Cody Veith: Why did I want to profile a straight guy with no gay acting roles? Because of his d*ck? With ginger and African dudes

 

My "profiles to do" includes a guy I've never heard of, Cody Veith (pronounced Veeth).  He's the tall ginger hugging a black teenager, with the comment: "Kaiden was happy to meet him mom I watch his shows he couldn't wait to tell his friends."

Apparently Mr. Veith doesn't believe in punctuation marks, so it's not clear whether Kaiden was happy to meet him, or he was happy to meet Cody.    

I found a black teen actor named Kaiden: Kaiden Fiorello.  But he  doesn't have any shows,just an episode of Evil Lives Here.  And he doesn't look anything like our Kaiden.

So Cody is referring to himself in the third person, and quoting him: "Mom, I watch his shows!" 

Surprisingly for someone who wrote that post, Cody is a high school graduate: Arbor View High School, Las Vegas, class of 2022, concentration in business management.  

Left: An Arbor View wrestler.  Cody wasn't on the wrestling team.  I just like the photo.

Cody's Instagram says that he is an actor and "professional prankster," based in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.  He's also obviously straight, with innumerable photos hugging, kissing, and showing off the backside of the Love of His Life.  

Why did I want to profile this guy?  Just because he never heard of punctuation marks?

He's got a physique, and a d*ck on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends, but that's not usually enough. Maybe I saw something inspiring in his social media.

More after the break

Survival of the Thickest: Mavis and her nemesis spar in Paris, Khalil and Luca "get closer," and who the heck is Lopez? With his d*ck and n*de models

Link to the n*de dudes

I wasn't planning to review Survival of the Thickest, about a thick black woman finding body positivity as a fashion designer.  But Queerty said that it had gay representation, and one of the cast members, somebody with the last name Lopez (I didn't record the first name), appeared on the n*de celebrity subreddit, so I figured I'd give it a shot. 

In Episode 3.4, "C'est la vie, Bitch," they visit Paris Fashion Week, while back in New York, Khalil and Luca "connect." They must be the gay couple, and there'll be shots of Paris. 

Khalil is played by Tone Bell, backside on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

Scene 1: Mavis and her friend on a tour bus, shouting "I'm a designer!"  They reach their destination, the Victoria Palace Hotel , but they're actually staying at the horrible hostel next door.

"It's got character," Mavis says, trying to look on the bright side. "It's got [a vulgar term for lady parts]"  

"It smells like an 18th century pap smear."  A lot of lady part jokes.

She likes the doorknobs in the center, like a belly button, and asks the concierge if she can check his belly button.  He refuses.

Scene 2: Seven flights of stairs and a hallway bathroom, but there's a view of the Eiffel Tower from the window.  Of course -- on tv every Parisian hotel room looks out at the Eiffel Tower, even if  it's miles away and facing the wrong direction.   Mavis washes up  with a handi-wipe, while they discuss how far they've come in two years.

Whomp, someone farts.  Turns out that the ladies have a roommate sleeping under the covers in the top bunk.  

Scene 3: Luca (Marouane Zotti), the one who's going to connect with Khalil (hopefully by kissing), is counseling a refugee couple, assuring them that they'll get housing soon.  They also need a job.  "I promise that you'll..."

His coworker Donny Wang (Ronnie Chien) butts in to tell them that their chances are slim,  When they leave, he advises "Never promise anything.  Keep their expectations vague...."

In other news, a girl asked him to DJ at the gentlemen's club tonight.  

"Sorry. I have plans with friends," Luca tells him.

"Oh, I wasn't inviting you.  I was bragging about all the n*ked ladies I'm going to see."  Ugh, a character whose shtick is being a slimebag.  

Left: Ronnie seems to be gay in real life.

Scene 4: Mavis is giving a pep talk to her models, telling them to "eye f*ck" everyone.  There are some androgynous and genderqueer types, and some plus-sized, like David Ventakapen (n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends).   They walk across a portico (with the Eiffel Tower in the background, of course) and get photographed.  Then Mavis is introduced to thunderous applause.   A journalist tells her that the genderqueer outfit has made her the Best New Renegade of Fashion Week, which comes with a Vogue cover.  And she's invited to the Vogue party tonight.  Wait -- she's the most renowned fashion designer in the world, but she's staying in a youth hostel?

Suddenly Mavis almost collapses in pain, but her friend tells her to dance it off.  Chekhov's Gun: This better be important.

And when are we getting to the Lopez guy?

Scene 5: They have time before the Vogue party tonight, so we get a montage of the usual.  They want to take a boat tour, but the tour guide won' sell them tickets, even though the boat is only half full. And when they try to go to a restaurant, the waiter (Theo Pham) tellsl them that it's closed.  Racism plotline? About 10% of the French population has African ancestry, more in big cities.

They try a Senegalese restaurant in the Black neighborhood, Château Rouge in the 18th Arrondissement,  and are served immediately.   "I like Black Paris a little better than the rest of Paris," the Friend muses.

Khalil and Luca getting close after the break

Kid Cosmic: Why is "Fry and Hamburg are gay!" big news? So are Craig and Eric, Nergal and Irwin, George and the Secret Keeper....

Kid Cosmic, on Nickelodeon, stars Jack Fisher (left) as "Kid," a comic book-obsessed orphan boy  living in a desolate world consisting of his trailer, his Grandpa's junkyard, a retro 1950s diner, and an endless desert.  

Suddenly, for reasons, everyone who happens to be in the diner develops superpowers, and is tasked with finding the Rings of Power.  Stuck Chuck, a gay-stereotype alien baddie, eventually joins the team.

Just before Season 3 dropped, on February 2nd, 2022, showrunner Craig McCracken announced in a Twitter post that Fry and Hamburg are a romantic couple.

Who?

 

They're the diner cooks, visible on the right of this character photo.

 Fry (voiced by Eric Bauza, below) is a skinny, tattooed Italian guy  with super-stretching ability, and Hamburg (voiced by Fred Tatsciore) is a blond German hunk with the ability to exude multiple arm

On February 5th, McCracken further specified on his Instagram "how they met and fell in love": Hamburg graduated from a top culinary school in Europe, but wanted to cook "real food," so he got a job at the dingy diner in the endless desert, and fell in love with his coworker, Fry. 

They are very minor characters.  They didn't even get superpowers until Season 2, and even then, they were #10 and #11 in the superhero list, with no lines in most episodes.  I saw no gay hints about them in Seasons 1 and 2, but then, I wasn't looking closely: they were mostly background.  

So, on to Season 3.  I'll check every appearance of Fry and Hamburg, looking for holding hands, hugging, dancing together, a shared apartment, any hint, however minuscule, that they are being presented as a canonical romantic couple.

Back Story: In Season 2, the Galactic Heroes worked at an interplanetary diner as a cover while they tried to track down the missing Rings of Power.   When the Rings were all accounted for, they used them to defeat the Planet Destroyer, a planet-sized Big Bad.  In the fracas, the Rings were scattered all over Earth.

More after the break

Evan Mulrooney: Tony's gym boyfriend, an Albanian c*cktwizzler, a Trad Husband, Jar-Jar Binks' hookup. Is he gay or just pretending?

I find a lot of gay actors to profile from the gym buddies that Tony Cavalero posts about.  Today he worked out with Evan, whose Instagram is full of muscle pics and humorous POVS, like "Top Three Spots for a First Date in Wilmington, Delaware." One involves searching for the Mud Man in Dupont Marsh Fields.  I found a Dupont Environmental Education Center, but nothing about a Mud Man cryptid anywhere.

I guarantee that you have no idea what he means by "perfect protein snack."  Hint: it starts off with baked cottage cheese.

But  I need to know if he's an actor -- Tony often works out with civilians.

Success!  11 acting credits listed on the IMDB, more on his professional resume, plus two interviews.

Evan is Evan Mulrooney, who grew up in an "unstable household" in Wilmington, Delaware (he still suffers from general anxiety disorder).  

He attended the Salesian School (private, Catholic) and University of Maryland on a football scholarship, but some torn knees and concussions suggested that sports was not a viable career path.  

After graduation, he  moved to Chicago, where he studied at the Acting Studio  and the Annoyance Theater. 

Evan's theatrical credits include: 

Steamworks: The Musical, about the legendary gay bathhouse

Shitfyre: The Musical, a retelling of the Fyre Fest debacle (according to Google AI, "a disastrous music festival that failed due to poor planning and execution).

It’s Christmas Goddammit!: "a dark comedy about a truly dysfunctional family"

Queer Eye: The Musical Parody, presented by Second City.

At least two gay roles there.  

In 2022, Evan moved to Los Angeles.  He has 11 or 13 on-screen credits, depending on who you believe, including:

Crime boss Joe Bulo as a young man in four episodes of Fargo (2022)

Agron Darke, an Albanian mob enforcer on a 2023 episode of Justified: City Primeval.  The shooting script has him complementing Raylan's hat.  A mark calls him a "no-neck Albanian c*cktwizzler," and his brother Besnik says that "he's sensitive, like a woman."  So maybe he's got some gay hints.

Vinnie Caccimello in four episodes of Only Murderers in the Building (2025).  He's not in the cast list, but he may be the son of missing dry cleaner Nick Caccimello.

The movie Start without Me (2025), not listed in the IMDB: "Adam, a former musician (Finn Wittrock), and Marissa, a flight attendant with marital issues, embark on a life-changing Thanksgiving road trip."  

So Evan played at least one gay-subtext character in his tv work, and has at least one probable n*de photo.

More after the break

Leon Mallett:Checking the East Anglia Boy's n*de photos first, researching his potential gayness and celebrity status later

 

Link to the n*de photos

I don't usually start researching based on some adult videos, but this guy has it all: cute face, nice physique, impressive beneath the belt gifts, in a series of very clear photos posted on several celebrity sites.  I'm just worried that he's not an actor, so I won't be able to profile him.

So I'll check the IMDB last.  First up: his social media, to see if he's gay. 

Tagline: Singer/Songwriter.  He could be an actor, too.  I'm continuing the research.

An East Anglia boy, from Norwich, about 2 1/2 hours east of London.  

Lots of beefcake shots and guy-hugging photos, no girl-hugging -- a good sign.

Wait -- in one photo, he's grabbing the "big couple of palavas" on Katie Price.  An interest in palavas is generally a sign of  male heterosexual identity.

But Katie Price is an actress, model, and public figure who performs at a lot of Pride events, and came out as a lesbian in 2025.  Maybe he's just being playful.

But Leon's sweater says "Alright, my darlin'?"  That's something you would say to a girl.

Ok, I'm ready to check the shirt-lifter's IMDB profile.

Leon Mallett, aka Leon James, was born in 1995 in East Anglia.  In 2014, he auditioned for The X Factor, the British talent showcase, as a member of the boy band Fifth Street, but didn't make it.

He and his brother Alex auditioned as a duo in 2017.  Alex was cut during Boot Camp (the first challenge), but Leon made it through the Six Chair Challenge, Judges' Houses, Week 1, and Week 2, whereupon he was eliminated. 

He returned as a special guest on The X-Factor: Celebrity (2019).

And he appeared as himself in the documentary When Celebrity Goes Horribly Wrong 2 (2020), about celebrity fails: Calum Best accused of assault; Nick Ferrari making r*cist comments; Chloe Goodman in  a feud with her sister.

No information on what Leon's scandal was. 

Next, I'll check his songs for gay hints.

In "East Anglia Boy" (2014), Leon praises his home province: the sights, the food, the shopping.  He meets a girl who likes his accent, but not his clothes. Sounds heterosexist. But it's a  parody "American Boy" by Estelle, where she meets a boy, so he would have to meet a girl.

"One Girl in a Million" (2014) sounds extremely heterosexist, but it was actually written by Leon's father.  Leon found it in the attic after his death, and recorded it as a tribute.

Leon's backside is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

More after the break.  

"Samuel": French middle school boys are all in love with the same girl. With queerbaiting, drag, Freudian dreams, and some n*de twinks

 

Link to the n*de photos

When I was growing up in Rock Island, there were no gay characters in children's media -- and they were vanishingly rare in adult media.  In grade school my friend Bill and I vowed to be "best men" forever, and in junior high I swooned over Dan, who had blond hair and warm hands, but parents, teachers, and peers insisted that we were tepid, inconsequential "buddies."  Soon, very soon, I would "discover" girls, and drop my boy friends, instantly and without hesitation, to devote my life to what really mattered, finding and winning The Girl.

I scoured through tv shows, comic books, and the books in the Denkmann School library, searching for evidence that same-sex loves could endure for a lifetime: Will and Jack fighting aliens together in The White Mountains, Tony and Doug declaring that "I won't leave without you!" on Time Tunnel, even Rich and Sean smiling at each other in The Secret of Boyne Castle.  

A show about a boy who actually experiences a real, undeniable same-sex romance would have been a godsend.  

The animated Samuel (2026), by French cartoonist Émilie Tronche, just dropped on Netflix.  It features  a ten-year old boy whose diary entries are depicted in line drawings on a minimal canvas, similar to the Diary of a Wimpy Kid.  The blurb tells us that he's going to face "first loves, complicated friendships, and the start of middle school," with an illustration that undeniably shows him kissing a boy.  Dude is going to come out!

I can't wait to review Samuel.

Episode 1, Scene 1: Samuel writes in his diary that he's in love with a girl.

Say what?  I'm confused.

The boy he is kissing is shown on the blurb for Episode 5, so I'll review that one instead. 

Episode 5: At choir practice, a rumor goes around that Dmitri asked Julie to go out with him.  Everyone laughs and makes fun of the two.  Dmitri is the boy he is shown kissing.

The teacher comes in and asks if everyone has learned the solo part.  Dmitri claims that he has.

The full choir:

Why do people in love always seem to be the same?
They carry, as they walk by, the same look in their eye
One single flame -- they are the happy ones

Dmitri's solo.  Is he going to sing to Samuel?

I barely know you, but to drift away with you, like they do
We could make enough room, you and me
For both of us, with no fuss

You have to let me know it won't be in vain

Whatever the stakes, I want to be a happy man

Suddenly Samuel finds himself in church, about to be married to a boy?  No, to Julie,  but Dmitri rushes in at the last minute, a la The Graduate, and takes her away.  

Later, Samuel sees Julie and Dmitri in the schoolyard, and they confirm that they are in love.  This depresses Samuel, as he is in love with Julie, too.  Say what? When are he and Dmitri going to kiss?

Ok, episodes are only 3-4 minutes long. I'm going through all of them on fast forward, looking for the development of the Samuel-Dmitri romance.

Episode 6: Dmitri does not appear.  Samuel has a best friend, Benjamin.

Episode 7:  On the field trip to the museum, Dmitri and Julie sit together, upsetting Samuel. 

Episode 8: Samuel's friend Benjamin returns from his grandmother's funeral. They discuss his grief, but when he starts crying, Samuel is too macho to hug him.  Instead, he says "Your hair is really greasy."  Jerk!

Episode 9:  Dmitri tells Samuel, "You look pretty," but they're rehearsing a play, and Dmitri is a fox planning to eat crow Samuel, so it might not be his real-life sentiments.

Episode 10: Samuel tells his diary, "Last night something happened.  I don't know how to describe it." Finally, the kiss!   On the way home after the play, they stop at a stop light, and Samuel sees a girl, maybe Julie, in the next car.  She waves at him.  "That's what happened."  A wave?  

Episode 11: During summer vacation, Samuel runs into his enemy Dmitri crying on the sidewalk.  He explains that he is sad because school is over, and he's lonely. Julie must have dumped him.  He asks to hang out with Samuel's friend group next fall, when they're in middle school.  So are they going to fall in love over the summer?

Episode 12: Samuel's babysitters, Bryan and Jonah, invite him to a party with adults.  They usually go to clubs; maybe they're a gay couple?  Nope: when the dancing starts, they're mesmerized by two girls who give them "come hither" finger gestures, and ditch Samuel.  Ugh!  "You will abandon your same-sex loves, instantly and without hesitation, to devote your life to the only thing that matters, finding and winning The Girl."

More after the break

Jack Barlow: "Real Housewives" teen, Mormon missionary, hair-care guru, gay tease. With n*de and b*ondage photos.

   

Link to the n*de and b*ndage photos

Jack Barlow suddenly appeared on my Instagram "suggestions," displaying his physique on the beach -- in a pink swimsuit.  Then he goes on an all-guy beefcake vacation. Obviously gay!

But the pink swimsuit shot is followed by a barrage of photos of Jack going to rodeos and concerts, celebrating his 21st birthday, eating French crepes, bragging about how good he smells, all with his arms around his girlfriend, his future wife, the love of his life.

Ok, ok, you're heterosexual.  The cover photo was just a tease. 

After 831 girl-hugging photos, we come to another gay tease: Jack displays his physique on the beach again, holding a gigantic phallic surfboard.  Followed by a new barrage of girl-hugging.

You're hung, but nature has "prick'd thee out for women's pleasure," I get it.

But...the all-guy beefcake vacation?   Looking very cozy, buddy.

And then we get a gay-subtext commercial for Fresh Wolf, a Men's Grooming Line created by Jack and his brother Henry -- shampoo, body wash, pomade...pomade?  Didn't that go out in the 1940s?

More after the break

"Siblings," Episode 1.1 or 1.3: Dan tries too hard to win a guy who uses a wheelchair. With gay wheelchair guy bonus

Link to the n*de dudes

Siblings is a Britcom (2014-16) now streaming on Amazon Prime, featuring lazy, amoral siblings Hannah and Dan (Charlotte Richie, the sort-of-cute Tom Stourton).  Reminds me of The Other Two, so let's take a look at "Wheelchair Conference," which the IMDB calls Episode 1.1, but Amazon Episode 3.3

Scene 1: At breakfast, Dan is describing a bank robbery that "really happened," but it turns out to be a movie.  Hannah has to rush to work (at 10:30), because she has a new boss who might expect her to show up. The old one was always drunk, and didn't notice whether she was there or not.

But what is Dan supposed to do while she is away?  "Go out and make a friend."

Scene 2:  Hannah rushes into the office just as Drunk Boss is leaving.  He's been sacked for good for silly things like "gross incompetence."  Now she has to find a way to kiss up to the new boss

Cut to the coffee shop, where Dan approaches a Writer (Rob Carter, who is heterosexual) busily working on his novel (just work at home0.  He asks inane questions, and "jokes" that he's going to pour coffee on the guy's laptop.  But he slips, and actually does! (just work at home).  Friendship attempt thwarted, he leaves.

Scene 3: After a long day of trying unsuccessfully to make friends, Dan comes home to Hannah conducting extensive research on the new boss, looking for an angle.  The problem is, there are a lot of Annette Walkers online, so she has to learn about everything from Costa Rica to the University of Hull.

Ulp, there's a homeless guy named Biscuit in the house.  Time for a lot of jokes about how homeless people are disgusting, har har, and Dan is an idiot for inviting one home, har har.   About 40% of homeless youth are LGBT, kicked out by homophobic parents. A sizeable percentage are victims of physical and sexual abuse.

Scene 4: At the office, Hannah tries to kiss up to the new boss by demonstrating her knowledge of Costa Rica and the University of Hull, but this is a different Annette Walker.  She's been going through the reports, and discovers that Kevin's  job encompasses Hannah's job, so one of them is redundant.  Hannah lies that "Kevin is homophobic."  Interesting -- 20 years ago you would be fired for being gay, and now you're fired for being homophobic.

Kevin is played by Matthew Steer.  No intel on whether he's gay.

Uh-oh, Kevin is talking to the new boss about his report analyzing five years of appraisal statistics.  Hannah heads him off with "Weren't you saying last week that gay people shouldn't be allowed to live by the seaside?"  "Um...no."

Boss Annette can't work late tonight, because she's meeting her son for dinner, and she has to get the company car refitted for his wheelchair.  What a coincidence -- Kevin  had to get his car refitted for his mother-in-law's wheelchair!  Uh-oh, Hannah is out.

Or maybe not: "My brother Dan uses a wheelchair, too.  He's 23."

"My son is 23, too!  Why don't the two of you come to dinner with us tonight!" Setting them up on a date?

It takes a while to become accustomed to using a wheelchair, so Dan will doubtless be awkward and give himself away.

Scene 5: Dan falls head-over-heels in love with the son, Charlie, who is a video game developer -- his dream job! And Charlie is impressed by the jokes that everyone else hates.  Dan asks him out on a date:

"Sorry, I have a basketball game tomorrow night, but you can come and watch.  We're playing in the semis."

"I've got a semi right now!" Thanks for sharing, buddy.

Charlie is played by David Proud, who uses a wheelchair in real life.  He is famous for his role as Adam Best, a snobbish Oxford student, on EastEnders, and is heterosexual in real life.

Back at dinner, Dan explains how he had the "accident" that led to his needing a wheelchair: he was jet-skiing in Puerto Rico with this smokin' hot supermodel, and they were making out, and...dude, I don't care if your bi, but you won't attract gay men by talking about ladies with incredible bodies.

Scene 6: Boss Annette invites Heather to a business weekend, where they will be staying "in a hotel" (tell me more, tell me more)

Cut to Dan and the wheelchair basketball team in a bar after the game (hey, no fair -- I wanted to see some of the game).  He asks Charlie to stay with him "for the rest of my life."  Too soon, dude!

Random n*de guy who uses a wheelchair on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

Then Dan  invites Charlie for a sleepover: "Of course, we won't be doing much sleeping!"  Charlie balks, a straight dude not realizing that Dan has been hitting on him, so he backtracks "Because we'll be watching films and stuff, not s*x."

More after the break

Caleb Ruminer: From fundamentalist Arkansas to angst drama, softcore straight stuff, gay adult stuff, and gay teases

  

Link to the n*de Caleb and some other dudes

In the teen drama Finding Carter (2014-2015), 16-year old Carter (Kathryn Prescott) discovers that the woman she thinks of as her mother actually kidnapped her when she was three.  She is reunited with her birth family, and must juggle the standard high school "boys! fashion!  mean girls!" drama with soap opera angst: kidnapping, insanity, se xual assault, cancer, drug ab use, murder, "shocking revelations," and "dark secrets."

She has two potential boyfriends, the violent drug dealer Crash (Caleb Ruminer) and the kind, gentle Max (Alex Saxon). 

There are two lesbian characters, Madison and Bird, who face extensive homophobia, go through extensive angst, and date Max before figuring "it" out. 

I've already done a profile of Alex Saxon, so this is about Caleb Ruminer,  which is hard to type without it sounding dirty.  It means "someone who ruminates," fixates on negative thoughts.

Caleb was born in Cabot, Arkansas, about 25 miles north of Little Rock.   Ulp.

He found his passion for acting while singing in church, appearing in church plays, and so on. Ulp.

After graduating from high school, he attended the American Musical and Dramatic Academy, AMDA, in Los Angeles, for two years. Then dropped out because they were too liberal?

His first acting gig was an 2013 episode of Castle, as the brother of a teenager who would grow up to be on death row.

Then came the unyielding angst of Finding Carter 

In a 2014 interview in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (wait -- there are Democrats in Arkansas?), Caleb talks about a struggle with being a Christian and playing a bad boy.  But, he figures, the bad boy is never praised for committing sins, so it's ok.  He found a church in Los Angeles where they talk about how you can be Christian and an actor.  

Ulp.  Doubtless there's some (a lot) of homophobia in our boy's background.

But some pe nises, too (on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends)

After Carter, Caleb starred in Lethal Seduction (2015), which is what it sounds like: teenager Caleb is seduced by his cougar neighbor, who influences him to do  a lot of deviant stuff.  His mother is also in love with him, so the two psychos have an increasingly violent tug-of-war with Caleb in the middle. Plus he has a teen girlfriend and a best buddy (Sam Lerner, right)

Sam Lerner is best known as Geoff Schwartz on The Goldbergs (2014-23). There's a photo on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends of him chilling with some very gifted home boys.

Next Caleb had guest spots on:

Episode 1.5 of The World According to Billy Potwin (2018), about a far-right anti-vax 13-year old in a family of liberals. Like Family Ties? 

Episode 1.1 of Strange Ones (2018): "Two enigmatic travelers make their way across a remote landscape," facing paranormal peril. First up: an angst-ridden high school girl conjures a demon.  Wait, a movie entitled The Strange Ones and a tv series called Strange Ones both premiered in 2018.  I may be mixing them up.

Episode 2.3 of Dirty John: Betty Broderick (2020), a true-crime show about the woman who murdered her ex-husband (Christian Slater) and his new wife in 1989.  "Betty takes a desperate step to save her marriage."

Episode 1.1 of The Irrational (2023): A professor (Jesse L. Martin, left) uses his knowledge of human nature to solve murders.  His roommate and best friend is a queer woman.

Caleb's character is a former Marine suffering from PTSD and alcohol abuse.  Figures.

Dude, try a comedy.  They aren't that bad.

More after the break.  

"The Summer I Turned Pretty," Season 2: As God is my witness, I heard Spike say he was dating a boy

 

I reviewed The Summer I Turned Pretty last summer, and said it had a lot of gay potential.  The second season just dropped on Amazon Prime, so I'll see if any of that potential was realized.  The premise: a poor girl (actually upper-upper middle classt and her famous-writer mother spend the summer with Mom's ultra-rich ex-girlfriend and her two hot teenage sons, both of whom are in love with her.  

Season One Recap: Not promising.  I lost track of the number of boy-girl smooches.  It looks like both brothers and a third guy are in love with her.  For a girl named "Belly," she gets a lot of action. The only other plot point appears to be either Mom or her ex-girlfriend dying of cancer.  

Scene 1: It's the second summer that Belly's been pretty.  She lounges by the pool, the two brothers.  Psych!  It was a daydream!  She's actually in class, she's broken up with Conrad, and the lady with cancer has died.  "Escaping to your dreams is easier than living with your memories," she muses. But not to worry, Corey (Louis Tomeo, left), the hot guy who sits in front of her picked this moment to flirt. Except we never see him again.  He's just there to signify that everyone is intensely attracted to Belly.

Switch to Belly smooching with Conrad (Christopher Briney, top photo), the first of the brothers  "This almost doesn't seem real."  Psych!  This one isn't a dream -- it's a memory from last summer.  

The memory continues:  Conrad tells her how much he loves her, Belly drops a bombshell: "Your brother and I have been dating, too.  He's got a bigger cock than you, but you are better looking.  I don't know which to choose."  Ok, I may have edited the dialogue slightly. 

Conrad talks her into breaking up with Cock Boy.  They sneak into the house and talk to Cancer Mom, who is delighted to see that her son is heterosexual.  They grin and giggle for a long time, enjoying their shared heterosexual privilege. 

Scene 2: Back in the present, the teacher dismisses the class for the summer.  Despondent, Belly starts unloading her locker.  A clump of girls tries to talk  her into volleyball camp, and Steven (Sean Kaufman, left) whoops and hollers about going to Princeton in the fall.  He just found out now?  

His friend, a long-haired boy named Spike (Colby Burton),  rushes up, exuberant about the upcoming graduation party: "I'm dating the singer."  One of the girls complains that his boyfriend is a  "Machine Gun Kelly wannabe." 

Since when do 1930s gangsters sing?  Oh, he's actually an alternative rock/hip hop singer. So unless I misunderstood the dialogue, Spike is dating a boy.

Next Belly's counselor tells her that  her grades took a nosedive, and she dropped out of volleyball, so her chances of getting into a good college are nil.  That's not true.  I got a D in chemistry and still got into a...um...college.  "Have you thought of Finch Blockhead Academy?  They let in anyone with money."

More Cock Boy after the break

"The Tender Bar": Gay Tease Hides a Homophobic Exterior

 

Speaking of gay teases, The Tender Bar, on Amazon Prime,claims to be about a man works on his professional and romantic life at his uncle's bar, while the 5-second long icon trailer displays two guys crusiing each other at said bar.  Obviously the man is gay, right?  

I was a little suspicious, so I did some background research.

Wikipedia doesn't give a plot synopsis, but it does list Ben Affleck as the star -- although his relationship with Matt Damon led to a lot of speculation that he was gay during the 1980s, he's actually homophobic.  Back in 1997, he said "A man kissing another man is the greatest challenge an actor can face."  I assume he meant heterosexual male actor.  So kissing a guy is much more challenging than acting in scenes where, say, you are raped or murdered.  

What if a hetero man has to kiss a woman he's not attracted to?  Wouldn't that be a challenge, too?  

Another star is Tye Sheridan, who I thought played Phil Dunphy on Modern Family, but that's Ty Burrell. Tye Sheridan played Cyclops in X-Men: Apocalypse.  Is Cyclops the one who developed a brief gay-subtext romance before his boyfriend was exploded?  No, that's Banshee.

Google Images claims that this is Tye Sheridan, but when you click on the link, it turns out to be Ben Hardy.  So I give up.

I watched the full trailer on IMDB:

1. Sometime in the 1940s or 1950s, a woman with an Andrews Sisters hairstyle and a 1940s-style car takes her son to live with a crotchety old man.  She tells her son: "You're going to law school," although he's only about ten.  He starts hanging out in the bar.  

2. Heterosexist moment: A bartender asks a patron, "Which sister?  The hot one or the crazy one?"  So it's not a gay bar.   Of course, it wouldn't be in the 1940s, at least not openly.

3. Another guy, maybe the Uncle, takes the boy in, shows him some books, and encourages him to become a writer. He starts banging away on an old Selectric.  (invented in 1961, so Mom must have dropped him off in the late 1950s; she just dressed 10 years out of date).  

 4. Uncle also gives the boy life advice, like: "Never hit a woman." So he's heterosexual, and he assumes the kid is, too, and the trailer wants us to be very certain of that.

5. The boy, all grown up, is entering Yale, class of 1986.  So he graduated high school in 1982.  But if he was 10 in 1959, he'd be going to college in 1967.  So Mom must have dropped him off around 1974.  Why the 1940s costume?  She must be the crazy one, not the hot one.    

6. He  meets a girl, and they have sex (by minute 1.33).  I don't need to watch anymore.

Out gay actor Ivan Leung has a handful of lines as Jimmy, the boy's classmate at Yale, but I doubt that his character is gay.  

All in all, a tease.  The two guys at the bar are apparently Uncle and Boy, just pretending that they are into each other.

And why is the bar tender?  I keep thinking Tender Trap, a 1955 movie about a man who accidentally proposes to two women at the same time.  I read an article specifically entitled "What is the meaning of The Tender Bar title?", but it just said that the boy liked it.

It's based upon a "memoir" by J. R. Moehringer, who, like every writer, debotes his first book to the story of a young man who wants to become a writer (it sounds claustrophobic, but they all do it).  

The word "gay" does not appear in the novel, but in one scene, Uncle Charlie tells a patron that if he finds Sigourney Weaver attractive, he must be "a homosexual."  Huh?  But she's a woman.  

So the memoir is homophobic.  

By the way, Moehringer was born in 1964, so Mom actually did drop him off at Grandpa's in 1974.  She just like to dress like the Andrews Sisters.

"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.