Ladies Making Comics

This is actually old news on a number of levels, but it’s now official— co-creator of the Matrix Trilogy Larry Wachowski is now officially out as Lana Wachowski, while promoting her new film Cloud Atlas, the first film on which she will be credited as “Lana” (her most recent film credit, as a producer on Ninja Assassin, still credited her as “Larry”). Lana had been rumored to be transitioning for almost 10 years now, though she had never addressed those rumors until now.

Of course, her real outing came with her introduction to Fantagraphics’ No Straight Lines anthology of queer comics!

Lana and her brother Andy first started in the entertainment industry as writers for Clive Barker’s Razorline imprint at Marvel. They then conceived of The Matrix as a comic book—thus eventually leading to a horrified teenage-me having to cope with the possibility that I could have almost NEVER heard of The Matrix because I didn’t read comic books, an oversight I sought to remedy with great gusto.

The Wachowskis made it easy by commissioning Matrix comics by some of the best of the medium for the official website, including Neil Gaiman, which led me inevitably to Sandman, and the rest is history. Postscript: The first time I entered a comic shop was to purchase their self-published Doc Frankenstein comic, which is still one if the best comics I’ve ever read.

I wish Lana all the happiness in this new stage of her life and officially welcome her into the Sisterhood of Comics Creators, with her own page on the Women in Comics Wiki!