28 May 2009
In A House Without A Soul
I'm back from a lifetime away. If you haven't read my tribute blog for The L Word, give it a whirl, please.
So what's been happening with LGBT TV in the last fortnight.
The second season of Ashes To Ashes is nearing it's end and while the first season had a nice subplot with gay gangsters and rent boys, this season had a hardened former criminal called George Staines transform himself into a woman called Gaynor Mason, a woman that Ray notably seemed attracted to. As a seemingly militant homophobe some episodes this season have almost suggested that Ray doth protest too much regarding his heterosexuality. Even Chris duly noted his lack of girlfriends while Alex even called him repressed in a letter she wrote him. Could it be that Ray might be gay? Possibly but given how blatantly sexist, racist and homophobic the character is, it's probably those traits that would prevent any woman from committing to a long term relationship with him.
When it comes to television writers, Joss Whedon is one of the few that I have a lot of confidence in. He's probably done greater service to women on TV with Buffy the Vampire Slayer than the likes of Sex And The City and Desperate Housewives will ever really achieve. So why does his new series Dollhouse feel like a massive retrograde? Since it's debut on the Sci-Fi channel last week, it's ignited a serious amount of debate and given that the titular organisation draws justifiable comparisons to the likes of trafficking, slavery and prostitution, it's hard to imagine how this could possibly be female enhancing at all. With a second season confirmed, there's a chance Whedon might draw on some LGBT topics but it's almost unlikely that we'd ever get something as wonderful as Willow and Tara.
Tonight's episode of Brothers And Sisters on More4 might be one of the series most sex obsessed episodes to boot because if characters aren't having sex, they're thinking about it as well in the more than usual kind of way. It's a big episode for Kevin and Scotty when the former's soap star ex-lover Chad (still played Jason Lewis) comes back to town. A threesome gets proposed, which for network television is a little daring but will Kevin and Scotty experiment with an open relationship or retain their monogamy? Either way, anything's better than Ryan and his whacky obsession with Nora or anything involving Holly, right?
- Many stars have come out in protest against Prop 8. Nice to have the celebrity support.
- I've read rumours that Heroes fourth season may introduce a gay character. Why not just out one of the characters that's always been there?
- Howard Ebison was the latest candidate to get the boot from The Apprentice. Well, they do say that nice guys finish last apparently.
- Former L Word actress Katherine Moening has been cast in an upcoming medical drama called Three Rivers, because apparently we don't have enough of them on TV at the moment.
- Tonight is the last ever episode of ER on More4 at 9pm after a retrospective of the series at 8pm. Fans of Kerry Weaver may wanna watch this.
- Rumours are flying around that a Buffy movie sans the original cast or Joss Whedon could be coming to a cinema near you. Naturally this has caused a lot of Whedonites to go apeshit over the idea.