Dr. Bce Banner beme Dr. David Banner for the "Incredible Hulk" TV show back the 1970s, and Lou Ferrigno says the name change me about bee CBS thought the name Bce was "gay-ish."
Contents:
- MARVEL COMICS REVEALS EARTH'S FIRST GAY SUPER-COUPLE
- THE INCREDIBLY GAY HULK
- IS HULK GAY, BISEX, OR STRAIGHT?
- STAN LEE WAS WRONG ABOUT THE INCREDIBLE HULK
- LOU FERRIGNO -- BCE BANNER WAS TOO GAY FOR TV
MARVEL COMICS REVEALS EARTH'S FIRST GAY SUPER-COUPLE
In recent years, many Marvel fans have exprsed disappotment that the MCU is takg s sweet time to troduce a gay character who isn't a meo by the director of the movie appearg onscreen for 40 sends. The '70s: No Gay People In The Marvel Universe... Throughout the '60s and most of the '70s, there were no gay characters Marvel ics, unls you unt the ocsnal effemate villa or "lispy stool pigeon.
THE INCREDIBLY GAY HULK
" And we say "most of the '70s" bee that changed 1979 wh the troductn of the first explicly homosexual characters Marvel Comics history. Gay rears, and people wh basic humany general, weren't imprsed wh the fact that Marvel's first foray to LGBTQ reprentatn nsisted of two dis-era rapists lled Dewey and Luellen (Dewey and Luellen (c) Walt Disney Company, all rights rerved). When they let Marvel know about this, wrer/ic child prodigy Jim Shooter, who also happened to be the pany's Edor--Chief, fend the story by sayg that he " unrstand why any non-rapist would be offend" and potg out that there were lots of non-sister gay characters that very magaze.
You jt uldn't tell they were gay.
Shooter apparently liked this "you n't see the gay people" policy, nsirg what happened next... The '80s: Marvel Bans Gay Characters (But Some Slip Through Anyway).
IS HULK GAY, BISEX, OR STRAIGHT?
Multiple ic book wrers have stated that Marvel wouldn't let them troduce any gay characters the '80s, possibly bee Shooter had ran out of bullsh exc after the Hulk YMCA ntroversy. Why go through the trouble of makg your gay characters ls offensive when 's easier to ban them? The Comics Co Authory was also a problem, sce forbid "sexual abnormali" and "sex perversn" and, until 1989, they unted homosexualy as both.
Some wrers still managed to get stuff past the anti-gaydar. Marvel Comics Life's hard enough beg gay and a mutant, but image beg Canadian on top of that. Capta Ameri had a clearly gay supportg character too, but his boyiend uld only be referred to as his "roommate.
In the late '80s there was a storyle where Northstar was heavily hted to have AIDS, but someone at Marvel mt have realized wouldn't look good to have their only gay superhero be HIV-posive, so they fixed by... Somewhere between all this sany, Northstar publicly announc his homosexualy for the first time, which was a bold move back then.
STAN LEE WAS WRONG ABOUT THE INCREDIBLE HULK
Northstar's homosexualy was barely acknowledged for the rt of the '90s and, spe beg surround by perfectly sculpted abs and butts everywhere, he was never shown so much as glancg at another du (let alone beg a relatnship). The Incredible Hulk had an openly gay supportg character who wasn't a plete embarrassment and an (unrelated, non-terrible) AIDS storyle. The '00s: Marvel Proudly Announc New Gay Characters, Then Kills Or Censors Them.
Durg Marvel's sperate post-bankptcy perd the early '00s, they got some media attentn by announcg they were rebootg a classic wtern character, the Rawhi Kid, as an " your face" gay wboy.
The fact that Marvel published this ic their adults-only MAX le and slapped a big "EXPLICIT CONTENT" parental warng on the ver, jt bee the ma character was gay. Dpe repeatg how "proud" they were of the character, a uple of years later Marvel tablished he was only actg gay to "nfe others. " Even revealg that he was zapped by a -gayg ray or briefly posssed by fairi would have been more dignified.
LOU FERRIGNO -- BCE BANNER WAS TOO GAY FOR TV
Marvel Comics "Superpowers: Pretend gayns.
Speakg of youngsters, 2006 Marvel troduced a young gay superhero lled Freedom Rg, created by Walkg Dead wrer Robert Kirkman.
His sexualy wasn't a huge part of the stori, but terviews, Marvel head honcho Joe Quada ed his existence to brag about the fact that they had "more gay and lbian characters appearg Marvel ics than ever before" and touted him as the "star" of the Marvel Team Up seri. All four are well-round young characters who happen to be gay... And all four were sgled out for torture while their straight teammat went unharmed durg the Civil War crossover, also 2006 (not a great year to be a young gay superhero).