How a Canadian superhero brought queer representation to

Marvel Comics
Marvel Comics is frequently referred to as “the house of ideas,” yet the idea of a
queer superhero did not fully arrive at Marvel until the 1990s. Despite Marvel’s
reputation as a campus phenomenon and as a hotbed for liberal — even subversive
— discourse, Stan Lee’s comics publishing juggernaut would not feature a
canonically gay character until some 30 years after the debut of The Fantastic
Four.
There’s a reason for that.

The 1954 Comics Code Authority — a censorship bureau that policed comics
content — explicitly banned “sex perversion or any inference to same,”
which comics scholar Hilary Chute notes is “a clear reference to homosexuality.”
The Marvel Universe as we know it began in 1961, with the launch of Fantastic
Four #1. Thus, Marvel Comics was, from the outset, actually prohibited from
depicting gay characters.
So how do you a write a queer character at a time when comics are expressly
forbidden from featuring queer characters?

In a word: delicately.

The slow coming out

It wasn’t until 1992 — three years after a major revision to the Comics Code
officially opened the door to depictions of LGBTQ+ characters — that Marvel had
their first openly gay superhero. In Alpha Flight #106 written by Scott Lobdel, the
character Northstar (alias Olympic ski champion Jean-Paul Beaubier) declared: “I
am gay.”
Even then this move was met with outrage by Marvel’s corporate leadership.

A hotbed for queer subtext

Northstar had debuted way back in 1983 as part of the all-Canadian, government-
sponsored superhero team, Alpha Flight. The team first appeared in the pages of X-
Men.
At the time, X-Men comics were already a hotbed for queer subtext. Comics
scholar Ramzi Fawaz notes that Claremont’s X-Men “articulated mutation to the
radical critiques of identity promulgated by the cultures of women’s and gay
liberation.”

Another comics scholar, Scott Bukatman, puts it more simply and says: “mutant
bodies are explicitly analogized to … gay bodies” in Claremont’s X-Men. It is no
surprise then, that Marvel’s first gay superhero should emerge from this series.
Validation through storytelling

Northstar’s sexuality first surfaces in Alpha Flight #7 (1983) when he meets up

with “an old friend” named Raymonde who is strongly hinted to be a former lover.
In the story, written by Byrne, Raymonde comments on Northstar’s good looks. He
also references the secretive nature of his relationship with Jean-Paul: “Then you
have not really told your sister all about me, after all, Jean-Paul? I thought that
would have been odd.”
When Raymonde is later murdered, Northstar snaps with blind rage. The narrative
caption tells us: “And Raymonde had led him out of that dark fear, into the bright
clear light of self-acceptance.”

In 1983, the narrative of a former lover being murdered and thus spurring the
superhero to action and emotional eruption was already a comics cliché. But
staging that through a same-sex couple establishes a sort of subtextual validation of
Northstar’s relationship as something more than the Comics Code Authority “sex
perversion” label.

Two years later, in the 1985 limited series X-Men and Alpha Flight, Northstar’s
sexuality is once again woven into a key story, this time written by Claremont.
After having his consciousness briefly absorbed by the X-Man Rogue, Northstar
becomes furious that she now knows his “secrets.”
In a misguided attempt to help Northstar, Rogue then asks him to dance at a very
public reception. When Northstar’s own teammates make fun of the incongruity of
Northstar dancing at a ball with a woman, Rogue thinks “None of y’all understand
him the way ah do.”

Northstar
On the literal level, Northstar is being ridiculed for his general disinterest in
heterosexual romance. But Claremont is crafting a story of a man who struggles
with his closeted sexuality in the face of social pressures.

It’s a sympathetic portrayal of the character that helps to normalize the concept of
a gay superhero, even if Marvel couldn’t identify him that way at the time.

Whether through delicate subtext or comics covering wedding events, Northstar

holds a uniquely prominent and, at times, poignant position in the history of
LGBTQ+ superheroes.

As we come to understand the importance of diverse representation within the

superhero genre, this is a character that needs to be known, discussed and
hopefully appreciated.