There's this idea in media and culture that men and women can't be friends. You’re not going to hear that anywhere on DC.com, though, because we know better. The only reason the idea exists in the first place is due to some very outdated notions that reduce every male/female interaction to a potential sexual interaction. Frankly, they’re debasing, objectifying and utterly untrue. After all, we see it all the time in the DC Universe! Some of the strongest friendships between men and women in the DCU are entirely platonic. DC has heroes that can fly or bend steel in their hands, but being friends with the opposite sex is not a superpower. That doesn’t mean it’s not worthy of celebration, though! Here are ten awesome, totally platonic male/female friendships that you’ll discover in your favorite DC comics and shows.
Simon Baz and Jessica Cruz
When the two latest human recruits to the Green Lantern Corps first met in the 2016 Green Lanterns series, they could not stand each other. With the rest of the human contingent busy fighting cosmic battles in space, Hal Jordan placed them in charge of protecting Earth by forcing them to share the same Power Battery, ensuring they would have to learn to get along with each other. Now, historically, not all of Hal Jordan’s ideas have worked out for the best, but we have to admit this one turned out pretty great. Together, Simon and Jessica have worked through each of their own individual insecurities, showing that the power to overcome fear is stronger when you have a friend by your side.
Harley Quinn and King Shark
No one would expect a former therapist-turned-psychotic clown to befriend a half-shark demigod. It’s true that the Suicide Squad makes for strange bedfellows, but that’s not even where Harley Quinn and King Shark’s friendship began. Though they briefly served together in the 2011 incarnation of the Squad, Harley and Nanaue first got to know each other on a personal level outside the comics, in the Harley Quinn animated series. Since then, although the cast has fluctuated in the extreme between each season, King Shark has remained one of the few constants in Harley’s life—a friendship so strong that it’s found its way back into the comics, in the ongoing Birds of Prey.
Jason Todd and Stephanie Brown
One was killed when he went off on an unsanctioned solo Robin mission. The other was killed…when she went off on an unsanctioned solo Robin mission. As the sibling dynamic between Jason Todd and Stephanie Brown has grown across titles like Task Force Z and The Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing, we find ourselves asking: “Why don’t these two hang out more often?” Maybe it was the fact that she was dating Tim Drake and there was still some tension there between Jason and his replacement. But with Tim moving on to a new relationship, there’s nothing stopping Jason and Steph from commiserating on misspent youths and what a miserable hardass Batman can be. Sign us up for the Bad Robins Club.
Cassandra Cain and Duke Thomas
As one of the newer members of the Bat-Family, Duke Thomas has never had much chance to bond with other heroes his age. He had the other bootleg Robins, back in We Are Robin, but they all went their separate ways at the team’s disbanding. He’s never been a member of the Teen Titans or Young Justice and with his parents still living, albeit in critical condition, he’s been hesitant to plant his feet fully in Batman’s camp. Apart from Batman himself, Duke’s first ally within the house of Wayne was Cassandra Cain, who took him on as a sparring partner in the most recent volume of Batman and the Outsiders. Under the instruction of Black Lightning and Katana, Cass and Duke have relied on each other to sharpen their skills and make each other stronger, and occasionally break to go mini golfing with Stephanie. For the battle-trained Cassandra, motion and combat is the truest mode of conversation, and few have grown to speak it with her more fluently than Duke.
Dick Grayson and Donna Troy
When Marv Wolfman and George Pérez created the New Teen Titans, they envisioned them as a family—Dick Grayson, the first kid sidekick, as a paternal figure to the team, and Donna Troy, the first young woman on the original Teen Titans, as the team mother, leading new recruits and old friends alike towards the future. Dick and Donna have been working together since the 1960s, the twin leaders of the next generation of heroes. And despite the elevated levels of hormones that often run through Titans Tower, they’ve never hooked up. Years after his run on The New Teen Titans had ended, Wolfman would talk about how he considered writing a story where the two long-term allies did try and make a go of a romantic relationship, only to find they were too similar for the prospect to work. We like to think that Dick and Donna know each other well enough to have figured that out already.
Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen
Back in 2019, Superman made the important decision that if he truly stood for truth, he needed to come clean with the world about his secret identity. (Knowledge that has since been erased from the world, thanks to the machinations of Lex Luthor.) Before telling everyone, though, he made sure the most important people in his life knew first. That included Jimmy Olsen, who had a revelation of his own: Lois had told Jimmy before Clark had the chance. After all, he and Lois had been friends longer than either of them knew Superman. With Superman so dominant a figure in both their lives, it can be easy to forget that Lois and Jimmy have their own working relationship as the boldest and most trusted journalists in the DC Universe. Even when a Kryptonian isn’t around to catch them falling off a skyscraper, they’ve always had each other’s backs. Of course, that doesn’t mean Lois is beyond occasionally setting her sidekick up with her sister.
Batman and Hawkgirl
When most people look at Kendra Saunders, they see a winged, mace-wielding warrior. Others who know her a little better see the tragic remainder of a millenia-spanning reincarnation cycle, ejected from an eternal romance. But when Batman looks at Hawkgirl, he sees something few others do: a detective. Laden with ghosts and hardened for battle as she is, Kendra also carries a keen, investigative mind that the World’s Greatest Detective shows an abiding respect for, consulting with her on more extraterrestrial or mystical cases which fall into her purview. While Hawkgirl has her own backlog of issues, she makes for a more reliable partner than Detective Chimp.
Wallace West and Avery Ho
Wallace and Avery respectively represent the subsequent Flash eras of the New 52 and Rebirth. But in the lightspeed timeline of the Flash, that makes them practically twins in the Speed Force. As Kid Flash and the Flash of two Justice Leagues (China and Incarnate, respectively), Avery and Wallace represent the Gen Z class of the Speedster family—bringing a new definition, if you’ll forgive us, to “Zoomers.” Together, they’re currently working the case of a lifetime against the evils of the modern music industry in Jarrett Williams and Danielle Di Nicuolo’s Speed Force.
Peacemaker and Leota Adebayo
You’d be forgiven based on the name alone for thinking that the Peacemaker TV series wasn’t an ensemble show. But from its unskippable intro onwards, it’s quickly apparent that this breakout Max series is about Christopher Smith’s coworkers and friends as much as the vigilante himself. No relationship typifies this quite like that between Peacemaker and Amanda Waller’s daughter, newly minted agent Leota Adebayo. When they meet, Adebayo’s decorum, pragmatism and general ability to exist in any space without immediately embarrassing herself puts her at instant odds with the colorful antihero. But the respect and trust which grows between them underlines the show’s theme that none of us are beyond redemption if we’re willing to change.
Vic Sage and Renee Montoya
If the Question stands for any specific question, it’s the question of the self. All our lives, we write the answer to the question of “Who am I?” At a pivotal moment in Vic Sage’s life, he opened his mind to changing his answer. And when that life seemed to approach its end, he sought someone who could use that same insight. The value of a lesson is how you pass it onwards. That’s how he met Renee Montoya, a former blue-bleeding cop for the GCPD who had to resign when her questions about the systems she had always trusted piled too heavily unanswered. In Montoya, Vic found exactly the person he used to be. Exactly the person he knew how to help. In 52, Renee Montoya began as the Question’s contractor, then his protege and ultimately his last, and perhaps closest, friend.
Alex Jaffe is the author of our monthly "Ask the Question" column and writes about games, movies, TV, comics and superhero history for DC.com. Follow him on Bluesky at @AlexJaffe and find him in the DC Community as HubCityQuestion.
NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Alex Jaffe and do not necessarily reflect those of DC or Warner Bros. Discovery, nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.
