"I rEwAtchEd aLL Of sTrAnGer tHinGS anD I STiLL diDN't FiNd aNy eviDeNcE FoR ByLer."
Because you're not looking for it.
"I aM LoOkiNg fOr iT ThoUgh."
Not in the same way.
As soon as the guy and girl characters smile at each other, audiences stare unblinkingly during every scene those characters are together, mentally noting down every infinitesimal instance that could possibly be seen as romantic. And when the guy and girl do get together, they aren't surprised, because they were already looking. They already knew.
"Ooh, is that a smile? THEY'RE DESTINED TO BE IN LOVE!!! I MUST FIND MORE PROOF!!!"
When it's two guys, people don't give them the same amount of attention.
They don't care about the way they look at each other, or that two of the guys in the friendship group are in fucking tears every time they sit down for a heart-to-heart. Just bros being bros.
Plus, it's a big TV show– one set in the 80s, no less– why would gay people be in it? Gay people are reserved for the little shows about gay people, or as irrelevant side characters to be killed off. Not two of the most integral characters to the show.
That's just not how the media works.
If one of them was constantly decked out in fucking rainbows and spoke with a lisp, maybe then people would start looking for it. That's what we expect. The gay character is always the gay character, nothing more, nothing less.
We've been primed through years of previous media experience to ignore any possibility of a same-sex relationship, and focus on the straight ones. If the show isn't about the gæ, why would it have the gæ?
I know because I thought that way a couple years ago, and I'm an actively-on-fire queerpocalypse of a person.
Anyway, I bet that when/if Byler becomes a thing, people will finally rewatch the show and look for it. Then they'll go, "Oh. Ok." Then a rainbow will shine over their house and shit glitter everywhere in celebration.
