The Chair Company, Episode 1.3: A chair conspiracy, a queer kid, a ginger chub, weirdness for its own sake, and men in suits with d*cks

Link to the n*de dudes

 I am attracted to men in suits, but not at all to the corporate world, the heterosexist trajectory of job, house, wife, kids that was pushed endlessly through my childhood.  I want a world of art and beauty. 

So at first I wasn't interested in The Chair Company on HBO MAX, starring Tim Robinson as Ron Trosper, a "job, house, wife, and kids" guy whose chair collapses during a Very Important Presentation, leading to more mishaps that threaten to destroy his Very Important Career.   

Trying to track down the Chair Company responsible for the defective chair, he ends up at an empty warehouse.  Later a guy assaults him, telling him to "Forget about the chair company."

He doesn't.  He tracks down his assailant, Mike (Joseph Tudisco), a security guard at a local cafe.  But Mike says "I was hired by a guy I'd never met.  He didn't show his face." 

Maybe they could work together to find him?

Wait -- why is Mike interested in helping?  There must be some gay-subtext buddy-bonding.  I'm reviewing the next episode, 1.3: @BrownDerbyHistoricVids Little Bit of Hollywood? Okayyy.

Try putting that in the Works Cited section of your research paper.

Scene 1: Family Man Ron is at Game Night with his daughter, her fiancee, and her fiancee's parents.  Hey, Daughter is gay.  What a surprise -- I figured this show would be entirely heteronormative.  Ulp, he gets a text: "No way out!", with a photo of him taken at that moment from the hall closet.

He pulls open the closet door, and a little person pushes him aside and runs out.  But he wanted to be found out.  Family Man Ron gives chase, but Partner Mike rushes up and explains "He's my guy, LT (Joe Apelian). I had him watching to make sure you weren't setting me up."  

LT wanted to tell Mike that there was no way out of his hiding place, but he texted the wrong person. 

Scene 2: The enraged Ron wants to end the partnership, but Mike has intel: he tracked down the guy who paid him to scare Ron, but that guy was hired by someone else, and paid $50,000 for the job.  That's quite a lot -- usually scares go for $400. 

LT interrupts, yelling that Partner Mike isn't his friend, he's no good.  He begins kicking boxes.

Left: None of the three have beefcake photos online, so I'm posting 1990s heartthrob Lou Diamond Phillips, who plays the CEO of Family Man Ron's company.

Scene 3: That night, while asleep, Ron keeps imagining LT staring at him.  He checks all the closets. 

In the morning, he asks his wife if they can install a security system today.  A reasonable plan, but he makes it sound crazy by imagining someone with a gun bursting in and forcing them to kill each other.  

Scene 4: At work, Ron is discussing something about square footage with a client (Mike Britt).  A literal bug crawls into Ron's phone.  Now we're getting surreal. 

When he has a spare moment, he tries to find out who owns the empty warehouse -- ulp, you have to make your request in person.  But before he can duck out, he is dragged into the atrium to watch his tv interview about a shopping mall the company is building: "The way you think about Canton, Ohio is about to change: you're about to step into a bit of Hollywood."  Thus the title.

 The whispering is about a Mistakes Party -- where you admit your mistakes -- that Ron isn't invited to, because he's the boss.

More after the break

"Clickbait": Gay Representation on the "Non-Stop Thrill Ride" about a Kidnapped Family Man

 

My viewing schedule is rather crowded with Korean soap operas, Disney Channel teencoms, and awful action-adventure movies, so I'm leery of giving the Netflix thriller series Clickbait (2021) a try.

The description immediately turned me off: "family man" Nick (Adrian Grenier) is kidnapped.  I hate the phrase "family man."  It's used to claim that heterosexual men who have reproduced are more moral, more industrious, infinitely more valuable than the rest of us.  So you've had sex with a woman.  How does that make you a saint?

But one of my Facebook friends, who is gay (like all of my Facebook friends except for a few relatives), called it a "nonstop thrill ride."    So I conducted some research.  Quite a lot of research, actually.

Beefcake:  According to the Parents' Guide, there is no male or female nudity, but several scenes where men and women kiss, and a woman takes her bra off.

Gay Characters: A search on "Clickbait," tv, and "gay" revealed numerous copies of an interview with Abraham Lim, who plays the reporter working on the case: "as a gay man," he feels marginalized whenever he goes into a gay bar, and faces anti-Asian racism.

Yes, but is his character gay?

A search through the cast list reveals that Family Man Nick has a wife and two children.  The older is played by Camaron Engels, who has a TikTok video labeled LGBT and "gay."  But I don't get the connection: it shows a space alien dancing.

Nick's younger son is played by Jaylin Fletcher, who definitely has something nonbinary going on, and has played gay characters (or the little brothers of gay characters) in Snowpiercer and Sunday Church.  Little Bro could be queer.

Phoenix Raei (Roshan Amiri, the detective investigating the case) is an Iranian-Australian actor who played a gay character on the soap The Heights.  It's refreshing to see someone of Middle Eastern descent play something other than a terrorist, but I doubt that any network suit will ok a character who is Muslim and gay.

An article on "10 LGBTQ Series to watch this fall" reveals that Nick's sister Pia is bisexual, and reporter Ben Park (Abraham Lim) is gay.  Ok, but do they actually do anything, or is it "bisexual but only dating men" and "gay means fabulous."?

Gay Representation:  Wikipedia has a much-too-detailed plot synopsis, which is why I didn't read it first..  I'm surprised it hasn't been flagged.  Of the 52 references to Pia, only one mentions her dating, and it's a guy.  There might be some female loves in the series, of course, but it is a very detailed plot synopsis.

Ben Park, however, gets a centric episode (#5), where he and his boyfriend Cameron (Jack Speer) argue over his callous handling of the case, and finally break up. Neither Cameron nor Ben appear in the plot synopsis after that.  

At least Ben is "ruthless" and "driven," breaking the stereotype that all gay men are fierce and fabulous.

Will I Watch:  Probably not.  I've already spent two hours on Clickbait, and I know about the surprise ending.