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Bogdanove noted that most superheroes are archetypes, and both DC and Marvel tend to steal one another’s archetypes back and forth — but that without somebody like Steel front and center, DC doesn’t have an Iron Man parallel. He added that he thought Black Panther scribe and best-selling writer Ta-Nehisi Coates would be a great choice to do it.
“Ta-Nehisi Coates would be great,” Bogdanove said, noting that while he would love to revisit the character with co-creator Louise Simonson, it is probably a good idea to let a person of color have their say. “I don’t know if that’s a get they could possibly get, but I think we would get a good take there.”
Bogdanove, who joked that the Steel movie provided he and Simonson with a 40-cent royalty check every few months, said that his idea that DC needs somebody like Iron Man has never gone away.
“I still think that the idea of a home-made Iron Man,” Bogdanove said. “DC already has a billionaire superhero, so we don’t need to chase Tony Stark; we have Bruce Wayne. But the idea of a guy who retires from the Establishment, leaves the Establishment, and just because he’s so smart, on a shoestring, he’s able to become a kind of DIY Iron Man. I think it’s good to have a guy who does it, not with inherited wealth, but with his brains.”
He also added that Steel’s popularity with fans make him a good choice to have around so that DC can have a more diverse Justice League lineup without attracting claims that they are engaging in performative diversity.
“There are things that are problematic from a political standpoint with Cyborg,” Bogdanove argued, referencing the character who has been a staple on the Justice League since 2011. “If your token Black character, his body is mutilated, there are things uncomfortable about that from a modern perspective that probably weren’t as noticeable in 1980.”
