Hudson Yang: From "Fresh Off the Boat" to Harvard, cooking, dudes, and the best gay comedy of the year. With Hudson and Xu bedroom stuff

Link to the n*de photos

Fresh Off the Boat (2015-20) was a nostalgia series based on the memoirs of celebrity chef Eddie Huang.  Hudson Yang (left) plays the 12-17 year old Eddie, growing up in the 1990s in a Taiwanese-American family "fresh off the boat."  

Dad (Randall Park), who runs a cowboy-themed restaurant in Orlando, pushes him to embrace the best (and worst) of American culture, while Mom pushes him to embrace his Taiwanese heritage, resulting in conflict and plot complications.

Eddie has two younger brothers (Ian Chen, Forrest Wheeler, right) and a surprising number of gay friends and acquaintance: 

Officer Bryson (Alex Quijano), a regular at the family restaurant.

Oscar Chow,  Mom's college boyfriend, whom she helped come out (Rex Lee, playing about the same character as on Suburgatory).  He brings his dull-as-dirt boyfriend to Thanksgiving dinner.

Randy and Andy, who buy a house from Realtor Mom.

Next door neighbor Nicole, whom Eddie helps come out (after dating her)

A good beginning for a gay-inclusive career.  Let's check on Hudson's other roles.

While on the Boat, Hudson appeared in a 2016 episode of the Disney Channel's Liv and Maddie, either as a basketball player or an art student.

The short Hum (2017), about a preteen boy-girl romance.

A 2018 episode of Sofia the First, about a girl who becomes the Princess of Enchancia when her Mom marries the King.  Hudson's episode is about mermaids

Seven 2019 episodes of The Lion Guard, featuring Kion, son of Simba from The Lion King (voiced by Matthew Broderick, left in 1994, Rob Lowe here).  

After the Boat, Hudson appeared in Run & Gun (2022), with Ben Milliken as a criminal-on-the-run trying to live a quiet life with the heterosexist trajectory of job, house (well, trailer), girlfriend, and kid.   You know that won't work out well.  Hudson plays a college student interning at Ben's insurance company.

Next he played the Honor Student (2023), who loses his brother in a mass shooting, and gets revenge by holding a teacher hostage.  No indication that he's gay.

So, only one show with gay representation. That's  not....

Wait, I forgot to research Extremely Unique Dynamic (2024).

The premise: best friends (Harrison Xu, left, Ivan Leung) spend the weekend making a movie about making a movie.  Extremely Unique made the rounds of 17 film festivals and won five awards, plus a nomination from the Queerties. Reviews calls it "A new standard in LGBTQ and Asian-American representation" and "the dumbest, dopest gay meta comedy of the year."

More after the break

The Top 10 Hunks of "Dear White People," Season 3

Dear White People (2014) was a drama with comedic elements about a radio show that points out microaggressions and white privilege at an elite Ivy League college.

The first season of the Netflix tv adaption (2017) continued the story, with the Winchester students dealing with unconscious (and conscious) racism, police targeting, cultural appropriation, and so on.  Still a drama with comedic elements.

The second season (2018) was more comedy than drama, with some attention to white supremacy, institutional racism, and a conservative "why do black people complain all the time" group.  Plus Lionel gets a boyfriend.  It bogs down in a ridiculous plotline about a secret society that controls the world leaving DaVinci Code clues around the campus.

In its third season (2019), Dear White People has become a comedy.  There doesn't seem to be an ongoing plot arc, just micro-plots about selecting a film studies mentor, unionizing, dating, embarrassing moms, and a sex club. Most of the time I have no idea what's going on, and I don't really care. I'm just watching for the Lionel plotlines.  And for the beefcake.

Here are the top 10 hunks of Season 3.  I'm omitting the ones covered (or rather, uncovered) in my previous review (Gabe, Lionel, Reggie, Kurt, Al, and Kordell).

1. Mason Trueblood (top photo) as Colin, a writer for the Pastiche humor magazine (aka Harvard Lampoon).  One of the main plotlines of Season 3 involves Pastiche writers trying to find their own voices, and a female writer being ignored.

2. Kobi Kumi-Diaka (left) as  Jimiyu, a Nigerian student with a crush on someone or other.

3. Jeremy Tardy as Rashid, a member of the Black Student Union, the more conservative black organization on campus.

4. Blair Underwood as Professor Moses Brown, who left after he became rich with an app he developed, but returned because...he wants to nurture young minds?

5. Erich Lane as Clifton, Reggie's roommate, who spends his time doing whatever it is that white people do.  I liked the scene where he changes clothes in front of Reggie, displaying his package and everything (nothing seen on camera).

6. Glenn McCuen as Chet Fuckboi.  I don't remember this character, in spite of the name.


















7.  Alex Alcheh as Milo, one of the graduate teaching assistants.


8. Ryan Alexander Holmes as Nicholas.  I don't know who this character is, but who cares? The actor is hot.

9. Wade F. Wilson as Michael, who insults Lionel at the sex party, and then asks him out.

10. Eugene Ko (left) as Jesse, one of the graduate teaching assistants.  It's about time the show added an Asian character.  Racism isn't all about black and white.

Now, if they can only get him to take his shirt off.

See also:Dear White People