Maine Transgender Woman to Play First Transgender Superhero
In fifth grade, she acted like a superhero by challenging her Orono, Maine school administration to let her use the girls' bathroom at school. Now, she's playing a literal superhero in a national network television series.
Maines herself is a transgender woman; she was born a boy but started identifying as female at the young age of 2. She will play the part of Nia Nal, the transgender woman reporter also known as the superhero 'Dreamer' in the CW series 'Supergirl'. The casting announcement came Saturday at Comic-Con in San Diego.
According to the Press Herald, in 2014 Maines and her family won a case against the school administration's decision to have her use the staff bathroom on the grounds of anti-discrimination laws. After Maine's family won the lawsuit, she continued on to become the transgender activist she is today, punctuated by her appearance as our first transgender superhero. She explained just how ground breaking the casting was in a recent interview with Variety:
"We had trans people on television portrayed by cis men as sex workers and drug addicts, which painted a very specific image. ...Now, it's very relieving and hopeful to watch... casting offices stepping up to put trans people in trans roles so we can portray ourselves and start to disprove some of those stereotypes about us.... I'm just beyond thrilled to be able to do that in a SUPERSUIT!"
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