Posted in: Comics, Comics Publishers, Current News, DC Comics, Marvel Comics | Tagged: Bernie Jaye, Rhianna Ptratchett

Bernie Jaye or Rhianna Pratchett as Marvel's First Brit Female Writer?

Bleeding Cool asked if it could it possibly be true that Alison Sampson as the first British woman who has written a comic for Marvel USA.

A week or so ago, Bleeding Cool, attending MCM London Comic Con, asked a question. Could it possibly be true that Alison Sampson, not only drawing but also writing a new project at the Women Of Marvel panel at New York Comic Con, She-Devils for 2025, may mark the first time a British woman has written a comic for Marvel USA.

Also, there was the possibility that Emma Vieceli, who was exhibiting at MCM a few rows down, may be the first British woman to be hired as a writer by DC Comics for Nightwing in 2023. There was, of course, Leah Moore writing Tom Strong and co-writing Albion and Wild Girl from Wildstorm, which was owned by DC, even if there were editorial firewalls. But was there anyone working on the DCU to beat Emma?

Well, since then, we have a couple of additional asterisks. Bernie Jaye, best known in comics as an editor and colourist, and EIC of Marvel UK for a time, wrote a handful of Marvel UK titles. She co-created Hell's Angel with Geoff Senior, writing the series from #1-5 before it became Dark Angel and returned to it from #9 to its conclusion with #16. Does this count? It was editorially created and packaged in the UK, but it was printed in the USA.

The other contender is Rhianna Pratchett, who co-created and wrote the Mirror's Edge series for DC/Wildstorm in 2008, though that was after Leah Moore's Wildstorm work and may also not count as a DC comic book. Though what does count is down to you. But she did also write a short Shanna The She-Devil and Silver Sable story with Alina Erofeeva and Ruth Redmond for the Women Of Marvel 2022 volume. This appears to be her only work for Marvel – her Attack On Titan anthology work was once intended to come out from Marvel, but Kodansha went with it instead. So Alison loses her Marvel US crown to Rhianna, but she hasn't had anything published by Marvel since. I get the feeling that Alison may be up for a lot more.

And this all it might make for some fun discussion and/or handwringing at Thought Bubble in a couple of weeks, especially amongst some of the British male writers who have been doing rather well lately.

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