Thursday, 1 October 2015

5 Great shows for LGBQT Representaion

Today I thought I'd share with you 5 shows that I watch that I believe offer positive and I hope accurate representations of sexual and ethnic minorities, as I know how difficult it is to find such shows. The idea for this post actually came from another TV post I was writing about female led shows and I found a probably quite unsurprising correlation between shows which offered great portrayals of women and those that offered positive portrayals of gay/lesbian/transsexual etc. people. It just goes to show that in order to believe in one kind of equality you often have to believe in all types of equality. Anyway I'm rambling now so please enjoy this little compilation and I hope that this article is enlightening to you.



1//Sense8- I'll admit, when I first heard the premise of this show, I was very sceptical, but I ended up watching the whole season within a week, it was that good. It centres around 8 complete strangers who become mentally and physically linked so that they can access each other memories, skills and feelings. There are Gay, Lesbian and Trans characters amongst the main 8 in this show, but what I love about it is that it shows so many different perspectives. One character is hiding the fact that he's gay for the sake of his career whilst others are out and proud. I also love that they have a trans character in the show but it doesn't centre around her transition and shows her post transition living a very happy life. Arguably the two lesbian characters have the most functional relationship in the entire show, which is unusual to see too.
2//Orphan Black- I think I've talked about this show on my blog far too much now but I really don't care because it's easily one of my favourite shows ever (And I say that as a committed TV addict). The entire idea of the show is brilliant and Tatiana Maslany is just such an incredible actress, I so frequently forget when I'm watching the show that it's just one person. I think my favourite clone is Cosima and her and Delphine are definitely OTP material. Evelyne Brochu is just gorgeous as well which helps. It really helps. The initial stages of their romance are just so cute; the way Delphine is slightly in denial about her feelings.
3//OITNB- I feel like this really doesn't need any explanation because if you haven't seen this you must have been living under a rock the last three years. It's brilliant and you should just watch it. So much sass. So much hotness. What's not to love.
4//Carmilla- Lesbian Vampires. I just thought I'd get that out there to begin with. This is a relatively unknown webseries as far as I know, but over summer I spent an entire day watching every episode available to me (1 1/2 seasons) and really enjoyed it. It's based off a rather old book and it's very cheesy and sometimes the acting really does make me cringe but the reason that it's included in this post is because the two main characters are lesbian and there's also an agender person and whilst this isn't part of the main plot, it's a great side story to see how the persons friends struggle with it. It's available to watch on the Verve Girl youtube channel with new episodes of season 2 coming out every week.
5// Girl Meets Boy-  I probably shouldn't be including this as currently I've only actually seen one episode of it, but I was just so impressed. It's rather a ground breaking romcom about a transsexual woman which I found genuinely very amusing and heart warming. I'm just very disappointed that it's on BBC 2 and not BBC 1 as I really think that this show needs a more prominent position on TV schedules simply because it's so unusual to see a trans character on British TV, especially on a major broadcasting network such as  the BBC.

As always, I would love to read your comments and hear from you, particularly about any shows which you think offer great representation!

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