The Envoy
25 years ago - Xanthe Zhou is born in San Francisco's Chinatown.
19 years ago - 6-year-old Xanthe Zhou is killed in a car accident on a rainy night when the veil between the living world and Spirit World are thin. The Verdant Sorceress of the the Jade Court attempts to resurrect them, permanently draining her of her rank and leaving her as Po Po, a powerful spirit, while Xanthe is both half-living and half-dead. Po Po begins to teach Xanthe to be an Envoy, battling mystical threats in the living world and tending to the souls of the dead in the Spirit World.
13 years ago - 12-year-old Xanthe Zhou's sister Stephanie is born. Their family no longer leaves offerings at their grave, but they continue to check in on their family, where their sister sometimes sees them.
9 years ago - 16-year-old Xanthe Zhou reconnects with their mother, who attempts to keep them with a binding talisman, but is able to break the binding because the talisman uses their deadname.
4 years ago - 21-year-old Xanthe Zhou and John Constantine stop the Sorceress Wan Yujing from consuming spirits to gain the strength to challenge the Jade Court. They defeats the Sorceress in the Jade Tower. In exchange for restoring Po Po's rank as the Verdant Sorceress, Xanthe is granted a seat on the Jade Court.
2 years ago - 23-year-old Xanthe Zhou helps free the members of Stormwatch trapped in the Spirit World. They join them in defeating Kaizen Gamorra, and become the newest member of Stormwatch.
1 year ago - 24-year-old Xanthe Zhou and Stormwatch make themselves public when they join the battle against Mageddon.
Xanthe Zhou holds a very particular record. They are the very first character who generated comments on this site asking if they can be included even before I'd gotten my hands on their source comic. They are just that compelling a character; the second they hit the page, it's just immediately evident that this is someone who deserves more attention. I am beyond excited that we found a spot in our continuity that we believe really gives them a place to thrive... I would love to hear what you think!
Xanthe Zhou's Comic HistoryXanthe Zhou was introduced during the 2023 publishing initiative Lazarus Planet, but their powers and story thankfully have precious little to do with that whole thing. Instead, their story is really told in their own 6 issue miniseries, Spirit World. It's a book by writer Alyssa Wong and Taiwaneese artist Haining, and its a rare example of an extremely modern story and character that feel like they should have been in DC forever.
We're introduced to Xanthe, a Chinese non-binary sorcerer who uses a distinct casting style centered around the use of joss paper. They serve as a sort of messenger between the living world and the spirit world, as they are part of both worlds after dying in a car accident in their childhood. The story follows them on an adventure through the Spirit World along with Batgirl and John Constantine, ultimately confronting an evil sorceress and really stepping into their own power. The second this character showed up, I was asked how I would be incorporating them. There was never a question as to whether or not we'd use them, I just held off for some reason, thinking that a role would show up that they were perfect for... |
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Our Xanthe Zhou StoryWe're not changing anything at all about Xanthe's stellar characterization and story; this is one of those times a character arrives fully formed and all we can do is just copy them verbadim. The amount of color and adventure and story we get by adding them is just completely off the scales.
What we ARE doing, however, is making them the newest member of our Stormwatch team, and they fit so unbelievably well there I feel like this could easily be what they were added for in the first place. The Authority has a magic user on it called the Doctor, who is basically a lineage of Earth Shamans, so there's precedent for a magic user, but Xanthe is just so much more compelling a character. They have that slightly just story-adjacent feeling that we look for in Stormwatch characters, coming from a slightly weird modern publishing initiative... and since they sometimes use the name the Envoy, they even fit the naming scheme of the Authority, whos members include the Engineer and the Doctor. This is one of the most fun things that happen when you're constructing your own fan continuity. Every so often you stumble on an idea that just feels like it's so obvious it was always there just waiting for someone to come up with it. Xanthe is very clearly a character who deserves way more focus, and this just feels like the perfect place for them to get it. |
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