The upcoming Batgirl film has cast DC’s first transgender character with actor Ivory Aquino now set to play Batgirl’s best friend, Alysia Yeoh.
In the super-woke DC comic book series, Alysia Yeoh is the best friend of Barbara Gordon — Batgirl’s alter ego — and an out-and-proud, transgender bartender.
Aquino is best known for the activist LGBTQ series When We Rise, and portraying trans rights activist Cecilia Chung, according to Deadline.
While Yeoh will play Warner’s first DC trans on the big screen, trans actor Nicole Maines was the comic book giant’s first onscreen trans character when TV’s Supergirl introduced the character Dreamer in 2018.
Batgirl is set to debut on HBO Max, likely sometime late in 2022. Brendan Fraiser will be featured as the movie’s villain, the arsonist Firefly, and Michael Keaton is said to be reprising his 1989 role as Batman. The film will also feature J.K. Simmons as Commissioner Jim Gordon, Barbara’s policeman father.
The Alysia Yeoh character has the distinction of being part of the first “transgender wedding” ceremony to appear in any major comic book when Yeoh married Jo Muñoz in Batgirl number 45, in October of 2015.
Thus far, the Yeoh character has never become a superhero herself. However, the character’s creator, Gail Simone, recently admitted that there was a brief plan to have Yeoh temporarily take over as Batgirl after Barbara Gordon became injured in a fight. That idea was scrapped, though, and to date the character has only been portrayed as a bartender and friend of Barbara Gordon.
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