It’s Pride Month and we’re expecting all of the networks to look us straight in the face and say “you exist!” What precisely have Netfilx, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Peacock and HBO Max rustled up for the LGBTQ+ folks this June? It’s time for your monthly streaming guide! Let’s discuss.
Netflix’s June 2021 Lesbian, Gay and Bi Content
Summertime: Season 2 (Netflix Original) – June 3
Season One of this Italian teen series centered on the romance between Ale, a famous motorcyclist and Summer, an introvert working at the Grand Hotel for the summer to support her mother. Summer’s best friend Sofia is queer and has the hots for Summer. In Season 2, we’re returning to the Riviera, where I spy a lesbian with a bleached-blonde alternative lifestyle haircut kissing someone (maybe Sofia?).
Dancing Queens (2021) (Netflix Original) – June 3
Dylan Peterson’s got a job cleaning the drag club Queens where their star choreographer, Victor, spots her dancing and realizes WOW SHE’S A TALENT! She could save the Queens! Except she’s a girl. So she pretends to be a boy so she can be a drag queen?
Feel Good: Season 2 (Netflix Original) – June 4
One of our most beloved shows of 2020 is back with Season 2, in which Mae will attempt to salvage her relationship with George, recover from a relapse, figure out some gender stuff and some career stuff and just generally be really relate-able and weird and I can’t wait!
Workin’ Moms: Season 5 – June 15
In the show’s fifth season, it seems Frankie is on a better path than she’s has been before, with her realty business booming; a far cry from the gay disaster we met in season 1. And yet there are still plenty of shenanigans to be had with her house full of co-parenting queers.
Elite: Season 4 (Netflix Original) – June 18
The first three seasons of runaway hit Elite centered quite a few gay and bisexual male characters, but queer women remained in the background — Polo’s corrupt lesbian Moms and the subtle reveal of Rebeca’s bisexuality. In Season 4, her orientation will be thrust to the forefront at last because she for sure has a girlfriend in this trailer. Netflix has been teasing its first Sapphic storyline on Elite and in the words of so many other gay websites, “we are here for it.”
America: The Motion Picture (Netflix Original) – June 30
This R-rated animated revisionist history of the founding of America features Olivia Munn as Thomas Edison. She has an undercut and just looks really truly incredibly gay, but I have no confirmation of this, just hope.
Hulu’s LGBTQ+ Streaming Content For Girls, Gays and Theys in June 2021
Changing the Game (2021) – June 1
This documentary delves into the ever-present issue of transgender inclusion in sports, following athletes at all stages of their athletic seasons and personal lives — like Sarah, a skier and teen policymaker in New Hampshire and Andraya, a track star in Connecticut openly competing on the girls track team. At the center of the narrative is Mack Beggs, who made headlines when he won the Texas State Championship in girls wrestling.
Jennifer’s Body (2009) – June 1
As Erin wrote of this controversial Megan Fox / Amanda Seyfried vehicle: “This film explores some of my favorite themes all in one glossy, campy, self-aware package: misandry, women being extremely gay together, principled revenge, and the triumph of aught culture.”
Love, Victor: Season 2 – June 11
Victor Salzar came out as gay to his family in the Season One finale of Love, Victor — the Hulu teen romcom spin-off series of the original Love, Simon — and now that he’s out, the whole series gets gayer as Victor builds a larger network of queer friends and tries to figure out what being gay really means to him. If you’re patient and eagled eyed, sources tell me that there’s also some light gay girl vibes to be on the lookout for in Season Two.
Motherland Fort Salem: Season 2 Premiere (Freeform) – June 23
In Season 2, Raelle, Tally and Abigail will be confronting the following: dangerous magic, higher stakes, a new threat from an ancient group of witch hunters called the Camarilla. Their training gets more serious as the girls move up to War College, where everything will be pushed to the limits! We’re also getting a new non-binary character, M, a second-year soldier in War College who is very protective of her comrades.
What Is Amazon Prime Video Offering The Homosexuals In June 2021?
Rent (2005) – June 1
How do you measure your life in love? The only way to find out is to watch this film about a bunch of interesting artists some of whom are queer and/or HIV positive and are all friends with the same annoying white straight cis man. There are songs! One of them is called “Take Me Or Leave Me.” If you ever wanna hear me sing it in my car just let me know.
Black Swan (2010) – June 1
A very intense film in which there is A SEXUAL SCENE involving rapidly unraveling ballerina Natalie Portman and freewheeling dancer Mila Kunis. I feel like they’re gonna put this in the LGBTQ Stories section and I am going to side-eye that.
Fried Green Tomatoes (1991) – June 1
Join us as a gay book (Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe) by a gay author (Fannie Flagg) gets turned into an allegedly not-gay movie about tomboy Idgie and her gal pal Ruth who run a diner together and deal with some pretty rough situations!
Grandma (2015) – June 1
Lily Tomlin stars as the titular Grandma, Elle, a lesbian poet and widow who gets a visit from her teenage granddaughter who needs money for an abortion. Thus the two head on an all-day journey into Elle’s past trying to score the cash to make it happen.
Orlando (1993) – June 1
Based on bisexual depressive Virginia Woolf’s Orlando, this film set in the 17th-18th century is the touching tale of a nobleman (Tilda Swinton) who inherits his parents house from Queen Exliabeth I (Quentin Crisp), has a disastrous affair with a Russian Princess and then wakes up ia woman and returns home to see if she can still keep the property.
Saving Face (2005) – June 1
One of the best lesbian movies of all time, Alice Wu’s Saving Face is a tender and very funny love story between two Chinese-American women — one a confident dancer and the other a closeted doctor living with her Mom who also has plenty of her own drama.
Flack: Season 2 – June 11
Anna Paquin is a messy bisexual PR agent in Flack, and Season 2 promises you know, more catastrophes that she will fix. Also I believe her sister shows up and calls her a sex-and-drugs addict and a narcissist, and then Robyn tries to get sober but also maybe gets pregnant? Martha Plimpton joins as Robyn’s Mom.
Bosch: Season 7 – June 25
Apparently in an earlier season of this procedural, the closeted LAPD Homicide commanding officer dated a character played by Rose Rollins!?!?! Anyhow that’s ancient history and Rose has moved but I think that the commanding officer is still in it and so; this show trucks on.
“Manhãs de Setembro” (“September Mornings”): Limited Series – June 25
This project follows “the journey of a trans woman who leaves her hometown” in search of being a free and independent women. Five 30-minute episodes tell Cassandra’s story as she gets a place of her own, a boyfriend she loves, a job as a courier in downtown São Paulo and a shot at fulfilling her dream at being a cover artist of Vanusa. But things take an unexpected turn when her ex, Leide (Karine Teles), shows up with a person she claims is Cassandra’s son.
Also this month on Amazon Prime Video, some premium subscription-channel series are available for free: Stonewall Uprising (2010), Season One of Queer as Folk, Season One of The L Word: Generation Q and Season One of Work in Progress.
Here’s What HBO Max Is Cooking Up For The Gays This Pride Month
Iris (2001) – June 1
A biographical drama about bisexual novelist Iris Murdoch’s relationship with her husband John Bayley, starring Judi Dench as old Iris and Kate Winslet as young Iris.
Kajillionaire (2020) – June 1
Bisexual writer/director/weirdo Miranda July’s third film is “a careful, long-game-playing meditation on how we can learn to parent ourselves when our own families refuse to do the job.” Starring Evan Rachel Wood, the film is both a “dreamy, golden-hour queer love story set amidst the friendly outlandishness of contemporary Los Angeles” and an “unsettling, fluorescent portrait of familial betrayal.”
Feast of Love (2007) – June 1
Based on the Charles Baxter novel I personally loved quite some time ago, this film looks at “love and its many permutations,” set in Portland and centered on local community college professor Harry Stevenson. One of the stories is about Bradley, a cafe owner whose wife of six years (Selma Blair) meets a girl named Jenny (Stana Katic) playing softball and well, you can imagine where that goes. (LESBIANS)
Betty: Season 2 (HBO Original) – June 11
Betty’s long-awaited return sees all our faves returning to their skateboards and New York and being gay and dancing and doing drugs and making mistakes and wearing masks around their chins!
Revolution Rent (HBO Documentary) – June 15
Neil Patrick Harris, Andy Señor Jr., and Victor Patrick Alvarez bring this documentary about Señor Jr’s experience traveling to Cuba and directing a production of Rent, the country’s first Broadway musical by an American company in over 50 years, which involved reimagining the show in a Cuban context.
Genera+ion Season 1: Part 2 (HBO Original) – June 17
The remaining episodes of Genera+ion, the edgy queer teen drama that captured our hearts earlier this year (?!) will drop into your lives on June 17th. With a few very brief exceptions, the trailer is mostly indifferent to the lives of heterosexuals. I truly cannot wait to watch our favorite angsty teens sort through all their messy gay feelings!
LFG (HBO Documentary) – June 24
A “no-holds-barred” inside account of the U.S. women’s national team’s ongoing fight for equal pay, as told by Megan Rapinoe, Jessica McDonald, Kelley O’Hara and others. LFG stands for “Let’s Fucking Go” by the way. Fun fact!
Peacock’s New Queer Content for June 2021
Milk (2008) – June 1
Allison Pill plays lesbian activist Anne Kronenberg in this excellent Harvey Milk biopic.
Rebellion!: Stonewall (2019) – June 1
This film is, I believe, about Stonewall, although somehow its existence managed to eclipse our knowledge at the time and even until this day. IMDB has characters like Sylvia Rivera and “butch lesbian” so um, YMMV. Let’s see what this is!
Transcendent: Seasons 1-2 – June 1
This Fuse reality TV show from 2015-2016 follows a group of trans women who perform at the San Francisco nightclub AsiaSF.
We Are Lady Parts: Season 1 (Peacock Original) – June 3
Amina Hussain is a geeky microbiology PhD student looking for a husband who instead finds herself in a punk band as their unlikely lead guitarist. Lady Parts’ drummer, Ayesha, is queer, as is a culture writer/influencer who wants to help the band grow in popularity. “The brilliance of We Are Lady Parts lies in the sharing of multiple truths of Muslim identity,” writes The Stylist. “From what it’s like to be queer to what it’s like to be a Black Muslim woman and even having parents that encourage Amina’s thirst for punk rock.”
Absolutely LOVE this list and look forward to it every 1st of the month!
May I contribute with one more show?
On June 25th, Amazon Prime premieres “Manhãs de Setembro” (“September Mornings”), an original that follows “the journey of a trans woman who leaves her hometown and doesn’t compromise her goal to be a free and independent woman” (Imdb).
Here’s the international trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3iE_imB_7s
oooo cool yes i will add!
I’m several episodes into “We are Lady Parts”, and Ayesha is not the one I suspected of being queer.
same, but i enjoyed it all the same
Yes! Please watch Changing the Game, everyone — I saw it a couple years back at a festival and one of the featured teens is my partner’s niece. It’s really, really well done and quite the labor of love.
It’s been a while but wasn’t the doctor closeted and the one living with Joan Chen and the other the dancer?
I’m so glad Betty is coming back!
This list is a feast 😍
“bisexual depressive Virginia Woolf’s Orlando”
This is such a nice flat portable take. I’m gonna make it my new handle, too.
Also: 17th to 20th centuries. The book ends, famously, on the day it was published (the present day!) and the film updates this to then present day.
I feel the need to throw Bosch (on Prime) some love — it’s a good show, more of a noir than a procedural, Lieutenant Grace Billetts is awesome (and played by Amy Aquino) and was never closeted and is a lead character!
Oh gosh, am I going to watch RENT on Amazon Prime even though I own it on DVD and never watch it? (That’s a rhetorical question, of course I am.) My favorite part is Adam Pascal’s hair, and also the part where Mark is supposed to be on the phone but instead he’s just on the roof of a building singing his phone call into the air. It’s a great movie.
We Are Lady Parts is possibly my favorite thing ever (although it took an episode or two before I was sure I was a fan)
Thanks for this one. I was waiting for Flack S2.