Welcome to the ’Net’s premiere (as in first — I won’t presume to say it’s the best) Birds of Prey website.
The first version of Birdwatching debuted in April 1998, and the Birds of Prey themselves have been through some ups and downs, highs and lows, since then. Right now, I’d say they were on a super-high with Gail Simone, Ed Benes, and Alex Lei at the helm of the Good Ship BoP, and I hope they keep right on sailing.
I decided to create this site when I failed to find any other site already “out there” which gave me the kind of information about the Birds of Prey costars (working together and separately) that I wanted. Building this site has provided me with an ongoing excuse to indulge in some really enjoyable research in the form of comic book collecting.
“Because You Demanded It!” the cover of issue #1 proudly declared — with the extraordinary Birds of Prey series which, up until 1998, had existed only in a series of superior one-shots and special miniseries has now been a monthly comic title for almost four years. Birds of Prey not only gives Oracle the ongoing main character berth Barbara Gordon deserved for years, it also revives one of the best female characters comics ever created: Dinah Lance, the Black Canary. It also inspired a very loosely adapted TV series which lasted 13 episodes in the Fall of 2002 on the WB.
Cancellation befalls good stuff as well as bad stuff, so it is my hope that at least in some small way this site has and will continue to help strengthen the fan base and readership for the Birds of Prey series so that it will be with us for a very long time.
Birds of Prey boasts two of the best DC characters ever — male or female, meta or mortal — and has been blessed with exceptionally talented creators including Terry Moore, Amanda Connors, Jimmy Palmiotti, Gilbert Hernandez, Chuck Dixon, Albert T. De Guzman, Jackson “Butch” Guice, Gloria Vasquez, Greg Land, Drew Geraci, Shannon Blanchard, and more.
The dedication of the series’ original editor Jordan F. Gorfinkle (who brought Dinah and Babs together and created the concept of the Birds of Prey in the first place) guaranteed the high quality of the comic and gave it strong roots from which to grow.
Before the fall of 1997, I’d been away from any but the most superficial comic fandom since childhood. I still have the tattered remnants of a few of my old Batman, Shazam!, Superman Family, and Justice League of America comics, and I remember a couple of stories I must’ve read to death, because the comic books themselves are no longer around. Even as a little girl, I thought the Black Canary was the coolest woman I’d ever seen. And even though, as a grown-up, I have more in common with Oracle (who is the other coolest woman I’ve ever seen), I still think so.
I’m very glad I tripped my way back into comic fandom, and I’m thrilled that I stumbled over the Birds of Prey during their early days so that I can enjoy watching their story unfold along with all the other great stories and sheer fun comic books have to offer.