Characters of Colour in superhero comics - the men (part one)

Following on from our previous post about good women characters of colour within superhero comics, we come to the second post, about male characters of colour.

Firstly, an explanation of the label system. 

On the blog we label all our posts with CoC for Characters of Colour if the character has a significant role in the book.  You can view all posts tagged with this label here, this includes the independent comics.

Don’t forget our manga reviews.  Most of our manga is set in Asian countries so the default ethnicity becomes Asian and there are very few white people in the books.  As such we won't list any manga titles in this post.  Independent and manga comics will be covered in another post.

Characters of Colour in superhero Comics - the women (part one)

Someone on the facebook group recently asked where all the strong female characters of colour in superhero comics were.  This is a very good question and one that I feel needs answering.

I think there is a feeling that superhero comics tend to feature only white heroes (and male ones at that).  Whilst historically this was certainly the case, in recent years it has got better.  There are now several characters of colour in the superhero books (although not as many as there are white characters).  They are also in independent publications and manga.  I'm going to use this post to highlight a few particularly great female characters, and then do another post of the male characters.

About Formats. The Telephone Book Collection

Christmas is coming up and you may be looking for presents for the comic fans of your acquaintance or maybe you might want to take this opportunity to try some comics. If so, that’s what this blog is for: comic recommendations for the new reader. Of course, graphic novels are quite an expensive medium, probably more than most of us will want to spend on anything less than the closest of relatives. So today we at New readers…start here turn the spotlight on a format that emphasises quantity and economy: the telephone book collection.

Suggested Reading Order: Superman - New Krypton

In the last few years the Superman family of books has had a lot of crossovers, collectively titled New Krypton. The general gist of these stories is that Krypton, Superman's long dead homeworld, is recreated leading to lots of interesting and unexpected conflict situations.  It's a cross between a family drama, a detective story, a crime thriller, a war story and a space epic.

As someone new to the genre, or new to Superman books generally, looking through the bookshelves you would be forgiven for feeling a little lost and perhaps not knowing quite which one to pick up.  Which is where we come in.  What will follow is a brief explanation (without spoilers) of the major things that have been been happening in the books over the last few years, and a suggested reading order.