The formula was easy: take six to eight beautiful people, three or four boys (schemer, hunk, nerd, and ethnic minority), three or four girls (cheerleader, feminist, princess, and ethnic minority). Give all of the boys some tongue-lagging, eye-exploding girl-craziness, and all of the girls an obsession over boys. Give them three sets: high school hallway, locker room, and teen hangout. Add a clueless principal and an occasional parent, and voila! The scripts write themselves (or actually, they can be recycled from 40-year old episodes of The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis).
In spite of the dull repetitiveness of the plots, gay teens might find them worth a look.
1. The shirtless, swimsuit, and speedo shots were constant, and the muscles often spectacular. Even those teens who weren't man-mountains got their turn in the wrestling singlet.
Or found some other reason to take off their clothes.
These pairs often enjoyed emotional bonds much more intense than those of their knee-jerk heterosexual romances. Plots often involved threats to their relationships. For instance, on Breaker High, Alex and Max break up, and Jimmy jumps at the chance to befriend the hot jock. But then he realizes where his true affections lie and returns to Sean.
But at the same time, they constantly patroled the boundaries of their relationship, evoking and rejecting the possibility of homoromance in joke after joke, episode after episode. The studio audience usually responded with hysterical laughter: they knew exactly what was not being mentioned.
Beefcake, buddy-bonding, and borderline homophobia. What else could a gay teen want from a Saturday morning teencom?
Ryan How long seemed to be typecast for these "homophobic homoerotic" roles. Have you ever seen The Slaughter Rule? His relationship with Eddie Spears in that movie is similar. (Also, my theory of "instant pretense, just add Beethoven" is still true. I mean, I like this movie, but still...)
ReplyDelete