Ever since the comic publisher announced that one of its top-tier characters would be revealed as gay, fanboys and girls have been in a frenzy over the sexual orientations of their favourite heroes.
Would it be Superman? Or Batman? Or Robin? The stakes were high - these characters are multi-million-dollar franchises.
DC's rival, Marvel, fired the first pink shot, when it announced that one of its heroes, Northstar, would be marrying his boyfriend in the pages of Astonishing X-Men.
Yesterday Bleeding cool reported with confidence that the hero DC would be reintroducing to its newly revised universe as gay was the original Green Lantern, Alan Scott.
And this is where it gets tricky. Because the Green Lantern Ryan Reynolds played on the big screen last year is a different Green Lantern to the Scott Green Lantern.
That Green Lantern was Hal Jordan and is the most popular version of the character. Scott, who made his first appearance in 1940, didn't even wear the all-over green body suit and was never part of an intergalactic peace keeping corps. He wore green pants and a green cloak and wielded a strange lamp that housed mystical green flame. He was also vulnerable to wood (no sniggering).The change is revealed in the pages of the second issue of "Earth 2" out next week, and comes on the heels of what has been an expansive year for gay and lesbian characters in the pages of comic books from Archie to Marvel and others.
But purists and fans note: This Green Lantern is not the emerald galactic space cop Hal Jordan who was, and is, part of the Justice League and has had a history rich in triumph and tragedy.
James Robinson, who writes the new series, said Alan Scott is the retooled version of the classic Lantern whose first appearance came in the pages of "All-American Comics" No. 16 in July 1940.
And his being gay is not part of some wider story line meant to be exploited or undone down the road, either.
"This was my idea," says Robinson, noting that before DC relaunched all its titles last summer, Alan Scott had a son who was gay.
But given "Earth 2" features retooled and rebooted characters, Scott is not old enough to have a grown son.
"By making him younger, that son was not going to exist anymore," Robinson said.
"He doesn't come out. He's gay when we see him in issue two," which is due out Wednesday. "He's fearless and he's honest to the point where he realized he was gay and he said 'I'm gay.'"
It's another example of gay and lesbian characters taking more prominent roles in the medium.
In May, Marvel Entertainment said super speedster Northstar will marry his longtime boyfriend in the pages of "Astonishing X-Men." DC comics has other gay characters, too, including Kate Kane, the current Batwoman, The Question, and married characters Apollo and the Midnighter.
