I Don't Think That Hearstopper Or Red White And Royal Blue Are Not Made For Queer People. It Is Just

i don't think that hearstopper or red white and royal blue are not made for queer people. it is just that they are about being queer rather than directly for queer people.

hearstopper, especially, is about teenage queer experiences (first love, coming out, discovering your identities...). while dead boy detectives plot doesn't revolve around the queerness of the characters, since its a detective show.

and rwrb is something else, even. I would say it represent an in-between: although important part of the plot focuses on alex's sexuality crisis, the subplot revolve around politics and international relationship.

rwrb represents the middle ground of the queer media venn diagram. It panders to straight people by offering a clear and distinct representation with some explanation of queer identities while having queer characters whose identities don't solely revolve around being queer.

i say that we need all of those kind of stories, some like hearstopper, some like dead boy detectives and some like red and white and royal blue, because they serve different purposes.

while stories like hearstopper help straight audiences or young queer people to understand queerness and its diversity and struggles, shows like dead boy detectives further humanizes LGBTQ+people by representing them in casual yet meaningful ways with all of the nuances that come with being queer.

as someone who is a huge fan of other queer content (like heartstopper and red, white and royal blue), dead boy detectives feels so incredibly different.

despite how much i love those two, they don’t feel like they’re made for queer people.

in a lot of ways, they feel like media made for cishet people about queer and trans people which is fine and doesn’t make it unenjoyable, but dbda has a totally different feel to it.

it feels like queer media made FOR queer people.

they have so much nuance to their characters and don’t shy away from it. charles openly flirts with both edwin and crystal despite the fact that he never says anything about his sexuality and edwin’s backstory doesn’t try to hide the horrifying way that queer people were treated historically and i think that’s really important.

though he is very clearly repressed, he is still unapologetically queer. he showcases his jealousy loudly and there is no doubt in the viewer’s mind that he is queer even for a moment.

same with monty and the cat king. they’re so vibrantly and boldly queer. monty begins flirting with edwin nearly the moment we see him and as does tck. what i really appreciate about tck is his gender nonconformity. i think that’s so important and i honestly really appreciate that they don’t even mention it.

with tck in particular, his actions can be considered rather predatory, but we never really feel like that’s due to his queerness which is FASCINATING because that is a really harmful stereotype of queer people, but it never feels like that’s what they’re going for or like they’re using it to demonize queerness.

with jenny, she says so casually that she’s attracted to women and it’s not even something that they have to discuss again. it’s such an unimportant aspect of her character, but it’s still so unabashedly there. i love that niko doesn’t even say anything about it when she learns, she just accepts her, no questions asked.

even with simon, he very clearly discusses his sexuality in E7 when he tells edwin that he liked him, but he never has to say the words. we just KNOW contextually because he talks around it. he i would argue that he is the only instance of a character discussing shame in their identity and it immediately results in one of the loveliest quotes in the show.

“if you punish yourself, everywhere becomes hell.”

he has spent over a century repressing himself and when he finally tells edwin, the boy he liked and treated terribly because of it, he is immediately told that it is not torture to be queer. he is immediately told that there is nothing wrong with his sexuality.

the confession scene btwn edwin and charles in E7 and the scene in E6 where edwin is TRYING to confess are so fucking important to me. nearly immediately, charles tells edwin that it doesn’t make any difference that he’s queer and that he accepts him. when he does confess, he doesn’t make him feel bad for it. he tells him that he loves him too, but that he can’t say he does in that way right now, but that he’s the most important person in his life and that that will never change.

the scene in E7 where they’re on the roof and edwin tries to apologize for potentially having made things awkward, charles shuts it down immediately. he says “it doesn’t.” and that’s the end of it.

this show exemplifies queerness through a queer light and it’s very clear who the intended audience is for dbda not to sound like i’m hating on the first two pieces of media (rwrb is literally one of my special interests, trust me, i adore them both), but maybe that’s why hs was given a third season and dbda was cancelled within five months of airing. i feel that these two pander to straight people in a lot of ways, but dbda doesn’t. it’s something that is incredibly important to me and i’m really happy about it.