Listen I can’t believe how well that was done. Like they didn’t HAVE to do that. The games barely gave scraps about Bill and Frank and Frank especially has a horrible lonely ending.
But the show, the show really said we’re devoting almost an entire episode to their love story, how they met, how they fought with each other and for each other, how they loved one another and took care of each other, and how they chose to be together even at the end.
I won’t even call this Bury Your Gays, because for once it was done right and well and respectfully. Anything set in the apocalypse is going to be a tragedy, but giving Bill and Frank that agency, to find one another to carry on all those years together, to be a real couple with fights and problems and bickering but also so much love and care? They did that for us.
Especially right now we need this, when so many queer people are attacked just for being who they are. Putting a queer love story front and center, even if only for one episode, was beautiful.
Murray Bartlett is always a gem, as is Nick Offerman. But especially here they played those characters so well. The tentative looks and touches in that first episode. The subtle hints at their problems and inner workings. The joy. The sadness, the love, the anger, all of it so real. And speaking of, letting them be hairy and furry and bearded. And old. Almost all gay media is targeted for consumption by a younger audience in a way, all rippling abs and waxed chests and perfect stubble on a mid 20s or 30s man. But they let them look real, they let them look their age, and even age more in the flash forward to the present time for them. Yes both are hot men obviously, but a silver fox and a bear are not the two you’d think of if someone said a major TV show was doing a gay romance. Older queer men, queer women and other genders too let’s be honest, rarely get any stories of their lives and loves. So to see that, and see it done so beautifully, even if bittersweet, was a joy.
2087
romaincrisis
germansingergirl
kaledo-art
gummygunk
