Isle of Men: 12 Manx men with tree-trunk calars. Plus bondage, archaeology, boggarts, fun runs, and a gay god

Link to the n*de dudes

The Isle of Man, between Ireland and Britain, is  named after Manawyddan, the God of the Sea and one of the queer icons of my childhood.  But Manx word for man is mannin, so there could be some connection to the masculine, too.

1. The Manx word for p*nis  is cronny, but that sounds silly to non-Celtic ears, so I'm going to use the Welsh word, calar

Like several other Celtic languages, Manx became extinct in the 18th century, but it's currently enjoying a revival.   There are prizes for the best Manx essay, schools offer elementary instruction in Manx, and 3-6% of the population uses it for everyday conversations.

2. A Manx speaker.

3. A rather thin Manx twink, but I'm including him because of his tree trunk.

The Isle of Man is known for its archaeological sites: the biggest neolithic tomb in the British Isles, early Christian monasteries, the Viking-era Peel Castle.

And for its paranormal activity: trolls, goblins, boggarts, banshees, and tusk-men roam the downs.  There are mysterious disappearances, time-jumps, alien abductions, haunted castles, and lots of neopagans finding meaning in the paranormal energy.

More after the break

Manawyddan Son of the Boundless: a gay Theosophist writes about two boys in love

 

Around fifth or sixth grade, I found a book in the Denkmann Elementary School Library, Hero Tales from Many Lands: short vignettes from the lives of Beowulf, Achilles from the Iliad, Sigurd from the Volsunga Saga,  Rustem from the Shah Nameh, and many others. 

Most were unreadable due to the old-fashioned writing style or silly subject matter  -- "How Cuchulain wooed his wife"?  Why not tell about his heroic deeds? 

But "Manawyddan, Son of the Boundless," from the Welsh  Mabinogion,  brought that moment of ecstatic joy that I knew from Rich and Sean in The Secret of Boyne Castle

Barnabas Collins and Willie Loomis on Dark Shadows

Ray and Cho in Operation Time Search

 Chekov and Sulu on Star Trek

It was about two boys together:

The gods are thinking of raising Pwyll Prince of Dyfed to godhood, but first they give him some trials to see if he's worthy.  They remove his memories -- he will be called Dienw, Nameless -- and send him out into the wilderness.  

After wandering for years, hungry, tired, and "knowing all sorrow," Dienw stumbles upon "a youth of great beauty" harping a song so beautiful that the animals stop to listen. He introduces himself as Goreu fab Ser, Son of the Stars.

When I was ten years old, this was the  most beautiful picture I had ever seen.

They travel from Ireland to Wales together.  

When they are crossing the Menai Strait, between Anglesey Island and mainland Wales, their coracle capsizes, and Goreu can't swim!  Dienw drags him kicking and struggling to the shore, and then, overcome by exhaustion, dies.  

Goreu carries him to to Mount Wyddfa (Mount Snowden, the highest mountain in Wales), where the gods live, and immerses him in the Cauldron of Life, Pair Dadeni.  

Dienw awakens to "one of immortal beauty, whose forehead shone like the Morning Star. " Goreu, revealed to be the God Gwydion ap Don, hugs him and says that his new name is Manawyddan, son of the Boundless.

Same-sex love not only exists, it carries with it a spark of the Divine!  

In junior high my friend Darry and I started writing a fantasy novel that, we claimed, was absolutely not imitating Tolkien.  I borrowed the Cauldron of Life and the last scene, where Jim awakens and Rai greets him with a hug, directly from the story.  

And I wanted to know more.  What happened next? Did Manawyddan and Gwydion ap Don rule together?  Did they have more adventures?  

More adventures after the break

Gemstones Episode 2.4: BJ gets baptized, Baby Billy gets Funyons, and there's incest, cake, and frolicking muscle boys

  

Link to the n*de dudes.

This is my favorite of the season. Although we continue with Eli and Kelvin's intertwining darkness, we add two more or less lighthearted plotlines, starring Judy/BJ and new characters Baby Billy/Tiffany.  They are all tied together by the question of eros/phileo: how can we reconcile the erotic desire that leads to permanent romantic partnerships with the love of family and friends?

A Boy and His Cat: Flashback: Charlotte, North Carolina 1993.  Going in fresh, pretending to have never seen Season 1, we are introduced to new characters, the grinning, fast-talking Baby Billy, his wife Gloria, and their special-needs son Harmon, in the mall at Christmastime,  Later we will discover that Baby Billy is a ne-er-do-well, constantly coming up with sleazy scams and get-rich quick schemes.  He and his sister Aimee-Leigh were child stars before she went on to a career as a serious gospel singer and married Eli Gemstone.  Baby Billy never forgave her for "abandoning" him.

  

After Harmon gets a photo on Santa's lap, Gloria goes off to shop, leaving father and son alone. Baby Billy offers to let Harmon choose any Christmas present he wants.  He chooses a cat. Then Baby Billy says that he's going off to buy Funyons, onion-flavored snack rings (this will become important later).  Instead he runs away, abandoning his family! 

Remember the Lissons?: We cut to Jesse and Amber hanging out with the Lissons -- the megachurch pastors  planning a Christian resort  -- and discussing how close their friendship has become.  Jesse breaks the news that they can't get their Daddy to fork over the money to invest.  He's asked multiple times, but Eli refuses to budge.

Lyle is aghast. The Gemstones are worth over $600 million; surely Jesse can afford $10 million on his own?   Nope, it's all Daddy's money.  Jesse will control it someday, of course, but not until Eli dies.  

The Lissons are irate, lambast Jesse and Amber for being poor, and break off the friendship.  I think they just liked you for your money, guys.

The Judean Desert:  Kelvin and Keefe figure that they can restore the confidence of the God Squad with a 40-day field trip in the Judean desert.   They walk across the Gemstone airfield, Kelvin in a military coat with a leopard-spotted beret, and Keefe in an oddly feminine black robe, with his backpack in front.  

Notice the Ace of Spades on Kelvin's coat. Some fans think that he is subtly coming out as asexual,  Actually, it was used by British regiments in World War 1and II, and by American soldiers during the Vietnam War, symbolizing luck, victory, or death.  

But the Ace of Spades is the most powerful card in the deck, so Kelvin probably chose it to signify that he is the most powerful man in the group, the Alpha.

Uh-oh, Martin, Eli's chief accountant and right-hand man,  intercepts  them. Eli has refused to pay for the trip.  Do you see a parallel between Kelvin/Keefe and Jesse/Amber's problems?  

Kelvin bats his eyes, touches Martin's chest, and begs: "You got here too late.  We already took off. Please?"    Wait -- are you flirting with Martin?  Homoerotic hotness doesn't work on everyone, dude.

And it doesn't work: Martin lays down the law  Kelvin is forced to break the news that his father said no, thus losing even more of his authority with the God Squad musclemen.

I Know What a Tomater Is:  In the Gemstone Parking Garage, Eli finds a tomato smooshed on his windshield.  The Tan  Man (James Preston Rogers) appears and says, threateningly, "Get the message?"  

Eli pretends that he isn't sure -- maybe something to do with a broken heart?  The Tan Man growls, howls, flexes and clarifies: "you hurt my boss's feelings real bad, and he's not the kind of guy who likes to have hurt feelings."  So, what kind of guys enjoy having hurt feelings?  "He wants an apology."  

Having confronted far more formidable foes, Eli is not impressed by the Tan Man's theatrics.  He sends a message for Junior:"tell him to go f*ck hisself."  

BJ's Baptism:   As people file into the Baptismal Chapel, Baby Billy from the 1993 flashback, now with white hair and a whiter grin, performs "There is a fountain filled with blood" while his new wife, the young, very pregnant Tiffany, looks on.  So Baby Billy has solved the eros/phileo problem by abandoning his family altogether.  But be careful: that baby is going to make you a Family Man.

Outside, Kelvin argues that he cleared the whole God Squad to attend the baptism!  Nope, only he and a "plus one" are on the guest list.  The God Squad guys start murmuring again. Another blow to his authority! 

Kelvin promises to feed them all -- he asks his date, Keefe, to steal some food, resulting in humorous but ridiculous bits.  Do you really want to eat a shrimp that's been transported from the hors d'oeuvres table in Keefe's mouth?  Why not just go out for hamburgers?

Baby Billy begins the service, bragging that he's on the Christian Pop Charts now, and misnaming BJ as TJ.  He must not be very close to the Gemstone family, either.   Hey, the seat next to Kelvin is empty. Why isn't he sitting with his date?  Is Keefe already raiding the caterers for the after-party?

Next Judy sings: "When a man outgrows the family of his origin, and they've no place in his life./ Cause he's different now -- he's got to show them how."  

Wow, we're really zeroing in on the eros/phileo problem. Judy favors abandoning the family, too. She was originally going to sing "Rock my Boy's Body," emphasizing the erotic nature of her relationship with BJ (it was moved to the episode finale).

People stop to ask me, "How do you please your man?"
Take it from the black sheep baby, every way I can
Sometimes it's with fire, and sometimes with ice
Just don't get it twisted, this body's gonna pay the price

Eli takes over and completes the baptism.  Judy introduces him as "BJ Christian Barnes."  

More after the break

"Weapons": Mysterious disappearances, a positive gay couple, a scary clown lady, a femme boy, and a lot of n*de dudes. What's not to like?

Link to the n*de photos

Weapons (2025), on MAX: in the stereotypic small town of Maybrook, Pennsylvania, 17 of the 18 children in a third grade class disappear from their beds at exactly 2:17 am.  Security cams show them sneaking out of their houses and running into the woods, with their arms out like they're pretending to fly.  

I thought this was going to be a mysterious disappearance with no solution movie, like Picnic at Hanging Rock, but there is a solution: we find out what happened to the kids at the end.  Before that, we see the effects of the tragedy on five people:

Justine

The teacher, Justine (Julia Garner), and the surviving kid, Alex (Cary Christopher), are interrogated, and their houses searched, with no clues.  They had no idea that it -- whatever it was -- was going to happen.

A month later, still with no clues, Justine speaks to the parents at a memorial assembly.  She swears that she  doesn't know what happened, but they don't believe her. "You did something to our kids!" the parents yell.

It doesn't help that she's an alcoholic who picks up booze every day on the way home, she picks up strange men in bars (well, to be fair, I do that, too), and she was fired from her last job for inappropriate behavior with a child.  Principal Marcus (Benedict Wong) decides that it would be best for her to take a leave of absence.

One of her hookups is the Cop Paul (Alden Ehrenreich), who is trying to get clean and sober and stop cheating on his wife, but she gets him drunk and takes him home (no beefcake).

The principal has forbidden her from contacting the traumatized surviving kid, but she starts staking out his house.  Weird -- the windows are covered with newspaper, and when she snoops inside, she sees his parents sitting on the couch, motionless, like zombies,  Alex yells for her to go away, but she continues the stake out.  She falls asleep in her car, and a lady in scary clown makeup bursts in and cuts off a lock of her hair.

Archer

Construction worker Archer (Josh Brolin, left, backside on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends) is sleeping in his missing kid's room and mourning their loss (I thought it was a girl due to their long hair and femme features, but it turns out to be a boy, Matthew).  His wife insists that he go to work, so he heads to the house he's building.  The construction crew is having problems: no sodding, and the door is painted the wrong color, darn it!  One expects him to start yelling, but he quietly puts the red paint in the back of his truck to exchange later.

Next stop, the police station, where the Chief says they have no more leads, so stop coming in every day.  

He checks the security cam footage of his child leaving, and notices that he's moving in the direction of the radio tower.  Maybe it sent a signal?  He asks the other parents for security cam footage of their kids, but doesn't get very far.

Then he sees Justine at the gas station/liquor store, and decides to ask her some questions.  But while they are talking, Principal Marcus comes rushing up, his arms spread as if he is flying, his eyes all white, and attacks her!  Archer tries to help, but the guy is incoherent, like a zombie.

Paul

Cop Paul happens to be the son-in-law of the Police Chief (Toby Huss) -- and he didn't get the job because of his qualifications.  They discuss how his wife is coming back early from her trip, and then he goes to work.

The long-haired, scuzzy-looking James is jaywalking -- better stop him!  He runs, so Cop Paul gives chase.  He finally catches the guy, handcuffs him, and starts searching his pockets -- uh-oh, a needle prick!  He's so outraged that he pummels James-- with the dashcam recording everything. 

When James regains consciousness, Paul lets him go -- but don't come anywhere near the police station, or report the assault, or you're dead!  

Back at the station, Paul asks his Police Chief father-in-law what to do.  He suggests getting checked for HIV, and forgetting about the video.  In 30 days it will vanish, so as long as James doesn't report, he's clear. 

James

Crack addict James (Austin Abrams. top photo, the one with the curly hair) calls everyone he can think of to beg for money, but they've all had enough.  He steals some things to pawn, but the pawn broker won't give him enough.  He breaks into Survivor Alex's house, and finds his parents, sitting like zombies.  Thinking "they must be high," he tries the basement, and finds the missing kids, standing still, lifeless, like zombies. 

There's a $50,000 reward for finding them!  He calls the police and asks about the reward, but they want him to come to the police station.

As he approaches, Paul sees him, gives chase, and attacks.  "But I know where the kids are!" he exclaims.

Paul drives him to the house, and leaves him locked in the police car while he goes inside.  Hours later, he returns, his movements shaky, his eyes white, and drags James in with him.

More after the break. 

Jamie Mayers: Absurdly hot Short Guy, LARPer, ghost, with a trans mom, a gay dad, a BFA, and a boyfriend. And maybe a d*ck

Link to the n*de photos

We've been watching the American version of Ghosts (2021-26), about a disparate group of ghosts who are trapped between worlds in a bed-and-breakfast in upstate New York.  I'm not happy with the way they approach the Revolutionary War soldier Isaac being gay.  At least in Season 1, he'll say that a man is attractive, and the other ghosts will stare, mystified, as if same-sex desire cannot possibly exist.

But I like the buddy-bonding and the beefcake. 

In Episode 1.7 (2021),  Samantha, who can see ghosts because she was dead for a few minutes, encounters early 20th century newsboy Winky.  He was only 12 years old when he died, but the actor is obviously an adult --- 21 year old Jamie Mayers, now 25, and at 5'3", an outstanding member of the Short Guy Brigade who deserves a profile.

Well, he's also absurdly hot,  and gay in real life.  But mostly because he's 5'3". 

Jamie has several well-stocked social media pages, plus Linkedin and a professional website, so we can piece together a biography:

He was born in Montreal in 1999, and began acting in 2010, with some shorts, commercials, and Lies My Father Taught Me at Theatre Calgary: a Jewish boy's bittersweet memories of 1920s Montreal.

In 2012, Jamie played the son of gay-vague werewolf Ray (Andreas Apergis, left) in an episode of Being Human, about ghost, vampire, and werewolf roommates.

And he voiced the young Connor in the Assassin's Creed III video game.  He returned in 2017 to voice Pharaoh Ptolemey in Assassin's Creed: Origins.

Teencoms followed: the bratty little brother of Live Action Role Playing Gamer Brittany in seven episodes of LARPERS (2014-15)

The gay-vague best friend of a teenage boy whose life is narrated by sportscaster-like beings in Game On (2016-17).

And a drama: Four episodes of This Life (2015-16), about a woman dying of cancer while her teenage sons have soap opera problems.

But his most famous role is in Venus (2017):  Indo-Canadian trans woman Sid (Debargo Sanyal) is just starting to transition, when a teenage boy shows up on her doorstep, a son from a high school girlfriend.  He's fine with having a trans mom, but what about her conservative Indian parents?   She also finds the time to fall in love with Pierre-Yves Cardinal (n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends).

In high school Jamie spent several summers at Stagedoor Manor, a performance camp for youth in Loch Sheldrake, New York, playing:

Otto in Grand Hotel: a dying bookkeeper who wants to spend his last moments in luxury.  He gets a girlfriend. (Played by Daniel Evans, n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends).

Tobias in Sweeney Todd: the mentally challenged assistant to the murderous barber.  Played by Neil Patrick Harris on Broadway.

Jamie graduated from high school in 2017, and spent his gap year in London, where he performed in two plays with the St. George's Players, Avenue Q and Into the Woods.

Life after high school after the break

Golden Cities, Far: In junior high, we write a heroic fantasy novel with absolutely no connection to "The Lord of the Rings"

I discovered The Hobbit in sixth grade, The Lord of the Rings in junior high, and thought it the best thing ever written. Heroic fantasy!  Elves, dwarfs, and wizards fighting the Dark Lord in an alternate Medieval world!  Infinitely superior to sword and sorcery (about mighty-thewed barbarian heroes in an ancient world), and to those dreary naturalistic novels about high school basketball stars that teachers were always pushing at us.  Even better than science fiction.

Around eighth or ninth grade, my friend Darry and I started working on our own alternate Medieval world -- if we couldn't find a "good place" in our world, why not make one of our own?   

We developed a gazetteer-full of new countries, wrote historical timelines spanning thousands of years, compiled detailed genealogical charts, and invented a dozen languages of Elves, Dwarves, and Men (well, some words in each). We got ideas from fantasy novels, myths, folklore, the histories of obscure countries, and anything else we could get our hands on:

The country of Runoe after forgetting the name of Runde Island in My Village in Norway.

The forest-dwelling Colemonas of Jotunheimr after the Norse giants and Coleman camping equipment. 

The Dark Lord, Moi, after a book in the junior high library, In Search of Moi (we hadn't studied French yet, so we pronounced it Moh-ye)

We worked every day at lunchtime and after school, on Saturday and Sunday afternoons, during holidays.

Fantasy worlds must be used as the setting for novels, so by eighth grade we were working on a plot about a Midwestern teenager named Jim swept away through a time-space warp to the world of Toulbium, where he gathered companions to fight the Dark Lord Moi.

Everyone we told about the story screamed “You’re plagiarizing The Lord of the Rings!”

 But we patiently pointed out that:

1.  Jim is rescued by Ray when he enters the world of Toulbium.  Frodo and Sam  Frodo and Sam already know each other.

2. Jim and Ray travel west to Montenia, not east to Mordor.

3. There are Eluses instead of Elves.  

4. Jim is black.  There aren't any black characters in Tolkien.

5.  Montenia is surrounded by dark forests, whereas Mordor is bounded by mountains.

6. Instead of throwing the One Ring into Mount Doom, Jim throws a magic sword into Pair Daedeni, the Cauldron of Life.

7. Jim becomes a born-again Christian. (I was Nazarene, remember?)

Every Saturday we took the bus downtown to Readmore Book World to spend our allowance on heroic fantasy novels for research.  They were part of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series, bright, shining paperbacks with evocative titles: The King of Elfland's Daughter, The Broken Sword, The Wood Beyond the World, Beyond the Golden Stair, Golden Cities Far.

But there were some problems:  

More after the break

"After the Hunt": Pretentious philosophy professors have problems, with some p*nises and Will Price

Link to the n*de dudes

After the Hunt (2025), on Amazon Prime: A college professor with a dark secret. I'm in academe, and I love movies set in The Halls of Ivy.  Plus it stars Will Price, who I've had a crush on since I saw his gay-subtext role in The Chair Company.   I'm in, even with the two minutes of commercials that Amazon Prime makes you watch before the movie (in addition to the $100 per year fee).

Scene 1: Maggie, a middle-aged black woman, stares forlornly at some African art that shows a man and a woman getting it on. Actually, she's bored stiff at a faculty party while icy cool, incredibly pretentious Alma (Julia Roberts), is lecturing on how there are no universal standards of morality.   Uh-oh, she's going to be a murderer.

Horndog Hank (Andrew Garfield), who is sprawled across the couch with his legs spread, grabs Maggie and says that her dissertation on performative dissent will be the best thing ever written, sure to become a classic in philosophy. But she's only given them a few passages.  "You're too tight.  You need to loosen up."   

This shocks Arthur (Will Price) so much that he drops his drink.

"So, when are you going to defend?" Maggie's elderly mentor (Michael Stuhlberg) asks.  (Defense is where your committee asks biting, unnerving questions about your dissertation and then decides whether to grant your Ph.D. or send you home with four to six years wasted).

"I haven't decided yet."

He chides her for having self-doubts.  This dissertation will make her name as the greatest philosopher of our generation, so why wait?

Hey, Michael Stuhlberg played a 26-year old grad student in Call Me by Your Name (2017). Eight years later, he's playing a guy in his 70s?

Correction: Google said that this was a picture of Michael Stuhlberg, but it's actually Armie Hammer.  Stuhlberg played his boyfriend's dad.

Maggie has to use the restroom. Incredibly Pretentious Alma says: "Don't use the usual one -- Frederick has a project in there. Use the guest bath at the end of the hall."  I'm guessing that Frederick is her son.

Scene 2: Maggie drifts folornly down the long, scary hallway, finds the bathroom, and slowly shuts the door.  Whoa, horror movie tropes.  Something sinister is waiting for her in there!

Back at the party, Alma and Horndog Hank are grabbing and fondling each other.  Apparently they're married, and going up for tenure at the same time. 

Elderly Mentor tries to talk them out of it:  "I don't want to be a contrarian, but sometimes a wish fulfilled can be more baffling than the longing."

Alma disagrees: "It's not some egoitic teleological pursuit, it's a threshhold."  Professors don't talk like that.

"If you get tenure and I don't, I'll be rageful," Horndog Hank jokes while grabbing and fondling her.  "Well, if you get it, and I don't, I'll be furious."

I'm expecting a scream, as Maggie is eaten by a monster. Or maybe she has offed herself, and the maid discovers her body. Nope, no scream. 

 The problem: No toilet paper.  Looking for some, Maggie finds an envelope taped above the cleaning supplies.  Inside, a handkechief, a photograph, a letter, and a newspaper article.  But someone is coming, so she pockets some and puts the rest back. 

More after the break

Ferdia Shaw: From a Disney Channel flop to Chekhov, best friends with an Elf, Gaiety Grad. With his Kilkenny c*ck and a Dwarf backside

 

Link to the n*de photos

No offense to aficionados, but I have never been able to get into Irish literature. It's either vaguely disturbing or incomprehensible.

Ulysses: "Mr Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls... which gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine"

Dude is into water sports?

"The Isle of Innisfree": "I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, and a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made."

Or you could use bricks. 

The Unamable: A novel consisting of the ruminations of a featureless entity living (if you can call it that) in a jar. 

Nuff said

Artemis Fowl: The first of an 11-volume series of young adult novels about a teenage richter, a villain who eventually reforms, in a world where goblins run organized crime syndicates and fairies have a police force.

It sounds interesting, but it put me to sleep.

In 2020, a movie version appeared, starring Ferdia Shaw as 12-year old Artemis, Tamara Smart as his girlfriend, Colin Farrell as his kidnapped Dad, Laura McDonnell as an 800-year old Elf cop, and Josh Gad (below) as a Dwarf giant who joins the Fellowship of the...um...

The plot had little connection to the book series, which enraged fans, and it was too convoluted to draw in new viewers.  It got an 8% on Rotten Tomatoes.  Critics called it a "confused, muddled, sloppy mess of bad intentions and worse execution."  

Disney expected a theatrical hit that would lead to a long-running franchise.  Instead, Artemis Fowl was plopped onto the streaming service Disney Plus, and after a few years quietly removed.  

Ferdia Shaw, who beat out 1200 hopefuls for the chance to play Artemis and become a Disney star, was born in Dublin in 2004, but grew up in Kilkenny.   Although he comes from a show biz family (grandson of famous actors Robert Shaw and Mary Ure, nephew of Ian Shaw, some sort of relation to "angry young man" John Osborne), he has only two other acting credits listed on the IMDB:

Poster Boys (2020): Petty thief Al (Trevor O'Connell) and his smart-aleck nephew (Ryan Minogue-Lee) go on a cross-country road trip. Ferdia plays a hooligan.

 Wellness (2025): a group of wellness influences attend a team-building exercise in the wilderness that goes terribly wrong. He plays minor character Duine Aisteach.

 More after the break

Owen Vaccaro: Marky Mark's son wins three Girls of His Dreams, posts girl-hugging photos, but is he gay? With Marky bottom and twink d*cks

Link to the n*de dudes

In the short Silver Fox (2024), not to be confused with the 2017, 2018, 2023, and upcoming movies with the same name, famous gay comedian Joe Fox (writer/director Julio Vincent Gambuto) returns to his home town for a show, and in his dressing room, announces that he's going to do it in drag.  His oldster friends, Nick and Brian (Dan Butler of Frasier, Alec Mapa of Ugly Betty), disapprove: the audience is coming for gay jokes, not a political statement.  

But his twink assistants, Chris and Rocco (Logan Rozos, Owen Vaccaro), think that the idea is fabulous.

The conversation moves from outfits to gay assimilation, straightwashing, the younger generation's debt to the gay people who came out during the homophobic 1980s and 1990s, their debt to the Civil Rights Movement, how gay stereotypes have changed over the years,  how we should handle the newly revived homophobia and transphobia of the fascist state...

Wait -- Owen Vaccaro?

Could there be another one?

If you see every movie that Mark Wahlberg is in, because he's friggin' Marky Mark, then you've seen Daddy's Home (2015): Mild-mannered Brad (Will Ferrell) is trying to be a good father to his wife's kids.  When their biological father Dusty (Mark) shows up, he assumes that the guy is a jerk because he's muscular and rides a motorcycle.  The two try to one-up each other in being The Good Dad.    Eventually they decide to co-parent.  

It was not a great movie. But Marky Mark took his shirt off...

And Will Ferrell's not bad, either.

10-year old Atlanta-based actor Owen Wilder Vaccaro played their son Dylan.  He displays the interest in basketball and girls that characterizes all preteen boys in Hollywood movies. 

I didn't see the sequel, Daddy's Home 2 (2017), regardless of the possibility of Marky Mark with his shirt off, but I just went through it on fast-forward. The dads' Dads show up for Christmas, and try to one-up each other in similar situations.  12-year old Dylan gets "the talk," tries to impress the Girl of His Dreams, and finally kisses her.   

The only queer-coded moment comes when various girls line up to kiss him under the mistletoe, and a boy is #8 in line (maybe Colton Osorio).  It's a throwaway gag: a boy wants to kiss a boy?  How ridiculous!

Owen's next film, The House with a Clock in its Walls (2018), is a fantasy based on the 1973 novel by John Bellairs: an orphaned boy (Owen) goes to live with his uncle (Jack Black) in a mysterious old house, fights an evil sorcerer, and gets a girlfriend. Annoyingly heterosexist.

There are two posts with gay content in Owen's social media.  In May 2018, he poses with pride merchandise and says "Hooray for Target! Love wins!" (This was before the department store chain gave in to the Orange Goblin and removed LGBT people from its website and its shelves).  

And in December 2018, he is shown hugging a girl named Carly.  His shirt depicts an astronaut with a pride flag on his visor.  Comments mostly assumed that they were a romantic couple, but one said "I think it's a platonic friendship."

But there's nothing of gay interest in his movie roles:

More after the break

Joe Mande: The incredibly gorgeous Ben of "Modern Family" writes for tv shows that I don't like, shows his d*ck but not his chest

 Link to the n*de photos

Ben (Joe Mande) is introduced in Modern Family Episode 6.17 (2015) as the shy, beset-upon marketing manager at Pritchet's Closets and Blinds, where Jay's daughter Claire has just taken over as boss.  He returns in four episodes of Season 7, mostly to be the butt of jokes.  Lives with his mother?  Owns a cat?  What a loser!  

Claire holds the "little suck up from marketing" in utter contempt, but keeps him around because he will do anything she asks, such as performing "mom" duties so she can pretend to have the perfect work/life balance.

Jay's wife Gloria thinks so little of him that she can never remember his name, although she knows everyone else who works at the company, even the guys in the warehouse.  

 

In Episode 8.12, Ben notes that he has a crush on Claire's adult daughter, Alex.  He doesn't expect her to reciprocate, since he's a total loser, not good enough for her -- or for anyone, really.  He doesn't deserve to have friends or a romance.  But Alex is into losers, and a guy who lives with his mother, owns a cat, works in closets, is constantly ridiculed by everyone, and is over 40 ("actually, I'm 26"): "kiss me!"  

Maybe she is attracted to losers like Ben, Alec (John Karna), Teddy, Sanjay (Suraj Patel), and Arvin (Chris Geere, below) because they are so easy to control, belittle, diminish, and feel superior to.  

She spends four more episodes in Season 8 and two in Season 9 having fun ordering Ben around, making jokes at his expense, ridiculing his interests, and doing bedroom things with him in ways that ignore his needs.

Finally Ben can't take the constant ridicule, and starts seeing a woman who actually likes him.  When Alex finds out in Episode 9.5, they break up, and he is never mentioned again.

I kept thinking, what the heck is wrong with these people?  Ben is gorgeous, with that round face, expressive eyes, and scruffy beard. At 5'9", a member of the Short Guy Brigade.  And always wearing a business suit!  When he was on stage, I couldn't pay attention to anyone or anything else.

So let's try a profile.  

Question #1: Gay in real life?  No: he's married to the "beautiful, kind, funny, supportive, warm-hearted Kylie Augustine," and apparently a devotee of Hooters. 

Question #2: Any gay content in his movies and tv shows?

Joe was born in Albuquerque in 1983, went to high school in Minnesota, and received a BFA in Writing from Emerson College in 2006.  He began doing stand-up comedy in college, and moved to New York after graduation to go professional.

 His first film role is in Yeti: A Love Story (2006): five college students go camping.  Joe goes off into the woods to pee (d*ck on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends), and is skewered.  The others are killed, but not by a yeti, by a weird cult.  The male yeti is a good guy, who rescues Adam (Adam Malamut).  The two fall in love.  I can't tell if it is homophobic or not, but Malamut is straight in real life, and according to one review, "incredibly annoying."

More after the break. 

My Boyfriend and My Satanist Ex-Boyfriend at Thanksgiving Dinner: A Kelvin/Keefe Adventure

 "Mama!" Keefe exclaimed.  "Why on Earth did you invite my ex-boyfriend to Thanksgiving Dinner, when you knew that Kelvin was coming?"

She frowned.  "Well, why not?  Daedalus came to every Thanksgiving and Christmas for five years.  And your nephew Austin's piano recitals. Jimmy called him 'Uncle Daedus.'" He's part of the family.  Just because you broke up for some crazy reason doesn't mean we have to break up with him, too."

"I found God, Mama! Isn't that what you wanted for me?"

"All I ever wanted was for you to be happy.  And you were happy with Daedalus.  A lot happier than you seem now, when every word I say makes you uncomfortable or angry, and the wonderful Reverend Gemstone treats you like his personal servant.  Now, does this casserole get onion rings on top, or not?"

The rest of the story, with n*de photos and explicit s*x scenes, is on Righteous Gemstones Beefcake and Boyfriends

Sweethearts: Thanksgiving romcom proving that there's gay life in Kansas...um, rural Ohio.. so don't move to Oz

Link to the n*de dudes

Christmas romcoms are always about women leaving the Big City to find infinite joy and belonging in small towns.   Gay men can't relate, since they high-tailed it away from homophobic small towns to Big City gay neighborhoods.  

Sweethearts, on MAX, is a rare Thanksgiving romcom that pushes the small town.  There's gay life in Kansas.  Why move to Oz?

The premise: two life-long best friends are going to the same college but distance-dating the boy/girl back home: 

1. Ben is dating Claire, still in high school.

Ben is played by Nico Hiraga, left, a former semi-pro skateboarder. He has appeared in Booksmart, Love in Taipei, Goodrich, and The Power.

2. Jamie, a girl (Kiernan Shipka), is dating Simon (Charlie Hall, left), who is dumb as a fence post but got into Harvard on a football scholarship.  Say what? 

 The long distance relationships  aren't working out, so the two make a plan to break up with their partners when they all go home for Thanksgiving.  

Obviously they're going to get together or it wouldn't be a romcom.  I'm fast forwarding through their scenes to get to Palmer (Caleb Hearon), the flamboyantly feminine "third friend" pictured in the animated opening. He's probably the standard romcom gay best friend who facilitates the romance, but maybe he'll get a boyfriend of his own.

Correction: I'm also interested in Ben's college roommate Tyler, played by Zach Zucker , a "Bad Bi Boy Clown" -- literally. He trained for two years at the Ecole Philippe Gaulier.  

On his Facebook page, Zach notes that "Bi Visibility Day is cool because it forces all of the people who have caused you pain by denying your existence to look at your pics."  

His character is introduced smooching a girl in bed, but maybe he's bi:

He looks at Ben's fake id and comments: "I'll go out with you.  Just kidding."

Ben has his hands full, so he asks Tyler to take his cell phone from his pocket.  "Whoops, wrong phone.  Just kidding."  

He seems to be dancing with Ben in the closing party scene.

And that's just when  I paused the fast-forwarding.

Paris: "Third Friend" Parker is introduced at Minute 15, calling the duo, wearing a striped shirt and beret, sitting in front of an image of the Eiffel Tower.  He took a gap year after high school to move to Paris, and he is working at a fast-food place near Euro Disney.  Why would visitors to Euro Disney want to see fast-food workers in clichéd French costumes?  

He announces that he is no longer "vaguely pretending to be straight." Really?  Who would think you were straight after talking to you for 30 seconds? 

He'll be coming out to a select group of former classmates at a party at his house on the night before Thanksgiving.

More after the break, including a rural Ohio gay community.  Caution: explicit.