the latter. We don't actually know if Mystique likes women, or if she only liked a woman. There's no indications that Psylocke likes women, only that she liked a woman.

Can you see the problem where the biggest LGBT characters are, going by on-panel evidence, at best "questioning" rather than flat-out "queer"?

[Beetle]

The issue is more that the biggest LGBT characters at Marvel are characters whose LGBT status is essentially never actually addressed. Mystique had a romantic relationship with Destiny, but over the past 20 years, that relationship has gotten only occasional references, and it's still the only romantic or sexual relationship we've ever seen her have with a woman. She sleeps with one man after another - a somewhat disconcerting number of her stories over the past 25 years have revolved around her sleeping with men. She has a history of being written as a male fantasy, and it feels like even her bisexuality is a part of that.

With Psylocke, she had a single arc in a low-selling title that had her become involved with a woman who was splintered off from a man she'd already fallen in love with. And it was never mentioned outside that single arc. If it never gets brought up again, and if no one knows it happened in the first place, it's hard to consider her a great LGBT character.

This isn't about "gold star" stuff. I would have no problem, for example, with a writer deciding to tell tell a story where a character who's always been gay falls in love with someone of the opposite sex; and if it happened, I would still consider the character gay up until the character declared him/herself as bisexual. It's not about putting down people or character who are heterosexual but have a relationship with someone of the same sex. But if a person who does that still says they're straight, then they're straight.

Bisexuality is largely about attraction. A bisexual person may never so much as kiss someone of the same sex, but they are still attracted to people of the same sex. Not just one specific person, but in general. There's a difference between "I like women" and "I like a woman." The former is a bisexual, the latter is not.

And right now, as far as we're aware, the two most popular characters who are LGBT are both the latter. We don't actually know if Mystique likes women, or if she only liked a woman. There's no indications that Psylocke likes women, only that she liked a woman.

Can you see the problem where the biggest LGBT characters are, going by on-panel evidence, at best "questioning" rather than flat-out "queer"?

So this isn't about gold star gays but Mystique has still slept with too many men? Mystique can sleep with a hundred men and only have one relationship with one woman in her century of living and still be bisexual. And her relationship with Destiny wasn't exactly for male fantasy, especially considering that Destiny is best known as a wrinkly old woman, it couldn't be further from male fantasy, it was about love.

Psylocke fell in love with the female part of Fantomex, that revelation was a major part of why she chose Cluster over Jean Phillipe. Hell I'd argue that Cluster is the equivalent of a trans woman. She was a female mind born into a male body and was finally given a body that was her own when she was reborn.

My question is if these relationships were still ongoing right now, with as much on panel confirmation as we've ever had (Mystique and Destiny telling eachother they love each other but not saying the word bisexual, Psylocke getting naked with Cluster), would we still be having this argument? Are you going to discount Rictor or Shatterstar in the future if they one day break up and exclusively date women?

[Kieran_Frost]

I think bisexuality is harder to convey in comics, the LGBTQA characters are not very prominent and given the timeline of comics. Stories that take place in a day can sometimes be a years worth of issues in our time, and so on and so forth. So much of comic cannon and continuity is taken at panel value that subtext is nonexistence or lost on lots of readers.

Agreed. It's a balancing act. You can't only show one side, BUT if you only shown one side (i.e. they are in a relationship with someone) some will feel it's being ignored. How many bi characters do we see in long term relationships? Off the top of my head Moondragon & Phyla is the only one I can think of (and they're both dead).

@Kieran I agree with what you're saying, perhaps I wasn't good at wording what I was saying xD what I meant to say is that Mystique in general is a far more prominent character in the Marvelverse than any other openly LGBT character. So some may view her as the "most prominent" LGBT character simply due to her being bi and having the most appearances. It's just that "prominence" doesn't have any meaning since it's never really explored or discussed at all, especially if you compare her to the bisexual Daken.

Ahhhhhhh! Then we are indeed on the same page; because I agree with this. Mystique is the most famous character who happens to be LGBT, of this I think we can all agree. Just such a shame her bisexuality/trans/curious/questioning status is so rare and so forgotten by nearly all writers. I mean just in the last 5 years; she's been romantically involved with Wolverine, Daken, Sabertooth, Fantomex, Prof X (LOL!!!), Iceman... now what is interesting: Daken, Fantomex (and Iceman, the old queen) are all LGBT (and Claremont always considered Wolverine bi).

Most of us are open to all types of LGBT characters, as long as they're well written and properly handled, and in Mystiques's case her bisexuality is almost never addressed, unlike other bi characters on this list. We're hoping that changes with the new book coming up with her, Daken, Laura and Sabertooth.

I'm soooooooooooo excited to have Daken back in an on-going (that isn't written by Remender). I have great faith in Charles Soule; it's gonna be EPIC!!!!!

Also, how cute is this!

Calling that fact, and adding up that it equates to Mystique's bisexuality being questionable seen as we've only been told of her having one relationship with a female, does not equal biphobia, and if anything, highlights another oft forgotten section of the spectrum of sexuality, those who are just curious/questioning/one offers, who will go with one person of the same sex, but then never again.
My first boyfriend, he's like that, went out with me for 5 mths when we were 16/17 and when we ended, has never ever slept with a man again and identifies as straight, not bi.

Very good point, we must not forget that either. And you have those who dislike being labelled by society (I could see Mystique being one of those); who don't want to "name" what they feel and hate when people make them do it. We just don't know, because we never heard Mystique comment on it. Fingers crossed that all changes in Death of Wolverine: Logan's Legacy #4

I think the thing with Mystique is that it's the authors that always mention that "Mystique is bi" but Mystique herself never really addressed the "I'm bi" or "I'm questioning" scenario that many people who deal with that go through and we never really got to see her relationship with Destiny, it all happened behind the scenes. Because of that, it's difficult to take that side of her seriously since it occurred during a time when censorship was rampant and since then we've hardly seen anything on panel to address it, you know? That's why her "prominence" as an LGBT+ figure is shoddy to some of us but her identity is still what it is, we just want it to be at least addressed and expanded upon in-panel and that doesn't mean that she has to be with another woman, it could be her just passively alluding to her sexuality (Ms. America anyone?) or at least have her recall her love for Destiny again since (to my knowledge at least, I haven't kept up with the books) I don't think she has even mentioned her in a while.

Beautifully put.

[Kieran_Frost]

The issue is more that the biggest LGBT characters at Marvel are characters whose LGBT status is essentially never actually addressed. Mystique had a romantic relationship with Destiny, but over the past 20 years, that relationship has gotten only occasional references, and it's still the only romantic or sexual relationship we've ever seen her have with a woman. She sleeps with one man after another - a somewhat disconcerting number of her stories over the past 25 years have revolved around her sleeping with men. She has a history of being written as a male fantasy, and it feels like even her bisexuality is a part of that.

Very succinctly put.

With Psylocke, she had a single arc in a low-selling title that had her become involved with a woman who was splintered off from a man she'd already fallen in love with. And it was never mentioned outside that single arc. If it never gets brought up again, and if no one knows it happened in the first place, it's hard to consider her a great LGBT character.

Psylocke's an interesting one. If only she'd finished the series WITH Cluster, I think we could see this as "opening the doors" to her realization. But because she broke away, and almost felt like it was all a lie, it becomes problematic. I'd love to ask Humphries what he considered her. Does anyone remember if he stated this? AT THE SAME TIME, it was a very clear LGBT relationship (more on-panel kissing and female/female love than Karma's ever dreamed of having). How do we not count it? I don't know if Psylocke is "bisexual" but she definitely falls under the "queer umbrella" when it comes to LGBT representation in comics. It was a good step. Like Buffy in Season 8. She's not bi, just queer. If that makes sense?

This isn't about "gold star" stuff. I would have no problem, for example, with a writer deciding to tell tell a story where a character who's always been gay falls in love with someone of the opposite sex; and if it happened, I would still consider the character gay up until the character declared him/herself as bisexual. It's not about putting down people or character who are heterosexual but have a relationship with someone of the same sex. But if a person who does that still says they're straight, then they're straight.
Bisexuality is largely about attraction. A bisexual person may never so much as kiss someone of the same sex, but they are still attracted to people of the same sex. Not just one specific person, but in general. There's a difference between "I like women" and "I like a woman." The former is a bisexual, the latter is not.

All excellent points.

And right now, as far as we're aware, the two most popular characters who are LGBT are both the latter. We don't actually know if Mystique likes women, or if she only liked a woman. There's no indications that Psylocke likes women, only that she liked a woman.

RUDE!!!

Can you see the problem where the biggest LGBT characters are, going by on-panel evidence, at best "questioning" rather than flat-out "queer"?

The biggest question is: is there a coloration between the "most famous characters who happen to be LGBT" and the fact their sexuality isn't a big part of their story? Does it make it easier for readers/less threatening? Does it make Marvel think it will be less a problem when it comes to advertising, so they are more willing to invest in those characters? Or is it just a coincidence? Similar to the idea is it a coincidence the only LGBT solo stars have been bi? Well, that's not true, at-least we now have Loki for trans. And how ADORABLE was that scene with Odin? I wish I had a scan.

[Tiamatty]

So this isn't about gold star gays but Mystique has still slept with too many men? Mystique can sleep with a hundred men and only have one relationship with one woman in her century of living and still be bisexual. And her relationship with Destiny wasn't exactly for male fantasy, especially considering that Destiny is best known as a wrinkly old woman, it couldn't be further from male fantasy, it was about love.

No, Mystique's relationship with Destiny was not, under Claremont, a male fantasy. But since Destiny's death, Mystique has often been written as a male fantasy. The fact that she is (probably) bisexual factors into that - the idea of a girlfriend who'd be totally up for threesomes with other chicks.

And I actually specifically addressed the numbers thing. I said that bisexuality is about attraction. Even if a bisexual woman never actually so much as kisses another woman, she is still attracted to women in general. Not to a specific woman, as is the case - from what we've seen - with Mystique and Psylocke. either of them have shown an attraction to women. They've each shown an attraction to a specific woman. Frankly, neither of them even seem to be "questioning" - when Psylocke hooked up with Cluster, we never saw her wondering what it meant. While it's still possible that a writer will come along and make Psylocke specifically bisexual, right now, the on-panel evidence doesn't actually indicate that. Right now, the on-panel evidence indicates she's a heterosexual woman who fell in love with a specific person who happened to be female.

Psylocke fell in love with the female part of Fantomex, that revelation was a major part of why she chose Cluster over Jean Phillipe. Hell I'd argue that Cluster is the equivalent of a trans woman. She was a female mind born into a male body and was finally given a body that was her own when she was reborn.

I actually agree that Cluster is equivalent to a trans woman. Which is part of what makes Psylocke's attraction to her more complicated. Psylocke fell in love with a person she believed to be a male. That person turned out to be a female, and Psylocke, after initially rejecting the female form, came to realize she loved the person inside the form. A woman whose husband comes out as a trans woman doesn't become bisexual just because she chooses to remain with her now-wife. She's still a heterosexual woman, because as a rule, she's still attracted pretty much exclusively to men.

My question is if these relationships were still ongoing right now, with as much on panel confirmation as we've ever had (Mystique and Destiny telling eachother they love each other but not saying the word bisexual, Psylocke getting naked with Cluster), would we still be having this argument? Are you going to discount Rictor or Shatterstar in the future if they one day break up and exclusively date women?

Shatterstar's shown an attraction to other men - I'm pretty sure he actually flirted with Northstar. So he's definitely bisexual; more likely, he's pansexual.

If the relationships between Mystique and Destiny and Psylocke and Cluster were still ongoing, then they'd be ongoing same-sex relationships, so no, the debate probably wouldn't be going on, because it would still mean two prominent characters in ongoing same-sex relationships, and people who read the books those characters appear in would see that the characters are in same-sex relationships. But it's a moot point - neither of those relationships are still going on. Psylocke's same-sex relationship - which started as the end of one issue and ended in the one right after - is something that even most X-Men fans probably aren't even aware of, given the low sales of that run of Uncanny X-Force.


Again: Can you see how the situation with them is problematic? Mystique is probably the most prominent LGBT character, and she's never even been shown sharing a kiss with Destiny, the one same-sex relationship she's actually been shown in. (She's kissed two women, both in her solo series. In both cases, the other women initiated the kiss. In the first, she'd taken the form of a man, and a spy posing as a prostitute kissed her as part of her cover. In the second case, it was an insane woman who only kissed Mystique as an attack to infect her with some weird disease.) Psylocke is probably the second-most famous "LGBT" character, and her one relationship lasted all of five minutes and hasn't been referenced since then and doesn't seem to have had a particularly notable impact on her, from what we've been shown.

Can you see the problem where two of the most prominent LGBT characters have such minimal LGBT history? It'd be like the most prominent Jewish character being someone whose Judaism was mentioned once and then never brought up again after that.

Psylocke, right now, going by the on-panel evidence, isn't bisexual. She's not even questioning. She's a heterosexual woman who had a brief fling with a woman and went right back to men. Bisexuality is a trend, not a single instance. And, before you say something that completely ignores my earlier comment, no, it's not a trend involving activities with both genders, it's a trend of attraction to both genders. A woman fantasizing about Angelina Jolie isn't bisexual. A woman fantasizing about Angelina Jolie, Taylor Swift, Ellen from accounting and that cute waitress probably is bisexual.

[Wiccan615]

Wonderfully put Tiamatty, couldn't have said any of that better myself (though I tried )

[Time Like Lightning]

I'd love to ask Humphries what he considered her. Does anyone remember if he stated this?

At one point on his Tumblr, he stated he viewed her as a 2 on the Kinsey Scale. According to Wikipedia (don't you dare judge, if I can't use it for school I'll use it here), that's "mainly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual." Which-- I'd like to remind everyone-- refers to thoughts and attraction, not sexual actions. 1 though 5 on the Kinsey Scale all refer to various forms of bisexuality, btw.

[Kieran_Frost]

Found this funny scene, worth enjoying.

I actually agree that Cluster is equivalent to a trans woman. Which is part of what makes Psylocke's attraction to her more complicated. Psylocke fell in love with a person she believed to be a male. That person turned out to be a female, and Psylocke, after initially rejecting the female form, came to realize she loved the person inside the form. A woman whose husband comes out as a trans woman doesn't become bisexual just because she chooses to remain with her now-wife. She's still a heterosexual woman, because as a rule, she's still attracted pretty much exclusively to men.

That's a really interesting analogy I hadn't considered. Because it's the person, not the gender she fell in love with.

Shatterstar's shown an attraction to other men - I'm pretty sure he actually flirted with Northstar. So he's definitely bisexual; more likely, he's pansexual.

It was Iceman.

Again: Can you see how the situation with them is problematic? Mystique is probably the most prominent LGBT character, and she's never even been shown sharing a kiss with Destiny, the one same-sex relationship she's actually been shown in. (She's kissed two women, both in her solo series. In both cases, the other women initiated the kiss. In the first, she'd taken the form of a man, and a spy posing as a prostitute kissed her as part of her cover. In the second case, it was an insane woman who only kissed Mystique as an attack to infect her with some weird disease.) Psylocke is probably the second-most famous "LGBT" character, and her one relationship lasted all of five minutes and hasn't been referenced since then and doesn't seem to have had a particularly notable impact on her, from what we've been shown.

More excellent truth bombs!

Can you see the problem where two of the most prominent LGBT characters have such minimal LGBT history? It'd be like the most prominent Jewish character being someone whose Judaism was mentioned once and then never brought up again after that.

It would be like Nekra or Caliban being the most prominent black character; fans wouldn't be too thrilled seeing them labelled "most prominent" because... come on...

At one point on his Tumblr, he stated he viewed her as a 2 on the Kinsey Scale. According to Wikipedia (don't you dare judge, if I can't use it for school I'll use it here), that's "mainly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual." Which-- I'd like to remind everyone-- refers to thoughts and attraction, not sexual actions. 1 though 5 on the Kinsey Scale all refer to various forms of bisexuality, btw.

Ah, thank-you for this, that is really interesting. So he saw it as a 2, which does mean maybe it won't come up, maybe it will.

[Tiamatty]

At one point on his Tumblr, he stated he viewed her as a 2 on the Kinsey Scale. According to Wikipedia (don't you dare judge, if I can't use it for school I'll use it here), that's "mainly heterosexual, but more than incidentally homosexual." Which-- I'd like to remind everyone-- refers to thoughts and attraction, not sexual actions. 1 though 5 on the Kinsey Scale all refer to various forms of bisexuality, btw.

So that's Humphries' take. But I'm not sure I'd say that's supported by on-panel evidence. Not yet, anyway. We haven't seen the actual attraction to multiple women. (Though it did seem, during Humphries' run, that Psylocke maybe had a thing for Storm.)

[America / Bucky / Russia]

My first boyfriend, he's like that, went out with me for 5 mths when we were 16/17 and when we ended, has never ever slept with a man again and identifies as straight, not bi.

My second boyfriend when I was 14 has identified as straight ever since, never came out as anything and has only dated girls and is in a long-tern relationship. It happens.

This whole story made me smile. You sound like amazingly supportive parents. Far more parents of LGBT kids should be just like you.

More supportive parents is what we need. There have been times in the past where my parents have leaned upon homophobia (my mum asked me that I should try it out with a girl to see how it goes just before I was going to go on a date with a guy; great timing right there), but I think it's more about not knowing to say the right thing and I think they've grown more understanding in the years - I even saw Lilting with my mum the other week, because gay men making out is exactly her cup of tea. xD

[NexusTenebrare]

YEY!!! I'm not alone. I get why some don't like Graymalkin, and I do agree almost all we know of him is he's gay and old (because, outside that one issue in Young X-men, no-ones really done anything with him; though he does still appear at the JGS on occasions, but even then his dialogue is sparse). And I'd love to see Marvel take Mystique, an LGBT character they already have, and really go for it; making the first true LGBT A-lister. But they haven't right now; and it's silly to pretend otherwise. Her sexuality (when it comes to women) is a footnote almost no writer touches. She's been a major foe in numerous comics for a long time, and we have canon evidence her and Destiny were lovers from other people, but never her. How does she feel about her sexuality? We have no idea. Is she bi? Is she trans? Is she straight with an asterix. Who knows? Hopefully that will be cleared up very, very soon.

This makes me sad. You forgot to mention something about Graymalkin that I think is rather important and that if a writer would actually focus on it, could actually make him more interesting. And that is the fact that he's related to Xavier.
That's really something that should've been focussed on at least a bit in Young X-Men. Show Xavier bonding with his ancestor. Bendis could easily have used him too in some way. Maybe have future Xavier jr try to contact him for some reason or even have him show up at Xavier's will reading.
I know there's barely anything to him as a character, but I do think there are relatively easy ways to raise him up to the level of the more prominent X-kids.