Batwoman Trailer: First Look at Ruby Rose in the Role

The CW just dropped the first trailer for Batwoman, the newest entry in the network’s Arrowverse. The teaser seems to take pages right off the comic books and will no doubt please ardent comic book fans, let alone Batman fans in general.

It stars Ruby Rose (Orange is the New Black, John Wick 2: Chapter 2, Pitch Perfect 3) as she plays Batwoman (Kate Kane), a character that has been hailed as the highest-profile gay superhero to be featured in a prominent comic book role.

What You Should Know

The original Batwoman appeared in DC Comics (1956), as a love interest for Batman in order to tackle the questioning of Batman’s homosexuality. But during the Infinite Crisis storyline in 2005, the character was revamped as an heiress of Jewish descent and a lesbian. It was a conscious decision made by DC Comics to diversify its characters and attract a larger readership in line with the social landscape with gay rights and activism.

The CW’s Batwoman follows in this stead as the first look trailer shows us. Katherine Kane is Batwoman and the maternal cousin of Bruce Wayne (Batman). She takes up the mantle of the caped crusader when Batman goes missing—either on duty with the Justice League or retired.

Kate Kane is the daughter of Jacob “Jake” Kane, a Colonel in the military. In the comics, Kate follows the steps of her father in joining the military. Although she excels, Kate is forced to leave the Academy for reasons of not wanting to denounce her sexuality as a lesbian—something we actually see in the trailer. Following this, she returns home to her father who helps train her.

Batwoman: First Appearance in the Arrowverse

The character of Batwoman first made an appearance in Elseworlds, a three-night, three-episode crossover event starting with The Flash, Arrow, and ending in Supergirl. During this event, The Flash (Barry Allen) wakes up in the body of Arrow (Oliver Queen) because John Deegan, an Arkham Asylum psychiatrist, rewrites reality. Hence, they both head to Gotham—Batwoman’s territory—to undo the damage. It is at this point they run into her. It’s safe to say that although season 1 may be more of an origin story for Batwoman, we can be assured we’ll be seeing more of Supergirl, The Flash, Arrow and maybe the Legends of Tomorrow.

Though in the same universe, Batwoman seeks to be different from its predecessors. In the trailer, we see her being marginalized due to her sexuality. And from what the trailer shows, this seems to be the show that will finally tackle societal issues the everyday man and woman go through.

There is no word yet on whether or not everyone’s favorite cape-wearing crusader, The Dark Knight, will appear or if this will have crossover events with the DC Universe’s Titans or Doom Patrol shows, seeing as they are somewhat related to the Bat-Family. Either way, from the first look trailer, the show promises to be a whole lot of fun. And with the successes of the Arrowverse so far, there is no reason to expect anything less from Batwoman.

Batwoman is set to premiere this fall on the CW network.