'Wonder Woman' writer Greg Rucka says, yeah, she's queer

Impact

Confirming what many have long believed, Greg Rucka, the writer behind the latest Wonder Woman comics revealed this week that its titular character is officially queer — and her homeland, Themyscira, is basically a queer lady paradise. 

In an interview with Comicosity, Rucka confirmed that yes, Wonder Woman is queer by our definitions, and she has "obviously" been in love with other women — but in her fictional homeland, an all-female, utopian society, such definitions might not even be necessary. 

"It's supposed to be paradise," Rucka said. "You're supposed to be able to live happily. You're supposed to be able — in a context where one can live happily, and part of what an individual needs for that happiness is to have a partner — to have a fulfilling, romantic and sexual relationship. And the only options are women." 

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Heterosexuality doesn't even exist in Themyscira, which is populated by women known as Amazons. As Rucka explained to Comicosity, "An Amazon doesn't look at another Amazon and say, 'You're gay,'" he said. "They don't. The concept doesn't exist."

Rucka has authored multiple Wonder Woman storylines, the Los Angeles Times reports — one that specifically explores her origin story and her female-only homeland. But Wonder Woman as a character is far older than Rucka — she made her debut in 1941, according her official DC Comics bio.

Wonder Woman's original creator, William Moulton Marston, was a Harvard-educated psychologist who was, as historian Jill Lepore wrote in the New Yorker in 2014, "profoundly influenced by early-twentieth-century suffragists, feminists, and birth-control advocates" in creating his famous character. Marston also happened to be engaged in a low-key tryst with his wife and their shared lover, Olive Byrne.

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Marston died in 1947, but Wonder Woman, whose original catchphrases included "Suffering Sappho," became a queer icon for generations of women, even before she was officially "out." In a 2015 Wonder Woman comic, she officiated a same-sex wedding, explaining to Clark Kent (aka Superman) that her homeland "is all women. ... To us, it's not 'gay' marriage, it's just marriage."

Rucka's reveal that Wonder Woman is officially queer within her fictional world is an exciting step towards greater representation — but Rucka doesn't think his declaration that Wonder Woman is queer is even important — according to him, the answer has been in the story the whole time he's been writing it.

"I don't know how much clearer I can make it," he told Comicosity, "It doesn't matter if I say, 'Yes, she's queer.' Or 'No, she's not queer.' It matters what you get out of the book. Can you find it? Is it there? Is it on the page in action or in deed? Then, there's your answer."