The 10 Gayest/Feminist-est Things That Happened at San Diego Comic-Con This Year

San Diego Comic-Con, the biggest geek gathering in the world, happened over the weekend and some pretty exciting queer/feminist news dropped during it. Here are ten of those things.

1. Steven Universe creator Rebecca Sugar came out

Mey Rude brought you this news about 45 seconds after it happened because she knows what you want, she knows what you need.

These things have so much to do with who you are, and there’s this idea that these are themes that should not be shared with kids, but everyone shares stories about love and attraction with kids. So many stories for kids are about love, and it really makes a difference to hear stories about how someone like you can be loved and if you don’t hear those stories it will change who you are. It’s very important to me that we speak to kids about consent and we speak to kids about identity and that we speak to kids about so much. I want to feel like I exist and I want everyone else who wants to feel that way to feel that way too.

2. Supergirl re-confirmed Maggie Sawyer

The Supergirl panel mostly featured (righteous) grumbling that the show is introducing so many new male characters, including Superman. But they did re-confirm that Maggie Sawyer is going to swagger into town, and I actually forgot to tell you until just right now that she’s going to be played by Floriana Lima!

3. Syfy renewed Wynonna Earp

Finally! It’s a shorter season, but I feel very confident that when the fans who found this show late in the game team up with the already very dedicated queer fan base to make some noise on social media and boost the ratings, Wynonna Earp will be around longer than just ten more episodes.

4. The 2016 LGBTQ Geek Year in Review

That this panel existed at all is pretty cool. That they spent a significant amount of time talking about Lexa’s death and what the backlash and activist mobilization means to the larger pop culture conversation is rad as heck. Hey, and you know someone on this panel: It’s Chelsea Steiner!

5. Brie Larson will play Captain Marvel

A big known name is a big damn deal for this movie that Marvel has been jerking around for about ten thousand years.

6. Roxane Gay is writing Black Panther

HOLY CATS, Y’ALL. This news didn’t break at Comic-Con, but it broke during the first day of Comic-Con, so it definitely counts.

https://twitter.com/rgay/status/756571434931990528

7. Wonder Woman has an official trailer

Well, then.

8. Lupita Nyong’o and Danai Gurira joined the Black Panther movie

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

9. It Gets Geekier: How Being Gay and Geeky Turned Out for the Best

I see you in that sea of male panelists, Noelle Stevenson!  From Comics Beat:

For Noelle Stevenson, she talked about how she herself had only came out relatively recently, after having broken up with her then boyfriend. But she said that she had harbored feelings for the same sex for some time, though then they were confusing. “I remember coming home from a Christian craft faire, and my sister was watching the very first X-Men movie. ‘Who is this blue woman doing flips?! Why do I have feelings about her?’” Noelle went further to add on how she also felt strangely toward the female bounty hunter Zan in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. “It really wasn’t until Lumberjanes where I was able to really talk about it… So that’s me! I’m really gay!”

Noelle also won another Eisner. (As did Mey’s beloved Super Mutant Magic Academy.)

10. #MarvelMamas

Just these women in a big budget movie, please.

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Heather Hogan

Heather Hogan is an Autostraddle senior editor who lives in New York City with her wife, Stacy, and their cackle of rescued pets. She's a member of the Television Critics Association, GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics, and a Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer critic. You can also find her on Twitter and Instagram.

Heather has written 1718 articles for us.

30 Comments

  3. Thanks for the coverage, Heather! I’m so excited about so many of these things!!!!!

    As an aside, I want to love the #MarvelMamas photo, I really do. I’ve wanted to love it since the moment it went viral this weekend. But…. I can’t move on from Tilda Swinton in the center of the photo. Her casting as The Ancient One in Dr. Strange is one of the most offensive cases of whitewashing that I’ve seen in a long time. I get that, factually speaking, she’s a “Marvel Mama” and I’m not trying to stir controversy, just personally saying that having her as a reminder in this photo… it changed the magic of it for me unfortunately.

    • I have a hard time supporting her in general because she signed that fucking Roman Polanski petition.

  4. Okay so Maggie Sawyer is going to be on Supergirl but will they ever address her sexuality on the show or nah? Will Kate show up at some point? I might actually start watching the show if they handle this better than the last time Floriana Lima played a lesbian, er sorry, bisexual character(the writers couldn’t seem to make up their minds) on television.

    I’m so happy for Lupita and Danai to have starring roles in a such a big movie. They deserve it. It’s something you rarely see happen for women of a particular complexion. It does make me worry though about Michonne’s fate on The Walking Dead.

    Also, can we talk about the fact that the Spiderman:Homecoming cast seems to be predominately people of color besides for Peter himself? I’ve been telling myself that I don’t care about yet another retelling of Peter’s origin story. And I don’t. It’s the third time in so many years. But I really want to support this movie for the cast alone.

    • I love that about Spiderman! He’s going to a NYC public school, the cast should be mostly poc. I’m glad that they are going to be authentic/ realistic in that regard. It’s made me relatively excited for the movie, and I was never a big Spidey fan.

      YES SO EXCITED FOR LUPITA AND DANAI!!!! For all the reasons you mentioned!!

    • The casting call for Maggie Sawyer described her as an “out and proud” detective, so I am cautiously hopeful.

    • There was a rumour prior to SDCC that Batwoman/Kate Kane would be Maggie’s Ex and appear as a guest star in Supergirl, but I never saw that progress beyond rumour.

  6. I may or may not have wanted to scream in delight when I heard the casting for Captain Marvel. So excited for that, Wonder Woman, and Black Panther. Not to mention Luke Cage is coming in September to Netflix!

  7. LET 2016 BE THE YEAR OF THE GAY OK.

    Like we’ve had enough deaths, both IRL and on screen, so from now on Karma says we can only have nice things !

  8. “What I do is not up to you”. I wish I wrote this on a sign and walked around the Republican National Convention with it.

  9. That Wonder Woman trailer made me so so hopeful
    Please don’t disappoint me again, DC

  10. I really wish they’d cast an older actress to play Captain Marvel, considering I think she’s supposed to be much older in the comics, but Brie Larson is a big name so I have mixed feelings.

    I have NO mixed feelings about Roxane Gay writing Black Panther, the Wonder Woman trailer, and the Black Panther cast, though. Just pure excitement.

    • Yeah, a lot of people have been saying that realistically a 26 year old would not have the credentials that Captain Marvel has at that age. She should be in her 30s at the least. Not to mention that so many of the males in the Marvel Universe are played by actors in their late 30s and 40s.

      • Hemsworth started as Thor at about the same age. Larson will certainly be able to carry on in the role for many years.

        And, frankly, lot a lot of comic book characters… Carol’s credentials are unrealistic. Some of her backstory is more convoluted and flat out sexist and offensive. They’re starting her with a clean slate in the MCU. My only real desire is that she still be an officer in the USAF and still be a test pilot. Larson’s age is perfectly acceptable for those criteria.

  12. My fav. moment from the Noelle Stevenson panel involved hearing how Shannon Watters had basically given her a (metaphorical!) “Powerpoint presentation” on the joys of being a queer woman, in which the major talking points were:

    1. It’s like having a sleepover with your best friend every night &
    2. Everything is soft!

    <3

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