queer tv characters

[ratcreature]

Not that I needed another tv series, but recently I started watching Traders eps. Initially it was because I've seen a bunch of SGA/Traders x-overs centered on David Hewlett's Traders character Grant Jansky, and I dislike reading crossovers without having seen at least a little bit of all characters so that I can imagine them. So I figured I'd

Comments

[ratcreature]

You're right about that feminine thing. The only "butch" character I recall is Grace from Joan of Arcadia, but she is more portrayed as still figuring her sexuality out than as anything else. Which makes sense since she's a teenager, but I didn't list her because of her sexual orientatin being still uncertain. But to me she read definitely as a cool potential baby dyke.

Now I wonder whether queer male characters would be less threatening to masculinity if they were portrayed in the more or less feminine gay cliche (as many minor gay characters seem to be) to distance them from being male at all or analogous to the lesbian characters, who are "still women", as just like other guys, thus trying to disconnect the image of masculinity from heterosexual sex.

[ratcreature]

Strangely enough the lesbian and gay characters (outside of soap operas) I remember from German tv series (which I don't watch a lot) are all from police and prison dramas and such. Like a gay police detective who's partnered with a more mach guy and they surprisingly get along. Another one is a lesbian police detective, well actually that is a bit overstating it, she flirted with and kissed another woman on screen once, and there's afaik no steady male love interest as the series is mostly about the police work, and the character is somewhat butch, what with having short hair, not caring much about looks, watching football and such, but the actress (who's openly lesbian) said that she had no interest in her character being one (maybe she doesn't want to be type cast in the rather limited "lesbian" slot), so there was never any follow-up. Then there's some series taking place in a women's prison that has lesbian couples (or maybe situationally lesbian couples, I never watched the thing)...

[likeadeuce]

Interesting! Another HBO show, The Wire, has a lesbian as a major character. And wasn't there a queer boy on My So-Called Life?

[unlovablehands]

And wasn't there a queer boy on My So-Called Life?

I think so. Ricky?

[slashpile]

And Kima's girlfriend Cheryl? Is Sally's student-turned-assistant on Traders.

And Omar, on The Wire, is gay. He's one of the major characters in a year-long story arc (and, of course, his boyfriend). On the commentaries, they repeatedly talk about how the show is about how institutions destroy individuals, and that Omar is the only person on the show that isn't caught up in one system or another.

The guys who do The Wire also did Homicide. They're pretty driven to portray Baltimore as it is, which means that they constantly have to fight to have multiple black actors on screen. They also got a lot of crap for having a female homicide detective. But they're kind of proud, now, because over the run of the show Baltimore did get (more) women in Homicide. So, I expect they're going to keep it up on all fronts.

[executrix]

There's a dead lesbian character on Hex, but given the nature of the show being dead doesn't necessarily count for much.

And how dare we assume that characters are heterosexual if we don't see them with any partners and no partners are named--and how do we know that a character who used to have/currently has an other-sex partner has no same-sex interests?

[ratcreature]

I'm not wondering about whether a character's sexuality is open to interpretation, or even has strong undecurrents queerness, like I think are present with Grace on Joan of Arcadia. I was talking about TBP explicitly stating a main or regular character is gay, lesbian, or bisexual, either by having him/her openly same-sex love interests on screen (or mentioned in on screen conversation), or declaring themselves as such, so that there is no way one could possibly cop out and see them as fully heterosexual. And whether that was easier for tv shows to do for female characters than for male characters.

[viciouswishes]

Two women can't really have sex, don't you know?

[ratcreature]

What, not even with strap-on dildos?

[viciouswishes]

They're only half-way there. You gotta have the real, throbbing cocks.

[slashpile]

OMG, I clicked on this link from metafandom, because it made me think of Traders, but I never expected that it would actually be about it.

Because I missed several Traders eps, and that's obviously one of them. But it's perfect. I don't read femslash at all, but every. damn. scene. between Sonja Smits and another woman, and I'm screaming for fanfic. So, there's that.

But Traders also stands out in my mind for some of the minor characters who've been gay men. (I don't want to spoil you - what ep are you at?) There's the biogeneticist who they set up with Porky Pete (financially), who's lusting over Jack. (306)

And which episode is the one with Sally's ex? Makes a nice switch from her and every billionaire in the western hemisphere.

Of course, it *is* a Canadian show.

/neighbourhood of drunk-with-giddy-joy hockey fans, absent for tonight because of the flood

just a few links, now that you've got me thinking

[slashpile]

Okay:
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~wyatt/tv-characters.html
http://www.queertv.btinternet.co.uk/
http://www.afterellen.com/TV/gaymenvswomen.html

[ratcreature]

The episode with the ex-girlfriend was 3x14 IIRC (episode numbers kind of blur together for me during marathon series watching). And you know how at that time Ian is trying to get her to go out with him? There's scenes where he talks to Donald that he's sure the woman is an ex-girlfriend of Sally and about how hot it is that she's into women too. That conversation is adorable with Donald being somewhat flustered and Ian being all eager as if imagining a threesome.