‘Midnighter & Apollo’ – Who’s On The Bottom Bunk?

Most gay comics are overly sexual, highly exaggerated, and far off from reality … and that is why we most likely read them.  Huge packages, graphic sex, and aliens that belong in therapy for their ideas of what they can do with our orifices.  Those are the extreme gay comics. But we don't label comics that feature straight characters and aliens as straight comics, so let's jump back a step. 

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Comics that have gay characters in them aren't overly sexual and seem to stay away from anything but kissing for sexual interaction, if you can call kissing that. Now, Midnighter and Apollo are changing that. In Fusion.net's  "DC’s ‘Midnighter & Apollo’ Just Made A Bold Statement About Masculinity And Gay Sex," we see the boys taking gay sex in a mainstream comic to the masses.

 

At some point between rinsing plates and hanging them up to dry, the couple take advantage of the fact that they’re finally alone and get down to having sex right there in the kitchen. The moment’s spontaneous and intimate and reflective of the fact that Midnighter and Apollo have been on-again, off-again soulmates in various comics for nearly 20 years.

Though this isn’t the first time that Midnighter and Apollo have been depicted being sexually intimate with one another, this particular scene of the two raised a number of fans’ eyebrows because of the not-so-subtle implication that Midnighter, a hyper-violent, über-butch Batman analogue, is a bottom.

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Once the clapping and cheering died down a bit, Orlando insisted that sex scenes like this are an integral part of creating honest stories about queer people in pop culture. Considering the fact that we’ve seen characters like the Green Arrow performing cunnilingus on Black Canary, Orlando said, seeing Midnighter and Apollo getting down shouldn’t really shock people.

Orlando’s right to a point—mainstream comics have featured fairly explicit images of straight, heteronormative sex for decades now, but there’s definitely something to be said for identifying one of DC’s first openly gay heroes as a literal power bottom on the page.

Even in more complex, nuanced depictions of gay culture, bottom-shaming—the mockery of men who prefer to be the receptive partner during intercourse—is still fairly common. Like all forms of homophobia, bottom-shaming is tied to the idea that gayness and gay sex are feminine things and that feminine things are less-than.

In showing Midnighter as a bottom (though he could very well be versatile), Midnighter & Apollo is inviting its readers to broaden their understandings of gay men, gender, and homosexuality. Butch guys can be bottoms, feminine guys can be tops, none of that defines their masculinity. – Fusion.net

 

For the entire piece, head over to Fusion.net.

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Bravo Midnighter for showing that we are like everyone else.  I am sure there will be backlash for us living like our counterparts, loving like humans, an having sex "just like everyone else."

 

h/t:  Fusion.net for pics and text.  DC comics for original pics.

2 thoughts on “‘Midnighter & Apollo’ – Who’s On The Bottom Bunk?”

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