#It is not a “wlw focused” show it's not romantically focused at all in fact

[crossf15]

I knew Dunmeshi was going to have an annoying fanbase when the anime released, but it being co-opted by homophobic lesbians and posers who don't even watch anime/read manga wasn't on my bingo card if I'm being honest.

[writey-mcwriteface]

i’m holding your hands and looking you in your eyes. they gave us the billy kiss scene before the agathario kiss scene specifically BECAUSE agathario is the main romantic relationship of the show. billy’s relationship with his boyfriend is important because it adds context to his character. it tells us more about him. they gave us their scene in the sixth episode because their relationship is not narratively important.

at this point, i am confident that agathario is one of the key focuses of the show. their kiss, the climax of the tension they’ve been building from the start, will likely take place in the eighth episode, at the climax of the story itself, because their relationship IS narratively important!

i get that a lot of fans are worried about not getting the representation we thought we would. i understand that many of us are thinking back to other shows that let us down with representation, especially with wlw representation, because i definitely am. but nothing we’ve seen from agatha all along has indicated that we will be let down. in fact, i strongly believe that everything we’ve seen so far indicates the opposite.

agathario is definitively not queerbait. their scenes have been explicitly romantic, and the writers have made it very clear that they have a long, painful history. i promise you that it would be unthinkable for agathario not to have a climactic moment. i promise you that we will learn more about their relationship, because failing to do so would completely deny all of the set up they’ve done so far. and i do solemnly believe that there will be a kiss.

the moral of the story is that just because there was an mlm kiss before a wlw kiss, it doesn’t mean that the mlm kiss is more important. in fact, i think it means that the wlw kiss is more important because it isn’t taking place at a completely random point in the show. i’ve seen far too many people lamenting that we saw billy’s kiss scene first, when this perspective denies the realities of effective storytelling.

have patience. let yourself trust. feel the fear and let it go. kathryn hahn wouldn’t fucking do this to us.

[whatsjulietslastname]

expending on the mlm pricefield thing (and i’m not talking about double exposure anymore), i think if pricefield had been one of the first mlm pairing to be openly queer in video games history, it would’ve been way more of a big deal back when the game was released and years later. i also think little to no people would be debating whether their relationship is platonic or not, and people would’ve been way faster at jumping to the conclusion that you were homophobic if you thought they were.

historically, the most popular mlm pairings (i’m thinking johnlock, kirk and spock from star trek, merlin and arthur, all the h*rry p*tter and marvel gay ships) have a way bigger fanbase and are way less denied than the wlw ones (i’m thinking supercop, emma swan and regina mills, betty and veronica from riverdale etc). (for the record, i looked up “queerbaiting” to make this post and have examples, and found like a dozens of mlm pairings and always the same few wlw ones…) AND it is way more socially acceptable to say “those two women have a platonic relationship” whereas, if you do the same with johnlock, for instance, you WILL get an angry twenty paragraphs long reply about how there was nothing platonic about it (even though John Watson married a woman).

my point is not “he married a woman so he wasn’t queer” my point is, whenever one part of a wlw pairing has a boyfriend, or a man who she shows a glimpse of interest in (*cough cough* Warren Graham *cough cough*), it is IMMEDIATELY used as ‘evidence’ that this character cannot be queer since she can be in a heterosexual relationship — which is an argument that, again, you will practically never find directed at a gay ship. and, again, the few people who do use this argument against mlm pairings are called ‘homophobic’.

AGAIN, i am not saying that you cannot ship Warren and Max or are homophobic if you do, i’m saying that if Chloe and Max had been two guys, people would’ve been so focused on them, on Max’s diary’s entries, and the two possible kisses they can share onscreen, and the flirting and implications in their relationship, and Chloe’s obvious attraction to Max, that grahamfield would’ve had a way smaller fanbase — or no fanbase at all. and people would’ve absolutely disregarded the fact that you can make Max romance Warren (who is a girl in this scenario). they would’ve seen Warren’s nearly one-sided flirting, and would’ve immediately gone “she (Warren) is in love with him (Max) and he doesn’t give a fuck” (and the kiss in the Two Whales would’ve been collectively ignored by the entire fandom, as is Mary Watson, or Pepper Potts, or Tonks, or Ginny Weasley).

but BECAUSE Max and Chloe are girls, people are still debating whether she is even queer or not by saying “if i make her romance Warren she experiences no attraction towards Chloe and therefore is straight” which is false, because the attraction is HERE. all you, as a player, get to decide is whether or not Max acts on it. and no matter how much evidence there is that Max is indeed romantically interested in Chloe, you will NEVER convince those people, because to them, the moment a woman and a guy interact in a non-platonic way, this woman has to end up with said guy, no matter how queer-coded her relationship with another woman is.

and now that pricefield is broken up, people who would’ve been rioting if it had been guys are calling people who are rightfully upset ‘dramatic’. just try and imagine the reaction of the Sherlock fandom if Sherlock was returning without Watson because “they argued off-screen and decided to stop seeing each other”. those guys aren’t childhood best friends, are never romantically involved, their fandom hasn’t been begging to have a glimpse of them together for ten years, and yet i can’t even imagine how angry people would be. all this fandom was asking was to at least not destroy Max and Chloe’s friendship, and look where we are now.

[girl4music]

We really need to unpack how similar Gabrielle’s Dark future is to Xena’s Dark past and how Gabrielle walked freely into the Dark but was ultimately capable of not falling into the darkness even though she does go through a lot of what Xena went through. Xena lost her brother and that sent her down a spiral of violence and eventually all out bloodlust when betrayed by Caesar.

Gabrielle loses her entire family sans her sister, her husband, her own child (that she herself killed 3 times!) and yet she still remains good or in the Light. I’m not saying it doesn’t faze her or negatively impact her. It does in very irrevocable ways - but the fact is that she remained unmoved by it in the way that she never went down that same spiral of violence as Xena.

But the question is why? What makes her so special?

Maybe it’s not so much HER that’s special but rather the love Xena and Gabrielle shared that is. Perhaps the reason why she never fell into darkness is because the love she had for Xena - and in return - the love Xena had for her - is what kept her on the right path in life.

Which is poignant because Gabrielle did that for Xena too. She is what kept her on the straight and narrow.

So Xena was wrong. Gabrielle was better off with her because Gabrielle was always meant to be a warrior and was always meant to lose her blood innocence.

So if she was without Xena, she would have spiralled because there’s no justifiable reason for her not to.

As I said - she’s not special so she’s not shielded from darkness or that of the consequences of falling into darkness. It’s probably just because love was her Light and that had far more of a grip on to her than the Dark.

A written thematic narrative like this would be too much if not for the way Lucy and Renee portrayed it as leading characters. Allowing their characters’ relationship to ebb and flow naturally and organically through the characterization and the story being told.

See what I mean about how it all HITS better as a love story? Everything in the show feels more valuable. The romantic aspect doesn’t ruin the show, it enhances it because the love between them is the heart of it and the main driving force behind every narrative choice.

I wish more shows with WLW representation in did it this way because then it wouldn’t feel so contrived. It wouldn’t feel like it’s put there because it HAS TO be but rather - it’s put there because it feels right to be. They really did NAIL WLW representation in ‘Xena: Warrior Princess’ whether they realized they were providing it or not because they stayed focused on depicting two women in love BECAUSE OF the story and not in addition to it or despite it or regardless of it.

BECAUSE the story WORKS and HITS best that way or the individual character stuff doesn’t make sense. If not for the profound love between Xena and Gabrielle, how could either of them possibly have overcome and triumphed in their own individual character storylines? What possible justifiable reason would be for them to if not to fight for the love that they have for the other?

If there’s only ever one victory in this show it’s LOVE because there’s not a chance of any victory without it. Both these characters would be lost to the darkness without being a northern star to and for each other.

[swan2swan]

Let's talk about what happened with Brookenji.

And no, I don't mean the fallout in Chaos Theory. I mean what happened in the original show. At least, what I believe happened. This is--mind you--total Conspiracy Board style speculation based on little pieces of evidence collected and gathered throughout my years looking into behind-the-scenes stuff and following social media. It would really help if I could find one particularly tweet, but I think it was deleted either in anticipation of spoilers or just because he regularly deletes them.

But...here's the one responsible for that:

Xi.

Xi was the Original Ben, as you can see. Young and nervous. While Ben was...

Well. Ben. Big Ben. But obviously the jock character. The tall, smarmy, rich white guy.

You may be able to see where this is going, but I submit this evidence to you from my memory, and you'll just have to trust me:

One of the showrunners of Camp Cretaceous tweeted ages ago (Season 1-2, well before Season 4 and the Nonsense), tweeted about how there's a disappointing lack of Asian romantic leads in media.

And you know what? He's right. Very much so! Think of ten major tentpole movies from the past thirty years and pull a Japanese, Korean, Chinese, or Vietnamese romantic lead. No, no, no, not the women! The men. An Asian man.

"Oh, well, Shang Chi--" no. Don't get cute.

The fact is, it's just...not a thing that happens. And I think one of the goals with Camp Cretaceous was to change that. Just like they struck ground with Yaz and Sammy being an interracial wlw romance in a children's cartoon, they were gonna put an Asian dude in the romantic partner position.

By now, you obviously see where this is going...and what happened:

If Xi had remained the scared kid, he would have fallen from the train. He would have grown in the jungle and emerged as a wild child. He would have an mmensely different feel in Season 3 where he was breaking away from the group and determining to stay on the island...until the end, when he bonded with the group.

And that is when Brooklynn--or Jules, rather--would have suddenly taken interest in him. Xi and Jules, the wild kid and the rich girl. It would be cute!

But they changed things and took them in a different direction--possibly pretty close to the time the show started. Which meant that the whole first half of the show barely had any setup planned for Kenji and Brooklynn, as they were now known...and they didn't really want to go with Ben and Brooklynn. Especially with how strong the dynamics between Ben and Bumpy and Ben and Darius became.

But they still had to set up the Brookenji romance, and the plans for OG Ben and his Rich Dad to shatter the group dynamic suddenly had to adjust...and you know what? Throwing the romantic strain into it was a pretty good idea! Not bad! But...with the timing of his arrival, the writers only had one season left to them. So they had to jam it all into one season, because there was a little race-swapping done at the last minute that wound up being super-crucial to the endgame.

And personally?

As messy as Brookenji was, I think it was better for them not to remain rigidly focused Xi-Jules and turn it into Ben-Brooklynn. While it would have neatly paired off everyone for the final seasons--Ben and Brooklynn having their Rich Girl/Wild Child romance, Kenji and Darius having their Friends-to-Brothers arc as Kenji betrays the group for his dad (SEE HOW SMOOTHLY THAT WORKS, TOO?), and Yaz and Sammy...well, you know...I think I like what we got with Ben a lot more.

But you can see how the original plan of broad strokes would have been a lot smoother. Turned out that the characters evolved more than planned. And obviously they could have stuck with the Kenji/Darius focus being the main fallout of the group...but that also sort of leaves Brooklynn high and dry with regards to the plot. What's she got left? Though, also...looking back on those seasons...even her romance with Kenji didn't do much for her. Probably because it wasn't really supposed to be a thing. We don't know what the plans for Jules were in the original script, but when those got ditched (PRESUMABLY. THIS IS ALL ME SPECULATING!!!), they had to scramble with her. Maybe she was supposed to have more parental issues. I dunno.

But whatever the truth is, I do still maintain that Kenji was written to be a romantic guy with that in mind. Listening to Brooklynn's color preferences, feeling awkward, being protective...heck, he even kept that rizz through to the new series:

But the bottom line is that Kenji isn't Xi. He didn't have the growth that was planned for Xi, which would have tangentially influenced Brooklynn/Jules's sudden interest in him.

This is also one of the consequences that comes with having shows compressed and rushed so much in the modern era. If we'd been getting filler episodes over the seasons, they might have been able to start building Kenji and Brooklynn up during the E750 arc, if not sooner.

NOTE: I'm not sure what the scripting and planning timetables were with this show. But from what I've gathered, the characters were swapped well after the conceptual stages. And they made it work! There's still a coherent story! I think the sloppiness just came because they had to hurriedly change tracks on some parts, and we noticed.

[toomanyopinionss]

I want to talk about

Surviving Summer

(nonspoiler/spoiler)

hey y’all, it’s been a minute since i’ve done one of these. let’s get into it…😏

So i genuinely like this show. Just finished watching the second season, in fact.

I feel like it’s the good amount of cheesy and adorable and mind numbing without being too formulaic and basic like some of these Netflix originals tend to be. Now it can be annoying and cringy sometimes, don’t get me wrong. But it’s got some pretty good actors and actresses with enough heartfelt moments and playful scenes to make one feel content. She’s not a top ten, but she never tries to be, you know??

As for the show itself? Surviving Summer is the perfect name for it, because Summer the character? a HOT mess. I cannot stress this enough, the frontal lobes on that one are not fully formed. It’s especially apparent in season 1. Even so, i love her 🥰. I cant help it ok? She has the confidence that i dreamed of having in high school, and now tbh.

I won’t go to deep into every character, but let me just say this: they will ALL annoy you at some point. It’s so obvious that they’re teenagers, cuz they childish. But they all care about each other most of the time, and surfing. It’s a great summer watch! go for it, don’t be shy

7.5/10. Surface level fun with shenanigans galore and annoying teenagers.

SPOILERS

Y’all the second season was gooood. I liked it better than the first tbh. Summer, like i said before was much more serious and focused, but it didn’t change her personality at all, which i loved.

I liked how they got more into Bodhi’s conflicts with surfing and the racism in the industry on her end. If anything, i wish they had time to do even more with it. Because everything else they did with her character this season was just bleh. A half hearted conflict between poppy blown WAY out of proportion and a half assed queer relationship that was cute but barely touched on because hottake Netflix hates their wlws and their black main characters 🤭(oop who said that)

Poppy and marlon were cuteeeee. sidenote, who else forgot that bodhi and marlon had a thing, cuz i sho did 👀. they have such good chemistry and it just warmed my heart. SPEAKING of good chemistry…

✨“summer have you seen yourself?”

summer and baxter are the only mf choice, im SORRY.

immediately side eyeing anyone who says that summer and ari should be together, because i’m not sure you and i watch the same show. another steaming take, but I never bought into summer and ari. they are too sibling for me. i was taken ABACK when they kissed in season one. I genuinely did not see it coming. they play off each other nicely, but in a romantic way? NOPE, i don’t buy it.

but from the first scene with baxter and summer, i knew. it was intense. the casual touches, the instant bind they formed, the way bax looks at her 🤭…

you cannot compete where you don’t compare, Ari is not the one 🤷🏾‍♀️

anyone else? hmmm…

oh, y’all join me in a big FVCK you to Elo and Wren. they both suck actual ass and i hate them both.

it’s the way that they treat everyone like shit equally. even their own brother? like what the fvck is wrong with them?

like especially wren. being jealous and overly competitive is one thing. but they way she handled the bodhi situation, plus the way she outed her old teammate? literally bordering on racist and homophobic like wtffff. maybe a lil psychotic too, cuz why is she literally a threat to summer’s life? don’t take it out on her cuz your boyfriend is an indecisive disaster. at least they didn’t give wren a redemption, i would have been so pissed off like fvck her.

ok this is getting long. tldr, Season 2 was entertaining and fun. poppy and marlon were cute, summer was awesome, ari does not need a girlfriend, justice for baxter, and wren and elo will not be seeing the pearly gates.

[dreamwreaver]

Yeesh, I cringed at the mention of the Chaggie sexy song. Not that I'm homophobic, I don't hate the fact Chaggie is getting a song, Lord knows those two need something else other than the father-daughter copycat song, but like... Why? Why specifically a sexy song? Does this song serve a purpose in driving the plot forward or does it express the character's goals? Doesn't feel like it. From the way Viv talks about it, it seems that it's just a "fun" song to put in, just extra horny fuel for those shippers and that's why I'm not looking forward to it. Cuz Viv is planning Alastor's backstory, the Vee's plans, Vox and Alastor's "sad and complicated relationship" and the whole thing with Sir Pentious, Emily and Sera Heaven in Season 2 and she's gonna cram in a Chaggie song that is SPECIFICALLY stated to be sexy. With all the plot points Viv has stuffed inside, not to mention the additional songs, this shippy segment seems pointless and out of place. To me, it feels like Viv is just trying to make up for how boring Chaggie is but this idea to "fix it" isn't really gonna cut it.

I don't know honestly. Like here's the thing; I knew going into hazbin even before the pilot dropped two things; 1. Charlie and Vaggie were a couple and 2. Viv was not going to do much fanservice for it. Where I started to worry was in the period between pilot and show, when Shark Robot was still in charge of hazbin and helluva merch. Because it very much went from having individual character merch of Charlie and Vaggie on top of Chaggie merch to just Chaggie merch. All of it. Not a single piece of Charlie merch or Vaggie merch was being produced.

(Petty side note we had two shirts of Charlie and Alastor together before we ever got chaggie shirts)

Here's the thing about a well written relationship; I should not need merch to tell me they're a couple. I should not need a whole ass character being invited into the plot just to introduce someone as a romantic partner so the audience is up to speed. You can throw as many sexy drawings of chaggie at me as you want but the show's own treatment of them speaks volumes to me. And I think what people are calling out is how by and large the mlm couples in Viv's shows get a ton of development and attention, wlw? Not so much. And hey, part of me is glad we are at a stage where a character is in a queer relationship and it's not news, it's not shocking. The part of me that has studied story telling in various forms for well over a decade however, says that two main characters ("main" on the part of vaggie but still) being in a long term relationship should have it be obvious.

Let's look at Helluva; no one needs Moxxie to introduce Millie as his wife or vice versa for the audience to know they're a couple. From their pet names to their interactions you know they're together. Or, for a more long term couple; Fizz and Ozzie. For all they've kept it on the dl everyone knows, and it's obvious. Ozzie keeps a damn portrait of the two of them in his office. He calls Fizz "Fizzy Frog" and constantly worried over it. He denied stolas a request solely because he knew Fizz before that adventure his boyfriend wouldn't have wanted to help Blitz.

But I think Viv has to a certain extent noticed some of the critique about how Chaggie has been portrayed over season 1 and is now trying desperately to correct it so she's over correcting now. What is the point of focusing on Charlie and Vaggie's relationship now when there is so many moving parts? It's not like they're gonna break up (imagine the backlash for that decision because bisexual women are only valid when they're dating other women *insert eyeroll here*) and clearly she doesn't care to give them any conflicts that help their relationship progress and grow as they do.

And here's the other thing right, I'm getting progressively more annoyed how many fans bitch and moan about "Alastor is asexual" when it comes to Charlastor but proceed to make him the twink bottom bitch for literally every other male character in the series. Which, even disregarding the notion of how out of character is is for him and how it's not ace or bi-phobic so long as the ship is visibly queer, is just hypocrisy at its finest. I'm not saying everyone needs to ship as I ship, but the fact that people are still taking Alastor's remarks literally when the voice actor and the creator for the show said he was lying about having any fatherly feelings for Charlie and infantilizing Charlie to a frankly misogynistic degree only to be placated about a "sexy" song from the wlw that will have nothing to do with the major plot threads at hand is really going to get my goat.

[weirdthoughtsandideas]

This is the video ever and I think about it every now and then

Fun fact as a kid I watched Girl Meets World in a rainbow lense where I only focused on Riley and Maya. Everyone else were all ”omg but Lucaya” or whatever but I did not even care. Like I thought the romance was so uninteresting I only focused on Riley and Maya and they are very highkey the reason I am into WLW besties to lovers ships.

Like many people were more like ”oh I liked -insert canon ship, most likely lucaya- but I did lowkey ship Rilaya” but I HIGHKEY shipped Rilaya and did not give a flying heck about any other ship whatsoever. Nowadays I do appreciate the friendship stuff with the group, but I was never into the romance plot at ALL and the only romantic stuff I ever will be invested in in this show is Rilaya.

Also I wanna do a video like this with a ship I like sometime.

[thestobingirlie]

i'm loving everyone coming out of the woodwork to get their negative ron@ nce confessions off their chest, so i hope you don't mind mine as well: i think removing steve entirely from both of their perspective's is half the point of the ship, because as much as nancy has desperately needed a friend for years, this is one that wound up being much less about her and much more about her love life

robin and nancy's friction in the library was both because robin is socially awkward and nancy has a short fuse, and also because i think nancy was jealous of robin. they get along better once robin has proved her use to nancy, but also after robin made very clear that she and steve aren't dating. once they got closer, they have smaller background moments that show a more comfortable friendship, but all of their actual conversations are about the case or steve. i DO like stancy, and even i found it out of place and wished their friendship could be more about them (honestly i think stancy would be getting so much less hate rn if the duffers weren't such big fans of the matchmaker trope, but they're freaking obsessed with it)

fandom is always gonna ship two hot people together, especially if there's a tangible but nonthreatening amount of tension to their dynamic, but i think when 90% of their dynamic is about SOMEONE ELSE people start spite shipping, to purposefully re-imagine them when the third character is completely irrelevant

because yeah, the ship really does only work if you completely remove steve's personality and relationship with both robin and nancy. "wlw relationships shouldn't be about men" is true, and i agree with it, and that's how i know ron@ nce is never gonna happen unless it's platonic soulmates steve and robin sharing a girlfriend

good points! and yeah, i actually love that everyone is just venting to me about why they hate r//nance lmao

i do think it sucked that robin and nancy’s friendship became solely about stancy (and i hate the matchmaking trope so much, and it is used continuously throughout st). although, i will say that i think outside of their connections to steve and the upside down, they really don’t have much in common. maybe the duffers realised that, and figured the best way to make them friends is to just make every scene about steve lol

nancy does desperately need a friend, which is why i wish this season had focused more on platonic stancy then romantic. honestly, i don’t have anything against stancy, and if it was written well, i wouldn’t mind it being endgame (though to be fair, i never really care about endgame ships, i can just read fanfic, you know?) i just don’t love that we’re seeing these romantic scenes while jonathan and nancy are still together. but anyway, nancy’s arc hinges on the fact that she needs a platonic relationship, and so does steve’s! both nancy and steve will go through development when they learn they don’t need romantic relationships to be happy.

sorry got off track there, but yeah, i just can’t really buy into r//nance, romantic or otherwise because so much of it is about steve.

don’t get me wrong, i understand why people ship nancy and robin, but to me it just feels more like a crack ship, then a real one. and i love a good ship that has no basis in canon, but when people try and argue that this ship is the only one that makes sense, is when i start not liking it.

and, yeah, exactly like you said, there is no real way to separate r//nance from steve, a lot of characterisation has to be ignored in order for the ship to work. and while wlw ships shouldn’t be about men, i think to try and use that to describe r//nance is nonsensical, and feels like a point they’re making just to make r//nance seem progressive, and anyone that’s against it a horrible person.

[quill-and-chalk]

Oh my god thank you for that post! Budget (which of course the length also plays into, Heartstopper isn’t even half as long as First Kill atm) and established viewership are exactly what I’ve been saying plays into the renewal! Yes it sucks First Kill got cancelled when it absolutely shouldn’t have been but we could compare it to awfully performing straight shows instead of pitting queer media against each other (and also generally to shows that feature POC as main characters vs. those that don’t since that’s a factor too). Streaming services in general won’t hesitate to cancel all of our shit, regardless of the kind of queerness featured.

I also get so frustrated that people are saying “but mlm shows have it so much easier to get renewed” and then point towards the fact that mlm are either infantilized or fetishized by straight people like it’s a win? Can y’all not? This goes in the same vein as people who I’ve seen argue that sapphics are more socially acceptable because they seem more “innocent” and men find the thought of two women making out hot. This isn’t actual acceptance, both of these are just cishet people being gross about queer people. Can people on both sides please stop acting like that’s an advantage?

No yea this is EXACTLY right. Like I said good lgbt media is veeerrry new and to be honest Our Flag Means Death and Heartstopper are the first unapologetically queer pieces of media in a show format (in my opinion) that have succeeded. Many other ‘LGBT’ shows are catered to a straight audience or watered down for them.

Like if you really look at queer media and it’s history you can see that gay white men specifically were more likely to be represented in shows. Though it was always from a dehumanizing perspective and only as a side character. Think 2000’s and the common notion of the Gay BFF where these men were always white and always seen as a prop. Then this evolved a bit into the token gay side character getting to have a love interest (which is usually the only other gay guy) Remember that Glee was considered ground breaking for simply having Blaine and Kurt get together and that was in the early 2010’s. We see this trend with other 2010 shows which were almost always geared towards straight people ( Shadow Hunters, How to get away with Murder, etc) Even when we got media focused on gay men in the later 2010’s it tended to still market towards a Cis-straight audience and was branded as either a comedy because effeminate queer men are ‘fun y’, filled with a trama narrative , or simply just had all queerness stripped from it (Think Love Simon, Special, or The politician) To put it simply, yes there is bias towards mlm representation in media but that’s because that bias is rooted in a history of dehumanization towards queer men.

Now if you look at a history of wlw relationships being portrayed in media it seems much shorter but it’s actually kinda… not. So basically wlw relationships and wlw portrayal in media during the gay panic era had a very weird luxury, because their relationships weren’t taken very seriously. They had the ability to basically pass off romantic relationships as gals being pals and any explicit relationship could just end tragically and then it was fine. It’s why the lesbian pulp fiction genre thrived during this time. This kind of ‘if we ignore it then it’s not real’ policy with wlw media means that they didn’t have the same history as mlm. Most wlw characters in the 2000’s are implied/subtext and even going into the 2010’s if a wlw relationship was shown it was much more likely to be developed off screen at the end of a show. Wlw relationships were still sexually objectified though and sadly the most common form of explicit representation for wlw relationships was often for the male gaze. This is why it’s seems harder for sincere wlw works to succeed commercially because 1. There are more sincere/realistic wlw works since wlw have had the (again it was in a unusual way) privilege of always having a level of sincerity in their media prior. Even if that sincerity had to be edited. And 2. Because straight audiences still sexually objectify wlw relationships and when they see wlw media come out from the ‘just gal pal shadows’ they can’t relate to the sincerity and unapologetic queerness that comes from the media. To put it simply they can’t fathom the fact that they can’t objectify the relationship or that the relationship isn’t shown through straight colored glasses.

Then everything is flipped in media aimed at younger audiences ( and I’m gonna shorten this because I’m rambling) Because queer men are dehumanized and characterized to be a character that’s only good for sassy/mean/sexual comments and that is, obviously, not gonna fly well in shows geared towards a younger audience. While since wlw relationships are more easily explained away as ‘gal pals’ then they actually get more representation because they can, again, fly under the radar. Legend of Korra did this by implying they got together with a hand hold, Steven Universe was able to air in multiple countries because translations just pretended any lgbt relationship was ‘just a strong friendship’, and She-ra was even able to be as queer with that ending because NJ basically convinced Netflix they were ‘just good friends’ until the final season.

This is just the tip of the iceberg because there is sooo much nuance to this conversation and even more queer history we could bring up that I didn’t mention. Though the common theme here was that straight-Cis audiences have never respected us and every group in the lgbt community has had to fight for representation and that fight looks different for different groups.

[nose-bl]

something i've noticed is that wlw get more representation in animated shows, while mlm get more representation in live action shows and shows more oriented towards teens and adults. like, steven universe, she ra, the owl house, amphibia, adventure time, etc etc, animated shows with queer rep tend to focus on wlw and they do get renewed (although the fact that they have queer rep at all makes it a challenge, like with any other piece of queer media). but when it comes to live action, shows with mlm rep tend to get renewed more than wlw shows, and mlm get more stories focused on the romantic aspect, while wlw shows usually have like a main plot not related to queerness but romance is still important and there (at least from the media i've consumed). i'm not sure why this is

[vividroseinfatuation]

💞Look at you go, I just adore you, I wish that I knew, what makes you think I’m so special💞

Since I’ve been focusing on what schools I’m going to apply to and what to put in my portfolio lately, I’ve started to get really nostalgic for Steven Universe. Steven Universe has been really important to me, to the point where it was the turning point of deciding I wanted to go into animation for a living. It was the first show I had actually watched that showed clear lgbtq+ representation and showed realistic struggles with metal illnesses which left a huge impression on me.

Pearl has almost always been one of the most important characters to me in anything. Not only was she great wlw representation but she showed signs of struggling with ocd (also her colour palette is the exact same as the ocd flag so that’s a cool fun fact). I also struggled with a romantic situation in middle school that really made me relate to her situation. It was all so amazing and refreshing to see a character just like me in Steven Universe and I am honestly incredibly grateful to Rebecca Sugar for everything they have done.

Thank you for giving me characters I can really relate to. Thank you for giving such incredible representation. Thank you for inspiring me to dream of working on a show that will affect kids as much as Steven Universe has affected me.

[filmmakerdreamst]

Gabrielle, Xena, and their wlw legacy 25 years later

“Before I met you, no one saw me for who I was. I felt invisible. You saw all the things that I could be. You saved me, Xena.” – Gabrielle, “The Ides of March”

The story of Xena is remembered as many different things. A heroic saga, a tale of redemption, a campy romp. It’s a series that truly had it all, and that’s why it remains iconic a quarter of a century later. Yet it is perhaps best remembered for the series-long slow burn subtextual love affair between Xena and her “traveling companion” Gabrielle.

While Xena and Gabrielle never became a canonical couple throughout the show’s run, producer Liz Friedman was (and is) an out lesbian and she, along with many of the writers, are on record as having worked to push queer themes throughout the series. Though studio executives refused to allow an openly queer relationship to flourish in late 1990s all-ages programming, looking back, they got away with a lot. While the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle remains the most talked about element of the show with good reason, something that stands out during a rewatch is that Gabrielle’s story is a queer narrative from the very start.

In the pilot episode, Gabrielle and her fellow villagers are taken hostage by henchmen of the villainous Draco. Despite being “only a bard,” Gabrielle is a brave young woman, and tries to stand up for the others, but to no avail. She is, after all, a storyteller, not a warrior. At that fortuitous moment, Xena arrives and defeats the warlords effortlessly, and it changes Gabrielle’s life forever. Not only is her life spared, she has found a new purpose – Xena.

Gabrielle is immediately smitten and attempts to follow Xena out of town when the other villagers, knowing her reputation as a ruthless killer, demand that she move on. Xena is jaded and prefers to travel alone, but Gabrielle trails her. She is committed to proving to Xena that they need each other. She even saves Xena’s life by thinking on her feet and keeping her cool under pressure so that Xena finally, grudgingly feels compelled to hear her out. When Xena threatens to send her back home, Gabrielle immediately replies, “I won’t stay there,” and makes an impassioned plea to Xena to allow her to accompany her on adventures.

“Gabrielle doesn’t elaborate on the details of her alienation, but any queer viewer would be able to relate.”

Even from the very first episode, Gabrielle knows she does not belong in her hometown. She knows she does not fit in, and the heteronormative plan that has been laid out for her by the people in her life seems akin to torture. She doesn’t elaborate on the details of her alienation, but any queer viewer would be able to relate. Xena is moved by this, and she finally agrees to accept Gabrielle into her life. For both of them, this proves to be the most important decision either of them would ever make.

This is all within the very first of the one hundred thirty-four episodes of Xena: Warrior Princess, and it truly set the standard for what we would see going forward. Gabrielle would have some romantic interests outside of Xena over the course of the series, but there is no questioning that her life revolved around the Warrior Princess from the moment she met her. Xena struggles with myriad romantic attachments throughout the show, conflicted over her past loves like Marcus, and the god of war, Ares, who sees the bond between her and Gabrielle as a threat and consistently attempts to break them up. For Gabrielle, she is briefly married, but her husband is little more than a plot device who is then almost immediately killed. She is trailed after by Joxer, but has no interest in him. In contrast, she is dedicated to Xena, and rarely questions the strength of their connection. Though it isn’t always explicit, by the end of the series, it’s difficult to view their relationship as anything but a love story.

Looking back, what was mandated a platonic relationship by censorship comes across more like a highly successful polyamorous relationship, in which the two grant each other space and understanding while remaining fully committed to one another. By the end of the story, they appear to be in a more monogamous arrangement, with Xena ultimately choosing Gabrielle as her one true partner, but it’s important that they allowed each other to express outside interests without anger as they grew together.

Indeed, though Xena’s affairs are many, Gabrielle’s strongest outside interest is with the Amazons. This, of course, is not without its own subtext. In the episode “Hooves & Harlots”, Xena focuses on trying to solve a murder mystery while Gabrielle trains and bonds with the Amazons. The Amazons emphasize sisterhood and they give Gabrielle a greater understanding of who she is as an entity separate from Xena. In “The Quest,” we learn that if Xena were to perish, Gabrielle would go to live with the Amazons rather than rejoining her old village or even pursuing her career as a bard. Though the Amazons are also never confirmed as queer despite the obvious queer elements of their story, Gabrielle’s emphasis on surrounding herself with a community of other queer people is important. In the Amazon episodes, the Gabrielle-specific subtext is as strong as it ever gets. In “To Helicon and Back,” Gabrielle politely notes that Xena will have to leave because a pending ceremony is Amazon-only, and Xena graciously agrees with only a trace of apprehension, quipping, “Don’t do anything that I wouldn’t do.” Xena supports Gabrielle and encourages her to form close bonds with other women, but they always come back to each other.

In “The Ides of March,” the villainous Callisto teams up with Xena’s cruel ex Caesar to usurp rulership of Rome from its tenuous democracy. Xena has seen a prophecy warning her to never set foot within Rome lest she risk her own death, but when Gabrielle is captured, she feels she has no choice. They nearly escape, but she is paralyzed by Callisto in the middle of a fight to free Caesar’s prisoners. Gabrielle spent much of the last season on a quest for peace, but when she sees Xena fall, she does not hesitate to unleash her full rage on the Roman guards. She fights valiantly while Xena begs her not to, fearing the cost to Gabrielle’s spirit. After they are both captured, they are imprisoned together and sentenced to death. When Xena weakly apologizes to Gabrielle, asking her forgiveness for making her break her vow of non-violence, Gabrielle insists that it’s meaningless, as nothing has ever mattered to her besides her life with Xena. The two of them are crucified together, and they die gazing into each other’s eyes. Though they return to life in the next season, we see that even in death, their souls were just as intertwined as their lives had become.

Gabrielle’s struggle with violence and the inner peace she ultimately achieves in concern to it is generally what people focus on when talking about the importance of her story, but that all happens alongside her journey to acceptance of herself as a queer person. She and Xena are not an immediate item but rather a slow burn love story in which they both must prove their love and devotion while struggling with their own inner demons. Yet still, at any time throughout the series when the two become separated, Gabrielle is not well until she is reunited with her partner. Xena, for her part, grows to depend on Gabrielle in a way that is, at first, completely alien to her. Though Xena has had many loves, none of them went to the lengths that Gabrielle went to in order to be with her. Leading up to her catastrophic death in the final episodes, her commitment to Gabrielle is agonizingly apparent. Even in death, the two of them will never be separated.

Without Gabrielle’s queer subplot, textual or not, Xena would not have been the show it was. Xena’s story involves a lot of conflicting feelings and ends with her making amends for who she was before ultimately letting go of it all and finding her own peace. Gabrielle’s story is about holding on to her faith and her kindness regardless of what she goes through. Together, these stories combined to be one of the greatest love stories in television history. Though the comics would later portray their relationship as openly queer, the fact that it didn’t need to be canonical within the show to be as important as it is to queer audiences only further proves the impact of the series, the vitality of Gabrielle’s story, and the poetic beauty of her complicated, but all-encompassing, love for Xena.

- Gabrielle, Xena, and their wlw legacy 25 years later by Sara Century

[soupthatistohot]

Why do I write primarily mlm fanfic?

This was something I asked myself the other day. I am a girl, I think I'm queer (but I am attracted to men, whatever I am), so why do I fixate on mlm relationships? Why do I never feel compelled to write wlw or even just some good 'ol straight stuff? I brought this up to a few friends of mine who also watch anime. One of them said that it’s because lots of popular media only really focuses on developing their male characters well, and I think this to be a very suitable explanation (as well as the fact that I’m queer and thus gravitate towards queer stories).

Take Sk8 the Infinity for example. I could count the number of female characters in this anime on one hand, and one of them is a robot. The others are supporting roles who only serve to support the male main characters. I love Sk8 very much, and with the possibility of a 2nd season I’d love to see a prominent, well-developed female character (but if they make her Reki’s love interest I will literally stab someone). But as the anime stands right now, there are no female characters that aren't just basically plot devices.

Another show I love dearly, Yuri!!! on Ice, is much the same. While there can be more of an argument made here because 1) competitive figure skating is split up between men and women, and 2) I believe that the story Yuuri and Victor is absolutely meant to be a romance, so having the two men as the focus is somewhat necessary, there's an overwhelming lack of fleshed-out women in the story. All the female characters are supporting members that only exist for the benefit of male characters. Yuuko and Minako support Yuuri, Lilia exists so Yuri P. can improve, Mila is just... kind of there, and Sara's whole character is centered around her brother being overprotective of her.

Okay, so let's look at something a little less... fruity. Horimiya. I've only watched the anime, so if there's stuff I miss from not having read the manga (yet), please forgive me. I still think this is a valid perspective, though, because if there's female development that the creators decided was so unimportant that it could be cut, that still supports my point here. In my opinion, Miyamura is a lot more developed than Hori. He has his tragic backstory of being a loner, and having his secret piercings and tattoos and all that. A lot of the story ends up focusing on his side of things... despite the fact that Hori is the protagonist. The story follows her perspective for the most part, we learn things about Miyamura as she does, yet I feel like she's a bit dull. She has a uncommon home life and has to take care of her younger brother, that's her big bad secret? I get that it's kind of unexpected since she's the pretty, perfect, popular girl, but I still feel like it's a tad anticlimactic. It's hardly ever addressed beyond the first few episodes, too, and it just kind of exists as a fact within the story. Even beyond our main couple, it seems like the other female characters development and stories are all focused on the boy they're interested in (except for Sawada, but she's there for like a couple of episodes and then doesn't really show up all that much again... and her crush on Hori is handled really weird, I didn't exactly love it). Remi's entire character is pretty much centered around her boyfriend, and Sakura and Yuki are basically competing for Toru. Meanwhile, the guys have story beats themed around the girls they're interested in, but I feel like it's not as obsessive or dramatic as how the girls are depicted.

So, we're given these female characters, who are really watered-down and honestly kind of boring, and we're not super compelled to write about them. When we are given flat female characters, there's nothing to work with. It's more fun to use the characters who have had development and play around with the "what ifs" and our own personal headcannons. The characters who get this special treatment are primarily male. And while I commend a lot of shows for developing their male characters in such a way that doesn't exactly fit with society's idea of masculinity (ex: Reki's insecurities and depression, Yuuri's anxiety and femininity, Miyamura's isolation and depression), in the end these characters are still boys, men, males.

I also think mlm is so prominent because of both straight girls and queer people. For straight girls, it can often be fetishization (forgive my generalizing, I'm sure not all straight girls are like that, but an overwhelming amount definitely are). I think one of the best examples I can give for this is Phan. This is a bit different since it's not anime, but instead real people, but if anything that really drives home the point even more. The way Dan and Phil were (and probably still are) treated in the fandom internet space is disturbing, to say the least. Their audience, while much of it was queer, was also made up of an overwhelming amount of heterosexual girls who not only shipped them intensely, but also often sexualized them. And look, there's nothing inherently wrong with being a straight girl and writing smut, but it gets to a point where it can be kind of weird if its excessive. Like, if that's all the relationship is really about, and if the people you're writing about are real human beings, that's definitely overstepping. I will admit that I had a Wattpad and that I wrote Phanfic way back when, and this is something I'm not exactly proud of. Granted, I did not write anything explicit, it was still super weird, whether or not I was queer. And I'm not saying all the problematic aspects of the Phandom were because of straight girls, because what I contributed was arguably problematic, and I did not identify as straight at the time. At the same time, though, there were straight girls who wrote exclusively smut (or "lemons" as they might've been referred to at the time). There were those who analyzed every post, every bit of information they could find about these men on the internet. They obsessed over the fact that they occasionally shared clothes (which is fairly common for roomates of similar sizes to do), and gathered evidence to support the theory that they shared a bed. It was bad. It was invasive, and it got to the point where it wasn't about the people, it was about the fetishized fantasy these girls made up in their heads about these real, actual men.

Dan and Phil's online presence kind of disappeared for a few years... and I don't blame them.

Getting back on track, mlm is prominent for queer people because it's the LGBT representation they so desperately want to see actualized in media. If a show doesn't make their favorite queer ship canon (and they often don't), they'll do it themselves! That's what fanfic is for! I also know that queer people project onto these characters a lot, and that writing about them is almost like a form of therapy. They see these characters as queer, and they see themselves in these characters, so they write about these characters experiencing similar emotions to them. The thing is, the most compelling characters are male, so those are the characters they end up focusing on, even if the person in question is strictly sapphic. My best example is how I project onto Reki. Personally, I end up thinking of him as (and thus end up writing him as) having some internalized homophobia around being bisexual. That's literally what I am currently going through. I can't project this onto any of the female characters in Sk8, because I couldn't see them going through this experience because they're not developed enough to.

Despite all of this, I still enjoy all of the shows I mention a lot. I think it's just an interesting topic that I was thinking about. I'm not trying to bash anything that I used as an example, these were just my personal observations based off of what I know about these shows and their fandoms. I do, though, believe shipping real people isn't super cool, and I stand by that as someone who used to do it. I'm not going to stop you... I just think it's intrusive and inappropriate to pretend like you know enough about influencers to dictate who they should be involved with romantically. Their love life is, frankly, none of your damn business.

So, long story short, we should make anime (and popular media in general) less misogynistic.

(Also, please leave Dan and Phil alone, they deserve privacy)

[itsclydebitches]

I’m wlw. While, I’m not going to shame WLW members of the FNDM, bumblby pisses me off. V6 skipped development for both characters for the sake of “confirming” it, but I thought there scenes in V7 were cute. At first. Then it felt like RT dangling gay keys in front of my face. Now they’re attached to the hip while giving the het. ship (Renora) independence. Yang doesn’t care what Ruby thinks and only Blake was upset by her fall. What are your thoughts?

I’ve touched on their relationship quit a bit over the years, on and off, so I’ll try to summarize those big thoughts here: 

I like the ship. I’ve always liked the ship. I’ve never been a die-hard fan like some, but as soon as I entered the fandom and realized they were a thing I went, “Oh yeah, I can see that. I’m on board!” 

Which isn’t to say I’m always a fan of how people engage with them. It’s a fact that every major ship in any fandom is going to have its annoying, dramatic, and toxic elements. It’s also a fact that RWBY has developed a reputation for being particularly vitriolic. I think a lot of the hate towards Blake/Yang stems less from what we actually got in the canon and more from bad experiences from a small subset of fans. Not everyone. Not even the majority. But enough that casual fans, Blake/Sun fans, those who dislike the ship, etc. have reached a point where bmblb is a) so incredibly prominent and b) at times so heated that even a fellow shipper can grow frustrated at the state of the “RWBY” tag. This then bleeds into our reading of the canon material. After all, if you’re frustrated about seeing this pairing so often in fandom spaces and/or you’ve had a bad run-in with someone who ships them, seeing even more of them on Saturday will exacerbate those feelings. 

This is a frustration that’s increased as the show still refuses to make the relationship canon. Crafting scenes each week where something semi-romantic occurs, but isn’t enough to confirm a relationship (like the forehead touch) creates a branching number of annoyances, from “Oh my god how is this still not canon” to “Here’s another week of the whole fandom claiming it is canon.” Those “dangling gay keys” are a problem both for those desperate to see the relationship confirmed because they love it and those desperate to see the relationship confirmed so the characters can begin focusing on other aspects of their identities. “Attached at the hip” feels too close to queer baiting for comfort while simultaneously too narrow a depiction of Blake and Yang. Surely they have concerns and relationships outside of each other. 

I agree entirely that the relationship was rushed in some respects. However, there’s a post somewhere in the depths of my blog where I argue strongly that queer relationships should be allowed to be rushed, simply because so many het ships are too. I stand by that. I understand the frustration of moving from the two interacting primarily as teammates to suddenly holding hands, but that’s a gap that appears in many, many non-queer pairings. Jaune is a great example. Though we introduced Pyrrha’s interest in him from the get-go, he was running after Weiss for his whole time at Beacon, got a little closer to Pyrrha, she suddenly kissed him, and then... we’re meant to believe they were madly in love? His grief is certainly written in a way to imply as much. The cultural expectation of the guy losing the girl just fills in the rest, we didn’t actually see it on screen. So I both agree and disagree. I always want RWBY to be better written, but I also don’t want to hold our queer pairings to standards we don’t demand of the het ones. That way lies a lot of excuses for why it “can’t” ever happen. I’d rather have poorly written and rushed representation than no representation at all. 

Agree entirely about there being a problem with Yang’s fall. Blake’s reaction was fine. The lack of reaction from everyone else was not. As I said in my recap, you can’t prove their love by taking love away from these other relationships. Making Ruby seemingly care less about her sister will not convince me that Blake cares a great deal. Though this is a problem RT has across the whole cast, tying into that “attached at the hip”ness. Characters tend to have one (1) relationship and that’s it. RT really struggles to write a cohesive group, instead creating a collection of duos that happen to inhabit the same space. I can see places where they’ve been trying to correct that this volume  — Yang speaking to Ruby about Summer, Nora talking to the girls about Ren  — but moments like Blake’s talk with Ruby really struggle. In that, these characters haven’t spoken in seven seasons, so all Blake has to say is a generic, ‘I believe in you’ that comes across as stilted and unpersuasive  — we can see the writers trying to convince us that Ruby is The Best and that these girls have a relationship when they... don’t. And scenes like Yang’s fall show us that these underlying struggles are still at work. RT doesn’t know how to craft a scene where everyone reacts because Yang is a well-rounded person sporting a deep and unique relationship with three other teammates. They know how to craft a scene where the one (1) relationship takes centerstage and everyone else becomes cardboard cutouts. 

As for renora’s independence, I need to side with RWBY on this one. The entire point of this arc is that Nora realized she is also attached at the hip and wants to do something about it. That’s a good thing! Whether or not RT actually manages to write a relationship where they’re together without being entirely co-dependent remains to be seen, but splitting them in this last episode was a good start. Similarly, the show did separate Blake and Yang for the majority of this volume and now may have separated Yang from the group for a significant length of time. That’s not the same thing as the girls realizing they need space like Nora did... but then, they aren’t in an acknowledged relationship like Nora is. I don’t think it’s fair to compare them when Yang and Blake haven’t even reached the point where they’re talking about their relationship, let alone what that looks like going forward, and therein lies my real criticism. In order to see the depth RT is trying to give to renora, they have to actually make bmblb canon first. It all comes back to that. The question of queerbaiting, how they find healthy boundaries, how they compare to other relationships in the show... there’s no real groundwork to discuss any of that until we can say, 100%, that they are, in fact, a couple. 

[horsegirlimogentemult]

i’m having Thoughts about wlw in children’s cartoons in the past 10 years or so and how far things have come!!!!! it’s so nice to me!!!

thinking about a few months ago when the version of velma from mystery incorporated was revealed to be intended as a lesbian with her girlfriend marcie……and that was the best they could do in 2010-2013 and i respect that, you know? for that time that was the equivalent of screaming “they’re lesbians” from the rooftops

like that’s a world pre-bubbline, which singlehandedly made so much possible—the episode of adventure time that began the bubbline ship in an instant, what was missing, aired in september 2011. that was the BEGINNING. bubbline couldn’t become officially canon until the finale in 2018, and it took so much to get there

and don’t even get me started on how korrasami was a GAME-CHANGER. it was 2014 when the lok finale aired!!!! only 3 years after the start of bubbline. people seem to forget now that that was the biggest thing that had ever happened. they were the first wlw couple in a children’s show (that i'm aware of, anyway) that was allowed to be explicitly together romantically in the most obvious way the creators were able to show it. in 2014, that was unreal. and another thing that makes me really emotional is that korrasami could happen because of the existence of bubbline, and korrasami later helped bubbline make it to the end goal

and then! both bubbline and korrasami led to the possibility of steven universe (2013-2020) ramping the levels of gay up to, like, a thousand. i don’t think cishet people exist on that show. steven universe helped to normalize lgbt themes for cartoon network.

and again—adventure time was on a while. bubbline was a really slow burn with a long time between their episodes. the world changed a lot in that time. by the time 2018’s finale rolled around, the network allowed them to finally let bubblegum and marceline kiss on screen because of steven universe and korrasami, partially, plus the fact that ruby and sapphire had also kissed a few months earlier (july 2018, versus september 2018). correct me if i’m wrong but i think i remember that being the first animated/cartoon wlw kiss, or maybe specifically in a kids’ show?

and now we have she-ra (2018-2020) and how catradora is the Main Thing of the show. the main character is a lesbian and her happy ending is she gets to be with the girl she loves. the main lesbian couple is so intrinsic to the plot of the show, the heart of the show, that they could not be removed and it’s how the creator, a lesbian herself, was able to convince the network to do it. and that’s not even mentioning the married lesbian couple, or another lesbian who canonically had a crush on one of the other girls and then ended up with a different girl, there’s lots more lgbt characters in she-ra okay no one is cishet but i’m focusing on wlw here,

and now the one currently sweeping the internet and for good reason is lumity from the owl house (which just began in this year of 2020) where it’s season one and amity is very, very clearly shown to have a crush on luz and it’s honestly more obvious than some straight couples i’ve seen on tv. it’s allowed to be normal and natural and it’s so delightful

and all of these were possible because they were fought for tooth and nail, and they were all possible because of what came before it! and they’re all WONDERFUL!!! it is so, so incredible that we have each and every one of these in the world, and that they mean so much to people

and god i know we have SO much farther to go in lgbt rep but all of this was all in 10 years!!! less, really!!!! but today’s kids get to see all of these and have what we didn’t get to and isn’t that AMAZING!!!! i’m EMOTIONAL ABOUT GAY PEOPLE IN CHILDRENS CARTOONS