By Rachel and Heather
1. Lesbian invents antigravity rail.
2. Lesbian adopts a llama.
3. Lesbian gets lost on the subway.
4. Lesbian gets loose on the subway.
5. Lesbian successfully negotiates a hostage situation.
6. Lesbian has to decide whether to buy a condo or keep renting.
7. Lesbian has a Three’s Company-style misunderstanding with another lesbian.
8. Lesbian goes on a date with the lesbian who participated in the misunderstanding.
9. Lesbian defeats an evil wizard.
10. Lesbian with a crunchy exterior reveals she’s got a soft caramel center.
11. Lesbian is an old, wise mentor — but wait, no, actually she’s the grandmother.
12. Lesbian falls in love with someone from a lower class, her father’s not gonna like it.
13. Lesbian goes on a quest to find the jewel that can stop the sinister overlord.
14. Lesbian meets a new quirky friend who opens her up to adventure.
15. Lesbian is a loyal servant and the only one who knows the hero’s real identity.
16. Lesbian journalist goes on an undercover assignment.
17. Lesbian gets in a fight in a bar.
18. Lesbian is a sleeper agent.
19. Lesbian is the handler of a lesbian sleeper agent.
20. Lesbian handler of a lesbian sleeper agent falls in love with lesbian sleeper agent.
21. Lesbian is a reformed bad girl — or is she?
22. Lesbian is actually a ghost.
23. Lesbian deals with an overbearing landlord.
24. Lesbian blames her shitty behavior on her rich parents.
25. Lesbian is the Chosen One.
26. Lesbian astronaut explores Pluto’s heart.
27. Lesbian must uncover the secret before time runs out.
28. Lesbian babysits and falls through magical portal with bratty kids.
29. Lesbian navigates workplace misogyny as a professional sports agent.
30. Lesbian navigates workplace misogyny as a CIA operative.
31. Lesbian navigates workplace misogyny at the Gap.
32. Lesbian bartender follows her dreams to become world-class chef.
33. Lesbian robot falls in love with her straight best robot friend who does not know if she returns lesbian robot’s robot feelings.
34. Lesbian is a therapist.
35. Lesbian decides to be the hero you need, not the hero you want.
36. Lesbian discovers dinosaur bones.
37. Lesbian owns a comic book shop.
38. Lesbian comic book shop owner is secretly an alien spy who accidentally falls in love with humanity.
39. Lesbian gets a dog.
40. Lesbian explores a coral reef.
41. Lesbian of color gets a lot of money to produce quality TV about lesbians of color (sci-fi).
42. Lesbian finds out she’s a mannequin!
42. Lesbian invents cool video games with lesbian friends.
43. Lesbian inherits a zoo.
44. Lesbian raises dragons in the desert.
45. Lesbian takes to the sea to become a pirate.
46. Lesbian kisses another lesbian, is happy, stays alive.
47. Lesbian coaches a football team.
48. Lesbian competes in a slam poetry competition.
49. Lesbian travels around the world by hot air balloon.
50. Lesbian must save town from nuclear plant meltdown.
51. Lesbian must get married by her 30th birthday to inherit ten million dollars.
52. Lesbian discovers other realm in her wardrobe.
53. Lesbian turns to sexy life of crime.
54. Lesbian has a wacky road trip.
55. Lesbian saves an embattled local bookstore.
56. Lesbian runs a marathon.
57. Lesbian fights evil with swords.
58. Lesbian goes to Mars.
59. Lesbian gets really into jigsaw puzzles.
60. Lesbian tries to win Hamilton tickets.
61. Lesbian programs comical AI companion.
62. Lesbian takes on evil corporation in court.
63. Lesbian has a picnic.
64. Lesbian joins local scrappy underdog kickball team.
65. Lesbians go to community college together.
66. Lesbian becomes YouTube star overnight.
67. Lesbian tries to make friends in the PTA at her kid’s school.
68. Lesbian travels through time.
69. Lesbian moves to the big city.
70. Lesbian leaves the big city to become an unlikely farmer.
71. Lesbian takes care of an ill parent.
72. Lesbian hikes the Appalachian Trail.
73. Lesbian becomes competitive hot dog eating champion.
74. Lesbian learns to square dance.
75. Lesbian buys her favorite diner to keep it from closing.
76. Lesbian is attacked by rabid shapeshifter.
77. Lesbians fights to save her family with the help of an uncultured lesbian barbarian.
78. Lesbian is an attractive pickpocket.
79. Lesbian crosses the mountains with a witch.
80. Lesbian solves the sorcerer’s riddle.
81. Lesbian competes in the Olympics.
82. Lesbian is spirited away by an evil priest.
83. Lesbian gets a job at the Museum of Lesbian Artifacts.
84. Lesbian discovers the vibrator exhibit.
85. Lesbian cannot believe vibrators existed in Victorian times!
86. Lesbian is lured into a trap by a wolf.
87. Lesbian hero finds the lured lesbian and slays the wolf.
88. Lesbian loves her horse.
89. Lesbian slays what was once believed to be an invincible predator bird.
90. Lesbian is like, “Is that all you’ve got?”
91. Lesbian gets caught in a storm.
92. Lesbian must master dark magic to break the evil charm.
93. Lesbian wouldn’t do that if she were you.
94. Lesbian kisses another lesbian in the rain.
95. Lesbian rides a ferris wheel with another lesbian.
96. Lesbian and her ferris wheel lesbian are attacked by a feral clown.
97. Lesbian stargazes.
98. Lesbian does star charts for zany customers.
99. Lesbian cop falls in love with lesbian thief.
100. Lesbian lives happily ever after.
I just finished watching the 100 and I REALLY REALLY needed this Heather :(.
I made a terrible mistake by checking tumblr this morning, so while I haven’t seen ‘it’ yet and am still in denial, this really helped cheer me up.
Also ‘Lesbian gets really into jigsaw puzzles’ totally describes my last Christmas.
Aaaaaannnd I’m crying again. Why did I let myself get sucked in like that? Why did I think it would be different?
We trusted them and they let us down. I too feel so betrayed. How could they?
Currently trying to process by making up a story where all the dead TV lesbians sit around at a Dead Lesbians Anonymous support group, trying to process what the fuck is going on with this world.
Someone write this fanfic asap. Tara can be fucking president.
What’s really sad is that I started thinking this up a couple of months back, and there have been so many additions that I had to start making splinter support groups. TV lesbians die quicker than you can plot a storyline about dead TV lesbians.
Ghosts of dead TV lesbians travel the world as a team of heroic crime-fighting spooks, saving the lives of all future TV lesbians!
OMG YES PLZ WRITE THIS
This needs to be in sequential art format ASAP.
Be it a 3 pager or a series, we needs it.
I miss her already…
I never could get into the show, it’s just not my cup of tea. The Clexa-storyline didn’t change that. But I feel bad for the people who liked it and about another dead female womanlover.
Thank gods, a support group. I stanned so hard for this show. It seemed too good to be true.
Apparently it was.
I mean I get the problem of the actress being contracted on another show, and it was causing huge scheduling issues. And in this universe she couldn’t exactly just “move to australia” or something. But putting that scene SECONDS after the love scene WTF ? And do it in such an anti-climatic way ?!
Exactly!! And in addition to it being queerbaiting, it was actually just garbage writing? Like Jasper survives a SPEAR TO THE CHEST thanks to Clarke’s quick thinking, but COMMANDER LEXA, nightblood and battle-tested warrior, gets taken out by a stray bullet, and Clarke basically just sits there and watches her die?? It’s inconsistent with both of their characters and with the way death is typically handled on this show. It felt sloppy, rushed, forced, lazy, obvious, and 1000% unnecessary.
And it bears repeating that this was Tara & Willow all over again. Right after a kiss/love scene, sudden, senseless, stray bullet.
Not even a moment of true happiness before taking it all away. I’m heartsick right now.
Yup. Just like Willow and Tara. I’m so sick of it.
I had no clue this was a direct response to an actual dead lesbian storyline until reading all these comments, and I have to say it felt highly relevant and emotional anyway.
Yeah I mean it’s ALWAYS super relevant sadly :(. At this point i’m gonna form a prayer circle for Poussey :(
Me too. As I never got into the 100 I had no idea. I wish it wasn’t always relevant anyway.
@madderka same. #yougetme
Also favourite one : 31. Lesbian navigates workplace misogyny at the Gap
I am eagerly awaiting the processing that I hope will occur on Boob(s on Your) Tube. I woke up this morning with still a little bit of sadness lodged in my chest… :'(
Also – do queer women really get killed off at higher rates than others on TV? Any studies folks can point me to? Because I’ve heard that a number of times and I’d be really interested to see numbers.
The question is, are you asking for a straight-up headcount, or for percentages? Because if you’re asking for a straight-up headcount, straight women get killed a lot more–there are just so many more straight women.
Percentages, though…it’s pretty dire.
Definitely percentages. And I totally need to look into it more myself.
I just wasn’t sure if percentage-wise it was worse, or if it just feels worse to me because, unless I’m watching Lip Service or something like that, killing off a queer character on a given show often cuts the number of queer characters in that particular show virtually in half. That’s just never going to be the case for straight characters.
Heather, you are kind of the only person on the Internet that I trust to accurately express how screwed up this feels, but I’m also loath to ask it of you. I’ve been reading your stuff since you started writing about Skins as StuntDouble. You’ve been a beacon of sense and narrativestructureLOVE for so long. I think about how tired I feel this morning, and I wonder “Do we even need to write anything new?” What do we say about Lexa that we haven’t already said about Tara? And Xena? And Maya? And N…ope. I’ve been reading and listening so long, but today I find that I do have something to say for myself too. I hope this speaks for some of you too:
I’m not even that mad. I just feel so. stupid. I have been hardening my heart against queer storylines since “Seeing Red,” man. I’m 30, not a scared 16-year-old. I’m frankly ashamed of myself. I have ONE RULE: I don’t board any lesbian TV ships unless the last episode has aired. (Of course, SkinsFire showed me even that isn’t safe.) But I let The 100 in these last few weeks. The SAD has been hitting hard, my reappointment’s up in the air, and my relationship is probably over. So I relapsed into fandom. And it felt SO good. I binged. I DEVOURED every decent fic I could get my hands on. I heard the actress had been cast elsewhere, but I refused to believe what it meant.
This is the first episode I watched live.”Can you believe this show?!”, I crowed to my partner and my roommate. “I wish I could tell my 16-year-old self I’d be seeing a bisexual PROTAGONIST get to kiss a lady with the lights on in primetime! Remember how there was no way for a lesbian to kiss a girl without getting brutally murdered and/or pregnant after?” Those were literally the words that came out of my mouth.
It happened. The closing credits rolled. The preview showed nothing but DUDES. I looked at the other queers in the room. They seemed confused and understandably embarrassed by watching a grown-ass woman break down over a CW show. “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “It’s just… not different.”
That’s all there really is to it: We thought this show was different. The writers reassured us. It’s 2016. The White House was god-damned rainbow. Carol gave us hope that we COULD have nice things. But it’s just not different.
And I could live with that, honestly, except the GOP debate the next channel up is MORE than happy to remind us of how unsafe and unwelcome we are as queers, trans* folks, and people of color.
People come to TV to escape from a world they don’t feel safe in, but it’s never been a safe place for us. I won’t forget that again.
I think creative works get to be more than that when you’re not so desperate for it: it’s hard for people in the main to see that, to understand why minorities use odd language and talk about “safe spaces”. Why these are also important for people dealing with mental or other personal health and welfare issues.
It sounds like you’re going through a lot and could probably use some support; but in terms of escapism, comics are in a fairly good place at the moment. Not the big two publishers so much, but the other imprints certainly: autostraddle has some great articles with recommendations, and there’s more out there too.
Are you me? Because that’s exactly what happened to me. As someone in their 30s, I swore I wouldn’t get sucked into fandom until I knew what happened in the end. But instead, I let myself HOPE with The 100. All the signs pointed to the producers and writers actually GETTING it. They were on board with the pairing, liked the actresses, and talked about the responsibility of representation.
I feel betrayed. Once again, I allowed myself to get into a fandom and have hope. I have never seen Tumblr be so sad as I did last night and today. All of the inside jokes, fic recs, and analyzing gifs are just gone, and replaced with an unending sadness. I hope the fandom recovers, but it will never be the same.
x10
I have been in mourning since I watched the episode last night. Like literally numb all day and being zero percent productive. What sucks is that I should have known better. I am in the group with the 30-somethings who had been crushed many times before and who swore, swore!, we wouldn’t get invested in a couple again…until Clexa drew us in. Another show again. To deal with this heartache. Again.
This put into words exactly what I’ve been trying to sum up. I just feel… so stupid. And so disappointed. Why the hell did I let myself believe this would be any different?
exactly exactly exactly. I feel sad, and betrayed, and so so stupid.
I don’t even like the 100, I find Clarke (and Bellamy, and Abby, and Jaha – the ultimate Jeovah Witness – and Murphy and Raven, etc…) stupid. I like to watch it so I can make fun of it with a friend, it’s a good time together. However, I feel very sad because of what she meant, because I wanted them to be happy (I don’t like Clarke but poor girl… anyway, if they kill all of her love interest, maybe Bellamy will die ? i’m not gonna cry on this one !). Also I feel so sad for all of the people who loved them, wanted them together, wanted teenage lesbian to have an happily ever after, and did not get one. Specially teenagers. I mean… killing fictionnal lesbian is bad. Killing fictionnal lesbian in a teenager’s show is cruel.
This is pretty much me as well. The only characters I like are Lexa and a couple of the other grounders. The rest of devoid of redeemable qualities.
Just want to say I wish 83 was the story of my life…
Also I was about to try and get into the 100 and now I’m not going to bother… Adding it to the list of shows which I have walked away from/decided to avoid due to fridging.
I mean it’s great you could just watch it until they make love and then just STOP ? Like I rewatch the L word but stop before Dana gets cancer…
Like stopping the last Harry Potter movie before the stupid epilogue… So it just finishes with the trio on the bridge and I can pretend that Hermione worked out she’d be better off with Luna.
I was thinking about this last night while walking my dog. The new X-Files series is just now showing in France and I am confused with a lot of it because I decided to end the series before Scully’s baby ever happened so I have been super confused by the reboot.
And I was wondering if the extent of my ability to thoroughly deny canon whenever/wherever it suits me is because of all the years of relying on subtext/imagination for queer characters and ignoring their deaths.
Like, I remember people getting furious with JK Rowling for saying Ron/Hermione don’t really belong together because they could not handle anything contradicting what was written. And I can not relate to that at all.
And then I looked at twitter this morning and immediately thought, “Oookay, great. Something else that NEVER HAPPENED.”
R.e. X-Files I just keep ignoring the baby stuff… I’m sure I’m missing out but it doesn’t feel like it. I’m in for the cryptid based procedural and conspiracy stuff. I’m terrible at watching the end of things. I always have been. I just hate endings.
But yeah I regularly deny canon. I guess spending most of the 90s living on subtext had an effect on me yeah, that and my Nope response to all the deaths.
I should have known. I should have known better.
I should have known that Jroth’s insistence that race, gender and sexual orientation don’t matter is just another way of saying that he doesn’t want to think or care about those issues.
I’m hurt, angry and sad, but I hate the way that they made me feel stupid for wanting to believe it would be different.
I think he probably cares but has no conception of what that demands: it’s something for which creative representation, at all levels, and diversity is the only cure, I think.
Race, gender and sexual orientation probably don’t matter to the story being told, but he still doesn’t, can’t perceive the whole context in which his story takes place, and doesn’t know the right questions to ask to alter that perception. Listening to and raising up other voices is the only solution to that: look at the mess they’ve made of portraying PoC in the show, despite a strong, diverse cast. It is not enough to simply be “race-blind”.
I feel kinda stupid too, because part of me read the fanfic, loved it, started following it from a distance, and yeah: hoped. The fem-slash community is pretty tight that way.
I think everybody is overreacting. FIRST the actress was only available for seven episodes this season due to her contract with FTWD. SECOND they didn’t just kill her mindlessly they made it an important point in the story. Though it was rather sudden. THIRD Clarke is not suddenly straight; she slept with Niylah in the first ep this season(as long as that don’t use this as an excuse for her to never be with a woman again… then I take back everything). She’s still a canonically bisexual main character on mainstream TV. SPOILER fourth there are pictures of ADC filming in the city of light and living on through the 2nd AI. So this isn’t the last we’ll see of her. They can do a lot with the whole reincarnation thing and it’s rather fascinating to think about. Also I know people want there happy stories and all but they’re boring. FIFTH none of the characters are having happy times on this show; you can’t honestly expect the bisexual and lesbian characters to be left out of it because they’re minorities. To me doing that is a bigger disservice. ‘Like oh man we can’t kill them off, even though it makes since, because lesbian.’
Last thing I’m I the only one that paid attention to the mountain of foreshadowing? Since the second episode it was ‘don’t worry about my death, my spirit will live on blah blah blah.’ ‘Do you talk about anything other than your death?’ Seriously I felt like they were slapping me in the face with it.
Oh please don’t tell a bunch of sad queer women they’re overreacting over yet another lesbian death. Not in this post.
Nope nope nope. I don’t need someone invalidating all of the collective grief that is happening.
IT IS HAPPENING FOR A REASON.
P.S. The mountain of foreshadowing was actually the reason I had hoped they wouldn’t go there. It was almost TOO MUCH in a way that I thought it was an attempt to redirect our attention for something bigger and more creative. In other words, I expected more of the writers than they were able to conceive.
Agreed. The writers on this show are known for doing the exact OPPOSITE of what you expect. With all the foreshadowing I assumed it was a red herring. I feel so stupid now.
I like how you assume that we didn’t actually know all of that.
It’s not just one dead lesbian. It’s every dead lesbian and gay character whose body was added to the pile over the years. For younger girls who love girls, “happy endings are boring” isn’t a comfort when they keep seeing women like them die.
It’s fine to have a preference in endings and plot points, but you don’t have to tell the people upset that they’re overreacting to have one.
As you said yourself, ADC was only available for 7 episodes and is a regular on another show. So makes you think they are going to bring her back in some larger capacity later on. She will be in the finale for all of a few minutes, then what? The character is dead. Period. No need to give people false hope yet again on some speculative “Wel, maybe…” bullshit.
And this wouldn’t be a big deal for people if LGBT characters didn’t already only make up 0.08% of television. When you start killing them off it’s glaring because there are already tons of straight characters by comparison. You can kill one off and 20 more will get introduced. It is not the same. This shouldn’t be hard to understand. You can’t the equality card in defense of these types of deaths when you know damn well things are far from equal.
SHUT THE FUCK UP
and yes, AS can delete this but I needed to say it
People are sad for many reasons.
The foreshadowing was there by the Lexa just existing. I didn’t think Heda Lexa would be an elder. So her death was always looming for me but the how and the when is the problem I’m having. That accidental stray bullet less than a minute of screen time of them being together for the 1st time. Bump that. It’s awful. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I don’t feel super angry. I feel tired, and annoyed, and hurt for the kids/people who are really really hurting. I’ve teared up but I haven’t cried.
I cried buckets over Kate from LTIH and still tear up thinking about it. I think I’m telling myself I won’t cry one tear for this story because the way the story was told doesn’t deserve my tears. I’m sadder than I want to be. I wish I didn’t care.
But I actually really dig this show and will continue watching. It’s just a different show for me now. Lexa was my favorite character. There’s rewatching and there’s fanfiction and that’s that.
I’ve been reviewing this show all season, and this episode was atrocious not ‘because it killed Lexa’ (which I predicted before the season started) but because of when and how.
You can’t have consummation then death in consecutive scenes and not have it as a Banner Lesbian Death Trope. You can’t mimic one of the most famous offings of a queer woman in the history of television, and not have it be just a cruel twist of your pen. You can’t kill lots of characters in ways directly correlated to plot and paying for your sins, and then stretch to kill one of two queer women immediately after she has a sexual/happy experience, and expect us to believe you know about or respect either your own story or your target audience.
I went into a lot more detail in the review itself (including why Lexa being in the City of Light doesn’t negate any of this), if you’re interested: bit.ly/1R6sDJ5
A response to the 100, right? I totally feel you. Jesus.
Too bad gayness can’t be copyrighted or something, so straight white males would be prevented from writing shit like this.
I just started watching the 100 a few weeks ago and was really starting to enjoy the second season. I was about halfway through so Lexa hadn’t even made an appearance yet, and so the clexa relationship wasn’t even why I was watching though it was something I was mildly and cautiously looking forward to. But after reading about what happens I’m not even going to bother watching anymore. I’m so sick of these storylines. The Cophine debacle of the entirety of Orphan Black’s season 3 has met my quota of tv bullshit I can handle for at least the next 15 years.* If I want to be disappointed and sigh a lot and yell at a tv screen I’ll just watch that or Seeing Red. The 100 isn’t doing anything new.
*Delphine is alive though. We’re either seeing her again during the last episode of season 4 or, if they really want to drag her “death” out (also due in part by Brochu’s scheduling conflicts), during season 5. It doesn’t excuse the bullshit of season 3 though. And I’m not sure there’s enough water in the world to contain the amount of salt the cophine fans are throwing at the writers.
Thanks for this bit of levity, Heather. I’m honestly still reeling from the episode. The show has gotten SO MUCH RIGHT that I honestly believed they could, at the very fucking least, avoid A POINT BY POINT remake of one of the worst queer TV/story tropes of all time.
It’s like they TRIED to mirror Buffy’s “Seeing Red,” among other things. Which even Joss Whedon has since apologized for doing.
Hell, I can think of several ways they could have furthered their plot, had a big twist/reveal, and NOT killed off that character when and how they did. They could have killed her off later and I wouldn’t have been mad, so long as it was actually in keeping with the story and the characters and didn’t come DIRECTLY AFTER them finally consummating their relationship.
I mean, for fuck’s sake. Credit to the actresses for being incredible in the roles, as always, but I’m heartbroken, not gonna lie.
Right ? Like it would have been TOTALLY fine for her to loose the big one on one from a few episodes ago. It was badass that she won, but that was a legitimate moment where it could have gone the other way.
But nope, let’s throw in the “she has sex and then a random stray bullet kills her” . SMH
Exactly. This is a show with a lot of death. I could have been very forgiving of killing a queer character if it had been really well written. But a stray fucking bullet? I can’t forgive that lack of creativity.
As someone who doesn’t watch the show, I really appreciate these points–that it wasn’t just the death but the disrespectful and homophobic context of the death (as in right after sex, and with little narrative justification). Though I do think killing the female love interest of a bi female lead who also has a male love interest is sketchy either way; it doesn’t seem like there are other major lesbian or female bi characters on the show.
But it sounds like there’s a big difference between this death and say, that of Delphine in Orphan Black, which was framed as a Big Heroic Moment and redemption for the character, and which mirrored the death of Paul, a male character with whom Delphine was always paralleled, and which left an intact female couple in major roles on the show.
To be fair the “male love interest” only exists as wishful thinking in the heart of Bellarke shippers though. It’s why this show was SO NEW. The queer content was canon and the straight content was fanfiction ! I’m so worried they’re gonna make her and Bellamy have “intense” scenes together now (especially since he turned into a piece of shit murdering colonialist). Gag.
ALso I agree the “redemption means death” was less brutal, because even thought Delphine was in a lesbian relationship this isn’t a lesbian trope but is actually fairly common in fiction.
Whereas what happened in the 100 is 100% a lesbian death trope.
Really, the male love interest is fan head canon? WOW. OMG, I understand why people are so upset! I hope it stays that way!
Yeah, the thing about Delphine is that her death was actually 100% about Delphine, and her making up for her past shadiness, and not about, say, how her death would make some dude (or even Cosima) upset. And the fact that they killed Paul, the straight male Delphine, in exactly the same way a few episodes earlier made it hard to take. I feel sorry for people who loved the character, but it doesn’t feel biphobic.
Whereas killing a lesbian after she has sex with her girl, and for the shock value I get from these descriptions, is just 100% fail.
Yeah, we finally had a f/f relationship that was the *main* actual canon ship on the show. The “male love interest” has not ever been presented in that way – people paying attention can tell his relationship to the protagonist has been one of two alpha/leader types with very different approaches to problems finding ways to work together in a platonic balancing of roles–or outright fighting. There’s like, zero sexual tension between them.
It’s been so utterly refreshing, the show was actively courting the queer demo, and that makes this betrayal sting all the more.
Clarke and Lexa’s relationship was handled SO WELL leading up to this, largely thanks to one (female) writer who really got it. This episode? Written by a dude, and the death dictated by the showrunner (also a dude). Which isn’t to say that men can never get this sort of thing right, but honestly? With how frequently they’ve fucked it up on productions with actual budgets and the potential for large audiences? I’m sort of at an “everyone out of the pool” point with it.
I’ve already come up with like five different ways they could have written in a Lexa death, furthered the story, and entirely avoided this total shitshow of a plot line. But hey I’m not being paid to run the show.
“Lesbians trying to win Hamilton tickets” sounds like a reality TV show that would get brutal. Maybe no one would die, but there would be suffering. The lengths we would go to…
I was picturing the opposite, like just a bunch of lesbians going to a Ham4ham looking gorgeous.
The 100 Writers before killing Lexa: We’re totally super aware of the Dead Lesbian trope and why it is so fucked up
The 100 writers now: lol
This article totally made me laugh by the way, and thank you for the staging ground for Dead Lesbian feelings before the recap later today.
“22. Lesbian is actually a ghost.”
At first I was like, “hey, this storyline DOES involve a dead lesbian.” But you know what? If she’s already a ghost, then they can’t kill her. *nods approval*
TV writers would still find a way to kill her.
I can’t deal with this right now, I’m not ready yet, I need more time.
Fuck it, I want to A.L.I.E. the world for real, to hell with it all.
“Lesbian is a reformed bad girl — or is she?” lololololololllolol
was on tumblr after the show and it was gut wrenching to see the clexa blogs i follow have to deal with people thinking about cutting themselves again. people so low, suicide hotlines were being reblogged. i dont know how but i watched a reaction video and to see how transfixed we were and freaking soaring after they are reconciled to the absolutely lowest of lows in the span of one commercial break makes my feel nauseous actually. le sigh
right ? Fuck that whiplash! This was so disrespectful.
we’d been waiting for a love scene for damn near a year and after last night we couldn’t even make gifs, lol. my word for this is cruel, it feels incredibly cruel
I’m bummed, but I saw this coming because I never bought into the idea that this show was all that groundbreaking or super progressive. I didn’t trust Jason Rothenberg as far as I could throw him. Maybe it’s because while I’m gay, I’m also a WOC, and seeing the way this show has repeatedly failed with respect to race put me on guard from the beginning. So this is essentially just the other shoe dropping. I had braced myself for it. A small part of me was hoping that it wouldn’t come to pass, but I’m not surprised it did. Sigh.
Thank you for sharing your perspective. You’re totally right re: their treatment of race.
Yeah, I didn’t say anything before in previous The 100 posts because I didn’t want to be one of those people harshing everyone’s squee (and I mean there was a lot of f/f goodness to squee over), but I became progressively more and more uneasy with how the show was handling race. So this was super-disappointing, but I’d be lying if I said it shocked me.
The silver lining is that I used to feel pulled in two opposite directions with this show when it came to race and sexuality. Two different aspects of my identity battling it out, and feeling like a traitor depending on which one I prioritized. By killing off Lexa, I am no longer conflicted because now the show fails equally on both fronts. So thank you for that, Jason Rothenberg.
… It’s not much of a silver lining, but I take what I can get. LOL.
I love this philosophy! Way to look for a silver lining.
What can I say, I’m a glass half-full kinda person. :D
This is giving me a lot to think about. I mean, we deserved to feel happy about the “good” queer content, but at the same time we did fail to acknowledge the shitty parts of the show because of it and thus failed to make a space for you to discuss those feelings.
I think that this site is usually pretty receptive so it’s not that I was worried or anything that people would get mad at me or be terribly dismissive about it. It was a problem elsewhere in the Clexa fandom, but I trust that if I had said something here, people would have listened, even if they might not have agreed. And it’s not like I was the only WOC who liked Clexa*. But I did feel guilty about going there. I shouldn’t have, maybe, but no one wants to be the person raining on everyone’s parade.
* That was one thing I saw elsewhere on the Internet that I hated. Like Clexa? You must be white and just not understand the show’s racism. Hate Clexa (or Jason)? You must be straight and not understand how important LGBTQ representation is.
@Julie this was me exactly, wish I could have had your foresight. QWOC as well here, and the only reason I didn’t quit after they killed Wells was because I had heard such great things about Clexa. It’s so rare to find shows that have great representation for both race AND sexuality that I’m used to having to pick my battles like that.
Makes me appreciate The Fosters that much more. :D
(Countdown to Stef or Lena being killed because, idk, they trip over a stray pebble in the middle of the street.)
Really appreciate this. I didn’t watch the show, even though cheesy sci-fi is my happy place, because of what I heard about the racism in the show, and now I am very glad.
And I am really curious about whether the racism of the show generally and the homophobia of this specific instance are linked. It doesn’t have to be, I know, but from the little I know it does seem like they were getting plaudits for having a lot of characters of color without bothering to treat them well, and this latest lesbian death like the same thing.
I appreciate this perspective.
I can’t use less-than-legal means to watch videos and it airs on a cable channel here, so I have only followed the show through recaps/youtube clips which really glossed over everything that isn’t Lexa/Clarke.
It should definitely be something we talk about more.
I feel like Rothenberg just tells himself, “My show is set in the future where nothing works quite the same! It’s all just survival, man!” so that he doesn’t have to care about representation and actually relate the show to the real world it is created/broadcasted in.
“I feel like Rothenberg just tells himself, “My show is set in the future where nothing works quite the same! It’s all just survival, man!””
MTE! I felt as though he used the dystopian setting as a cop-out to not having to explain anything he didn’t want to explain. It sorta felt that way about sexuality too, not just race, like when he said that no one cared about who loved whom because it was the future and they had more important things to care about. I understand that our present-day labels (gay, bi, queer, pan, lesbian, etc.) might not make sense in that future world, so I could get behind Clarke never explicitly saying she was bi. And I appreciated a show with queer characters where their sexual orientation was almost incidental and their storylines weren’t about homophobia or angst. (Nothing against those, but it’s nice to have more options.) But it felt like he hadn’t actually given much thought to how this society had reached that point of not caring about sexuality and he was just using the “future dystopia” card as a convenient out. It was half-baked world-building.
i didn’t see it coming but at the same time, the fact that she was still listed as a guest star in the opening credits was making me nervous these past few episodes, and thus i can’t say i’m SURPRISED.
also re: Delphine
i’m kind of terrified that her appearence in those episodes will be via some BS flashback or weird dream sequence, and i’m too hurt by the whole story line to let myself get my hopes up.
also i hate hate hate the new GF. the actress is weird and uses a lot of vocal fry and dresses like a real housewife on a hat related downward spiral and unironically believes in reiki, I AM DONE
First, this list is fantastic and made me laugh out loud several times (31! 46!).
Second, I look forward to one or more thoughtful reaction posts to the lesbian death on the 100 when writers have had time to think and process (and maybe heal). As someone who doesn’t watch the show, I am really curious to learn more and have a bunch of questions, though I understand people may be too raw for them now.
I’m particularly curious if to know there were warning signs, either in the text itself or on a larger level in the show, and if the terrible racism that the show was famous for (which to be honest is why I didn’t watch) was one of them. I think that could go either way–treating characters of color badly seems like a sign that a show doesn’t get it, but then look at Lost Girl–and I’d like to know what people who watched think.
When Arrow killed its bi female character, I was surprised other people hadn’t seen it coming, because I didn’t even watch the show but had expected it. (It’s a show about men and manpain, and she wasn’t a member of the core cast.) I think we’re in a tricky place right now, because there is some genuine progress and signs of change, so it’s easy to hope, but then the old bad tropes are still out there and can be devastating when they crush us again.
Third, this makes me all the more glad that Autostraddle has announced a new policy of rewarding quality over quantity in representation and paying more attention to shows that do women well, even if there aren’t LBTIA characters. Because I’d love to see more conversation about what shows are worth our time and effort as a community, and maybe some discussion of warning signs so that we aren’t always reliving that same stupid Buffy episode.
There’s a palpable difference between a show like the Fosters, that centers the experience of its lesbian characters and prioritizes its female characters generally, and too many of the others that use and abuse our stories for shocks. As a sf fan, I’d rather watch a show that does straight women really well than one that centers on men and includes a badly-treated lesbian–though I respect others will make other choices. But I love to see us talk about this!
Great list, and sincere condolences to the 100 fans.
Hey!
Obviously not an Autostraddle writer, but I am literally doing academic research on the Clexa fandom, so I hope I have a modicum of knowledge to work from here.
I think there were definitely warning signs. The show kills people ALL the time. Frankly, it’s sort of the point – post-apocalpytic sci-fi political drama? People are gonna die. Beyond that, the treatment of POCs has been very problematic; I think a lot of people are used to having to choose between good POC representation and good queer representation, though, so it was still a surprise that this would have happened – though, I think, not as much of a surprise as it would have been if they had not been racist.
Also, the producer, Jason Rothenberg, is known for trying to keep a very tight lid on spoilers. He tweeted about filming the finale in Vancouver and told fans to come find them, and they were shooting a Clexa scene, so a lot of people took that as a warning – there was no way that wasn’t going to be used in some way, because it was so intentional and out of character for him. I don’t think anyone expected this, though.
Finally, the possibility of Lexa’s death has been talked about a lot on the show. People were hoping that was just because she is in such a prominent position, but obviously that was not entirely the case… Also, there have been a lot of lines like “May we meet again” or “Death is not the end, Clarke,” so a couple people are wondering if she will actually be back in the City of Light scifi storyline that’s sort of like a hallucination where there is no pain and no death, particularly because that seemed to be going on in the aforementioned finale filming in Vancouver. Unclear as to whether or not that will happen; I’m entertaining the possibility but frankly I think what’s most likely is that Clarke sees her in the City of Light and they get to say goodbye again and then Lexa will be gone for good.
I think there are several reasons why a lot of people are crushed, though:
1) The queer representation had been very good. They were treated like whole people, their sexualities were not the focus, and the Clexa scenes were respectfully portrayed. That made this much more shocking.
2) The producers had acknowledged the “Bury Your Gays” trope and had been reassuring fans for months to “have hope” and “trust them.” So the fact that they then turned around and committed the trope was like a slap in the face to a lot of fans who /had/ trusted them.
3) The scene occurred directly after they kissed for the first time since the betrayal at the end of Season 2, and the first time they had sex. It was separated only by a commercial break. So for a lot of fans, not only was it like being dropped from the top of a rollercoaster, but it means there is really no enjoyment or collective effervescence or anything around the ship becoming canon again because it was immediately followed by Bury Your Gays.
4) The producer literally said after the episode came out, “I don’t even want to talk about the trope that’s out there about LGBT characters; that is not something that factored into the decision.” Which was also like a slap in the face, because when it had come up before it had been followed by “we’re aware,” “have hope” and “trust us.”
5) The producer is also citing the actress’ work schedule as a reason to kill her off, and a lot of fans are pointing out that that’s at least a little bit BS. She’s said Lexa is her favorite character, her agent has said it would be good for her to continue on The 100, and FTWD have said that they would be happy to allow her to film several episodes per season in the future. So killing her off didn’t really have to happen.
6) Finally, people are frustrated because her death happened in a really non-meaningful way. She was the Commander of the 12 Clans, the singular most powerful person in the show, who was phenomenal in battle and a brilliant leader, etc. etc. etc. People were expecting her to die, sure – hopefully she would not but expectant that she would – but nobody was expecting her to die by a stray bullet because she opened a door at the wrong time. For a lot of fans, that was the final piece of disrespect.
Hopefully that puts what’s going on a bit more in context!
Much appreciated!
It seems clear from what you and others say that the show did a dirty deed and deserves to be called out on it. The producers’ trolling of fans seems especially cruel. (I understand that dealing with fandom in the social media age is difficult and complex, and that no one really knows how to do it well yet, but this does seem like buttering the bread on both sides.)
But I’m especially interested in the larger phenomenon. This is one of a long line of shows (going back to the 90s!) to give us very good representation for a time and then abruptly cancels it out or undercuts it with a deeply disrespectful move–in fact, that pattern has been incredibly common for almost two decades. (Almost more so than representation that is just awful all through.)
Reading what you and others say, I can’t help but see parallels, or warning signs.
–the weirdness around not labeling sexuality in the show, which some people describe above, reminds me of the way Buffy the show couldn’t figure out whether Willow was bi or gay or address the matter in a way believable for teens at the time, which in retrospect was huge warning sign. (As was that terrible episode when Willow comes out to Buffy and the moral drawn is that’s totally ok to respond homophobically at first as long as you eventually reconcile.) It’s been a pretty consistent hallmark of representation problems for decades, especially if it consists of unwillingness to use the words “bi” or “bisexual” on air. Not because people who don’t label don’t exist in our communities, but because not labeling is a way for pop culture to distance itself from the LGBT communities.
–the terrible treatment of characters of color, especially since it seems like there was some self-congratulation on the diversity of the cast and no consideration for the racism of the portrayals.
–the foreshadowing of Lexa’s death you describe here, though that doesn’t necessary hint at how offensive or badly written the actual death would be. (Were other characters killed off this badly?)
And I totally get your point about it being a post-apocalyptic show that kills off characters–which I think is fair, and I wouldn’t argue that it’s never OK to kill off a bi or lesbian character. (Stakes and standards are very different still for trans characters.) It’s the disrespect in the manner of death that is disturbing.
The only thing that seems new is the creators’ active trolling of the fandom re Bury Your Gays; that flip-flop is disturbing. Especially since it seemed that type of engagement actually worked for them really well for a time.
Omg this is the smartest comment I’ve read today. YES YES. You’re right ! There ARE warning signs, I feel like we should write them on a FUCKING wall and look at that wall every time we feel the hope that they’ won’t screw us over one more time.
It’s like that one “friend” you have who loves to think of themselves as progressive but who’s actually a terrible ally and still homophobic or racist or transphobic, and instead of them being overtly aggressive you have to deal with microagressions day in and day out.
Wow, thanks! :)
I would love to help paint that wall! Ten-foot high letters in the middle of Autostraddle land!
And your analogy is on point. I think we should have a more robust conversation about some of these microagressions, if you want to use that term here, and how they are linked to bigger acts of bad representation.
And maybe have some sort of Lesbian/Bi Danger Scale System, where we’re on high alert if there are a lot of warning signs (like the show being centered on a man and his manpain, or not calling its bi characters bi, or foreshadowing a character’s death when it has a history of killing minority character off in dumb ways, etc.)
Somebody made this on Tumblr: http://logically-abstract.tumblr.com/post/140441858413/the-expendables-you-binches-better-gt-this-fuck
It’s kind of sad that this isn’t even all of them. I can think of a few more. Didn’t Rose just die last week too? So that’s two dead lesbian characters in a weeks time. Wow.
Interestingly, I feel like no one was really mad about Rose’s death. People were sad that it meant no more Bridget Regan, but it didn’t touch a nerve with people the way The 100 did. But I’m not sure why Lexa’s death is different, even though I’m one of the people who thought Rose’s death was okay but was disappointed with Lexa’s. Was it because at that point Luisa and Rose were long over (despite their lingering feelings for each other) so it wasn’t really a case of “a nice lesbian couple can’t have nice things”? Or maybe because it didn’t feel like the JTV showrunners were actively courting an LGB fanbase the way Rothenberg was, which seems to have added a lot of insult to injury. Or maybe people just care less about JTV in general; I don’t think the fandom is quite as passionate as The 100!
I think it’s everything you said, plus the fact that they at least had the excuse that Rose was an actual villain. And we knew that pretty much right from the start so I don’t think anyone expected a happy ending for her. And they’ve already introduced a new relationship for Luisa so we don’t have to worry about queer content vanishing from the show with the death of one of its queer characters.
I will say that I was a little disappointed with it, but only because I feel like they moved onto a new villain before they really wrapped up Rose’s storyline. I was really looking forward to her making a big comeback (mostly, like you said, because I love Bridget Regan) and then she basically showed up and immediately died.
But Jane the Virgin is such a positive show overall for its female characters that it’s hard to be mad at it for too long.
Yeah, I think it definitely took the sting out of Rose’s death because we still had Luisa and Susanna. So many of the comments on the autostraddle recap were along the lines of, “Bummer that Rose has to die, but OMG HOW PRECIOUS ARE LUISA & SUSANNA?!?”
It does suck that they brought Bridget Regan back only to kill her off so soon. But with the way this show works, they can easily retcon it to make it so that it wasn’t actually Rose who died. Hey, she was in the business of plastic surgery, after all…
I’d also add:
1) Rose is a murdering villain who forced Luisa to stay in the closet about their relationship and then PUT HER IN A MENTAL INSTITUTION when she tried to come out about it.
2) Rose’s death is really more about furthering Luisa’s character arc than is it about, say, its effect the Jane/Michael relationship. Any happy ending for Luisa involves her resolving her feelings for Rose and moving on into a more healthy relationship. And that better relationship (with Susannah) been set up in a way that makes it more serious than her fling with Juicy Jordan earlier.
3) All signs point to Rose not actually being dead and this being another one of her plots, which seems very different from the faint hope that Lexa is going to pop up in an afterlife for one episode later.
It’s also true that Rose and Luisa are recurring characters important to the plot but not in the main cast, and can and do disappear for episodes at a time. (Frankly I think this is just Rose’s latest disappearance and just as temporary.) Luisa and Susannah will likely occupy the time and space Rose did before her “death.”
Whereas (aside from the social media stuff) Lexa’s death seems like it’s actually going to change the amount of queer content in the show quite dramatically.)
It’s for all the reasons you said but I think people are more pissed specifically because of the way Rothenberg has been hyping up that particular fandom since the end of Season 2. He has gone out of his way in interviews to act like Clexa was some progressive shit that wasn’t going to end like all the other shows. He repeatedly went out of his way to use his social media presence to pander to that demographic and tell them to have faith that Clexa would get together this season. Why spend seven weeks doing that to young girls when you knew damn well the rug was about to be pulled out from under them? Even Ryan Murphy didn’t engage in that kind of fandom fuckery. We knew he didn’t respect us.
I also think people were less upset about Rose’s death because yes JTV isn’t as popular as the 100 but there are also 2 other lesbians on the show and their is no immediate concern that those characters are going to die or end up with men. The other big ship on the 100 is Bellarke and they are canon in the book. Clarke is bisexual and that’s all well and good but there are like 500 other m/f couples on tv. I really don’t care about another one tbh.
These are very very good points.
Damn, I wasn’t even fully aware of how much he had been fucking with fans’ hearts since I don’t really follow the show through social media at all. What an asshole.
If he had just kept his mouth shut instead of communicating with them non-stop like he gave a shit he probably wouldn’t be getting accused of queerbaiting or lost close to 50k followers last night with little girls @ing him like it’s the end of the world. Just saying.
Me watching TV last night:
Oh, and look, I used a gif from another show that pissed me off w/r/t its f/f content. Woohoo.
I wanted to watch Merlin at some point, but was put off by Arthur’s character. Guess I didn’t lose much in the end.
Yeah, Arthur is terrible. And you definitely didn’t really miss out. What they do to Morgana’s character is some of the worst character assassination I’ve seen on a show. And the worst part is, you realize most of the “good guys” are the actual villains, but the show isn’t smart enough to realize that and still wants you to sympathize with them. I was even warned ahead of time that the show would make me mad, but I watched it anyway because of Katie McGrath’s ridiculously beautiful face. But even so, I never finished it because it was such a disappointment.
This three and a half minute fan video is better than the whole show. It probably won’t make much sense to you, but it’s still really lovely and it uses one of my favorite songs as a soundtrack.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rMDjFhUzqg&w=420&h=315%5D
Phew! Apparently I still have a lot of residual Merlin feelings.
Ugh, character assassinations, I hate those. I think I watched half a season aaaages ago (7-8 years ago? could it be so long ago?) and while I liked some parts of it, Arthur was so grating that I just couldn’t take it anymore. Morgana was definitely someone I was interested in, but yuck, so much douchebaggy testosterone from Arthur.
Thanks for the vid, Katie McGrath has a pretty face indeed :)
What really pisses me off is I got on Twitter after the episode was over and The 100 writers’ room was basically patting itself on the back about what great, brave TV they just wrote.
Um, no. I think the words you’re looking for are predictable and lazy and cruel.
I saw that too and I thought about making a Twitterbot to send them pictures of sharks every hour but then I decided that I can be better than twitter harassment. Sigh.
I did send them an all caps “HOW DARE YOU.” tweet, but that’s as much energy as I could muster after watching that episode.
Brave? Because no one’s ever killed off a queer character before… Oh wait.
First of all, this article is brilliant and I’m going to use it as a set of prompts for writing exercises.
Second of all, I don’t watch the show, but last night, watching all my tumblr friends mourn and wail and gnash the teeth, I felt just horrible. I’m super-relieved that I didn’t get personally invested, but even so, I am still overcome with waves of fury on behalf of all y’all.
Lesbian tweets this list @the100writers.
In the historical context, I agree with all of the grief and anger over the reinforced tropes. The use of “dead after sex” seems egregious.
But I also remember the outrage of If-Then-Else. A lot of people dropped the show, dismissed the ship, others dismissed the show as no longer to-do, there were articles about the same historical dead queers context.
Is it different? r’s comment has some valid points. There was foreshadowing that Lexa was connected to the CoL, from her tattoo, to the links to the Nightbloods, to the entire aesthetic and thematic focus of the show as primarily about the shittiness of humanity. Would we have preferred Lexa was a male character? The debates around whether Root/Shaw was queerbaiting also tended to dismiss the context of the text, PoI as a very chaste show, where Root/Shaw was the most overt romance and sexual relationship compared to the canon het relationships.
Does that excuse If-Then-Else? Externally, the Shahi circumstances give the show more leeway, and Shaw got to go out heroically instead of after sex, so it is different. But in hindsight, we also know that Shaw is coming back. (And also, ITE was just a fantastic piece of media, by all craft standards)
But if we have hypothetical hindsight knowing that Lexa will come back, (because if she doesn’t, that reeeeally doesn’t bode well for Raven) will that “excuse” this episode in the long run?
But the devil is in the details. That historical context matters. BtVS introducing Kennedy afterwards doesn’t excuse Tara’s death, nor would a hypothetical resurrection in the comics, because of the cultural context during the time in which Willow/Tara was originally broadcast. As sad as that makes me as a PoI fan, Shoot hasn’t had as much of a cultural impact as Clexa. Tara and Lexa’s deaths do more damage, especially by not dying heroically, and in the latter case, that fucking “death after sex” thing. The audience never owes it to the text to invalidate present feelings for hypothetical futures.
And yet. Because I am not directly in The 100 fandom, I’m more curious to see if there will be CoL payoff. (At least on the matter of queer representation. The show is still very frustrating on its racial issues.) I much prefer to evaluate completed works because development is change over time, and endgame can be a huge influence on how to evaluate artistic value in the long run. I mean, The 100’s track record doesn’t seem like this is going to produce a The Devil’s Share or Terra Incognita, but still. Should we have given PoI a pass? What will it take to give The 100 the same pass?
What is If-Then-Else? Is it a show, or an episode of the 100?
If-Then-Else is the episode of Person of Interest in which one of the character of a lesbian ship dies.
Oh, thanks. I don’t watch that show; were they actually a canon relationship, or two female characters who had mad chemistry?
It was actually quite groundbreaking: the two actresses had MAD chemistry, the fanbase responded well to it as well, and instead of doing what every other show would have done (throw males at their characters to show how STRAIGHT they are) they actually WENT with it and created a very complex insanely organic relationship between a psychopath and a sociopath.
There was zero “action” between them until the episode in question where Shaw kissed her then sacrificed herself. BUT it’s a heavy action show where barely anybody gets romance. Almost all of the romance is subtext (it’s understand that one of the lead characters had a thing with a recurring character yet it’s never addressed they just mention it in passing) so the fact they actually got a kiss and what developed afterwards (the second half of the ship raising hell on earth to find her missing lover) pretty much raised them as the ONLY ship on the whole show WHICH IS HUGE.
Oh, see, that sounds interesting, and nowhere near as problematic at the 100 example.
Although a woman dying after finally first showing physical affection for another woman still does make me uneasy…I think Bury Your Gays is tied strongly to even older tropes punishing women for exercising their sexuality at all.
I think a key factor is how much the character’s death is actually about that character herself, and makes an appropriate conclusion to her own story, and how much is about the effect on the other characters/show as a whole.
I mean yeah I agree with you but I’m not playing devil’s advocate when I say that it kinda flipped the trope on its head. Shaw basically sacrificed herself and knew she might die so she gave Root a kiss before going, which was the first on screen kiss, but it’s been hinted heavily that they’ve been having sex for a while, we just didn’t see it because… Well no other character has sex on screen either, basically.
(But it’s still up to interpretation. Some writers on the show consider that their first kiss while other writers told the actresses that they’ve been having a lot of sex for a while).
@Zahra: In addition, they writers did the same thing with another character that died, where they only kissed in their very last episode together. All of the other canon het relationships have also pretty much been restricted to one single on-screen kiss. So in the context of the show, it’s not exclusive to the queer characters at all.
But that’s kind of what I was musing over in my original comment. How much are we supposed to look at examples within the context of the shows, and when do they get a pass because of that context, vs. the outer historical context? If Shaw didn’t come back, (say, if Sarah had taken her planned two years maternity leave) but the show had maintained its excellent track record of making the loss and grieving matter, would it still count as Bury Your Gays?
If Lexa actually comes back and Clexa becomes endgame, will this episode stop being Bury Your Gays?
Thank you for your comment, I really enjoyed it !
I think what helped with If-Then-Else is that you’re right, it was one of the best hour of tv we’d witnessed in a while. I think the sheer genius of it shows they didn’t just “get rid” of Shaw because Sarah Shahi got pregnant. You can tell how much afterthought they put into it. On the other hand, this episode of the 100 feels SLOPPY.
(I mean I was pissed that Carter died as well in PoI but same thing, that episode was one of the best! They really gave her a truely amazing send off).
Also I don’t remember the conversation around If-Then-Else but I for one WASN’T that mad about it. Sure I was sad, but I never felt like they were using the dead lesbian trope! Or that they were queerbaiting. The way they handled the development of the relationship between Shaw and Root felt really organic and respectful and I feel like the way Shaw “died” was respectful as well.
In retrospect I think a lot of us here aren’t just pissed because a lesbian character died we’re also REALLY pissed at the bad writing.
Exactly, agreed on everything you said about POI, both about Shaw and about Carter. ITE was probably the best single episode I’ve ever watched, so while I was clearly heartbroken about Shaw, I was not raging at the writers for the laziness.
Also thank god I’m in academia and can organise my own time because I don’t think sick days for “yes hello I can’t come in to work today they killed another lesbian on tv last night” has been invented yet. Someone should get on that.
I know the feeling! I would’ve done the same but I had to teach a lab today, so I had to go in! And there were some entitled brats in today’s group, so it was not the best day ever!
101. Lesbians get out of their wagon after a hot date together and get into bed. The tragedy is they can’t do anything cause their 2 cats are watching.
If either Steph or Lena Foster gets killed by a stray bullet right after having sex, I think I will swear off tv forever.
Seriously doubt that’s going to happen. Among other things, they’ve already shot Stef and had her survive!
Nope. Trust no one.
Well, if it does happen, at least Stef and Lena have managed to have sex before, multiple times, without the bullets flying.
Is it bad that I laughed at this comment ?
Lol, always helps to look at things from a different perspective, doesn’t it?
If that happens, I am moving to the bottom of the ocean.
Thank you for this article – it has at least started to make me feel better after last night.
I went into that commercial break convinced that Lexa wasn’t ACTUALLY gonna die from a stray bullet to the stomach right after having sex with Clarke – the show can’t be that stupid right? They can see how obviously that would play into harmful tropes right? Right?
This is the first real time I was following an ongoing show with a f/f ship that ended in the dead lesbian trope. I am equally parts mad at myself for letting myself be tricked into thinking this show wouldn’t fall into that and mad at the show for tricking me.
OH yeah! That was another thing that made me furious! I can’t believe they actually went to a goddamn commercial break during that scene and then came back from it and STILL LET HER DIE.
Just remembered I had been contemplating buying the first two seasons on blu-ray recently. Really glad I held off on that.
The last show I bought in HD was the fifth season of Warehouse 13.
Now, The 100.
Only SD for me now.
Yikes, that’s rough.
Person of Interest Season 5: SD!!!
I mean it’s pretty much cancelled at this point isn’t it ? :/
It’s like they want us to forget it exists so that the ratings can be horrible when it finally comes out and use it as justification to cancel :(
@chloe: I still believe in a miracle.
All of the CBS shows will tank, POI will have spread so widely through netflix and word of mouth that the ratings will be through the roof and they will, unexpectedly, continue it.
Root and Shaw will be the new leads, or get their own spin off or better, even movie, named “The Grumpy Assassin and the Perky Psychopath Save the World” and the show will continue on and on.
As long as they don’t air the last season, I can still hold on to that dream, so yeah, no complaints from me.
Sd and hd look the same to me! I feel like I’m taking crazy pills!
I just wrote this in reply to Zahra’s comment above, but I thought I’d put it down here for anyone just scrolling through looking for some more context on what happened in the show yesterday. I am doing academic research on the Clexa fandom, so I hope I have a modicum of knowledge to work from here.
“I think there were definitely warning signs. The show kills people ALL the time. Frankly, it’s sort of the point – post-apocalpytic sci-fi political drama? People are gonna die. Beyond that, the treatment of POCs has been very problematic; I think a lot of people are used to having to choose between good POC representation and good queer representation, though, so it was still a surprise that this would have happened – though, I think, not as much of a surprise as it would have been if they had not been racist.
Also, the producer, Jason Rothenberg, is known for trying to keep a very tight lid on spoilers. He tweeted about filming the finale in Vancouver and told fans to come find them, and they were shooting a Clexa scene, so a lot of people took that as a warning – there was no way that wasn’t going to be used in some way, because it was so intentional and out of character for him. I don’t think anyone expected this, though.
Finally, the possibility of Lexa’s death has been talked about a lot on the show. People were hoping that was just because she is in such a prominent position, but obviously that was not entirely the case… Also, there have been a lot of lines like “May we meet again” or “Death is not the end, Clarke,” so a couple people are wondering if she will actually be back in the City of Light scifi storyline that’s sort of like a hallucination where there is no pain and no death, particularly because that seemed to be going on in the aforementioned finale filming in Vancouver. Unclear as to whether or not that will happen; I’m entertaining the possibility but frankly I think what’s most likely is that Clarke sees her in the City of Light and they get to say goodbye again and then Lexa will be gone for good.
I think there are several reasons why a lot of people are crushed, though:
1) The queer representation had been very good. They were treated like whole people, their sexualities were not the focus, and the Clexa scenes were respectfully portrayed. That made this much more shocking.
2) The producers had acknowledged the “Bury Your Gays” trope and had been reassuring fans for months to “have hope” and “trust them.” So the fact that they then turned around and committed the trope was like a slap in the face to a lot of fans who /had/ trusted them.
3) The scene occurred directly after they kissed for the first time since the betrayal at the end of Season 2, and the first time they had sex. It was separated only by a commercial break. So for a lot of fans, not only was it like being dropped from the top of a rollercoaster, but it means there is really no enjoyment or collective effervescence or anything around the ship becoming canon again because it was immediately followed by Bury Your Gays.
4) The producer literally said after the episode came out, “I don’t even want to talk about the trope that’s out there about LGBT characters; that is not something that factored into the decision.” Which was also like a slap in the face, because when it had come up before it had been followed by “we’re aware,” “have hope” and “trust us.”
5) The producer is also citing the actress’ work schedule as a reason to kill her off, and a lot of fans are pointing out that that’s at least a little bit BS. She’s said Lexa is her favorite character, her agent has said it would be good for her to continue on The 100, and FTWD have said that they would be happy to allow her to film several episodes per season in the future. So killing her off didn’t really have to happen.
6) Finally, people are frustrated because her death happened in a really non-meaningful way. She was the Commander of the 12 Clans, the singular most powerful person in the show, who was phenomenal in battle and a brilliant leader, etc. etc. etc. People were expecting her to die, sure – hopefully she would not but expectant that she would – but nobody was expecting her to die by a stray bullet because she opened a door at the wrong time. For a lot of fans, that was the final piece of disrespect.
Hopefully that puts what’s going on a bit more in context!”
This is great, thanks!
Still in shock, still traumatized, still don’t know how to feel about this, still don’t know if I will continue watching or not.
Just needed to join in on the grief circle. You guys, I’m saaaaaad :(
Hugsssss
I’m so grateful that we have this article to process though <3.
I’m absolutely miserable. I watch with a group of friends, and we’re going to watch next week’s episode, and then take the two-week hiatus to think about whether or not we want to continue.
Went to bed feeling sick, woke up feeling sick. Still reeling.
I used to love The 100, but this was so incredibly problematic that I don’t think I’ll be able to watch anymore. Even my straight dad was angry.
They could have dealt with it literally any other way and I probably would have been fine with it. But no, they had to bury the gays.
R.I.P Lexa, and goodbye to The 100.
I never watched the 100. My friend was a fan and I was interested in Clexa. I was honestly thinking of starting to watch the show in a few months when I’ve finished university. But now I’m sat here just feeling so overwhelmingly sad. I’m writing an article as one of my final pieces of coursework about the whole tragiqueers for the straight gaze thing focusing on the responsibilities of writers. And here I am with another example of tragic queer and irresponsible writers. I don’t even know what to say, apart from this is making me even more determined to write the happy queer stories I want to see, because by the looks of it that’s the only way I’m going to ever get them.
Really though!
At this point I think the only way we will ever get the stories we deserve is if we write them ourselves.
This really just goes to show that if we trust anyone with our stories we will be disrespected.
Very disappointing, but unfortunately not unprecedented.
So. How the frak does Jasper survive a goddamned giant spear in his stomach, but Lexa dies in such a dumb and shitty way from a stray bullet. I stopped watching someway in the middle of the second season cause of lack of time and other shows catching my interest, but I swear I wanted to catch up. Not anymore. Fuck you, Jason Rothenberg & co, fuck you. You’ve definitely earned the entry-level badge on the Ryan Murphy scale of disrespect towards the queer women fandom.
Ugh, I have flashbacks to Juliet’s death on LOST. Dunno if there’s any Juliet fans around here, but her death was so cheap, dumb, lazy and done solely for the purpose of seeing how sad it made Sawyer. But that still didn’t hurt as much as this, given that there were a million other f/m pairings out there that were well-written and with great chemistry. This, however, was one of the most promising shows and relationships, and they fucked up heavily. Dying after sex, seriously, this is unbelievable cruel.
I’m off to play Mass Effect for the millionth time and have my epic space f/f romance with Liara to forget about this mess.
Someone should tell the producers that its not a good twist if the entire fandom realizes that it could happen, but thinks that the writers are smart enough not to do it.
LOL! You win the internets.
I can’t believe they pulled a Tara Maclay on us.
What was that like in the writer’s room?
“Hey, let’s quote another completely unneccessary and painful Lesbian Death scene!”
“Yay!Great idea, Bob! Let’s use the one from the big first Lesbian story on TV!”
“Totally sure that the Lesbians and queers will totally get the allusion and they’ll be like so grateful and feel seen!”
“Totally!”
Yeah? Well, fuck you.
Yes. Exactly this.
I’m not gonna talk about the deep issue in this post.
So, I’m gonna go with: we need our own network for this to work and, in the name of God, nobody let Ilene Chaiken to touch a thing.
The Autostraddle TV network where Heather writes all the dialogue a la PLL recaps
OMG I’m half laughing at this and half crying because you know there’s a parallel universe out there that’s exactly like ours except Ilene Chaiken has a lesbian network (and so of course mainstream media don’t even bother with lesbian storylines anymore)
#darkesttimeline
LOL
Oof, skipping the comments because I haven’t seen last night’s episode yet… but a lot of these are not just storylines I want to see, but also video games I desperately need to play! Also, lesbian astrologer doing star charts for wacky clients seems like maybe the best comedy series ever and NEEDS to be a web series, at the very least!
YOU GUYS.
I just realized that Lexa was killed by a guy who was trying to kill her girlfriend because he was convinced it was dangerous for her to have a girlfriend.
Obviously Titus’s fear wasn’t based on homophobia.
But still, the parallel between being killed by someone who is angry you have a girlfriend is such a disgusting parallel to real life events I threw up a little in my mouth when I thought about it.
the parallel the parallel. I was clearly too upset to deal with syntax and such. UGH
I have been in mourning since I watched the episode last night. Like literally numb all day and being zero percent productive. What sucks is that I should have known better, because I am in the group with the 30-somethings who had been crushed many times before and who swore, swore!, we wouldn’t get invested in a f/f pairing again…until Clexa drew us in. Another show drew me in again. To deal with this heartache. Again.
I feel this. I’m only 19, but we still grew up with the shadows of knowing that that was the history of queer characters. And I hate that we are in a place that we are blaming ourselves for trusting.
Disgusted and utterly disappointed with what happened last night.
Lexa deserved to die in battle up against Pike or even Bellamy but a stray bullet. Geez, they needed a plot line moved along pretty quick obviously and ruined a good pair. Sure it was cliche and yes Clarke was turning her soft but she should have died honorably. Not like that. It sucked. From any fan’s point of view. Not just a lesbian. The show is about strong characters who survive the hardest environment. It really was lazy writing.
Oh by Crom, 76.
Why can’t you just say werewolf running amok? Or heck even lycanthrope.
Are you afraid to be called speciesist? It’s not like any of us haven’t really bad time beyond our physical control before.
(my way of dealing is terrible attempts at humor apparently, excusez a moi, lo siento et cetera)
I just wanna know why the lesbian had to slay the regular wolf? Why couldn’t she befriend it? I feel like that would be more accurate.
I know :(
because she’s rightly afraid of the Night and the consequences with extremely long statute of limitation times such a thoughtless act could trigger.
I’m specifically pissed because the show isn’t even that fucking good and I binge watched it literally two weeks ago solely because of this specific ship like
I wasted my TIME on this show
I watched Bellamy talk and have plot lines for THIS
Ahah “I watched Bellamy talk and have plot lines for this”. Exactly.
YES, EXACTLY. I have LOATHED watching like 80% of this show from the beginning and I’m so mad at myself for coming back because it looked like they were going to do something really special with Clexa.
I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN.
For the past day or two I’ve been seeing a ton of stuff about the dead lesbian trope online and I could tell that it was in response to something, but I didn’t know what until I read this. I literally spent the last week binge watching almost all of The 100 for the first time (didn’t get to the most recent few eps yet which is why I didn’t know), and I don’t even care about the spoiler, I’m just upset that this even happened. The only reason I even started the show is because I’ve always seen a really great fan response and general enthusiasm about Clexa, and even when watching the show, one of the only characters who really stole my heart was Lexa. She and her relationship with Clarke were my favorite, favorite parts of what is otherwise a show that’s frustrating to watch (and often racist). I’ve only been a fan for a week and I just feel so gutted over this. I can’t even imagine what it must be like for people who were watching from the beginning and putting their faith in this pairing and what it meant.
Yeah I watched the first episode for the first time last week. So I guess I’m glad I didn’t waste the effort?
“16. Lesbian journalist goes on an undercover assignment.”
I’m only picturing Cat Grant going on an under-the-covers Supergirl assignment. I’m not upset about this.
“22. Lesbian is actually a ghost.”
But doesn’t this one technically require a dead lesbian?
The thing that really gets me is not the death itself; because although I really didn’t want it to happen, let’s face it, it was a possibility for a character like this in a show like this. It’s not even the totally meaningless way it happened. I do think that Clarke would have had more closure of sorts if Lexa had died in in a blaze of glory, and this would be less likely to move the plot forward to whatever rage-filled rampage the writers might have her go on now.
It’simply the absolute slap in the face of practically a carbon copy of Seeing Red (characters finally get (back) together, then immediately one of them dies). This trope is one of the worst and I feel like I’ve seen it way too many times. I would like to think the writers were ignorant of this similarity, because it would be too cruel if they copied it deliberately.
It is disappointing, to say the least. Lexa was a unique and interesting character while she was around – and for me, was a rare redeeming feature of what can be a problematic show in a lot of respects. I probably won’t be watching further.
Even if they do bring her back for CoL stuff, as some people further up thread have been saying, it won’t change the method of her demise.
Has Autostraddle produced a ‘LGBT TV tropes 101: Things to avoid if you don’t want to alienate your audience’ list somewhere in the archives? I feel like it might be quite cathartic.
Lesbian mows down a rally of political lesbians with a machine gun. Gets rid of evidence. Buys Earl Gray tea on the way back. Goes home and snuggles with gf on the sofa as they both watch The Expanse. End.
But what about their cat Bea Artorius?
Playing a support role. If this turns into a triple A blockbuster, the cat gets a spinoff.
Purrfect.
I can’t believe this show thought it was ok to have the lesbian be killed by her must trusted advisor when he was trying to kill her girlfriend for disapproving their relationship. What kind of fucked up message is that??? I didn’t need a reminder of how the world works, of how our family members/friends/colleagues don’t accept us. I didn’t need a reminder that my love for another girl can get me killed. I really want this show to crash and burn now. Sorry not sorry.
Held only in my mind like an absolute weirdo I have about 10 or so stories with queer women in them as primary characters, one I’m not sure if they are a woman or not because their gender is a 3rd gender(sorta) that serves an important social purpose.
And some of have quite a bit of “on screen” violence and not cute action movie violence. I’m talking biblical that sword is more a blunt object that a sharp object nastiness, Tyson on Holyfield wrestling match, genocide and just wow my ACE score is only a 3 what.
There’s some off screen too; like one of the side stories of a same gender wedding, the wedding night before one of the wedded pair marches off to war. She comes back, alive with her pension and a maybe a scar or what her wife doesn’t recall being there before.
Out of all of that fridging and Bury Your Gays potential only 1 dead lesbian who died fighting for a cause that is continued after her death and saved a lot of people.
This from me who read and watched a franchise whose fridging of female action character and love interest of the male main character was possibly the most brutal fridging ever. She didn’t even get to die, she became an adult toddler with little to no understanding of how to protect herself and repeatedly put in danger. Often stuff close to what traumatised her. Just dude it still messes me up.
But it is totally possibly to have a complex world with strife and violence without killing the main character’s lesbian love to make more strife.
I think that is my point.
i feel like i’ve already watched half of these movies.
I live in the UK so haven’t officially watched the episode yet but as soon as I found out I was like “fuck no, no, no, no” and had to see it for myself!! Since then I’ve been reading the reaction and fallout of that episode; I’m grateful that I’m not the only one who reacted in such an intense way.
Right I’m a thirty-something lesbian and rarely get overly emotional over fictional characters but killing Lexa off felt like someone just kicked me in the face, put their hand down my throat and pulled my heart out!!! I’ve been sad, angry, acting like a some sort of crazy stalker fan!! Seriously I’ve been concerned with the intensity of my own reaction!!
I think much of my reaction comes from this: it’s so unusual to have strong female characters who are literally the leaders, seriously kick-arse leaders, it’s even more rare for those females to be lesbian or bi or trans!! Yet we are suppose to live in a world of apparent equality *has coughing fit*!! there is huge under representation in the mainstream; don’t get me wrong it’s definitely improved!! So when you see a character on TV that is that strong female gay leader who wasn’t just used for sex, or has a miraculous change of heart and returns to men or is the interesting side kick and best friend. No. Lexa (beautifully played by ADC btw) stood on her own, her sexuality not mattering because it really shouldn’t; she was strong, powerful, intelligent and gracefully dangerous! Her relationship and love of Clarke was so tender and vulnerable; it drew people in because it was believable (notably because of the crazy chemistry between the two women)………. Therefore when Lexa is killed off by a fucking STRAY bullet it just seemed so unjustifiable to a truly powerful and important character right after the moment of pure happiness! I mean seriously it almost makes it laughable if it wasn’t so tragic and heartbreaking ( bravo Alycia and Eliza)! Total injustice (and aspies really hate injustice)!!
Honestly I know I shouldn’t get this upset over a fictional character but if Lexas death has caused this reaction to thousands more people then surely that must represent something, say something! Fiction has the power to change lives; so I hope that when the dust finally settles we won’t be satisfied with mainstream tv killing off gays, casting white heterosexual men in leading roles and basically sticking to every fucking sterotype going when it deals with lesbians!!!
Oh and I get and completely understand all the reasons behind why they had to kill her off but still they could have been more creative!! Also why leak pictures of the finale clearly showing ADC on set because I swear to god if they bring her back for a city of light reprisal where Clarke has to lose her again I will not be held responsibly for my actions (well I will but you get my meaning!!!
Rant over (still distraught but comforted by the fact I’m not the only one out there)! And a final salute to women and minorites everywhere- life does like to kick in the face!!!
It’s 2016, and I comforted myself by saying that, even though the best acted, (arguably) most complex, most painfully and angelically beautiful queer character on “The 100” was almost definitely going to die, she would at least be allowed to die with dignity, fighting the battle she was born to fight, and, hopefully, with the knowledge that the woman she loved felt the same way. Instead, Jason Rothenberg thought it’d be poetic for her to die as a direct result of her love for Clarke, and like 2.5 seconds after Lexa was reasonably sure that love was reciprocated.
It’s 2016 and even begging for scraps leads to disappointment.
LOVE IT! THANK YOU SO MUCH! I hope this will become canon to everyone. What version do I like the most?
Nr. 100.
The salt in this article is incredible. But however, does not nearly compare to the shitstorm that is The 100 side of tumblr.
I can’t be the only person who wishes this was all the same lesbian.
(This would make an awesome TV show, with every episode a different plot but the same character being like, “What is it /this/ time?”)