Gemstones Episode 2.2: Kelvin clenches, Keefe dances, and everybody flirts with Eli. With a n*de Texas dude bonus.

 

Previous: Episode 2.1 Review, Continued: Keefe's kiss, Kelvin's b*ner, and a thug with broken thumbs

In Episode 2.1, while we establish the Kelvin/Keefe, Judy/BJ, and Jesse/Amber conflicts of the season, Eli's old friend Junior stops by, and acts very much like an ex-lover.  They go out to dinner and beat up a tough.  Now we see the aftermath.

Link to NSFW version

Eli Gemstone indicted! Thaniel Block sits on the porch of his rental house in the South Carolina woods, reading some news stories from 1993: Gemstone Family Studios to close due to "a financial and rumors of  sexual scandals," with $4 million missing.  Another article: "Eli Gemstone indicted on charges of fraud and conspiracy." But Episode 2.5 takes place at Christmas 1993.  When did all this happen? Geezer Tim drops by to criticize him for living in New York and having a "nasty attitude." 

A Hot Piece of Tail: Judy and BJ visit Eli to ask him to officiate in BJ's baptism.  They find him asleep on the couch in the parlor. Junior enters and asks "Who's this hot piece of tail?"  He's actually looking at BJ, but Eli assumes that he means Judy and says that she is his daughter.  He apologizes and asks if BJ is her lesbian partner. BJ starts to answer, but Judy cuts him off.

There are several takeaways here.  First, Eli and Junior did not sleep together; Eli fell asleep on the couch. Weren't there any guest rooms in his mansion? 

Second, check out Junior's magenta bathrobe, jaunty hand on him, and pinky ring: he is deliberately presenting as queer.   

Third, Eli may have mentioned that one of his children is gay, and Junior forgot which.

Execretions and Hep C Loads:  After Junior heads to the kitchen to make coffee, Judy wants to know what's going on.  Eli tells her that "things got a little carried away last night," which she interprets to mean that they are having rough s*x.  He grimaces in disgust, but plays along to mess with her.  

Her main criticism is that Junior is unattractive: "I always hoped that if you were gonna yank a pole, it would be someone hot."  So Judy has considered the possibility that Eli is bisexual for a long time. 

She states that the "hookup" signifies that Eli doesn't care about his family.  Remember that Jesse likewise complains that Kelvin "popping boners" with the muscle men is "selfish, not helping the family."  But it's not just gay s*x; on this show, having a partner of any sort is framed as a betrayal.  The family is aghast when Judy wants to move off the Compound with BJ; Baby Billy is still hurt over his sister Aimee-Leigh "leaving him" to marry Eli.  

As they storm out, Judy cautions BJ to not touch anything, as there are probably execretions and Hep C loads everywhere.  This is a call back to Abraham leaving his semen everywhere in Jesse's house, plus an awareness that Hepatitus C can easily spread through s*x, so it is particularly common in gay communities.

Good Sniffer Seats: After they leave, Eli joins Junior on the back patio, overlooking the reflecting pool that leads to Aimee-Leigh's shrine.  Eli invites him to church, but he worries about the cost.  Junior avers that he's been to enough strip joints to know that you have to pay for the "good sniffer seats."  I can't find the term "sniffer seat" defined anywhere, but I guess that it's a seat close enough to the stage to smell the performers.  There are male clubs, but he's probably referencing a lady's club, being a hetero horn dog, backing off from the implication of gay activity. 

But not entirely: Eli offers to reserve a good seat for him, and the guys hold hands!

On closer examination, it turns out to be a man and a woman holding hands. We have cut to a scene involving Jesse and Amber's marital advice group. But it is so abrupt that the misdirection must be intentional.  The man is even wearing a shirt the same color as Junior's robe.

After the group meeting, Matthew and Chad ask why Jesse's old crew isn't hanging out together anymore.  This is all marital stuff, heterosexual nuclear family stuff; what happened to the band of brothers, savage and free?  Gregory explains; "I love you guys, but happy wife, happy life."

This is becoming an ongoing question in this season: how do you balance phileo and eros, the fraternal love of family and friends and  desire that creates husbands, wives, and lovers?  The Bible says that we must abandon phileo for eros, "leave their father and mother and cleave to their husband or wife."  Kelvin is trying to combine the fraternal and the erotic by forbidding romance. BJ is trying to negotiate both.

You Got a Hound Dog Here: Cut to Thaniel visiting the Salvation Center, where he admits that he has s*xual-scandal dirt on Aimee-Leigh, gathered from household staff.  Well, at least Kelvin is off the hook.

The World's Most Famous Christian: Next, Jesse and Amber visit the Lissons in Texas for a party to celebrate the proposed Zion's Landing resort. Joe Jonas, the World's Most Famous Christian, leads everyone in a line dance.  He proclaims his heterosexuality, singing about the "beautiful girls" he's been with while wearing a formless leopard robe and pink bandana, the antithesis of Kelvin's tiger jacket and club bulge. Desire for women un-mans a man, renderng him soft and sickly; only in the manly love of comrades can a man be strong and free.

More after the break

Revisiting "Eerie, Indiana"

 

I have fond memories of Eerie, Indiana (1991-1992), although I'm not sure how many episodes I actually saw.  Maybe just one: it aired on NBC on Sunday nights, against a block of must-see sitcoms on Fox: Parker Lewis Can't Lose, Herman's Head, and Married...with Children.  

What I remember is: teenagers Marshall Teller (Omri Katz) and Simon Holmes (Justin Shenkerow) are gay-subtext buddies who investigate humorous paranormal mysteries:  a mother uses magical tupperware to keep her sons from aging for 30 years; a boy they are babysitting gets trapped in a old horror movie on tv; an ATM machine becomes sentient and showers Simon with money.  The mysterious Dash X (Jason Marsden) seems to be the key to the ongoing mystery, but the series ends before it is resolved.

Omri Katz (top photo) went on to star in the Halloween classic Hocus Pocus (1993) and the gay-themed Journey into Night (2002) before retiring from acting.  I assume he's gay in real life.  

Justin Shenkarow went on to star in Picket Fences (1992-1996), and  do lot of voice work.  This is the only beefcake photo I could find on his Instagram.  There are also about 1,000 photos of him and his mother and none of anyone else, so I assume that he's gay in real life, too.

Bob and I have recently been watching/re-watching Eerie, Indiana, and it's completely different from what I remember.

1.  Marshall is hetero-horny.  It seems like he gets all dopey over a girl every other episode.

2.  Marshall gets all dopey over a boy in every other episode, too.  Simon just sits and smiles while Marshall dumps him for the teen hunk du jour:  Gabrial Damon, Cory Danzinger, Tobey Maguire, Scott Weinger, and finally Jason Marsden.  At the end of the episode, when the boy dies, gets zapped into an alternate reality, or just vanishes from the narrative, Simon quietly takes him back.

But when Simon dumps Marshall for a pair of older boys, Marshall gets jealous and tells himself  "This isn't like Simon!  He must be brainwashed!"

3. The tone shifts from humorous to somber at the drop of an episode.  People die, quite often.  A boy is being abused by his father..  A girl is homeless.  A man is mentally ill.  When you tune in, you never know if you're going to get a sitcom or an After School Special.

4. Marshall's 17-year old sister Syndi (Julie Condry) seems to be in another series.  We keep getting snippets of telephone conversations or off-hand comments about things going on in her life, but nothing is ever developed.  In her only B-plot, she thinks that she might want to become a police officer, but her surprisingly old-fashioned parents nix the idea: too dangerous for a girl.  So she changes to firefighter.

5. Marshall's parents (Mary-Margaret Humes, Francis Guinan) are absurdly wacky, authoritarian, or caring and hugging, depending on the needs of the episode, but at least Francis Guinan is cute.  He has 88 film/tv credits on IMDB, and has done a lot of live theater in Chicago, including some plays with gay themes.

He's one of the older guys in a bathrobe in this shot from the stage play Penelope.

Eerie, Indiana is not the show I remember from 1991.  It has even more gay texts and subtexts.

See also: Eerie, Indiana: Omri Katz, Paranormal Investigator

Sacha Carlson: Girl, boy, or nonbinary? Gay, ally, or homophobe? The answer will shock you. WIth Gillespie backside and Sacha d*ck

Link to the n*de photos 

When this cute guy appeared on the teen idol website, I clicked on the photo to find out if he's an actor who could rate a profile.  But it turned out to be a collection of photos of his girlfriend (right), Sacha Carlson.

I went through it anyway, hoping to see the cute guy again.   

Wait -- Sacha has some 5-o'clock shadow here.  Maybe they're transitioning?

A shirtless shot, with muscles and chest hair.  This person has a male-coded physique and a woman's face.  Maybe they're nonbinary?

Nope.  They don't give their pronouns on ther Instagram page, but Wikipedia and the IMDB say he/him. Sacha is a femme boy. 

A femme boy who is into girls, as the many, many girl-hugging and kissing photos on his Instagram suggest.

And his song lyrics (he's mostly a singer):

I get lost in the thought of her lovin'

Weak in the knees all of the sudden

I want more

But there's one thing you gotta know

I'm gonna drive you like Cadillac.

Hey, that's not family-friendly!

No reason why straight guys can't be femme, but doubtless everyone Sacha meets, including casting agents, will assume that he's gay, so he will be offered a lot of gay parts.

Other than music videos, Sacha has five acting credits listed on the IMDB:

Two episodes of American Housewife (2018):  his character not listed in the plot synopsis, but he's probably a student at the ballet academy that gay-vague Oliver (Daniel DiMaggio) is hoping to be admitted to.

Julie and the Phantoms (2020), about a teenage girl who forms a band with the ghosts of three teenage musicians who died from eating bad hot dogs in the 1990s: Luke (Charlie Gillespie, backside on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends), Reggie (Jeremy Shada), and Alex (Owen Joyner).

Alex is gay, and fully accepted by his bandmates.  He starts a relationship with Willie  (Booboo Stewart), the ghost of a boy who died in a skateboarding accident. 

Sacha plays Nick, a (living) femme boy who Julie is crushing on. 

A 2022 episode of 9-1-1 Lone Star.  Sacha's character doesn't appear in the plot synopsis, but there's a wrestling match and a road-rage incident, so he must be involved in one of those.

Everything I Ever Wanted (2025): It's the Girl of His Dreams.

More after the break.  What comes next will shock you, as the clickbaiters say.

Harry Potter's private file: The top 12 n*de, beefcake, and gay-subtext performances of Daniel Radcliffe

Link to the n*de photos

You know that the last of the Harry Potter movies was released nearly 15 years ago.

You haven't returned to them because the world is so complex and self-referential, and because there are a lot of problems that you didn't notice as a kid.  Antisemitic-stereotype Goblins?  Slaves who enjoy their slavery?  A headmaster who is gay, but we can never mention it on screen?  

But you still think of Daniel Radcliffe as David Copperfield...um, I mean the Boy Who Lived, and emerged from Under the Staircase to enrolle at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. 

As of this writing, Daniel Radcliffe is 36 years old, with 49 acting credits.  Most move him far away from Hogwarts, to worlds where gay people -- and male body parts -- exist.  Here are his top 10 n*de, beefcake, and gay-subtext performances:

1. Merrily We Roll Along (2025), which is not about the theme song to the Looney Tunes.  It's about two heterosexual chums in love with the same girl.  I haven't seen it.

2. Now You See Me, Now You Don't (2025) brings the Horsemen out of retirement for a diamond heist (are we expected to know who the Horsemen are?). Daniel plays the villain.  I haven't seen it, but I think he's straighr-by-default. 

3. The Lost City (2022) sounds like a remake of Romancing the Stone, with romance novelist Loretta kidnapped in the jungle.  It's up to her cover model/Love Interest (Channing Tatum) to rescue her.  We see his backside, but only so Loretta can pick leeches off it.  Daniel plays the (presumably straight) villain.

4. Weird: The Al Yankovic Story (2022) is a biopic of the parody song performer.  Entirely heteronormative -- dude even dates Madonna, which didn't happen in real life.  I liked this scene:

Al: "Welcome to my house.  Would you like a tour?"

Madonna: "There's only one room in this house that I'm interested in."

Al: "Oh, there's a bathroom down the hall."

5. The Jungle (2017): in 1981, the Israeli backpacker Yossi Ghinsberg and his buddies set out to search for a lost city in the Bolivian jungle.  But the jungle has other ideas.

I haven't seen it, but keyword searches don't reveal any gay subtexts.

6. Guns Akimbo (2019) was too heteronormative: a mild-mannered video game geek unwittingly signs up for a game where you fight to the death in real time. His opponent/Love Interest is a lady.  Come on, dude, you've only played one "openly gay" character.  Get with the allyship.

But we see Daniel's prosthetic d*ck missing the toilet.

More after the break

"Playdate": Paul Blart plays with Reacher, his gay son with a mysterious super-strong boy. With plot holes...um, I mean plot twists, sci-fi, and teenage romance

I was born at the tail end of the Baby Boom, when 77 million people were growing up in the U.S., so I could just walk outside and find nine or ten boys my own age to play with.  But today there are fewer kids, they live farther away, and parents are worried that if you go outside by yourself, you'll be grabbed by human traffickers or serial killers, so they arrange for you and a kid you barely know to go on a scheduled and heavily supervised "play date."     

When a movie called Playdate (2025) dropped on Amazon Prime, I checked the promo -- two dads, one of them Reacher (Alan Ritchson), and two boys.  There had to be some gay-subtext buddy-bonds in there!   

Scene 1: Ugh, the other Dad is Kevin James, star of Paul Blart Mall Cop, The King of Queens, and other mishegas that I've never seen but understand to be heterosexist, homophobic, and dumber than Adam Sandler.  He plays lacrosse coach Brian, who puts his kid Lucas (Benjamin Pajak) into the game even though he's terrible and the other members hate him.  That's called nepotism, buddy.

Blart convinces Lucas that he'll make a good play, walk across the field in slow motion as his teammates cheer, and impress girls.  Meeting/ impressing/ winning girls as the only reason boys do anything, established at minute 2.3.

"I love you, Dad!" Lucas exclaims, but the homophobic Blart shushes him.  You must never admit that same-sex love exists, not even the familial love of a parent and child.  The proper expression is "I like you."

Lucas makes the play, but tries to walk across the field in slow motion, and the opposing team clobbers him.  His teammates all hate him.  Also, he's severely injured.

Scene 2: Mom suggests that maybe Lucas isn't cut out for sports.  "No!" Blart exclaims.  "He is a boy!  All boys are cut out for sports!  By the way, what's taking him so long in the bathroom?"

He's being assaulted by a gang of bullies.  Blart breaks it up, threatens to "kick the ass" of the head bully, then worries that his son thinks he's a coward for not going through with it.  If you beat up a 14-year old kid, you'd have more than that to worry about.

Lucas notes that he's used to the assault; it happens every day.  Mom is horrified, and suggests calling the Principal, but Blart says the parents can't intervene.  What is this, 1982?  He has to get to work, but when he returns, they will figure something out.

Scene 3: At work, Frat Executive (Kurt Long), Insanely Handsome Frat Executive (Luke Greenfield), and Sorority Executive are cheering at a nature show, as a leopard kills an antelope. Boss Trent (Miles Fisher) calls Blart in and tells him to fix the numbers in that account.  "But that would be fraud!"  "Ok, you're fired."  Wait -- we were introduced to all these characters for one scene?  They won't appear again?

At home that night, Lucas is dancing for his parents. Mom says "Shake it, girl!"  Blart is not happy; if the kid doesn't drop the sissy act, people might think he's gay or something.  This guy is a total homophobe, and the year appears to be 1982.

Scene 4: Blart  takes Lucas to the park to force his inner manliness with a game of football.  He spies the super-buffed, effervescent Reacher,  with biceps the size of cannonballs, playing "lob football at the speed of sound" with his son, who looks like he can bench press his school.  

Reacher talks Blart into a one-on-one and tackles him, resulting in gay panic.  Meanwhile, CJ loves Lucas's hoodie and dance moves, and invites him home to see a tree that looks like Mark Ruffalo. Blart is scared of these people, but Reacher talks him into it. 

Something is wrong here.  Reacher is over-eager to be Blart's friend. His son CJ keeps glaring at him, and when he moves in for a hug, goes ballistic, punching, kicking, and biting. Is he being kidnapped?

Scene 5: They arrive at the house. Reacher hugs Blart tightly.  Lucas: "Isn't Reacher super-strong and cool, and look how big he is?"  Don't you hate it when your boyfriend is more interested in your Dad?

While Lucas and CJ are in the back yard smooching...I mean, dancing...Reacher gets even more creepy.  He mentions a dead wife nonchalantly, but doesn't remember her name.  Or what CJ stands for. 

They go to lunch at Buckee Cheese's, where bad guys attack. Reacher manages to subdue them, but when they rush to the car and drive away, six or seven carloads of assassins give chase. 

More after the break

Shayne Topp: Nickelodeon teen, Barry's buddy, bodybuilder, sketch comedian who pretends to be gay and huge down there. We'll see.

  

Link to the n*de photos

The Goldbergs (2017-23) was a nostalgic look at showrunner Adam F. Goldberg's childhood experiences in the 1980s, with Sean Giambrone as a stand-in for Adam.  I wasn't a fan: most of the experiences involved attempts to meet, impress, or win The Girl of His Dreams.  But it aired in the same block with Speechless and Modern Family, in the days before we went to all-streaming services, so we had no choice but to watch.  

I liked Adam's older brother Barry (Troy Gentile), a muscular wrestler, and in Season 2, the gay-vague hippie-chill Matt (Shayne Topp), who struggles become his friend and join the Jenkintown Posse.  As far as I remember, he never displayed any heterosexual interest, and he had a queer-coded attraction to Barry.

Plus he was exceptionally cute,  and at 5'7", he was a member of the Short Guy Brigade.  Who could ask for anything more of actor Shayne Topp?

How about a muscular physique?

And other parts of interest.

Into tie-up games.

And a reader.

Born in 1991 in Florida, Shayne  played the unrequited crush of a Yu'pik girl in Dear Lemon Lima (2009).  He was a regular in the teen variety show So Random (2011-12), and appeared in episodes of ICarly, Henry Danger, Sam & Cat, and Fred: The Show.  He also did some fashion and n*de modeling, but he is best known as a sketch comedian.

More after the break. Caution: Explicit.

Gemstones Episode 2.1, Continued: Keefe kisses, Kelvin erects, and Eli breaks a twink's thumbs

 

Link to the n*de guys

In the last scene, Keefe is excluded from Sunday dinner with the family.  Now we see what he missed:

Judy and BJ accused of betraying the family because they got married at Disney World (by Prince Eric, the "hottest guy in the Disney catalog"), and because they don't have kids.  Judy argues that she's trying to keep her body "foine" to incite BJ's desire.  Nope, they need to make babies. The job/house/wife/ kids litany again.

There's also a jab at Kelvin's muscle obsession. It's not just homoerotic desire: Jesse thinks that desire of any sort is inconsistent with family.  

Left: Jonah Hauer-King, who played Prince Eric in the Litle Mermaid movie.

More Disruptions: We cut to Eli playing croquet, gazing at women, and flirting with a lady.  Suddenly Junior, his friend from his wrestling days, appears amid sinister music!   Eli ignores him and drives away.  A disruption of Eli's heterosexual dalliance, parallel to the God Squad disrupting the nuclear family procession earlier. 

My Mans:  The family flies to Florida to inspect the site of the Lyssons' proposed resort.   When they return, Keefe and the God Squad meet them at their private airfield.  The family is shocked: didn't they know about the God Squad? 

"Uh-oh, my mans!" Kelvin exclaims, rushing forward to tell Keefe "You are looking great!"  In Southern Coastal grammar, "mans" is singular, "mens" plural.  He means Keefe.

Keefe tries to move in for a kiss, but Kelvin blocks him with an awkward hug.  He tries again, and Kelvin blocks him again. Finally he makes a blatant "enough!" gesture and backs off.  Judy finds this little dance hilarious.   It reflects the couple's conflict this season: Keefe wants to join the family as Kelvin's partner, the equivalent of BJ, sitting at the dinner table being criticized, while Kelvin isn't sure that same-sex romance is even possible.  His muscle cult is about desire: no love allowed. 

We cut to Eli in his office, watching a tv news show: Thaniel Block being interviewed about the "salacious scandal" story that took down Pastor Butterfield.  How famous was this guy?  I thought he was just the anonymous pastor of a satellite church.  They preach "s*x only between married heterosexual partners, or you're going to hell," but privately they do everything under the sun.  Who will he target next?   Maybe Kelvin-- "Secretly gay youth minister and his stable of muscle boys."  Ulp.   

More after the break

Captain Tootsie

Captain Tootsie is one of the more interesting  superheroes of the Golden Age of Comics.  Debuting in 1943,  he sold Tootsie Rolls, those brown sugar-corn syrup concoctions, which gave him the "quick energy" to save the day.  His half-page adventures appeared in hundreds of comics, from Action Comics and Captain Marvel to A Date with Judy to Man. 

Captain Tootsie Battles Monster Man!
Captain Tootsie Tames a Tornado!
Captain Tootsie Traps Killer Bear with Invisible Light!
Captain Tootsie and the Return of Dr. Narsty!

Sometimes his adventures were a bit less urgent:

Captain Tootsie Saves School Party!
Captain Tootsie at the Winter Carnival!

 

Here he saves the world from Dr. Narsty, who has stolen a kid's toy cannon.  Hootin' Zoots! 

Captain Tootsie was drawn as a very muscular blond in a red shirt, yellow belt, and blue pants, which didn't look anything like the familiar brown-and-white tootsie roll.

His most frequent sidekick was Rollo ("roll-o", get it?), a miniature version of himself with blond hair, a red shirt, and pecs.

Sometimes he also hung out with Fisty, a petite black-haired boy wearing a suit; and Fatso, who had curly orange hair and wasn't very fat by today's standards.


More after the break

Lemogang Tsipa: a gay Trojan, a warlord from Atlantis, and Shaka Zulu. With c*cks, circumcision, and Matthew McConaughey

 

Link to the n*de photos

I wanted to profile Lemogang Tsipa because he has an unusual name, which I keep confusing with Lemongrab from Adventure Time (it actually means "Recognition" in Tswana).

And because his character had a bisexual three-way (and kissed a dude) in Troy: Fall of a City, so maybe he is gay or bi in real life.  

Plus he is super-handsome.

Basic bio: Lemogang was born in 1991 in Empangani, South Africa (about two hours from Durban). His father is Pedi and his mother Tswana, so he grew up multilingual, fluent in English, Afrikaans, Xhosa, Zulu, and Tswana.

At age nine, he was diagnosed with ADHD, but he was able to channel his energy into chess, swimming, soccer, hockey -- and dramatics.  He graduated from Grantleigh College,  a boarding school in Richards Bay, and the South African School of Motion Picture Medium (BFA, 2012).

Lemogang's film debut came in the South African Felix (2013), and his first international film was Alien Outpost (2014), about the aftermath of an alien invasion.

More international film roles followed: 

He played Addo in the contemporary adaption of Roots (2016), with Malachi Kirby as Kunta Kinte and Rege-Jean Page (left) as Chicken George

Phedon in the Stephen King fantasy The Dark Tower (2017), starring Idris Elba and Matthew McConaughey (left, n*de on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends)

Patroklus, lover of Achilles, in Troy: Fall of a City (2017).

 

But most of Lemogang's work has been in South Africa:

Amandla (2022), featuring two brothers (Lemogang, Thabo Rametsi) on opposite sides of the law.

Blood Psalms (2022) is set 11,000 years ago, shortly after the House of Kemet fled the destruction of Atlantis and settled in Africa.   While the Five Tribes gather to celebrate the politically-motivated wedding of King Letsha (Mothusi Magano), his daughter, Princess Zazi, becomes pregnant with a baby whose birth will fortell the End of Days.

There are also various scheming pretenders to the throne, sorcerers, orphans with disputed parentage, and hangers-on hiding terrible secrets. 

More after the break.

Daniel DeSanto: The gay kid in the Midnight Society, a Mean Girl, a Sicilian assassin, a short guy with a big ___. Who cares if he's straight?

  

Link to the n*de photos

Submitted for your approval: Nickelodeon's Are You Afraid of the Dark (1992-1996), an anthology of ghost and horror stories told by -- and evaluated by -- a group of teenagers called the Midnight Society.  

It aired at 5:30 pm on weeknights and 9:30 pm on Saturday night, so I didn't watch often, but I recall a few episodes. 

"The Tale of the Water Demon": Tony Sampson steals a gold watch, which draws the wrath of the water demon and threatens his gay-subtext buddy, Charlie Hofheimer

"The Tale of the Zombie Dice":  Jay Baruchel fights a video arcade owner who is shrinking teens and selling them as pets.

"The Tale of the Phantom Cab": While lost in the woods, Jason Tremblay (no relation to Jason Tremblay) stumbles upon a monstrous being who keeps teenagers captive unless they can solve a riddle.

And I recall three of the teen actors who appeared in the frame sections, squabbling, flirting, forming alliances:

Bookish intellectual Gary (Ross Hull, left), the leader.

Frank (Jason Alisharan) the leather-jacket bad boy

Prank-loving, irreverent Tucker (Daniel DeSanto, right), Frank's younger brother, who joins the Midnight Society in Season 3, and stays through the series finale.  He becomes the leader of the Midnight Society in the revival series (1999-2000).

You're probably expecting a profile of Ross Hull, who is gay in real life, and rather built; but Gary turned me off by crushing on Sam (a girl) and eventually dating her.  

Frank competed for Sam's affections, too. 

But Tucker never expressed any heterosexual interest; indeed, he seemed to have a "he's arrogant!" love-hate attraction to Frank. 

He pushes to get his friend Stig (Codie Wilbie) to be admitted to the group in Season 6.  In the revival series, he and his friend Quinn (Kareem Blackwell) found the new Midnight Society together.    

Plus his stories are about friendships that are threatened, or grow stronger, through paranormal peril.  A lot of gay coding for Nickelodeon in the 1990s.

I didn't follow any of Daniel's post-Dark works. Somehow I had the impression that he played Elaine's boyfriend Jake on Seinfeld (a recovering alcohol, he goes off the wagon due to Jerry's negligence, and seeks revenge).  But the episode aired in 1991, when Daniel was 11 years old.  Jake was actually played by David Naughton. 

When I was reviewing an episode of 100 Things to Do Before High School for my profile of Max Ehrich, I thought I saw him playing Mr. Roberts, the guidance counselor, but that's Jack De Sena

Our Daniel, a Toronto native, was a busy child and teen actor, specializing in horror for obvious reasons:

Gabe, who visits Egypt with his uncle and uncovers a mummy's curse in two episodes of Goosebumps (1995).

Theo in two episodes of The New Ghostwriter Mysteries (1997): he helps the gang and the ghost foil a corrupt cop, and later, thieves who target seemingly worthless items.

Zeke, a teenage theater employee who helps Taylor Handley foil The Phantom of the Megaplex (2000).  

More after the break

"Rock Paper Scissors": Paper meets The Girl, Rock tries to prove that he's a Dave. With 2 gay characters, four Danny d*cks, and Mickey from "Seinfeld"

  

Link to the n*de dudes

"Rock Paper Scissors" is a game where players turn their hands into the objects, hoping that theirs will cover, crush or otherwise defeat their opponents.  Here Kramer and  his gay-subtext boyfriend Mickey (Michael Richards, Danny Woodburn) play on an episode of Seinfeld.

Danny's d*ck and four others are posted to  RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

When Paramount Plus recommended a tv series called Rock Paper Scissors, I figured it was for preschoolers, like Bananas in Pajamas.  But the fan wiki states that there are two walk-on gay characters, Hipponoid Commander (Episodes 1.1) and Dave (Episode 1.14), and Common Sense Media (the homophobic one) says that it is "completely inappropriate," with "strong LGBT undertones."  Can't let gay kids know that they exist!  So we'll check it out.

Episode 1.1, "Paper's Big Lie"

Intellectual Paper (Thomas Lennon), trying to invent something, is annoyed by the loud ninja practice of his roommates, athletic Rock (Ron Funches) and hipster Scissors (Carlos Alarazqui).  There's a knock on the door: it's their new neighbor, a female Pencil.

Cliche shot of Pencil walking in slow motion, her long hair blowing in the wind, while Paper gushes in "girl of my dreams" ecstasy.

She works for a high-tech company, so he pretends that he has a high-tech job, too.  His brain objects: "You work at a crappy store that sells technology."  But his nether parts outrank his brain.

Even when Pencil asks for a tour: Paper puts up a poorly drawn sign and claims that she can't go inside because they're working on a top-secret device that will produce unlimited food out of nothing. 

The human boss yells: "I don't pay you to talk to girls, I pay you to unravel the pile of wires in the back room."

Left: Threads says that this is Carlos Alarazqui, best known for "Rocko's Modern Life" and "Reno 911." I don't think so.

This makes Pencil a bit suspicious, but not the President of the United States: she saw the sign and figured that Paper must be super-smart.  The world needs his help. Lady is not too bright, is she?

Problem: The Hipponoids, "the most dangerous species in the galaxy," have the Earth surrounded.  The  Commander (Darin de Paul) explains that their planet is low on food, so Earth must hand over its supply. 

Perfect!  Pencil announces that Paper can make a device that will produce unlimited food, with no raw materials needed.

Paper's brain begs him to admit that he knows nothing about technology, but no, he thinks he can still find a way to fix this and Win the Girl.

In the workshop, Pencil praises Paper's tech expertise while building the device herself.  She seems to be just as invested as Paper in keeping up the Big Lie.  There must be some "Boy of My Dreams" going on.

When they show the device to the Hipponoid Comander, Paper tries to take credit, but accidentally breaks it.  He lies about that, too.

New plan: he'll bring his ninja roommates Rock and Scissors to the ship, and they'll knock out the aliens before they can invade the planet.

That doesn't work.  Finally Paper decides to come clean: "I was just trying to impress someone that I like, and the lie got out of control."

The Commander is sympathetic: back on the home world, he was an office drone, but he lied that he was  a great warrior to impress his crush.   Then he had to join the space force, and somehow he rose up in the ranks to become commander.

"There he is -- handsome, huh?"  He looks rather goofy, but Paper agrees.

"I've had to keep up this lie for 50 years!"  You'd better seal the deal soon, buddy. "And I can't invade Earth because then he'll find out that I lied, and never speak to me again."

Paper and the Commander find a solution that permits them to retain both lies: they pretend to use hand-to-hand combat to decide the fate of the Earth.  Paper wins, but "Your Commander is so tough that he 'accidentally' destroyed the device."

Whoops, Rock just fixed it. 

Gay Representation: The Commander as a muscular being fights stereotypes, and Paper responds nonchalantly to his crush on a male.  The writers could easily given him a crush on a female warrior, so this is a positive step.  But how about a scene where the Commander actually interacts with the crush? B

The next episode after the break

Weird Science, the movie and tv show: three gay-subtext couples, two gay-vague guys, and a lot of beefcake.

Link to the n*de dudes

Weird Science (1985) is a John Hughes brat pack comedy with a paranormal twist. Nerds Gary and Wyatt's (Anthony Michael Hall, Ilan-Mitchell Smith) are discouraged because the Girls of Their Dreams are dating a pair of belligerent, obnoxious preppies (Robert Downey Jr., Robert Rusler), and won't give them a chance.  So they use a computer to create their perfect dream girl, Lisa: she is not only attractive but super-smart, plus she has magical powers.

I forget most of the plot after 40 years, but wikipedia has helpfully filled in the details, Instead of dating them, Lisa conjures them a car, gets them fake ids, and hosts a wild party, where she thwarts their adversaries and their bullying older brother, military-school graduate Chet (Bill Paxton).

She also summons a pack of rabid bikers to kidnap the Girls, so Gary and Wyatt can mount a daring rescue and win them.

It was cheesy stuff, and entirely heteronormative.  There was a scattering of the incessant homophobia that one sees in every John Hughes movie, but spewed by the evil Chet, not by one of the good guys.  That was a big win in the era.  

Plus some strong gay subtexts between Gary and Wyatt and the prettyboy preppies Ian and Max.  And quite a surprising amount of beefcake

I wanted to do a "any gay roles/are they gay in real life" profile of one of the guys, but I can't find anything suitable.

Don't pay attention to the femme-half shirt and girly beneath-the-belt stuff.  Ilan-Mitchell Smith, now a history professor, is straight in real life.

Anthony Michael Hall, the darling of the Brat Pack, appeared in Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, and Johnny B Goode, and as an adult The Dead Zone and Awkward.  Straight characters, with maybe one exception, and straight in real life.

Brat Packer Robert Downey Jr. appeared in Back to School, The Pick-Up Artist, Johnny B. Goode, became famous for Chaplin (playing the silent-era comedian), and went on to play Iron Man and Sherlock Holmes.  More straight characters, with maybe one exception, and....well, you get the idea.

At least we know that Robert Rusler is a gay ally: he befriended his Nightmare on Elm Street 2 co-star Mark Patton, and took him to some of the gay bars in West Hollywood (no, we never met).  But his tv work, in The Outsiders, Babylon 5, Snoops, Murder She Wrote, Bones, Ray Donovan...as far as I can tell, all heteronormative.  And...straight in real life.

Let's try the Weird Science TV Series.

It aired on the USA Network from 1994 to 1998. I watched on occasion, usually while on the treadmill at the gym. Gary and Wyatt are now played by Michael Manasseri and John Mallory Asher. Lisa characterizes herself as a "magic genie," and Wyatt's parents are absent, leaving his older brother Chet (Lee Tergesen) to look after/bully them.  

The "winning the Girl of Our Dreams" plotline appeared in just the first two or three episodes; later Lisa turns the boys into girls, clones them,  turns them into rock stars, traps them in a horror movie, traps them in The Twilight Zone, transports them to the Old West, and brings a video game villain to life. 

More after the break