i've hesitated a bit to send this recommendation to you, because 2020 is a really bad year to get into it, but have you ever heard of the pro wrestling tag team called the Golden Lovers? Kenny Omega, voted world's best professional wrestler in 2018, basically used his entire career to tell a decade+ long epic gay love story. this love story is also deeply intertwined with what is widely considered to be the best wrestling match in history. i found out about it a year ago and am obsessed now lol
(cont.) there are a couple existing video essays about the Golden Lovers story out there. if you're completely new to wrestling, i recommend starting with Super Eyepatch Wolf's video "Professional Wrestling is Stupid and Beautiful and I Love It," which talks about the GL story at the end, but explains how pro wrestling works, first. the best summary of the story (albeit out of date) is Rachel's twitter thread and medium article titled "that one tweet thread about the Golden Lovers, annotated"
(cont.) whether or not the Golden Lovers story is "canon" is a complicated question. neither Kenny nor Kota are explicitly "out," but they're also in careers where that can be complicated, and Kenny has basically all but said that he's bisexual. the story also blends real life and kayfabe (wrestling fiction) to a point where it's impossible to determine exactly how much of it is real and how much of it isn't. it's also made complicated by company politics, lol, and the pandemic hasn't helped
(cont.) but the Golden Lovers story is still going on! it's very much just in the background, but there are hints in Kenny's costume choices and Undertale promos (yes, really), and both Kenny and Kota are still referencing each other in the moves that they use. pro wrestling is actually incredibly rewarding to watch if you're into close reading and analysis, because it basically requires that level of attention in order to fully follow the storylines. it also weaves together RPF and fiction
(cont.) to bring this full circle, Kenny is actually a huge Star Trek fan haha, and before his last singles match with Kota in 2018, he made a tweet explicitly comparing it to Kirk and Spock having to fight each other in Amok Time. sorry for sending so many asks in a row! if you want more information about this or other LGBTQ things in wrestling, or just about wrestling in general, lol, feel free to shoot me an ask! so much of wrestling fandom basically gets passed down through word of mouth
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I tell you, I did not have ‘decade long gay love story as told by professional wrestlers’ on my Bingo card.
I’ll definitely have to read through that Twitter thread when I get the chance. And one day I’d love to watch that explanation of pro-wrestling because I’ve never had any idea wtf was going on there (but people seemed to have fun with it so I didn’t judge).
What a nifty, random thing to suddenly be aware of. Thank you for the rec. <3