To be honest, I don't actually read Judd Winick's GREEN ARROW. Actually, I only read the Kevin Smith run, and even that seemed to be largely an exercise in continuity-rectification as much as storytelling.

Still, I note with interest that the book has been getting renewed attention for its latest storyline, in which supporting character Mia Dearden is revealed to be HIV positive. Mia is apparently the current incarnation of Green Arrow's sidekick Speedy (my god, are they still using that name?), so she's also the first HIV positive superhero. Okay, Marvel teased the idea with Northstar years ago, but they chickened out, so it doesn't count.

Characters such as Mia tend to find themselves in a double-bind, not necessarily through any fault on the part of the writers. Winick's interviews give a neat illustration of the problem. On the one hand, the whole piece is based around the fact that she's an HIV positive character. That's the big angle. HIV positive. Never been done before. It's something that immediately marks her out from the crowd. Yet, as Winick makes clear, that's the precise opposite of the point he wants to make. The point of the story is "to show her living with HIV" and, essentially, to say that it doesn't make any difference.

'Mia Dearden, the current Speedy, is the first HIV positive superhero.' Which gives rise to an obvious tension: the character grabs attention through her HIV status, but the story then has to convey the message that it's irrelevant. Success depends on convincing the reader that it's a non-issue. And that's the bit where stories tend to get into trouble.

The problem is that there are two different factors that make it an issue - "it", in this sense, being HIV status, colour, sexuality, whatever minority you want to work with. One is whether it's an issue in the real world, outside the stories. The other is whether it's an issue in story terms, which affects how readers react.

According to the CIA World Factbook, as of 2003, 0.6% of the American adult population were HIV positive. That's around 950,000 people. Not a huge chunk of the population, but a sizeable number of people - and Mia's runaway prostitute back story certainly places her in a plausibly high-risk category. Annual deaths from HIV are only around 14,000 in the US, so especially when you factor in the extraordinary slowness of comic-book time, Mia can quite credibly look forward to many happy decades of firing novelty arrows at costumed evildoers, in which HIV won't play much of a part.

So all logic says that it ought to be possible to write it as the relative non-issue that Winick demands, right?

Well, no, not necessarily. There's another problem to deal with. Even where a character's status is a relative non-issue in the real world, it can still be an issue in fiction if it makes the character stand out like a sore thumb.

In some ways this problem is particularly pronounced in superhero comics, since both Marvel and DC still operate universes based on a framework of characters set up in the 1940s and 1960s. Because of the social conditions at that time, both universes are disproportionately overwhelmed by straight white guys. So when Green Lantern finally meets some black people, or the Falcon finally turns up, it's a bit of an issue. Aside from anything else, the character inevitably stands out as a conscious decision by the writer; it's very hard for the reader to truly react to that choice as a non-issue.

'A character's status can still be an issue if it makes them stand out like a sore thumb.' Along similar lines, alas, poor Northstar. As a character, he was almost better off in the days when they merely dropped hints that he might be gay. After it was made explicit, it seemed that the character couldn't make anything more than a cameo appearance without the Issue coming up.

There's an issue of Steve Seagle's ALPHA FLIGHT where Northstar introduces himself to someone, who replies, "Oh yeah, the gay one". "I am not the gay one," Northstar bristles. "I am the one who happens to be gay". But so long as he's practically the only homosexual in the Marvel Universe, he will be The Gay One, like it or not. In the context of his fictional world, it's the most distinctive thing about him. He is the only gay in the village, and writers can hardly create a flood of new characters to rectify the balance without it seeming even more absurdly contrived.

Marvel have even managed to get some coverage for their lame-duck AMAZING FANTASY book on the basis that the lead character is Hispanic. Nobody seriously thinks that being Hispanic is a desperately unusual condition in America, but apparently it's still considered sufficiently unusual in the context of comics that it's used as a publicity hook. (Mind you, Anya Corazon's ethnicity really is completely irrelevant to the actual title - a touch unfortunate, since it's utterly generic in every other respect.)

Regardless - the point is that when such characters start to appear in fiction, especially in a pre-established fictional universe where they unavoidably don't fit in, they will stand out and it will be an issue. This isn't so bad if the story you want to tell is about terrible prejudice and oppression, since the angle there is, "It shouldn't be an issue, but it is". But if the character exists to send the message that their most unique distinguishing feature is completely irrelevant, you run the risk of a character who will be read as the product of tokenism. This is a desperately difficult trap to avoid.

Winick complains about his reputation in this area:

"I'm accused of having a greater social agenda than I actually do. I've done a smattering of stories that are socially relevant and I'm considered the soap-box guy. I've done one story arc in GREEN LANTERN featuring a gay character who was a survivor of a hate crime. Sunfire was gay in EXILES. And there's other stuff sort of there that people like to hang their hat on, saying I'm just this big commie out there pushing an agenda. It's only a handful of stories."

The problem Winick faces is that he's acquired a reputation for going into these areas that shouldn't be issues but are, and writing stories about that. These are seen as soapboxing because, unavoidably, you can see the strings when a writer continually works in themes that are generally ignored. Winick's attempts at social relevance also stand out much more in a genre that doesn't necessarily operate in that area. (A victim of a gay hate crime stands out a mile in GREEN LANTERN. He would be comparatively at home in a Vertigo book, or an episode of SIX FEET UNDER.)

All this is arguably unfair to Winick, who may simply be doing something that more people ought to do - but it unavoidably colours reactions to his work.

Paul O'Brien is the author of the weekly X-AXIS comics review.

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