10 Surprising Superhero Romances You Didn't Know Existed
6. Rictor And Shatterstar
When Rictor and Shatterstar first met in X-Force #13, there was no intention for the two to be gay, never mind together. However, the writer at the time, Fabian Nicieza kept accidentally creating little moments between the two. An example being in X-Force 34, where Shatterstar learned Spanish so that he and Rictor could talk in private. In a later issue, Shatterstar was very uncomfortable when a woman approached him at a club with Rictor.
Little nuggets like that must have really stuck with Nicieza's sucessor, because when Jeph Loeb took over, the writer was dead set on the two getting together.
As Rictor left America to see his family, Shatterstar was distraught and launched into an emotionally charged monologue before taking him to the airport. Later in the series, it was said Shatterstar had lost a friend, but was too stubborn to admit Rictor was more than that.
It would be fourteen years before the relationship was finally confirmed, when the two kissed in X-Factor #45. Why it took Marvel so long to finally confirm something fans had long suspected is unknown. It wasn't as if they were the first gay characters Marvel had published, but they got there eventually.