list in 2011. The character has been adapted into various media, including animated television series, video games, and comic strips. The character and his stories were adapted for live-action Black Lightning TV series, which ran from 2018 to 2022. The title character was portrayed by Cress Williams, who also went on to make appearances in the related TV shows The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow. Publication history The original candidate for DC Comics' first headlining black superhero was a character called the Black Bomber, a white racist who would turn into a black superhero under stress. Comics historian Don Markstein later described the character as "an insult to practically everybody with any point of view at all". When the editor who had approved the Black Bomber left the company before the character had seen print, Tony Isabella (whose previous writing experience included Luke Cage, a black Marvel Comics superhero with his own title) was asked to salvage the character. Isabella convinced editors to instead use his Black Lightning character, which he had been developing for some time. Isabella wrote the first 10 issues of Black Lightning before handing it over to Dennis O'Neil, and Trevor Von Eeden designed the character's original costume and drew the first 11 issues. Only one issue scripted by O'Neil came out before the series was canceled in 1978 as part of a general large-scale pruning of the company's superhero titles known as the DC Implosion. Issue #12 was published in Cancelled Comic Cavalcade and World's Finest Comics #260. Black Lightning made a number of guest appearances in various titles over the next few years, including a string of issues of World's Finest Comics written by O'Neil, then shifted to Detective Comics and a two-part story in Justice League of America in which he declined an offer of membership. In 1983, with his powers restored, he regularly appeared again as a member of Batman's spinoff superhero team, the Outsiders. When The Outsiders ended, he returned to making occasional guest appearances. In 1995, a new Black Lightning series began with art by Eddy Newell and again written by Tony Isabella, who was fired after the eighth issue and replaced with Australian writer Dave de Vries. The series was canceled five issues after Isabella left the title, the decision having been made before these issues had seen print. Isabella said he believes the editor replaced him with a