Lobdell did not begin to read comics until he was 17 years old, while lying in bed after lung surgery. Later, he went to college to study psychology, but quit two years later when he began to write. While in college, he wrote for the college newspaper and interviewed Marvel editor Al Milgrom. Lobdell started submitting various stories to Marvel, but was systematically rejected by various editors, including Tom DeFalco. Later, DeFalco started editing Marvel Comics Presents requiring many writers, pencillers and inkers. Lobdell submitted a story about a character from Contest of Champions. Because the characters involved were rather obscure, DeFalco did not need to extract approval from other editors, and he decided to give Lobdell a chance.
Marvel Comics
In the 1990s, Lobdell became known for his work on Marvel Comics' X-Men-related titles, specifically Uncanny X-Men and the spin-off series Generation X. He wrote the first 28 issues of Generation X along with runs on Excalibur and X-Factor. Lobdell was the primary creative force behind most of the major X-title related storylines throughout a majority of the 1990s, including "X-Cutioner's Song", "Fatal Attractions", "Phalanx Covenant", "Age of Apocalypse", the "Onslaught" saga, and "". Lobdell had writing stints on Marvel's Daredevil, Alpha Flight, The Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix and early issues of issues of Iron Man and Fantastic Four during the "Heroes Reborn" event. Lobdell wrote the 1992 issue of Alpha Flight in which the superhero Northstar – originally intended to be gay, but closeted by the publisher's existing policy against openly LGBT characters – declared that he is gay, in a storyline intended to also address the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Lobdell returned to Marvel in 2001 to conclude plots he left behind with one last storyline, "Eve of Destruction".
In 2011, Lobdell took on the writing duties for Red Hood and the Outlaws, which debuted as part of DC Comics' company-wide title relaunch, The New 52. His portrayal of Starfire/Koriand'r in the first issue was criticized as shallow and sexist by some critics. He also wrote a new Teen Titans comic starring Red Robin, Superboy, Wonder Girl, Kid Flash, and three new characters, including the gay Hispanic superhero Bunker. His run on Teen Titans ended with Volume 4 Issue 30, the series was relaunched soon afterwards. In 2019, Lobdell began writing a new Flash book focusing on Wally West following the limited series Heroes in Crisis, titled Flash Forward, which began publication in November.
Awards
His work has won him recognition in the comic books industry, such as a nomination for the Comics Buyer's Guide Award for "Favorite Writer" in 1997.
Controversy
In 2011, Lobdell explained that among the reasons he no longer had a social media presence was the unintended spillover from his personal to professional life, and a run-in he'd had with writer Ron Marz on Twitter. Lobdell had accused Marz of having a "brain tumor" in response to comments in which Marz characterized as "racist" complaints by some fans that Afro-Latino character Miles Morales would replace Peter Parker in Ultimate Spider-Man, and that African-American actor Laurence Fishburne had been cast as Perry White in the film Man of Steel. In 2013, Scott Lobdell admitted to sexually harassing comic book artist/writer MariNaomi on stage during a Prism Comics panel at Long Beach Comic Con. MariNaomi had submitted an article to XoJane describing how she'd felt harassed by an unnamed fellow panelist, who had questioned her sexuality on stage, made offensive comments about her appearance and Asian features, and made sexually inappropriate jokes about her during the panel. Lobdell later identified himself as the panelist in question, and issued an apology to MariNaomi through Heidi MacDonald of ComicsBeat.com.
