‘I Am Not Starfire’ Writer Mariko Tamaki To Helm Detective Comics

JB Augustine |

Dec 9, 2020

Sunday’s online CCXP Worlds expo was home to more than a blip of Godzilla vs. Kong footage, as DC announced that ‘I Am Starfire’ writer Mariko Tamaki will be the next writer on Detective Comics following the conclusion of the Future State event.

Future State Batman

Announced during the DC Future State: Batman panel, the core Detective Comics book will be helmed by Tamaki and Go Go Power Rangers artist Dan Mora, the same team behind the Future State: Dark Detective limited series.

This will not be Tamaki’s first foray into the Batman property, having written the Harley Quinn graphic novel Breaking Glass and, in a team-up with Mora, the story ‘The Gift’, which was featured in the 1,000th anniversary issue of Detective Comics, #1027.

Detective Comics-1027-variant cover

DC’s announcement was heralded as a historic moment for female writers, with many touting Tamaki’s role as a historic moment, as she is now only the second-female author to write a core Batman title and the first to write one long-term.

Prior to Tamaki’s assignment, the appropriately named Devin Grayson penned nearly thirty-issues of the 2000s series Batman: Gotham Knights, though her appearances on the book were periodic rather than continual.

DC Future State-Dark Detective

Tamaki is also the author of I Am Not Starfire, the now infamous Young Adult graphic novel featuring Starfire’s goth, lesbian, and body-positive daughter, that has drawn the ire of fans and creatives across the board.

Best-selling and award-winning writer Jon Del Arroz described this critical social justice theory-based take on the orange-skinned Titan’s future as an example of “the amount of lack of respect these corporate executives have for you.”

“They’re also trying to force this on their main books and this is exactly how they progress things” he continued. “They test things out. They don’t care if it sells or doesn’t and then they force it on the main books to get this ‘new audience’ they’re not going to get.”

He further pointed out how “they’re also trying to force this on their main books and this is exactly how they progress things,” explaining that “They test things out [and] don’t care if it sells or doesn’t and then they force it on the main books to get this ‘new audience’ they’re not going to get.”

Del Arroz also took issue with DC’s promotion of the Tamaki as the ‘first long-term Batman writer’, arguing that once a company begins to observe SJW hiring practices, “you can’t really replicate it again and have the first whatever at DC Comics.”

A creative team’s historic importance was never the “selling point” prior to this recent shift in culture, Del Arroz observed. He then recalled how books, such as Detective Comics, were once praised for having “decent storytellers” and lamented how it has turned to celebrating “stunning” authors for writing specific characters.

The author then explained, using a fair bit of sarcasm, that he sees this creative shift with Detective Comics as another slanted play at identity politics, one which he believes will result in poor storytelling and a failure to bring in new readers.

Tamaki and Mora’s will take over Detective Comics in March with issue #1034, following the conclusion of both Future State: Next Batman and Future State: Dark Detective.

What do you make of Tamaki on Detective Comics? Let us know your thoughts on social media or in the comments down below!