For those of you here for other reasons The Secret Series (and their spinoff Series The Bad Books) is a five (eight counting Bad Books) part book series intended for "middle grade" that is put well enough together to have aged like fine wine for me and also shares the top spot in my brain with Russian literature (but of course has been here longer because I did read it when I was in the intended audience first lol). It's got alchemy in lots of contexts and detail, very overt references/analogy to how Hollywood culture hurts children, and chocolate is their equivalent to alcohol. It's also got a lot of implied/explicitly queer and neurodivergent characters for its time (although it is pretty dated in other ways). This is just. A small taste. A miniscule glimpse into the absolute iceberg that is the amount of Secret Series art I've done over the years (not to mention the Bad Books or even my full-length fanfic)
(aka who is simultaneously trans masc, trans fem, AND gender neutral)
Round 1
Max-Ernest (The Secret Series)
Maxwell Klinger (M*A*S*H)
Voting ended onAug 31, 2023
PROPAGANDA
Max-Ernest (The Secret Series)
prime representation of when you're 12 and something is Ambiguously Wrong. the books are about keeping secrets and figuring out how to live your life, and the author has said that the story is in part him processing being Gay in Middle School. Max-Ernest specifically is the one sitting to the side while the other two protagonists have their heterosexual tween romance arc. is he gay? is he hiding that he transitioned? is she hiding that she's a girl? is he just left out of Normal Tween Milestones? he got bounced around to a lot of Specialists (tm) when he was little: "some said he was artistic, some said he was autistic". by the time the books start he's Just Different and living with that. he has contentiously divorced parents and tends to accept his personal life without getting mad about it, and while trying not to have feelings about it at all. he's into stage magic and stand-up comedy. he cuts every hair on his head the same length because he doesn't want any of them to feel like they're being treated unequally. he's just like me for real
god i need to reread these books cuz I had so many trans egg feelings about max-ernest when I was a trans egg
Maxwell Klinger (M*A*S*H)
A character from mash who uses crossdressing as a ploy to get out of the army but then it gets a little genuine and a lot of the characters affirm him as both a man and a woman in a way that reinforces the show’s themes of rejecting gender norms and masculinity as a way of rejecting the american military system.
also, he was canonically offered the section 8 discharge he was going for. but it would have been recorded on his psychiatric/medical record that he was homosexual/transsexual. so instead of being pathologised he kept wearing the most beautiful dresses and being an incredible life saving surgeon.
like that plot is easily read as "i'm not gay!! don't discharge me for that!!" but then why would he have kept wearing dresses?
No, Klinger said "yeah i'm not going to be written down as insane for queer coding myself so i'll just keep doing it on the front lines of a goddamn war with my canonically bisexual friend Hawkeye while we save lives."
at one point as i recall later in the series (presumably after he was offered the section 8) he was gonna go back to wearing his uniform but found it uncomfortable#he is canonically more comfortable in feminine clothing like. take from that what you will
please I need the five other people who like the secret series and have read the bad series to help me
have we decided Anthony is good for our boy?? Have we decided if they lasted or not?? I’m late to this train have you guys made a decision.
i like to think he and max ernest are as healthy as two (likely) traumatized boys can be but we know nothing about Anthony.
