Last month, long-time Marvel editor C.B. Cebulski was announced as the new Editor-in-Chief for Marvel Comics. With the announcement, rumors re-emerged regarding Cebulski writing under the pseudonym of Marvel Comics writer “Akira Yoshida”. “Yoshida” was a comic book writer for Marvel Comics, Dark Horse, and Dreamwave 13 years ago and had penned issues of Thor, X-Men, Elektra, and many more Marvel stories. He suddenly disappeared.
This week, Cebulski finally admitted to Bleeding Cool that he was, indeed, Akira Yoshida. He told the site, “I stopped writing under the pseudonym Akira Yoshida after about a year. It wasn’t transparent, but it taught me a lot about writing, communication and pressure. I was young and naïve and had a lot to learn back then. But this is all old news that has been dealt with, and now as Marvel’s new Editor-in-Chief, I’m turning a new page and am excited to start sharing all my Marvel experiences with up and coming talent around the globe.”
Cebulski, who is completely white, created “Yoshida” during his tenure as associate editor at Marvel Comics to get around a policy that forbad editors to write for Marvel. A large amount of the comics “Yoshida” wrote were predominantly set in Japanese settings and featured martial arts.
After Comic Book Resources reached out to Marvel for an interview with “Yoshida”, Cebulski created this whole backstory for the fake writer. According to the CBR profile in 2015, “Yoshida” grew up in Japan and attended comic book conventions, which led him to work in comics. When people asked if anyone had ever met “Yoshida”, former Marvel editor Mike Marts claimed to have met him at Marvel HQ, when in reality, it was a Japanese translator who was there for an unrelated visit.
This is not a good look for Marvel. Not only has the new Editor-in-Chief lied about being a Japanese writer, but he wrote a number of Japan-centric comics for the franchise under that false pretense. “Yoshida” was hired for his perspective of Japanese culture in his work, which now looks to be culturally appropriated.
Fans have begun dissecting the work Cebulski had done through “Yoshida”:
Every single Akira Yoshida comic was a barrage of ninja and samurai shit where every character was obsessed with "honor." From what I can tell, "honor" means anything from baking to murder. http://pic.twitter.com/n1RFxlQ1QU
— Seanbaby (@Seanbabydotcom) November 27, 2017
According to Cebulski, Marvel was aware of the situation and they have handled it prior to taking the EIC position. Marvel has not officially commented on the matter.
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