#they are all roommates btw and they're all gay and trans

[orbitalbeetle]

can i offer you some horses in these trying times

[francesthecute]

It's the next morning and i'm still not sure what to do with this knowledge. i guess i'll give more context

So my dad would fall asleep watching TV a lot. I figured out when I was like 10 or 11 that I could also pretend to fall asleep across the room, keep one eye baaarely open and watch all the TV I wanted through the blurred view behind my eyelashes. I couldn't get up to change the channel and risk him waking up, so all this tv was whatever channel my dad last had on.

My Dad was asleep. Whatever we were watching ended and a new movie was starting. Idk if it was in another language but i remember none of the dialogue or story besides what i vaguely saw. I'm not sure i had ever even seen a thriller at that point. For the longest time i thought it must have been a weird indie french movie or something i'd never see again.

All i know is whatever i saw, i watched from start to finish and it left me with extremely confusing thoughts and only vivid memories of the ending. Mostly confusing thoughts.

If you haven't seen Bound btw, it's softcore butch/femme porn given a story arc in the back half. It's a 'male character goes insane like in The Shining with a twist character reveal' story structure told from the perspective of the gay sex. It's about two women who are lesbians first and women second. It's the breakout film of the Wachowskis. It's the cumulative repressed lesbianism of two future trans women and it's a wonder how it ever got made.

So i go half my life not knowing what it was i saw that night with only partial memories of the end of it, content to believe i'd never know.

Last night my roommate suggests we watch it, only describing it as a lesbian movie from the Wachowskis. I'm game. I'm baked out of my mind off a horribly painful hit from my roommates' DIY gravity bong. I'm watching gay sex. As it goes on, though, I start putting pieces together. About 2/3 of the way through I'm CONVINCED this is The Movie. I tell my roommate and they're skeptical bc I get very deja vu heavy when i'm as high as I am. Which is fair, I do. But I know a detail that will proof positive tell me it's the same movie. A key detail I never forgot. If at the end of the movie, the guy gets shot and falls back into a bunch of white paint and his blood mixes with the paint, it's the same movie. That visual has been with me for 15 years.

Spoilers for Bound but uh, that's exactly how it ends. The gay sex lesbian movie is the one my little child brain saw all that time ago. The mystery of half a lifetime now solved. Now I have to go back to society and be normal about it I guess.

I think Bound 1995 may literally be responsible for me being a lesbian

[galinophrum]

!!

ok so first thing you need to know is that Arlo is my little baby boy baby.

He's been friends with Nic (my other oc who i might talk about if you want 👀) since they were kids but back then he was a girl. When they were 8 they were playing in a park near Arlo's house and a humanoid creature tried to eat him and Nic killed it so save Arlo and they both got trauma from that. After that they stopped being friends for a variety of reasons but after a few years Arlo calls Nic again to warn him because he's being stalked by some weird creatures/things and he thinks they might go for Nic also. They learn that those creatures are faeries and that they really shouldn't have killed that faerie that tried to eat kid Arlo cause now they're pissed at them.

Arlo is trans and he has a pretty rough relationship with his parents cause of that. His mother completely shut him off after he came out to her and his father wasn't the most supportive at first. He was okay but after a while he got really weird about it and Arlo moved out. Now he lives in a shitty apartment with a shitty roommate and his puppy (he's called Anubis and he's a border collie australian shepherd mix)

But the thing is that Arlo is a half-blood fae. His father had some fun back in his youth with a pretty elf lady named Juno and she got pregnant but he was also dating Arlo's "mother" at the same time. When Juno gave birth, she gave Arlo to his father cause she had to many responsibilities to take care of him and Arlo's "mother" resents him and his dad for it. When Arlo learns that his mother isn't his mother, he has an existential crisis cause he really doesn't want to be a faerie. One tried to eat him as a kid. That's understandable.

He's your typical bad boy, y'know. He has a leather jacket and rides a motorcycle, all that. To quote that one post, he has that sadness in his eyes that you only see in Eastern European gay porn. I'm still debating whether or not he has tattoos but he probably does.

In the story, he's the chosen one but he really doesn't want to be. He eventually ends up dating Nic but it takes them a while to get together cause he's really not in touch with his own feelings. He's also really good friends with Cerys, the Autumn Court princess and at some point she had feelings for him, but he respectfully said no.

here's his face btw. credit

[bibastibootz]

amazing thoughts, 10/10!!!!!

I love what you wrote about Basti and his internalised homophobia!! it's so devastating, yet so fitting to his character. How he maybe recognises that he's attracted to men (after all, he does have a conventionally attractive "Jugendfreund", which is basically like saying, "btw they were each other's first love" (other interpretations would be boring and therefore invalid 😌)), but how he also likes women and thus thinks, "hmm I can't be gay because I like women, so I won't acknowledge how some men make my heart flutter because I am definitely 100% straight", like.... Basti, please let your kids explain the concept of bisexuality to you, I am begging!!!! your tag "its like my friend always choosing to play the male character in a game before realising they're trans" is so true for "Scherbenhaufen" (and I do feel called out). And like you said, he would be totally fine with kissing Thorsten when they're all alone, but holding hands in public with another man? He'd rather die, honestly. That is why I was so struck by him comforting Mathias Döbele's lover Yusuf Arslan in "Vergebung", because I cannot recall Basti comforting any other relatives of victims before, at least not this intimately. Why does he all of a sudden run his hand across the back of a man crying about losing his lover who he could only be with in secret? Does he mourn the loss of a life that could have been his?

This is also where the finale of "Die Nacht der Kommissare" comes in. Thorsten and Sebastian have extensively talked about their general feelings before (sometimes by screaming), but not their feelings for each other. That topic is taboo. But suddenly Thorsten confesses, "Sebastian? Ich liebe dich." and they BOTH avert their eyes and are silent for a moment - because it's not a joke, so they can't just laugh it off like, "haha, I love you too, man!", no! That confession was real, the first proper show of affection by using their words (on that note, where 👏 is 👏 the 👏 Thorsten/Basti 👏 hug?? 👏👏👏). And they are both uncomfortable and don't know what to say in that moment. What do they end up doing? They never talk about it, they avoid it completely. That is until the end of the episode when they're sitting on that bench and Sebastian says, "Ich liebe dich. Hab ich dir das heute schon gesagt?" By saying that, Sebastian desperately tries to make the love confession between Thorsten and him sound like all the other confessions Thorsten said to other men that night, which he clearly didn't mean seriously. Hence, this "Ich liebe dich." is played off as a joke because they are both not ready to accept that they love each other for real, unconditionally, mostly silently, and have done so for a long long time.

And concerning Thorsten, I think he has accepted that there might never be romance in his life again. Which is why he proposed the Alters WG with Sebastian, which, frankly, is a way of saying "I want to spend the rest of my life with you.", without requiring a ring on their finger. They can live together if they want to, on their own terms, however they want to define their relationship. History might then say they were roommates (oh my god they were roommates), and we all know what that means. 😌

Hello! First of all, I love your blog so much, you give off such warm, positive vibes :)

I wanted to ask if you would explain your head canons regarding Basti and Thorsten's sexualities a bit more? I've seen you refer to them as gay/bi respectively quite often and I would love to hear your reasonings and explanations behind that. (Not at all because I disagree, I'm just obsessed with the two of them and I think you'll have some very interesting takes on the topc!)

If you don't want to just ignore me :)

Hi! and thank you for this lovely ask, it put a really big smile on my face!! you're so kind! 😌 and OOHHHH do I have headcanons about Thorsten’s and Sebastian’s sexuality, I hope you’re ready!! 🔥 (I prefer making lists rather than writing articles, so I hope this still reads well enough)

schwuler Thorsten <3 It would be so easy to say that Thorsten is straight because he had a wife and a daughter back in Hamburg, but people who claim that aren't watching the show right. Here's why I think that a reading of him as a gay man is so so so so valid:

Susanne and Lilli: There are many ways to fit his late wife and daughter into this headcanon, so take your pick: He genuinely didn't know he was gay and started a family. He was in denial and started a family anyway. He was well aware of his homosexuality and maybe this was a mutual arrangement between him and Susanne. It was purely superficial.

(lack of) interest in women: Once Thorsten is in Stuttgart, he literally never shows any interest in any woman whatsoever (much to the dismay of his neighbour) and I do not remember him flirting with any woman ever. Also when asked about women, he literally answers, "Keine Ahnung, ich bin da kein Spezialist." A fortuneteller read his hand once and said: "Sie sind ein lebenslang Suchender. Besonders Frauen sind Ihnen ein ewiges Rätsel." and Thorsten replies, "Jetzt wird es vielleicht doch etwas zu persönlich." Hm. . . So Thorsten is sb who still hasn't found himself? And women are a mystery to him? Hm, gay. Also: Another relationship with a woman, much less so marriage, is so far off his radar that he proposed to Sebastian to start a "Alters WG".

often presumed gay: It is almost a running gag that people assume Thorsten is gay (except that the possibility of a gay Thorsten should not be the punchline). Julian Siebert in "Grabenkämpfe" assumes that Thorsten is gay. His boss while undercover in "Freigang" assumes that he's gay: "Bist du schwul oder warum sind hier keine Weiber?" Thorsten replies, "Schwul.", which the boss plays off as a joke.

casual, yet serious about queerness and other queer people: This is particularly striking in comparison to Sebastian because Thorsten seems so #woke about everything. He understands subtle and not so subtle nods and hints from other queer people but does not make a fuss about them and immediately recognizes queerness (as opposed to Sebastian): Once again "Grabenkämpfe," where Thorsten never jokes about Julian Siebert's obvious interest in him. Also in "Hart an der Grenze" Basti treats them playing a gay couple as a fun joke while Thorsten is very much not amused - and there is just sth in the way he treats the topic so seriously that makes it seem as if it real to him. In "Anne und der Tod" they interrogate clients and stand in front of an old man who has pictures of him and another man on his shelf and wall, and while Sebastian very innocently asks whether that's his brother or son, Thorsten's behavior suggests that he caught on instantly that the old man is in fact gay and that those are photos of him and his late partner.

actively against homophobia: When an old man makes a homophobic remark at him and Sebastian, he immediately grabs Sebastians hand to make that man uncomfortable and as a big fuck you and a way of saying, "Yeah people are queer, get over it, old man!!"

never denying, never clarifying: As much as men flirt with him or people assume he's gay, Thorsten never denies it and never clarifies that he is, in fact, heterosexual. Never! Best example is (once again) "Grabenkämpfe" when his neighbour spots Thorsten at a gay bar with another man and says that at least now she knows why he didn't have time for her - and Thorsten does not get defensive and screams sth like, "I'm not gay, I'm here for a case!", he just lets it slide. And remember when the Freigang boss derogatorily asked Thorsten whether he's gay but then later it seems that Thorsten had sex with a woman, to which the boss replies "Na egal, bin ja froh, dass du nicht schwul bist."? Thorsten once again does not outright say, "Genau, bin ich nicht." but instead replies, "Ich weiß." and looks sad and angry at this blatant portrayal of homophobia.

love confession: In "Die Nacht der Kommissare" Thorsten confesses his love to Sebastian while on drugs with a loud and clear "Sebastian? Ich liebe dich." He continues to confess his love to other men in that episode, but this "Ich liebe dich" feels very different, very sincere and from the heart. I like to read this scene as both a platonic and a romantic love confession.

There is probably so much more, but this is just from the top of my head. Moving on!

bi Basti <3 Sebastian is bi because it Just. Makes. Sense.!!!!!

the rise and fall of the Bootz family: I need to start with Julia and the kids because Sebastian is introduced as a happy, young family man who has basically achieved everything, both in his private life and career. His life as a husband and father is basically too perfect when we meet him, and of course it does crumble more and more into pieces with every new episode. We soon see tension in his and Julia's marriage, ultimately leading to their divorce and Sebastian's never-talked-about problem with alcohol and his separation anxiety. I encourage everyone to watch all the eps until "Spiel auf Zeit" as if Sebastian is falling out of love with Julia and in love with Thorsten (. . .is it possible to love two people at once? Good question, Sebastian).

Felix Klare supremacy: Even Felix Klare himself thought that Tatort was lacking diversity in terms of presentation of women and gay people back in 2013 and he advocated for becoming the first gay Tatort duo. Aber Richy wollte nicht. Tja.

bi in another universe: In "Tödliche Tarnung" we learn that Sebastian and Julia were once close to breaking up and Basti wonders how different his life could have been: "Julia, hast du dir schon mal überlegt, wie unser Leben verlaufen wäre, wenn, naja, wenn wir uns damals getrennt hätten?" Cue "Scherbenhaufen": When he is about to go undercover, he has to come up with a backstory for his character. And what does he do? Completely remove a wife and kids out of the picture and then says, "Ehrlich gesagt, ich hab sie dann mit meinem besten Freund betrogen." Kinda bi to make up a scenario in which he gets to be with Thorsten instead of Julia, if you ask me. And he looks so happy about it, too.

weird about queerness: Sebastian has always been weird about political correctness, and to me this reads as a defense mechanism, as a way to distance himself from queerness and treat it as sth "not concerning me". And yes, I do headcanon Basti as having serious internalized homophobia, why do you ask? I have yet to form proper thoughts about Basti's uncharacteristic compassion towards the gay man who has just lost his lover in "Vergebung", it feels so personally affected. What we can nevertheless witness, though, is some personal growth in that Sebastian is more comfortable with and knowledgable about queerness.

heteronormative worldview / hetcomp: Sebastian literally doesn't know that bisexuality exists. When he hears of married men (yes, there have been three such storylines. . . THREE!!!!) who had a secret lover on the side, he always assumes they were gay and never once considers bisexuality. Looping back to the Bootz marriage&divorce as well as the countless "secretly gay married men" trope, Basti is literally describing his life in "Vergebung" without acknowledging the parallels.

flirting with Thorsten: Of course, any straight man can flirt with his friends, but the way Sebastian does it is so "haha just joking!!! . . . unless 👀"-coded. First the pretend gay couple at the adoption agency, then another pretend gay couple in the waiting room, then the queer undercover persona plot twist. And look how flustered he gets when he gets flirted with.

honorable mentions: bi lighting, bi sitting, bi bi bi music.

Again, there is most definitely more and everyone is free to add on to my thoughts! 😌✌️

bonus: Are Thorsten and Sebastian in love? 👀 Yes, and as of February 2024 there are 32 episodes to prove it. Thank you for reading! 🫶