Bi tv

This blog is dedicated to all the bisexual characters featured on television!

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Pretty much Exactly What It Says on the Tin; tropes having to do with bisexuality. Tropes: Ambiguously Bi: Someone with bi subtext. Bi the Way: Bisexual and reasonable. But Not Too Bi: Stated to be bi, but only really seen interested in one …

A quick look at all the different ways bisexuality is portrayed in the media.

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This is important.

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phoebe buffay: canon bisexual

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Zoë Washburne wants to remind everyone that a bi person who is married is still bi, monogamy doesn’t mean that someone has ‘chosen a side’

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Character: Ilana Wexler Appears In: Broad City Commonly Interpreted As: Straight

But Really: Ilana is portrayed as free spirited and sexually liberated. She is in a persisting sexual relationship with her male friend Lincoln, which she regards as “purely physical”. In the episode “Coat Check” she dates a woman, Adele but breaks it off at the end of the episode; when she realizes that she’s only attracted to Adele because she looks exactly like her. Throughout the series she has shown to have romantic/sexual feelings for her bet friend, Abbi.

Ilana is bisexual.

With many thanks to hermionemollypeggypond for this write up!

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How Ilana From 'Broad City' Taught Me To Be Unapologetically Bi

A big part of embracing my identity was seeing a queer narrative that wasn't straightwashed.

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“That is true masculinity. You are truly evolved and I am truly wet.” - Ilana Glazer

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THIS IS SO IMPORTANT

Can we just talk about how perfect Community’s 6x04 “Queer Studies and Advanced Waxing” is?

Like there’s so much to it, from Chang’s concern that he was only cast as Miyagi because he’s asian, to Abed (canonically recognized as having ASD) having intense empathy for the baby birds (with the wonderfully tragic subtle parallel of his mother having left him when he was young).

But the best part was the amazing discussion of sexuality and it’s complexities.

Dean Pelton has always been assumed as somewhat queer. He is very attracted to Jeff and he often dresses in drag. But sexuality is so much more complicated than just liking boys or girls. There are more than two genders, more than monogamy, more than monosexuality, more than physical attraction, etc etc. And while any kind of positive LGBTQIA representation is awesome, it’s usually something like what the school board tries to do in the episode. They want the Dean to be a neatly packaged, cardboard cut out of the gay white cis male. But that denies so much of who he is and also reduces him to a symbol of how not homophobic they are rather than a complete person.

I cannot get over how well Frankie sums up how problematic this is

“When a person becomes symbolic, they gain symbolic power at the price of independent power.”

Omg. I am obsessed with how perfect that line is. Frankie Dart is my hero. Plus, she subtly comes out to Jeff and the Dean as queer like it ain’t no thing. New fave characacter. 

But most importantly is the vagueness of the Dean’s metaphor. Personally, I took the never ending handkerchief metaphor to mean his sexuality is complex and constantly evolving, while still having some things in common with being straight up gay. Both handkerchiefs and rabbits can be pulled from a hat. But the rabbit is pulled out once and done so it is much simpler, while the handkerchief progresses over time (hence “never ending” handkerchief). Additionally, the rabbit out of a hat is a magic show trope; it is the example non-magicians use as what a magician does (like how heterosexuals only think of queer people as simply gay). Whereas the handkerchief trick, while there is sometimes of an awareness of it, isn’t really as commonly thought about or represented. There’s even a ton of variety within how the handkerchief trick is performed; it doesn’t even have to be out of a hat but can be from a sleeve, mouth, pocket, or behind an audience member’s ear. I think I’m letting this metaphor run away with me, but you get the idea.

I also like that they don’t say what else the Dean is. Because, as Frankie said, your sexuality “is nobody’s business.” The Dean is simply himself. 

Sexuality and gender is a spectrum that extends in a multitude of directions, not just gay or straight. And when we stop having to label and understand something in order to accept it, then we will have truly made progress.

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How Community's Dean Pelton broke new ground for sexual politics on television

In five seasons, the Community character has undergone one of the most unique and fascinating arcs in recent sitcom history

This article explores the possible reasons that Dean Pelton’s sexuality is kept ambiguous on the show Community. It’s possibly just playing into the predatory bisexual troupe, as he is often seen fighting for the affections of male character Jeff Winger. But a closer look signifies that his arcing confusion could mean that Dean Pelton is still figuring out his own sexuality.

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All 175 Dead Lesbian and Bisexual Characters On TV, And How They Died

So many women who’ve suffered death by television and just-so-happened to also like other women.

An introduction to the troupe “Bury your Gays,” a phenomena that occurs when writers/producers kill off a lgbtq character, usually after very limited screen time

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TV producers, stop portraying bisexuals as villains

Show creators should portray bisexuals as normal people — not just power-hungry, unethical, cheating liars.

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Annalise Keating (How to Get Away with Murder) is bisexual.

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Shadowhunters / Magnus Bane

Magnus is a warlock who does not fall into the bisexual troupe where characters are represented as immoral or evil. Shadow Hunters is based on the book series the Shadowhunter Chronicles by Cassandra Clare, where Magnus’ sexuality is named and developed, yet it is still represented fairly accurately in the show. 

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PRAISE

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Character: Clarke Griffin Appears in: The 100 Commonly Interpreted As: Straight, Lesbian or Bi

But Actually: Clarke is bi! Clarke Griffin is the main character of the 100, about a group of 100 teenage prisoners sent down to the Earth 97 years after a nuclear war, to see if the ground is habitable. Clarke later becomes the leader of this group.

At the start of the show, a boy named Finn Collins is seen consistently flirting with Clarke. At first, she appears uninterested, but they grow closer until they have sex in episode 4. However, it turns out that Finn already has a girlfriend, Raven Reyes, who later arrives on the ground in an escape pod.

For the next series, Clarke is shown as still having feelings for Finn but is angry with him still for lying to her. Finn has a very strong attachment to Clarke though, now Raven has broken up with him, and goes on a rampage, killing eighteen grounders (tribal warriors who live on the earth) while looking for Clarke, causing the grounder’s commander to sentence him to death.

Clarke kills Finn as an act of mercy so he doesn’t have to suffer the pain of torture. After his death, the grounder commander Lexa, who is around her age, reveals that she lost someone she loved too, a woman she was in a relationship with was killed by an army clan, to hurt Lexa, which is why she now believes love is a weakness.

Over the next few episodes, Clarke and Lexa get closer as Lexa rescues Clarke from all the grounder soldiers who want to kill her and Lexa is show to trust Clarke very much, at which point, ‘Clexa’ was deemed a new ship by the fandom. In episode 14 of season 2, Clarke says to Lexa “Maybe life should be about more than just surviving. Don’t we deserve better than that?”

Lexa replies with “Maybe we do.” After this, the two of them kiss for a good ten seconds before Clarke says that she isn’t ready for a new relationship yet.

Clarke is very definitely bi, as confirmed by the writers.

With many thanks to cosimacormiere for this submission.