The superhero genre has become a powerful force of cultural production in contemporary America. In the last twenty years, a plethora of books, films, television series, and even merchandise has exclusively celebrated "traditional" superheroes, privileging only one form of national identity. However, such idolization often excludes large portions of the American populace, as the superhero genre promotes conventions that neglect to represent socially marginalized identities. The conventions often posit desexualization, masculinity, and heteronormativity as the only viable means of superheroism, leaving sexualized, feminine, and queer identities out of the limelight. Queer superheroism thus emerges from the margins of American superhero narratives to save all superheroic identities from cultural and generic stagnation. The heroes in this project resist sociocultural normativity and generic conventions in tandem, and in doing so, challenge the genre as a site of singular identity and symbolization. Queer superheroism transforms the genre by perpetually critiquing, subverting, and reinventing that symbolization, demonstrating unlimited and multiple possibilities for American superhero narratives.
