Elizabeth Wilkinson is not a UFC fighter by today’s standards. This little-known English bare-knuckle fighter broke all barriers to be a boxing champion and considered by many as the first female boxer.

Legendary Comics in true fashion seek out new untold interesting stories for their line of comic books and graphic novels. When Kelly Zekas and Tarun Shanker pitched the historical story of the boxer, the comic book publisher jumped on the opportunity to retell and fictionalize the story into the pages.

Here’s the graphic novel synopsis:

Championess is based on the true story of Elizabeth Wilkinson, a female bare-knuckle boxer in 18^th century London. Elizabeth reimagined as half-Indian, and her sister Tess struggles to make ends meet and cover Tess’s debts. While Elizabeth works odd jobs at the local newspaper, the only way she knows how to make enough money to help them survive is her true passion, bare-knuckle boxing. With Tess’s support, Elizabeth trains at the boxing facility of one of the most famous retired boxers and the only real fight promoter of any notoriety, James Figg. As Elizabeth trains with Figg and James Stokes, she confronts her personal demons of what destroyed her family and comes to terms with being the first half-Indian female boxer in a white male world.

Tarun Shanker and Kelly Zekas wrote the story for Championess with Amanda Perez Puentes providing the artwork. Legendary Comics’ Nikita Kannekanti edited the product.

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LRM Online’s Gig Patta chatted with the Championess team about bringing this historical fiction to life onto the pages of a graphic novel. Also, we discussed the liberties and reimagined the story with these real-life characters.

Championess is available in bookstores and online retailers tomorrow.

Watch the exclusive interview below. Let us know what you think.

Source: LRM Online Exclusive, Legendary Comics