#maybe our definitions of queerbaiting are different

[thatlgbtqfandom]

I've watched a few interviews with the cast and crew of Good Omens and can I just say that, as someone who was a BBC's Sherlock fan back when it was still airing, it makes me so incredibly happy to finally have a show that not only doesn't queerbait (yes, the bar is in hell), but where the actors seem genuinely happy with and open about the queer direction the show is going in, and where they don't shame the fans for also being happy about this development. I just watched an interview with Michael Sheen where he, almost unprompted, brought up fanfiction and said that he thinks that it's a shame that people used to be weird about fanfiction because he thinks it's amazing and shows a love for the show. And... as someone who kind of still gets upset whenever I'm reminded of certain interviews and panels with the cast and crew of Sherlock (if you were in the fandom I'm sure you know which ones I'm talking about), this unabashed celebration of queer joy from the cast and crew of a big show like this is just something I could never have imagined as a young, queer fan!

I get that there are different circumstances, Sherlock fans could definitely be a lot sometimes, and maybe it's cruel of me to compare shows like this. But I genuinely believe that Sherlock did some actual damage to my (and many others') trust in media and in creators. It's one of the main reasons I absolutely didn't believe Our Flag Means Death would do what it did even when I was seeing it play out before my very eyes. It's why I didn't believe Crowley and Aziraphale would ever even come close to actually expressing their feelings for one another despite all of the queer subtext in season 1 and despite the cast and crew calling it a love story. Maybe all of this even added to my suspicions that they weren't going to follow through because we've all been let down time and time again.

And I'm not trying to pin the fault of queerbaiting solely on Sherlock and the team behind it - I am aware that there were many other big shows and movies that also queerbaited at the time. But out of all of those shows, I mainly watched Sherlock and it, along with the interviews with the cast and crew, were my main points of reference for what to expect regarding queer representation in (especially mainstream) media at the time. Which is why I'm mainly using Sherlock as an example of this unfortunate trend.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that with all of these shows now subverting our very, very low expectations for what kind of space queer characters and queer stories are allowed to occupy in (especially mainstream) media, I feel like my teenage self is starting to heal just a bit. But, both back then and in hindsight, I'm also completely baffled that a few shows in the late 2000s and early 2010s were able to get away with the shit they were pulling and completely ruin young, queer fans' trust in both creators and in their own media literacy.

[neonscandal]

Thanks for your posts and metas, @neonscandal .... Before I found your blog, actually I ship tododeku and kiribaku. But thanks to you, I became bakudeku shipper (until now). Your metas are amazing and always based on canon. Sorry, I'm not good with words, but I hope you know how great your blog is (you are definitely one of my favorite tumblr blog). 💐🌷

And WOW these last 10 - 15 chapter, really are the best. Even my mutuals who are anti-bkdk can't deny Bakugou and Midoriya's bond anymore. Also, love Uraraka and Toga's bond....

Do you think it's possible that at the end of BNHA, Bakugou and Midoriya have ambygous relationship (kinda like Tiger and Bunny)....? I know it could be hard to be canon in shounen series.....

P.s Do you think SatoSugu (from JJK) is queerbaiting?

⚠️ Vague spoiler warnings through chapter MHA 410 at best. Covers JJK S2 with a vague mention of a character who pops up later in the manga.

It's funny you say that because I also love a good tododeku or kiribaku situation. Like yea, people have their OTP but... realistically? Characters should be just as messy as people in real life. ✨ They're going to date around before things fit together with that OTP, right? At least that's how I look at it. So I love exploring offshoots.

You are far too kind in these rough times but I appreciate you saying that (and reaching out). The swarm of asks lately have been so funny. I tend to carve out time to address them quicker than some of the other things bouncing around my head (literally, the exact opposite happens with fic updates 🥺) so I'm just happy I'm writing something. If someone else enjoys it then that's the whipped cream and caramel on my sundae.

DUDE. I hadn't read 409 or 410 yet because holiday chaos but I feel like we're beyond allegations at this point haha ALTHOUGH, I didn't see the cliffhanger from 410 coming at all so I wonder what that means for the larger story.. Got any theories?

Regarding endgame... honestly the last two chapters gave me a little anxiety. "This is our tale?" Too good to be true. Especially when we know from chapter one "this is a story of how I became a great hero". Also, I've had some thoughts since 406 about how their connection is being framed up which I haven't had time to write but it feels like a lot of fanservice for Horikoshi (and subsequent editors, etc) to not commit. Additionally, in all the ways this story subverts the typical formula for shonen, it would also feel like a fumbled opportunity to turn everything on its nose with such a wildly popular series. So I'm holding out hope but conservatively preparing for one of them to just... not make it even if we get a confession *shudders in Supernatural flashbacks*.

I hope this makes sense as I struggled to recommend stories where this wasn't the case when asked about BL. In my opinion, good representation in mainstream stories (gender identity, orientation, race, religion, disability, etc.) is when, whatever makes a character different isn't their whole identity. Specifically in the context of more traditional stories (not centered on BL for instance), they should be involved if not just as integral to the plot as any other character wherein their diversity isn't sticking out like a sore thumb. But even that characterization requires nuance which is what makes it so hard to articulate? Maybe it's simpler to say that their character arc shouldn't just be based around identity. As a short answer to your question, I don't think that SatoSugu is queerbaiting. I think they are authentically and intrinsically coded to one another in subtext and out loud straight from Akutami but that, sometimes, relationships don't work out or love is unrequited. They may not have had the same feelings despite their inherent complement to one another and that's okay.

As above, characters should be just as messy as real people and that's what makes what didn't happen between them all the more tragic because it's heartbreaking in how relatable it is (not the cult leading and murder though). Seems like a convenient answer from a delulu shipper unless you take into consideration how Kirara Hoshi's identity is given the same level of subtlety. They aren't defined by their identity nor are the characters jarred by some particularly grandiose reveal nor are they perturbed by the nature of their connection to Hikari. I'm by no means an expert but I think that these characters are executed well in the sense that they have a complexity that doesn't hinge on what would otherwise make them different. They aren't "othered", it's just a fact of who they are and the story continues. It's a facet of who they are without cheaply being all they are. With Gege Akutami's own pronouns not expressly confirmed, perhaps that informs the care around those with differing identities.

I haven't seen Tiger & Bunny yet but now I know what to check out next!

[nerdylolo]

My honest takes on The School for Good and Evil movie:

It wasn't horrible, but it was certainly a bit disappointing to me, and definitely not what I expected.

The beginning, taking place in Gavaldon, was very different from the books, but not quite bad. I don't know why they made Sophie less... obviously vain, but it wasn't terribly done. Also, I didn't understand why Sophie and Agatha didn't know about the SGE yet, I personally thought Agatha's disbelief in it and Sophie's enthusiasm about it was a major enjoyable part of their relationship in the book, but maybe it was so they could introduce it to us through them? Also, so sad we didn't get to see more Reaper with dead birds and more miserable Agatha life.

I and my brother were sad to not see Castor and Pollux, as well as the other Good professors/characters who weren't there. Princess Uma, Sader. I think that would have been a lot to include in a movie--hence why I think TSFGAE would have been better as a shoe--but alas. I was also very confused and distressed about how they've been handling the School Master/Rafal during marketing, and now during the movie? I definitely think it removed all of the mystery about him, a big loss.

I think, personally, the costumes, set, all the design, even cgi and practical effects, casting and acting were fine. My main issue was pacing and script. The pacing felt very odd. Even as an agressive Tagatha stan, I feel like this movie pushed them together too quickly with barely a few hints of Tedros and Agatha before making them kiss at the end, which felt very wrong to me. (Their relationship was slower and more natural in the books! One of the reasons I liked them so much!)

I definitely thought the book story would need upgrades to be up with the times, and in some ways, the movie did an okay job (I definitely liked the part where Rafal talked about slowly corrupting Good with vanity). However, the script writing is where I think it went to far. The writing was very middle, the modern language from Agatha and Sophie felt very awkward next to everyone else and out of place in general.

Of course, I very much disliked the part where, to symbolize her Evilness with ugliness, Sophie grew a hooked nose. Antisemitic much? I honestly felt like the movie starting with using disheveledness and dirtiness to symbolize ugliness (rather than just unpopular characteristics like bug eyes, crooked/hooked noses, weight) was better, but then they brought out the big hooked nose for grand Evil Sophie and that definitely threw me off. I had hoped they'd stick to dirty and disheveled than associating characteristics with Evil, but that happened.

Of course, I can't not talk about the Sophie Agatha kiss. I read the books when I was small, so I know The Spoiler. Don't worry. I don't think the movie is pulling any more queerbaiting than the book was. And I think that the queerbaiting could be debated, given the whole context of the time the book was written, what messages Soman Chainani wanted to write, etc.

Confession 1. When Sophie called Aggie her best friend, died, and then Agatha kissed her, I laughed so hard I cried. They really leaned into it so hard, huh. They said "GUYS THEYRE NOT IN LOVE THERE'S NO REASON YOU SHOULD THINK ITS GAY BUT HERE'S A MOUTH KISS". Hilarious.

Confession 2. I think they only added the Tagatha kiss to reiterate that, even though Agatha kissed Sophie, they are not a thing. Overly pushing Tagatha with the limited chemistry they had so far.

Other words about shipping. Why did Lady Lesso say "my love" about Rafal, that felt out of nowhere. They defruited Lady Lesso, but at least we got our Hestadil fruits. Wish we saw more of the Coven, though. Anadil and her rats, Hester and her tattoos, Dot and her chocolate. I wish we knew them more, even saw more of the classes. Also, I adored Hort's entrance, Earl did a perfect job with him the whole movie, even when the script failed him. Same with the rest of the Coven.

Final point: The pacing was weird, would have done better as an episode series I think than a movie. Such a shame, because I loved the cast and most of the rest of the work done on this movie.

[eisforeidolon]

I first commented this but maybe it's better as an ask. I'm a j2 fan who enjoys Mishalecki antics but cringes at most Jenmish panels. I don't think Misha is actually a bad person, more clueless and attention-seeking, and so I enjoy him with Jared where they both give as good as they get. With Jensen it's different. For many reasons, and Heller delusions causing drama with their batshit interpretations is only one of them.

Misha shamelessly objectifies Jensen, in a way he does not do with Jared, and baits Destiel for his own profit. This alone makes me feel like I want to protect Jensen from him, not see them together on stage, silly as it sounds. Then, Jensen is often visibly uncomfortable on stage with Misha (I suppose because of the whole objectifying thing) and in response mocks Misha ruthlessly. It makes for a cringe viewing experience unless you have shipping goggles on.

It's not always like that though. The Jenmish panel at JIB12 last summer was a lot of fun. But often it is.

I do sometimes add on to comments to continue a discussion, but I also may not feel like I have much to add or just get lazy. So if you specifically want a response to something, a direct ask is the better way to go.

I don't begrudge anyone enjoying panels with Jared and Misha. I just get kind of irritated when the same people talking up how great they were then talk shit about Jensen for *gasp* also joking with Misha. Not just finding those Jensen and Misha panels awkward af, because frankly, sometimes they are, but actively blaming Jensen for agreeing to a panel or not storming offstage in a snit. If it's that terrible to interact with Misha, it's that terrible to interact with Misha - it is or it isn't.

I personally just reached a point where I was completely fed up with Misha, but I recognize that Jared and Jensen are friends with the guy and assume that (a) they don't see the worst shit he says/posts or don't take it seriously and (b) he must have some kind of redeeming qualities one-on-one I just don't have the perspective to see.

I think it definitely plays a part that when Jared and Misha make off-color jokes to each other it's very mutual. It doesn't have that longstanding undercurrent of Misha's queerbaiting and objectification of Jensen/Dean behind Jensen's back that makes Misha's motives inherently questionable, made even moreso when he's the one disproportionately trying to turn the conversation that direction. I personally don't find Jensen's mocking jokes of Misha uncomfortable because I have dear friends where roasting each other is our way of horsing around, and it fits with Jensen's "grumpy guy" persona? But I can see why they would read as just making everything that much more awkward. I also think that Jensen is the most reserved comparatively, so it's easier for Misha and Jared to match energy levels in the first place, even without all the baggage.

And yeah, not all Jensen and Misha panels are unbearably awkward. But there has never been a Jared and Misha panel remotely as awkward as many of theirs have been. Like, seriously, if I was the kind of person to think actors were fucking solely because of the way they interacted on stage - which I'm not because that's dumb as fuck - but if I were? From Jibcon panels taken as a whole, I'd assume Misha had some weird stalkery crush on Jensen the latter was trying not to be visibly weirded out by, Jensen and Jared were occasionally raunchy BFFs playing it up for the crowd for shits & giggles, and Jared and Misha were the fuckbuddies.

[vld-has-messed-me-up]

patting you gently on the shoulder. sometimes someone reblogs an old vld post of mine and i remember being neck-deep in it at age 16. have fun and enjoy the clown music

I was also neck-deep in it at age 16.

I actually got into voltron as Therapy Content to get over being burned by a completely different show. I got into voltron (after seeing klance analysis on tumblr) thinking "well this time I definitely won't be queerbaited!". And I was so excited about it. There were two seasons already out and it seemed like I was going to get exactly the kind of content I want; animated, anime inspired, sci-fi fantasy, Found Family, some rivals to lovers, some wholesome interaction, interesting character arcs. And I followed the show for years, checking in whenever there was new content and casually keeping up with crew news while staying in my own little peaceful section of fandom.

The worst part is, through each new season, I never fully gave up hope on canon klance. It was only when the thing was fully ended that I realized the truth. (Which is exactly how it went with the previous thing, incidentally.)

Voltron really was the nail in the coffin of my trust in other creators.

[I was legitimately watching the new She-ra with the attitude of "it doesn't matter how many hints there are or who is making it, you cannot trust the creators not to queerbait you" like some jaded veteran.]

And for years I kinda thought that we queerbaited ourselves, that we had accidentally tricked each other into believing that we were going to get more than was ever hinted.

And now, after many years, I think I can safely say that we were actually queerbaited and the reason it seemed like we weren't is that that's how queerbaiting is supposed to work it's supposed to make you question if you really saw what you saw. Queerbaiting is a form of mass market gaslighting and for several years it was working on me.

But no, we did not imagine the tension and the teamwork and the Bonding Moments and the banter and the support and the potential. It was there, we saw it, we were right.

And sure, I may joke about being a clown but here's the thing: klance in 2023 is so relaxing. The show is over, time has passed, we've all grown, we already have all the canon character details and lore bits we are ever going to get, the choice adhere to canon or ignore canon or rewrite canon is entirely ours for the taking, the ship wars are over, the toxic forces have left, any mob mentality has faded away; it is so peaceful. Like sure, we will never get the potential back and we will never know exactly what happened in production "but at least the war is over" their space war and our shipping wars, it's all in the past now. I think this era of voltron fandom is where maybe we can all start to heal.

I'm actually intending to rewatch the show (a thing I was originally very against) because I want to really see it all in order and see how the flow actually was and see if I can assess what really might have been happening behind the scenes. I want to look at it in its entirety (with a mind that has grown and is much less desperately invested) and puzzle the whole thing out. This is my personal therapy for myself, to look back at it and evaluate it with much more neutral eyes. I am going to make notes and maybe a casual little conspiracy thought web to get my thoughts all sorted out. And then, then I am going to outline the story that I saw in the potential, the story that I think we deserved, perhaps even multiple variations of it depending on which attributes I keep.

And in this way I believe I will finally be able to think about voltron without feeling so unresolved about it. Because I don't like feeling this way about it, I don't like that I look back on these characters I loved and this show that I loved and feel so betrayed and furious.

I don't think I'll ever forgive the writers or the company fully, but I think I can forgive the story itself for being written that way, I think I can learn to love the art for what it gave me and fill in the gaps in my own mind. I think I can reclaim this thing for myself, the love that I had for this show, I think I can reconstruct it in my mind and make something that I can love without shame. I don't want to feel guilty for having liked voltron anymore. I want my love of this show to be mine again.

[weirdthoughtsandideas]

Have you heard Cande is demi?? But she's kinda lying about it because she has a friend with benefit or something.

I've only heard that from like one person, but I did look it up if there was anything about it.

Apparently she said this on some podcast?

While I do understand a bit of spanish, it's not enough for me to really be able to understand much of anything what they're saying here, and I don't have the energy to try to find when in the hour long conversation she said it. But it's quoted in the title, so like... she must've said it.

Apparently Cande has said a lot of things on this podcast and it's hard to me to comment on anything, much because I am not fluent in spanish and thus cannot confirm if she phrased things the way people say she did. It's also that, in a podcast, you often don't have any script, which means occasionally you phrase something wrong or say something out of the blue that you haven't really thought through, just like when you're having conversations irl - and when you're famous, people are more ready to just hang up on anything you say. But I won't say she hasn't said anything that's been a bit iffy or off - it's very possible she has, but I just can't confirm or deny it cause... I just don't understand enough of the language to know for sure how she may have meant it.

But, I will say this: If she says that she is demi, then she is. No one else can tell otherwise. That's only something she can know. And so if she has a "friend with benefit" it's not like demisexual people can't feel... sexual attraction? And maybe she feels a deep connection with him (I got confirmed it was a man). We don't know anything and frankly, it's not our business. I've heard some people say "oh but she is clearly straight and fakes being demi" ?????????? that's not- ok. That's saying a bi person is "clearly straight/gay because they're dating someone of the opposite/same sex". Sexuality is fluid too and everyone experiences it differently. Sexualities aren't just the textbook definition and everyone experiences it differently. We don't know what her relationship with demisexuality is. Labels doesn't mean we are forced to think and act inside a box either.

I've heard some people call it "queerbaiting" which it absolutely is not. Does she market herself with this identity and make money out of it when she's actually "lying"? Is she a creator who markets and hits at a same sex relationship without showing it? No? Then it's not queerbaiting. Search that word up.

I can't say much about other things she's apparently said in this podcast, but with this? It feels like people who says it's a "red flag" that she "doesn't seem demi when she says she is" really are just mad about other things she's said and have decided that this is a bad thing too simply because "if a person is morally wrong they can't be anything but cishet and if they aren't cishet, then they are lying".

Again, can't comment on other stuff she's said, but with this, if she says she considers herself demisexual then she fucking is, it's not up to us to decide.

[daffodilwill]

am I the only one who doesn’t consider that queerbait??

[centaurianthropology]

What ‘Our Flag Means Death’ Did for this Older Queer Fan

I’ve been trying to articulate what feels special about ‘Our Flag Means Death’ to me for a while.  I’ve been active in fandoms since the ‘90s, back when webrings were your best bet for good fan content.  I have seen a lot of shows come and go.  And I got very used to my fandom experience going something like this: find a new show or movie or book or other thing, write a lot of meta about character motivation and plot structure and costume choices, and often find a pairing I found appealing.  The chemistry was usually good, with variations on antagonistic, friendly, or other chemistry.  And if I was lucky, the show would drop a few hints that there was something there.  You learned very quickly to be grateful for scraps, and to never expect too much.  There was never, NEVER an expectation that a queer pairing would be ‘endgame’, or would ever be manifested in anything more than a few lingering glances and the actors and maybe a writer or two being all for the relationship EXCEPT. 

Except the producers, the studios, the audience.  It would never be accepted.  So it was confined to glances.  And that I understood.  I could appreciate that.  I knew that, if they could, those writers and those actors would have gone there, but gay marriage being legalized seemed like an impossibility, queer cinema was treated as niche or arthouse, and the only queer characters allowed on network shows had to be sidekicks who never had sex.

After that came the era of the queerbait.  Showrunners were more aware of fandom in the mid-2000s, and really wanted that sweet sweet audience retention.  So some shows started to lean into the possibilities of queer relationships.  They played up that things might happen between characters on screen.  It was no longer “we want to, but the network/producer won’t let us”; it was “maybe there is something there! *wink* *wink*”, only to turn around and inevitably claim that the audience misinterpreted, that there was nothing there and never had been.  It was somehow less than what we had in the ‘90s, because then at least we knew we were never getting anything, we knew that the writers had pushed something as hard as they could and they felt as shitty as we did that it wasn’t going to happen.  This was, well, bait.

And yet I don’t really think I understood that feeling of being baited, because I never got the canon queer ship on screen.  Whenever I saw the bait, as a fan who had been around and seen the talks in the ‘90s about queer rep on network TV, I knew that it was bait.  I knew that they would never follow through because everyone was convinced that two men kissing would end their television show.  So no matter how much they teased the audience, I knew it was lies, and I didn’t feel like it hit me as hard.  I told myself it didn’t hurt.

Now we’re in a new era where queer relationships are directly confirmed by creators, but there’s always still this halting before the final hurdle.  “These two men are in love,” they’ll say, but then turn around and say, “but it’s so elevated and pure and perfect that they would never sully it by smashing their faces together.  So they’re definitely in love guys!  Just don’t expect them ever to show that physically.”  Because gay love is now in vogue, but gay kissing and God forbid gay sex are still that bridge too far.  Even shows with great queer rep that aren’t explicitly billed as queer romances will stop before the kiss.  

And this doesn’t feel like asexual rep or an embracing of queerplatonic relationships, because it definitely doesn’t feel like they deliberately set out to write that.  No, it always feels like they wanted to have their cake and eat it.  They want the queer fans that will come to see a queer relationship, but they don’t want to lose those fans that they are still convinced will stop watching when two mens’ lips touch (it’s different for women, because straight men love lesbians, and so they get a pass for ogling reasons, which ...  is a whole different story, and a whole different long post, frankly).  

And then comes David fucking Jenkins, who seems like an impossibility.  He is an apparently straight white cis man in his forties.  He is the exact sort of demographic that you would never expect to deliver a meaningful queer story, or a story with explicitly anti-racist or anti-colonialist beats.  On first glance, he’s every other showrunner who’s tried to pull a fast one on queer audiences before.

But as this article shows, there was something different ticking away in his head.  He watched Star Wars and came away with the impression that Finn and Poe were the couple with chemistry.  He saw how fans treated Kelly Marie Tran and John Boyega and wanted to do better.  He’s almost blissfully unaware of the long history of queer fans getting ignored, then baited, then told that gay sex or kissing would ‘lessen’ such a wonderful relationship.

So he set out to write a queer sitcom about pirates.  And since it was a romcom, of course the two leads were going to kiss, because that was the point of a romcom.  That’s what the audience signed up for, and to turn around and give some bullshit line about how their mouths touching would lessen what they had was inherently ridiculous.  A romcom has specific beats, sure.  They were inevitably going to be separated by misunderstanding, but there was also an agreement with the audience that it wouldn’t be forever.  

And the kiss sealed that deal.  It showed that he had none of those weird hang-ups or beliefs that if he showed two men kissing, his show would be over.  And you know what?  He was more right than he could have ever imagined.  What he was doing was, in his head, simply following through with the agreement established by all romcoms.  It wasn’t remarkable or revolutionary.  It wasn’t until he was surprised that more people weren’t believing it was a romcom by the moonlit scene in episode 5 that he started to understand something was happening that he hadn’t been privy to before.  I think it was only after that that David Jenkins did a deep dive on queerbaiting, and realized how pervasive it was, how even the queer audiences weren’t willing to believe what was obvious on screen.  That, in the words of Lucius: “This is happening.”

And they didn’t believe it until the kiss, because that’s always the line that shows aren’t willing to cross.  When he stepped over that boundary he didn’t even know existed, he had an audience ready to go to war for him.  Because he had delivered.  There was no waffling, no bullshit.  He just delivered.  And after that, well ...

The audience flocked to him.  They campaigned, made cakes and Twitter storms and were unrelenting.  They were a groundswell for a show that had gotten no advertising, no buzz, no press before its airing.  It’s clear that HBO Max had the same old attitude that he had crossed the line with that kiss, and that the show would flop.  But it was the opposite, and instead of tanking his show, it got him a renewal.  

And I myself felt such a lightness in my heart after seeing that.  Even with the darker end the season had, I knew that this was a romcom, that our lovers would be reunited, get over their miscommunications, and would be together in a meaningful way.  David Jenkins had the idea, and then he filled his writers room with people to bring that idea to life, to push back and buy in.  Queer people, people of color, people of different cultures.  This is the move of a man who has a dream to write a diverse, queer story, and knows that he has a good idea for it, but also knows that he needs people who have lived those lives to help him avoid stumbling blocks that he never could have seen.

Seeing this leads to the extraordinary result of writing that is well aware of how queer characters and characters of color have been treated by the media, and how queer fans and fans of color have been treated too.  It also led to him going on his own journey of discovering, realizing why people reacted the way they did, why they were hesitant to believe he would deliver, and why they would fight so hard for his show when they did.  It was effervescent, like drinking champagne, to finally just ... have this.  For it to happen both with the writers knowing it was something special, and the showrunner not understanding why it wasn’t always so easy just to deliver these stories.  Just to see the chemistry and go for it.  Just to treat characters with respect and still let them be silly and ridiculous.  To have an entire world that feels queer friendly, beyond the queerness of the lead characters.

It only really hit me recently, when I heard that tired old excuse of “they love one another, but kissing or sex would cheapen that relationship, so they’re in love, but not in a sexual way”, and I was finally sick of it.  Because David Jenkins and his silly gay pirate show showed that it’s bullshit.  He showed that your audience booms when you finally set aside the fear of two men kissing, and just pay off the relationship.  When you embrace queerness not just in words, but in deeds.  It took OFMD to finally rip those tolerant blinders off me and for me to think, “Oh, just say that you don’t want to show two men kissing because you think whatever audience you have will think it’s gross.”  Just say it.  Just be honest instead of trying to parade this as a better form of queer representation.  I wouldn’t like you any more, but I would respect the honesty.

Finally getting what I always secretly wanted from a show--but would never admit that I wanted because I knew I would always be disappointed--has taken away my ability to tolerate whatever excuse showrunners trot out for not taking that final step.  OFMD opened my eyes.  It woke me up to realizing that I had spent twenty years pretending I wasn’t hurt when a show teased a relationship they never intended to pay off.  I haven’t felt so giddy about a show in years, and I have *never* felt so giddy about a queer genre show (because I’ve never seen one before that delivered so well on both being queer and on being genre)!  This was not a show billed as a romance, but a show about pirates, but it delivered such a lovely romance and such a lot of silly pirates!    

So thank you, David Jenkins.  As you went on your journey of discovery about queerbaiting and how it made you feel, I have been on a similar journey.  And you helped me get there.  You and your silly gay pirate show.

[musclesandhammering]

Every Single Issue I Have With S*lki (It’s Not Just The Selfcest)

Here goes. I threatened to post this a few days ago and never did, but I just saw a s*lki stan Twitter account claim that Loki caring about Sylvie more than the whole multiverse was a Good And Romantic thing and it pushed me over the fucking edge, so now you all have to read this. I’ve divided it into categories cause there’s just THAT much.

OOC Bullshit

• First and foremost, no amount of mental gymnastics you do will ever make me believe that this specific Loki- the one that just invaded New York, that just came off a year of Thanos Torture, that just got done being influenced by the sceptre, that was literally in the middle of a crisis already, and then on top of that went through all the trauma of Ep 1- would even be worried about a romantic relationship. That would be the furthest thing from his mind. Go back and watch how he acted in Avengers- you think that guy would abandon his previous mission to become a snivelling simp for a girl he’d just met 3 days prior? Yeah, there’s no universe in which that makes sense.

• “It’s very in character for Loki to fall in love with himself lololol-“ NO, it’s literally not. Out of all the characters in the mcu, I don’t think I can think of anyone that genuinely hates themselves more than Loki. He even referred to all his other male variants as “monsters” and said meeting them was “a nightmare” in this series. He’s got so much self-loathing, plus the fact that he genuinely thinks himself to be an evil backstabbing scourge- so there’s no evidence at all suggesting that he would ever develop a fondness for, or even be inclined to trust, another version of himself, after only knowing them for 3 days.

• Building on that, the whole concept of Loki falling in love with a version of himself just feeds into the annoying ass misconception that he’s a narcissist. No matter which way you stack it, he’s not. If you’re referring to NPD, he doesn’t fit the criteria, and if you’re saying “narcissist” just as a slang term meaning “selfish and arrogant”, that still doesn’t accurately describe him. But when creators like Waldron and Herron do things like having him fall in love with himself, it makes it so much easier for casual viewers to think that he is.

Shitty LGBT Rep

• It’s kinda sus that Loki’s are allegedly genderfluid and yet the only female-presenting variant we see (and apparently the only female-presenting variant there is, cause the male Loki’s all seemed unfamiliar with the concept) is treated as some kind of mind-bogglingly special paradox. Also very sus that, out of all the Loki variants, the one our Loki falls in love with just so happens to be the only female one. What a coincidence.

• The fact that the creators of the show went around bragging about Loki’s bisexuality and Marvel purposefully (lbr) allowed stories about Loki possibly having a male love interest to circulate, specifically enticing queer viewers to watch the show (you know, the definition of queerbaiting), and then instead of having a male love interest (Loki was the first queer main character, so it was the perfect opportunity) they gave us *gestures to this dumpster fire* this… it’s just a middle finger to LGBT fans. The fact that they would rather have this relationship with all its myriad of problems than have a gay relationship is just……. Very telling.

• While him being with a woman obviously doesn’t refute his bisexuality, the fact that they showed/talked about him being interested in 3 different women (flight attendant, Sylvie, Sif) and never even hinted at him being attracted to a man, definitely makes it seem like they were trying to cover up his bisexuality to smooth things over with the more homophobic viewers. You know? It’s like “I know you’re pissed that we sorta confirmed Loki as bi, so we promise we’ll never mention it again! Or even hint at it! As a matter of fact, we’ll give him lots of female lovies and make him seem as straight as possible! That’ll take your mind off of that horrible crumb of queer rep, right? Please please please keep giving us your money!!!”

• Aside from all the other issues, at its core, the biggest reason why I think I’m so irritated with s*lki is that it took one of the most interesting, complex, and diverse characters in cinema atm and squished him into a tired ass unnecessary heteronormative subplot…. Like literally every. single. other. protagonist. ever. Loki is such a unique character, and it’s so so so incredibly disappointing that they stuck him into that same boring cookie cutter romance that happens to every other character in every other movie I’ve ever seen. It’s a disservice, and it’s honestly just not compelling or entertaining at all.

Thematic Issues Galore

• His arc didn’t need a romance. With anyone. It was unnecessary and it didn’t make sense plot-wise. In fact, one of the reasons he was my fav prior to this was because he was the only big-name mcu character whose story wasn’t muddied-up by a romance that didn’t need to be there. So much for that.

• He wasn’t emotionally ready for a romantic relationship with anyone. Hell, just a genuine friendship would’ve been pushing it for him at this point. He was in such a bad state that any relationship he got into would’ve been toxic and unhealthy for both him and the other person, and it doesn’t make sense why the writers would want to put him in one when there were so many cons and essentially no pros (other than “Uwu aren’t they cute together”).

• Sylvie’s character in general was unnecessary and Loki’s character was robbed just by her being there. The whole show became about her post-Ep 2. They spent most of the time giving her backstory, building her up, telling us how awesome she is, trying to convince us to like her, etc when what they really needed to be doing was building Loki up- cause I gotta say, if I had to describe TVA!Loki in a few words, they would be Flat, Boring, and Weak.

• The romance overtakes the plot. They spend time portraying their supposed connection that could’ve been spent adding depth and complexity to literally any of the characters. They make the big Nexus Event them giving each other googly eyes on Lamentis when it could’ve been so many other way more profound things that speak to the fundamental nature of Loki’s. They have the climax of the finale be “oh no she betrayed him to kill He Who Remains” when it could’ve been something way more compelling (Loki having a moral crisis over whether or not to kill HWR, Loki contemplating the state of the multiverse and weighing the pros and cons of freedom vs order, Loki looking into some What If situations and getting emotional about what could’ve been regarding his family, Loki realising the gravity of HWR’s offer and finally coming to terms with how important he is to the universal cycle, etc etc). The entire plot suffered in favour of a romance that half of us didn’t even want.

• It essentially reduced all of Loki’s potential character growth down to “He did it for his crush.” He seemed to at least have some motivations of his own in Ep 1-2 (feeble as they were) but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, literally every action he took was just him being a simp for her. Why did he lie in the interrogation? To try to protect Sylvie. Why did he fight the minutemen and Timekeepers? To survive kinda, but mostly cause it was important to Sylvie. Why did he get pruned? Cause he got distracted trying to confess his crush to Sylvie. Why did he try to get out of The Void? Cause he thought Sylvie needed him. Why did he stay in The Void? Cause Sylvie was staying. Why did he try to enchant Alioth? Cause Sylvie told him to. Why did the multiverse get cracked open, leading to an infinite number of Kangs waging war on all of existence? Cause Loki didn’t wanna hurt Sylvie in their fight at the Citadel and then get distracted by her kissing him. It’s uninteresting and honestly pretty embarrassing.

• Throughout their “relationship arc” the writers do their absolute damndest to convince us that we should like Sylvie more than Loki. And you know what? It’s the most hypocritical shit I’ve ever seen. They preach and preach about how Sylvie’s life has been so difficult/we should feel bad for her/she had it so bad/poor poor sylvie/she had it SO much worse than pampered prince Loki…. But then they never even touch on any of Loki’s trauma of hardships (the ones that have been ignored for literally 3 movies now). They frame Sylvie as a good person and a Freedom Fighter after she spent literal decades/centuries mass-murdering brainwashed TVA agents and showing exactly zero remorse for it….. but then they make it their mission to constantly remind us that Loki is a terrible person and constantly put him in situations where he’s forced to acknowledge his wrongdoings/show remorse/admit to how “evil” he is for being a mass murderer for like 2 years. They show him on-screen having a wider range of powers than her, and perpetuate his whole shtick of being a “master manipulator” or whatever….. But then they make Sylvie “the brawn” more competent, intelligent, and physically capable than him. Tell me how it’s a good thing for a ship to be so narratively biased toward one character.

Missed Opportunities

• If they absolutely had to have a romance subplot, then they could’ve paired Loki with one of the characters that have already been established OR one of the characters that were a big part of the whole TVA storyline anyway. It would’ve been so interesting if they’d revealed that Loki had a history with some of the players from previous films (Sif and Fandral both come to mind). It also would’ve been really interesting if they’d given Loki a love interest that actually had some allegiance to the TVA as a whole (Mobius maybe, but not necessarily. It also could’ve been Renslayer or B-15). Hell, imo it would’ve been cool if they’d followed through with that “See you again someday” line that he said to the flight attendant in Ep 1. ALL of these characters have way more chemistry with him than Sylvie, and they were also already relevant to the plot without wasting half the show to give background info on them.

• If they absolutely had to have a hetero-presenting love story involving an enchantress-type figure, then there’s a whole Enchantress (Amora) that was actually Loki’s love interest in the comics. Plus, fans have been screaming for Amora to appear in the mcu for years. Plus, Tom literally pitched an Amora/Loki storyline way back in 2012-13. Also, Lorelei (another enchantress) is also one of Loki’s love interests in the comics, and she already exists in the mcu (she was on Agents of SHIELD). There were several different established characters for them to choose from. Creating a whole knew amalgamation of a character and going with the “she’s a Loki variant” storyline was just completely unnecessary and made no sense.

• They completely robbed us of a Chaos Twins dynamic. Had they handled Sylvie better and not forced her and Loki to smooch, the two of them could’ve had a really really complex and interesting sibling relationship. Loki could’ve stepped into Thor’s shoes and sort of used that new role to gain some self importance, and Sylvie could’ve finally had somebody to look out for her/teach her magic/be there for her. It would’ve been very aesthetically pleasing, the vibes would’ve been out of this world, it would’ve been way more profound than this bs, and frankly it would’ve been much more entertaining to watch.

• Loki’s relationship (read: obsession) with Sylvie completely overshadows all Loki’s other relationships in the show. Loki and Mobius were literally the focal point of the series in Ep 1-2, but after Sylvie showed up in Ep 3, they barely had any interactions with each other, and Mobius pretty much faded to the background entirely. Loki had the beginnings of a pretty interesting antagonistic relationship with Renslayer (with her wanting him pruned, then arguing with Mobius that he couldn’t be trusted), but after Sylvie showed up the dynamic shifted to focus on the history between her and Ravonna. Loki and B-15 started off very badly and openly disliked each other throughout Ep 1-2, and then in the end of Ep 2, Loki showed a little bit of concern for her when she was possessed, hinting that they might be inching toward a reconciliation- especially considering how obvious it was that Loki was gonna uncover the TVA’s sins eventually. There was so much potential for him to be the one to give her her memories back and convince her to change sides, but no, of course that honor went to Sylvie. In fact, after Sylvie showed up, Loki and B-15 never even spoke to each other again.

Various S*lki Fails

• If they were trying to convince us that this affection was mutual, they completely failed. There’s nothing I’ve seen that even hints at Sylvie feeling the same way about Loki that he does about her. At most, I’d say she has a slight endearment to him. She finds him likeable and she’s grudgingly fond of him, but she definitely isn’t in love with the guy. Maybe she thinks he’s cute and hopes that he gets out of this mess alright, but her mission obviously comes before him- whereas, it’s been confirmed multiple times that Loki cares about her above anything else. She doesn’t trust him, she looks at him like he’s an incompetent fool half the time, she shows little to no reaction during most of his confession moments, and she kissed him as a means to distract him so that she could get him out of her way. Look, all I’m saying is, when you get into a relationship where one of you is way more invested than the other, it never ends well.

• This goes without saying for a lot of us, but the selfcest is just straight up odd and cringey. If you’re cool with that sort of thing, fine! People can ship what they want! But don’t pretend it’s not at least a little bit uncomfortable. Yes, I know they’re not technically siblings so it’s not technically incest, and they’re also not technically the exact same person, but they’re similar enough that it makes things weird. And yes I know selfcest can’t happen in real life, so there’s no way to judge it morally, but neither can most of the other stuff that happens in these shows/movies (the Snap, Loki destroying jotunheim, superhero with powers being held accountable, mind control) and yet we still find ways to judge their morality, because they all mirror real-world events. (The snap= genocide; Loki destroying Jotunheim= bombing other countries; superhero accountability= weapons accountability; mind control= grooming and coercion). And lbr the closest real-world mirror to two versions of the same person (who may or may not share DNA, family, backgrounds, physical and emotion characteristics) being romantically involved with one another is incest. And you can be ok with that if you want- that’s your prerogative- but don’t get pissy just cause a lot of us are squicked out by it.

• The whole mirror metaphor (learning self love via each other) thing just fell completely flat. First of all, having Loki learn to love himself by looking at someone who mirrors him did not, in any way shape or form, require them to be romantically involved. But they were. Of course. Secondly, the creators have contradicted themselves so many times on whether Loki and Sylvie are the same or not, that it doesn’t even really register to the viewer that the mirroring thing was what they were going for. Finally, Loki and Sylvie are shown to have so little in common- and to have only the most bare minimum of similarities personality-wise- that it doesn’t even make sense that Loki would “learn to love himself through loving her”. Like? They’re nothing alike. So how would he make the connection that he himself is actually pretty cool, based on her alone? There’s virtually nothing in her that reflects him.

• I know the objective of the entire show was to convince us of how awesome and unique Sylvie is, but honestly her relationship with Loki just did the opposite. A hallmark of a Mary Sue is having her constantly upstage the male lead, and then having him instantly fall madly in love with her anyway. And that’s.. exactly what happened here. Everything they’re doing to try to force her character to be more stan-able is really just forcing her to look more like their self-insert OC. Which is exactly what she is. It would’ve been so much more satisfying if she didn’t have to try so hard to look cool, if they didn’t have to try so hard to make her backstory tear-inducing, if they didn’t have to turn our protagonist into a snivelling simp just to prove how incredible she supposedly is. Very much #GirlBoss energy and we all know how performative and cheap that is.

• The entire thing was too rushed, there was too little build-up, and it was nowhere near believable. As stated above, it’s ridiculously unlikely that Loki would canonically even be interested in Sylvie, and this show did nothing to explain why he was. He just suddenly was. There was nothing they showed us as viewers that would justify a guy as closed-off and preoccupied as Loki falling head-over-heels for a girl he just met. Their was no explanation, no big revelation, no reasoning, it just… kinda happened. And I’m also severely skeptical of any love story that has the characters go in this deep after only 3 45-minute episodes of exposition.

I’m sure there’s other stuff, so if anyone thinks of anything, let me know and I’ll be more than happy to add it. Tagging @janetsnakehole02 @raifenlf @natures-marvel and @brightredsunset800 for expressing interest. This is all your faults.

[abbybubbls]

I haven't seen much of it as I thought, but I wanna share my quick thoughts on the Good Omens vs. Our Flag Means Death queer rep before it becomes a huge argument. I won't go super into detail of OFMD because I don't have the memory capacity of all the stuff Ed and Stede and the rest of the cast go through with each other.

OFMD is still great with its rep, but I remember and know Good Omens more, and I'll defend it as much as I want, because I've seen this argument go on and on and on and on.

In terms of queerness, Good Omens has non-binary asexual angels, Crowley's androgynous style of clothing, Pollution going by they/them, and in terms of Aziraphale and Crowley's relationship, it's very clearly a realistically queer slowburn.

(Side note: I know the queer rep is mostly directed to the supernatural characters, and I can definitely understand how people can be upset if they're represented by only otherworldly creatures and not humans, but if all lesbians were represented as powerful magical beings, I'd feel amazing to be represented like that! But I'm not non-binary or asexual, so I can't speak for anybody who feels the opposite. It's totally understandable if some people feel that way and want to be represented as they are: humans.)

I think what people need to learn is that queerbait is different from slowburn. Good Omens is just as gay as Our Flag Means Death is, even if Aziraphale and Crowley never physically show any romantic affection, but it's still clearly there in their faces and actions towards each other.

Crowley blowing the paint away from Aziraphale's coat, Crowley saving Aziraphale from the bastille and from the Nazis, Aziraphale's big revelation when Crowley saves his books after the church blows up...

"You go too fast for me" - Aziraphale saying he's not ready to step up his relationship with Crowley yet

"Come up with something, or I'll never talk to you again" - Aziraphale saying he knows Crowley will miss him when Satan arrives and nobody has a plan, a comeback to all the things Crowley listed down that he knows Aziraphale would miss if Heaven won over Armageddon

"To the world" - Their declaration of love while sharing a toast for avoiding Armageddon

Hell, have you counted how many times Crowley calls Aziraphale "angel", and not just because he knows Aziraphale is an angel?

In the most simplest of terms, Crowley and Aziraphale's relationship is painted as two gay people being belittled by their peers, but they cope through it all together.

We might get an Our Flag Means Death level of confirmation in season two, like a handhold or a hug that goes on for too long. As much as I really really want a kiss, I don't care if we don't get one, but I know 100% that it will spark controversy and dub Good Omens as queerbait again when it's really not, because it ALREADY has queer characters, INCLUDING Aziraphale and Crowley.

Some asexual relationships don't need physical contact, and as much as I want to see that through Crowley and Aziraphale in season two, if it doesn't happen, I'll be fine. A bit upset, but nothing Earth shattering to be too angry over. We don't even know the entire plot of season two, it hasn't aired yet.

I know opinions vary on Neil Gaiman himself confirming that Aziraphale and Crowley share a love story, but I just think it's cool how he flat-out said it. "No matter what Crowley and Aziraphale are, it's a love story."

It makes me happy that he's just going along with it in a genuine way instead of denying it like most creators and their characters having queer subtext. Very neat.

Oh jeez, this went a lot longer than I wanted it to. What time is it?

Queerbaiting: "Ohh, you saw how meaningful their dynamic is and you want them to be a couple? PHSYCHE! They're not gonna be! They're as straight as a ruler! HAHA!"

Slowburn: "Watch as these two wannabe lovers get through their troubles, and hopefully, just maybe, they'll be happy together by the end."

I personally think Good Omens and Our Flag Means Death both make very good queer representation in their own ways, some moments much different than others. And I think different ways of gayness and asexuality representation is very much needed!

[steveyockey]

do you think that -- if they WERE planning to do gay angel press initially -- part of the reason they didn't might have been the (reactionary) bury your gays backlash from fans and non-fans? in which case. twitter rly does ruin everything. :/

I’m not tied to this but here’s a hypothetical to work through that at least provides a theory on the lack of gay angel press (probably not very different from any other theory on this website but just writing it out for continuity),

okay. pre-pandemic. the arc of the final few episodes seems to have been set and 15.18 was the last piece, pending jensen’s approval. roadhouse heaven ending was a go — presumably featuring a cas cameo among other various and sundry friends. approving 15.18 introduces a problem by way of the fact that cas has just confessed his undying love for dean and there’s an expected response. but it’s fine! you don’t actually need that, you’ve been baiting fans for a decade, you can work your magic one more time with a lil wink and nudge and never have to deal with that again. ambiguous “to each his own” ending, you talk up the gay angel on one side and the bronly-ness of the last hunt on the other; everyone walks away happy. you have successfully threaded the needle of finishing off a twelve year queerbait without “caving to the fans,” high fives all around.

15.18 gets filmed. the angel is gay gay. the footage is. we don’t know what the footage looks like. there could be anything. maybe there’s a kiss with tongue. ends up not really mattering because the pandemic happens and they have to stop shooting and stop airing. no idea how much changes in 15.19 (clearly SOME stuff considering we know the folks who got chuck snapped in the silo were supposed to be shown back in the flesh and that got cut). 15.20 has to change — so roadhouse heaven becomes three person heaven (plus the cast and crew, who were already on set so no, this is not proof they could have brought a crowd of actors anyway, it’s just. weird. I don’t like this decision. strikes me as authoritative like WE told the story not YOU. anyway). putting cas in three person heaven makes winking and nudging a lot harder to do and would make the absence of an actual substantive response to the confession uhhhh very obvious. so you have to cut cas. and then maybe you have to cut other references to cas in 15.19, maybe you cut some emotionality from dean’s side in 15.18, maybe you straight up insert the moment in 15.20 where dean tells sam to stop being an eeyore about cas’s death! we don’t know how much was changed, but there was at least the opportunity at this point to dull dean’s response to the whole thing so the absence of cas in heaven is more palatable. it’s the bronly ending, but you already gave the audience the gay angel. and the gay angel is alive and building heaven with his son! no more cashing in on the queerbait but still cashing in on canon gay.

it’s november 5th. 15.18 airs. it trends higher than the biggest election “of our lives.” holy shit! gay angel! but of course the issue is the people responding aren’t the people who have been watching the show. they don’t have context for what’s going on and “turbohell” catches on. fuck. did you kill the gay angel? of course not, he’s in heaven with his son! lisa berry can post her goodbye instagram to her character because obviously billie’s dead, she’s the villain. she’s not expected to come back. but cas is... cas is different. and he’s not dead and you won’t be taking any questions on this until we get to the end, when everyone can settle down. so you have your actors gush about the episode, you leave everyone on pins and needles so they’ll come back for two more, and then! well. 15.20. cas is “alive” technically. dean is dead, as you always planned. some people are happy, some people are middling, and some people are fucking pissed at you because apparently by not outright killing off the gay angel you promised them the gay angel was coming back. any clarification you would offer here would unspool your entire plan — gay angel on one side, brothers on the other. erasing cas isn’t the same as killing him, but you can’t say that (though misha basically did in response to the rogue translator shenanigans). killing dean wasn’t even supposed to be about cas, but now everything is about cas. you took him out of the story completely and he’s still managed to take over. and all you can say is, well, it’s always been a story about brothers.

this obviously doesn’t account for everything, such as what the fuck was uriel’s actor doing? why the fuck did the show actually give us the instructions for how to get someone out of the empty and not do it? and there’s an infinite number of things that could have happened that I would simply never guess not knowing specific onset dynamics and money decisions. whatever happened that caused this clusterfuck really does suck for everyone in that writers room who was on team gay angel because, as I have said in the past, 15.18 only works due to at least four years, if not seven or more, of consciously writing the angel as gay. I hope bobo and yockey and even misha feel personal satisfaction at a job well done, but god if a single fucking interview could at least let us indulge in the victory with them. anyway, all of this is to say, yes I do think the bury-your-gays of it all definitely plays into it (and I would say, again, linking this to it chapter 2, it’s significant muschietti and co decided to make richie gay over eddie; people who haven’t read the book might not know that eddie like. literally drinks mineral water. in the 80s. he wears gucci loafers. he marries a carbon copy of his mother. stephen king would never admit to writing a gay man but that was a gay man. but eddie dies! eddie always dies. so they had some good sense in giving the gay story to the one who lives and leaving the dead one holding all the coding). and I definitely think randos on twitter making fun of the confession did not help matters. but I also think the decision to pull press cannot be extricated from the rubble of the last two episodes and everything they promised but never delivered. literally a single second of cas in the finale would have been their golden ticket! that’s far more than what jj did for star wars! but they got played at their own game by, of all things, an international pandemic. somehow a very supernatural ending after all.

[sophiapathic]

Sk8: The Infinity - A Take on Love

Because my six unfinished assignments can wait until I throw this into the void, scream for five hours and after my voice gets hoarse, I resort to watching the beach episode on loop until next Saturday.

This was entirely sparked by the recap episode, which really pressed the reak havoc and theorize button in my brain. I am truly losing my grip on reality. Help. I apologize in advance, creatures of Tumblr. 

Me right now:

Anyways... 

I saw people mention here and there screaming that “we need canon relationships and they will get trust issues if a romance isn’t confirmed by the end of the series”. I think that mindset is harmful to have in this case. You can’t really avoid being disappointed if you get into the series expecting it to deliver on your wishes of gay romances. So, this might be controversial, but stay with me please. The anime and manga are both confirmed to be based primarily about the characters themselves and of course the sport -skating. I was hoping to take a closer look at what the series intends to do with certain dynamics and relationships according to yours truly. I also want explain my reasoning behind it not being queerbaiting, though it being inherently queer-coded, through the current lense of the canon.

Sk8: The Infinity is unquestionably a love story.

We need to state the genres this series is in, because some of us tend to forget. It is in fact not a shounen-ai, not a yaoi, not a romance, not even a josei. Say it with me it is a series in: COMEDY and SPORTS.

(Source is the official US Sk8 website.) The spotlight is udoubtedly on skating and what it means. Another important highlight of the show is how the definition of the sport relates to the characters, and how vastly different they are from what we expect. For example, when we see Shadow first, we pigeonhole him into this vulgar indecent rock and roll persona, only to find out later that he is actually a stweetheart at a flower shop. Joe is another very good case study. When we first see him we think of him as a womanizer muscle-head, later we find out he has a heart of gold and is very emotionally intelligent. We’re also quick to judge Miya as the cold, unfeeling prodigy then we discover how lonely and normal he is on the inside. And so on and so on. 

The show continues to defy our expectations of what each character should be like. In a way it is about breaking the conventional stereotypical roles we subconsciously assign to certain looks. We see that even in anime, multifaceted characters can exist without distrupting or damaging the delicate dynamics of a traditional sports anime. We successfully established the second focal point of the series as disproving stereotypes and presenting strong, diverse and unexpected personalities.

How about the defition of skating? What does it mean in the context of Sk8: The Infinity then? Where does a love story come into the picture? Skating is repeatedly described as a ritual of love within the anime, an idea that our villian, Ad*m, is obessed with. In a sense skating is a language of love canonically.

Then skating itself is love. Throughout the series we see varied styles of skating therefore different ways of expressing love, affection. We get to experience several metaphorical ways of “being in love” through characters skating with each other. Each dynamic shows us a type of love. Healthy, disfunctional, outright abusive. 

The way Reiki teaches Langa to skate can be interpreted as a direct metaphor for someone learning to love again after losing a person close to them. Langa’s father has died and Reiki literally brings him out of his shell again. It can also be interpreted as a queer kid’s experience of a world of romance that feels similar to his previous one, that being snowboarding, yet it still being new and different. Skateboarding. When due to Reiki Langa’s potential is discovered and his hunger for more and more develops, especially next to Ad*m, Reiki’s main frustration stems from them not being well-matched or on equal footing anymore. He feels like he cannot give Langa what he needs anymore. Which would obviously go againts the literal description of a healthy romance. Two people with mutual respect who both bring equal assets to the table. He feels like he needs to catch-up to be with Langa again. The only thing he doesn’t consider is Langa’s deep appreciation of him and the fact that literally he was the one who helped Langa experince the feeling of love again.

Kojiro and Kaoru’s relationships, to me, is very much representative of two people  wanting to be in each other’s presence, but due to their different language of love, miscommunicating horribly. Them bantering and insulting each other is the only way they know what to do with the other. The only way they can ensure the other’s attention and eyes are on them. This has worked so far. They are literal opposites, but both have a very clear definition of their form of love. To Joe skating, or love itself, is about the feeling and going with the flow. Being spontaneous. Whereas for Cherry, every move needs to be calculated and executed perfectly in order to be “efficient”. Their frustration comes from both wanting different things from the other, but not communicating their need properly. Despite this, they stick together due to a magnetic pull they obviously feel towards the other. The attraction is there, the trust is there, they are even well-matched in skill as we see them neck-to-neck constantly. They could give each other what the other wants. Only if they could express themselves well... This is why Joe pushes Reiki towards reconciling with Langa. he wants them to not fall into the same trap of not stating their  needs and thoughts properly.

Now Ad*m and Langa are obviously problematic and I don’t really want to have to explain, honestly guys. I really don’t  (since I have trauma regarding this subject), but I need to go into this a little bit. This is a textbook toxic predatory relationship. Where the older, twisted, damaged person, has an obsession with a young, outstading child. He wants to lead him into “Paradise” and show his “Eve” what love is really about. (Ain’t that disgusting you guys...) His form of love is inflicting pain, so I really can’t imagine a scenario where he and his “Eve” live happily ever after and everything is fine and dandy. He needs someone who he can torture. He literally is looking for someone who can handle his way of expressing affection, his “love hug”, who has the same type of crazy eyes for adrenaline and danger. His Eve. In his distorted mind, this all makes sense and Langa is that someone he was looking for thoughout the years. The problem is, he disregards Langa’s side where the relationship becomes problematic.

Cherry and Ad*m during their younger years seems to be a very innocent infatuation on Kaoru’s end. It is a one-sided relationship where someone is in love with the idea of a person long gone. They were discovering the world of skating, or the world of love together with Ad*m taking the lead. Cherry immediately became infatuated with him, wanted to learn his love language, wanted to be at the same level he was. It probably started very innocent. At first, Ad*m being gentle, because that’s how Tadashi was with him too, then after whatever happened between those two, Ad*m, disappointed in the way of love, or skating, Tadashi showed him, returned to what his aunts taught him. Maybe after injuring Kaoru with the “love hug”, therefore eliminating him from being his potential partner, started looking for his “Eve”, gradually became more agressive in love as in skating. Kaoru was distraught and wanted the Ad*m he originally learned love from back. Holding out some hope even years after. Trained to get used to his “love hug”, to literally condition himself to be able to get close to him. Ad*m, however showed Cherry brutally that he truly cannot handle his way of love.

Ad*m and Tadashi. *sighs* As of this post, I don’t really have enough information to give you a good overview of what I see this relationship representing. As far as I can tell Ad*m was abused horribly and to ease the pain and make him forget, Tadashi showed his another way of expressing affection. Skating or love. Basically a first love gone horrible bad, scarring an already abused child and turning them into a monster. Tadashi himself reinstates this during one of the episodes. It was his fault that Ad*m turned out the way he did. Their love slowly became strongly abusive throughout the years. Tadashi is stuck in it because he feels like he deserves it. This is a metaphor for  dangers of an emotionally and physically abusive relationship, where one person feels responsible and the other is using power. Tadashi’s guilt keeps him next to his master and he even endures abuse, now he is trying to break out and show Ad*m he messed up and I think this could potentially be a good representation of how difficult that process truly is. 

As far as Reiki’s, Miya’s, Shadow’s skating goes. Their main arc relating to love is first and foremost learning to accept themselves and aprecciating their uniqe way and style of skating. Only after can they become people who can truly be accomplished in love/skating (in Miya’s case I’m obviously talking about platonic feelings). Each of them had a preconception of their persona in love/skating, which gets questioned heavily throughout the series. Miya gets defeated, Shadow’s soft side gets discovered, Reiki... well. I get sad. :c Even though he taught someone to love again, to appreciate life again, he ended up discovering how dissatisfied he truly is with himself... These three all need to learn to love every aspect of themselves to reach fulfillment and to really experience healthy human relationships.

Sk8: The Infinity is unquestionably a love story, without explicitly being a romance, meaning that it is a tale about love, both romantic, platonic and everything inbetween through a queer-coded lens, showing both dysfunctional, abusive and healthy relationships, ways to express emotions and even delves into self-love and the idea of nature versus nurture in the villian’s case.

That is why I, personally don’t scream for a canon couple. To me, the show gets its main point about affection and love across, without making any of these relationships explicitly stated. Not to mention that it does justice to both of its assigned genres. Comedy and Sports as well. Yeah sure, I wouldn’t complain, but I think these dynamics are more than satisfying to watch, and much deeper than bishounens wanting to bang each other, which is, in my opinion, inherently sexualized. If they want, yeah they can confirm, make it canon without forcing it to be a center storyline. Hell, I would even be happy about it. I would clap with all of us. BUT, as the series currently is, I really see it taking the other route because of the above. This way audiences who want a yaoi or ikemen going at it, won’t be disappointed with the series when they find doesn’t revolve around that, straight viewers will just find it flamboyant, and people who look for subtext and want to read between the lines will certainly do that with the amount of crumbs and hints the writers gave us. 

We don’t need outright, written in black and white gay representation in Sk8 to experience very real types of love. The queer theme is secondary to me, just like queerness is, in most people’s lives. Yeah sure, it is a big thing, but not the only attribute a person has. My life doesn’t revolve around my queerness. I rarely talk about it. If I was a main character this would be a side-arc. Just like Sk8 doesn’t revolve around the characters coming out. It’s just them living their lives and possibly being queer while doing so. If you look at it this way, it is almost normalizing attraction between same-sex people by just showing it as regular love. If you can, why not interpret it this way, so it can be a liberating experience instead of a disappointing one.

Please don’t attack me! I am fragile and this is only my opinion. c:  *crawls back into her hole*

[thetaekookcloset]

Doesn’t it get tiring to constantly think that Tae and JK are lying when it comes to each other? He could’ve said yes to Tae coming to see him because he said yes about two other people, plus Jin already being there, so it wouldn’t have been strange for Tae to have visited at all…

Do people not realise how damaging shipping has become that the members’ actions get misinterpreted because of the narratives built by shippers? Vminkook constantly accused of being queerbaiters because of shippers’ narratives.

The things people are saying about Tae right now should open all shippers’ eyes to the fact that they’re doing more harm than good by actively promoting this idea that any of the members might be together. (And I’m not talking about the regular shippers who read their little fanfics and go about their day, but the self-titled “supporters”.)

Does it get tiring to constantly think Tae and JK are lying about each other?  No, because I don't think that at all.  What I do think is that if they were dating, they would have to hide that fact, and doing so would most probably result in some falsehoods.  I also just have a pet peeve in general about people assuming the members never lie or fib or stretch the truth when that's demonstrably untrue, so I can get a little snarky on that topic, I'll admit.

What does get kind of tiring is being accused of things that happen in the reverse all the time.

For example, you're saying that I constantly think Tae and JK are lying about each other because I pointed out that if they wanted to hide the fact that they'd been together on a certain day, they could simply say otherwise.  But people (maybe not you specifically, I won't try to claim any of this is true of you since I don't know who you are) also, in my opinion, blatantly ignore and dismiss things that the members show us about themselves all the time, because those things don't fit the image that they have of the members in their heads.

Doing so, in my opinion, often perpetuate heteronormativity, at best, and queerphobia at worst.  I'd argue that that's significantly more harmful than assuming that the members probably all obscure things about their personal lives sometimes.

Maybe it is objectively better to take a middle-of-the-road, moderate approach and just assume that they're close friends, but as I say all the time, all we can really do is make our own observations and interpret them through our own lenses.  I don't want to take what's happening and twist it to fit my own narrative, but that's not the same as recognizing that there are multiple possibilities.

In this particular case, I could go either way on it, but that was never really my point.

My post wasn't meant to be saying that Jungkook was definitely lying about Taehyung not visiting him for his birthday.  My point was just that this one little thing -- whether it's the full truth or not, whether it's more complicated or not -- isn't enough to undo years' worth of interactions I've seen that have made me think that maybe Taehyung and Jungkook are in a relationship.

As for shipping being damaging because it leads to the members' actions being misinterpreted, that's a two way street.  The fact of the matter is, there are really only interpretations here.  We don't know the Truth, so we can't know what's a misinterpretation vs. what's not.  It could very well be that I'm misinterpreting things, but on the other hand, it could be you who's misinterpreting.

I see Jungkook's and Taehyung's interactions and interpret them as being a bit more intimate and romance-coded than most people's, which makes me think maybe they're romantically involved.  You don't see that, but you could just be missing things, or looking at them with your own biased thinking and coming to a different conclusion.  That’s all they are, ultimately: different conclusions.

There are toxic people in every subset of this fandom, so in terms of doing more harm than good, I feel like it makes more sense to lay the blame for that on the individuals who are doing and saying shitty things, rather than on the idea of shipping or "supporting" itself.

It's not that deep, you know?  At the end of the day, I just happen to think Taehyung and Jungkook might be dating.  It's really that simple.  Is there harm in thinking that?  Maybe you feel that way, and you're entitled to your opinion, but I don't agree.  I just think they're sweet together, and I like to splash around in my little corner of the internet to talk about it.  That's it.

[shesquaredpodcast]

Your analysis about Gregorio and Tally makes it more understandable. However, it's still hard to swallow. That such a queer friendly show from all levels from creator to cast couldn't or wouldn't make Talder explicit is baffling and disappointing. She could have just ended up single instead of being forced with this guy who shows up for 2 eps! Talder is definitely canon but frankly too many viewers are too willfully ignorant or not smart enough to see subtext. They only count kissing (1/2)

I understand your frustration, Anon. Trust me. I’ve dealt with queerbaiting for decades and it hurts Every. Single. Time. I do not know legitimately why Gregorio was brought into this except maybe that was the plan for the end of the series after 7 years and they couldn’t let it go for whatever reason? They truly did write Talder as canon and showed it all season, so to shoehorn him in feels rushed and like gay panic. I get that.

That being said, I don’t believe Sarah is going to stay around - I think she will finally rest, and if that is the case Tally has to be able to move on. Now, do I think it would have been better served narratively for her to be single? Yes. This incessant need to have people couple up is baffling and frankly a disservice to storylines and characters. However, given the rushed nature of the episode as a whole, it feels like they simply ran out of time.

As for people invalidating the ship - they can only do so if we allow that. Talder may not have had sex, they may not have kissed canonically (yet!) but that love and devotion and intimacy is 100% there and shown. I am baffled by people not taking that as the massive love story of the series because it is. I understand that people see canon as sex/kissing, but perhaps society or fandom as a whole need to expand our understanding of intimacy and love between characters.

For me, yes, Tally had sex with Gregorio and kissed him, but love? No, not a chance. However, with Sarah? 100%. That connection, that intimacy, that want; that desire - it’s there. It’s always there. Gregorio is a fling at the end of the world - Sarah is the soul connected to Tally’s as she walks through it.

Supercorp was straight up queerbaiting and it was blatant. It was disgusting and insulting what the CW did and they are notorious for it. Talder, however, is canon and I’ll do a TEDtalk on it if necessary.

I understand the frustration of loving both ships and feeling like it’s a repeat of Supercorp, but it isn’t. BUT, I get where you’re coming from. Your frustration is valid and you have every right to feel that way - don’t hear me say differently.

But Talder? Talder is canon whether people want to say so or not. They’ve always invalidated our ships, they’ve always called us delusional and benefitted from our views and money. But those characters and that love is real and it belongs to us, the fans. People are always going to throw stones. We just need to be there for each other and use them to build Talder a beautiful house to live in. This is the importance and healing nature of fandom and fanfiction/fanart.

We’re actually going to go into this very thing in depth in the next podcast so hopefully that’ll help provide more insight.

Until then, Anon - know that we here at She Squared are here to listen to venting, anger, fears, laughter, theories, stories, and any and everything else. We’ve got each other’s backs because we are stronger together. (Hugs)

- N Lance

[mynameisnowwyrm]

Spoiler warning

TL;DR horrible adaptation, but very enjoyable on it’s own

(Also just wanted to say I was so sure I was going to hate this bc of what’s different but they changed so much the cartoon and the live action are barely connected in my head)

Okay my review will be split up into two parts: fate: the winx saga as an adaptation and as a standalone work

As an adaptation:

0/10. Maybe 0.5 if I’m being generous.

The things that were unchanged from winx club:

There are characters named Bloom, Stella, Musa, Aisha, Sky and Riven

Aisha, Bloom, Stella and Sky resemble their cartoon counterparts

Riven is an asshole

Bloom is a dumbass

Magic exists

The specialists exist

Main characters go to schools for magic and specialists respectively

The dragon flame is a thing

Witches exist

Other than that it’s a completely different show. The plot vaguely resembles season 1 of winx club only in that Bloom is trying to discover her true heritage. Musa, who is supposed to of East Asian descent is not, Flora was not included and in her place is a different character with similar powers, Tecna was excluded entirely ( I believe this was to distance the show from the futuristic elements of winx club and focus only on fantasy, which doesn’t make sense since they changed Musa’s powers ).

The magic system was changed. Fairies don’t on the regular transform since in the show the know-how to do so was lost, though Bloom does unlock the ability in the finale. Instead of each being a fairy of an individual concept, everyone’s powers ale element based, with Musa’s powers being changed to her being an empath. While this does feel more generic, it makes more sense from a world building perspective and I can see why they changed it.

The fashion is horrible. You will never be able to convince me teenagers dress like that. One of the reasons the original cartoon was enjoyable was all the colourful, fun clothing. The clothes feel dated and too mature for the characters, like I can see a twenty-something person in 2013 wear some of those outfits. It especially feels like a missed opportunity since 2000’s fashion is coming back into style.

The characterization of some of the characters compared to winx club was hit and miss. Riven was an ass and Bloom was impulsive and naive, which is accurate, but Stella, oh Stella was a disappointment. Stella was a jealous, manipulative bitch, which in context of her character backstory makes sense, but is so far from her original portrayal. Cartoon Stella was spoiled and at times self centered, but she was also genuinely kind, helpful and bubbly. To see her character take a 180 and become the all too familiar jealous ex archetype was upsetting.

Now, aaaaall that being said, I don’t believe we should judge this as an adaptation. They changed so much that it is quite literally a new story. So let’s see how it stands up on it’s own.

Summary, taken from the wiki

The series tells the story of Alfea, a fictional boarding school where teenagers study. The world inside this universe is not only magical and full of monsters, but it is also a world of real teenagers who do the most common things: make friends and enemies, go out and of course... fall in love. They are eager to find their place in this world. This universe is different from the one we have all known for a long time.

The attention is focused on a group of proud teens, also well-designed female characters. Sometimes they are heroines, sometimes weak girls. Sometimes they are friends, sometimes rivals. Of course, they are not perfect, but they are real. A group of girls who did not know each other until they are included in the same team inside a school that is strange to them. They will meet forces that are beyond their control and things they do not understand. But, throughout the series, they will find themselves, form an indestructible bond, and transform into powerful and strong girls, ready to change not only the supernatural world, but also ours.

Character summary:

Bloom is a newly discovered fairy from the human world who is attending Alfea college in the otherworld. There she meets her new roommates: chatty Terra, athletic Aisha, uptight Stella and stand-offish Musa. She also meets Sky, Stella’s ex, who is training as a specialist.Shortly before coming to Alfea, Bloom discovers she has magic powers by almost burning her house down and killing her parents. She is distraught over this and it is why she is eager to gain control of her powers.It is discovered that Bloom is a changeling, a barbaric practice where a fairy baby is exchanged with a human one. This leads Bloom on a quest to discover her true heritage.

Musa is an empath, she can feel the feelings of everyone around her. To shut them out and escape she listens to music through her headphones. This leads to her initially coming off as uncaring when Terra tries to get to know her better.

Terra is an earth fairy with a particular talent for making plants grow. She is very nice and chatty, eager to make friends, but not afraid to stand up for herself. She struggles with finding someone to like her and compares herself to “cool girl” Beatrix who has boys following after her.

Aisha is a water fairy who swims twice a day every day. She comes off a a good person who wants to make friends and do the right thing. She also tries to do everything in her power to protect her friends.

Stella is a light fairy and princess of Solaria, the realm in which Alfea resides. She is repeating her first year due to an event prior to season one where she lost control of her powers and blinded her best friend. She is very uptight due to her perfectionist mother and tries to exert control in every other area of her life, when this doesn’t work, e.g. when someone flirts with her on-again-off-again boyfriend she gets jealous and causes trouble. She is also generally rude to the people around her.

Sky is a specialist legacy and Stella’s on-again-off-again boyfriend who has an interest in Bloom. His father was a famous specialist and he was raised by his father’s best friend.

Riven is Sky’s roommate, best friend and a genuine asshole. He insults and antagonizes everyone around him and gets involved with Beatrix. He seems dissatisfied with the life of a specialist.

Beatrix is an air fairy with a lightning powers. She seems mysterious and looks to be the villain of the season. She has enlisted the help of Riven and Dane.

Dane is a first year specialist who first seems to be friendly with Terra but gets sidetracked after spending time with Riven and Beatrix.

What I didn’t like:

The world building is sparse and the magic system is generic. I feel like things could have been better expanded upon. Throughout the show they bring up archaic fairy magic but it’s never really explained how that’s different from current fairy magic.

The interactions between Riven and Dane come off as a bit queerbait-y although they could be setting things up for a second season.

Everyone is constantly so rude towards Terra. Even her supposed friends are mean to her. What gives?

Stella was constantly rude to everyone but by the end they are all the best of friends when she really hasn’t changed much. Also Stella being the jealous controlling ex archetype and not enough people calling her out on her bullshit.

What I did like:

For a Netflix teen drama there is surprisingly little sex between the teenagers. This might be subjective but it was refreshing for me.

Again subjective but I could definitely relate to Bloom’s antisocial teen flashbacks

Beatrix was a fun villain

Though the story might be a little generic, I felt it was compelling throughout. I genuinely wanted to know what happened next.

The story was well paced. It never felt like anything was dragging along

Overall:

The show was definitely enjoyable to watch. There is a lot of room for improvement. It sometimes felt like different plot lines were unconnected and the costume choices leave a lot to be desired. Aside from that they set up a solid story and likable characters (some of whom I love love and love to hate) which I very much want to see further developed in the future. As a stand-alone work 6/10

[firelxdykatara]

gods, ok, apparently i’m not done.

atla fandom? we need to have a chat.

(....ok that made me sound pretentious as fuck. and maybe i am, but this needs to be said, cause i’m getting....real, real tired of a Certain Corner of this fandom and as a result, this is gonna be a discourse-heavy post so feel free to scroll past if that’s not your bag. as always, my salt posts all carry the catch-all #salt for ts tag, which you’re free to blacklist/filter at your leisure. i’m Very Annoyed at the moment, which will probably come through in the following post, so just. yknow. be prepared for that. or ignore it, that’s perfectly valid too.)

under a cut bc i do care for my followers and their sanity i swear lmao

there’s a real serious issue in this fandom with not understanding what queer terminology actually means or implies, especially when applied to a fictional narrative.

i’m specifically talking about ‘coding’, here. (if i were in a more meme-y mood, i might have said ‘the atla fandom found out about the term “gay-coding” and haven’t shut up since’.)

to the people who say ‘zuko is gay-coded’, i have this to say: you keep using that word. i do not think it means what you think it means. because he isn’t. i’m sorry, but he’s not! and the fact that this is such a prevalent claim in this fandom is distressing, bc it says to me that none of y’all know what gay-coding is or when and how to apply it! please, i’m begging you, go and look up these terms and what they mean and when they should be used before actually trying to plug them into your critical analysis, because when you misuse them and then call other people delusional for disagreeing with you it casts a pall over the entire fandom and is, i think, the root of some of the worst toxicity this fandom has to offer.

and the thing is, there are cases where gay-coding would apply--for instance, a couple series that are famous for queerbaiting their audience by coding their main characters as being attracted to one another (sometimes even despite their openly stated sexualities) come to mind, but those shows bare no similarities at all to atla and how zuko was written and portrayed! (and it would be funny, if it weren’t so obnoxious and infuriatingly wide-spread throughout the fandom, because the only queer couple we actually seen on-screen in either show wasn’t even queer-coded in any respect, and they’re canonically bi! [yes, i’m shading korrasami, or more accurately i’m shading bryke for refusing to give ka the build-up and development they deserved].)

this absolutely isn’t to say that headcanoning zuko as gay is a bad thing or invalid in any respect. (although the tendency for zukka shippers to do this specifically to keep zuko away from katara and/or invalidate his canon relationship/attraction to girls is more than a little eyebrow raising. especially since sokka is usually allowed to be bi, bc fans have no problem letting sukka stay in the background bc it’s no real threat, while jetko shippers are happy to have both boys be bi. [possibly bc katara is less a threat to jetko bc jetkotara is every bit as valid as any single ship between the three, but zukka can’t exactly let katara join in, and if the potential exists for zuko to be attracted to her then canon giving them the far deeper emotional bond becomes a threat to zukka’s existence? idk for sure--you be the judge.]) i prefer to hc zuko as bi (and always have, long before the atla renaissance), bc i don’t think zuko being attracted to boys is outside the realm of possibility, and it isn’t a threat to my ship since zuko&katara had a deep and emotional bond in canon that is very easy to develop further into something that becomes explicitly romantic--but the headcanon itself isn’t really the problem (although what it’s often in service to can be).

it’s the strange insistence that this is the only way to read his character, bc he was coded that way and so anyone who doesn’t see it must be too straight to understand--and i really shouldn’t have to say why and how that is so incredibly fucking insulting. (the ‘hetero lenses’ comment wasn’t cute when it came from bryke six years ago, and the same sentiment being repackaged and delivered by zukka shippers ain’t cute now.)

calling zuko gay-coded not only demonstrates ignorance as to what the term actually means, and how to usefully apply it in critical analysis, but also validates the frankly bullshit insertion of institutionalized homophobia in the world of atla where it was neither needed, nor wanted, nor ever hinted at in canon. as a queer woman i’m still infuriated by one fucking comic panel shoving institutionalized and systemic homophobia into a world where it was entirely unnecessary (and doing this in the first installment of the franchise showcasing a queer relationship??? making korra and asami worried about ‘coming out’ when they could have just gone on to have cute adventures together and tell people ‘hey we’re dating’ and have everyone else be ‘that’s awesome =DDD’ [because it is, in fact, possible to just have a world without homophobia i promise!!!!!] double yikes, i’m still pissed at bryke about it), and i doubly hate that ‘zuko is gay coded’ has become so widespread that ‘ozai hates him bc he’s gay’ has become a staple in that part of the fandom.

not only does making zuko gay and implying (or outright stating) that ozai hated and abused him because of it completely undermine zuko’s character arc by making his abuse about his sexuality rather than ozai’s toxic pride and anger at seeing himself reflected in his ‘weak’ son, but it comes very close to outright stating that abuse and trauma are inherently gay experiences, and they aren’t!!! they really aren’t, i promise!!!

abuse and trauma narratives exist outside of ‘my dad hates me because i’m gay’. and, quite frankly, there are MORE THAN ENOUGH queer trauma narratives out in the world. we do not need to start trying to retroactively make them canon in a series where they didn’t exist! if you’re gay and see yourself in zuko and project your own experiences on him, that’s understandable and valid. that does not make zuko gay-coded. and honestly, the insistence that he is makes very little sense to me, because you’re essentially trying to give the show credit for work you put into interpreting the characters! why would you want to do that? why not own your own headcanons and take credit for them, rather than insisting they are canon and everyone else is wrong for not seeing them??? like, i’ve said before that i’ve always headcanoned zuko (and katara) as bi, and even support it with my interpretations of evidence from the show, but the difference between ‘i think zuko is bi’ and ‘zuko is definitely gay-coded’ is that i know that bi zuko is my interpretation of canon, and that it is work i’m putting into the show that wasn’t actually intended by the creators/writers, no matter how much sexual tension i read into the jetko swordfight.

and like, zuko’s character arc doesn’t actually parallel a queer one all that well to begin with. it’s easy enough to do the work and twist it sideways just enough to make the general points fit, but the fact is, zuko’s arc is not one of self-discovery. it’s not one of coming to understand something fundamental about himself that he can’t change, that he was hated for, and coming out to his father in a dramatic confrontation where he shows that he understands himself and doesn’t need his father’s acceptance to be fulfilled.

zuko’s arc is actually one of trauma and healing. and those can (and often are--like i said, there are more than enough queer trauma narratives in the world, atla really doesn’t need to be one of them) be part of queer narratives, for sure! but they aren’t uniquely queer. and zuko’s confrontation with ozai during the eclipse doesn’t read like a ‘coming out’ at all. (yes, i’ve seen that post. yes, i rolled my eyes and moved on, bc unlike some people, i’m capable of not clowning on correctly tagged posts i disagree with.) zuko is specifically confronting ozai over his abuse, because his arc wasn’t about discovering anything fundamental about himself (and therefore realizing that ozai was hating him for something he couldn’t change)--it was about realizing that he was not at fault for the way his father treated him. it was also about realizing that the fire nation was broken and corrupt at its core, and that his father was an aspect of that he needed to break away from so that he could help the world begin to heal.

he says it himself:

Zuko: No, I've learned everything! And I've had to learn it on my own! Growing up, we were taught that the Fire Nation was the greatest civilization in history. And somehow, the War was our way of sharing our greatness with the rest of the world. What an amazing lie that was. The people of the world are terrified by the Fire Nation. They don't see our greatness. They hate us! And we deserve it! We've created an era of fear in the world. And if we don't want the world to destroy itself, we need to replace it with an era of peace and kindness.

making this about zuko being gay and rejecting ozai’s homophobia, rather than zuko learning fundamental truths about the world and about his home and about how there was something deeply wrong with his nation that needed to be fixed in order for the world to heal (and, no, ‘homophobia’ is not the answer to ‘what is wrong with the fire nation’, i’m still fucking pissed at bryke about that), misses the entire point of his character arc. this is the culmination of zuko realizing that he should never have had to earn his father’s love, because that should have been unconditional from the start. this is zuko realizing that he was not at fault for his father’s abuse--that speaking out of turn in a war meeting in no way justified fighting a duel with a child.

is that first realization (that a parent’s love should be unconditional, and if it isn’t, then that is the parent’s fault and not the child’s) something that queer kids in homophobic households/families can relate to? of course it is. but it’s also something that every other abused kid, straight kids and even queer kids who were abused for other reasons before they even knew they were anything other than cishet, can relate to as well. in that respect, it is not a uniquely queer experience, nor is it a uniquely queer story, and zuko not being attracted to girls (which is what a lot of it seems to boil down to, at the end of the day--cutting down zuko’s potential ships so that only zukka and a few far more niche ships are left standing) is not necessary to his character arc. nor does it particularly make sense.

(and before anyone brings up his date with jin--a) he enjoyed it when she kissed him, and b) he was a traumatized, abused child going out on a first date. of course he was fucking awkward. have you ever met a teenage boy????)

anyway, uh, that was a lot of words, so have a tl;dr: zuko is not gay-coded. there is nothing uniquely gay (or even uniquely queer) about his character arc or characterization, and he was certainly not coded gay in an attempt to sneak a queer character past the censors. if anyone involved with atla was gonna try that, it would’ve been in lok, and as established, they didn’t even manage to queer-code the actual queer relationship before the last few minutes of the final episode. headcanoning zuko as gay is absolutely fine (though if it’s only done to keep him away from female characters he may otherwise be attracted to, that smells more like misogyny than anything else), but insisting that this reading is the only one that makes sense, and anyone who doesn’t agree must be straight (hello, queer woman here making this insanely long thinkpiece) is very much not.

ship what you like, but stop trying to invalidate other ships and other interpretations of characters just to make your ship seem more plausible. it’s really not a good look.