Among Us: A crew of nonbinary bean-beings face a killer in their midst. With Park's backside, Elijah's junk, Korvo, and Yogi Bear

   

Among Us is an adult animation series based on a video game, filmed in 2024 and released on Paramount Plus in 2026.  Showrunner Owen Dennis has been associated with the gay-friendly Regular Show, Infinity Train, and AJ Goes to the Dog Park (and he has Pride wallpaper on his cell phone), so I expect some gay subtexts, or maybe even texts.

The premise: An alien shapeshifter is killing the crew members on the Spaceship Skeld as it travels toward its home planet with a precious cargo.  They have to identify the imposter before it's too late.  

The astronauts are bean-shaped,  about 3.5 feet tall, named after their color (which could present problems in a large group).  They have two legs, no arms, no mouths, floating hands, and large visors that change to express emotions. They are genderless, but they reference hookups and "childbirth," so something like human s*xual activity occurs.  

Since they are nonbinary, the astronauts are all LGBTQ.  But I'm going to gender them through the gender of their voice actors, and check for "same-s*x" desire.

I'm reviewing Episode 1.2, "You Can't Be Hot and Smart," which begins just after the first being, new crew member White (Patton Oswald) , has been sliced neatly in half.  

Scene 1: Everyone screams, retches, slips on the blood. Someone puts a "Wet Floor" notice. They try to notify MIRRA, their company, but comms are down.  Captain Red (Randall Park, n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends) cautions everyone, "don't panic."

And don't forget your towel (Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy)

Then Doctor Blue (Dan Stevens, Korvo on Solar Opposites) arrives, and everyone relaxes, because they inspire confidence.

Scene 2: In the med bay, Captain Red tries to avoid admitting that White was murdered;  maybe it was a work related accident?   Doctor Blue tells them that suddenly being cut in half is quite rare.  They perform some tests. We see swabbing, a petri dish, typing into a computer, and finally they conclude that...White is dead.

Scene 3: Meanwhile, in the cafeteria, everyone agrees that it was a murder. Did White have any enemies?  No, everyone loved them -- except Unpaid Intern Green (Elijah Wood, n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends) who wanted to steer the ship -- their lifelong dream -- but White stole the job. This aroused their bloodlust!

Green, mopping the floor, claims that they have "no l*st for anything, especially blood."

Scene 4: Captain Red asks Security Officer Purple (Ashley Johnson) to check the security cams for suspicious activity, but they only record in black and white, and without color, you can't tell who is who.  Maybe by costume?

Doctor Blue calls Purple into the medbay for an invasive body scan: they want to compare White's body with every crew member's, to see if the splitting-in-half was caused by an alien pathogen or mutation.  "I won't sleep until I know how to protect the crew!" they announce.

Purple swoons with romantic desire.  M-F voice actors

More after the break

Julian Hilliard: A gay superhero and two gay-subtext boyfriends, but is he gay in real life or just teasing? With some co-star d*cks

  

Link to the n*de photos

I decided to research Julian Hilliard based on this photo on the teen idol site.   He asks "Who is Craig?" and answers: "really goofy, friendly, funny." Obviously his boyfriend.

As of this writing, Julian is only 14.  Few guys have figured out that they're gay by that age, and even fewer have the guts to post about it openly in their social media.  

But maybe his coming out process was facilitated by playing a gay character: Billy Maximoff.

In the Marvel comics tv series Wandavision (2021), Wanda Maximoff, the Scarlet Witch, is memory-erased and trapped in a series of sitcoms, along with her husband Vision (Wanda-Vision, get it?) and various residents of Westview, New Jersey.   Vision is dead in the real world, and their two sons, Billy (Julian, the one being licked) and Tommy (Jett Klyne), were created to maintain the illusion, so when Wanda learns the truth and releases the town from its curse, her husband and sons cease to exist.

Or do they?

In Agatha All Along (2024), the witch Agatha Harkness takes on a sort of apprentice, whom everyone  calls Teen because he  can't reveal his real name due to a sigil.  In a big reveal, we learn that he is Billy Maximoff, memory-wiped and moved into the body of Billy Kaplan, who died in an auto accident just as Wanda was releasing Westview from its curse. 

Teen (Joe Locke) is gay, with a boyfriend who appears in two episodes.

In the comics, Billy came out in 2013, and  joined the Young Avengers as the superhero Wiccan, Marvel's first gay Jewish superhero.  He dated and eventually married Hulking (no relation to the Incredible Hulk).

Did the producers know that Julian was gay when they cast him as Billy in 2021?  Was he already out at age ten?  Or did he figure it out during his research into the role?

To determine the answer, I'll check his other acting roles and social media.  Julian was born in Dallas in 2011, into a show biz family: Mom is an actress, Dad a producer/director.  I didn't find anything of immediate gay interest in their works.

His first starring role was in The Haunting of Hill House (2018): A family moves into Hill House in 1992, and is forced to leave due to the haunting.  26 years later, the grown-up children must return. Gulp.  

Julian plays Young Luke.

The adult Luke (Oliver Jackson-Cohen, left) is a struggling drug addict, and the adult Steven (Michael Huisman, d*ck on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends) is a writer whose book about the haunting became a best-seller, alienating his family.  Both are hetero, but their sister Theodora is a lesbian.  So some gay representation in Julian's first major acting gig.

More after the break

"Come to Daddy": Elijah Wood is Gay for 45 Minutes

The title Come to Daddy, has a creepy, quasi-erotic feel, perfect for a "psychological thriller."  It stars Elijah Wood, who always plays gay-vague roles, and Stephen McHattie, who was hot back in the day, so I'm in.

Prologue: Quotes from Shakespeare and Beyonce?

Scene 1: Ah, wilderness!  A Timberline bus stops amid the big trees to let out a man in a black hat, who turns out to be Norval (Elijah Wood).

He walks through the big trees to a big lake.

He loses his hat, revealing a really stupid bowl-hair cut.  Finally he reaches a very distinctive two-story house shaped like the Jupiter 2 on Lost in Space, with a balcony overlooking the rocks.

How do they get groceries up there? Is there a road?  If so, wouldn't it be easier than the wilderness trek?

Craggy, creepy Dad (Stephen McHattie) answers the door, glaring suspiciously.  Crazy as a loon, Dad takes awhile to catch on that Norval is his long-estranged son, whom he wrote a letter inviting to visit..  Finally Dad invites him in.

Scene 2:  Unpacking in his room, Norval takes his cell phone out of his pocket --close up of his crotch.  Suddenly Dad barges in and asks for a photo. Is it just me, or did that exchange have homoerotic undertones?

Dad "accidentally" drops Norval's cell phone in the ocean, so he can't call anyone.  Uh-oh, 

Scene 3: At dinner, Dad razzes Norval for still living with his mother at his age ("You sleep with her?" he asks).  Then he pushes Norval to drink some wine.  Norval explains that his alcohol dependency led to an attemptd suicide, but Dad continues to push.

Norval hasn't mentioned a wife or girlfriend. The first rule of gay subtexts: if they don't mention a lady, they can be read as gay.  And Dad, although brash and vulgar, is refreshingly free of heterosexual braggadochio -- no "this gal in Shanghai could do things with her tongue!"

Scene 4:  After dinner, the two realize that they know next to nothing about each other, so they exchange bios.  Norval is a famous dj/pianist/musician and a close friend of Sir Elton John (I don't believe that for a second).  Dad a retired limo driver whose main client happened to be Sir Elton.  They got to be very close (implying that they were lovers!  good deal!)

Dad calls Norval's bluff by threatening to call Elton, then reveals that he doesn't know him, either.  Har-har.  This is turning way funnier than I expected from a psychological thriller.

Later, Norval is brushing his teeth when Dad appears, creepily, in the mirror:  "You ever been in a fight? I have.  Knocked a guy's ear off.  You could see right into his skull."  Run, Norvy, run!

Scene 5: In the middle of the night, Norval gets up for a glass of water, and overhears Dad talking on the phone: "What do you want me to do? I'm not going to kill him. We can use him for leverage..."

Norval runs back to his bedroom and pretends to be asleep.  Uh-oh, he's in trouble!

Scene 6: In the morning, instead of high-tailing it out of there as fast as his legs can carry him, Norval calls Mom on the house phone and says "No, he's not what I imagined."

Interspliced with the conversation are scenes of the two swimming (Norval has a nice chest, Dad not so much), Then Norval is taking a bath while Dad talks on the phone: "No, he's dead.  I killed him"

Scene 7:  Norval asks why Dad left when he was five, and why he sent the letter inviting him there.  Dad won't answer. They argue.  Dad razzes Norval for dressing like a woman, and calls him a "cunt" who puts rats up his "vaginia."

This seems to be an adaption of the homophobic urban legend that gay men put gerbils up their butts, shifted to a lady.  But why not just call Norval a "fag"?  Is   Dad going out of his way to avoid seeming homophobic?  But sexism is ok?

Anyway, Dad attacks Norval with a butcher knife, then drops dead.  After calling Mom for advice, Norval covers the body and calls the cornoer.

Scene 8: The next morning, Ronald the Cop arrives (bodybuilder turned actor Garfield Wilson).  He tells Norval that he has nice eyes and tries to impress him by burping (maybe taking off your shirt would be a better strategy, Ronald?).

Scene 9: Hey, what happened to Ronald?  I thought he and Norval would be dating. Now a lady coroner shows up to take the body.  She tells Norval that he has kind eyes.

If they end up dating, I'm leaving. 

Scene 10:  Gladys the Lady Coroner and Norval are walking on the beach together.  Grr.  Oh -- they're just carrying down the body. 

"You're going to be ok..when my husband died, I was a mess..take care of yourself"  That's not flirtatious, is it

Well, is it?

Scene 11: Instead of leaving, Norval has to wait for Mom to arrive.  That night he hears a weird scraping sound.  He hears it again while reading The Celestine Prophecy naked, and again while putting his clothes on.  He looks at Gladys' business card.  And smells it.

 He smells her card?  God, please let there be no fade-out-kiss.

He starts drinking again.  Drunk, he calls Gladys the Coroner Lady and invites her over for sex.  She refuses -- but only because he's being obnoxious.  If he invited her to a nice dinner, she'd probably say yes.

Ok, I'm disgusted.  I'm leaving.  Here's the rest of the plot, from Wikipedia:

Norval investigates the sound, and finds a beaten, bloody man in the basement-- his Real Dad (Martin Donovan)!

This is actually not him, it's a plug from Martin's twitter account of the movie he's directing, The Legs of Infamy, starring Steve McCain.  I'm definitely looking forward to it.

Plot dump: Back in the day, Real Dad, Fake Dad, Jethro (Michael Smiley), and a guy named Dandy (Simon Chin) were involved in a kidnapping.  Real Dad double-crossed them and fled with the money, which he, Mom, and Norval have been living on ever since.

Fake Dad found Real Dad and started torturing him.  At that moment, Norval showed up!  Now the other two guys will be coming to kill them both. But Norval manages to kill one, and the other dies in an accident.  The end.

Frigging gay tease.  But at least there's no fade-out kiss.