- One of my favorite couples on TV is Korrasami,
Korra and Asami from The Legend of Korra.
They're a wonderful couple, and I think it's great
that they had LGBT representation in a kids' show.
- When I was younger and figuring everything out,
I really identified with Willow from Buffy,
because she was probably the first, if not only, back then,
character that I saw who was a female type who liked women
who was also a nerd and just really into books
and all things that I was really into,
and computers and whatnot.
And it was nice to see both of those aspects
of her personality portrayed in a character.
- A movie called The Rules of Attraction,
there is a gay college gentleman,
and I kind of wanted to like, base my life off of him.
He was really cool, like, a lot of gay characters
tend to, you know, be shy and they're in the closet.
He knew what he wanted and he went out and got it.
- There's also Clarke and Lexa from The 100,
they're just awesome, kick-ass characters
and I just love them.
- So I think Gideon Goddard is really, like,
the only character that comes to mind,
and this was a very recent one, like,
I just watched the first season of Mr. Robot,
and, and Gideon Goddard is this really, like,
upstanding, he's constantly portrayed
as like this good guy.
Just a really nice dude.
And his sexuality is introduced sort of late in his arc,
but it's really nice, there's a really great, cute depiction
of him and his husband and it almost, like,
it really made me cry a little bit,
because it was the first time I had seen
just really true, intimate connection between two men
on screen in a way that wasn't, like hyper-sexualized,
or overly, like, part of their character,
it was just, these are two people sharing romance
and connection, and it was like a really compelling,
emotional experience for me,
and I think it affected me so much because
I've never really been exposed to that.
Like, I grew up never seeing those types of characters,
not once, you know?
- I think Nomi is kind of a standout character because,
well, she's actually a trans actress
playing a trans character, which is, like,
that doesn't happen enough in any shows.
But her character itself is also,
she's allowed to have more masculine traits,
like she's a hacker and allowed to do stuff
that a lot of trans girls aren't allowed to do
'cause they're supposed to perform femininity,
like way over the top.
And she also has a girlfriend in the show,
and a lot of times I feel like trans women have to like men
or be straight, because that's kind of like
the stereotype of femininity.
So she's allowed to do all of these things
that you wouldn't normally associate with
the stereotype of a trans girl,
and I love that about her representation.
- I feel like no one is talking about this,
because I have a lot of old examples,
but this movie called The Haunting,
it's this old movie from the 1960s
and one of the characters is a lesbian,
and it was just unheard of at that time
for a big major Hollywood release
for there to be a lesbian character.
And she actually tries to seduce one of the
straight female characters, and especially at that time,
a lot of lesbian and/or gay characters in films
always met, like, a sticky end, you know.
It was never said that because they were gay
they died terribly, but they always did.
But this one, her name is Theo in this movie,
she's kind of the voice of reason in this movie,
and she lives, in the end.
- I think having representation on screen
gives you an idea of what's possible or
what's able to exist.
Like if you have never seen a gay couple
or a bisexual couple or anything on TV,
and you're gay or bisexual growing up,
it's like you have no idea of how relationships
can be for you, the only thing you have to go off
is straight people's relationships,
and there's no, it just doesn't seem possible,
it doesn't seem like a thing you can be
or that you could ever be on TV
or that you could ever be a real thing.
I think it's super important just to, like,
validate people's existence, basically,
through seeing them in the media.