It's Your Move

Before Married with Children demolished the myth of the euphoric nuclear family, It's Your Move (1984-85) did the same for the teencom.  Matt Burton (Jason Bateman, who would go on to star on The Hogan Family) seems to be a perfect teenage boy, but he's actually an unscrupulous, amoral operator, running a variety of scams and illegal businesses with the assistance of his best friend Eli (Adam Sadowski).  His only soft spot is for his mother, Eileen (Caren Kaye), so some of his schemes involve doing things for her, like getting her a raise at work.

Then struggling writer Norman Lamb (David Garrison, who would go on to star on Married...with Children) moves into the apartment across the hall and starts dating Matt's mom.  It turns out that there is also an unscrupulous, amoral operator lurking under his "nice guy" facade.  But not to worry, he has only honorable intentions.

Matt and Norman begin a battle of wits, cons, and blackmail, as each tries to gain power and demonstrate the other's true nature to an oblivious Eileen.

It was a welcome surcease from the TGIF sitcom jungle. Plus beefcake (David Garrison in extremely tight jeans), gay symbolism (hiding a secret life), and a decided lack of girl-craziness in Matt. Though his relationship with Eli didn't quite make the intensity of a homoromance.

The producers had high hopes for It's Your Move.  A tie-in novel was authorized, and up-and-coming star River Phoenix had a guest shot in the pilot.

Teen magazines began nonstop gushing over freckle-faced Jason Bateman..

Unfortunately, the network shoved the series into a Wednesday night timeslot opposite the blockbuster Dynasty, with the sixth season of The Facts of Life as a lead-in.  I watched, but apparently nobody else did.  Only 18 episodes aired.  You can see them on youtube.

The Prisoner: We Want Information

When I was a little kid, we had only 3 stations, but sometime in the early 1970s, we got PBS -- the Public Broadcasting System -- and with it, a British invasion.  Suddenly I could see Doctor Who, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Monty Python's Flying Circus, The Tomorrow People, and even fluffy comedies like Father Dear Father and No, Honestly.  I guess they figured that anything British was bound to be educational. They were certainly easier to find subtexts in.

Take The Prisoner, which appeared in Britain in 1966-67, and on PBS in the mid-1970s.

The plot: a British secret agent (Patrick McGoohan) resigns, angrily, then goes home and packs for a trip.  He is gassed, and awakens in a scenic, well-scrubbed Village, where everyone has a number rather than a name ("You are Number Six.").  The Villagers are mostly kidnapped secret agents, from a variety of countries, more or less brainwashed and docile.











The mysterious Number Two, who is in charge of the Village, wants "information."  Number Six wants to escape, or, failing that, to find out who his keepers are.  But plots soon moved beyond the "Why did you resign?" maguffin to explore questions of conformity and individuality.  In order to live together in a community, we must require certain behaviors and banish others, but at what point does the need for conformity impinge upon the rights of the individual to think and feel what he pleases?

It was heady viewing for teenagers in the 1970s, on the par with Animal Farm and Brave New World.  And it was especially evocative for gay teenagers, who were told, day after day, hour after hour, "You must conform. You must desire the opposite sex, date, have sex, marry."

The gay symbolism made up for a decided lack of beefcake -- handsome Patrick McGoohan never so much as unbuttoned a button, not even to work out.  And a lack of bonding -- though there might be a homoerotic subtext in the cat-and-mouse game played by Number Six and the current Number Two (the Village leader changed in almost every episode).

However, there was one plus: virtually no heterosexual content.  Sometimes Number Six got a girlfriend, or pretended to in order to harass Number Two, but they never kissed.  McGoohan had it written in his contract -- no kissing girls (but not because he was gay; he wanted to stay faithful to his wife).

McGoohan starred in many other movies during the 1970s and 1980s.  He is perhaps most famous for playing King Edward in Braveheart  (1995), and eliciting homophobic audience cheers by pushing his gay son's lover out a window.  Not that I believe McGoohan, who died in 2009, actually condoned throwing gay people out of windows.

Gay Connections on "The Facts of Life"

The Facts of Life (1979-1988) was a TGIF sitcom (that aired on Wednesday nights) about four girls with disparate backgrounds who, for contrived  reasons, are working in the cafeteria of a private girls' school under their boss/mentor  Mrs. Garrett (Charlotte Rae)

In the first season, there were a lot of girls, and  "the facts of life" referred specifically to universal heterosexual desire ("when the boys you used to hate, you date"), but after that the show concentrated on the Fab Four and general Life Lessons.

When the world never seems to be livin up to your dreams
And suddenly you're finding out, the facts of life are all about you.

Wait -- I thought adolescence was a time of infinite possibility.  The world doesn't start squashing your dreams until your mid-20s.

Oh, well, the four girls were (clockwise from bottom left):

1.  Young, black, catchphrase-spouting Tootie (Kim Fields).  One episode I saw had her in a mania over pop star Jermaine Jackson, which caused Mrs. Garrett to reminisce about the Frank Sinatra mania of her youth.  She learns to be more cautious and less impulsive.

2. Spoiled rich girl Blair, whose parents basically own the school (Lisa Whelchel).  She learns humility.

3.Motorcycle-riding juvenile delinquent Jo (Nancy McKeon), whom everyone assumed was a lesbian, but she was straight (on the show, anyway).  She learns to solve her problems with words, not with fists.

4. Natalie (Mindy Cohn), who makes self-depricating jokes about being portly or Jewish, or both.  She learns to overcome her poor self-image.  Later in the series, she has sex with her boyfriend (after discussing it in detail with every character except Blair; a conservative Christian, Lisa Whelchel refused to be in the episode).

There were some men running around occasionally, such as George Clooney before he became a big star as a handyman-hunk, and Mackenzie Astin as a vulnerable kid that the girls sort of adopt.

No gay references, except in the first episode (August 24, 1979), when Blair criticizes another girl for being a tomboy, and insinuates that she is "strange" (hat is, a lesbian).  Mrs. Garrett takes control and helps the girl become more feminine.  Problem solved.

Also, there's the ongoing lesbian subtext with Jo, and for several seasons Cousin Geri (Geri Jewell, a comedian with cerebral palsy) was a regular, and more or less obviously lesbian,

Geri Jewell is gay in real  life, Mackenzie Astin is bisexual, and most of the other cast members are gay allies.  Even Lisa Whelchel; not all conservative Christians are screeching homophobes (see her interview in Chicago's gay newspaper, the Windy City Times).

"Onward": Not Your Grandfather's Teen Nerd Movie

I've seen any number of teen nerd movies, where the nerd gets mystical powers or goes on a quest for the sole purpose of wrestling the Girl of His Dreams from the obnoxious jock she's dating.  On the way, he is terrorized by bullies and sadistic big brothers, and savagely rejected by the "it" kids.

So I wasn't interested in seeing the new Disney-Pixar Onward  (dumb title). But Netflix is a desert and Vudu is getting slim...

The Premise:  A world populated by beings from folklore and mythology: elves, dwarves, pixies, centaurs, and so on.  They used magic until they discovered that technology is easier, so now they live in urban-sprawl cities with rush-hour traffic (this is better?), identical to our world except for some clever touches, like houses are shaped like mushrooms and they keep tiny dragons as pets.  Magic still exists, as a weird hobby pursued by a few eccentrics.

The Players:
1. Shy, socially-awkward, anxiety-ridden elf Ian (Tom Holland, top photo).
2. His widowed Mom (Julia-Louis Dreyfuss), apparently a troll or an orc.
3. His big, brash older brother Barley (Chris Pratt), also a troll or an orc.
4. Mom's new husband, by-the-books cop Colt Bronco (Mel Rodriguez), a centaur (insert joke about being hung like a horse).

The Set-Up:
It's Ian's sixteenth birthday.  He's agonizing over the prospect of inviting kids from school to his party, when Big Brother bounds down the stairs.

Uh, oh. Time for insults and name-calling.

Nope: Barley is exuberant and physical, but not bullying.  He's super-excited about Ian's birthday.

On to school.

Uh-oh.  Time for the Girl of His Dreams to walk by in slow motion, her hair blowing in the wind.

Nope:  No teenager in the movie displays or expresses any heterosexual interest.  John Hughes must be turning over in his grave (if he's dead)

Hesitating, petrified, Ian approaches the it-kids to invite them to his party.  Is one of them a troll with cerebral palsy?  Disability inclusive!

Uh-oh.  This is where they savagely reject him. "Come to your party, dick-wad?  I'd rather kiss a goblin!"

Nope.  They are perfectly willing to come to the party.

The Plot:  Ian's Dad (Kyle Bornheimer) was into magic, and left him a special gift: a mage-staff, with a spell that will bring him back to life for 24 hours, but only once.

Thrilled with the prospect of spending a day with his Dad, Ian starts the spell,but only gets Dad's bottom half revived before the Phoenix Stone that powers the staff breaks.  Ian, Barley, and Dad's Bottom Half are off on a dangerous quest through the urban wasteland to get another stone and finish the spell before the 24 hours are up.

They are pursued by Officer Bronco, Mom, and a helpful Manticore.

There are some minor complications.  The brothers have some minor disagreements:   It's all rather mild stuff up to the dragon at the end, the father resurrected only for a few seconds, and final brother-brother hug.

I think that the writers were trying so hard to be nice that forgot to be exciting.

Beefcake: No animated beefcake.

Gay Characters:  One of Colt Bronco's fellow officers mentions that she has a girlfriend, and the two are shown among the patrons of Manticore's restaurant in the final scene.  I expected a gay subtext between Ian and Barley, but their relationship is blatantly fraternal.  But not to worry, I'm sure the high school has a Gay-Straight Alliance.

My Grade:B+.