"The Prince": The actor claims that his flashy-femme prince is "just sensitive." See for yourself. With gay-subtext homies and Turkish d*cks

 

Link to the N*de Dudes

The Prince is unfortunately the title of about a dozen tv shows and movies, but the Turkish one (2023-25) stars Giray Altinok as the Prince of Bogonia, a fictional micro-kingdom somewhere in the Balkans during the Middle Ages.  The Prince (no other name because his father hates him) is so flashy-femme, and exhibits such a strong interest in men, that viewers began buzzing.  Altinok went on social media to clear up the "misunderstanding": The Prince isn't gay, he's just sensitive.  Funny, that's what my parents used to say about me.

Of course Altinok would claim that his character is straight: Turkey is the most homophobic country in Europe. It gets 4% on the Rainbow Map of LGBT legal status, while Russia gets 8%, and Poland 15%.  Let's take a look at Episode 1, and see how "not gay" the Prince is.

Scene 1: Establishing shot of Bogonia. Several n*de women, one chained up, snooze with semi-n*de guys (one bare backside shot).  Can you show n*de ladies on Turkish tv?   

A chained up man who has been cuddling with a man and a woman both awakens to a rap on the door, and yells at the Slave Köle (Canberk Gültekin, left).  Surprise -- he's the Prince!  Identified as bi in the first scene. Maybe Altinok meant "not gay, bi/pan."

 The King has summoned him.  "So what?"   "So what?" He returns to his orgy.

Scene 2: As everyone waits impatiently, the Prince bursts in.  He touches the cheek of one of the courtiers: "Come here, my black lamb."  He lectures against Turkish masculinity: to compete in the modern world, we need to be hugging and touching.  

The problem: The Hungarian army is at the border, and Bogonia doesn't have a big enough army to defeat them.  

"So, get help from our neighbors, like Bosnia?" "No, they all hate us."

Uncle Kalish (Serdar Orçin) suggests just surrendering and paying the tribute.  "No, we'd lose our proud history." "But this country is only twenty years old!"  This enrages the Prince's Older Brother Tenyo (Çagdas Onur Öztürk),  who threatens to kill Uncle Kalish for treason.

King to Older Brother: "I'm lucky to have you as a son.  Without you, my name would die with me."  So the Prince isn't going to have any kids.  Maybe he is gay, not bi. 

They decide to fight the Hungarians.  Older Brother gets the horses ready for their 50 soldiers.

Scene 3: The King meets with the Prince in private: "Everyone has some regrets in life.  Mine is you.  I can't find the words to describe my hatred of you." You're just homophobic, Dad.

The King orders Slave Kole to bring his Very Important Sword  to the Blacksmith to get the handle fixed. "The Blacksmith is my oldest and dearest friend, and only he can fix my sword."  The Prince asks him to also fetch the "big ruby necklace" that the jeweler has for him.  Dude is into drag.

Whoops, the King decides to humiliate the Prince by making him take the sword in instead of the slave.

Scene 4: Older Brother Tenyo's Wife has just taken a home pregnancy test (the Medieval version).  Still not pregnant! He is not upset: "Don't obsess over it, it will happen in due time."  But the Queen has been putting pressure on her; she sent a gigantic crib, hint, hint.   Older Brother suggests trying again now.

Scene 5: The Prince and Slave Kole in the market.  He stops to look at some fabric.  Dude is gay.  A commoner complains that the people are starving while the royals live in luxury, "especially that Prince."  "Which one?" "The ugly one."  

Upset, the prince orders him executed.  Slave Kole suggest  they could give him a chance to apologize.  Nope, he's hanged.

Next stop: the Blacksmith, the only person who can fix the King's Very Important Sword.  Except he's the guy they just executed!

Scene 6: The Prince's Sister is practicing swordsmanship when her stepmother, the Queen, bursts in and throws her sword out the window.  "Act like a Princess!"  "No -- I don't want to be a princess!"

"Too bad -- I've arranged for you to marry the Duke of Saxony!"   

"What?  No!  This is the modern world.  I want to be more than just a wife!"

Ok, the main conflicts are established: Older Brother can't get his wife pregnant, Sister wants to be a liberated woman, and the Prince is gay.

More after the break

Dan Shor: Tron, Star Trek, an Excellent Adventure, the South Pacific, and the Backside that Changed the World.

Link to the n*de dudes

Sometime during the days of Blockbuster Video, we rented Strange Behavior (1981), mainly because the cover blurb said something about Galesburg, Illinois, which is near the Quad Cities. 

We weren't aware that it was written by a gay man (Bill Condon), it stars a gay man (Dan Shor), and it features something that would change movies forever.

It's got a silly plot about a crazed college professor named Dr. Le Sange (Dr. Blood), who mind-controls the town teenagers into blood-crazed monsters.

No Galesburg sites are appear mentioned; Apparently they just picked a random town in the Midwest so there would be cornfields and stereotyped farm folk. It was actually filmed in New Zealand.

The focus character is named Pete Brady, which no doubt caused a lot of eye-rolls and derisive laughs in 1981: Viewers would instantly think of the kid from The Brady Bunch (Christopher Knight, who grew up into a muscle hunk.)

This photo teases a gay-subtext buddy bond between focus character Pete Brady (har har) and Oliver (Marc McClure), but the movie is actually heteronormative, with boy-girl romance all the way down.  

I'd rather date Marc McClure, loveable nerd Jimmy Olsen in Superman (1978).

 And Dan Shor, the guy who plays Pete, is not handsome. He's got a long face, a Romanesque nose, and a lantern jaw.

But none of that is important.

What's important is a scene early in the movie where Pete Brady (har har) and his father (not Mike Brady, darn it) have just gotten up in the morning.  Pete approaches him to discuss something.  N*de.  He then moves toward the shower.  We get an extended shot of his backside.

 

It wasn't the first n*de backside on film, but it was the first extended shot that wasn't for a comedic purpose.

There is no other n*dity, male or female, in the film, not even a shirtless shot.  What was the directorial decision to film Dan Shor that way?

In an interview, Dan said that it was a political act, an acknowledgement of gay potential in the homophobic 1980s. It disrupted the heterosexual male gaze and paved the way for movies to present images of male beauty.

"And it sealed my popularity in West Hollywood," Dan joked.  Or maybe he wasn't joking.

More after the break

Gemstones Episode 4.2: Baby Billy's d*ck, BJ's pole, Kelvin's pipe, and the Clobber Verses

Link to the NSFW version

Title: "You Hurled Me Into the Depths, Into the Very Heart of the Sea." Jonah 2.3: Jonah is in the belly of the great fish, praying for deliverance (not a whale -- there are no whales in the Mediterranean Sea).

Gemstone Roll Call: A gold-and-purple Baby Billy announces Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin in angel costumes.  The rest of the family joins them on stage for the Aimee-Leigh Birthday Give-A-Thon (in case you're interested, she was born on September 21, 1955).   Keefe does a high kick.  

The siblings appear in jetpacks, and rise up over the stage, but things go wrong and they crash.  Fortunately, it's just a rehearsal.

Baby Billy's D*ck:  In the dressing room, the siblings want to cut the jetpack bit, but Baby Billy insists: this is too important. So he's in charge now? And where the heck is Eli?   Somewhere in Florida. He won't answer their phone calls. 

Baby Billy then drops his trousers to flop his d*ck around: "This is what a real man looks like.  I booked all these people to the Give-a-Thon, so Eli has to be there!"   Fans were complaining that the stunt guy had no balls.  Who's looking for balls?

Eli Hooks Up:  Somewhere in Florida (actually the Keys), a grotesque long-haired Eli awakens on his boat, Nice Mussels, and cooks eggs for the lady he entertained last night.  She wants more of his "thick breakfast sausage" instead, but he explains that he is not ready for a relationship.  He's still trying to figure out what he wants.  Dude, you're 73.  Better hurry.  Besides, "I don't like you."  

She rushes off, but Eli struts down the dock, smoking a cigar, cruising the ladies.  Easter Egg: he has a cap from Adams College, a call-back to "Revenge of the Nerds"

Uh-oh, it's the siblings, for some reason dressed in their Cape and Pistol society costumes.  Judy has an unexplained bandaged hand.  They yell at Eli for drinking too much, and when they find a bra, hooking up with ladies.  "Am I supposed to be in mourning all my life?"  "Yes!"  They had the same argument with him in Season 2, when Junior arranged for a hookup with a lady.

He refuses to go to the telethon.  The siblings annoy him by saying "p*ssy" over and over, and making the tongue-through-fingers gesture, until he consents.  How does Kelvin know about that?

Time to set up the sibling conflicts for the season:

BJ's Pole:  BJ (not pictured) is in a pole dancing class otherwise occupied entirely by women (the casting call asked for men, too, but I guess none showed up).  Judy disapproves of him spending so much time aroiund hot ladies, or having any life outside of her, but he explains that the "physical rigor and slightly taboo nature of pole dancing" has keyed into his obsessive nature, like pickleball in Season 3 and skating in Season 2. BJ's story arc always involves trying to become his own person, distinct from Judy.

It turns out that pole dancing is a competitive sport, with men and women participants.

More after the break

Ben and Matt Royer: Disney/Nick teencom twins grow up, become journalists, one dates guys. With Matt and bf d*cks

 

Link to the n*de dudes

If you were watching the Disney Channel or Nickelodeon between 2015 and 2020, you saw twin brothers Ben and Matt Royer.  They were everywhere, playing conniving, mischievous, silly, or virtuous twins.

The brothers were born in Tarzana, California in 2003 and began acting in 2013, playing Vince and Vance Hodges in the sports comedy Back in the Game.  Griffin Gluck also appeared.

Next came the Nickelodeon teencom 100 Things to Do Before High School (2015-16) had the standard three friends, white male (Owen Patrick Joyner), black male (Jaheem Toombs), and female, giving advice like "say yes to everything for a day," "stay up all night," "adopt a flour baby," "meet your idol," and "get your heart pre-broken."  Ben and Matt played Benji and Enzo Froman. 

Chazz Nittolo played Gorgeous Eighth Grade Boy. In 2025, he's 25 years old.  Not bad.

While working on 100 Things, the twins were cast on the Disney Channel's Best Friends Whenever (2015-16): Two teenage girls and their buddy Barry (Gus Kamp) jump back in time, mostly to the recent past so they can determine why their new lab partner is a jerk or Barry can meet his science hero. Ben and Matt play Brett and Chet Marcus, the younger brothers of one of the girls, with crushes on the other. 

I don't know if the actor Gus Kamp (left) is the same as the trans singer August Kamp.

A lot of twin guest spots followed, including episodes of Pickles & Peanut (as Crabmeat and Umbrella), White Famous (Milo and Otis),The Guest Book (Henry and Hank), and Night Court (as Grant and Brant)

Ben also got non-twin roles on Young Sheldon and American Born Chinese, and in the movie The Happytime Murders (2018).

The twins hosted a podcast, Twinger Talk, where they interviewed celebrities.  I don't recognize the names of their guests, but the top photo looked cute: Matt Iseman, who was on The Bachelor.

Plus they supported a variety of charities, like an anti-bullying initiative and YSB Now ("You're So Beautiful" Now).

More after the break

Loot: Nicholas comes out to his Hoosier parents -- as an actor. Plus Taylor Swift fans, Booster bod, and Fagbenle bottom

 Loot, on Apple Plus, stars Maya Rudolph as Molly Wells, the recently-divorced wife of a tech mogul with $87 billion and a lot of free time, so she decides to run the charitable organization she started. So why is it called "Loot"?  They're helping people.  

I started watching Season 2 because trans actress Michaela Jaé Rodriguez (left) plays Sophia, the head of the organization, a stern, no-nonsense, no-office-parties-while-people are starving in Africa type. And she starts a relationship with architect Isaac (O-T Fagbenle, center). 

Fagbenle's backside is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

But then I read an article where Rodriguez talks about how it is a relief to play a cisgender character.  So no LGBT representation there.

The only actual LGBT character is Nicholas, played by Joel Kim Booster, who is gay in real life.  He's swishy and snarky, the "sassy gay assistant" stereotype that GLAAD finds all over the networks: Michael Urie in Ugly Betty and Ron Butler in True Jackson VP spring to mind.   Can't have those gay people in positions of authority, can we?  

I'm going to review Episode 2.3, "Vengeance Falls," because Nicholas confronts his super-conservative parents. Uh-oh, dude is going to come out.

The two plotlines are not connected at all; they might as well be from two separate series.  So I'll go through them separately.

The Sophia/Howard Story

Scene 1: At the office, Sophia asks Howard (Ron Funches) for his powerpoint presentation on the Space for Everyone project, but he barely started; he didn't even finish the word "presentation."  As she is criticizing him, everyone's phones ping: Taylor Swift tickets are going on pre-sale for superfans! Sophia claims that her ping is about a flood in Burma, but they don't believe her.  Because it's been Myanmar for 36 years?

Scene 2: Howard tells the other workers, Arthur (Nat Faxon) and Ainsley, that Sophia must be a closet Taylor Swift fan.  Why would she lie about it?  What evil plan has she concocted?

Scene 3: Howard sneakily quotes Taylor Swift lyrics to see if Sofia will out herself as a fan.  It doesn't work, so he just asks: "Why are you hiding your fandom?"  She denies it.

Scene 4: Time for Howard's very important powerpoint presentation about the housing project. But his presentation is not about housing; it's "Proof that Sofia is a Swiftie."  Turns out that Howard is Sofia's cousin, so she can't just fire him.

"Why are you doing this?" Sofia asks.

"To help you be true to yourself."  Being a fan of a singer is not exactly on the same level as coming out as trans, buddy.

Sofia insista that she's not a Taylor Swift fan.  She's taking a personal day on July 12th, but not to go to the concert: her great-aunt Lucia is having open-heart surgery.  She storms off.  He's not doing his job. Fire him, cousin or not.

Nat Faxon's backside is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends.

Scene 5: Sofia is at home, when Howard shows up to apologize.  Do it at work. I guess they wanted a new set?  He was just excited that they might have something in common.  

While she is in the kitchen, Howard checks out her vinyl -- Taylor Swift hidden in a Mavin Gaye album.  She lives alone -- who's gonna know? 

She explains that listening to Taylor Swift makes her feel guilty: there is so much misery in the world, how can she justify enjoying something?  He...well, you know how this one turns out.

The Molly/Nicholas Story

Scene 1: Molly and Nicholas (Maya Rudolph, Joel Kim Booster) are rehearsing a love scene from his play, Vengeance Falls: "I ache for your manhood!" "Then lose the dress!"  

I'll bet the promos were skewed to make it like they're really into each other.  It happened all the time on Will and Grace ("Look, Emma!  Will's been cured! Oh, darn, they're rehearsing a play").

They end the scene.  Molly praises his acting ability: "I really believed you were a former gigolo who got into city planning."

Nicolas notes that he's invited everyone: "my gym friends, my yoga frenemies, my lesbian dentist, my stalkers, the people I'm stalking, my sugar daddy."  "What about your family?"  "No...um...they're way out in Indiana." So they're fundamentalists -- but you're playing a straight guy, so who cares?

More after the break

Michael J. Fox/Alex P. Keaton

Michael J. Fox was the first celebrity I ever  met.  Shortly after I moved to Los Angeles in 1985, I met a guy who knew him from acting class, and the three of us had lunch at a place on Melrose Boulevard.  He was very nice, and completely gay-positive (and heterosexual, even though my insanely jealous boyfriend Ivo claimed to have dated him).

 Unfortunately his sitcom Family Ties (1982-89) wasn't.

It was one of the 1980s "family values" comedies, like Growing Pains, Life Goes On, and Home Improvement. about liberal ex-hippies (Meredith Baxter Birney, Michael Gross) with politically conservative kids (Scott Valentine was daughter Mallory's boyfriend). Michael played the teen Alex P. Keaton, a Young Republican whose money-grubbing provides most of the jokes.


Gay people did not exist in the world of Family Ties -- if they did, Alex's ultra-liberal parents would certainly have had gay friends.  However, sometimes Alex plays the "is he gay?"  game.  In order to impress a girl, he dons an apron to cook dinner. When Dad criticizes this gender transgression, he counters "I hope you don't mind -- I borrowed your apron.  I got quiche on mine."  The joke plays with the expression "Real men don't eat quiche."


In "Little Man on Campus," he fails his first test, and asks his sister Mallory why she fails so often:

Mallory: When I take a test...my mind starts wandering.
Alex: What do you think about?
Mallory: Boys.
Alex: (Waits for the howls of laughter to subside). Let's hope it's different for me.

Pretending to be gay as a joke only works if you don't have any significant same-sex friendships, so Alex carefully avoids sidekicks.  Wacky next door neighbor Skippy (Marc Price) hangs around because he has a crush on Mallory; they become friends anyway, but Alex carefully polices the relationship, even rejecting the standard sitcom stage business of sitting pressed together on a couch (so they can both be in a closeup).  In one episode, they somehow fall onto the bed together.  Skippy nonchalantly continues their conversation, but Alex recoils in horror and jumps away.  Since no gay people exist, this rejection has an even greater emotional impact than the homophobia of Teen Wolf, marking even nonsexual friendships as bad, wrong, and disquieting.

A few episodes suggest -- but immediately reject -- the possibility of romantic love between Alex and a male friend. In "Best Man," Alex's friend Doug (Timothy Busfield) gets engaged.  He treats Alex and his fiancee as emotional equivalents, hugging them and squealing "You're both so cute!", but still, Alex feels threatened by the new relationship and refuses to be his best man.  When he finally understands that he will still be an essential part of Doug's life, he hugs Doug so tightly at the altar that the minister, in "jest," asks which couple is going to be married.

In the two-part episode "A, My Name is Alex," Alex's friend Greg (Brian McNamara) is killed in an auto accident, and Alex is so distraught that he requires psychiatric help.  But after digging into his subconscious, the psychiatrist fails to find any homoromantic feelings, just guilt because Alex refused to accompany Greg on the errand that killed him, and the recognition of his own mortality.

How does someone who is so gay-friendly play someone so anti-gay on tv?

It was the 1980s?

See also: My Date with Michael J. Fox. Plus Marcus and the Scary Bulgarian Bodybuilder.

A Chess Game, A Christmas Carol, and Karl's C*ck: A Vance Simkins/Cousin Karl Romance

 

(I revised this story to get the Christmas Carol references right, and included a photo of Karl's c*ck on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends)

October 18, 2025. Queer Youth Game Night

“Now this piece is called a rook, or castle if you want.  It can move horizontally or vertically across the board, but it can’t go around other pieces.”

Cousin Karl nodded.  

Vance paused to wonder again what the heck was happening. What was he -- the former head of a megachurch empire based on "old fashioned Christian morality"  -- doing at a Queer Youth Game Night?  

With his arch-nemesis Jesse...ugh...Gemstone?  

Teaching his Cousin Karl to play chess while gazing at his massive biceps and wondering if he was big everywhere?

“This piece is called a bishop," he continued, trying to stop imagining Cousin Karl n*de.

“Looks like a cartoon character,” Karl said with a grin.  “See his nose and mouth?

“Well, I’ll be…now that you mentioned it, I can’t see it any other way! But it’s supposed to be bishop’s hat, like Catholic bishops, right?  He moves diagonally.”

“So the Catholic guy can’t be straight?  He must be gay.”

Vance laughed. 

March 10, 2025: The Round-Table Discussion of Candidates for the Top Christ Following Man

The question is "Should public schools teach a class in world religions?," but Kelvin interrupts to brag about his Prism ministry.  Vance seizes the opportunity to complain about a "homosexual" being nominated: "God's Word is clear on this issue." 

Kelvin gets all flustered and starts blustering about the Levitical Code.  

Vance isn't stupid.  He knows that it's not fair to latch onto one verse from the Code and ignore the others -- and that one verse wasn't even about modern homosexuals -- gays -- it was about temple stuff.  He knows that only a few Evangelicals think that God hates gays.  None of the preachers in the Cape and Pistol Society think so.  But he continues to dig at Kelvin, and when the boy wins the Top Christ Following Man award anyway, he screams about "homosexuals in our midst" on national tv.  

"The Queen and King can move in any direction," Vance continued, "But the Queen can go as far as she wants, and the King can only move one space."

"I get it," Karl said, grinning.  "Queens are the biggest and baddest of the pieces.  I guess that makes me a Queen."

Vance. laughed.  "You're bigger than anybody I've ever seen.  But not bad.  I think you're really nice."

Karl looked down at his hands.  "Thank-ee."

November 3, 2024. The Cape and Pistol Society

As usual, Vance is trying to dig at Jesse Gemstone.  The infuriating braggart thinks he's a much better preacher, but actually he's more successful because he comes from the Baptist tradition, and Vance is Wesleyan -- God requires perfection, no sins in thought, word, or deed.  No alcohol, no movies, no dances, no eating out on the Sabbath, no rock music, no secular literature, just the Word of God.  No wonder Jesse's laissez-faire "God loves you no matter what" fills the pews at the Salvation Center, and draws millions of views on their streaming service.  

Jesse's brother-in-law BJ was injured while pole-dancing -- disgusting! -- so Vance implies that he is gay, and asks "How many homosexuals in your family?"  "Two," Jesse answers. 

Vance wondered who Jesse meant: his brother Kelvin and...Cousin Karl?  No, he probably meant his son Pontius.  Tonight Vance dropped by Jesse's house to taunt him a bit, and heard that Pontius and his boyfriend Stacy (yes, a boyfriend) were going to Queer Youth Game Night at Kelvin's house.  They assured him that it was just board games, but he imagined all sorts of decadent, disgusting things, so Jesse offered to bring him over to observe.

It was just board games: Sorry, Clue, Uno, Apples and Apples. With Kelvin leading a gay trivia game in the parlor, a chaperone monitoring video games in the Game Room -- and in the kitchen, a massive man-mountain -- 6'7" (as Mae West used to say, "Forget the six foot; tell me about the seven inches"), bench press record 585 pounds, Top Strongman of the South three years running.  With a smile that lit up the room. 

Vance was only trying to be friendly when saw an unoccupied chess set and offered to teach Cousin Karl to play.  And when he rubbed his leg against Cousin Karl's under the table. 

"Ok, now the Knight, this horse-shaped piece, moves two squares vertical or horizontal, then one square perpendicular.  Let me show you."  He moved his Queen's Knight to C5.  "It can also jump over other pieces, like that pawn, for instance."

"Sounds complicated."

"Well, anytime you do something that people aren't expecting, they're going to be confused.  They may even get angry.  But that's the place where you can be an individual, show them who you really are."  He reached over and squeezed Karl's hand. 

More after the break

Gemstones Episode 4.1: Elijah scoundrels, Winston dies, and Kelvin screams. With Bradley's bottom and Jackson's junk

Link to the n* de dudes

Previous: Gemstones Season 3 Finale: Kelvin and Keefe married?  Pontius a dark lord?  Peter redeemed through the Redeemer?

Title: "Prelude."  This is not really an episode of The Righteous Gemstones at all.  It's a full theatrical movie starring Bradley Cooper, who you know as Ben in Wet Hot American Summer and Rocket  Raccoon in Guardians of the Galaxy.  So I'll do a scene-by-scene.

Scene 1: A small country church in Virginia, 1862.  Pastor Adam Grieves (Josh McDermitt) preaches and takes an offering.  After the service, rogue Elijah Gemstone (Bradley Cooper) shoots him and steals the offering money and his gold-plated Bible (this will be important later).

Uh-oh, before he can escape, Confederate troops arrive at the church and, mistaking him for the pastor, announce that he's been drafted to be chaplain for their division, heading to Fredericksburg.  It pays $50 per month ($2000 in today's dollars), plus room and board.

Overjoyed, Elijah asks for a moment to gather his things.  He changes clothes with Pastor Grieves, bashes his face in so no one will recognize him, and writes a note: "This is the body of a crook who tried to rob me.  He was handsome.  His name was Elijah Gemstone."   He was handsome?  Got yourself some same-sex desire going on, buddy?

Scene 2: A battle, with lots of Confederate soldiers being killed. Their grim faces flash by.  A boy gets his leg blown off.  600,000 soldiers died, plus about 1,000,000 civilians. 6% of the young adult men from the North, and 18% from the South

Captain Cane (Jim Cummings) approaches Elijah with the rumor that he was gambling and drinking with the guys last night, inappropriate behavior for a Man of God.  He denies it, and further threatens the Captain with hellfire for spreading rumors. Does this remind you of Jesse's s*x-and-drugs party from Season 1?

Scene 3: Elijah is called to pray with the boy who got his leg blown off (Alex Saxon).  He is dying and afraid, but Elijah just pretends to pray.  

Cut to night, with Elijah is drinking and gambling with the guys.

Scene 4: Time to preach the Sunday sermon.  Elijah can't do it, so he just says "God doesn't expect us to be perfect.  We make mistakes, but we're trying to be good, and that's good enough."  In Baptist theology, you don't need to try: once you are saved, you are incapable of committing new sins. But Elijah doesn't know that.

Cut to more drinking and gambling, followed by trying to avoid praying with another dying soldier, Winston (Jackson Kelly).  This one is worried that he won't go to heaven, because he's killed people, but Elijah assures him that God has made an exception on his "Thou shalt not kill" policy for soldiers who are forced to fight. 

Scene 5: Elijah and the soldiers bathing in the river (blurry d*ck shot).  Afterwards Ned Rollins (Kimball Farley) announces that he recognizes Elijah from before the War. "It took me awhile, but I saw the way you shuffle the deck of cards, with your pinkie out like a woman."  So Elijah has some femme/gay characteristics? Does he remind you of Kelvin?

His cover blown, Elijah attacks, but Ned just wants to partner with him: Major McFall (James Landry Hebert) is coming to camp tomorrow.  He's starting a card game, and he is loaded.  They could take him.

Cut to the card game.  They take him.  Then, worried that he will say something, Elijah kills Ned and stuffs his body in one of the coffins. And now he's Judy

More after the break

"Severance": Dystopian science fiction or realistic portrayal of corporate life? With a gay romance.

 

Severance, on Apple Plus (2022, 2025), begins with Mark (Adam Scott) sitting in his car outside the Lumen Corporation, crying.  I can relate -- during my office job, a horrible nine months at the Getty Consternation Institute, I cried a lot -- before work, after work, during lunch, while sitting at my desk.  But this job takes the humiliation and dehumanization, and takes it to a new level:

Mark has been severed, split into work and life selves.  The two selves, his innie and his outtie, have no memory of each other.  So he has no idea what goes on in that dark, sinister building.  But we do.

He takes an elevator to the sub-basement, the severance wing, endless corridors, painted white with no signs and no decor except for an occasional painting of Company Founder/Messiah Kier performing miracles or punishing sinners.

You're not supposed to wander around anyway, and trying to make a map is strictly forbidden.  Innies do not remember anything about their life outside, so from their point of view, the work day ends, they step into the elevator, and immediately step out again for the next work day.  

From the innies' point of view, they never leave.  Their lives consist entirely of endless white-walled corridors and harsh fluorescent lights. They never see or hear anything about the outside world. This is only a slight exaggeration of the real corporate world, where you aren't supposed to talk about or think about your life outside the office.

They eat Lumen-brand snacks from Lumen vending machines, paid for with Lumen tokens.

They have nothing to read except the multi-volume handbook, where the rules are written as Bible verses:

No outside reading material: "Be content in my words, and dally not in the scholastic pursuits of lesser men."

No sleeping on the job: "No workplace shall be repurposed for slumber."

Their purpose in life: "And I shall whisper to ye dutiful through the ages. In your noblest thoughts and epiphanies shall be my voice. You are my mouth, and through ye, I will whisper on when I am 10 centuries demised."

The outside world is no paradise, either.  It's always a gray, cloudy, drizzly late winter. Mark's house, provided by Lumen, is nearly empty, with only a few pieces of furniture and no decorations of any type.  He might as well be at work.

The job of the Macrodata Refinement Department is seemingly meaningless: rows of numbers slide by on a screen.  You must capture and dispose of those that produce emotions like disgust and fear. Workers have no idea what this is doing; finding errors in computer code, rating movies, murdering people?  

But they don't do a lot of searching anyway. They spend most of their time gossiping about office politics, receiving minor perks like finger-traps and waffles, going to the Wellness Center to be psychoanalyzed, or being sent to the Break Room to be broken by repeating a formal apology a thousand times. 

More after the break