Gates, whose father owned a used book store with a large selection of comics,[1] became a comic book fan at a young age, describing himself as "the DC kid" while dubbing his brother Alex "the Marvel kid".[2] During his teenage years, Gates drifted towards the music scene, but rediscovered comics in the late 90s when his family had to inventorize the father's store before its closure.[3][4] While attending University of Oklahoma, Gates wrote, drew and self-published short autobiographical slice-of-life comics and worked part-time at his then-local comic book store, Speeding Bullet Comics. After graduating with a degree in Fine Arts and a specialization in film and television production, he moved to Los Angeles.[1]
Career
In 2006, while attending WonderCon in San Francisco, Gates became acquainted with the comic book writer Geoff Johns.[5] Upon learning that Gates just recently moved to Los Angeles and had aspirations to work in television and film, Johns recommended him for an interview with the writing staff of Blade: The Series, where he was eventually hired as a production assistant.[1] After the series was cancelled, Johns offered Gates the position of his personal assistant, which Gates would later compare to a "writing apprenticeship".[6] Despite planning to be a television writer, he created a few short scripts inspired by then-upcoming Green Lantern storyline "Sinestro Corps War" and gave them to Johns, who in turn passed them on to the editor Eddie Berganza.[1] Soon after, Gates made his debut as a comic book writer with a back-up story in Tales of the Sinestro Corps: Superman-Prime, illustrated by veteran artist Jerry Ordway.[5]
After writing a few more short stories centered around the Green Lantern mythos, Gates followed Johns to the Superman family of books, taking over the Supergirl title.[7][8] Gates' run on the series began as a tie-in to the inter-title crossover storyline "New Krypton", spearheaded by Johns (as the writer of Action Comics) and James Robinson (as the writer of the Superman ongoing title).[9][10] When Johns stepped away from Action Comics and "New Krypton" to focus on other projects, Gates joined Robinson to co-write two limited series that would act as the culmination of the crossover storyline: Superman: Last Stand of New Krypton and Superman: War of the Supermen.[11][12][13] Gates' run on Supergirl ended shortly thereafter.[14][15]
In 2010, after DC Comics offered the artist Rob Liefeld to draw a new volume of the Hawk and Dove series with a writer of his choice, Liefeld hand-picked Gates due to his work on Supergirl and War of the Supermen.[16] The title, which was supposed to follow up on the plot threads from the "Brightest Day" crossover storyline, became a part of "The New 52" company-wide relaunch instead.[17] Gates left the series after five issues while Liefeld took over both writing and drawing duties for the remainder of the run.[18] Other projects of the period include a Kid Flash-centered tie-in to the "Flashpoint" crossover storyline[19][4] and a Captain Victory series for Dynamite created as part of the "Kirby: Genesis" initiative.[20][21]
In 2012, Gates was asked to help in developing a film script by Matthew Price, his former employer and owner of Speeding Bullet Comics.[22] The result, a coming-of-age story described as a "superhero movie by way of John Hughes", premiered on the festival circuit two years later under the title The Posthuman Project.[23][24] In 2013, Geoff Johns offered Gates to take over the writing duties of the recently-launched ongoing series Justice League of America's Vibe as both Johns and his co-writer Andrew Kreisberg had to leave the title due to their increased workloads.[25][26] In addition to Vibe, Gates ventured into the larger DC Universe with a number of one-off issues and a mini-series tying into the company-wide crossover storyline "Forever Evil".[27][28]
In 2016, returned to the character of Supergirl with a digital-first series set in the world of the eponymous television series.[29][30] Soon after, Gates was contacted by Andrew Kreisberg, one of the executive producers of the television series, who offered to write an episode for the show.[31] In 2017, Gates joined the writers room of another Kreisberg-produced superhero series The Flash,[32] before becoming the story editor for the show's fifth season and executive story editor for seasons six onwards. In addition to his work on live action series, Gates has also contributed scripts to the animated series Super Dinosaur and Spider-Man.
Includes the "Blood-Sisters" short story (co-written by Gates and Greg Rucka, art by Fernando Dagnino) from Superman Secret Files 2009 (one-shot, 2009)
All issues of "The Hunt for Reactron" crossover — Supergirl vol. 4 #45–46 and Action Comics #881–882 — are co-written by Gates and Greg Rucka.
"Part Six: Divided, Conquerable" (co-written by Gates and James Robinson, art by Travis Moore and Eduardo Pansica, in Adventure Comics vol. 2 #10, anthology, 2010)
"Part Seven: Distractions" (with Ivan Rodriguez, in Supergirl vol. 4 #52, 2010)
"Part Nine: This is the Way the World Ends" (co-written by Gates and James Robinson, art by Pete Woods, in #3, 2010)
"The Epilogue is the Future" (with Travis Moore, in Adventure Comics vol. 2 #11, anthology, 2010)
