10 Amazing Comic Storylines Derailed By Editorial Politics

1. The New 52

Batwoman Kiss
DC Comics

DC made the controversial decision in 2011 to relaunch its entire line of comics and erase years of continuity €“ Clark Kent and Lois Lane were no longer married and other notable events were retconned. But this major revamp also brought with it a slew of editorial issues that have derailed a number of series that were a part of the launch.

Within the first year, legendary artist George Perez had left Superman, while industry firebrand Rob Liefeld left his three titles in an effort to €œpreserve my sanity,€ as he said on Twitter. Last summer, James Robinson, one of the anchors at DC for years, quit Earth-2 without much explanation (he was immediately picked up by Marvel). But the biggest controversy came last September when Batwoman creators J.H. Williams and W. Haden Blackman announced via Twitter that they had quit the book citing massive editorial interference.

Recently, Batwoman, Kate Kane, had proposed to her girlfriend Maggie Sawyer in what would have been the industry'€™s first lesbian marriage. However, DC editorial told Williams and Blackman €œno marriage can result.€ Williams said the decision wasn€™'t meant to be anti-gay but instead driven by the fact that publisher didn'€™t want any of its characters to be married.

Regardless, the Batwoman interference blew up into a PR nightmare for DC that still reverberates today.

In this post: 
Batwoman
 
First Posted On: 
Contributor
Contributor

Mark is a professional writer living in Brooklyn and is the founder of the Chasing Amazing Blog, which documents his quest to collect every issue of Amazing Spider-Man, and the Superior Spider-Talk podcast. He also pens the "Gimmick or Good?" column at Comics Should Be Good blog.