I wanted to write a story that not only was different than what was normally told, but pointed out why diversity is important. That not only contains it, but also discusses it. I wanted to write a book that makes the readers intensely aware that it is a book. And yet still be entertaining.

I remember when first daring to write a novel in first person with a female protagonist that I feared it wouldn’t work. I’d written about vampires, werewolves, ogres, and ghost dogs, but I was genuinely concerned that writing from the perspective of an undead, cannibal, witch woman would be beyond my abilities. That instinct says everything about how we guys (specifically cisgender ones like myself) are trained to view gender in fiction.

Here are the fall and midseason premieres I'm eagerly anticipating. What about you?

Daisy Ridley can now add another awesome title to her resume. The Star Wars: The Force Awakens star has signed on as executive producer of the first film to be entered into the Kids section at the Sundance Film Festival.

In studying the preceding Star Wars films, an interesting point emerges. If Rey is a Mary Sue, she's far from being the very first one. She just happens to be a girl, and for some that's apparently a problem.

Our heroine is aboard a massive spaceship that feels more like a haunted house than a piece of sci-fi technology. She’s independent and cool-headed. Her character has an agency that shows she isn’t there in service of the male characters, if anything, they end up just being background players for her. She isn’t overtly sexualized, and she isn’t there to please others. She can take on any evil that gets thrown at her. To put it simply, she’s a total BAMF.

The last thing we should be doing is pitting women against women, even if they're fictional characters; the world does that enough as it is. The fact that we even have two female superhero shows out right now is groundbreaking. That's what we should be redirecting the conversation towards.

Way, way back at New York Comic-Con, we had the opportunity to talk to the thoughtful, hilarious, and incredibly creative Black Canary team, Brenden Fletcher and Annie Wu. Read on for their thoughts on DC You, aggression in comics, and great songs to make art by.

We were pretty disappointed that Evangeline Lilly's Hope Van Dyne was needlessly sidelined in Ant-Man in favor of making another movie about a male superhero. Despite our dismay over the Captain Marvel movie's repeated delays, we're glad to see the Wasp finally get to do her thing—and get acknowledged in the sequel's title—and so is director Peyton Reed.

As Barbara Gordon (aka Batgirl) once said in reference to her friend Kara: “A hero is not measured by what her power may be, but by the courage she shows in living, and the warmth she holds in her heart.”

I hate the phrase "Strong Female Character."

One of the most resonant things Guillermo del Toro said during his interview with The Mary Sue is "these decisions have a weight." He was speaking specifically about the decision to give Tom Hiddleston the only significant moment of nudity in Crimson Peak, but also generally about making art that ignores conventional gender roles.

Stars, they're just like us! They want more Furiosas!

Candice Patton is not shy about her role as reporter, Iris West, on CW’s The Flash.

No character is capable of achieving that level of complexity while written under the assumption that a female character becomes more interesting by giving them typically masculine traits.

A new study on the 2014-2015 television season has some really fascinating insights into what men and women want to see from ladies on TV. The results... may surprise you.

Last May, Gwenda Bond's novel Fallout, about the adventures of highschool-aged Lois Lane, helped to give the DC character some of the attention she deserves in her own right. And now, Lois is getting a sequel!