May 2023: What’s New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, Hulu, Paramount+ and HBO Max

April flowers bring May showers, and this May we are being showered by networks looking at their content for lesbian, bisexual and queer women and trans people of all genders and apparently thinking, “what if instead of debuting this in May, we show it in June for PRIDE???” Luckily, Netflix has stepped it up this month and will be singlehandedly providing a true bounty of queer content for May, so that’s something.

Netflix’s Lesbian and Bisexual Content for May 2023

Pitch Perfect (2012) – May 1

Everyone’s favorite a capella franchise’s first entry finds our heroine Anna Kendrick scoping out her path and her musical calling at her new college. Her singing team eventually includes Amy (played by queer actor Rebel Wilson) and actual lesbian character Cynthia Rose (Ester Dean). Also there is a lot of Becca/Chloe fanfic.

Hannah Gadsby: Something Special (2023) – May 9

Gadsby is back in their third Netflix stand-up special, filmed at the Sydney Opera House in fall 2022. Advertised as a “smart and feel good set” we are promised material about “a wedding (theirs!)” and “more than one traumatic encounter with a bunny.”

Queer Eye (Season Seven) – May 12

If you’ve ever asked yourself “when will the fab five go from beignets to ben-yays and bring some sparkle and sass to New Orleans?” have I got some great news for you! It’s May 12th. The second episode will feature a lesbian named Stephanie!

Anna Nicole Smith: You Don’t Know Me (2023) – May 16

This “unflinching and humanizing examination of the life, death and secrets of Vickie Lynn Hogan” (aka Anna Nicole Smith) promises to tell the star’s real true story, from her ascent to her untimely passing in 2007. We’ve got never-before-seen footage, home movies, and interviews with key figures who’ve never spoken out before, including deeper insights into her relationship with a former girlfriend.

Fanfic (2023) – May 17

This Polish LGBTQ+ drama follows two high school students who “form an intense connection as they navigate the challenges of discovering and expressing their truest selves.”

XO, Kitty (Season One) – May 18

Noted teen matchmaker Kitty Song Covey of the To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before multiverse considers herself a worldly expert on love, but when she moves to Korea to study and reunite with her long-distance boyfriend, she learns that she’s got so many more lessons to learn. This spin-off is easy to jump into even if you’ve not seen the films and, as per our interests here, there’ll be a couple of prominent queer storylines including a queer women storyline that is “handled beautifully.” I’m not sure which girls on the show are gonna be the gay ones, but queer actor Regan Aliyah is playing Juliana, so I’m placing at least one bet on her.

Selling Sunset (Season 6) – May 19th

This program about selling very expensive real estate in the very expensive city of Los Angeles features noted queer woman Chrishell Stause, who is currently dating G-Flip.

Wanda Sykes: I’m An Entertainer (2023) – May 23

In this new stand-up special, legendary lesbian comic/actor Wanda Sykes will be speaking on topics ranging from “the challenges of raising Gen Z teens” to “the dilemmas of being a liberal in a hyper charged political climate.”

All-American (Season Five) – May 23

The Ultimatum: Queer Love: Season One Premiere – May 24th

Where do I even begin to describe the wonder and the glory we are pledging our lives to — The Ultimatum: Queer Love? Featuring an entirely queer cast (all lesbian and bisexual women and/or non-binary people), The Ultimatum finds couples in which one member is ready to get married and the other is not and dares them to make that ultimatum and then spend some weeks dating other people to see if they should definitely commit or possibly not commit.

HBO Max’s Lesbian Content for May 2023

1000% Me: Growing Up Mixed (2023) – May 2

This documentary from W. Kamau Bell talks to mixed-race kids and families in the San Francisco Bay Area “who are navigating issues of identity in a world that often asks them to pick a side.” Amongst the participants are two kids with two moms, 13-year-old Carter (who is Black and Latina and Kamau’s goddaughter) and 13-year-old Nola, Carter’s best friend (who is Black and white). I spotted Saint Harridan founder Mary Going in the trailer so I imagine one of these kids are hers. Just a hunch.

Angel City (2023): Three-Part Documentary Series Premiere – May 16

This docuseries goes “behind the scenes and onto the pitch” with the Los Angeles professional women’s soccer team Angel City Football Club, best known to those in Los Angeles as the best place to run into every lesbian you’ve ever known. Following the league from its origin story through the 2022 inaugural season, this series promises to “reveal the passion and grit needed to build a franchise from scratch and blaze a bold trail in the world of professional sports.”

Hulu’s May 2023 Shows for Girls, Gays & Theys

Best in Show (2000) – May 1

Christopher Guest’s mockumentary about showdogs features Jane Lynch as trainer Christy Cummings, a competitive handler working for poodle-owning couple Sherri Ann and Leslie Ward Cabot. But there’s more going on between Sherri and Christy than meets the eye, if you know what I mean and I think you do!

Jeopardy Masters: Series Premiere (ABC) – May 9

Trans lesbian trivia queen legend Amy Schneider and noted Canadian lesbian Mattea Roach will be amongst the six competitors facing off in this “Champions League-style” format version of the beloved

Class of ’09: Season One Premiere (FX) – May 10

I have it on good authority that the situation you have observed in the trailer for this show, which follows a class of FBI agents through three distinct points in time grappling with big changes in the criminal justice system enabled by A.I, is indeed as Sapphic as you suspected it is. Yes, we see Sepideh Moafi and Kate Mara in bed together and also drinking in a dimly lit restaurant in a somewhat flirtatious manner. Mara plays Amy Poet, a former psychiatric nurse and future elite FBI agent who never imagined herself working in law enforcement, and Sepideh plays Hour Nazari, “a socially awkward but brilliant FBI trainee who become an agent specializing in data.”

How I Met Your Father: Season 2B Premiere – May 23

This spin-off of How I Met Your Mother kicked off this year with a lesbian romance and now we are back for the back half of Season Two.

Drag Me to Dinner: Season One Premiere – May 31

Neil Patrick Harris, Bianca Del Rio, Haneefah Wood, and David Burtka star, with host Murray Hill, in this10-episode series that also features 40 drag queens in a “riotous, format-busting, fourth-wall-breaking, unapologetic sendup of traditional reality competition shows!”

Paramount + LGBTQ+ Material for May 2023

RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars: Season 8 Premiere – May 12

The eighth season of RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars will feature an all-star panel of judges, including our beloved Batwoman Javica Leslie and noted former bowtie enthusiast JoJo Siwa!

Rosie’s Theater Kids (2022) – May 23

This documentary tells the story of the impact Rosie O’Donnell’s non-profit Rosie’s Theater Kids has had on its students and alumni through archival footage, interviews, first person accounts and performances.

20 TV Moments That Changed Lesbian Visibility Forever

Happy Lesbian Visibility Day, the one day a year us lesbians take our corporeal form and make mischief in the streets in our flannel and Birkenstocks while singing “Fast Car” by Tracy Chapman at the top of our lady lungs! This year, one of the ways we’re celebrating here at Autostraddle dot com is by taking a look back at some of the TV moments that have changed lesbian visibility forever. This is not an exhaustive list, and I tried to leave out the bad stuff like the beginning of Bury Your Gays in 1976 when Executive Suite went all Hayes Code on poor lesbian Julie or how, in the mid-1990s, Picket Fences started the trend of re-shooting all sapphic kisses in the pitch black dead of night. As always, I’d love to hear your most life-changing lesbian visibility TV moments in the comments!

LA Law (1991)

The first lesbian kiss on television happened a little too close to traffic for my comfort; it still makes me nervous when I watch it on YouTube. Luckily C.J. Lamb (Amanda Donohoe) and Abby (Michele Greene) managed to get one peck and one longer, closed-mouth smooch off without getting plowed into by any cars. “He’s a Crowd,” an excellent name for a sapphic TV episode, is usually considered the first “very special lesbian kiss episode,” meaning nothing was ever going to come from it but ratings.

Courthouse (1995)

Let me just quote Autostraddle TV Team star Natalie here; she says it better than I ever could:

“Years before Gina Price-Blythewood would hire an unknown Lena Waithe as her production assistant on The Secret Life of Bees, she penned and co-produced shortlived series for CBS called Courthouse. From descriptions — since the show isn’t yet available for viewing anywhere, I cannot personally confirm — the show feels like a precursor to those Shondaland series we’ve come to love: Beautiful, highly talented people working in the pressure-filled crucible of a Clark County courthouse. And just like in Shondaland, the gays were represented. Judge Rosetta Reide and her housekeeper, Danny Gates, became the first-ever black lesbian couple on television.”

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1995)

Jadzia Dax and Dr. Lenara Kahn kissed right on the mouth in the DS9 episode “Rejoined,” not because they were into each other, organically, but because they were both female joined Trill who were hosting symbionts of a male and female couple who used to be married. Those symbionts recognize each other and end up making out, so what we get is Jadzia and Lenara locking lips. Star Trek has always been notable for moving the diversity representation conversation forward, and this is no exception. In fact, lots of lesbian TV scholars — me among them — believe this was the genesis of sci-fi and fantasy shows being much more friendly toward lesbian characters than any other genres. It’s a trend that continues to this day!

Friends (1996)

Friends never did right by lesbians, using us almost exclusively as punchlines in a way that seeped into loads of other TV shows in the 1990s — however, Carol and Susan’s wedding was both the first lesbian wedding on TV and one of the only genuinely sweet storylines the show ever gave Ross’ ex-wife and her much better new spouse. It’s funny, yeah, but it’s also full of pathos. I’ve actually never not cried when I watched it, even as a kid.

Ellen (1997)

Ellen‘s “Puppy Episode” really needs to introduction or explanation; it was the biggest coming out moment in television history, made even bigger because Ellen herself came out at the same time. She became a hero to lesbians and a lightning rod punching bag to conservatives and their “family values.” Ellen’s career almost didn’t survive. Her show definitely didn’t. It still remains a watershed moment in lesbian culture, a sort of BCE/CE for representation.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2000)

Willow’s coming out kind of changed everything. It continued the trend of fantasy series being most friendly to lesbians; it kicked off the trend of teen shows being the ones to embrace lesbian characters most easily; it started the first longterm lesbian relationship on TV; it was the precursor to the modern Bury Your Gays phenomenon; and also it was just a really sweet moment in which one best friend told another best friend a scary truth, and her best friend just kept on loving her exactly the same as she always had done.

The Wire (2002)

It’s Omar Little that most people talk about when they talk about LGBTQ+ rep on The Wire. And, of course! Omar is one of the most important gay TV characters ever. And, in fact, both Natalie and I have him near the top of our Best Ever TV Characters lists. (Not just gay ones.) But let us not forget Kima Greggs, the lesbian detective who was allowed to be messy and complicated, to experience love and heartbreak because of her own charm and shortcomings, the rare Black woman who was given the kind of moral latitude usually reserved for straight white men. Kima wasn’t perfect, but she was compelling — and that’s the point. It’s 20 years later, and we’re still fighting about whether or not characters have to be “good” to be “good representation.”

All My Children (2003)

All My Children‘s Bianca Montgomery was a total game-changer. Daytime TV has always been even more heteronormative and conservative than primetime TV. Bianca wasn’t a Very Special Character who arrived simply to be gay and leave; she was a staple of the long-running series, someone viewers had watched grow up. Her falling for a girl, her first kiss, her coming out, her dating, her wedding, her children — viewers got to experience it all. Most viewers had no choice but to keep loving Bianca because they’d always loved Bianca. It was the greatest gift to kids whose parents watched soap operas.

The L Word (2004)

What can I say that hasn’t already been said? The L Word was ours. The first thing, in fact, that was all ours. We gathered around TVs in living rooms and bars, we sneaked the DVDs between other movies when checking out at Blockbuster, we hid them when they came in the mail from Netflix. We watched The L Word in groups like the World Cup, and we watched under the covers hiding from everyone but ourselves. It is a cross-generational cultural touchstone that gave us permission to laugh, cry, and rage together. Even the theme song will live forever in our lesbian noggins.

The Rachel Maddow Show (2008)

When Rachel Maddow made the leap from radio to TV in 2008, she was this brilliant liberal lesbian who filled a news niche for just a few of us. Now she’s a household name across the entire country and the anchor of all MSNBC’s political coverage. She is the most trusted name in liberal politics, to the point of reverence among many households. She never came out; she just was out. She normalized sardonic lesbian nerds in a way Daria Morgendorffer only dreamed of.

Glee (2009)

The problem with writing about the impact of Santana Lopez is that it deserves an entire book. Literally. A full college course could be taught on the way Santana changed the world. But for the purposes of this Lesbian Visibility Day, I’ll succinctly say that Glee was the cracking sound of the beginning of the avalanche of LGBTQ+ TV characters who followed the devastating blow to marriage equality caused by Proposition 8 in California, the first time Americans voted to take away the right for gay people to get married. Santana’s lesbianism wasn’t even in the plan; the writers just tossed in a throwaway joke about her making out with Brittney, at exactly the time Twitter made it possible to talk to the people who made TV, out of the mouth of Naya Rivera, who went all in on advocating for fans, at a moment when Fox was basically printing money off the Glee brand. Santana was lesbian TV’s John the Baptist; she knocked down the door for who-knows-how-many other sapphics to come out of the closet. She was an idol, an icon, and she will remain on of the most important lesbians in television history.

Pretty Little Liars (2010)

Before it was Freeform, it was ABC Family; and before it was ABC Family, it was the Christian Broadcasting Network’s The Family Channel, which was founded by one of the Religious Right’s most monstrous and homophobic figures, Pat Robertson. In 2010, in the episode “To Kill a Mockingirl,” Emily and Maya kissed in a photobooth. Pretty Little Liars was such an enormous ratings and social media success, ABC Family started modeling ALL shows off of it, which meant that Emily and Maya’s kiss paved the way for dozens and dozens more gay kisses as the network became the go-to place for lesbian characters in the early 2010s.

Orange Is the New Black (2013)

Orange Is the New Black was one of Netflix’s first real cracks at original programming, and wow was it hugely successful in the beginning. It was also one of the first non-prestige cable TV shows that didn’t rely on ad revenue, so outrage by the One Million Moms or whoever wasn’t an issue. That meant the series could be as gay as it wanted to be, and it went ALL IN. Orange Is the New Black had almost as many lesbian characters as The L Word, and it also featured trans lesbian Sophia Burset played by Laverne Cox. It went off the rails in the end, but the beginning was revolutionary.

East Los High (2013)

I’m simply going to quote Natalie again:

“Back when Hulu was still a fledging company and just starting to produce its own original content, there was East Los High. The show, which still retains the title of Hulu’s longest running series to date, made history after being the first English-language series with an all-Latine cast, writers and creators. East Los High‘s second season centered around the tumultous love affair between Jocelyn, a smart, talented aspiring journalist, and Camila, a dance team member with ambitions of making it in the music industry. The storyline earned Camila’s portrayer, Vannessa Vasquez, the show’s first Daytime Emmy nomination.”

Master of None (2017)

Master of None‘s “Thanksgiving” launched Lena Waithe into the stratosphere. She became the first Black woman to win an Emmy for outstanding writing in a comedy series, and afterward, she was given the keys to the kingdom. She has gone on to create dozens of other Black lesbian characters, in shows across genres and networks and streamers. She writes, she produces, she showruns, she acts, and she’s showing no signs of slowing down.

One Day at a Time (2017)

Netflix’s reboot of Norman Lear’s beloved comedy series not only brought a Latine family to the forefront of the comedy game, it also gave us lesbian teen Elena Alvarez, one of the first queer high schoolers who felt like us to us. (And not just because Penelope name-checked Autostraddle after Elena came out.) One Day at a Time became one of those rare shows full of lesbian jokes, where it never felt like lesbians were being punched down at — probably because the writers room featured plenty of queer voices. Elena’s struggles and triumphs felt as real to us as our own, and yeah, it didn’t hurt that we got to imagine Rita Moreno as our abuelita.

Black Lightning (2018)

Nafessa Williams portrayed TV’s first Black lesbian superhero, and she owned every minute of her time on-screen. Black Lightning struggled to give her the love story she deserved, favoring more screen-time for straight romances, but that didn’t change the fact that Thunder was a game-changing hero in our country’s current most-favorite genre on a network that built itself on superhero storytelling. She remains a radical lesbian TV character.

Steven Universe (2018)

Legend of Korra walked so Adventure Time could run so Steven Universe could give us Cartoon Network’s first lesbian wedding, between fan favorite gems Ruby and Sapphire. Steven Universe shocked fans when it revealed that Garnet was actually a fused lesbian couple. It delighted us to tears when it proclaimed lesbian love to be the answer to all of life’s big questions. And it knocked our boots off again when Ruby and Sapphire bonded together to save the world after saying “I do.”

Twenties (2020)

And now I will quote Autostraddle Editor in Chief Carmen Phillips:

“If you look at the very short history of black butches on TV (there’s been just 22 of them in all of television, according to Autostraddle’s database) then sure — there’s a leap to be made between Master of None and Twenties. If only because there’s so few too begin with! Even as television and film gets queerer with every passing year, there’s still not nearly as much growth as I think we’d all like for black masculine-of-center characters… what sets Twenties apart is,  it’s the first time ever that a black masculine-of-center lesbian is the PROTAGONIST in her own comedy series on television. And we can add to that the fact that this series exists on [BET], a historically homophobic black network.”

Batwoman (2021)

Queer actress Javicia Leslie stepped into the cape and cowl in Batwoman‘s second season, making Ryan Wilder the first Black lesbian to headline her own superhero show and the first Black lesbian to become part of the Bat-family. And now, Natalie again:

“Until 2020, I’d never bought a comic book before, at least not for myself. But then came Batgirl #50 and the introduction of Ryan Wilder, officially, into DC Universe.. .and I bought my first comic book. Weeks before Javicia Leslie’s debut as Ryan Wilder on my screen, I was invested and had a small sliver of this forthcoming reality to call my own. A black woman was going to wear the cowl one day and I wanted some tangible representation of it.”

A League of Their Own (2022)

Prime Video’s A League of Their Own series truly did something special: It rebooted a beloved property that nearly completely overlooked Black women and lesbians in its original iteration and centered the story of a Black lesbian by giving her a fully realized world to inhabit. Max Champman had her own dreams, her own complicated family (including her queer and trans aunt and uncle), her own best friend, and occasionally she tossed a ball around with the Rockford Peaches catcher. Sure, yes, there were plenty of lesbians and gender non-conforming stars on the Peaches, and we loved them all! We own the ball field! Cliches are cliches for a reason! But it was Max’s story that resonated most with us, like a breathe of fresh air we’ve been needing to breathe for decades.

19 Shows To Watch If You Like “Yellowjackets”

So you adore Showtime’s thrilling supernatural horror mystery series Yellowjackets and you’re looking for other shows like Yellowjackets, or shows that embody some aspect of Yellowjackets that you yearn for. Well, great news: here are 19 shows that might satisfy that primal urge.

1. The Wilds (Prime Video)

If you like high school girls, including a lesbian athlete, struggling for survival in nature after being thrust out of a flying object that had promised to take them somewhere else altogether, try The Wilds. This teen drama finds eight teenage girls abandoned on a desert island after their plane crashes en route to Hawaii for “Dawn of Eve,” an empowerment retreat they’ve been sent to by their parents. The girls embody and eventually betray their obvious archetypes as they attempt to piece together a path towards survival when it seems rescue is, at best, not around the corner. (Stream The Wilds on Prime Video)

2. Class of ’07 (Prime Video)

If you like a diverse group of women with complicated emotional relationships to each other stranded in an isolated area with no hope of immediate rescue forced to eventually consider cannibalism, try Class of ’07! Class of ’07 is like… Yellowjackets, but make it comedy! Set at the ten-year high school class reunion at an all-girls Catholic private school, Class of ’07 answers the question “what would happen if there was an apocalypse of sorts during your high school reunion and you ended up basically on an island, forced to confront the adolescent trauma you’re all still living with while surrounded by the people who caused it?” The cast is incredible (and full of queer actors), there is one queer character, and it’s a delightful, dynamic little watch. (Watch Class of 07 on Prime Video)

3. Wreck (Hulu)

If you like queer horror with touches of humor and a mystery that centers friendship, grief, and growing up, try Wreck! It’s a slasher set on a cruise ship that contains a lot of class commentary and genuine thrills. There’s a killer twist, and a below deck conspiracy that’s suspenseful without becoming overly complicated. The show’s central friendship is between a lesbian and a gay boy, which is frustratingly hard to find on television! It’s easy to inhale this series in a weekend. (Watch Wreck on Hulu)

4. Welcome to Eden / Bienvenidos a Edén (Netflix)

Cr. LUCIA FARAIG/NETFLIX © 2021

If you like the challenging dynamics that arise from a group of young people, including queer women, unexpectedly separated from civilization in an isolated location, unwittingly dabbling with hallucinogenic drugs and struggling to find a pathway forward after their friends begin disappearing or dying, you should try Welcome to Eden! This Spanish-language thriller finds a group of escape-hungry teens lured to a remote island for what they’re promised will be the party of a lifetime, only to learn they’ve actually been recruited to join a cult headquartered on the island. (Watch Welcome to Eden on Netflix)

5. Pretty Little Liars (Freeform)

(Photo by: ABC Family/Eric McCandless)

If you like complicated, unnaturally attractive teenage girls being taunted and extorted and blackmailed by a mysterious person or group of people who do not reveal their identity, try Pretty Little Liars. A year after the queen bee of their social group goes missing, four former best friends who wear really ambitious outfits to school are drawn together and pushed apart by relenting messages from the mysterious “A” who threatens to expose their secrets. As the show proceeds over the course of seven seasons, those original secrets feel increasingly silly compared to their new secrets: so much murder and deception, so little time! Very similar to Yellowjackets in that you never really know who to trust besides the core four, and you’re also not really sure who’s dead! (Stream Seven Seasons of Pretty Little Liars on HBO Max)

6. Dare Me (USA)

(Photo by: Rafy/USA Network)

If you like homoerotic elite high school sports teams containing girls with a lot of psychological baggage and a story that involves the slow unpeeling of a central mystery, try Dare Me. Unfortunately only given one season at USA, this series based on a Megan Abbot novel follows a cheer team under the leadership of a new, boundary-less coach whose own personal unraveling aligns with that of many of her damaged, self-destructive charges. “Dare Me takes a still heightened but significantly more grounded approach to its tales of teen violence and small-town drama,” Kayla wrote in her comparison of the show to Riverdale. “It still dresses up its darkness with glitter, but that mask is very intentional, a piercing juxtaposition of the thrills and terror of high school sports.” (Stream One Season of Dare Me on Netflix)

7. The Leftovers (HBO)

If you like Jasmin Savoy-Brown in a supernatural prestige cable drama centered on a town deeply impacted by a tragic event in which some residents lost more than others and some of them eventually formed cults, try The Leftovers. The show is set three years following the “Sudden Departure,” an unexplained global event in which 2% of the world’s population suddenly disappeared. Savoy-Brown joins us in Season 2, as the show shifts its focus and moves its main characters from Mapleton, New York to a town in Texas that didn’t lose any residents during the Rapture but now faces a new tragedy that engenders emotions including chaos and panic. (Stream all three seasons of The Leftovers on HBO Max)

8. Westworld (HBO)

If you like a show that spawned active, engaged reddit fan boards of fans attempting to unravel the show’s central questions through piecing together its various clues, try Westworld. Westworld takes place in the future in a Wild West themed amusement park populated by androids and patronized by rich people who enjoy killing and raping the androids without consequence. But then the androids start becoming sentient and shit gets very complicated. A perfect first season is followed by two more that didn’t hit quite so hard, with a fourth debuting this year. (Stream Westworld on HBO Max)

9. Station Eleven (HBO Max)

If you like a story in which past trauma remains a vivid presence in the still-tenuous present or are just interested in viewing the best television show I have ever seen, try Station Eleven! Station Eleven grapples with the world built in the aftermath of a flu that wiped out civilization entirely in 48 swift hours, weaving together stories of interconnected characters across time, flashing between the day the pandemic first hit and the ensuing few years and then what remains 20 years later, focusing specifically on The Traveling Symphony, a group of actors and musicians who perform Shakespeare in a loop around the now sparsely inhabited Great Lakes region. (Stream Station Eleven on HBO Max)

10. Killing Eve (BBC / AMC)

(Photo by: Gareth Gatrell/BBCAmerica)

If you like weirdly charming sociopaths like Misty Quigley who enjoy commiting murders, try Killing Eve! This delightfully deranged thriller follows Eve Polastri (Sandra Oh), a British intelligence investigator who becomes obsessed with a very beautiful and fashionable assassin Villanelle (Jodie Comer) who in turn becomes obsessed with her. Season One is a perfect season of television and by Season 3 we are mostly here for the outfits and the sexual tension although I believe some spy stuff is still technically happening on some level. (Stream Killing Eve on Hulu)

11. The Haunting of Hill House & The Haunting of Bly Manor (Netflix)

If you like haunted lesbians who aren’t really sure what’s real and what isn’t, try The Haunting of Hill House and its follow-up series, The Haunting of Bly Manor! Both seasons of this supernatural horror series take place in houses that hold both their present residents and the very creepy history of its previous inhabitants who continue to hover around literally and figuratively. Also, there are queer women in both who are often not entirely sure what is happening in their lives: relateable! (You can stream The Haunting of Hill House and The Haunting of Bly Manor on Netflix.)

12. Lost (ABC)

If you like large groups of people forced to build a new world for themselves on a strange unidentified patch of land with supernatural qualities after a plane crash that left many of them in a compromised medical state and also one of them is pregnant, try Lost! Lost, which was enormously popular during its run and had a brilliant first season and a sprawling and brilliant ensemble cast, is considered a definitive entry in the Stranded on a Desert Island cannon. Like Yellowjackets, Lost also employs a lot of flashbacks and flashforwards to gradually unwind its central mystery. (Stream seasons 1-6 of Lost on Hulu)

13. Cruel Summer (Freeform)

(Photo by: Freeform/Frank Ockenfels)

If you like a dark thriller produced recently but set in the mid-90s and loaded with nostalgic call-backs that is about high school popularity politics and a town grappling with an unexpected disappearance, try Cruel Summer. In a small Texas town, the very popular Kate Wallis disappears without a trace and awkward outcast Janette Turner takes over her life — but when Kate turns up a year later, new questions must be asked. The show hops between 1993, 1994 and 1995. (Stream Cruel Summer on Hulu)

14. The Society (Netflix)

If you like a bunch of high school students going on a little trip that turns out to actually be a prequel to having to create their own society with limited resources and a lot of pre-existing tension, try The Society. The senior class of West Ham, Connecticut, heads off on their senior camping trip, but a storm defers the journey. When the busses return them home, however, home has changed insofar as nobody is there anymore, just them, and roads to the outside world have been closed. Unfortunately, the show’s renewal was snatched back from the world by COVID, so we only get one (1) season. (The Society is streaming on Netflix)

15. Good Girls (NBC)

If you like watching suburban Moms and allies undertake low-key heists through which they discover new things about themselves, try Good Girls! This crime dramedy follows three Moms in suburban Michigan struggling to pay the bills who plan a big supermarket robbery heist only to find themselves involved in something much bigger than they expected involving a mob gang who was using the supermarket as a front. As the series continues the stakes raise and they find themselves involved in an increasingly dangerous and thrilling journey. (Good Girls is streaming on Netflix)

16. The A-List (BBC/Netflix)

If you like teens on a sinister island with a supernatural mystery, try The A-List. This British teen thriller is centered on Mia, who arrives at summer camp on Peregrine Island expecting to be Queen Bee, only to find a challenge from the very sinister Amber. The creators called it “mean girls meets Lost.” There’s also Alex, who is genderqueer and has a little thing with Petal, a cheerful little hippie who joins Alex for explorations into the mysterious monsters in the forest. (You can stream The A-List on Netflix.)

17. Wayward Pines (Fox)

If you like Juliette Lewis and an all-star cast in a creepy fish-out-of-water thriller where the water is not exactly what it seems and there are a lot of flashbacks, try Wayward Pines. Based on the Blake Crouch trilogy (which I also highly recommend!), Wayward Pines finds secret service agent Ethan waking up after an accident in a strange, seemingly perfect small town in Idaho where he’s gone hunting for two federal agents who’ve gone missing. (Lewis is only in the first four episodes, but by then you’ll be hooked anyhow.) (You can stream the two seasons of Wayward Pines on Hulu.)

18. Creamerie (Hulu)

If you like considering the possibility of matriarchy with one (1) grown man and a lot of humorous negotiations between charismatic women who are usually slightly panicked in an ambient way, try Creamerie. This dystopian comedy finds three dairy farmers building a life eight years after a mystery virus killed all the men and now their town is now mostly under the control of a wellness cult who have created a “reproduction protocol” to repopulate society. One of the three sisters at the center of the story, Alex, is gay, and has a very complicated relationship with (You can stream Creamerie on Hulu.)

19. Riverdale (The CW)

(© 2020 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved.)

If you like a group of troubled teens in a dimly-lit town with low-key Twin Peaks energy and also like being able to read Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya’s recaps of a television program after you have finished watching it, try Riverdale! Like so many thrillers on this list and elsewhere, Riverdale had a perfect first season and was more uneven from there, but it also added a queer storyline for Cheryl Blossom and Toni Topaz and remained fun and weird with plenty of intrigue to keep you on your feet.

15 Queer Cartoons To Watch if You’re Mourning “The Owl House”

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been tearing up about The Owl House series finale for almost a full week now. In a good way, because it was a perfect sendoff. And also in a sad way, because it’s over. If you’re feeling the same way, maybe you could use a little list of other animated series to check out while your heart mends? Below I’ve chosen 15 of my all-time favorite queer cartoons! Please share yours in the comments!

The Legend of Korra

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: Gays who like badass, complicated women; Avatar-style magic; and a slow-burn romance with an endgame sapphic sendoff.

Steven Universe 

Where to watch: Hulu, Cartoon Network (with ads)

Who it’s for: Fantasy fans who love expansive lore; found family feelers; trauma healers; and gay + trans characters for days and days.

Danger & Eggs

Where to watch: Prime Video

Who it’s for: Weirdos who know their queer pop culture and want to vicariously attend the best Pride parade ever.

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power 

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: Anyone who likes epic fantasy and sci-fi and has always wondered what it’d be like if The Lord of the Rings or Star Wars was canonically queer.

Adventure Time

Where to watch: HBO Max, Hulu Plus, Amazon Instant Video (rent or purchase)

Who it’s for: Nerds who are in it for the long haul and who are ready to embrace an entire zoo of wacky, wonderful characters in a post-apocalyptic bizarro world.

Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: Music lovers, hypebeasts, and queers who never get tired of plucky heroines with hearts of gold.

Pinecone & Pony 

Where to watch: Apple TV+

Who it’s for: LGBTQs who want to show their inner child the kind of love they wish they’d grown up with.

OK K.O.! Let’s Be Heroes

Where to watch: Hulu, Cartoon Network (with ads)

Who it’s for: Teen Titanheads and queers who remember Nicktoons in the afternoons.

Magical Girl Friendship Squad

Where to watch: fuboTV, Tubi

Who it’s for: Anyone who believes Broad City would have been better with MAGIC.

The Dragon Prince 

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: D&D players, epic fantasy fans, anyone who wants some legitimately good queer disability rep.

Dead End: Paranormal Park

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: Folks in fandom, autistic gals and pals, and anyone who’s fascinated by those secret tunnels underneath Disney World.

The Legend of Vox Machina

Where to watch: Prime Video

Who it’s for: Grown-ups who love Dungeons & Dragons and fully-realized characters set inside a seemingly endless fantasy world.

Star Trek: Lower Decks

Where to watch: Paramount+ or with a Premium Subscription to YouTube, Roku, or Prime Video

Who it’s for: Fans of Star Trek or any of the best workplace comedies.

Harley Quinn 

Where to watch: HBO Max

Who it’s for: Gays who love comics, a little bit of blood, deep irreverence for source material, and deadpan humor.

Arcane

Where to watch: Netflix

Who it’s for: Video game gays.

15 Excellent LGBTQ TV Parents Because I Started Watching Succession and YIKES

I recently started watching Succession and holy cats Logan Roy is the worst parent in the history of TV! Worse than Hiram Lodge from Riverdale! Worse than Aaron Echolls from Veronica Mars! Worse than all the parents in their weird cult in Marvel’s Runaways! Worse than Tony Soprano! Worse than Ross Gellar! Logan Roy’s whole entire deal is just… physically, mentally, and psychologically torturing his terrible children, who probably always would have been terrible, but are extra-terrible because their father is human garbage! Anyway, I had to take a break from my Succession binge to rewatch The Owl House and remind myself that all parents are not like fuckin’ Logan Roy — and while I was doing that, I went ahead and made a little list of TV parents of LGBTQ+ kids that are actually pretty dang awesome.

Stef and Lena Adams Foster, The Fosters

The Coach and Tammy Taylor of gay TV, Stef and Lena raised their own Julie Taylor (Brandon) but also some really excellent kids, including queer teen Jude who they nurtured and supported through gender-nonconformity, coming out, first love, first heartbreak, and also finding out his sister was dating their brother. They loved all their kids, and never stopped bringing more into their home because their hearts were just that big.

Camila Noceda, The Owl House

Some parents embrace their bi daughters and their bi daughter’s lesbian girlfriends. And then some parents, like Camila Noceda, embrace their bi daughters while letting an entire gaggle of kids from the Demon Realm move in with them and plot to rebuild a portal to a magical world. The Camilas of the land pin rainbow hearts to their sweaters and never take them off. They buy books about bashing the binary and adopt orphaned queer basilisk shape-shifters. They wield baseball bats to protect their kids from evil wizards. Also there’s only one of them. Our Camila! Camila Noceda! What a sweet potato!

Bert and Gracie, A League of Their Own

Bert and Gracie aren’t really Max Chapman’s parents; they’re her aunt and uncle — but they step up and serve the kind of parental role she needs when she’s grappling with her sexuality, with chasing her baseball dreams, and with figuring out how to dress in a way that makes her feel at home in her clothes. They have her over for dinner, cut her hair, take her out, make her suits, and encourage her to follow her heart (and her girl) even when it feels like the scariest thing in the world. They lend her their own courage, and she gladly accepts it.

Wayne Fields, Pretty Little Liars

It’s hard to call any of the parents on Pretty Little Liars “good” parents. If they were “good” parents, they’d absolutely 100% no question move their children out of Rosewood, PA. But Wayne Fields was the best of the bunch. Not only did he support Emily fully when she came out to him, he later climbed a drain pipe and shimmied up the brick wall of Rosewood High School to rescue Emily one night when the building came to life and tried to murder her. He tucked her under his arm and pulled her down the stairs and outside to safety while the marquee in the hallway flashed ACT NORMAL BITCH. A true hero.

Captain Carol Freeman, Star Trek: Lower Decks

Two of the hardest things in the world are being a Starfleet Captain and being a mom (I would assume, I have never been either), but Carol Freeman is the best at both of them. Her bisexual daughter is a crew member on her ship, and Carol doesn’t play favorites. And sure, she’s a little hard on her sometimes, but she kind of has to be: Beckett Mariner thrives on chaos in an organization ruled by order. But Carol’s always finding the balance between encouragement and tough love, and apologizing when she misses the mark. She’s firm, she’s fair, she’s a total boss.

Joel, The Last of Us

Another surrogate parent for the list, Joel goes to great lengths to NOT think of Ellie as his daughter, but he keeps failing at it over and over because he can’t help it. He was born to be a dad and he loves her, okay? He loves her. In fact he loves her so much that her personal well-being is more important to him than the fate of all humanity, and he’ll stop at nothing to keep her safe from every danger of the apocalypse. And when she can’t go on any longer, he’ll literally carry her the rest of the way.

Burt Hummel, Glee

There was only one Glee character better than Burt Hummel and that was Santana Lopez who is the greatest TV character of all time, so it’s not really a fair comparison. Burt didn’t understand Kurt and his Beyonce shenanigans at first — but he worked hard to learn about gay stuff and to see his son’s heart, and then to protect him from everything the world threw at him. He was there for his concerts, there for his heartbreak, there to teach him about safer sex, and there when he married the love of his life. World’s Best Dad. Tattoo it on his heart.

Angela Bassett, Master of None

Mother. Mommi. Mother. Hang on. Mommi. DANG IT. One second. *hoses self off with ice water* Hem hem. Right, so, Angela Bassett played Lena Waithe’s mom in the Thanksgiving episode of Master of None that launched Lena into the stratosphere. At first she had a hard time understanding her daughter’s sexuality, didn’t even want to discuss it, but she worked hard on herself so that Denise could feel comfortable bringing her girlfriend home for the holidays, so she could laugh with her daughter’s lover, and even let her help make the mac and cheese.

Penelope Alvarez, One Day at a Time

Penelope Alvarez did one of the toughest things in the world when she was raising her kids, including lesbian nerd Elena: she kept them right in the center of her world, and she didn’t stop living her own life. She modeled being an adult who just keeps on growing, and even messes up sometimes. But nothing could keep her form being there for her kids when they needed her. When Elena came out, when she brought home her Syd-nificant other, when she decided she was ready to have sex, when she wanted to wear a suit, when she needed to stand up to her dad. Penelope was always right beside her, with a smile, a word of encouragement, a hug, and a reality check when it was needed.

Gina Campbell, Skins

I bet you didn’t remember Naomi Campbell’s mom on Skins was Olivia Colman, did you? Gina wasn’t perfect, of course; she was running some kind of socialist cult out of her living room, and she slept with Naomi’s history teacher after he made a pass at Naomi — but when Naomi couldn’t stop destroying her own happiness because she was scared of falling for Emily Fitch, her mom sat her down and told her a hard truth: that The people who make us happy are never the people we expect. So when you find someone, you’ve got to cherish it. It gave Naomi the courage she needed to chase the girl she loved; the part about it being gay love was never even a worry for her mum.

Honey Ellis, Fresh Off the Boat

Honey was Nicole’s step-mom, way younger than Nicole’s actual mom, and they didn’t always see eye-to-eye — but when Honey ran into Nicole at the Denim Turtle, the town’s gay bar, she saw her step-daughter in a new light and agreed to help coach the lesbian softball team’s game against Nicole’s dad’s team. She knew nothing about softball, didn’t even own a ball cap, but she went for it and stood beside Nicole when she came out to her dad right there on the field.

Eliza Danvers, Supergirl

Eliza Danvers loved her daughters more than anything in the world. They were both superheroes to her (and, in fact, they both became superheroes in the end). Sure, sure, there were tough times; it’s never easy to adopt a child from a planet where they were basically a goddess, but Eliza ultimately found a way to balance it all, and support Alex as she came out as a grown-up and chased the kind of life she’s always wanted: wife and kids and her sister as her best friend forever.

Randall and Beth Pearson, This Is Us

Tess Peason’s coming out on This Is Us remains one of our all-time favorites here at Autostraddle dot com, in large part because of how Beth and Randall handled it. Tess cries as she finally confesses that she’s not like the other girls at school who are getting boyfriends; she doesn’t want a boyfriend, like ever. She maybe even wants a girlfriend. Very, very gently, Randall says, “Tess. Hey, Tess. Listen. We’re your parents. We’re here to help you, in a cool, laid back kind of way, without it becoming a thing.” Beth wraps her up in her arms and says, “We love you. No matter what. Okay? Look at me. You see me? Look at your dad. You see him? Do you see anything other than two people who love you more than any two people could ever love anyone?” Tess does seem them, really sees them, maybe for the first time ever, and it changes the shape of her entire world.

April 2023: What’s New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, Showtime, HBO Max, Hulu, Prime Video, Disney+, Roku and Paramount+

It’s time for April showers but after you get out of that shower you need to get into this guide to all the television you could be enjoying on your sofa or preferred place to sit! We’ve looked deeply into this and have come to you with a plethora of television shows and movies with lesbian, bisexual, queer and trans characters streaming on Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, HBO Max, Paramount+, Disney+, Roku and Showtime.

Top: Tiny Beautiful Things, Slip, Dead Ringers, Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies Bottom: The Matildas, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel, Beef, Couples Therapy, Walker: Independence, Miriam Margolyes: Almost Australian

New and Gay and/or Lesbian on Netflix in April 2023

Beef (Season One) – April 6

This series from A24 “follows the aftermath of a road rage incident between two strangers. Danny Cho (Steven Yeun), a failing contractor with a chip on his shoulder, goes head-to-head with Amy Lau (Ali Wong), a self-made entrepreneur with a picturesque life. The increasing stakes of their feud unravel their lives and relationships in this darkly comedic and deeply moving series.” Queer actress Maria Bello plays queer billionaire character Jordan.

All-American: Homecoming (Season 2) – April 11

When Simone Hicks leaves her family and friends behind in Los Angeles, she finds a chosen family at Bringston University in Atlanta. While Simone tries to balance freshman year with collegiate athletics and the realities of life at an HBCU, she leans on Nate — a non-binary, gender non-comforming diva who offers to share her space — and Keisha, a bisexual, aspiring dancer turned med student with commitment issues (natch). (Thanks to Natalie for writing this blurb for me!)

Miriam Margolyes: Almost Australian (Season 1) – April 11

Legendary British lesbian actress Miriam Margolyes has just become an official citizen of Australia, and she has a lot of questions about what this means for her! In this series she will FIND OUT.

Welcome to Eden (Season 2) – April 21

This Spanish-language series returns to the rebellion that’d been sparked on Eden. There were a few queer and trans characters in the first season, including trans DJ Mayaka, lesbian Bel and the lead character, Zoa, who’s bisexual.

Prime Video’s LGBTQ+ Stuff For April 2023

Bros (2022) – April 4

This major studio gay rom-com that got so much press about people not going to see it that nobody ended up going to see it is focused on the love story between two white cis gay men, but has “a queer world that is predominantly trans and POC — even if the white cis gay men are the only ones with real characters.”

The Marvelous Mrs Maisel: Season Five Premiere – April 14

It’s the final season of one of Prime Video’s flagship properties, promising to give Midge a grand send-off complete with numerous flash-forwards and a final season story that finds her working as a writer for a late-night show while her dapper lesbian manager Susie toils away to improve her career and everybody wears cute period outfits!

Dead Ringers (Season One) – April 21

This absolutely bananas gender-swapped re-imagining of David Cronenberg’s psychosexual horror cult classic Dead Ringers (1988) stars Rachel Weisz as twins Elliot and Beverly Mantle, obstetricians who have big ideas for revolutionizing women’s health. Beverly is a lesbian and she begins dating Genevive, an actress on a popular TV show, early in the story, which makes Elliot very mad. Like the original film, the series promises “co-dependent twin doctors at the top of their professions who start to unravel under the weight of their obsession with each other and their career pursuits.” You can also look forward to a lot of blood and realistic depictions of childbirth!

Queer HBO Max Shows & Movies Streaming April 2023

Walker: Independence (Season One) – April 1

This CW Western series is set in the late 1800s and follows an affluent East Coaster whose husband is murdered while they’re journeying out West together. She eventually lands in Independence, Texas, with her new  companion, loveable rogue Hoyt. Queer non-binary actor Katie Findlay plays eccentric burlesque dancer Kate Carver. According to Looper, “with the blessing of producer and showrunner Seamus Fahey, Katie infused their own queerness into Kate, giving us a glimpse at what life was like for the queer community in the 1800s.”

Tangerine (2015) – January 1

Shot entirely on an iPhone, this iconic film follows two trans sex workers, Sin-Dee and Alexandra, on Christmas Eve, as just-out-of-jail Sin-Dee tracks down the pimp/boyfriend who’s been cheating on her and Alexandra’s on a journey towards her singing performance that evening.

The Winchesters (Season One) – April 6

The first season of The CW’s Supernatural spinoff is set in the 1970s, telling the story of how John Winchester and Mary Campbell fell in love and fought monsters together while looking for their missing fathers. The characters include Mary’s friend Carlos Cervantez, who is bisexual and non-binary, and DJ Rockin’ Roxy (Bridget Reagan), who is queer.

A Black Lady Sketch Show: Season Four Premiere – April 14

Our favorite sketch show returns for its 4th season. Sadly, queer writer/performer Ashley Nicole Black isn’t returning for the fourth season because she has so many other hot jobs!  Tamara Jade (The Voice season 19), Angel Laketa Moore (Atypical) and DaMya Gurley will be joining Robin Thede, Sky Townsend and Gabrielle Dennis as featured players.

#BringBackAlice: Season One Premiere – April 14

A year after her shocking disappearance, popular influencer Alicja Stec is finally found — with no memory of what happened to her. But then it turns out that another teenager disappeared without a trace on the same day as Alicja, and her brother’s certain Alicja is the key to finding her. There’s a brief moment in the trailer where Alicja is kissing a girl, but also I cannot find a trailer in English or subtitles so!

Somebody Somewhere: Season Two Premiere – April 23

After slowly building a cult following throughout its first season, Bridget Everett’s Somebody Somewhere returns with more of that portrayal of small-town Midwestern queer life for which it has been so very praised. In Season Two, Sam’s working to move beyond her grief, deepening her friendship with Joel, building a new connection to her other sister and working with a new singing teacher.

Hulu’s April 2023 Shows for Girls, Gays and Theys

Tiny Beautiful Things (Limited Series) – April 7

Kathryn Hahn plays Claire, the advice columnist behind Dear Sugar, in this adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s bestselling book that finds Claire’s entire life falling apart just as she’s hired to help people work through the pieces of their own. Tanzyn Crawford plays Rae, her biracial queer teenage daughter, described like so: “uncomfortable in her own skin and often emotionally torn between her parents, Rae shows artistic leanings, though she’s an introvert of few words, just starting to develop her own opinions and making sense of who she is in the world.” Also, Desiree Akhavan is amongst the directors on this project that was created and written by queer producer Liz Tigelaar, who also was showrunner for my beloved Little Fires Everywhere.

Single Drunk Female: Season Two Premiere (Freeform) – April 13

One of the only shows to portray sobriety and recovery in a way that is not actively harmful is back! The protagonist is queer, but appears to be just dating men this season. But her sponsor (played by Rebecca Henderson0 remains a lesbian, and trans actor Jojo Brown plays Mindy, her “delightfully acerbic sobriety sister and manager at the grocery store.”

Paramount+‘s Gay Stuff For April 2023

Broad City (Seasons 1-5) – April 5th

The legendary Abbi and Ilana, who are both pretty queer, are landing in their entirety upon Paramount+, which is nice for us, what a treat!

Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies: Season One Premiere – April 6

Set in 1954, four years prior to the official Grease movie timeline, four “fed-up and misfit students band together to bring out the moral panic that will change Rydell High forever and become the founding mothers of the first high school clique known as the Pink Ladies.”  There is definitely some sapphic kissing in the trailer, and non-binary actor Ari Notartomaso plays gender non-conforming character Cynthia who, in the trailer, is seen as one of the T-Birds, one of the Pink Ladies, and also in a scene where she’s about to kiss a girl wearing a gay hat.

Showtime Queer April 2023 Streaming Content

Couple’s Therapy: Season 3B – April 28

Queen Mother Dr. Orna Guralnik returns for the second half of the third season of Couple’s Therapy, where she’ll be working with four new couples “wrestling with the confines of long-term relationships” and challenging heteronormative structures of what a successful relationship looks like. Amongst them are Nadine and Christine, a couple desperately trying to adjust to one partner’s desire to transition into polyamory.

The Roku Channel’s Bisexual Content for April 2023

Slip: Season One – April 21

Mae (Zoe Lister-Jones) feels dull in her relationship, cheats on her partner, and wakes up the next day in an entirely new life where nobody remembers the reality she lived in before. The life-hopping continues, each jump inspired by Mae having an orgasm. And of course, Mae dates a lot throughout this journey into alternate universes — men and women both! Shelli saw Slip at SXSW and said “It’s clever as hell, gets pretty damn queer, and the way she has to “activate” her time travel is hilarious.”

Disney+ LGBTQ+ Content for April 2023

The Owl House: Final Special Episode – April 8

We will say goodbye to this beloved queer-inclusive animated series with this final episode of their three-episode third season. It will follow Luz’s journey to save the boiling isles from the evil Emperor Belos & the unpredictable Collector.

Matildas: The World At Our Feet – April 26

Football Australia has partnered with Disney+ to make this six-part docuseries about the journey of their national women’s football team, the CommBank Matildas, as they prepare for the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023. Obviously gay team captain Sam Kerr, recently named the most influential woman in Australian sport, will be central to the docuseries.

20 Undead Sapphic TV Characters, Ranked by Brain Munching

One thing about sapphic TV characters is: they sure do die! But also, a lot of them are undead, like vampires and zombies and ghosts. And some of the ones who have died have been resurrected, both on-screen and by the actors who played them after their shows were over. The undead, of course, are most famous for eating brains, so today on Undeadstraddle, I thought I’d make a little list of undead sapphic TV characters, ranked by whether or not I’d let them munch on my brain. Hopefully this will finally get me recognized by the Pulitzer nominating committee.

20. Hope Mikaelson, Legacies

I don’t think Hope actually wants to eat my brain. I think it would make her feel bad. So she’s at the bottom of this list.

19. Barbara Kean, Gotham

She ruined her entire life because she was in love with a cop. I don’t want her anywhere near my brain.

18. Pam Swynford De Beaufort, True Blood

Pam’s not really my type, but I do have a whole lot in common with Tara Thornton, who definitely came as close as possible to letting Pam eat her brain, so, like, I guess I could say I wouldn’t let Pam eat my brain, but if it came down to it, maybe I would?

17. Alison DiLaurentis, Pretty Little Liars

The reason I wouldn’t let Alison DiLaurentis eat my brain is because I know she’d then stuff my empty skull will with some kind of doll inside a doll which she’d then hide in a barn in rural Pennsylvania as a clue to a mystery that didn’t have anything to do with me.

16. Jenny Schecter, The L Word

I just want to clear up, first, that, according to Mia Kirshner, Jenny Schecter is alive, after dying, so: undead. I don’t think I’d volunteer to let her eat my brain, but if she did eat it, at least a New Yorker short story would come out of it and the fate of my brain would be debated at length on Twitter after my demise.

15. Sophie-Anne Leclerq, True Blood

I have, historically, not made a lot of great decisions when it comes to ginger femmes, so no matter what I say here, the truth is I would definitely let Sophie-Anne Leclerq eat my brain if she asked nicely. Or meanly. Or, like, if she simply approached me with a fork.

14. Lexa, The 100

Because Lexa is only technically alive in a simulation, I am going to assume she would only simulate eating my brain, which is fine. I simulate stabbing every man who calls me a bitch in video games but I’ve never done it in real life.

13. Ava Silva, Warrior Nun

If this sweet lamb needs my brain to save the world, which is of course the only reason she’d ask, she can have it. And anyway maybe eating my brain will imbue her with my gay powers and make her rebel against the church and tear it down from the inside out.

12. Lucy Westenra, Dracula

The thing about Lucy Westenra is she has Katie McGrath’s face and who’s gonna say no to that?

11. Rose Solano, Jane the Virgin

Another ginger femme, another series of bad choices.

10. Sara Lance, Legends of Tomorrow

I’m saying Sara Lance can eat my brain because I think she’d find a way around eating my brain because she’s an outside-the-box thinker who doesn’t want anymore buried gays. I think she’d save the day and keep my brain in tact and give me one of her dykey high fives while we share a beer after the heroics.

9. Delphine Cormier, Orphan Black

I think Delphine would eat my brain whether I wanted her to or not, if she felt like it needed to be done, and there’s no way I could fight her off or outwit her, so I might as well just submit to the feast.

8. Dani, The Haunting of Bly Manor

Having my brain eaten by Dani seems like it could be one of those epic poems about sirens and the sea, and then we’ll just live our lesbian lives in the lake for all eternity, which doesn’t seem like too bad of a deal.

7. Bill Potts, Doctor Who

Bill’s been through enough shit to last a hundred lifetimes. If she needs to eat my brain, it’s hers.

6. Mona Vanderwaal, Pretty Little Liars

The thing about Mona Vanderwaal is she could literally be eating my brain right now and I wouldn’t even know it — and if I discovered it, if I saw her munching on my noggin, and I was like, “Why are you gnawing on my head?” She’d be like, “Because you signed this ironclad contract telling me I could.” And she would produce the contract, which I wouldn’t remember signing, but my name would be right there on the dotted line, and I would be legally required to let her continue her meal.

5. Helena G Wells, Warehouse 13

HG probably invented something to make the whole brain-eating process as painless and mess-free as possible, so I guess that’s okay, and she could also probably bring me back to life with a robot brain, and she’d probably cryogenically freeze me until my new brain was ready. Pretty good looking out, for a brain-eater.

4. Vamp!Willow, Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Waaaait a second, is this where my ginger femme path of emotional destruction began???

3. Villanelle, Killing Eve

I’m going to be honest with you: I think my wife would like to get into a situation where me and her and Villanelle are kinda taking turns eating each other’s “brains,” and I’m never going to deny my wife her wildest dreams. (Jodie Comer said Villanelle climbed out of the Thames after being shot, so it’s all good, she’s undead.)

2. Tara Thornton, True Blood

If Tara Thornton asked me for literally anything, including a bite of my brain, I would simply say: yes.

1. Kathryn Janeway, Star Trek: Voyager

Ahhh. No. THIS is where my ginger femme path of emotional destruction began. Enjoy my medulla oblongata, my queen.

15 TV Comedies Where Lesbians Are In on the Jokes

One of the weirdest thing about lesbians — and queer people, in general — is that we’re generally considered to be the funniest humans on the planet. I don’t know the exact math, but I would estimate that 98% of the best and most famous stand-up comics are queer women, for one example of hilarity. HOWEVER, lesbians are also generally considered to be the most humorless folks on earth, and are constantly the butt of played and mean-spirited jokes on TV. And, look, there’s plenty of stuff to clown on us about — but it’s only funny if we’re not getting punched down at. And so I have made a list of 15 TV Comedies Where Lesbians Are In on the Jokes, so you can enjoy being gently mocked in peace!

Brooklyn Nine-Nine

After Stephanie Beatriz came out publicly in real life, Rosa Diaz came out as bisexual on Brooklyn Nine-Nine; she even dated a hairstylist played by Cameron Esposito for a while. Rosa’s coming out was moving and hilarious, and one of the most on-point bi comings out we’ve ever seen (her parents were fine with her being bi, as long as she “ended up” with a husband).

Derry Girls

Derry Girls would have been once-in-a-lifetime hilarity, even if Clare had never come out as our favorite “wee lesbian,” but it added something special to the series, especially because it was set in the late 1990s. Nothing’s off limits for mocking on Derry Girls, except Clare’s sexuality; she’s even given a love story in the final season.

Twenties

Twenties has the distinction of being, by far, the sexiest comedy on this list. Plus, the only comedy ever? to feature a Black masc lesbian at it center. (Unless you count Lena Waithe’s Denise as the center of Master of None, which she sometimes was, but also Hattie is Lena Waithe’s fictional counterpart on Lena Waithe’s own show, so it’s sort of a Waitheception anyway.)

Grace and Frankie

Grace and Frankie is as close as we’ve ever gotten to seeing two women fall in love in their later years and live out their retired lives together. It’s also one of the funniest shows ever made, because of course it is; Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin have only grown better — and better together — over time. We were always a little worried the show would lesbian-panic (it was conceived and showrun by a Friends co-creator, after all), but it actually went in the opposite direction, with Grace choosing Frankie over everything in the end.

One Day at a Time

From the moment the word “Autostraddle” made its way onto One Day at a Time, during its first season, we knew this show was going to be for us. The writers room was full of queer folks, and so the most clowning jokes always felt like they were coming from inside the house (in a good way). Plus, you’d be hard-pressed to find another comedy that had its pulse on lesbian pop culture the way this one did.

A Black Lady Sketch Show

Admittedly, A Black Lady Sketch Show has gotten less gay as time has gone on, but there are still so many hilarious queer skits, and so many excellent LGBTQ actors, including Ashley Nicole Black, Brittani Nichols, Raven-Symoné, and Laverne Cox. Carmen has rounded up some of the show’s best gayness, not once, but twice!

G.L.O.W.

The funniest thing about GLOW, in the beginning, was that it thought it was a straight show! GLOW could also have easily succumbed to gay panic, but — unlike so many other shows we’ve known and loved over the years — it didn’t keep the most charismatic parings of women apart. And it ultimately gave us a beautiful love story between Arthie and Yolanda.

Golden Girls

Golden Girls was ahead of its time in nearly every way, including its LGBTQ rep. The scene where Blanche finds out that Dorothy’s friend, Jean, is in love with Rose — “Lesbian? Lesbian. Lesbian!” — remains an iconic sitcom moment and a piece of beloved gay TV history. The only improvement The Golden Girls could have made was letting Dorothy be a lesbian, something even Sophia knew was probably true.

Reboot

One of the biggest cancellation bummers of this year was Hulu axing Reboot, and not only because it had three LGBTQ+ women. Hannah, the lesbian. Timberly, the bisexual. And Bree, “A Sexual Fluid.” All three had distinct queer journies, and while Hannah’s was the most heartfelt — including a love story with Stephanie Allynne’s Hulu HR Rep — it was Bree’s Google searches after her first night with Timberly that remain an absolute highlight of queer absurdity.

Harley Quinn

Harley Quinn is, hands down, the funniest Batman property ever, in large part because it endlessly mocks Batman himself and the fanboy gatekeepers who have tried to keep us queer nerds out of comics all these years. It’s irreverent, it’s of-the-moment, it’s a little bit gross, and — through it all — it’s a love story about two best friends who have belonged together since they first met in Batman the Animated Series three decades ago.

Girls5Eva

I don’t understand how Girls5Eva keeps flying under the radar. I guess because the seasons are short and it’s on Peacock? This show is consistently hysterical, with one of the best comedy ensembles in the business. Real life lesbian Paula Pell plays fictional lesbian Gloria, a member of a former girl group. Her modern day lesbian hijinks are a hoot, but we especially love the flashbacks to her trying to pretend to be straight when the band was brand new.

Hacks

Hacks is a masterpiece, and even though Deborah Vance cannot stop herself from making endless jokes about Hannah’s queerness, she also accidentally loves her very much. And anyway, Hannah really is a disaster bisexual. By the time Deborah’s on a lesbian cruise dancing like Ellen on stage, you just know this series will remain a gay favorite for all time.

Abbott Elementary

Abbott Elementary doesn’t have any queer women characters yet (although there is a very large contingent of Barbara/Melissa shippers on this internet!). But Brittani Nichols is a writer and producer on the series, and it’s easy to see her queer fingerprints everywhere. The jokes about how Janine deals with breakups like a lesbian, the jokes about Jacob’s bisexual erasure, the endless WNBA shout-outs. Every episode feels like a gift to us, even without lesbians to hang our backwards baseball caps on.

Star Trek: Lower Decks

Star Trek: Lower Decks is all Star Trek, but it’s also a workplace comedy at its warp core. The series spends its time below the bridge, with the crew that keep the USS Cerritos running, and that includes queer heartthrob Beckett Mariner, who is really the show’s main character. She, too, is a walking disaster with a heart of gold and a total fear of commitment — but she gets an enemies-to-lovers girlfriend anyway. She will also make you cackle out loud at least once an episode.

One Mississippi

It’s a comedy about wives Tig Notaro and Stephanie Allynne, played by Tig Notaro and Stephanie Allynne. Its cancellation was a stab in the guts! One Mississippi is everything you love about Tig Notaro’s humor — the dryness, the wit, the candor — and a story of survival and true love on top of it. You ever cry and laugh at the exact same time? It’s actually pretty cathartic.

March 2023: What’s New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, Showtime, HBO Max, Hulu, Prime Video, Disney+, Starz and Paramount+

As any March hare could tell you, we are now entering the month of March and that means it’s time for Yellowjackets! But also there are other television shows and movies with lesbian, bisexual, queer and trans characters streaming on Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, HBO Max, Paramount+, Disney+, Starz and Showtime this fine March of 2023 and it’s time for us to talk about them!

Top row: Wreck (Hulu), Yellowjackets (Showtime), Class of ’07 (Prime Video), Mae Martin: Sap (Netflix). Bottom row: Perry Mason (HBO), Turning the Tables With Robin Roberts (Disney+), The Big Door Prize (Apple TV), Queen of the Universe (Paramount+), All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (HBO Max), Good Trouble (Freeform/Hulu)

New and Gay and/or Lesbian on Netflix in March 2023

Magic Mike XXL (2015) – March 1

This cinematic masterpiece sequel about an all-male stripper team features bisexual actress Amber Heard as a flirty bisexual photographer named Zeo.

Next in Fashion: Season 2 – March 3

Tan France and Gigi Hadid’s version of Project Runway has a few seemingly LGBTQ+ contestants this season, including trans designer James Ford, who you may recognize from his various connections to the Autostraddle-verse including that one time he said on this very website that Spindrift is bad.

Shadow & Bone: Season Two – March 16

It’s time for everybody’s favorite streaming guide game: Riese Tries To Explain The Plot of a Sci-Fi/Fantasy Show They Have Never Seen By Paraphrasing The Show’s Promotional Materials!!! AHEM: in the second season of this show, Alina Starkov and Mal Oretsev must rise to the challenge presented by General Kirigan’s new army by gathering their own powerful new allies and begin an epic journey to locate two mythical creatures that’ll amplify their powers. Also, a deadly heist will send the Crows on a collision course with the Sun Summoner. Queer actor Jessie Mel Li plays Alina, and has said she’d love to see Alina go bisexual in Season 2, and Nina Zenik is cannon bisexual.

Carol (2015) – March 20

Hmmmmm not sure what this is about but i do feel like I’ve heard of it and it’s definitely gay

Mae Martin: Sap – March 28

Non-binary queer comic Mae Martin of Feel Good and that one picture with Elliot Page gets their own stand-up special, directed by Abbi Jacobson! We are all so very excited about because they are so hot and funny and we love everything they have ever done or will do!

Prime Video’s LGBTQ+ Stuff For March 2023

Daisy Jones & The Six: Season One Premiere – March 3

Based on the best-selling novel by Taylor Jenkins-Reid (Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo), this mockumentary-ish show tells the story 20 years later of a band that rose from obscurity to fame and then, following a massive show at Chicago’s Soldier Field, broke up forever. Although the book didn’t have any queer elements, Nabiyah Be’s character Simone is queer and Ayesha Harris is playing her love interest!

Class of ’07: Season One – March 17

This Australian comedy about an all-girls school class reunion that gets interrupted by an apocalypse that strands all its attendees on a just-created island really should be a lot gayer than it is but… for not being gay, it is still a good time. The cast includes queer hip-hop artist BVT (whose character is clearly gay but doesn’t really like, do anything gay), the delightfully weird and gay actress / director Caitlin Stasey (Neighbours, Please Like Me, Reign) and queer actor / content creator Emma Horn.

Swarm: Season One – March 17

Dre (Dominique Fishback) is a devoted member of an obsessive fandom focused on Ni’Jah and her obsession gets really dark when she becomes a serial killer. Dre is queer (although she doesn’t come fully into her identity until the very end of the series) and she also at one point on her traveling reign of terror, intersects with a queer women’s empowerment cult led by Billie Eilish. In the last episode we meet Kiersey Clemons’ Rashida, a queer graduate student who dares to dislike Ni’Jah.

Nope (2022) – March 21

In this neo-Western science fiction horror film from Jordan Peele, Keke Palmer plays a character A. Tony describes as “the charismatic little lesbian of my dreams,” the sibling to Daniel Kaluuya’s OJ. Together they manage a horse ranch in California that handles horses for film & TV productions, discover something “wonderful and sinister in the skies above” that might offer a clue to who killed their father. They also must contend with the owner of an adjacent theme park trying to profit from the supernatural phenomenon lurking above them all.

The Power: Season One Premiere – March 31

This adaptation of Naomi Alderman’s bestselling novel which explored the question “What if women ruled the world?” focuses on a group of teenage girls who mysteriously develop a special power that allows them to electrocute people. Among them is Roxy (Ria Zmitrowicz), the secret daughter of a powerful business owner in London who witnesses her Mom getting killed by gangsters and also she is queer!

Queer HBO Max Shows & Movies Streaming March 2023

Milk (2008) – March 1

This biopic telling the story of the legendary gay rights activist and politician Harvey Milk has a queer female character, Anne Kronenberg, played by Allison Pill. I saw this film in the theater and cried like a baby!

Tangerine (2015) – March 1

Shot entirely on an iPhone, this iconic film follows two trans sex workers, Sin-Dee and Alexandra, on Christmas Eve, as just-out-of-jail Sin-Dee tracks down the pimp/boyfriend who’s been cheating on her and Alexandra’s on a journey towards her singing performance that evening.

Perry Mason: Season 2 Premiere – March 6

It’s been a long wait for the second season of this drama series reboot that tells the origin story of famed defense lawyer Perry Mason in post-WWI Los Angeles. In Season Two, Mason’s number two Della Street (Juliet Rylance) has found herself a beard, is bored with her girlfriend Hazel (Molly Ephraim) and will find a distraction in the form of Hollywood screenwriter Anita St. Pierre (Jen Tullock). So far, reviews claim Season Two is actually better than Season One!

All the Beauty and the Bloodshed (2022) – March 19

“Laura Poitras’ remarkable documentary All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is about Nan Goldin and her work,” wrote Drew Gregory of this award-winning film about legendary bisexual photographer Nan Goldin. “It’s also about Goldin’s campaign to take down the Sackler family, the owners of Purdue Pharma, the company who manufactured Oxycontin. The brilliance of the film is it shows these aspects of her life to be one in the same.”

Hulu’s March 2023 Shows for Girls, Gays and Theys

Wreck: Season One – March 1

This British comedy horror show — which got negative reviews overall but positive reviews from LGBTQ+ publications specifically — finds a young gay lad named Jamie working on a cruise ship to investigate his sister’s disappearance. Also aboard is Vivian Lim (Thaddea Graham), who joined the Sacramentum after fleeing her homophobic family. She eventually has a thing with Lily Tee (Ramanique Ahluwalia). Writer Ryan J. Brown said of the show’s thematic bent: “as a gay man and horror fan, I think horror has always been queer but it’s always coded, and subtext. I thought, ‘let’s do away with the subtext. Let’s have explicit representation.”

Good Trouble: Season 5 Premiere – March 17

According to the Good Trouble Fandom Wiki, ” The roommates will face their toughest obstacles yet as they’re confronted with evolving relationship challenges and new career opportunities. Through highs and lows, romance and heartbreak, The Coterie crew will lean on each other while they navigate the next stage of adulthood.”

Showtime’s March 2023 Queer Content

Yellowjackets: Season 2 Premiere – March 24

BUZZ BUZZ BUZZ !!!! Lots of new cast members will joining our favorite program including Lauren Ambrose as adult Van! Trans actress Nicole Maines is joining up as an associate of adult Lottie — who’ll be played by Simone Kessell. Season One ended with everybody wondering if Lottie was leading a plane-crash-obsessed cult, so!!! Please check out our in-depth analysis of the Yellowjackets Season Two Trailer here.

Disney+ LGBTQ+ Content for March 2023

Turning the Tables With Robin Roberts: Season 2 – March 15

If you’ve been waiting all your life to see lesbian news anchor Robin Roberts (Good Morning America) hold intimate roundtable conversations with female celebrities from all walks of life then you are in luck my friend! The first season was jam-packed with queer participants (Tig Notaro, Raven-Symone, Melissa Etheridge, Billie Jean King, etc), this year I have spotted one (1) and her name is Hayley Kiyoko.

Apple TV+’s Lesbians of March 2023

The Big Door Prize: Season One Premiere – March 29

A machine in a small town grocery store promises to predict the destiny of any user who submits themselves to its powers! The story centers on Cass (Gabrielle Dennis) and Dusty (Chris O’Dowd)’s family, which includes Izzy (Crystal R. Fox), Cass’s lesbian Mom who owns a shop in Deerfield.

Paramount+‘s Gay Stuff For March 2023

The Challenge: World Championship: Season Premiere – March 8

MVPs and Global Champions from Challenge editions in Argentina, the UK, Australia and the USA will come together to represent their countries and fight for the chance to be crowned CHALLENGE WORLD CHAMPION. Amongst these humans is lesbian athlete Kaycee Clark (Big Brother, The Challenge).

Queen of the Universe: Season 2 Premiere – March 31

Vanessa Williams hosts this drag queen singing competition and bisexual Spice Girl Mel B will be joining the judging panel that already includes Trixie Mattel, Michelle Visage and Graham Norton!

Starz Queer March 2023 Streaming Content

Power Book II: Ghost: Season 3 Premiere – March 8

In Season Three, Tariq St. Patrick sets out to get his trust, return to his family, and leave the game for good. But a ruthless new connect interrupts his plan to reconnect with Tasha and Yaz, putting him back into business with Brayden, (bisexual character! although she hasn’t had a bisexual storyline yet!) Effie and the Tejadas.

Minx: Season One – March 24

HBO Max renewed this brilliant little show and then VERY RUDELY rescinded the offer but luckily Starz swooped in to save it and they’re putting season one on their platform on March 24th! This story of a young feminist in 1970s Los Angeles who joins forces with a porn rag publisher to create the first women’s porn magazine has a major gay man of color character and also some delightfully surprising queer lady storylines!

All 235 Dead Lesbian and Bisexual Characters On TV, And How They Died

People die. Characters die. This is perhaps life’s most unfortunate fact: that people will die and leave the rest of us behind. It’s incredibly rare that any dramatic television series lasting over three seasons will never kill a main or recurring character, and all those deaths have driven a stake through the heart of fandom: Joyce on Buffy, Lady Sybil on Downton Abby, Charlie on Lost, Ned Stark on Game of Thrones, Jen on Dawson’s Creek, Nate on Six Feet Under — but when the person who dies is a lesbian or bisexual character, queer fandom takes it pretty hard.

The history of lesbian representation on television is rocky — in the beginning, we seemed exclusively relegated to roles that saw us getting killed/attacked or doing the killing/attacking. And until the last five or so years, lesbian and bisexual characters seemed entirely unable to date an actual woman or stay alive for more than three episodes, let alone an entire run, of a show. Gay and lesbian characters are so often murdered on television that we have our very own trope: Bury Your Gays. We comprise such a teeny-tiny fraction of characters on television to begin with that killing us off so haphazardly feels especially cruel.

Not every death listed below was wholly uncalled for. In many genres, like soap operas and shows about vampires, zombies, criminals, or games of thrones, characters are killed on the reg. That’s a different trope — Anyone Can Die. Furthermore, shows composed entirely of queer characters will inevitably kill one. But regardless, they still add to the body count weighing down our history of misrepresentation.

And, due to the recent untimely death of Lexa on The 100, this week seemed like a good one to count down everybody we have lost over the years.

This list contains every television death of an OPENLY lesbian or bisexual or queer female character on a television show. With a handful of exceptions, these are all characters who appeared for more than one episode. The exceptions were deemed exceptional because something about the characterization still fits in with the Bury Your Gays trope. Victims-of-the-week from crime procedurals (Law & Order, Cold Case, CSI, Criminal Minds or older shows) or patients-of-the-week from hospital dramas (Chicago Hope, E.R.), aren’t on this list, as that is an entirely different kind of list, but recurring characters from those shows are on this list. Nor is subtext on this list, because we’re not gonna give Xena showrunners Queer Character Credit for a character they refused to make openly queer when she was really so obviously queer. You know? [ETA: Okay, I’ve added Xena after doing further research and because if one more commenter takes up space on this thread — a thread I’m using to find more characters to add, and also to engage with thoughtful/funny readers who have opinions and feelings — to tell me that I “forgot” Xena without reading this introduction, I will become the 200th dead lesbian and the cause of death will be “Walked off a cliff with a commenter in her arms. Murder-suicide.” But Xena will be the one and only inclusion based on subtext.] Also, although I’ve done tons of research, I haven’t personally seen all of these shows, so mistakes may very well exist, and feel free to politely inform me of them in the comments, or tell me about characters I may have missed — it’s especially helpful if you can tell me the cause of death and the year.

Unsure if this needs to be said but… SPOILER ALERT.

Special thanks to the LezWatchTV Database for providing info on shows I haven’t seen or heard about directly!

Every Regular or Recurring Lesbian or Bisexual Female Character Killed On Television

Julie, Executive Suite (1976)

Cause of death: Hit by a car. Her love interest had just walked into traffic after realizing her lesbianism and Julie was chasing her.

Franky Doyle, Prisoner: Cell Block H (1980)

Cause of death: Shot by a police officer after escaping from prison

Sharon Gilmour, Prisoner: Cell Block H (1980)

Cause of death: Pushed down the stairs by a corrections officer

Karen O’Malley, Casualty (1987)

Cause of death: Head Injury

Cecília, Vale Tudo (1988)

Cause of death: Car Accident

Cicely, Northern Exposure (1992)

Cause of death: Shot by a gunman employed by the town’s evil overlord who doesn’t want to let the lesbians change his town. The shot was intended for her girlfriend Roslyn, but Cicely, who was already sick, blocked the bullet and died in Roslyn’s arms, thus magically healing the town’s long-simmering feuds and leading them to re-name the town “Cicely.”

Talia Winters, Babylon 5 (1995)

Cause of death: Activated a sleeper personality that wiped out her actual personality, effectively killing her

Beth Jordache, Brookside (1995)

Cause of death: Genetic heart condition, died in prison

Susan Ross, Seinfeld (1996)

Cause of death: Toxic envelope glue

Naomi “Tracy” Richards, Band of Gold (1996)

Cause of death: Stabbed herself

Lucy, The Fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders (1996)

Cause of death: Caught thieving and hanged

Kathy, NYPD Blue (1997)

Cause of death: Shot by a hit man hired by her girlfriend Abby’s ex, who wanted to get rid of Kathy so she could get back together with Abby. Abby was pregnant at the time.

Sondra Westwood, Pacific Drive (1997)

Cause of death: Murdered by a serial killer

Jadzia Dax, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1998)

Cause of death: Blasted by an alien-possessed alien

Sonia Besirky, Lindenstraße (1998)

Cause of death: Drug overdose from medication given to her by her ex-lover’s husband

Leila and Rafaela, Torre de Babel (1998)

Cause of death: Explosion in a shopping mall

Susanne Teubner, Hinter Gittern (1999)

Cause of death: Shot during a bank robbery (she was a customer)

Shaz Wiley, Bad Girls (2000)

Cause of death: Bomb, died in resulting fire

Laura Hall, Shortland Street (2000)

Cause of death: Heart attack

Diamond, Dark Angel (2001)

Cause of death: Used as a lab rat for research that killed her

Xena, Xena the Warrior Princess (2001)

Cause of death: Beheaded

Beate “Bea” Hansen, Hinter Gittern (2001)

Cause of death: Injuries from an explosion

Jule Neumann, Hinter Gittern (2001)

Cause of death: Suicide

Frankie Stone, All My Children (2001)

Cause of death: Murder Mystery!

Bridgit, 24 (2001)

Cause of death: Shot by a man in front of her girlfriend

Tara Maclay, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (2002)

Cause of death: Shot in the heart by a stray bullet

Kelly Hurst, Family Affairs (2002)

Cause of death: Pushed down the stairs by her lover’s husband

Megan Hartnoll, At Home With The Braithwaites (2003)

Cause of death: Electrocuted in the bathtub

Juliet Becker, The Bill (2003)

Cause of death: Stabbed

Tina Greer, Smallville (2003)

Cause of death: Impaled through the chest on a large piece of wood during a fight with a male character

Sandy Lopez, E.R. (2004)

Cause of death: Injuries sustained from fighting a fire in an abandoned warehouse

Al Mackenzie, Bad Girls (2004)

Cause of death: Poisoned

Hanna Novak, Verbotene Liebe (2004)

Cause of death: Stroke, died in her girlfriend’s arms

Ines Führbringer, Hinter Gittern (2004)

Cause of death: Throat slit, died in girlfriend’s arms

Thelma Bates, Hex (2004)

Cause of death: Murdered by a demon

Flora, Deadwood (2004)

Cause of death: Beaten by a man who then forced a woman to shoot her with his gun

Brenda Castillo, Charmed (2004)

Cause of death: Stabbed with a cursed blade by a man, causing her to rapidly age and then die

Tosha, The Wire (2004)

Cause of death: Shot during a heist gone wrong

Marissa Cooper, The O.C. (2005)

Cause of death: Car crash after being driven off the road by her drunk ex-boyfriend

Servilla, Rome (2005)

Cause of death: Stabs herself in front of her rival house, inhabited by the mother of her lover

Dusty, Queer As Folk (2005)

Cause of death: At a benefit at a gay club when a bomb went off

Dana Fairbanks, The L Word (2006)

Cause of death: Breast cancer

Helena Cain, Battlestar Galactica (2006)

Cause of death: Shot by her ex-lady-lover

Manuela Wellmann, Hinter Gittern (2006)

Cause of death: Stabbed, died in girlfriend’s arms

Maya Robertson, Hex (2006)

Cause of death: Hit by a car

Natalie, Bad Girls (2006)

Cause of death: Bludgeoned to death with a brick

Gina Inviere/#6, Battlestar Galactica (2006)

Cause of death: Set off a nuclear weapon

Eve Jacobson/Zoe McAllister, Home & Away (2006)

Cause of death: Inside a building when it was blown up

Van, Dante’s Cove (2006)

Cause of Death: Killed by the Shadows

Angie Morton, Stritctly Confidential (2006)

Cause of death: Suicide. Jumped off a building.

February 2023: What’s New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, Prime Video, Peacock, Disney+, Shudder and Paramount+

Hello and welcome to your monthly adventure into which streaming networks are bold and visionary enough to include lesbian and bisexual and queer women and/or trans people in their February lineup. What is new and gay on  Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Peacock and HBO Max this February 2023? Wh

It was another challenging month for me, friends, as once more I found myself picking up strong gay vibes from a number of programs only to get five screeners deep and learn those vibes were actually radiating from gay men. But if you’re looking for some gay male storylines this month, look no further than Apple+ TV’s Dear Edward and Shrinking; as well as the film Spoiler Alert on Peacock!

Top Row: Harlem, The Watchful Eye, Love Match: Paris, Bel-Air
Bottom Row: Million Little Things, Your Place or Mine, Attachment, Star Trek Picard, Harley Quinn and Planet Sex With Cara Delevingne

New and Gay and/or Lesbian on Netflix in February 2023

Your Place or Mine (2023) – February 10

This rom-com from Alline Brosh McKenna (Crazy Ex-Girlfriend) sees Debbie (Reese Witherspoon) and Peter (Ashton Kutcher) as best friends forever who swap houses for a week — him taking care of her son in LA, her spreading her wings in NYC — to discover themselves et cetera you know how it is with heterosexuals. Tig Notaro appears in this film as, I believe, Debbie’s sardonic lesbian pal! I suppose it’s possible her character is straight but lord have mercy if so.

Perfect Match: First 4 Episodes – February 14

This Netflix reality show mashup — bringing together contestants from previous Netflix reality shows for a new game that I suppose involves love or dating in a matchy matchy way — is teeming with bisexuals! We’ve got Too Hot to Handle star Francesca Farago, who previously dated fellow reality queen Demi Sims and is now dating trans influencer Jesse Sullivan. Then there’s Are You The One’s bisexual season alum Kariselle Snow (who also appeared in Netflix’s Sexy Beast, thus qualifying her for this program). Also there is the bisexual Abbey Humphrey from Twentysomethings: Austin. Two girls who kissed on their season of Too Hot to Handle, Izzy and Georgia, are also in the cast, but I’ve got no clue if they’re actually bi because I did not see the show. It appears the cast includes 11 men and 12 women, and while it’s possible I am bad at counting, it’s also possible that there’ll be some room for some same-sex matchups!

Some Netflix shows on my gaydar although I couldn’t confirm one way or the other if they’re gonna have queers relevant to our interest are: the new Elite-inspired Indian teen melodrama Class, Season Four of You, and Tig Notaro in We Have a Ghost.

Prime Video’s LGBTQ+ Stuff For February 2023

Harlem: Season 2 – February 3

This series about four stylish & ambitious best girlfriends in Harlem has a lesbian lead, Tye, played by lesbian actress Jerrie Johnson! She’ll be “considering her future” in Season Two while her friends go on their own journeys of self-discovery as they level up to the next phase of their careers, relationships and big city dreams.

Carnival Row: Season 2 – February 17

In Season Two of this fantasy-noir series, inspector Philo is investigating a series of gruesome murders that have stoked social tension while pansexual character Vignette Stonemoss (Cara Delevingne) and the Black Raven are plotting payback against The Burgue’s human leaders. Bisexual character Tourmaline will be inheriting supernatural powers that threaten her fate and the future of The Row. I have no idea what any of this means but it feels true that “with humans and fae folk divided and freedom on the line, each hero will face impossible dilemmas and soul-defining tests in the epic conclusion of Carnival Row.”

Queer HBO Max Shows Streaming February 2023

Harley Quinn: A Very Problematic Valentine’s Day Special – February 9

This special event follows Harley as she pursues her goal of having the best first Valentine’s Day ever with Ivy with obsessive zeal. Meanwhile, Bane’s efforts to impress an unexpected date go off-kilter and Clayface “engages in some self-love.”

Hulu’s February 2023 Shows for Girls, Gays and Theys

The Watchful Eye: Season One Premiere (Freeform) – January 31

A late add from the tail end of January is this thriller following a young woman with a complicated past who secures a nanny job with an affluent Manhattan family, where her own intent to be a con woman is compromised by the building’s deadly secrets and its inhabitants’ ulterior motives. She also makes nanny friends and of those nanny friends, Ginny (Aliyah Royale) and Kim (Clare Filipow) are queer and Alex (Baraka Rahmani) uses they/them pronouns.

Kissing Jessica Stein (2022) – February 1

This classic was frustrating in its time but is delightful to experience in the present day — following Jessica, who’s yet to find her soulmate and thus goes for it when the personal ad she feels drawn to turns out to be written by a woman — a downtown hipster named Helen, with whom she strikes up a relationship despite not being sure if she’s actually into women. Also Tovah Feldshuh is her Mom!

A Million Little Things: Season Five Premiere (ABC) – February 9

A Million Little Things will kick off its fifth and final season with a funeral and a new haircut for the love of my life, Grace Park, who plays a character named Katherine who is currently dating Greta, played by Cameron Esposito.

Three Ways (2023) – February 10

From Black-led media platform Andscape, “Three Ways” is a sex comedy following Stacey, a sexually awkward woman who decides to take control of her life, get over her ex and conquer her fears by having a threesome with her new suitor and a mysterious woman she’s yet to meet.

Planet Sex with Cara Delevingne: Limited Series – February 14

In this docuseries, queer model Cara Delevingne will “put her mind and body on the line in search of answers regarding human sexuality, its joys, mysteries and constantly changing nature. In every episode, she shares her own personal experiences. Uniquely unfiltered and authentic, there’s no limit on how far Cara’s willing to go to explore what makes us all human.”

Love Trip: Paris: Two-Episode Season Premiere (Freeform) – February 15

Premiering on Freeform on February 14th and debuting the next day on Hulu, this reality program is dropping four American girls who are allegedly “unlucky in love in their own country” into a French penthouse in the middle of Pairs, beneath a floor of French suitors ready to date them. Caroline is a personal trainer and a lesbian looking for her dream girl, Lacy is a France-obsessed mental health influencer who identifies as sexually fluid, and Josielyn is a Mexican transgender L.A.-based model who’s also open to dating people of all genders!

Grey’s Anatomy: S19 Winter Premiere (ABC) – February 24

Station 19: S6 Winter Premiere (ABC) – February 24

Spin Me Round (2022) – February 24

Shelli reported that the gay vibes in this comedy-thriller starring Aubrey Plaza and Alison Brie “are there but it’s not some major part of the film,” so your milage may vary! Aubrey Plaza plays the manager of a chain restaurant who gets to attend a special training program in Italy but her dreams of European glamour and romance turn out to not be what she’d hoped for because also there is DANGER!

Peacock’s Lesbians and Bisexuals of February 2023

Bel-Air: Season Two Premiere – February 23

Fresh Prince alum Tatayana Ali is joining the cast in a recurring guest star capacity for Season Two of this dramatic adaptation of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. She’ll be playing Mrs. Hughes, an English teacher who takes Ashley Banks (aka Ali’s role in the original sitcom) under her wing. Ashley came out as queer in the first season and we can’t wait to see what happens in the second!

Disney+

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022) – February 1

In the wake of King T’Challa’s death, Queen Ramonda, Shuri, M’Baku, Okoye and the Dora Milaje must fight to protect their nation from intervening world powers and work to embrace the best new path forward for the kingdom of Wakanda. Aneka and Ayo, both Dora Milaje who have a relationship in the comics, are girlfriends on the periphery of Wakanda Forever.

The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder: Season 2 Premiere – February 1

Nic reported that this reboot of The Proud Family (2005-2010) is “louder, prouder and gayer” — and it includes the genderfluid character Michael (voiced by EJ Johnson). The second season promises to “highlight culturally specific experiences of the Black community.” Billy Porter voices Randall, one of two gay Dads in the series. (The other is played by Zachary Quinto.)

Apple TV+

Pincecone & Pony: Season 2 Premiere – February 1

Queer story editor Taneka Stotts and non-binary writers Pilot Viruet and Gigi D.G. are behind this show that features a queer/nonbinary storyline between Rachel House’s Gladys and her partner Ser Anzoategui‘s Wren. This animated series is about a plucky heroine going on magical adventures as she faces down dragons, giants, trolls, and all the hard parts of growing up.

Paramount+

Star Trek: Picard: Season Three Premiere – February 16

The final season of this spin-off which officially made Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan) canonically bisexual and in a romance with Raffi Musiker (Michelle Hurd) promises a “proper send-off” to the series. Also Levar Burton is coming back!

The Equalizer: S2 Winter Premiere  – February 19

Shudder

Attachment (2022) – February 9

In this horror romance, has-been Danish actress Maja falls for British Jewish academic Leah, who swiftly has a seizure and must return to London and Maja of course follows her. But then she meets Leah’s mother, Chana, who is very religious and hates Maja and is very mysterious!! When strange things begin happening in the building, Maja suspects Chana’s secrets are super dark. “The horror of Attachment is found in Jewish folklore,” wrote Drew in her review. “But it’s also found in the specific relationships Jewish children have with their mothers.”

The 40 Best LGBTQ+ TV Shows on HBO Max With Lesbian, Queer or Trans Characters

HBO was an early pioneer of LGBTQ content, and its streaming service HBO Max has a lot of television available for queer women with lesbian and bisexual characters. But, like many other networks in the years of our lord 2022 and 2023, HBO Max has dropped a lot of beloved queer shows from its roster. Let’s talk about the best of what’s left!

* indicates an HBO or Max original

Adventure Time (2010-2018)

Adventure Time is essential viewing for the queer all-ages animation aficionados, a bridge between the subtext of Legend of Korra and maintext of Steven Universe, a series long on-again off-again love story between Princess Bubblegum and Marceline the Vampire Queen. But it’s also just really delightful, really weird storytelling for nerds of all stripes. If you’ve joined the great Dungeons and Dragons Renaissance of the past several years, Adventure Time will speak to your geekery in very specific ways. Follow Jake the Dog and Finn the Human across the post-apocalyptic Land of Ooo as they challenge Death, make friends with psychedelic teddy bears, grow up, fall in love with princesses and unicorns, and confront the hardest thing of all: their own trauma and insecurities. If you stick around long enough, you’ll even meet Fionna and Cake, the gender-flipped protagonists! Stream Adventure Time on Max.

And Just Like That* (2021-)

When we begged the goddesses for a Sex and the City reboot with a bit more queer representation and they promised us Sara Ramirez as the charming non-binary comic/podcaster Che Diaz, we thought we’d really scored big. Unfortunately, Che turned out to be truly unbearable and Miranda’s big queer awakening has inspired a lot of lesbians to mostly just feel really bad for Steve. But it’s still kinda remarkable that it’s happening at all, and our myriad complaints have not stopped us from tuning in each week to see the outfits, the jumbled attempts at intergenerational dialogue and interesting takes on aging. Stream And Just Like That… on Max.

The Baby (2022)

This British horror limited series finds a middle-aged woman unexpectedly landed with a baby, thus forced to give up her life of impulsivity and adventure. But it’s not just any baby — this one is stinky, controlling, manipulative and in possession of violent powers. Her younger sister, Bobbi, is a lesbian who desperately wants a baby of her own. Mrs. Eaves/Nour is another queer character, a 72-year-ld “Enigma” who’s lived in her car for 50 years and once had a passionate affair with Helen, a married pregnant woman who tried to escape her marriage with Nour. Stream The Baby on Max.

Batwoman (2019-2022)

Batwoman is the most famous lesbian superhero in comic book history, and her first season pulled heavily from her most celebrated and GLAAD-Award winning “Elegy” arc with Ruby Rose playing the brooding, traumatized, Shane-esque Kate Kane with just the right amount of swagger and aloofness. There were almost too many queer women to count that first season, a gay bar and perpetual ex drama. Black bisexual actress Javica Leslie donned the cape and cowl starting in Season Two and the show has never been better, wowing us every week with what’s easily one of our favorite superhero shows of all time. (-Heather) Stream Batwoman on Max.

Betty* (2020-2022)

With naturalistic performances and dreamy cinematography, HBO’s Betty captures the NYC skater girl subculture in all its appeal and personality, Betty brims with life and centers gender non-conformity and queer characters including Kirt, a charmingly oblivious tomboy and Honeybear, a Black videographer from a conservative family who skates with abandon and dates with reservation. Stream Betty on Max.

Betty (HBO)

A Black Lady Sketch Show* (2019-)

Carmen put it absolutely best in her review: “I’d put any part of A Black Lady Sketch Show against critics’ darlings like Donald Glover’s ATL or Julia Louis-Dreyfus on Veep, the best of SNL or anything from Mad TV and I wouldn’t break a sweat worrying about losing my lunch money. ABLSS is smart. It’s observational and absurdist. It’s the exact opposite of mindless humor; it requires the audience’s full attention…. I realize at this point it sounds like I’m basically saying “everything and the kitchen sink!” and it sort of becomes meaningless, but my point is the exact opposite: A Black Lady Sketch Show never chooses to limit itself; it sets a new bar and then rises to that challenge every single time.” Stream a Black Lady Sketch Show on Max.

The Deuce* (2016-2019)

Set during the 1970s and 1980s, The Deuce traces the Golden Age of the porn industry (and its adjacent economies) n New York City, centering on Eileen “Candy” Merrell (Maggie Gyllenhall), a street sex worker who eventually breaks into the filmmaking side of porn. A story that involves not one but TWO James Francos might not be at the top of your watch list, but Roberta Colindrez shows up in Season Two as Irene, a (gay) manager of the Show Land Sex Emporium. In Season Three, college student Abby, manager of the Hi-Hat bar, starts a relationship with a woman, and there’s also a sparingly represented lesbian couple of sex workers in the first Season. Stream The Deuce on Max.

Doctor Who (2005- )

Doctor Who has a complicated queer history. Its sister series, Torchwood, is probably the most egregious Bury Your Gays offender in sci-fi history, and Doctor Who itself is not without its missteps. The Doctor’s first and only lesbian companion, Bill Potts, ended the show as a sentient oil being! Lots of queer side characters have gotten murered over the years! But there’s still lots to love about the series. Madame Vastra and Jenny — the self-described lizard woman from the dawn of time, and her wife — are fan favorites and have made notable appearances in many of the show’s most pivotal episodes. Suranne “Gentleman Jack” Jones plays The TARDIS. And, of course, there’s bisexual heartthrob and Time Lord-y River Song, who is The Doctor’s loooooongtime love, an especially thrilling turn of events when Thirteen regenerated as a woman. (-Heather) Stream Doctor Who on Max.

Euphoria* (2019-)

Screwed-up, gorgeous, privileged, disillusioned, sarcastic teenagers on drugs: we know this song by heart. But Euphoria‘s heavily stylized trip into the trope feels somehow immediately fresh. Rue (Zendaya), fresh out of rehab at the ripe age of 16, returns home with no intentions to stay sober and quickly falls for Jules, the manic pixie dream trans girl (™ Drew Gregory), played by an actual trans actress, who she craves like the other habits she’s been encouraged to kick. Although Sam Levinson’s interpretation of sexual orientation and gender identity is blatantly incorrect at best and Season Two makes a brand new series of really bizarre choices, but we can’t tear ourselves away. Stream Euphoria on Max.

Gentleman Jack* (2019-2022)

The groundbreaking historical drama that Heather called “your sex-filled soft butch Historical Drama Dream Come True” follows legendary seductress Anne Lister, whose diaries from the early 19th century detail lesbian romantic consequences executed with remarkable boldness and fearlessness for the time period. This adaptation sees Surriane Jones display “a seductive, sensual, capable, robust soft butch energy that makes Shane McCutcheon look like a clumsy little baby goat.” Stream Gentleman Jack on Max.

Gentleman Jack (HBO)

Gossip Girl (2021-2022)

This hotly anticipated HBO Max reboot promised a much more diverse group of elite students but forgot to update the most inane elements of the original’s plot. Mean girl Monet de Haan is a lesbian, and trans model/actor Zion Moreno plays Luna La. While the first season didn’t use Monet de Haan to her full potential, that all changed in Season Two. “Rewriting Blair Waldorf as a Black lesbian who knows what it means to be sidelined, and who refuses to go back into the shadow?” wrote Carmen in her review. “It’s gold.” Stream Gossip Girl on Max.

Hacks* (2021-)

Ava, a bisexual comic who recently found herself cancelled and out of work gets hired to write jokes for an older, wildly wealthy, once-pioneering iconic comedienne now best known to millennials as a QVC salesperson. Ava moves to Las Vegas to work with Deborah Vance and self-discovery ensues! Season Two of this highly award-winning comedy was even better than the first, if you can believe it, and its lesbian cruise episode won an Autostraddle TV Award! Stream Hacks on Max.

Harley Quinn (2019-)

Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy have been fan favorites and queer icons from almost they bumped into each other during a heist in 1993 in Batman: The Animated Series. TWENTY YEARS LATER they kissed in Bombshells in 2015 and in the main universe in Harley Quinn #25 in 2017 — but it wasn’t until season two of the DC Universe animated series that they finally got the on-screen romance they deserve. In fact, the full second season is a slow-burn of Harley realizing she’s in love with Ivy, Ivy reciprocating Harley’s feelings, and a near-disastrous wedding finale that ends with explosions, para-demons, laser guns, flashing lights, blood and guts and chaos, and a confession of queer feelings that is animated as a throwback to Harley and Ivy’s original meeting in the early ’90s. It is honestly a perfect season of queer TV. And you don’t even have to know anything about Batman or comic books or Harley or Ivy to jump right in and enjoy it. Stream Harley Quinn on Max.

High Maintenance* (2016-)

Katja Blichfeld came out as a lesbian after producing the first season of this show with her then-husband Ben Sinclair, who also stars in the very New York series as friendly neighborhood pot dealer “The Guy.” “When High Maintenance is at its best there’s nothing better on television,” Drew wrote of the series. “When it’s at its worst it’s still really funny and weird and intriguing.” Smashing 2-3 brand new stories into every episode, the show above all truly loves people and queer folks have been baked (get it!?!?!) into its DNA from the jump. Stories have included a rare two-episode arc loosely based on Katja’s divorce and subsequent lesbian relationship, Margaret Cho and Hye Yun Park as queer kinksters experimenting with some risky new sexual paths, a neurotic lesbian couple afraid to kill a mouse, a non-binary person on a surprise date doing ketamine at a bowling alley, a group of neurotic feminist activists confront a pet snake gone wild. Stream High Maintenance on Max.

I Hate Suzie* (2020-2022)

Billie Piper stars as Suzie Pickles, an actress whose life is turned upside down when her phone is hacked and compromising photos are leaked, torching her relationship and her career. Leila Farzad is hilarious and simply delightful as Naomi, Suzie’s bisexual manager and best friend trying to support Suzie while also sorting through her own cadre of personal problems. Vogue writes, “In a show filled with great performances, Farzad’s is an especially compelling one, at once funny, smart, and rich with pathos.” Stream I Hate Suzie on Max.

“I Hate Suzie”

In Treatment (2023)

In Treatment debuted in 2008, starring Gabriel Byrne, and was rebooted in 2023, this time starring the always-incredible Uzo Aduba. The series follows several client stories through psychotherapy sessions from both sides — therapists and patients — and amongst those patients is Laila, a queer teen played by queer actor Quintessa Swindell.

Irma Vep* (2022)

To be honest, despite its near-universal critical acclaim, most of us here at Autostraddle did not enjoy Irma Vep, but it feels like a show we need to include on this list or else prepare ourselves for questions about why Irma Vep isn’t on this list. Mira, an American movie star who’s just had a breakup with her female assistant, goes to France to star as Irma Vep in a remake of the French silent film classic “Les Vampires.” She’s got a new assistant who’s also queer, and there’s a lesbian costume designer, but, as Drew wrote in her review, “there is nothing recognizably queer in these characters other than their obsession with chaos and heartbreak.” Stream Irma Vep on Max.

The Last of Us* (2023-)

Ellie is 14, queer and possibly the only human on earth immune to a brutal global pandemic that wiped out most of civilization, leaving survivors in a hellscape of a country ruled by a fascist government and groups of vigilantes. Based on a wildly popular video game, The Last Of Us follows Joel, a hardened and deeply traumatized smuggler tasked with escorting Ellie across a post-apocalyptic America to find the researchers who hope Ellie holds the key to creating a vaccine. What follows is a story of unspeakable cruelty and brutality and the patches of human connection and chosen-familial love that gathers in the absence of traditional structures of support. Stream The Last of Us on Max.

“The Last of Us”

Mare of Easttown* (2021)

This limited series stars Kate Winslet as a sad detective in rural Pennsylvania trying to solve some murders and some disappearances that threaten to wear away the fibers of her community. She does so with a lot of flannel shirts, a Delco accent and a strong assist from Evan Peters. Her college-aged daughter, Siobhan, is a lesbian with an undercut who’s gotta be the steadying influence in an unraveling drama. Stream Mare of Easttown on Max.

Nancy Drew (2020-)

I know we always joke about The CW making “gritty remakes” of anything and everything for better or worse, but they really hit this nail right on the head. A modern take on a classic book series that is, in my opinion, the perfect balance of nods to the original canon and brand new elements. For example, queer gals! Including but not limited to a character from the books, Bess Marvin. Plus, of course, plenty of mystery, stellar performances from newcomer Kennedy McMann, and that quintessential teen drama you’d expect from a CW original. (-Valerie) Stream Nancy Drew on Max.

The O.C. (2003-2006)

Many elder millennials considered oft-postmodern teen soap The OC to be appointment television in the early aughts. It brought Christmukkah, Mischa Barton, Imogen Heap and Seth Cohen into our lives via a fish-out-of-water tale of roughian Ryan Atwood, adopted into a wealthy charismatic Orange County family and consequently their high-drama social lives. It also brought us one of the most memorable Sweeps Week Lesbian Storylines ever when lanky it-girl Marissa Cooper (Mischa Barton) fell for edgy alterna-teen Alex (Olivia Wilde) and in doing so, became one of the first bisexual lead teen characters on network television. Stream The O.C. on Max.

Our Flag Means Death* (2022 – 2023)

“Packed with brilliant leads and an incredible ensemble of sensitive men, strong women, and badass non-binary folks, the show is an absolute delight, dancing between serious and silly in equal measure,” writes Meg of this show about a charming naive guy who upends his life to run away and become a Gentleman Pirate, despite a total lack of experience in the matter. “There are so many queer relationships, so many exes and love triangles, so many beautiful stories playing out and interweaving in ways that feel familiar and fresh all at once.” Non-binary Latiné actor Vico Ortiz plays Jim, a beloved non-binary character. Stream Our Flag Means Death on Max.

Perry Mason* (2020-2023)

The legendary fictional criminal defense lawyer gets his third television show with this dark period drama set in the 1930s and focused on his origin story. Second billing after star Matthew Rhys (The Americans) is Juliet Rylance as Della Street, the loyal and driven (and homosexual) legal secretary of Mason’s frequent client, E.B. Jonathan (John Lithgow), who eventually starts working for Mason himself. She has a girlfriend and in Season Two, her love life gets even more complicated — and intriguing. Stream Perry Mason on Max.

Pretty Little Liars (2009-2017)

In Rosewood, Pennsylvania, a town filled with barnes and graveyards, there exists a state of adrenalized hyperreality that is accessible to the town’s most exceptional teen girls. Imbued with its power, they can fly airplanes, survive being buried alive, perform black ops level surveillance and black belt level ninja moves, and bend time and space and the affection of burgeoning lesbians to their will. Pretty Little Liars follows the hijinks of these agents of chaos, and the friend groups they leave behind when they fake their own deaths and plant a series of increasingly insane clues, in the form of dolls and masks and human teeth, to help their friends solve the mystery of their disappearance. Emily Fields is one of these left behind friends, and while her heart belongs to the one who accused her of liking Beyonce a little too much, she entertains a string of other lovers, from free spirit Maya to catastrophically intense Paige to dead girlfriend lookalike Samara to coffee shop homosexual Talia. The later seasons make some egregious missteps with a trans woman character, the show perpetually kills off its queer women of color, and there’s a predator who is celebrated as a hero throughout. There are also a few seasons of absolute bananapants delight. Act Normal, Bitch! Stream Pretty Little Liars on Max.

Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin (2022-)

This spinoff takes us to Milwood and into a new group of girls being terrorized by a murderer and suggestive text messages, including queer computer nerd Mouse, who has lesbian Moms and stars dating a trans guy mid-season. This time, the girls are doing penance for something their mothers did 20 years earlier. While the first season came to a disappointing conclusion, there were plenty of thrills and chills and slasher mystery in the meantime. Stream Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin on Max.

Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin

Peacemaker* (2022 – )

Danielle Brooks’ character, Leota Adebayo, inThe Suicide Squad spin-off Peacemaker is a lesbian with her partner Keeya played by queer actor Elizabeth Faith Ludlow. “While Peacemaker may not be breaking any new molds,” writes Carmen of the series, “it thrives at playing to Gunn’s strengths, now taken to the small screen. Peacemaker has a striking pummeled beating heart — with interrogations of loyalty, duty, and loneliness — underneath its dick jokes.” Stream Peacemaker on Max.

Rap Sh!t (2022-2023)

Issa Rae’s Rap Sh!t about two high school friends in Miami who reconnect in their twenties and aim for fame together stars queer actor Jonica Booth as Chastity, and her storyline is “absolutely the best thing about Rap Sh!t‘s sophomore effort,” writes Nic. “Chastity still delivers that swagger and she is nothing if not a hustler but this season also gives her the opportunity to be scared and vulnerable. That rounding of the character, plus the fact that Francois is an absolute jerk, makes it impossible to not cheer for her.” Stream Rap Shit on Max.

Search Party* (2016 – 2022)

Despite there being no actual lesbian activity for the first four seasons of Search Party, it’s undeniably queer — gay men are everywhere, of course, but this weird crime comedy starring queer actress Alia Shawkat as an aimless millennial whose attempt to track down a college acquaintance who’s gone missing sends her on a life path of murder, mayhem and possible sociopathy feels like it was produced by a gay hipster hivemind. Cole Escola shows up as a psychotic trans superfan starting in Season Three. In Season Five, girls start kissing girls and niche queer faves like Grace Kuhlenschmidt and Michelle Badillo join the cast. Stream Search Party on Max.

The Sex Lives of College Girls* (2021-)

Leighton, a legacy from the Upper East Side in Maje tweed and Gucci ankle boots, is the lesbian member of the four-girl set of roommates at the center of this comedy. Queer inclusion is effortlessly everywhere in The Sex Lives of College Girls — with every queer character played by a queer actor — from Whitney’s lesbian teammate on the Essex Soccer squad to her coach to appearances by our very own Vico Ortiz as Tova, a non-binary student Leighton meets at the Women’s Center where she’s forced to volunteer. But I was honestly just as much (if not moreso) invested in the stories of her roommates: horny aspiring comedy writer Bela (Amit Kaur), naive scholarship kid Kimberly (Pauline Chalamet) and star soccer player and Senator’s daughter Whitney (Alyah Chanelle Scott). All grapple with so much their first semester at school — sex, sure, but also sexism, class, and their sense of self in this shifting world. But most of all this show is fucking funny, consistently fresh, sharp in all the right places and a true joy to watch. Stream The Sex Lives of College Girls on Max.

The Staircase* (2022)

If you’ve not gotten enough of this story from the groundbreaking documentary by the same name, boy are you in luck! It stars Colin Firth as Michael Peterson, a (bisexual) writer convicted of murdering his wife, Kathleen Peterson (Toni Collette), who’s found dead at the bottom of a staircase in their gigantic house, and enlists a huge legal team and a camera crew to clear him of wrongdoing. One of his daughters, Martha Ratliff (Odessa Young), is a lesbian. Stream The Staircase on Max.

Sort Of* (2021-2023)

This big-hearted series follows fluid, sardonic and slightly codependent millennial Sabi Mehboob, the youngest child in a large Pakistani family. They work as a bartender at an LGBTQ bookstore/bar and as a nanny for a downtown hipster family and are trying to find themselves amid demands from all sides to be everything to everyone else. Ultimately the show reveals that, according to Himani’s review, “sometimes, our greatest journey, the one where we really find ourselves, is the journey we take when we stay and face the cracks in our relationships to uncover the self-truths we’ve been running away from the whole time.” Stream Sort Of on Max.

“Sort Of”

Station Eleven* (2021-22)

Although the ostensive protagonist of this show is queer, there’s no “queer female content” per se, nothing that would qualify it for inclusion on this list. But this show is simply so incredible that we will use any excuse in the book to tell you to watch it. Based on a 2014 novel, Station Eleven grapples with the aftermath of a flu that wipes out civilization entirely in 48 swift hours, weaving together stories of interconnected characters across time, flashing between the day the pandemic hit hardest and the ensuing few years and what remains 20 years later. It’s a sweeping feat of world-(re?)-building and careful character study, and what could be simply triggering instead becomes a type of catharsis. It is about the importance of fiction — of story, of art — in materially barren times, how we’re shaped by personal reactions to shared trauma, the nature of chosen family and so much more. Stream Station Eleven on Max.

Steven Universe (2013 – 2019) and Steven Universe Future (2019)

Steven Universe and its epilogue series, Steven Universe Future is probably the most beloved queer animated series of all time. Created and showrun by non-binary queer writer/artist/musician Rebecca Sugar, the show follow Steven and his family of Crystal Gems as they seek to save the planet and keep Steven safe as he grows up and learns what it means that he is the vessel for his mom’s gem. One of his Gem parents, Garnet, is actually a married lesbian fusion between Ruby and Sapphire! They even get married near the end of the series, becoming the first children’s series to ever feature a gay wedding! The show itself is also full of queer sensibility. It’s an anti-capitalist, anti-patriarchal, anti-colonization that centers and celebrates found family, refuses to shy away from the exploration of both trauma and mental illness just because it’s a “kids” show, and has as fluid a take on gender as any other series on TV, full stop. It’s sweet and silly and fun, and it’s also deep and nuanced and full of hope and healing. Stream Steven Universe & Steven Universe Future on Max.

True Blood* (2008-2014)

Allan Ball’s second dark, death-drenched ensemble drama for HBO (the first, Six Feet Under, is handily one of the best TV shows of all time), inspired by the Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries, finds a variety of pansexual vampires (and their friends) in New Orleans, at the dawn of the invention of synthetic blood that enables them to live without preying on humans. Parallels to queer community exist throughout, and seven regular and recurring female characters pursue same-sex endeavors of various degrees, including Evan Rachel Wood’s Sophie-Anne Leclerq, Rutina Wesley’s Tara Thornton and the legend Pam Swynford De Beuafort (Kristin Bauer van Straten). Stream True Blood on Max.

“True Blood”

Veep* (2012-2019)

Julia Louis-Dreyfuss’s Selena Meyers and her crack team of savants and fools netted seventeen Primetime Emmys over its seven-season run. We had to wait a few seasons for her daughter to come out (and start dating a security detail played by Clea Duvall), but that was really the icing atop this cynical, sharp, politically incorrect political comedy and its knockout class. Stream Veep on Max.

Veneno* (2020)

Drew described this HBO series, based on Valeria Vegas’ book about Spanish trans icon Cristina La Veneno, as “probably the best trans show I’ve ever been fortunate enough to watch…. a complex, layered show that finds opportunity and expansive imagination in its flurry of stories.” Following Valeria Vegas (Lola Rodriguez) through her own transition as she meets Christina and writes and releases the book, it is interspersed with flashbacks to illustrate Cristina’s complicated, and often tragic, life as a sex worker, singer and media personality who was one of the first trans women widely known in Spain. Stream Veneno on Max.

Warrior* (2019-)

This martial arts crime drama series, rich in historical details, is based on an original treatment by Bruce Lee and captures the Chinese immigrant experience during the Tong Wars in late 1870s San Francisco. It follows a martial arts prodigy who emigrates from China to find his sister, only to find himself sold to a powerful tong in Chinatown. Olivia Cheng is Ah Toy, a bisexual madam who runs a brothel in Chinatown, known for amassing unprecedented levels of wealth for a landed immigrant. She has a romantic relationship with a wealthy white widow who provides asylum to Chinese migrants in Season Two. Paste, naming Warrior “the best show you’re not watching,” described its “colorful, complicated ecosystem of hatchet men, cops, laborers, brothel owners, corrupt politicians and long-suffering wives.” Warrior‘s first two seasons aired on Cinemax, and HBO Max picked it up after Cinemax dropped out of the original content game and is producing a Season Three. Stream Warrior on Max.

We Are Who We Are* (2020)

Chloë Sevigny and Alice Braga star as the lesbian Moms of a misfit teen who’ve just moved onto an American military base in Italy, where Sevigny serves as the base commander. There, her son makes an extraordinary connection with another teen undergoing a gender journey of their own. “What We Are Who We Are does most gracefully is to dunk you into the intense connection and limitless freedom the young people in this show seek together,” writes Kamala in her review of the series. Stream We Are Who We Are on Max.

The Wire* (2002-2008)

The intricate, slow-burn, novelistic storytelling David Simon employs in this modern masterpiece was far more unusual for its time than it would be today. Each stark, searing season focused on a different city institution and its relationship to law enforcement and the underground economies of low-income neighborhoods — the print news media, the seaport system, the city government and bureaucracy and public education. The Wire was one of several HBO programs to see a surge in viewership during quarantine as viewers settled in for a long haul story that humanized and centered the Black and brown characters usually given the short shift. Sonja Sohn played one of the first-ever Black lesbians on television as Detective Kima Greggs. Stream The Wire on Max.

White Lotus (2021-)

We were watching White Lotus despite the fact that it was not interested in representing our people (although it certainly came close) because Mike White’s sumptuous and satirical resort-set whodunit was just so very good. But in Season Two, White Lotus‘s Italian resort manager, the alternately meddling and anxious Valentina, turned out to be an actual lesbian who eventually had actual lesbian sex. Once again, we were tuning in anyhow: for bisexual queen Aubrey Plaza as the skeptical and standoffish wife of a newly rich tech millionaire Harper (who did report having partaken in a threesome during her halcyon days) but also for a delicious mystery set amid a perpetually unsatisfied group of wealthy couples and families vacationing against a gorgeous Sicilian sky. Stream White Lotus on Max.

Years and Years* (2019)

Queer as Folk’s Russel T Davies co-produced this nihilistic BBC/HBO production that sees one Manchester family, the Lyons, converge on one crucial night in 2019 and evolve over the ensuing 15 years as Britain — and the world  — undergoes great political, economic and technological instability. Amid the current pandemic, this show is frankly terrifying because it all feels entirely possible right now! As members of the family grow and change — including Edith, one of four Lyons siblings, a political activist who eventually begins dating Fran, a storyteller and activist — a few public figures remain constant as well, including specifically Trump-esque political celebrity Vivienne Rook (Emma Thompson). Stream Years and Years on Max.

Other shows on HBO Max with queer women as recurring or regular characters: Deadwood, Full Circle, Westworld, Industry, In Treatment, Katy Keene, Sex and the City, Sally4Ever, Rome, Run, Game of Thrones, Friends, Torchwood, Santa Inc, Snowpiercer, The Flight Attendant, True Detective: Night Country, Velma, Flight Attendant

Looking for more lesbian TV shows you can stream right now? Here you go:

• • 2022-2023 LGBTQ Television Hub
  • 43 TV Shows with Lesbian and Bisexual Characters Streaming on Hulu
  • 41 Queer TV Shows with Lesbian and Bisexual Characters Streaming on Amazon Prime
  • 92 Queer TV Shows to Stream on Netflix

Could I Make These Iconic Mean Moms From TV Happy?

There is no television character that gives me greater joy than the mean mom. I could blame it on many things: mommy issues, the fact that I started watching CBS primetime dramas when I was like nine, general homosexual unwellness — the list goes on. Not only do I love these women, I am often convinced that I am the only person who could make them, if not happy, at least content. Certainly I would be a better wife than the TV dads they are often paired with, right?

And thus, this super scientific piece was born. A round up of ten TV mean moms I have imprinted on throughout my life, ranked from least happy marriage to most. This is science and scholarship, people!

Irina Derevko: Alias

“Never talk to me about your love for Sydney again.”

I was a latecomer to Alias, but I went in knowing the high points: wigs, Jennifer Garner running, cool tech, a young Bradley Cooper. Then they introduced Irina, aka Spy Mommy, and I was off to the damn races! I watched that woman shoot, tase and hit her daughter over the head with a hockey stick, and I swooned every single time. I mean, she did pushups in her CIA cell and threatened Ron Riftkin on a jet — I do not know a better woman!

Yet I must accept facts: I would be a terrible wife for her. I like intrigue as much as the next gal, but I have no combat skills of any kind, and there is no way I could diffuse a bomb. At best I would be a mark in some kind of loud Berlin nightclub. Sigh.

Marriage Rating: -14/10

Maya Lewis: Scandal 

“If I’m going to give you something, I need to get something in return.”

I don’t know why I thought that Oliva Pope would have at least one parent who was vaguely normal, but wow, was I wrong on that one. I didn’t think it was possible to top Papa Pope’s non-stop monologuing, (“You love that she is a door marked EXIT.”) but then Mama Pope CHEWED THROUGH HER OWN WRIST to get out of her super top secret prison, and the sound of that scene haunts me to this very day.

She would look at me once and I would be terribly aroused but also too scared to function. I do not have the willpower nor the mind for any of the plots she sets up — we would make a terrible couple! Maybe I’d hook her up with Irina?

Marriage Rating: -10/10

Bree Van de Kamp: Desperate Housewives

“Yes, well, I feel badly about that.”

Talk about 100% that bitch! Bree was everything to high school me: high strung, high maintenance, and absolutely bonkers. She accidentally slash kind of on purpose attempts to poison her husband in the pilot! And when he accuses her of trying to kill him, she says “Yes, well I feel badly about that.” !!! That is legendary behavior!

Unfortunately, she is also a lunatic conservative and she famously hated her gay son. In a perfect world, we’d be cordial but distant neighbors trading baking recipes, and sure there would be a little bit of tension, but nothing could ever really happen.

Marriage Rating: 0/10

Regina Mills/ The Evil Queen: Once Upon A Time 

“It’ll be as though you never existed.”

Confession: Over the course of my lifetime, I have watched maybe…two episodes of OUAT? Quite literally everything about this show was absolutely baffling to me: the plot, the characters, the continued presence of Ginnifer Goodwin. But it was 2011 and I was on Tumblr, so my dash was simply chockablock with gifsets of Regina/The Evil Queen. She was so powerfully hot and mean that I did consider watching the show in its entirety, but my long standing beef with Jennifer Morrison (the worst character on House) made that impossible.

It’s probably for the best! I’m sorry, but I cannot live in a storybook town with unclear timelines and that many Disney characters, I would simply lose my mind! Best wishes Regina, I am sorry I could not be the wife you deserve.

Marriage Rating: 2/10

Jordan Sullivan: Scrubs 

“Dark haired? Domineering? Doesn’t take any of your crap?”

In retrospect, watching Scrubs at the tender age of 11 was probably not great for my emotional development. Still, I sat down every week, watched Jordan and Dr. Cox insult one another, and thought “Yes, this is what an ideal relationship is.” Like many iconic mean TV mommies, Jordan is a lot kinder than she lets on, and she defends the people she’s chosen to let in. I mean, the episode where she talks to Carla about postpartum depression?? It’s so sweet!

Sadly, I could not make her as happy as Dr. Cox does. It took a lot of prayerful reflection to reach this space, but their relationship is one of two tops. I am…not that, and I would probably annoy her with all my baking. I would not give her the fight she wants, and I think part of growing up is knowing that about yourself.

Marriage Rating: 4/10

Mama Burke: Grey’s Anatomy 

“So which was it? Were you being inappropriate or were you being selfish?”

At first I was compelled to include the meanest mommy of Grey’s, the one and only Ellis Grey herself. Her speech about finding out Meredith is nothing but ordinary rings through my head once every few months, but there is something about Mama Burke I find irresistible. Technically, I think her most iconic moment is the removal of Cristina’s eyebrows. For me, it is after Burke has left, when she plants herself in the waiting room and drags the shit out of Meredith for breaking up with Derek while also telling everyone the wedding is off. “Were you being inappropriate or were you being selfish?” I mean!

We would do pretty well together, Mama Burke and I. She could run her restaurant while I took care of the home. The only possible complication is that I am…quite frequently inappropriate and selfish, and I think my fondness for bits would, uh, drive her up the wall? Alas.

Marriage Rating: 6/10

Victoria Grayson: Revenge 

“Do you remember a lovely young woman by the name of Emily Thorn? She paid obscenely for Davis cottage next door, and you know how I can be about that sort of thing.”

Not to be dramatic, but we really are not making TV like we used to! Revenge was the perfect mid-aughts soap, and I fell for Victoria Grayson faster than you can say “revengenda.” I seem to vaguely recall that she dies at the end? But let’s be serious, no one watched more than two seasons of this show, and it is primarily season one era Victoria that I would wed anyway.

As far as I recall, Victoria’s main interests were: glaring dramatically from that CGI balcony, her kids, and cheating on her husband. I care a great deal for the first and third items on that list, and her kids are old enough that they don’t require the full time attention of two adults. Plus I’d get to throw sick Hamptons parties? Really, the only thing that would exhaust me is the constant scheming, like babe, we gotta give it a rest sometimes!

Marriage Rating: 7/10

Emily Gilmore: Gilmore Girls 

“Lorelei.”

There are few things on earth that thrill me more than the perfectly transatlantic way Emily says her daughter’s name. And the way she infuses it with such meaning — from irritated and exhausted to pleased and smug, sometimes even surprised and touched. “Lorelai.” Emily is absolutely a passive aggressive nightmare, and yet, every time I rewatch Gilmore Girls I love her more? I mean, can you imagine having Lorelai, history’s greatest monster, for a daughter? Wouldn’t you also be exhausted?

While I don’t have a huge love for society teas or DAR meetings, I am good at charming elderly white women, and I hate disappointing people. I don’t consider the 2016 reboot canon, but it cannot be overstated how gay it is that Emily is a widow who lives in Nantucket and volunteers at a whaling museum. We would have a grand time together!

Marriage Rating: 8/10

Alex Levy: The Morning Show 

[sighs]

And honestly, I am not proud of the fact that I would be a perfect wife for Alex, but oh god I would be. I am so good at complimenting high strung self obsessed women! I would be pathologically incapable of making her feel like anything was ever her fault, and as long as I got to kick it in that sick penthouse, I’d be fine. Our only complication is the fact that we are both bottoms, and that’s barely a complication at all!

Marriage Rating: 9/10

Chrisjen Avasarala: The Expanse

“Get the fuck out.”

Chrisjen is introduced by seamlessly going from tickling her grandkid to torturing a man in some kind of space prison. I am sure the intent of this was to demonstrate that she is a cold hearted politician that pushes her humanity aside when it suits her, but the only thing it demonstrated to me was that she is wife material! She swears like a sailor and will do anything to stay in power, all while dressing in gorgeous saris and literally dripping with jewelry. And her voice?? I have simply never loved a woman more. And as far as mean moms go, she is like, too busy to deal with her daughter and still traumatized about the death of her son. Barely counts, tbh!

Aside from the fact that I am not like, dying to venture into space, Chrisjen and I would have the perfect marriage. She would be busy all the time, I would do my thing while she was working or whatever, and I would listen to her rant about whatever was pissing her off for hours. Happily, even! I’d be great at interplanetary functions, and I would lovingly chide her into taking care of herself, which she would hate and appreciate in equal measure. Perfect spacewives, forever.

Marriage Rating: 10/10

The 100 Best Lesbian, Bisexual and Queer Sci-Fi and Fantasy TV Shows of All Time

So much has changed since we first ranked all the Sci-Fi and Fantasy TV shows with lesbian/bisexual/queer and/or trans women and non-binary characters in them. The first time we ranked them, it was January 2020, back when “pandemic” was a word I only associated with these types of shows, back before the newest waves of TV cancellations… but it was also before Batwoman nearly tripled its queer characters, before shows like Haunting of Bly Manor and Willow were out yet, and before Riverdale entirely switched genres on us, thus qualifying it for consideration on this list. Almost 50 new shows qualified for the list, which means we had to make actual cuts! So, please know that this is not even close to a list of ALL sci-fi/fantasy shows, just our Top 100!

This new list had some unsurprising boots, like The Exorcist staying at the bottom of voting — like, fully 150 out of 150. Some that I was surprised didn’t make the cut (I personally would have put Jupiter’s Legacy in the top 100, but it ended up not making the list at all.) Even the Top 5 look different, because we have new contenders, as well as new members of the TV Team that switched up the order of things!

I left my original description below, because I over-explain my over-complicated point system, but I did want to reiterate two things:

+ Since this list is very unique to this website page, the TV Team’s vote heavily influenced the inclusions and rankings. So maybe there’s a gem that belongs on this list that just didn’t make the cut because no one on the TV Team has seen it yet. I encourage you to advocate for your faves (politely) in the comments!

+ This is just for fun, to celebrate our favorite queer shows, and have a list we can all use as a “To Watch” list when we’re out of queer sci-fi to watch. Please don’t fight with each other in the comments.

Also just an extra shout-out to Autostraddle TV Team members Nic, Natalie, and Shelli for helping me out with some of these blurbs this year!

Enjoy!

This post was originally written in 2020 and updated/republished in 2023

From Doctor Who and Star Trek to Buffy and Wynonna Earp, sci-fi has been one of the more consistent places we, as queer people, have been able to find ourselves on TV over the past few decades. I think the reason is a combination of people who write sci-fi and fantasy already connecting with the “outsider” themes and therefore inherently include more minority groups, we Autostraddle outsiders sometimes being the ones writing said stories, and because it’s likely a little easier to pitch “also there are lesbians” when you’ve already been approved for “a woman sees herself jump in front of a train and then realizes she’s a human clone.”

Sci-fi and fantasy have always been my favorite genres, ever since I was a wee child watching Ghostwriter or Power Rangers. I liked the escape and the magic and the limitless possibilities, and I still do. So honestly even though I think this took longer than writing my final paper for grad school, I had a lot of fun doing this research and seeing how far we’ve come (and how far we’ve yet to go) when it comes to representation.

I had an overly complicated ranking system, and a very intense, annotated spreadsheet that was maybe entirely unnecessary, but helped me be sure I was putting as many FACTS into this list as I was heart. So while I used my own judgment for tiebreakers, to get a general idea of order, I awarded points as follows:

Every show got 0-3 points based on the quantity of queer women characters. (0 = throwaway lines/my dad wouldn’t have registered it as queer, 3 = more than one main character or 3+ queer characters over the course of the series.)

Then they got judged on quality, also on a 0-3 scale. (0 = a nameless witness mentions her wife while giving her account to the police and is never seen again, 3 = high-quality storyline, rich character development, no buried gays.)

I awarded one point for each of the following achievements: the show had a character on Carmen and Natalie’s Top 100 Queer and Trans Women of Color Television Characters in TV History (an update this year is coming for that list, too)! I could find an out queer and/or trans actor or writer with a reasonable amount of research, the show being critically acclaimed by mainstream critics, and the show being critically acclaimed by queerstream critics.

And maybe this will be controversial, but despite the fact that sci-fi is the first type of show to claim “everyone dies” in equal amounts, I still removed one whole point for every single dead queer female or non-binary character. Because we’re not at a point yet where it doesn’t count. The only time a dead queer woman did not count against a show is if their death didn’t mean they were no longer on the show. Since it’s sci-fi/fantasy we’re talking about here, often a person would die but their ghost would hang around, or they’d die but be resurrected; that’s fine. As long as the character is still on the show, I didn’t take away a point.

And finally, I had our TV Team here at Autostraddle give their faves a rating of 1-5, with the ability to give out twelve 10s. Because it doesn’t matter how perfect a story is on paper if actual queer people didn’t like or connect to it.

And before you Ctrl + F for She-Ra or Carmilla: I didn’t include cartoons because I think they belong in their own special category, and I only included original series produced by streaming services (aka Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, DCU, YouTube Premium originals) but not webseries, because those also would need a list of their own. Also this isn’t an exhaustive list of all the sci-fi/fantasy shows of all time that have ever had so much as a queer character, it’s just the top 100.

I would like to thank Riese’s exhaustive TV database for giving me a foundation to start on, Carmen and Natalie for giving me an idea for point structure, and sites like LezWatchTV, LGBT Fans Deserve Better, and Wikipedia for being invaluable sources of information, plus any help/input from friends (and my dad) I got along the way. Also shout out to the folks who keep fan wikis up to date, you’re the real MVPs.

I think those are all the caveats.

Oh wait, one more thing: This is for fun! While based on a fuckton of reading and watching and learning, and a lifetime of experience consuming sci-fi, this is a rating system I made up! While I feel like my hours of research and toiling makes for a fairly accurate list of 100, when it comes down to it, the difference between the #15 show and the #10 show could have just been how many people on the TV Team saw it. This is mostly a space to discuss all 100 of these times we’ve been represented in the genre. I do HIGHLY encourage you to make your case for why your favorite show should be higher on the list in the comments; just remember that this doesn’t actually have any bearing on anything besides our hearts, so please be kind to each other about it, okay? Sara Lance doesn’t keep coming back to life just so you can set each other on fire.

Okay, without further ado… the top 100 Sci-Fi/Fantasy TV Shows featuring lesbian, bisexual, queer and/or trans characters OF ALL TIME!

100. Shadow and Bone (2021 to Present)

Watch on Netflix

The cold shoulder look is so fetch.

Based on Leigh Bardugo’s Shadow and Bone trilogy and Six of Crows duology, Shadow and Bone tells the story of Alina Starkhov, a cartographer in a war-torn world who discovers she has powers that have the potential to set her homeland free from darkness known as the fold. The show has been both praised and criticized for its diversity (yay!! BIPOC characters! Less yay…ignoring the book’s description of Jesper’s dark skin tone and Nina’s fatness in their casting choices), but there’s an implied and casual queerness to multiple characters that feels refreshing. Nina (a Squaller) mentions her attraction to Zoya in passing, Jesper’s sexual fluidity is merely a thing that exists, and while Alina’s season 1 love interest is a cis man, Jessie Mei Li (the out queer actress who plays her) doesn’t see why Alina wouldn’t be bisexual; and in fact, is with me in wanting Alina to explore her relationship with Genya! — Nic

99. Fantasy Island (2021 to Present)

Watch on Hulu

This is a literal fantasy of mine, to be honest.

As a reboot/sequel to a show my parents loved in the 70s and 80s, my expectations for this show were pretty low. But it blew them all out of the water. Not only does it have a Very Special Queer Episode that is better than most lesbian romance movies I’ve ever seen, one of the main characters is a woman who was married to a man who was her best friend but now that she got her fantasy of starting life over as a young woman, she is realizing she was hiding the truest part of herself; the part that loves women. So we get to see Rose explore this side of herself for the first time, and it truly is a magical thing to witness.

98. Archive 81 (2022)

Watch on Netflix

The queer content in this show was about as clear-cut as the camcorder video quality.

While significantly less queer than the source material, Archive 81 is a haunting story of a man named Dan who uncovers a mystery while restoring damaged videotapes. Time seems to fold in on itself as new videos and clues are unearthed, and along the way we meet Melody, her queer ex-roommate Anabelle, and an elegant woman, Cassandra, hiding an illicit affair with the woman she pretended was her sister so they could live together, unbothered.

97. Warrior Nun (2020-2022)

Watch on Netflix

Based on a graphic novel, this action-packed adventure about a secret faction of ass-kicking nuns, and the woman who finds herself their reluctant hero has a very passionate fanbase. Lesbian nun Beatrice falls in love with aforementioned hero, the bisexual Ava, and they embark on the slowest of slow burns while trying to save the world from an ancient evil. If you like angst and longing, this is the show for you.

96. Under the Dome (2013 – 2015)

Watch on Paramount Plus

Carolyn Hill and Alice Calvert. “Under the Dome? Is that the sequel to Below Her Mouth?”

Based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, this show explores the lives of people in a small town who find themselves trapped under a mysterious, invisible, inescapable dome. Amongst these people are wives Carolyn and Alice. Unfortunately neither of them make it out from under the dome alive, leaving their teen daughter Norrie a likely-very-traumatized orphan.

95. Limetown (2019 – Present)

Watch on Facebook

Lia Haddock and Ashley. Know what else could make a whole town disappear? Not vaccinating your children.

Based on the spooky narrative podcast of the same name, Limetown follows lesbian journalist Lia Haddock as she tries to solve the mystery of an entire town that disappeared, in one of those every-answer-begs-more-questions type of situation. Lia has a girlfriend, and she may or may not have slept with her boss, Gina, played by Sherri Saum. It’s a creepy, disturbing tale (and Jessica Biel is a bit creepy and disturbing herself) so it won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is undeniably gay gay gay.

94. Light as a Feather (2018 – 2019)

Watch on Hulu

Perry and Alex. Fort-building is the only safe sleepover game.

A cheesy horror series — think “I Know What You Did Last Summer” meets “Final Destination” but with a PLL-esque cast — Light as a Feather focuses on a girl who lost her twin sister, a mysterious stranger, and a deadly sleepover game. One of the main girl’s best friends is a lesbian named Alex (of course), who may or may not have harbored feelings for the dead twin, but definitely got a girlfriend named Penny in Season 2. Unfortunately, the girlfriend ended up being evil and psychotic and crushed possibly to death (but possibly not??) but you can’t win ’em all.

93. Legion (2017 – 2019)

Watch on Hulu

Lenny Busker. Would I watch a series of Lenny Lennying around? Yes. Would I watch Day in the Life of a Puddle if it had Aubrey Plaza? Also yes.

Legion took a character written for a man and cast Aubrey Plaza in it without changing a single thing, which gifted us with the magical chaos that is Lenny. Technically Lenny died a bunch of times but always came back in one way or another (not as a ghost though…this show is real weird, y’all) so who knows if she would have returned if the show continued on. She also had a relationship with a woman called Salmon, because, as I may have mentioned, this show is real weird. But Aubrey Plaza is truly a sight to behold and takes the weird to a whole new level in the most delicious ways.

92. Timeless (2016 – 2018)

Watch on Hulu

Michelle and Denise Christopher. “You’ll always be du jour, mon amour, you’re timeless to me.”

Remember how Wishbone tried to teach you facts about history but also there was an ADORABLE DOG so you were actually paying attention? That’s sort of how I feel about Timeless. I learned so much (Hedy Lamarr was a legend, Google it) because instead of boring lectures, Abigail Spencer was dressing in period garb and teaching me through ACTION. The boss of this time travel operation was Agent Denise Christopher, who casually revealed at one point she had a wife and kids, and then sometimes those wife and kids would be on screen, and there was never a to-do about it. Except that one time Lucy and Jiya pretended to be lesbians named Cagney and Lacey to try to encourage young Christopher to come out to her mom and not go through with her arranged marriage. That was a to-do and a delight.

91. Y: The Last Man (2021)

Watch on Hulu

“Weird how this world is mostly women and trans men now but somehow it’s still about the one cis man.”

While wading into transphobic territory on source material alone, Y: The Last Man does manage to have a few LGBTQ+ wins along the way. Included amongst its cast are lesbian and queer women like Allison Mann (Diana Bang), Beth DeVille (Juliana Canfield) and bi actor Olivia Thirlby as Hero Brown. Plus! The cast includes a few trans characters and actors, including but not limited to the wonderful Elliot Fletcher.

90. The Walking Dead (2010 – 2022)

Watch on Netflix

Alisha and Tara. Pro tip: Don’t name your queer characters Tara. It doesn’t end well for any of them.

This zombie apocalypse drama is a critical darling that is lower on our list than it would be a mainstream site’s because they have killed three of its five lesbians, including one named Tara, which frankly is just rude. Alisha and Denise also went the way of the Tara, and in the ninth season, the gang met up with girlfriends Magna and Yumiko, a leader and an archer respectively, who somehow managed to survive until the show’s eventual end.

89. The Boys (2019 – Present)

Watch on Prime Video

Queen Maeve (and Elena’s reflection.) She’s a real Diana Prince on the streets, Wonder Woman in the sheets kind of gal.

I like to describe this show as “what if superheroes were assholes.” It’s kind of The Magicians of the superhero world in that way; take a typically joyful and empowering genre and make it dark and twisty. The Boys imagines a world where the capitalism of Marvel Studios also involves the superpowered people themselves, and being a hero is a high-profile job, not an honor-bound duty. Queen Maeve is this show’s answer to Wonder Woman, casually stronger than all the boys but getting less respect. She’s jaded and broody and grumpy, and, much to my delight, gay. She has some issues with her on-again, off-again girlfriend though, and maybe a few more things to work out, but can she save her relationship and the world at the same time? :cue dramatic music:

88. Dracula (2013 – 2014)

Watch Dracula on Netflix

Lucy Westenra and Lady Jayne. Someone better FIX THIS and cast Katie McGrath as a lesbian vampire for me someday.

This is another way you know I am not just arbitrarily making this order up because Dracula would be MUCH higher if I were. Katie McGrath was the picture of perfection as Lucy Westenra, harboring a soul-crushing love for her best friend Mina, knowing her feelings would probably never be returned. She learned to identify these feelings by way of Lady Jayne, who showed her what kissing girls is like, Cruel-Intentions-style. Lady Jayne was mercy-killed at the end of the WAY-TOO-SHORT run, because she’d rather be dust than a vampire, and technically Dracula killed Lucy, but SHE was totally down to be a vampire, and I will never, ever, ever forgive the TV gods for denying me at least one season of Vengeful Lesbian Vampire K’tay McGrawww Lucy Westenra for as long as I live.

87. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (2022 – Present)

Watch on Paramount+

Gays! In! Space!

It looks like I might have to start lumping all the Star Treks together into one category like I had to do the American Horror Story franchise because though this is the first Star Trek installment on this list, it’s far from the last! Strange New Worlds is the newest addition to the long legacy of space adventures, though set in a time before some of the most famous adventures even began. The show features bisexual Nurse Chapel, non-binary Doctor Aspen, and also features IRL queer Broadway superstar Celia Rose Gooding, who uses they/she pronouns.

86. Manifest (2018 – Present)

Watch on Netflix

Bethany. “I don’t want to say this is Prince Charming’s FAULT, but all my flights went smoothly until he got on one.”

Imagine if, on Lost, instead of landing on a mysterious island with smoke monsters in polar bears, the people on the plane landed back in their real life, but five and half years after their plane took off, despite it feeling like one (1) plane ride. That’s Manifest. There are visions and mysteries and someone killing the passengers off and it’s all rather exciting. One of the flight attendants, Bethany, was illegally transporting her (male)cousin’s boyfriend from Jamaica, where it is illegal to be gay, and also just trying to get home to her wife. In Season 2, we learn that Saanvi is queer and dating a woman. A married woman, but frankly that’s the least of her problems.

85. Now Apocalypse (2019)

Watch on Starz

Severine Bordeaux and an unnamed lover. I’m not 100% sure this show wasn’t just a nightmare I had, tbh.

Not unlike Legion in its what-the-fuckery, Now Apocalypse is confusing, interesting, and sometimes upsetting. This is also another show that has an everyone-is-queer vibe, with one of the main girls, Carly, saying that their generation has a much less binary view on sexuality and assumes everyone’s at least a little bit gay. There is a somewhat eye-rolly lesbian teacher/predator situation, but also an interesting exploration into an attempt at polyamory. Overall this weird trip has a very can’t-look-away vibe to it that is hard to peg as good or bad. (Which just goes to show how far having main/many queer characters and not killing any of them will get you on a list like this.)

84. American Horror Stories (2021 – Present)

Watch on Hulu

I’ve never seen anything so romantic and disgusting all wrapped up into one episode.

Despite my best attempts to keep Ryan Murphy’s influence on this list down to one (1) entry, cutting off its head just caused a second one to grow. American Horror Stories, the AHS-themed anthology series, is hit or miss episode to episode, starting off with a bang in the form of a lesbian murderess and her ghost girlfriend. The second season features queer milkmaids in what stands out as one of the better episodes of the series.

83. Torchwood (2006 – 2011)

Watch on Prime Video

Mary and Toshiko. When you’re on a date and they say they’ve never seen Buffy.

Torchwood, a Doctor Who spinoff about Captain Jack Harkness, takes the “everyone is queer” vibe and put it in ink — creators of the show have confirmed that everyone of any gender on Team Torchwood is queer, and we see at least five women bring that to life on screen. And I know 2008-2011 doesn’t sound like that long ago, but in Queer TV years, it’s practically a lifetime, so this was truly a unique situation. Not all of the queer women survive, but whew did we enjoy the timey wimey, wibbly wobbly ride.

82. Witches of East End (2013 – 2014)

Watch on Hulu

Joanna Beauchamp and Alex. At this point it almost feels redundant to point out when witches are queer but it’s still fun to talk about anyway.

A tale about a family of witches cursed to live and die a thousand lives without remembering the last, this show starred Jenna Dewan and Riverdale’s Mädchen Amick and I’m afraid part of the reason it went highly under appreciated was that it was on Lifetime. The matriarch of this magical family, Joanna Beauchamp, is revealed to have been in a relationship with (yet another) Alex, played by the illustrious Michelle Hurd. We get a glimpse into the domesticated life in the past and one post-baddie goodbye kiss and it sure is magical. (Side note: Bianca Lawson is also on this show. I believe her character drew from Bianca’s real life when she revealed how she stays eternally young.)

81. Firefly (2002 – 2003)

Watch on Hulu

Inara. It’s interesting to me that they’ve rebooted everything under the gorram stars but never gave this a go.

A cult classic, this one-season Joss Whedon space cowboy show made waves long after it was over, leaving us to wonder if Inara, the spaceship’s resident sex worker and confidante, could have explored relationships with women further if the show had continued on. As it stands, she takes on female clients occasionally, seemingly by choice and not out of necessity. She also seems to have a bit of a history with Julie Cooper Nichol, but that might be me projecting.

80. Star Trek: Picard (2020 – Present)

Watch on Paramount+

Space mommis!

Oh hey look, another Star Trek! This entry into the franchise follows iconic character Jean-Luc Picard into retirement…and back out again. Picard has Jeri Ryan reprising her Voyager role, Seven of Nine, and introduces Raffi Musiker, played by Michelle Ryan. And in Season 2, the duo is a couple, albeit a bit of a rocky relationship sometimes, but complex and thoughtful overall. Gays in space, you love to see it.

79. Counterpart (2017 – 2019)

Watch on Prime Video

Baldwin and Clare. I wonder if my timeline counterpart is having better luck with dating than I am.

This timeline-hopping thriller follows Baldwin, a soft butch assassin, who is having a time of it; she feels her life is not her own, she watches her alternative timeline self die, she struggles to connect to the women she encounters, which makes sense because the risk of betrayal is always just around the corner in a world like hers. This show blurs the line of the Bury Your Gays trope, by killing of a queer character in one dimension but not the other, but overall it is unique representation that should not go uncelebrated.

78. The Librarians (2014 – 2018)

Watch on Hulu

Cassandra and Estrella. “Yes, it is hard to be queer and work with someone who looks like Rebecca Romijn every day, thanks for asking.”

This campy, ridiculous show is like the bookish cousin of Warehouse 13 and Legends of Tomorrow. A spinoff of the movies starring Noah Wiley, the show follows a bunch of “chosen” nerds with special skills who have to save and protect magical objects. One of said nerds is Cassandra, a sweet, bubbly woman with an amazing brain, who once had a fairytale prince spell put on her, and another time had a tempting encounter with a vampire. It’s cheesy and magical fun all around.

77. Roswell, New Mexico (2019 – 2022)

Watch on Netflix

I mean probably all aliens are queer right?

There was a long time where I couldn’t figure out what the heck was going on re: the queerness of this aliens-among-us reboot of the 90s show, but eventually they made it crystal clear that alien hottie Isobel is bisexual as heck, and the show proves that we don’t have to give some shows to the boys and some to the girls, but you can in fact have multiple main queer couples at the same time.

76. Defiance (2012 – 2015)

Watch on Prime Video

Kenya Rosewater and Stahma Tarr. Do you think Jaime Murray and Lucy Lawless are in a competition to see who can play queer the most?

Jaime Murray is another actress who shows up in multiple shows on this list, but this is only one of two where she plays canon queer. (Though let’s be honest, Jaime Murray has chemistry with practically everyone like some kind of Katie McGrath.) In Defiance, she plays a quiet, obedient alien wife who has her eyes opened up to the world beyond her husband and starts to rebel in her own ways. One of which is by sleeping with Jenny Schecter the madame at the local brothel, Kenya Rosewater. This show also boasts queer alien Doc Yewll, and while Kenya goes the way of Jenny in this show, overall it’s still a fun supernatural romp.

75. The Sandman (2022 – Present)

Watch on Netflix

Sorry, Beeboverse, this is the only Constantine that matters.

The Sandman lives up to its name, having a dream-like and nightmarish quality depending on the episode. With a combination of throughlines and vignettes, it follows the story of Morpheus, one of seven entities called the Endless. The Endless all seem to live outside humans’ limited concept of gender and sexuality, plus there is a healthy sprinkling of queer human characters throughout. Not all of them survive, but they’re all incredibly interesting, in my humble opinion.

74. Vagrant Queen (2020)

Watch on SyFy

This further proves my “all aliens are queer” theories.

This SYFY space adventure was short-lived but not lacking in queer content. The sweet and bubbly pansexual alien Amae was a foil for grumpy and serious bisexual Elida as they made their way through space with their unlikely group of friends, and luckily the slow burn paid off before the show got sucked into the black hole of cancellations.

73. The Imperfects (2022)

Watch on Netflix

An asexual with supernatural pheromones was such an interesting concept and I’m sad we won’t get to explore it further.

Speaking of the black hole of cancellations, I’ll be forever salty this show only got one season. It has everything I love in a sci-fi romp: people discovering their powers and testing their limits, found family feels, a reluctant adultier adult who pretends to be annoyed by the youths but ends up feeling connected to them anyway. Plus, it gave us two queer characters of color: Abbi, who is asexual, and Hannah, who is cool with it. It would have been cool to get an entire season with those two as a couple, but what we do get is delightful and feels fresh and new. The cast also included non-binary Australian Rhys Nicholson, and Rekha Sharma who I don’t think is gay herself but she has played gay before, as recently as Roswell, New Mexico.

72. Caprica (2009 – 2011)

Watch on Apple TV

Clarice Willow. That feeling when you have so many wives that introducing them sounds like you’re taking roll call.

This Battlestar Galactica prequel did not last very long, despite having Buffy alum Jane Espenson at the helm for the first few episodes. And yet, in its one short season, it tackles topics like technology, religion, loss, and more. Clarice Willow — who Heather Hogan once described as “a psychotic bisexual Mommi” — has many husbands and wives, but despite living in a polytheistic community, is secretly a monotheistic terrorist. She even murders one of her own wives on suspicions that proved unfounded. It’s…a lot. But! Those who loved the show LOVED it, and those who love the Battlestar Galactica franchise but didn’t love it still accept it as the weird cousin they don’t really talk about at Thanksgiving.

71. The Shannara Chronicles (2015 – 2017)

Watch on Prime Video

Lyria and Eretria. What universe do you think is weirder, a post-apocalyptic land with magic trees and elves, or Riverdale?

Shannara is a rare mix of post-apocalyptic and high fantasy, not too dissimilar from Into the Badlands in that regard, but with more elves and magic. The opening scene in this show features an elven girl named Amberle running a blindfolded race intended only for men and winning it, so I was in from the start. Then they added bisexual rover Eretria, and though they killed her ex-girlfriend, she ended the series with a literal princess (played by Toni Topaz herself, Vanessa Morgan) by her side.

70. The Midnight Club (2022)

Watch on Netflix

Mike Flanagan loves us, this I know, for his TV tells me so.

The Midnight Club is the first Mike Flanagan joint we’ll see on this list, but it sure won’t be the last. Maybe it’s because his wife is bisexual icon Kate Siegel and he just carries that bi wife energy into everything he makes, maybe he’s just a stand-up guy, but so far we have yet to go unrepresented in a show he’s produced with Netflix. The Midnight Club is an amalgamation and reimagination of some classic Christopher Pike tales, centering around a group of teenagers in a facility for end-of-life care, as they all have terminal illnesses. To entertain themselves, they have a club not unlike Are You Afraid of the Dark’s Midnight Society, where they take turns telling each other stories. Some of these stories have queer vibes, and one of the patients is the resident rich kid with a good heart that everyone suspects might be a pathological liar, Cheri, confides to the other gay resident, Spencer, that she’s gay, too, in a rare, earnest moment.

69. For All Mankind (2019 – Present)

Watch on Apple TV+

Ellen Waverly and Pam Horton. Oh, Princess! If Betty McRae could see you now!

This what-if imagining of a future where the space race was more diverse and neverending, this addition to the queer canon is one of the newest shows on the list. Set in the late 60s/early 70s, Ellen the astronaut (played by Jodi Balfour from Bomb Girls) can’t exactly reveal to NASA that she is a lesbian who used to date Pam the bartender. Instead she finds herself a beard (a gay man himself, because the best beards are mutual beards) and shoots for the stars.

68. American Horror Story (2011 – Present)

Watch on Netflix // Watch on Hulu

Winter Anderson. Ally and Ivy Mayfair Richards. “Help we signed our souls away in a contract with Ryan Murphy and we can’t get out!”

I know that technically each season of American Horror Story is kind of like its own show, but they’re always at least a little bit queer, and I didn’t want 1/10 of this entire list to be filled up by Ryan Murphy, so I smooshed them together. The shows range in quality, both on a large scale and on a queer scale, but every time Lana Winters survives another decade of chaos, a lesbian reporter angel gets her wings. Because despite having upwards of 25 LGBTQ+ characters to date, they also come in at the highest kill rate with a whopping 15 dead queers. And honestly I could have missed some, I just grew weary from counting. Everyone has their favorite season of AHS, but as far as queer people go, Murder House (a classic fave, the first), Hotel (hello, Gaga), and Coven (a Stevie Nicks music video, a lesbian witch’s fever dream, and a haunted walking tour had an orgy in New Orleans, what’s not to love?) tend to trend as favorites. Also a shout-out to Asylum, because even though it was far from kind to our gal Lana, she was the Final Girl in the end.

67. Heroes (2006 – 2010)

Watch on NBC

Claire and Gretchen. I mean who WASN’T in love with their indestructible cheerleader roommate, amiright?

Save the cheerleader. Save the world. Even if you never watched Heroes, you’ve probably heard this phrase, because this ominous tagline was so pervasive while this show about ordinary people with extraordinary abilities became popular. We find out in later seasons that the cheerleader in question, Claire, is bisexual, which we learn via a kiss from her roommate (during sweeps week, of course) and a hand-holding that implied things could have gone places if the show hadn’t ended.

66. Naomi (2022)

Watch on HBO Max

Who amongst us hasn’t danced with our unrequited crush.

Everything’s seemingly idyllic for Naomi McDuffie in Port Oswego until it isn’t. She’s got two loving and supportive, adoptive parents, a true “ride or die” best friend, and friends that are down for whatever. But then Superman appears and does battle with an enemy above the town square and it’s clear: everything Naomi thought she knew was in doubt. Naomi discovers that superheroes and aliens exist, beyond the pages of the comic books she covets, and — to her great dismay — she could be one of them.

An adaptation of the comic book series of the same name, Naomi is brought to the small screen by Ava DuVernay and Jill Blankenship. The adaptation expands Naomi’s world to include Lourdes, the queer owner of the local comic book shop, who wants to be more than just friends with Naomi. But even the show’s A-list creator and lush visuals couldn’t save Naomi from the CW’s Red Wedding and it was canceled after just one season. — Natalie

65. Utopia Falls (2020)

Watch on Hulu

Humberly González does the goddess’ work, with 4 canon queer characters and counting. (Two on this list!)

Utopia Falls is like if Hunger Games and High School Musical had a strange, futuristic baby. Set in a world where different sectors send teenagers to compete in a high-stakes talent show, the show also uncovers long-kept secrets, including but not limited to a bunker full of archives of long-forgotten music. Hilariously, the AI voice of this archive is Snoop Dogg. Two of the contestants are Brooklyn 2 and Sage 5, despite being each other’s competition, the two girls also start to develop feelings for each other. Which is how I imagine all real competition shows go.

64. Midnight Mass (2021)

Watch on Netflix

Maybe someday I’ll see Annabeth Gish and not think of Pretty Little Liars, but today is not that day.

Mike Flannagan is back! The time with his wife, bisexual actress Kate Siegel, as the leading lady, Erin. This dark and twisty tale is a stunning take-down of Christianity, and a thoughtful inspection of life and death, all with a supernatural twist. It could be equal parts triggering and cathartic for someone raised Catholic, and overall it’s a very compelling story. The canon queer in question here is Sarah Gunning, played by Annabeth Gish, who is the local doctor and Erin’s best friend.

63. Arrow (2012 – 2020)

Watch on Netflix

Nyssa al Ghul. “My name is Nyssa al Ghul, you killed my Sara, prepare to die.”

If we were judging shows only on their most recent seasons, Arrow would be much lower on this list, but we’re looking at the whole sum of these shows, and when it comes down to it, this DC-comics-based vigilante show gave us Sara Lance, so we are forever in its debt. Sara and her assassin girlfriend Nyssa al Ghul came to us by way of Arrow Season 2, and they were dark and tense and a bit star-crossed, and it was beautiful. Sara died a few times but it never stuck, and she ended up being so compelling she got her own spinoff, while Nyssa stayed back and hung out with Sara’s sister Laurel for a while, eventually training the future Green Arrow. (And, most importantly, staying alive.)

62. Lucifer (2015 – 2021)

Watch on Netflix

Eve and Maze. As someone who was raised Catholic, imagining how furious this show makes religious extremists brings me great joy.

For a show that could have very easily crossed the line from “a bisexual demon” to “demonizing bisexuality,” Lucifer earned its spot in the Top 100 by never treading those dangerous waters, and in fact compensating for any qualms about that by pairing up the demon Mazikeen (aka Maze) with Eve. Yes, THAT Eve. Their story was heartfelt and touching and not just a lusty corruption tale; there was real, deep love and a few tender moments that really sunk their cloven hooves into my heart.

61. Vampire Academy (2022 – Present)

Watch on Peacock

All vampires are queer, that I know for sure.

In the latest remake of the popular book series, Vampire Academy follows vampire royalty Lissa Dragomir and her bodyguard-in-training, best friend and (supposedly platonic) soulmate Rose. While, at first glance, it might seem like Lissa and Rose are in love, but it turns out while their is the main love story, they are strictly best friends. This television adaptation does give us some some queer vampires though, including Mia, who also has two vampire dads. Despite her desire for upward mobility in the social ranks, Mia ends up falling for a guard, Meredith, and learning illegal battle magic just to protect her.

60. Peacemaker (2022 – Present)

Watch on HBO Max

Danielle Brooks supremacy

On paper, Peacemaker is not the kind of show that one might expect would show up on this list. John Cena as a beefy, dim-witted man who loves to smash in every sense of the word. A Suicidie-Squad-themed show with no Harley Quinn in sight. But as it turns out, there’s a character in the main cast of this show that makes it extremely up our alley. Danielle Brooks’ character Leota Adebayo is a lesbian, and easily the best part of the show. Out of her element, and constantly either making hilarious missteps or saying out loud what the audience is thinking, she’s an amazing addition to this cast, and with important (spoilery) ties to the main plot. She has a wife, Keeya, played by Elizabeth Faith Ludlow and they are downright adorable.

59. Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1993 – 1999)

Watch on Paramount Plus

Lenara Kahn and Jadzia Dax. Pressing foreheads together has apparently been a gay lady thing for decades.

I don’t have to tell you about Star Trek. You know about Star Trek. But in case you didn’t know THIS about Star Trek, I will tell you that Jadzia Dax and Lenara Kahn have this heartbreaking, forbidden love type of story and really stunning Trill markings. Trills have this whole symbiont/host situation where it’s illegal to associate with their hosts past lovers, or their past hosts lovers, it’s a whole thing. What’s fun about this is that Trills change their bodies’ genders all the time, which maybe makes them all the genders? Or gender-fluid at the very least. It’s not explored all that explicitly as far as gender identity, but these two Trills find themselves drawn to each other despite it being against the law and despite them currently being in two female bodies and it being 1995.

58. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (2014 – 2020)

Watch on Disney+

Piper. “Where are Captain Marvel and Valkyrie when you need them?”

I’ll be perfectly honest with you, Agents of Shield had exactly one (1) point for being critically acclaimed, and the rest of its points that got it to the 60th position came from TV Team points. Because it’s a compelling, action-packed show, with some seasons better than others, but they don’t have much to report on re: queer women. Victoria Hand and Isabelle Hartley were queer in the comics, but that was never mentioned in the show, and even if you count them, they both died pretty quickly. And Sk’Daisy and Simmons should have kissed decades ago, it seems. Briana Venskus as Piper and Jolene Anderson’s Olga Pachinko seem to be the closest things we have to alive representation.

57. Legacies (2018 – 2022)

Watch on Netflix

Josie Saltzman and Penelope Park. “Come, let us lead the new generation of queers on TV to greatness.”

The Originals was a gayer spinoff of The Vampire Diaries, and Legacies is an even gayer spinoff of that spinoff. (It’s also, generally, lighter and funnier despite occasionally harking back to its emotional ancestors.) Set in a boarding school for supernatural teens, everyone is queer and nothingeverything hurts. Witches Josie and Penelope were the couple to watch out for in Season 1, then witch-werewolf-vampire tribrid Hope and Josie keep mentioning their past crushes on each other despite them both having current feelings for the same boy, and eventually Josie found a new wolf to

56. American Gods (2017 – 2021)

Watch on Starz

Bilquis. I feel like there’s a vagina dentata joke in here somewhere.

You know you want to watch a show where a goddess occasionally devours her lovers via her vagina, right? No? Well, that’s what this show has. Bilquis is a goddess who will seduce any gender she pleases to turn them into her worshipers, on this show where New Gods and Old Gods live in America to wreak their havoc (or the opposite of that.) This show also features a guest appearance by queer, Indigenous actress Devery Jacobs plays two-spirited, Indigenous Sam Black Crow.

55. Siren (2018 – 2020)

Watch on Hulu

Ryn and Maddie. When in doubt, throuple it out!

If you, like me, are horny for mermaids, or thirsty for poly triad representation, this is the show for you. In a world where a town’s mermaid folklore proves to be based in reality, and the mermaids in question tend to be murdery, Siren somehow balances a mythical mystery, a PSA on the dangers of overfishing, and an endearing throuple between a man, a woman, and a mermaid who is learning how to live on land.

54. Mr. Robot (2015 – 2019)

Watch on Prime Video

Dominique DiPierro and Darlene Alderson.Girls: Exist, Me and Dom: *forget how to person*

If you have a thing for quintessential disaster lesbians, this show is for you. Amidst the hacktivism and corruption and conspiracies of the show at large, there is an FBI Agent named Dominique DiPierro who seems so smooth when she’s on the job but is immediately disarmed by Darlene when she asks her what her type is, and later, when she’s in her apartment and starting to make moves. It’s all very relatable. The show is dark and gritty and there is deception and trust issues but maybe these two crazy kids could make it work. Side note, trans actress Eve Lindley appears in four episodes in season four, and her character’s name is Hot Carla, which honestly is #goals.

53. Santa Clarita Diet (2017 – 2019)

Watch on Netflix

Anne Garcia and Lisa Palmer. “Me? Oh I’m a sheriffsexual. Yes no it doesn’t matter who’s in the role, I’m into them.”

I never thought I liked zombie-themed things, but when things like Anna and the Apocalypse added queerness and humor to the mix, I thought twice about my zombie ban. In the second season of Santa Clarita Diet, out queer actress Natalie Morales plays Deputy Anne, who starts dating her dead police partner’s widow, Lisa. They are funny and important to the plot and, despite how many brains got nibbled on over the course of the series, still alive.

52. Stitchers (2015 – 2017)

Watch on Freeform

Camille and Amanda. “I just had the weirdest dream…there was a warehouse…I smelled apples?”

Stitchers imagined a world where a woman with a unique brain chemistry could be “stitched” into newly dead bodies and relive their last memories to help solve their murders. A fascinating concept, brought to life by the main character’s coworker and roommate Camille, a sarcastic, hilarious computer scientist who later reveals herself to be bisexual. She talks about her queerness in that frank, explicit way we don’t see on TV nearly often enough, and her eventual romance with Amanda, played by real life queer actress Anna Akana, was breathtaking (but not literally, which is something I feel has to be said on a list like this.)

51. Into the Badlands (2015 – 2019)

Watch on Netflix

Odessa and Tilda. Flap flap, motherfuckers.

In this post-apocalyptic world, society is split into factions, and only the strongest survive. With magical abilities as an undercurrent, this show was a combination of stunning visuals and battle scenes that could be mistaken for a ballet. One of the main characters, Tilda, a baby assassin who is ready to grow into her own person, falls for a sex-worker-turned-assassin named Odessa. Just two little Butterflies in love. (The assassins were called Butterflies…hence the caption above.) Eventually the two part ways, Odessa moving on to date a fellow assassin named Mercy, and overall their storyline didn’t feel like it got the closure it deserved, but it was nice while it lasted.

Next page: TOP 50!

January 2023: What’s New, Gay and Streaming on Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, Prime Video, Peacock, Apple TV and AMC+

Well, my fellow television fans, it’s a brand new year and that means a brand new slate of programing with lesbian, bisexual, gay, queer and trans characters on streaming networks like Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Peacock and HBO Max. The main theme of this month’s guide is “this should be queer right???”

Top: Ginny & Georgia, The Last Of Us, The Drop, Hunters // Bottom: The Rig, Mars One, How I Met Your Father, The Legend of Vox Machina, Sky Rojo and The Traitors

New and Gay and/or Lesbian on Netflix in January 2023

Mars One (2022) – January 5

In this Brazillian family drama from writer/director Gabriel Martins, Eunice (Camilla Souza) — a college student ready to leave home and even more ready to explore her sexuality — is one of four protagonists. Writing about Eunice’s relationship with her girlfriend Jo in her rave review of the film, Drew wrote “their hotter than cute meet cute at a club, their dinner with Jo’s wealthy family, the way they love each other in the sort of impassioned yet insufficient way college students love. It all just feels so real. ”

Ginny & Georgia: Season 2 – January 5

Georgia’s reaction to Ginny and Austin leaving her and Ginny’s new knowledge about her mother’s actual activities are the powers shaping Georgia and Ginny’s relationship in Season 2. We’ll also be learning more about Georgia’s past and her relationship with Ginny’s father and Ginny will be dealing with the fallout within her group of friends from Ginny hooking up with her best (lesbian!) friend Max’s twin brother.

The Walking Dead: Season 11 – January 6

Sky Rojo: Season 3 – January 13

The third season of this Spanish Black Comedy Action Drama about “the impunity, ambiguity and brutal reality of prostitution, and the psychological portraits of those on both sides of the scale” will continue to feature Wendy, described as “a lesbian woman from Buenos Aires who flees Villa 31 and becomes a sex worker in the brothel to make money so she can provide a better life for herself and her girlfriend.”

Prime Video’s LGBTQ+ Stuff For January 2023

She Hate Me (2004) – January 1

This film is so bananas I can’t believe it got made! Probably Spike Lee’s worst project, She Hate Me is notable for making Kerry Washington bisexual. A man is facing some financial troubles that are not his actual fault and so he decides to become a sperm donor of sorts. His ex-fiancee, who came out as a lesbian after they broke up, sets up a situation in which groups of lesbians come over and pay him $10k each to have sex with him in hopes of getting pregnant. Words cannot describe the horrors of this movie.

Tangerine (2015) – January 1

Shot entirely on an iPhone, this iconic film follows two trans sex workers, Sin-Dee and Alexandra, on Christmas Eve, as just-out-of-jail Sin-Dee tracks down the pimp/boyfriend who’s been cheating on her and Alexandra’s on a journey towards her singing performance that evening.

The Brady Bunch Movie (1995) – January 1

Alanna Ubach is Noreen, a lesbian in love with a completely oblivious Marcia Brady, in this delightful satire that finds the original 1970s TV family plopped into the 1990s.

The Rig: Season One – January 6

This character-driven mystery follows the crew of the Kinloch Bravo oil rig as they must come together and fight for their lives after a fog cuts off all communication, stranding them in the harsh waves of the North Sea, no rescue helicopter of supplies on the horizon. Rochenda Sandall plays lesbian character Cat Brainwithe, and queer actor Emily Hampshire co-stars.

Jurassic World: Dominion (2022) – January 6

“The first thing you should know about Jurassic World: Dominion is that it is not a very good movie,” writes Kayla in her review of the film. “The second thing you should know about Jurassic World: Dominion is that it features a bisexual pilot played by DeWanda Wise.”

Hunters: Season Two – January 13

It’s been nearly three years since season one of this Nazi-hunting dark comedy set in the ’70s starring Al Pacino and Logan Lerman concluded its first season and now it’s finally back for its final one. In Season Two, our titular hunters must reunite to track down Adolf Hitler himself, who’s hiding in South America. Jerrika Hinton returns as Millie Morris, a lesbian who is investigating the Hunters. She had a really touching coming out storyline in the first season and now she’s back and out and proud.

The Legend of Vox Machina: Season Two – January 20

This “D&D liveplay game turned adult animated series” amped up the queerness of the original campaign the story is based on, with several queer female characters and promises of more to come in Season 2.  Bisexual actor Stephanie Beatriz plays queer character Lady Kima and nonbinary actor Stacey Raymond is nonbinary character Bryn. Valerie described it as “funny and boisterous and you don’t have to know a thing about D&D to enjoy it.”

Queer HBO Max Shows and Films Streaming January 2023

Skate Kitchen (2018) – January 1

Writer-director Crystal Moselle’s 2018 indie Skate Kitchen was the inspiration for super-queer and unfortunately short-lived HBO series Betty, and it shares the show’s same five central characters. “Nina Moran’s Kirt was explicitly gay in the film and is explicitly gay in Betty, and she is a soft butch comedic delight in both,” wrote Drew in her review of Betty.

Velma: Season One Premiere – January 12

Velma’s lesbianism was confirmed as cannon in October’s Trick or Treat Scooby-Doo!, but the animated series premiering on HBO Max may not have gotten the memo, which apparently has been described as a love quadrangle: Velma (Mindy Kaling) has feelings for Fred, Shaggy has a crush on Velma, and Daphne (Constance Wu) has “complicated feelings” for Velma. Also, Daphne has lesbian Moms! The cast of voice actors is teeming with queer women including Cherry Jones, Jane Lynch, Fortune Feimster, Nicole Byer and Shay Mitchell.

The Last of Us: Season One Premiere – January 15

Based on a video game franchise heralded for being the first with an LGBTQ+ protagonist, our fingers remain crossed that HBO Max’s hotly anticipated adaptation will maintain that representation and also delicately navigate some of the original’s queer tropes. Taking place 20 years after the destruction of modern civilization, The Last of Us follows hardened survivor Joel, who’s been hired to smuggle 14-year-old Ellie (aforementioned protagonist, played by Bella Ramsey) out of an oppressive quarantine zone. But! What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal, heartbreaking journey across the U.S. as they must depend on each other for survival. Apparently Ellie’s sexuality wasn’t confirmed until Last of Us II, and considering that she is, after all, 14, who knows how much queer stuff will be in the first season! Also I don’t really know what I’m talking about if we’re being honest! Storm Reid plays Ellie’s best friend Riley, whomst in the game does eventually become her more-than-friend.

Hulu’s January 2023 Shows for Girls, Gays and Theys

Are You The One? Complete Season 8 (MTV) – January 1

One of the world’s most impressive feats of reality television, this absolutely bananas concept — some method has determined whomst of a group of contestants are “the one” for each other and it’s up to them to figure it out — debuted an entirely bisexual cast in 2019. The world was never the same! If you haven’t watched this yet then I am so excited for you.

Professor Marston And The Wonder Women (2017) – January 1

This film from Angela Robinson, about the triad relationship between psychologist William Marston, the creator of Wonder Woman, his wife Elizabeth and their life parter, Olive Byrne, has everything: hot sex, a man who doesn’t suck, history, feminism and school!

Fantasy Island: Season 2 Premiere (Fox) – January 3

The Drop (2022) – January 13

Lex (Anna Konkle) and Mani (Jermaine Fowler) are a happily married couple trying to have a baby in this cringe comedy that finds them in a tropical location for their friend (and apparently Lex’s ex-lover!) Mia’s (Aparna Nancherla) lesbian wedding to Peggy (Jennifer Lafleur). But immediately upon arrival, Lex drops Mia’s baby (don’t worry it survives!), an event that puts a damper on the nuptials and initiates a spin-out of “recriminations, passive-aggressive behavior and uncomfortable tension” amongst this longtime group of friends.

9-1-1: Lone Star: Season 4 Premiere (Fox) – January 18

How I Met Your Father: Season 2 Premiere – January 24

We don’t know much about the second season of this Hulu original spin-off from How I Met Your Mother, but the show, which stars Hillary Duff as Jesse, also features Tien Tran as Ellen, Jesse’s adopted sister who started the first season after moving to New York from a small farming town following a separation from her wife.

Peacock’s Lesbians and Bisexuals of January 2023

The Traitors: Season One Premiere – January 12

Queer icon Alan Cumming hosts this unscripted competition series described as “a nail-biting psychological adventure in which treachery and deceit are the name of the game” in which 20 contestants compete in a series of challenges to earn a cash prize — but three contestants coined “the traitors” are devising a plan to steal the prize. Amongst these contestants is Andie Thurmond, a non-binary Director of Music Services from Reno, Nevada, who lives on a ranch with their wife and baby.

Poker Face: First Four Episodes Premiere – January 26

I saw the first six episodes of this show and I LOVED IT SO MUCH! This ten-episode Mystery-of-the-Week series from Rian Johnson follows Charlie (Natasha Lyonne), a grizzled former Poker champion with the extraordinary ability to tell when somebody’s lying. Following her friend’s murder, she hits the road in her Barracuda and encounters “a new cast of characters and strange crimes she can’t help but solve” at every stop. Although Charlie’s sexuality isn’t addressed (at least not in the first six episodes), there’s lots of queer characters encountered along the way and the truly stunning list of guest stars includes queer actors Clea Duvall, Rowan Blanchard and Cherry Jones.

Apple TV+ Getting Gay in January 2023

Truth Be Told: Season Three: Season Premiere – January 20 

The third season of this series starring Octavia Spencer as true crime podcaster Poppy Scoville finds our protagonist working with unconventional school principal Eva (Gabrielle Union) to uncover a sex trafficking ring responsible for the disappearance of several young missing Black girls. Also, Eva is queer!

Potential Queerness on AMC+ in January 2023

Anne Rice’s Mayfair Witches: Series Premiere – January 8

Following up October’s super-gay Anne Rice adaptation Interview with the Vampire, AMC+’s next entry in the Anne Rice multiverse is Mayfair Witches, and showrunner Esta Spaulding confirmed on the TCA tour that the show will be “very queer,” telling the press, “it was a complete and total priority for us, and we want, you know, our audience to look at this show and look at all of the characters in the show and feel that they see themselves, whoever they are; that the show is inviting and inclusive of every point of view and … everybody who watches it.” The story is focused on a young neurosurgeon who learns she’s the heir to a family of witches and must navigate the intricacies of a sinister presence that has been shadowing her ancestors for generations. According to a review of the first book in the series, “several of the female witches had some bisexual experiences.”

The Best TV Shows of 2022 With LGBTQ Women and Non-Binary Characters

See All 2022 End of Year Lists

It’s difficult to summon any general or specific description of the LGBTQ+ television landscape in 2022 without feeling a nagging anxiety similar to one you might feel describing your bright future with a girl who might not even like you back — because if we learned anything about LGBTQ+ inclusive programming this year, it’s that we can’t really count on any of it to last. Of the 28 shows on this list, nine were cancelled and four have yet to be renewed. One of those cancelled shows, Minx, was renewed for a second season and already in production when HBO Max changed their minds, axed it, and announced its intention to remove its first season from the streaming service altogether. Only 11 titles on this list — 40% of the total — have been definitively renewed for additional seasons. (That said, we’re obviously more likely to vote hard for a show we’ll never have a chance to vote for again, so these lists do favor expired properties.)

That aside, it was another promising year for queer representation, including two of the year’s most notable LGBTQ+-focused shows that are both, in a way, period pieces, although set in two very different periods — A League of Their Own and High School. While we bid a sad farewell to Genera+ion, we got two new (and renewed) mostly-queer teen ensemble shows — Heartbreak High and Heartstopper. I’m always especially drawn to shows that don’t just show queer characters, but queer community, and 2022 delivered a second season of Bilal Baig and Fab Filippo’s Sort Of (which miraculously received its third season renewal), Peacock’s Queer as Folk reboot and of course, The L Word Generation Q. It was also a great year for “shows we were watching anyhow introducing sapphic storylines,” like The Only Murders in the Building, Search Party, Acapulco and White Lotus.

Last year the number of non-binary characters on television effectively quadrupled overnight, and that rapid increase continued in 2022 with new non-binary characters introduced on shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Queer as Folk, Heartbreak High, One of Us is Lying, The Sandman, Never Have I Ever, Quantum Leap, Chucky, Supernatural Academy, Our Flag Means Death and TLWGQ. Trans men, however, continue to be underrepresented onscreen, although we got a few new characters this year on Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin, Dead End: Paranormal Park and Tom Swift as well as seeing Elliot Page’s character on The Umbrella Academy come out as a trans man.

The overall number of queer women and/or trans characters on TV in 2022 is similar to what we saw in 2021.

But amongst all of the shows that dared to tell our stories, whomst amongst them was the best? Well, today I’ll present to you what our team decided upon, using a scientific private voting process involving the ten members of the Autostraddle TV Team: me (Riese Bernard), Heather Hogan, Carmen Phillips, Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya, Natalie Duggins, Valerie Anne, Drew Burnett , Shelli Nicole, A.Tony Jerome and Nic.

28. Gentleman Jack

HBO // Season Two
Cancelled 

Last Year: Didn’t air

Photograph by Aimee Spinks/HBO

“Gentleman Jack’s success is due to showrunner Sally Wainwright’s complete refusal to flatten the portrayal of real life Anne Lister. Anne’s bravery, living louder and prouder than any known lesbian in history during the 1800s, is the stuff of legend. And it should be! But Anne Lister was also a complicated woman who was very invested in upholding the systems of power the working class were revolting against during her lifetime. Her relationship with her wife, Ann Walker, was no less layered. She loved her very much, but she also loved the opportunities that Ann’s wealth brought with her. They bickered. They stomped out on each other. And they also kept falling back into each other’s arms because something about their connection just wouldn’t let either of them quit. Gentleman Jack got all that right, and it was a joy to behold.” — Heather Hogan

27. Dead To Me

Netflix // Season Three
Cancelled

Last Year: Didn’t air

© 2022 Netflix, Inc

“Dead to Me came to a poignant close this year, thus ending the story of Judy and Jen, a queer woman and her straight best friend. Brilliantly acted by Linda Cardellini and Christina Applegate, it was a delight to watch these two characters go from unlikely friends to platonic life partners. They went through hell, but they went through it together. This show was as funny as it was emotional; especially in this last season, I feel like I teared up as often as I laughed out loud. And it was a special delight to watch Judy get flustered by, flirt with, date, break up with, and make up with Natalie Morales’ Michelle along the way.” — Valerie Anne

26. White Lotus

HBO // Season Two
Renewed for Season 3

Last Year: Didn’t have queer women characters

Photograph by Fabio Lovino/HBO

“The more-or-less settled-upon belief that Season Two of Mike White’s delectably weird whodunit is better than the first is correct, but especially so for our own selfish purposes: while Season One’s vaguely lesbian mean teens failed to deliver anything less vague, Season Two’s resort manager, the alternately meddling and anxious Valentina, was an actual lesbian who eventually had actual lesbian sex. We were tuning in, anyhow: for bisexual queen Aubrey Plaza as the skeptical and standoffish wife of a newly rich tech millionaire Harper (who did report having partaken in a threesome during her halcyon days) but also for a delicious mystery set amid a perpetually unsatisfied group of wealthy couples and families vacationing against a gorgeous Sicilian sky. White Lotus was appointment television, as fun to watch as it was to dissect between episodes, on TikTok and group chats and Reddit, where we trusted the story’s intentional choices were leading us towards a cliff-scaling twist. Sumptuous and satirical and always a whole lot of fun, White Lotus is rich in all the ways.” — Riese

25. Stranger Things

Netflix // Season Four
Renewed for Season 5

Last Year: Didn’t air

Tina Rowden/Netflix © 2022

“Stranger Things Part One: Season Four premiered earlier this year and was, unsurprisingly, broke the record for most views of an English-language premiere on Netflix. Our resident gays, Robin Buckley and Will Byers, are back to battle some terrifying evils and hopefully not get their hearts broken along the way. And, well, at least one of them succeeds. I’ve been extremely surprised that between the two, Robin has gotten more support from her best friend than Will. You remember Will? Who, you know, in season 2, came back to find his friends were like, “Man, you gotta stop acting like a kid.” as if he didn’t lose his childhood to being stuck in another dimension that was trying to kill him?

Yeah, that one. His story doesn’t get any better, it gets even more devastating, as he tries to confess his love (not overtly, but in a way that we all can understand as viewers) to one of his best friends. He’s met with about 10% of the support that Robin got from Steve and the consistent placing him literally in between Mike and Eleven to show what he’ll never have is lowkey brutal. But the shining light that is Robin Buckley, who Alex Masse beautifully explains is the autistic lesbian we are all waiting for, gives us at least one hopeful gay story. Our girl stutters through the overwhelming crush, broken heart, gets the girl in the end stage and it is wonderful to see her, very straight guy friend, support her wholeheartedly along the way. This is also where I’m gonna say that Robin and Nancy should be together, so you should watch so you can get on this shipping train with me.” — A.Tony Jerome

24. Derry Girls

Netflix // Season Three (Final Season)

Last Year: Didn’t air

“Derry Girls is just one of those shows. A moment in time about a moment in time that sticks with you forever. Creator and showrunner Lisa McGee pulled off one of the trickiest pieces of TV magic making the show about her own upbringing during the Troubles in Northern Ireland: She grounded the series firmly in late 90s, while sprinkling in a modern sensibility. It was Clare Devlin who embodied that last thing the most, our wee lesbian who came out in Catholic high school and even got a date and kiss with a girl in the show’s final season. Derry Girls never shied away from the hard stuff — political turmoil, religious persecution, loss and grief — but it also never stopped delivering the kind of jokes that make audiences all over the world belly laugh together.” — Heather Hogan

23. The Sex Lives of College Girls

HBO Max // Season Two
Renewed for Season 3

Last Year: Didn’t rank

Photo: Isabella Vosmikova

“Last season on The Sex Lives of College Girls, when a heartbroken Leighton Murray came out to her suitemate, Kimberly, she laments, “I don’t want to be like this. Kimberly, it’s terrifying. I don’t want my whole life to change.” But Kimberly’s there — the world’s greatest ally with her Pride balloon bouquet — and coming out’s just a little less terrifying. Then Leighton tells Bela and Whitney, the other members of this unwittingly chosen family, and the fear recedes. After that, whatever fear remains gets lost in the sheets of whatever queer or questioning girl Leighton beds during her post-coming out hoe phase.

But the resistance to changing her life? The resistance to being anyone other than the person she’s always seen herself as? That persists for Leighton throughout TSLOCG‘s second season. Her arc is the second season highlight.” — Natalie

22. First Kill

Netflix // Season One
Cancelled

Brian Douglas/Netflix © 2022

“First Kill had us in a chokehold from the second it was announced. Based on V.E. Schwab’s short story, the supernatural teen drama follows16-year-old vampire Juliette Fairmont, who needs to make her first kill to enter into vampire adulthood. She’s struggling with the whole murder thing when she meets and falls for Calliope Burns, who hails from a family of monster hunters. It’s lesbian Romeo and Juliet, but sexier and bloodier. Plus, First Kill gives us two very Mommi mommies to supplementally enjoy. Unfortunately, First Kill was the first show Netflix axed in its 2022 LGBTQ Bloodbath.” — Heather Hogan

21. Search Party

HBO Max // Season Five (Final Season)

Last Year: #22

Photograph by Jon Pack/ HBO Max

“Queer is a genre as well as an adjective. Sure, there are TV shows that are queer because they have a queer character or several, but not all of those shows have a queer sensibility. There is queer TV and then there is Queer TV. Search Party is Queer TV. Its first season could be dismissed as Girls with mystery elements, but anyone who had seen show creators Charles Rogers and Sarah-Violet Bliss’ acerbic feature Fort Tilden knew they were getting at something deeper. Each season that depth and specificity has been clarified, especially when the show moved from TBS to HBO Max. This final season was not only its gayest — at least in the traditional sense — it also was the rare chance to see an audacious work of Queer Art end on its own terms. Search Party is one of the great success stories of the 2010s streaming boom. What started as an easy-to-love pitch evolved into a show where Susan Sarandon is Cole Escola’s grandmother and a literal zombie apocalypse breaks out. Conversations about representation have grown stale — this is the kind of singular work we should be fighting to see.” — Drew Burnett Gregory

20. Better Things

FX // Season Five (Final Season)

Last Year: Didn’t air

Suzanne Tenner/FX

“I hate to start a blurb about one of the most comforting comedies of the last decade by bringing up the bigotry toward trans youth that has swept the country in recent years. But when so many New York Times op-eds are fixated on a moral panic, it’s important to have a counter-example. Pamela Adlon’s Sam Fox was that counter-example. Her middle child, Frankie, never lands on a gender or a sexual orientation during the run of the show. They don’t have to. The love and support Sam provides is unconditional. That doesn’t mean she does everything right but she tries and that trying is everything. She lets her kid explore, she lets her kid be whoever they are in that moment. She respects her kid’s identity.

And then respects her kid’s identity again when it changes. This is just one aspect of Better Things but it’s indicative of the show’s overall approach to family and community. It’s corny to say that any work of art has a core message of love but when I say that about this show, I mean it in a way that goes beyond platitudes. It’s love of cooking, love of travel, love of work, love of friends, love of children, love of parents, love when loving feels impossible, loving when you don’t understand, loving when you’re tired, loving when you’re angry, loving even when you’re hating too. In the series finale, Sam’s youngest tells her, “I like the way you live your life.” Ultimately, that’s what this intimate, little show managed to accomplish: a guide to a loving life.” — Drew Burnett Gregory

19. Bad Sisters

Apple+ TV // Limited Series

“This series is a MASTERPIECE in television and I say that proudly and firmly. There are five sisters, including one eyed le$bian with an amazing home Bibi, and four of them hate the fifth sisters husband perfectly known as ‘The Prick.’ Throughout the series every episode helps to unravel exactly why each sister has an issue with him — and also shows their attempts at murdering him. I know we each have a family member we just cannot stand, but this series shows what could happen if you decide you can’t take them to the point where they need to be gone. It’s funny, witty, wildly well-written, and the surprises that happen ACTUALLY surprised me and that finale — PHEW!!!!! I’m also going to go ahead and say that this series has one of the best opening credits I’ve seen in a minute.” — Shelli Nicole

18. Reboot

Hulu // Season One
Not yet renewed or cancelled

Photo by: Michael Desmond/Hulu

“There were so many ways for Reboot to go wrong. A real TV show about a rebooted fictional TV show about a classic fictional TV show. It’s too many moving parts to even wrap your head around. But by the time Reboot hit its stride in the middle of its eight-episode first season, all the myriad pieces were working together seamlessly. Is it a coincidence that the middle of the season is also when the series revealed that Hannah, Timberly, and Bree are all queer? (Lesbian, pansexual, and “a sexual fluid,” to be precise.) I think not! Reboot was a million jokes a minute, and it was also full of heart. As a bonus: Hannah joins the way too short list of Jewish lesbian characters.” — Heather Hogan

17. Minx

HBO Max // Season One
Cancelled

Photograph by Katrina Marcinowski / HBO Max

“Picture it, it’s 1970’s Cali and the porn industry (and polyester suits) are booming like mad. Joyce, a writer and feminist, wants to start a magazine, its been a dream of hers forever. She then ends up meeting Doug who helps her start a magazine — but it ends up being the first porno mag for women! It’s got hot guys, their cute butts, and incredible articles and all their photo spreads tell a story. It ends up being queer too when her older sister has a bit of a lesbian awakening of her own. But nudity and gayness aside, its a very dope show. It shows a side of the this era and the sexuality of it all from a women’s perspective (that isn’t Gloria Steinem), and its not trying to hit us too hard on the head with the point of it all. I’d also like to mention Idara Victor and Oscar Montoya who steal pretty much every scene they are in!” — Shelli Nicole

16. The Owl House

Disney Channel // Season Three 
Cancelled

Last Year: Didn’t Rank

“What else can I say about The Owl House that I haven’t already squealed in raptures this year? I think I’ve covered it all! So let me just reiterate that I think Dana Terrace’s Disney Channel black sheep is doing LGBTQ+ representation as well — and better, in most cases — than any “grown-up” show on TV. It’s not just the quantity of gay and trans characters, though there are many. It’s the fact that their internal lives are so rich and on display; their adventures are so full of life and wonder; their relationships are so layered and lovely. Season three also went all in on exploring the deep connections and complicated dynamics in found families vs. natal families. Luz is maybe the only bisexual character I’ve ever seen who has found a true home with both.” — Heather Hogan

15. Heartbreak High

Netflix // Season One
Renewed for Season 2

ELISE LOCKWOOD/NETFLIX

“In addition to having varied and nuanced queer storytelling in its first season, Heartbreak High was one of the best depictions of a significant friendship breakup on television this year. The series managed to explore so many interpersonal and systemic social issues — from dating while autistic to policy brutality against Aboriginal peoples to bisexual awakenings to slut shaming to comprehensive sex education to class and mental health — but without ever feeling corny or moralizing about any of these things. Instead, it did so with humor and ample room for mess. The cast is charming and has great chemistry, and the love triangles are great teen drama fodder.” — Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya

14. Paper Girls

Prime Video // Season One
Cancelled

“Paper Girls is another show on this list that is gone too soon! I might get in trouble for saying it, but the Amazon adaptation of the best-selling graphic novels is everything I wanted Stranger Things to be. KJ’s arc, in particular, captivated us all — and I could just tell the series was gearing up for more! I think a lot about what Young Me would think if she met Now Me, and Paper Girls let me live out the fantasy of my closeted, insecure teenage self coming face to face with my happy, whole, loud and proud adult self. There’s so much to be said about healing your inner queer child. I wish Paper Girls had been given a real chance to share that story.” — Heather Hogan

13. Harley Quinn

HBO Max // Season Three
Renewed for Season 4

Last Year: Didn’t Air

Photograph by Courtesy of HBO Max

“In its three seasons, Harley Quinn has never stopped surprising me. The way it called Joker on his abuse of Harley and let her murder him dead in the first season. The way it slow-burned Harley and Ivy from best friends to accidental lovers to girlfriends in the second season. And then, the way it let both characters, and their relationship, face challenges and grow stronger and better together in the third. Season three was as irreverent as ever — maybe more so, with Bruce Wayne’s plans to reclaim his childhood by making his very dead parents into zombies — but it was also shockingly soft in all the right ways.” — Heather Hogan

12. Heartstopper

Netflix // Season One
Renewed for Season 2

“Based on the beloved graphic novel of the same name, Heartstopper comes as close to capturing the feeling of a first gay crush as any TV show I’ve ever seen. The relationships are so sweet. The music is so queer and poppy. And there are just so many LGBTQ teens to root for. The standout for us was Yasmin Finney’s Elle, a trans girl who transfers from an all-boys school and finds herself fully accepted and loved into Heartstopper’s friend group. Heartstopper doesn’t exist to challenge straight viewers, but it does exist to comfort queer ones. And that’s more than we can say for every other show that’s been compared to Glee over the years!” — Heather Hogan

11. The L Word: Generation Q

Showtime // Season Three
Not yet renewed or cancelled

Troy Harvey/SHOWTIME.

“Season three is easily the strongest of Generation Q’s run. With the exception of Tibette’s dramatic reunion, the stories have dialed back the nostalgia a little bit and instead invested more time and energy in the new characters and relationships. Finally, it doesn’t feel like so much of a shadow of the show’s legacy looms over it and more like the series stands on its own. This is especially seen in this season’s Halloween episode, a playful and silly but ultimately grounded and layered episode that does bring back the past in the form of a guest appearance by Daniel Sea as Max but also plays by its own rules rather than the original’s. Shane even apologizes for the past. Generation Q also continues to be one of the only shows on television that shows the sex lives of queer women over 40 and 50, and for that alone, it still stands out in the queer television landscape.” — Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya

10. Station Eleven

HBO Max // Limited Series

Photograph by Ian Watson/HBO Max

“When we talk about comfort shows we’re usually referring to a gay children’s cartoon or a queer ensemble with sexual chaos. We are not usually talking about an apocalyptic drama that is at times so unpleasant that after finishing the fourth episode while recovering from Covid, I needed to stop watching for several weeks. And yet, by its heartfelt conclusion that is exactly what Station Eleven became. It is an ambitious, layered story about a doomsday quicker than our own and the bisexual theatre kid who survives and grows up to be Mackenzie Davis. It’s also a tribute to the power of art amid our most trying times. Davis leads a remarkable cast with Himesh Patel and Danielle Deadwyler giving two of the best performances on TV this year. When times are tough, escapism is nice, but meaningful art that shows reality and then shows hope is even better. Station Eleven shows that in its story — it shows that in its very existence.” — Drew Burnett Gregory

9. Queer as Folk

Peacock // Season One
Cancelled

QUEER AS FOLK — Episode 104 — Pictured: (l-r) Jesse James Keitel as Ruthie, CG as Shar — (Photo by: Alyssa Moran/Peacock)

“I’m not sure how the swiftly cancelled Queer as Folk reboot will ultimately be remembered — but to me, I saw nothing but promise, a dynamic cast and a team that was willing to take risks and eager to break representational ground. Like another noted reboot of a beloved Showtime program about queer people, it faced a tough audience of those who loved the original and also those who hated it. Unlike the deeply white, cis and able-bodied original characters (mostly played by straight actors), all of the new QAF’s main characters were people of color or trans or disabled or all of the above. The original series’ token not-gay-guys were a white lesbian couple named Mel and Lindsay, and the reboot delivered us Char, a non-binary Black masculine-presenting person and their partner, Ruthie, a trans woman who’d grown up with the series’ star, gay party boy Brodie. Queer as Folk gave us groundbreaking and incredibly hot sex, a Craft-inspired drag show, a sex party catered towards people with disabilities and a joyful portrait of chosen family coming together in the face of shared trauma. There really is nothing that defines queer community quite like it’s historical dedication to Throwing Parties When We’re Sad.” — Riese

8. High School

Prime Video/Freevee // Season One 
Not yet renewed or cancelled

“Clea DuVall and Laura Kittrell’s adaptation of Tegan and Sara’s teenage memoir makes for great TV, in large part because pop music’s favorite lesbian twins were so open when they wrote the book. The series has a glorious 90s sensibility. The flannel! The hair! The Doc Martens! The Nirvana of it all! And a Canadian one too. But there’s also something universal about the story of these two gay kids figuring out who they are in relation to their sexuality, their friendships, their dreams, and each other. Newcomer twins Railey and Seazynn Gilliland made an admirable leap from TikTok to TV, winning the hearts of longtime fans and even viewers who only knew Tegan and Sara from that Lego Movie song.” — Heather Hogan

7. Sort Of

HBO Max // Season Two
Renewed for Season 3
Last Year: #18

Photograph by Courtesy of HBO Max

“Towards the end of Sort Of‘s first season, Sabi (Bilal Baig) had, seemingly, found their footing. Their mother was coming to understand them, to acknowledge Sabi’s need to be themselves as she affirmed her own need. They’d enmeshed themselves in the lives of the Bauer family, becoming a trusted confidante for Paul, a comforting presence for his two children. But slowly, the foundation beneath Sabi’s feet shifts. Their father returns from Dubai. Bessy awakens from her coma. Relationships grow far more complicated and a refuge ceases to exist. It all sounds like too much but in its second season, Sort Of builds on the self-discovery from the first season and assures Sabi that they’re strong enough to handle whatever comes next.” — Natalie

6. Reservation Dogs

FX // Season Two 
Renewed for Season 3
Last Year: #14

“I often say I like to read books that are not only queer in content but also queer in form. Reservation Dogs is one of the first television shows I’ve seen that this also applies to. This show feels queer in its DNA, in its refusal to adhere to strict structure or be defined by a single genre. You can tell there are multiple queer folks in the writers room, and sometimes it’s those behind-the-scenes presences that matter even more than surface-level on-screen representation. In its second season Reservation Dogs continued to push the boundaries of conventional televisual storytelling. The cast excels all the way down to minor characters, and the strong sense of place makes for immersive, memorable worldbuilding. It’s also a show that rewards rewatches, so detailed throughout.” — Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya

5. A Black Lady Sketch Show

HBO // Season Three 
Renewed for Season 4
Last Year: #2

HBO

“I feel as if, at least at Autostraddle, A Black Lady Sketch Show has been claimed as queer culture for years. It felt refreshing, right from the top, to have such a smart, unabashedly Black, show also emphasize the point that all Black women — queer Black women, trans Black women — are funny as hell. But I’d argue that it wasn’t until this season when ABLSS really hit its exemplary, chaotic, peak. It’s no coincidence that their funniest season is also their gayest. Sweetly, casually gay, with queer characters as a part of a painted portrait of over-the-top caricatures where their sexuality was not the point or the punchline, but also as main characters in sketches where the jokes only landed if you knewto be in on them. Ashley Nicole Black trying to come out to her parents, only to be outshined by a spider terrifying everyone over the dinner table. Raven Symoné as a stud needing a bathroom. Wanda Sykes delivering stand up. Michaela Jaé Rodriguez as the self-centered clerk of a beauty supply store in a fantasy episode of The Purge. We were everywhere, and everywhere was a perfect place to be.” — Carmen Phillips

4. P-Valley

Starz // Season Two
Renewed for Season 3

Last Year: Didn’t air

“I may never have the words for P-Valley. Even now, my overwhelming feeling is stunned that we were lucky enough to witness it all? In P-Valley’s first season, Katori Hall wrote a Black queer nonbinary character in Uncle Clifford (Nicco Annan), owner of the Pynk strip club, that was breathtaking in its fullness. And yes, Uncle Clifford’s relationship with Lil Murda (J. Alphonse Nicholson) — a gay closeted rapper who’s head over heels in love with her, no matter how many walls Clifford puts up for what she believes is for both of their safety — has always been important. But it was the second season, and the exploration of Lil Murda on his own terms, and his relationship with a previous ex who was so much more, Big Teak, that broke me. I have never seen queer Black men taken with such care, such tenderness. John Clarence Stewart’s performance as Big Teak, in any other just world, would be an Emmy. And then there’s Mercedes (Brandee Evans), who, in trying to create a life for herself away from the club, finds self-discovery in Farrah. And there’s Farrah, after being repressed in her marriage for years, opening anew for Mercedes.

The best Black queer story told last year on television was P-Valley. The best and most realistic story about Blackness in the pandemic was P-Valley. And if there’s one show you missed and should watch, it’s absolutely down in the valley where the girls get naked. Don’t forget your bands, because ’round here we pay sex workers for their work.” — Carmen Phillips

3. Hacks

HBO Max // Season Two
Renewed for Season 3

Last Year: #5

Photograph by Karen Ballard/HBO Max

I always worry about a sophomore slump when it comes to shows whose first seasons blow me away, and I certainly had my fears about Hacks managing to pull off its strange magic a second time in a row. But it not only matched its first season’s singular sense of humor but pushed things even further. It’s discomfort comedy at its finest. Hannah Einbinder and Jean Smart are the best dysfunctional duo on television. Season two is such an unflinching look at failure, especially late-in-career failure. Deborah Vance is floundering, but she also refuses to quit. You’re never too old to bomb.

For artists — with the exception of very few — you’re always hustling, no matter how much success you’ve amassed. It’s always fun to watch when Deborah and Ava when they’re in their element, but it’s even more interesting to see when they fuck up — not only in their personal lives but also in their careers. And their relationship to each other remains one of my favorite dynamics, full of venom and admiration all at once. They’re obsessed with each other on a toxic level, and it makes all their conflicts so explosive. And the lesbian cruise episode is hall of fame status.” — Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya

2. Batwoman

The CW // Season Three
Cancelled

Last Year: #16

Colin Bentley/THE CW/ © 2022 The CW Network, LLC

“Ryan Wilder was the moment. And should, in fact, still be the moment. Her turn as Batwoman was the reason superheroes were created in the first place. She stepped into the cape and cowl in the middle of a real-life, revolutionary uprising for Black lives. She was played by endlessly charismatic bisexual star Javicia Leslie. She became one of the only Black queer women on TV who got to have a relationship with another Black queer woman on TV. She was surrounded by a supporting cast full of POC, including Victoria Cartagena, who finally got to play the Renee Montoya she deserved (after an infuriating half-season on Fox’s Gotham). In addition to all that, Ryan Wilder’s Batwoman was just fun. And badass. And hilarious. It was important TV, and it was good TV. We’re still mourning the loss.” – Heather Hogan

1. A League of Their Own

Prime Video // Season One
Not yet renewed or cancelled

Anne Marie Fox/Prime Video
Copyright: © Amazon Content Services LLC

“It’s safe to say that A League of Their Own blew us away. You’ve seen how it dominated all our year-end lists — because it dominated our hearts! There were so many gay characters to love, and all of them brought something fresh and powerful and vulnerable to the table. From Max and Carson’s journeys to self-acceptance and dream-chasing, to Jo’s journey to stardom, to Jess and Lupe’s brotherhood, to Greta Gill’s femme power, to Sarge’s secret sapphic leanings. We all binged the whole season, and then turned around and binged it again. A League of Their Own honored the beloved film, and it set itself completely apart. We will be devastated if Amazon doesn’t renew it for a second season.” — Heather Hogan

Autostraddle’s Favorite Lesbian and Bisexual TV Episodes of 2022

See All 2022 End of Year Lists

We’ve listed our favorite characters of 2022! We’ve listed our favorite couples! And now we’re here to tell you about our favorite lesbian and bisexual TV episodes of 2022! One again, I remind you that this is not a list of BEST episodes; it is a list of our TV Team’s own personal favorites. Check them out below and then share yours with us in the comments!

A League Of Their Own Episode 101: “Batter Up”

Heather Hogan: Like so many of my colleagues below, I really wrestled with which episode of A League of Their Own to pick. I honestly could have chosen the whole season and justified that decision. What really jumps out for me about the first episode is just how much the show deftly accomplished. It leaned into the nostalgia, of course; very necessary. But it also introduced an entirely new cast of characters who bore little resemblance to our original Peaches. Carson, of course, we got to know in big ways. Greta and Jo a little bit more. But we also got glimpses of what was coming with Lupe, with Jess, with our dear Sarge.

More even than that, though, was the way the series brought Max and Clance into the world of the Peaches while also committing to giving them their own world too. Their friendship was the best part of the pilot to me, even more than Carson’s haircut and I LOVE HAIRPLAY. It felt as real and lived in as a beloved baseball mitt. Until I saw it, I had a hard time believing the hype that the show was going to somehow find a way to center stories of Black ball players. Also, frankly, I though the Carson/Greta thing was just going to be a tease, so when it paid off in that kiss? Well, I was as stunned as Max, accidentally hiding in the pantry.

A League Of Their Own Episode 102: “Find the Gap“

Valerie Anne: It was exceedingly hard to choose only one episode of A League of Their Own. 106 was my first choice, but then when I thought harder about it, I realized I had to choose 102. I chose it because it has a little bit of everything I love about the season, setting the groundwork for all of these things to grow as the season goes on. It has tension between Greta and Carson, it has some great and fun baseball playing, it has adorable Peaches bonding when they stood up for Jess, a taste of the beginnings of a Max/Carson friendship, some epic Max/Clance shenanigans, and a moment of genuine emotional conversation between Greta and Carson. Plus, when I watched this with my friends, one thing made me throw my hands up in the air and make a very relevant sports exclamation: When Max kisses Mrs. Turner and confirms that she, too, is queer, I yelled, “TOUCHDOWN!” We just. keep. winning.

A League of Their Own Episode 105: “Back Footed“

Carmen Phillips: I wanted to write about this episode, but really I just want to write about that scene. You know the one. Max, sitting in the sunny yellow kitchen of her Uncle Bert and Aunt Gracie. Three Black queer people, across two generations, creating a new family other their own, and doing so by rooting themselves in one of our oldest traditions: the kitchen hair salon.

Bertie asks if Max is sure about this. Max inhales and licks her bottom lip before letting her teeth graze across it. She’s sure.

Gracie promises that Bertie’s going to make sure she looks real good, Bertie walks behind Max to put a towel on her shoulders.

Bertie starts to hum as she opens and closes the scissors. Max lets out a stuttered breath. The camera comes in close on Chanté Adams’ face. Her shoulders are still tense — but her eyes flutter open, her brain trying to place where she’s heard that song before.

“Mama always sings that.” Her mother, Miss Toni is pretty much the last person that Max wants to think about right now.

“Well, maybe you came here to find a piece of home.”

So often, when we talk about queer television, we think about romance (and in fact, my other selection for my favorite queer episode of the year centers on a Black lesbian romance). And that makes sense, of course. Queer love stories are still rare, the kind that make your heart fill and knock and pour out.

But what made A League of Their Own’s fifth episode so special is the reminder, romance is not the only kind of love story.

It’s been months, summer into fall and now winter, and I feel like I’ve been replaying this scene in my mind. The care for Black queerness, taken by this show. The care of we as Black queer people had, even back then. We somehow always found each other, loved on each other, even back then.

A League of Their Own Episode 106: “Stealing Home“

Shelli Nicole: I will admit that I was very worried about how ALOTO would depict Black Queer Love. I binged this show swiftly like everyone else, but I was so happy to be able to see myself in a historical show and not in some sad light. This episode I fell in love with Gracie. I think I fell in love with her because I feel like I will be her. A thick, dark-skinned, sexy femme who moves through this world in the way she wants too. This episode we got to see her and Bertie’s relationship and OMG I loved it. Them having a night out, cocktails and bowling, being loved on by her partner, and telling Max she refuses to let the world’s fear of who she is stop her from having a good time in it and gotdammit that’s how I feel. It just felt like a beautiful episode that was showing us what was to come with them and I was just loving every minute.

Drew Burnett Gregory: A League of Their Own is great television. It’s great television in the purest sense, in a way that has become all too rare in the age of streaming. Each episode works as a self-contained episode that then functions as an important part of the whole season. And, Amazon Gods willing, the season will function as one part of the whole show.

It makes it easy to single out this show when discussing episodes — and it helps that episode six, “Stealing Home,” is a goddamn masterpiece.

This is the episode where the Peaches go to the gay speakeasy and Max goes to Bertie’s party. It’s the show at its deepest and its most fun. It’s a masterclass in how to ground queer period storytelling in the harsh realities of the time without being maudlin or exploitative. It’s also when the complementary storylines on the show work best. The writers wisely contrast the raid on the speakeasy with Max thriving at Bertie’s party to soften the pain. This feels noteworthy at a time when some queer audiences seem allergic to any sort of conflict. It’s great to see a show that isn’t afraid to be real that still is thoughtful about the experience for queer viewers.

Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya: Like folks have already written, the penultimate episode of A League Of Their Own’s first season (HOPEFULLY FIRST OF MANY; RENEW IT YOU COWARDS) is a masterpiece. Everything that the series does well is exemplified in this episode, which is real about the dangers of homophobia in the time it’s set but also allows some room for joy and fantasy. Even down to the most tiny of subplots, the episode is full of detail, nuance, and emotional depth. The writing and performances work together to craft just an exquisite episode of television and queer storytelling. It sounds corny, but it really is one of those pieces of art that so easily inspires laughter and tears.

Riese Bernard: This episode is also at the top of my list but everything I want to say about it has already been said!

Batwoman Episode 311: “Broken Toys“

Carmen Phillips: There are times when it is worth it to be deep and analytical when writing about television. For example, I could talk about how Batwoman 311 “Broken Toys” is the longest sex scene between two Black women on network television, and the breakthrough that is for queer storytelling (and it is!). I could talk about the importance of showcasing Black queer women’s emotional intimacy and vulnerability (that, too!). Or I could just say: This scene is really f*cking hot.

But part of what makes “Broken Toys” one of the greatest sex scenes I’ve ever seen on television (I said what I said) isn’t the sex at all. It’s the laughter. The laughter when Sophie breaks Ryan’s lamp in a rush to get their clothes off. The teasing smirk when Ryan’s unable to undue Sophie’s belt. Ryan’s face nearly breaking into two as she gives up and Sophie flips them over instead (a top simply must do what a top must do).

Their first time starts in the dark of an empty club, both of them lit in blue, Ryan holding Sophie by the neck and reaching down for their kiss. But it ends with them together, awash in warm amber, laughing in bed. It’s hot because they know each other, it’s hot because they are still, underneath everything else, each other’s safest place and best friend.
And now I’ll go back to the part where I talk about how rare and groundbreaking it is to see two Black women together on television, how weighty this moment actually is. Because when you watch it, it’s comfortable, so joyful, and yes — so f*cking hot — that damn, it’s easy to forget.

Gentleman Jack Episode 202: “Two Jacks Don’t Suit“

Heather Hogan: Tib is one of my favorite recurring characters in Anne Lister’s actual diaries, so when she popped up on Gentleman Jack in Paris with her boisterous laugh and naughty jokes and constant winking at Anne about her raging homosexuality (“the vast, rich tapestry of your fruity past”), I fell in love with her immediately. Tib is too much. That was always Anne’s problem with her, which is hilarious because Anne Lister is also way too much. I think that’s part of what Tib means when she tells her ex that “two Jacks don’t suit.”

She means two butches like them don’t make for good bedfellows, and also that multiple ladies in top hats together is always going to cause a scene. But she also means the full force of who they are. They can’t orbit the same spaces. Tib was one of Anne’s longest, dearest, truest friends — and that comes through too. It was frankly thrilling to see so many 1800s gays hanging out together, and to laugh about how much things haven’t changed when it comes to bringing new lovers into established friend groups. Ann Walker and Tib both knew Anne Lister very well, but they also knew her in different ways. Watching them navigate that dissonance as they tried to find harmony for Anne’s sake was simply wonderful.

RuPaul’s Drag Race: Untucked 1407: “The Daytona Wind”

Drew Burnett Gregory: During the early seasons of Untucked, it really was true that if you didn’t watch then you were only getting half the story. That’s proved less true in recent years as all the queens are very aware that they are crafting a brand. Even when drama does happen, it usually feels a tad forced like moments are being made in order to make moments.

It’s fitting then that the most notable episode of Untucked last season wasn’t due to drama but love. This is the episode when about half the remaining cast revealed themselves to be trans. I already used my entire recap to focus on this episode, but in the months that have passed its importance in the landscape of trans people on reality television has only solidified.

Drag Race may have a complicated history with trans queens but after this season it feels like there’s no going back. The trans-est show on TV has finally come out of the closet.

Reservation Dogs, Episode 210: “I Still Believe”

Natalie: In Reservation Dogs‘ season finale, Elora, Bear, Cheese, and Willie Jack are finally doing it; they’re finally going to California. They’d lost each other — the crew, the Rez Dogs — in their grief and now, spurned by a final wish from their fallen friend, they’re going. They’ll see the “those weird trees with spikes,” look upon the ocean for the first time and cast Daniel’s letter out into the “big-ass lake that doesn’t end.” They’ll do it all, for Daniel.

But, of course, the trip isn’t as easy as they imagine. When they ultimately find their way to a California beach, the Rez Dogs have lost their car, their money and, most importantly, Daniel’s letter. When it’s finally time for the crew to dip their toes into the sand, it’s clear that Elora also lost her nerve. They’ve come all this way to give Daniel the goodbye he would’ve wanted but now she just can’t do it…she can’t let him go.

“Hey. Hey, Elora, we’re not,” Bear assures her. “It’s…it’s the pain. That’s what we’re letting go. It’s got us stuck.”

The words resonate so deeply with me — a kid still clinging to the pain of losing her father years ago — that I start crying almost immediately. It took a long time for me to realize that my refusal to let go of that pain had kept me stuck. The memory of my father felt so connected to the pain of losing him, I didn’t think I could have the former without the latter. It’s surreal to see those thoughts, those moments, that pain immortalized on television by these four teenage kids from the rez.

There are shows on television that are easier to watch that Reservation Dogs…shows whose beats are familiar, whose characters walk down paths that you’ve been on yourself. There will be moments that you don’t fully understand, expressions that you don’t get, customs no one taught you and this weird fascination with catfish (“We’re by the ocean, they got to have catfish, right?” Willie Jack asks). But then there are moments like those on that California beach where Reservation Dogs reminds you that whatever our differences, our humanity is shared.

The Owl House Episode 103: “Thanks to Them”

Ms. Marvel, Episode 105: “Time and Again”

Natalie: “I pluck my ancestors eyes from their faces & fasten them to mine,” Fatimah Asghar writes in “Partition,” part of her 2018 collection of poems, If They Come For Us. Now, four years later, with the Marvel universe behind her, Asghar plucks her ancestors’ eyes from their faces, fastens them to her own, and offers us a glimpse of what they saw with “Time and Again.” What they saw was neighbor killing neighbor, fueling a genocide that often goes unacknowledged. What they saw was a refugee crisis that eclipses anything we’ve seen in modern times. What they saw was Partition. What they saw was “the war no one calls war.”

It might seem odd to interject the story of Partition into Kamala Khan’s story, especially since much of “Time and Again” happens without the show’s heroine on-screen. But this is her history — it is the thing that makes Kamala who she is, what ultimately makes Ms. Marvel into who she is — and Kamala has to understand it to realize her full potential. It is a powerful reminder about how history shapes us, even if we try hard not to remember. Only armed with that knowledge, as her great-grandmother Aisha tells her as she lays dying, does Kamala have everything that she needs. To save her family, to save herself and to become Ms. Marvel.

P-Valley Episode 204: “Demetherius”

Natalie: When Mercedes climbs the pole at the condo, she is strong and unafraid. She’s in full control of her sexuality. She is creating art. Farrah looks on, in open-mouthed awe, and sees Mercedes for who she is, for who Farrah’s been afraid of being. See, Farrah’s given it all up: she sacrificed her identity — her sexuality, her strength, her art — to maintain this veneer of respectability on the arm of her philandering football coach husband. While Mercedes defies gravity, Farrah fears the fall, eschewing who she is and what she is for the safety of respectability. She loves Mercedes a little bit for boldly being the things that she isn’t and she hates her a little bit for that too.

Farrah’s been good about keeping her dalliances a secret over the years (she likes pussy just as much as her husband, she’ll proclaim later) but, try as she might, she can’t this time…the pull to Mercedes’ light is just too strong. So Farrah interjects herself into her husband’s sponsorship — first with him, then without him — in hopes that the closer she draws to Mercedes, the less afraid she’ll be of the fall. Maybe she’ll fly. Maybe we will too.

And while Mercedes and Farrah’s story connects, “Demetherius” excels because it endeavors to tell so many stories that resonate and skillfully weave them together. The episode offers the full spectrum of black life — from love and lust to pain and hurt — and every bit of the reflection feels familiar. It is my story in the most unlikely of places.

Paper Girls 106: “Matinee”

Valerie Anne: I can’t talk about how mad I am that Paper Girls was canceled, but I CAN talk about how absolutely perfect this show captured the emotions of a wee closeted queer girl. Not all of us had the ability to time travel and literally SEE ourselves being cute and gay with our girlfriends, or get advice from our future partners, but almost all of us have IMAGINED it. I definitely did. And my 13-year-old self definitely had that fetal-in-the-bathroom, heart-racing, breath-catching panic when I forced myself to face the possibility that I was gay. That technically happened in episode 105, “A New Period,” but the reason I chose the following episode is because in it, after following her future gay self and her future gay girlfriend to the movies, KJ got something I didn’t: reassurance that it would be okay. That it might take time, and it won’t always be easy, but that it’s worth it to embrace it. She had proof that she could be gay AND older, gay AND loved, gay AND happy. And it healed my inner child a bit. It’s an episode and a conversation I won’t soon forget.

The L Word: Generation Q Episode 304: “Last To Know“

Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya: I feel like I’ve been waiting my entire life for a Halloween-themed episode of The L Word, and I had impossibly high expectations…and yet they were exceeded!!!!!!! Not only do we get fun shenanigans related to my favorite holiday but we also get some jokey horror movie moments via Alice and Taylor. And then the cherry on top is the excellent guest appearance by Daniel Sea. Instead of ignoring the show’s history of mistreating Max, the writers acknowledged it and moved forward, making Max feel fully realized and adding depth to his arc in specific and nuanced strokes. No tricks, all treats!

Riese: The way Max returned to this franchise and the care they took with his story was among Generation Q‘s most heartwarming and triumphant moment yet. It’s all the more impactful because the episode had a non-binary writer (Nova Cypress Black) and a non-binary director (Em Weinstein). And Alice’s minor spooking was a delight to witness.

Willow Episode 101: “The Gales”

Heather Hogan: Let me tell you what I love more than anything on this earth: queer women, with swords, going on quests to save the day. Luckily that particular sub-genre has really picked up steam in publishing, but it’s still not very common on TV. It’s especially rare on legacy properties. So you could have knocked me over with an actual feather when Disney+’s Willow series gave us not one, but two queer sword-wielding women, who happen to be completely smitten with each other — to a LIP SMOOCHING DEGREE — setting out with Willow himself to turn back the darkness that’s threatening to engulf the world. I would be watching this show anyway. It is, as Nic said in her review, like a TV show D&D campaign. Plus I’m a nerd child of the 80s; it’s like catnip to me. I’ve been waiting my whole life for it. And the fact that Kit and Jade are gay from the word go? Gay and so very different, with such complementary and conflicting loyalties, and such distinct personalities, and such built-in conflict? I am camped out in front of my TV waiting for more.

Yellowjackets 109: “Doomcoming“

Kayla Kumari Upadhyaya: I suppose I have a trend of really enjoying penultimate episodes of first seasons of queer TV series! It’s nearly impossible for me to pick a favorite episode of Yellowjackets, but fortunately for me, the vast majority of them aired in 2021, making it slightly easier to narrow down a top pick for 2022. “Doomcoming” is a thrilling, often uncomfortable episode of television that comes the closest to replicating the nightmarish cannibalism fever dream that is the series’ pilot. We finally get a glimpse into the extent of the horrors that the characters will soon experience in the woods, their starvation and delirium quickly turning a bacchanal into something far more disturbing and psychosexual. Daisy von Scherler Mayer’s direction is fantastic here.

Reboot Episode 104: “Girlfriends”

Heather Hogan: Reboot’s fourth episode reveals that basically every woman in the main cast is gay. Hannah’s a lesbian. Timberly’s queer. And Bree? Well, she was also gay last night. The episode opens with Hannah fretting that she’s never come out to her dad and reverting to a kind of teenage worry about it. Timberly and Bree sleep together, which leads to such a silly morning-after scene. Bree frantically Googles “does one time make you gay?” and “coming out later and life” and “oscar-winning lesbians” before Timberly wakes up and tells her to chill. They were just having a good fun time, which they both did, and there’s no need to get weird about. But of course Bree makes it as bananas and self-absorbed as possible, following Hannah’s moving coming out speech by reaching for Timberly’s hand to announce herself as “a sexual fluid.” It’s so funny. The funniest coming out(s) episode I’ve ever seen. I’m giggling out loud right now just remembering it.

Queer As Folk Episode 106: “Bleep”

Riese: “Bleep” flashes back between present day New Orleans, where the fractured, grieving group of queer friends at the show’s heart is celebrating Mardi Gras; and past-day Brodie (Devin Way) and Ruthie (Jessie James Keitel)’s senior year of high school. In the flashbacks, Brodie and Ruthie are secretly dating and Ruthie is figuring out that she’s not the wry and effeminate gay boy Brodie and her classmates pegged her as, but in fact is a trans woman. Co-written by producer Jaclyn Moore and directed by Ingrid Jungermann, it’s a testament to the power of having queer and trans voices behind and in front of the camera when telling our most intimate stories. It’s in this episode that the central conflict between Ruthie and Brodie is given texture and history, and we begin to understand why this connection often seems to be at odds with Ruthie’s relationship with her partner, Char. Sadly the show was cancelled before it got a chance to really breathe.

December 2022: What’s New and Gay on HBO Max, Netflix, Prime Video, Peacock, Hulu, Paramount+ and Prime Video?

It’s hard to believe that December is already upon us, and with it the enduring question: which lesbian, queer, bisexual and trans women characters can we anticipate to be streaming upon Netflix, HBO Max, Prime Video, Hulu, Peacock, Paramount+ and so forth? The answer is “not a whole lot” because it is now the holiday season, and despite a handful of queer developments in the past few years, we have been aggressively overlooked as a community in 2022.

I looked deeply into the contents of so very many new Christmas movies debuting this season and came up completely empty-handed regarding queer women and trans characters, although I would like to give my regards to the cis gay male community because they are about to have a banner year!

The only new Christmas movies announced thus far with queer women characters are Merry & Gay, which debuts December 1st on queer streaming platform DivaBoxOffice.TV and, allegedly, one called “Looking for Her” on Tubi, which I cannot find any info about aside from a brief mention in this Entertainment Weekly article.

Anyhow, let’s get into what else is on!

HBO Max’s LGBTQ+ Content for Gals, Gays and Theys in December 2022

Sort Of: Season Two Premiere – December 1

We’re so extremely very excited for the return of Sort Of, which won Most Groundbreaking Representation in the 2022 Autostraddle TV Awards. HBO Max has declared that it is the “season of love” for Sabi Mehboob (Bilal Baig) who’s looking for uncomplicated romance and for everybody in their lives to love each other. But drama is afoot: their Dad returns unexpectedly from Dubai, the Kaneko-Bauers are struggling with Bessy newly released from rehab and Bar Bük is facing a potential eviction and shutdown.

Gossip Girl: Season 2 Premiere – December 1

According to Collider, Season Two of this reboot about hot rich teenagers at an elite high school in New York City terrorized by revelatory text messages is “packed with as much campy fun and sharp pop culture references as the first go-around” while also containing “some of the first season’s flaws.” Queer character Monet will be working on her complicated relationship with her mother, continuing her quest for power and exploring her sexuality “a little more.”

Doom Patrol: Season 4 Premiere – December 8

In Season 4, “the team unexpectedly travels to the future to find an unwelcome surprise” and then, “faced with their imminent demise, the Doom Patrol must decide once and for all which is more important: their own happiness or the fate of the world?” Diane Guerrero is returning as lesbian character Kay Challis/Crazy Jane and Madeline ZIma is joining the cast as bisexual character Casey Brinke.Space Case, an everyday EMT with a peculiar origin story of her own sucked into the Doom Patrol’s escapades.

I Hate Suzie Too Premiere – December 22

I didn’t know we were getting another season of this delightful British black comedy! What a Christmas miracle! This three-part “anti-Christmas Christmas special” will find Suzie (Billie Piper) amid a rebrand with a new agent and a new job on a reality competition show, Dance Crazee. Her personal life remains rocky — she’s estranged from her best friend Naomi (a bisexual character played by Leila Farzad) and her ex-husband Cob, while trying very hard to create a good life for her son. Trans Iranian writer/actor Yaz Zadeh is also joining the cast.

Netflix’s LGBTQ+ Movies and TV Shows for December 2022

My Unorthodox Life: Season 2 – December 2

In Season Two, former ultra-orthodox business mogul Julie Haart battles for control of her empire while going through a divorce. Furthermore, she will be attempting to reconnect with her daughter Batsheva and guide her daughter Miriam through her first committed relationship with a woman.

The Circle: Season 5 – December 28

The fifth season of social media reality TV show “The Circle” has filled its one-bedroom apartments with singles, including the series’ first deaf contestant and quite a few LGBTQ people, including at least one bisexual woman.

I’m also getting a vibe from some of the stills from the Norwegian series “A Storm for Christmas,” out December 16, but obviously cannot confirm at this time.

Prime Video’s Offering To the LGBTQ+ Audience In December 2022

Something from Tiffany’s (2022) – December 9th

Two straight couples — Zoey Deutch is in one of them and Shay Mitchell is in the other — have a Tiffany’s box mix-up that causes their paths to cross and “sets off a series of twists and unexpected discoveries that lead them where they’re truly meant to be.” Importantly for us here, Jojo T. Gibbs and Javicia Leslie are lesbian wives!

The Almond & The Seahorse (2022) – available for rent on December 16 

Queer actress Rebel Wilson plays an archeologist grappling with her husband’s traumatic brain injury in this drama that also stars Charlotte Gainsbourg as an architect who’s female partner is suffering from a similar brain injury. Together they “fight to re-imagine a future” that has left them “adrift from the people they love” and, judging from the trailer, do find that solace in each other’s arms/mouths.

Hulu’s Lesbian and Queer and Trans Characters for December 2022

Life Partners (2014) – December 15

A delightful little comedy about “two codependent best friends — one straight girl, one lesbian — and the man who comes between them.”

Mack & Rita (2022) – December 23

30-year-old influencer Mack, who idolizes her dead grandmother and has always felt older than her peers, goes to a past-life regression situation and emerges in the body of a 70-year-old played by Diane Keaton. When this film came out pretty much everybody hated it. The alleged comedy also features Loretta Devine as Sharon, the mother of Mack’s best friend Carla (Taylour Paige), and Sharon is a queer woman who left her husband for a woman who then died.

LetterKenny: Season 11 – December 26

This comedy revolves around a small rural Canadian community and two siblings who run a small farm and produce stand. In 2019, Valerie called it “surprisingly queer.”

Peacock’s Queer Content for December 2022

Survivor’s Remorse: Seasons 1-4 – December 1

This critically acclaimed Starz dramedy is about the family of Cam Calloway, an NBA basketball player who’s just made the big time and moved his family from Boston’s Dorchester neighborhood to Atlanta. Erica Ash is Mary Charles “M-Chuck” Calloway, Cam’s lesbian half-sister, who Carmen wrote was “one of TV’s most important lesbian characters” and truly I cannot recommend this show enough, I loved it with my whole heart.

Bros (2022) – December 2

This major studio gay rom-com that got so much press about people not going to see it that nobody ended up going to see it is focused on the love story between two white cis gay men, but has “a queer world that is predominantly trans and POC — even if the white cis gay men are the only ones with real characters.” Drew has described it as “not revolutionary, but hilarious.”

The Real Housewives of Miami: Season 5 Premiere – December 8

The first four episodes of the fifth season will drop on December 8, bringing with it openly bisexual model-turned-farmhand Julia Lemigova, who is married to transphobic tennis star Martina Navritalova. According to Kayla, “Her main storylines are having goats, saying goodbye to her teen daughters who are moving away, and possibly being in love with and/or romantically loved by her best friend Adriana de Moura.”

Paramount+ Bisexual Content in December 202

Sampled: Season One Premiere – December 13

This travel documentary series “presents a visceral exploration of international cities from the viewpoint of traveling musicians on world tours, exploring Berlin, Monterrey, Amsterdam, London, Medellin and Tokyo.” The Tokyo episode features bisexual singer/songwriter Arlo Parks.

November 2022: What’s New and Gay on Netflix, HBO Max, Showtime, Peacock, Hulu, Disney+ and Prime Video?

As we head boldly in the direction of November, everybody’s favorite Introduction to December, one comes around to asking oneself: what is new in the world of television and film on channels such as Netflix, Hulu, Prime Video, Peacock, HBO Max and Showtime when it comes to lesbian, queer, bisexual, trans and otherwise-compelling-to-us characters? The answer is “not much” but also, it’s L Word Generation Q season so I think we’ll survive!

Netflix’s LGBTQ+ Movies and TV Shows for November 2022

Manifest: Season 4A – November 4

The fourth season of this drama about the aftermath of a mysterious plane crash is set two years after Grace’s murder, with the Stone family picking up the pieces as death day approaches. Bisexual character Saanvi (Parveen Kaur) is continuing her work at Eureka despite interference from the government and the lack of funding that comes when your operation is no longer supposed to exist.

Warrior Nun: Season 2 – November 10

I’m gonna be honest I have yet to cast my eyes upon this program and nothing I am reading about it is friendly to the perspective of an outsider so here is the season synopsis: “Ava and the Sister-Warriors of the OCS must find a way to defeat the angel, Adriel, as he attempts to build his following into the dominant religion on the planet.” One of the main characters, Sister Beatrice, is a lesbian!

Dead To Me: Season 3 – November 17

“Just pitched all of Dead to Me Season 3 to my partners at  Netflix and they’re excited and I’m excited and I CAN’T BELIEVE THEY’RE GONNA LET ME TELL THIS STORY,” Liz Feldman tweeted about the final season of Dead To Me. In Season Two, Judy hooked up with a cop played by Natalie Morales, who will be returning to the cast. There’s a trailer right here for you!

Elite: Season 6 – November 18

This Spanish bananas teenage soap opera about hot young people who love blackmail and filming sex on their mobile telephones is back for a sixth season of chaos as Las Encinas deals with the impact of the death of yet another student at their deadly school. The Elite Wiki says the season will tackle systemic issues like racism, sexism and LBGTI_phobia. Sadly, bisexual badass Beka has left the show but queer character Mencia is looking very flirty with new character Sara in promo pics! I love this homoerotic romp, it never ceases to entertain.

HBO Max’s LGBTQ+ Content for Gals, Gays and Theys in November 2022

The Big Brunch, Season One Premiere – November 10

This reality competition show hosted by Dan Levy brings together ten talented brunch chefs with big dreams and a commitment to their local communities and personal heritage. The contestants include queer private chef J Chong, who is “passionate about bringing Cantonese food to her sweet little mountain town of Asheville” and non-binary L.A-based chef Catie Randazzo, who says “brunch is the perfect place to meet up with friends and family to bond over pancakes, memories and mimosas.”

The Sex Lives of College Girls: Season Two – November 17

One of my favorite shows of 2021 is finally back, with the foursome of Kimberly, Leighton (a lesbian character played by queer actor Renee Rap), Whitney and Bela navigating their way through relationships, underwear parties and strip show fundraisers as they proceed merrily along their college journey. In the trailer, it appears Leighton will be dating 30 women at once and having a lot of sex!

Love, Lizzo (2022)

Over the course of three years, filmmakers followed Lizzo through the Cuz I Love You world tour, the pandemic, and recording her latest album and this “intimate documentary” is the result, promising to show the artist getting “candid about body-positivity, self-love, and recognizing Black women for their contributions.”

We’re Here: Season 3 – November 25

Bob the Drag Queen, Shangela, and Eureka continue to journey across America, helping innocent people stage one-night-only drag shows.

Prime Video’s Offerings To the LGBTQ+ Audience In November 2022

Leverage: Redemption Season 2 (Freevee) – November 16 (US + UK only)

In this follow-up to the original Leverage (2008 – 2012), reformed criminals — the Hitter, the Hacker, the Grifter and the Thief — have returned, and along with a new tech genius and corporate fixer, they’re ready to take on a new style of villain and provide leverage to people who need help. Queer actress Aleyse Shannon plays lesbian character Breanna Casey, Hardison’s foster sister and the new tech genius, a skilled hacker and engineer. This season, “the corporate bad guys and dirty dealers are stepping on the little guy in their quest for money and power and the Leverage team is back to teach them a lesson.”

Hulu’s Lesbian and Queer and Trans Characters for November 2022

All Rise, Season 3A – November 9

This drama that “pulls back the curtain on the court system and shows the chaotic and sometimes absurd lives of judges and attorneys as they work with bailiffs, clerks, cops and jurors to bring justice to the people of Los Angeles” was cancelled at CBS and revived by OWN for its third season. Marg Helgenberger plays (lesbian) Supervising Judge Lisa Benner.

Planet Sex with Cara Delevingne: Season One – November 29

The model/actress who identifies as “100% queer” in Episode One is bringing us all along on her “personal journey with sexuality” in this series that includes masturbation seminars and going to porn libraries as part of her voyage through “laboratories, different cultures, different individuals” and “her own mind and body.” A “more explicit version” of the show will be airing on the BBC, apparently Hulu’s cut is a bit tamer.

Wrong Place (2022) – November 25

This film, currently rocking a 0% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, features Chloe (Ashley Greene) as the recently-diagnosed-with-cancer daughter of security guard Frank (Bruce Willis), who takes her girlfriend Tammy (Stacey Danger) on a trip to the family cabin in the woods but then Frank witnesses an execution and and bla bla crime crime who cares, Chloe is taken hostage and must survive!

Showtime’s November 2022 Lesbian Content

The L Word: Generation Q: Season Three Premiere – November 18

Have you heard? There’s this show on Showtime and every single character is queer!! We will even be recapping it here right here on Autostraddle.com. I think I probably will be writing or talking about this show every day for the next three months!!!!!!! This season everybody is looking for “the one” and Finley’s coming back from rehab and Bette and Tina are getting back together and Gigi and Dani have to make some tough choices and Alice is dating around and you know what you’ll just have to tune in I think

Peacock’s Queer Content for November 2022

Nope (2022) – November 18

In this neo-Western science fiction horror film from Jordan Peele, Keke Palmer plays a character A. Tony describes as “the charismatic little lesbian of my dreams,” the sibling to Daniel Kaluuya’s OJ. Together they manage a horse ranch in California that handles horses for film & TV productions, discover something “wonderful and sinister in the skies above” that might offer a clue to who killed their father. They also must contend with the owner of an adjacent theme park trying to profit from the supernatural phenomenon lurking above them all.

Booksmart (2019) – November 20

Molly (Beanie Feldstein) and Amy (Kaitlyn Dever), have been best friends forever, committed to their schoolwork and future collegiate success, eschewing social lives and typical high school shenanigans. When they find out all their partying classmates are also headed to prestigious colleges they decide to go all out the night before graduation and do all the teenage nonsense they’d foresaken all this time. Amy is a lesbian and tonight she’s gonna go for it with her crush!

Apple TV+ November 2022 Homosexuals, Bisexuals & Etc

Mythic Quest: Season 3 Premiere – November 11

Ian and Poppy are heading up their new banner GrimPop and making names for themselves while tensions brew and close ties are whittled away at their rival studio, Mythic Quest. Queer actor Ashley Burch is a game tester, Rachel, whose romance with fellow tester Dana (Imani Hakim) sizzled in Season Two, but they’ll be long distance as we head into Season Three.

Shudder’s Queer Movie for November 2022

Anna and the Apocalypse (2017)

This British Christmas zombie musical has a lesbian character played by openly queer actor Sarah Swire. Drew describes it as “a zombie movie musical filled with charm and heart and even a little emotional devastation” with “a very poppy teen vibe.”

Disney+ is Gay in November 2022

Willow: Season One Premiere – November 30

This fantasy adventure television series is billed as a sequel to the 1988 film that for some reason gave me nightmares for three straight years. Six heroes are on a dangerous quest to far away places where they’ll face their inner demons and try to save their world. Trans British actress Talisa Garcia’s casting as the Queen (a cis character) in the series makes her the first openly trans actor cast in a Lucasfilm production. In the trailer, Jade (Erin Kellyman) and Kit (Ruby Cruz) sure do seem like they are going to be getting INTIMATE.

25 of the Silliest, Spookiest Plotlines From “Buffy the Vampire Slayer,” Ranked by Absurdity

One dark and stormy night, like so many queer people before me, I eagerly introduced a friend to the world of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. We watched episode after episode from Season 1 (at least, they watched. I watched them, with bated breath). Finally, they said, “huh! Are there going to be vampires in this vampire show?” And in that moment I realized that we had watched plotlines involving a giant praying mantis, body-switching cheerleaders, hyena possessions, demons on the internet…and the list went on! There had only been two episodes about actual vampires, and one of them was the pilot.

Decades before the bananas plotlines of teen shows like Pretty Little Liars and Riverdale would truly run wild, Buffy asked the question we didn’t know we needed: What if high school was actually hell? What if that substitute teacher all the boys have a crush on was a giant insect? What if the college guys were offering up ritual sacrifices in their pursuit of capitalist success? What if the first version of yourself who allowed themselves to acknowledge their gay desires was a vampire doppelgänger? What if that guy you met online wasn’t who he said he was? What if? What if?!

In seven years, Buffy gave us some truly wild episodes — and they could be truly spooky, too! And so, submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, I hereby present 25 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s silliest, spookiest plotlines, ranked by absurdity.

25. Where the Wild Things Are, episode 4×18

Don’t you hate it when the bad energy from when the frat house used to be a group home convinces you it’s wrong to have lustful feelings for your girlfriend? Me too!

24. Dead Man’s Party, episode 3×02

Joyce brings home a mask from the gallery where she works — too bad it’s one of those pesky masks that resurrects the dead! I’m sure this will all go just as well as Buffy’s reentry into Sunnydale after spending the summer in LA is going.

23. Something Blue, episode 4×09

When one of Willow’s spells goes awry, Spike and Buffy, who are currently mortal enemies, think they’re in love! Will “Wind Beneath My Wings” really be their wedding song?

22. Some Assembly Required, episode 2×02

Life comes at you pretty fast! One day, you’re the high school quarterback, the next you’re a resurrected corpse who is begging your brother to build you a girlfriend from body parts.

21. Fear, Itself, episode 4×04

I’m telling you, frat houses are scary places! This time, Oz inadvertently summons a demon who feeds on fear while setting up the sound equipment for a party, like ya do.

20. Hush, episode 4×10

This might just be the spookiest episode ever. Come for the scary, scary Gentleman, stay for Giles’ transparencies!

19. Out of Mind, Out of Sight, episode 1×11

Clea Duvall guest stars as a high school girl turned invisible by her unpopularity, and is PISSED about it. The saddest thing about this episode is how rarely we actually get to see Clea Duvall!

18. Gingerbread, episode 3×11

Two local kids are ostensibly murdered, and pretty soon Joyce is making signs and badges for Mothers Opposed to the Occult. Nice acronym, Ms. Summers!

17. Doppelgangland, episode 3×16

This is an extremely important episode of television! Willow meets her vampire doppelgänger who is…really kinda gay!

16. Graduation Day, episode 3×21

Listen, sometimes you’ve gotta stab your enemies-to-almost-lovers crush, save the world from the demon Mayor AND survive high school, all in the same day.

15. Reptile Boy, episode 2×05

In which high school Buffy decides to go to a college party at a frat house that may or may not have some hooded robes in their basement. Buffy, I am telling you, it is time to STAY AWAY FROM FRAT HOUSES.

14. Beer Bad, episode 4×05

Reason not to drink in college #238: You might…go…neolithic?

13. Superstar, episode 4×17

I love this episode with all my heart. 10/10, no notes. Go watch it right now. I’ll wait!

12. Living Conditions, episode 4×02

Sometimes you get the college roommate “from hell,” and sometimes…well, say hello to Kathy, who irons her jeans and may or may not be a demon on a cultural exchange!

11. Band Candy, episode 3×06

This episode proves two things I’ve always believed with all my heart: That every grown-up needs to get to be a kid now and then, and that high school fundraisers where students have to sell stuff are EVIL.

10. Witch, episode 1×03

What do you do when your cheerleading glory days are over? Unless you’re Monica Aldama, the only rational choice is to switch bodies with your daughter!

9. I Robot, You Jane, episode 1×08

On this week’s episode of Catfish, there’s a demon on the internet!

8. Doublemeat Palace, episode 6×12

Buffy’s foray into gainful employment goes just about how we’d expect.

7. The Pack, episode 1×06

Oh no! One trip to the zoo, and Xander’s acting like…a sixteen year-old boy!

6. Bad Eggs, episode 2×12

There’s something going on with the eggs the Health teacher has assigned to teach parental responsibility! High school sex ed is exactly this scary.

5. Go Fish, episode 2×20

There’s so much to unpack here. Sunnydale High has a pool? Sunnydale students party at a lake that’s never seen again? The swim team gets their own sauna? Buffy’s finding piles of skin around campus? Xander inexplicably has muscles?

4. Ted, episode 2×11

The only thing scarier than your parents divorce? Your mom rebounding with a homicidal robot who calls you “young lady.”

3. Halloween, episode 2×06

Buffy, kiddo, listen: that guy you’re trying to impress with your Halloween costume is about 250 years old. You do not want to be a damsel in distress!

2. Teacher’s Pet, episode 1×04

Never go to a second location with a sexy, mysterious substitute teacher. This is not up for debate!

1. The Puppet Show, episode 1×09

Four words: Ventriloquist. Dummy. Demon. Hunter.