BRUBAKER, ED 73
for his work as a writer on titles such as Batman , Gotham Central , and Catwoman for
DC ; and Captain America , Th e Uncanny X-Men , and Daredevil for Marvel. Addition-
ally, Brubaker has put forth several moderately successful creator-owned titles, such
Sleeper (2003–5), Criminal (2006–), and Incognito (2009). He has most frequently
collaborated with artists Sean Phillips and Michael Lark.
In the early 1990s, Brubaker began working as a comic writer through regular
contributions to Dark Horse Comics’ series Dark Horse Presents. One of these
stories, the three-part novelette “An Accidental Death” (1992), garnered critical
acclaim, earning Brubaker his fi rst Eisner Award nomination (Best Writer/Artist
Team) and helping to open the door to more mainstream work. Following that success,
Brubaker’s At the Seams (1997) was nominated for an Ignatz Award (Outstanding
Graphic Novel or Collection) and showcases multiple narrators whose diff ering takes
on a shared relationship work together to render a fi nal story more developed than
any one narrator’s tale by itself.
Th ese early successes led to steady work with DC Comics, with whom Brubaker
signed an exclusive contract in 2000. Taking the helm of some of DC’s mainstream
superhero titles, he completed a nearly two-year run on Batman before teaming up with
artist Darwin Cooke to revamp the Catwoman franchise. His writing on both of these
titles showed Brubaker’s love of fi lm noir and pulp crime novels, and these elements
in his work were popular enough with readers to merit the launch of Gotham Central
(2003–6), a crime noir comic centered on the workings of the Gotham City Police
Department.
By late 2004, Brubaker was no longer under an exclusive contract with DC and
began working for Marvel Comics, where he signed an exclusive contract in 2005 that
promised him regular work with the publisher while still allowing him to write Sleeper
and Gotham Central. Th e author’s work at Marvel has included a noteworthy run on
Captain America , during which time Brubaker has retcon ned the death of Captain
America’s 1940’s sidekick, James “Bucky” Barnes, who would eventually become the
new Captain America after Steve Rogers was assassinated.
Brubaker’s work on Captain America showcases one of the major recurring themes
in his work: the mutability of characters’ identities due to the uncertainty of their past.
As Brubaker explained in an interview with Newsarama , the uncertainty of his charac-
ters’ narratives can often be built around secrets from their past: “Th e secret buried in
the past is one of my favorite plots to explore, because no matter how many times it’s
used, it’s always diff erent, because everyone’s secrets are their own... I’m a sucker for
stuff about characters refl ecting on something from their past.”
Outside of comics, Brubaker has also written scripts for fi lms and video games. He
currently lives with his wife Melanie in Seattle, Washington and maintains a Web site
at http://www.edbrubaker.com/.
Selected Bibliography: Brady, Matt. “Brubaker Talks X-Men: Deadly Genesis.” News-
arama ( June 27, 2009), http://forum.newsarama.com/showthread.php?threadid=38
