- Hey, it's Rowan, and
today I'm here with Calum. Calum is, as he's just
said for me to say to you, a gay YouTube boy, and today, we're basically going to be
reacting to queerbaiting. The first clip is from
show called Teen Wolf. We're gonna watch a couple
of quite infamous scenes. - Okay. (upbeat techno music) - I thought you liked girls. - I do like girls. Do you? - Absolutely.
- Great. - Do you also like boys? - Absolutely. Do you? ♪ I said I love you ♪ - So then, 'cause I thought
the queerbaiting there was on the girl. - No, so she was confirmed
to have a girlfriend in one of the earlier
episodes of the season, and then made out with
him and then basically came out as sort of
bisexual there quite openly. And then he has that realisation moment. - And it leaves, is it
leaving it open-ended whether he likes boys or not? - Mm-hmm, but so here's
the interesting thing. In the rest of that scene, he sort of also seems to
be having a realisation about the case that
they're solving, whatever, but they've placed that
realisation moment-- - There, deliberately.
- Immediately after. So they have plausible deniability. - That genuinely, I've
never ever seen that before, and that genuinely really annoys me, because they're doing that thing where it makes it so they get to appeal to the gay audience, but they
also don't get to annoy-- - Or like alienate.
- The homophobic people, like alienate people. - It's such, and the funny
thing about Teen Wolf is that Teen Wolf has had
a couple of gay characters and they use it all
the time in their press to kind of talk about and hype up how LGBT friendly they are. Ooh, it's one of the
classic queerbaiting shows. So there's actually another scene. - I'm a virgin, okay? And you know what that means? It means that my lack of sexual experience is now literally a threat to my life. I need to have sex, like right now. Someone needs to have sex with me today. Like someone needs to sex me right now. - All right, I'll do it. - Whoa! What? - How 'bout my place at 9:00? Plan to stay the night? I like to cuddle. (soft music) - That was so sweet. Are you kidding? - Yes, I'm kidding. - You know, you don't
toy with a guy's emotions like that, Danny. It's not attractive, all right? - [Tyler] You know who else is a virgin? - So Danny is a character
who's gay in the show. - But the other one, again. - But this one of the
main characters, Stiles, who apparently is straight, or who has not, there's never
been anything confirming he's anything other than straight. - So why do they keep
teasing us in this way? Why do they keep giving us
these little breadcrumbs? That, it's not even fun. That's just, it's like
borderline offensive. - Mm-hmm, yep. - Or just flat out offensive. - Yeah, I'm like, I'm
not even arguing that, because this is, it's the kind of scene that's such fanservice, but they'll, I think there are a lot of
shows that argue that it's like, well, don't you wanna see
strong male friendships that's healthy and heterosexual? Don't you think that
men deserve friendships? Why are you having to romanticise it? And I think it's such a
weird gaslighting thing to do to someone-- - Absolutely. - Like have scenes like
this, and then be like, why can't men just be comfortable
enough in their sexuality, and I'm like, comfortable
enough in their sexuality to want to sleep with other men? There's one more clip I
wanna show you of this. So this was a promotional
piece that came out. - Okay. - So this is a video
that Teen Wolf produced. - So it's not part of the show-- - Not part of the show. This is a video that was
produced by Teen Wolf, in order to encourage
people to vote for them. - Oh no, I know I'm
gonna hate this already. (water rippling) - Tyler. - Yeah? - Wake up. - No. - We're on a ship. Pun intended. - Whoa. Hey, man.
- Hey buddy. - Oh, hey, guys.
- Oh, hey, guys. - Whoa, there's like a whole
bunch of people right there. - Ah, didn't see the audience. We should-- - Oh, we were supposed
to tell them something. - We wanna ask if you guys could vote for Teen Wolf for the Teen Choice Awards. - For Choice Summer Show, right? - Best Choice Summer Show, yep. Can you please do it, 'cause we need you. - Please? - Ah, that's all that needs to be said. - We'll take more naps. I'm still tired. - Let's go back to sleep. - Like they're literally queerbaiting and not even hiding it. - Mm-hmm. - They're going, hey,
we want votes from you, so we're gonna pretend that we're gay, but we're never gonna actually confirm it. - Mm-hmm. - We're just gonna tease you with it. - Yep. - And that, and I get it,
like they're trying to be cute and they're trying to do it, and I'm sure that some
of the people behind this weren't doing it with malicious intent or maybe didn't even
realise it was problematic, but just give us proper representation, and don't, like we're not, representation is so
important to LGBT+ people, and I feel like using as it as something to dangle in front of us-- - Yeah. - As that, ooh, maybe this is a thing. - Maybe it'll happen. - But then never actually confirm it, it's frustrating beyond belief. - I think, yeah. - And a little bit of teasing is okay, like if you're planning to
make an LGBT+ character, and maybe you want to build up to that, that's different but I
mean, how many seasons has this show been going? - Like six or seven now. - And they've never confirmed this? - No, I mean, it's finished now. It's finished, the show's finished, and it's never been confirmed. The next one is for a
show called Riverdale. This is something that
someone sent me on Twitter. - Oh, no, I love Riverdale. - And I just watched this and I was like, what the fuck did I just watch? - No.
- Okay. - [Girls] And fight the fight. - Whoo, go Bulldogs! - Hmm. Ladies, where's the heat? Where's the sizzle? - Well, you haven't
seen our big finish yet. Don't freak out, just trust me. (upbeat music) - Okay, so this, watching this now this really really annoys
me and it was the music that really, because the way, they almost romanticised that moment. - And then swells up, and it's the kind of music
that you would expect for a first kiss from
a teen drama like this, if it was a straight couple
kissing for the first time in an actual relationship. - But this wasn't that. This was just two girls, and both of these characters are straight, and they never come out
as gay or otherwise. - It's just 'cause, and I think, as well, the two girls versus the two boys thing, I don't, I think it's unlikely that they would have two boys kissing in the same way. - Yes. - Because I think that
the way that lesbians are sexualized in a way
that's for people to view, and so it's really
interesting how queerbaiting, depending on the gender
of the people involved can have these really different
reasonings behind them, so this was kind of titillation
for straight audiences. - Yeah, absolutely. - As well as for lesbians
who wanted to see some kind of representation, and this was in the first episode, right? So this is like, in the first seasons. So this is queerbaiting
from the very start, getting them hooked on the first episode. - I feel like, as well, I feel like 99% of lesbian representation is always sexualization of lesbian women for a straight audience,
like you were saying. - Okay, so this next one is from a show, forgive me if I'm pronouncing this wrong, Rizzoli & Isles, which
is one I only ever see because of how much people talk about how queerbaited the two leads are. - Okay, yeah. - And this is just one clip. People sent me so many
clips from this show to demonstrate this. This is just one of them. - Listen, I don't wanna stand in the way of a great romance, okay? - What do you mean? - You and Tommy. I mean, clearly, opposites attract. - It's an evolutionary strategy to ensure healthy reproduction. - Okay, why do you gotta
go straight to breeding? All right, with my brother. - Look, I like Tommy a lot. But I love you, and I
hate it when you hate me, so I don't wanna do anything
to compromise our friendship. Good, 'cause I hate it
when I have to hate you. (laughing) - Sip it slowly. - That's the gayest shit
I've ever seen in my life. - That is, 'cause like, what is a bit upsetting is
that as that scene was opening, and unfolding, I could feel
my heart almost swelling, but to know that presumably, these characters aren't lesbians and they never become
lesbians is really sad, and again, like with one of the
other clips that we watched, the music, it's this romantic music that comes in to cue romance. - Yeah, in your head. - And that's not an accident. That's not-- - And saying like, if that had been a guy, and he'd have been like, I
don't wanna get in the way of your relationship with my brother, and then they'd have been like,
I like him, but I love you, that would've been like all the people, it would've been like,
ah, this is the start of the new ship on the show. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - This is them getting together by the end of the season. There's also an episode of this which is, that someone sent me,
as well, where one of, basically, they have to
go undercover as lesbians. - Oh, for God's sake. - And I think one of the difficult things with queerbaiting is we don't
know where the buck stops. We don't know who is actually responsible, so it's very easy to be annoyed
at the writers, I think, because you're like, well, you're the one who's writing this. - Yeah. - But I can see that there are some shows, like Korrasami in Legend
of Korra was a kids' show, and so the writers were explicitly told, you can't include this relationship in there specifically, but
they did as much as they could within the script to show-- - To include that.
- What was happening, and then, at the end, they basically walk into the sunset together, hand in hand. - So it's suggested. - So it's suggested as much they could do, and so it's, there's
no point in being angry with the writers then because the writers were doing everything they could, but we only know that because they were, have been so open since the show ended about exactly what they were
and weren't allowed to do, whereas most of these things
that are still on the air, the writers can't come out and be like, the producers are dickheads. - Yes, absolutely. - Because it's like, they want a job. But similarly, there
might be actors that say that they refuse to do
it if it get brought up, they could have agents of actors that say, my client doesn't wanna
take that kind of role. There's so many options that it could be and we don't know and for each one, it could be an individual situation, and I think that's what's
the most frustrating. - We don't know whose responsibility-- - Queer people don't know who to go to to be like, look, here's our case, here's the case we wanna put forward, and this is why it's problematic, but it's the reason why I have a policy where I don't think
representation is ever a spoiler. So I will fucking spoil something. If something is representation, I will tell you that it
has queer representation. I don't care if someone's like, oh, but I wanted it to be a surprise. I'm like, no, I want queer people to actually go and see this and they won't if they think it's straight
or offensive in some way. - Yeah, a person being
gay shouldn't be a big, scandalous, shocker moment. It shouldn't be a twist. - Yeah, exactly. - It's never a twist
that somebody's straight. Why should it be a twist
that somebody's gay? - Exactly. - I don't, yeah, I don't buy that at all. - Okay, so this is from
a TV show called Skam. Apparently, this is the
Italian version of it. - So these characters that
we're about to watch aren't gay. - Yeah, and this is the Italian one of it. - Right, okay. (upbeat music) (speaking foreign language) (group cheering) - Ah, that was a definitely, that was a definitely-- - Even though I knew it was queerbaiting, I even was pulled in by it, and genuinely thought
they were gonna kiss. - Mm. - But I feel like, there was like, not only was it her leaning in, being like that, but also,
her reaction was like, oh, it was like an I want this-- - Yeah, I want this, an uncertainty. That, to me, was like the
scene that you would have in a coming out narrative. - There's so much going on there. Again, you could say, oh,
it's just an accident. It wasn't intentional,
but the camera angles and everything else, it's
all foreshadowing romance. - Yeah, if you had a guy, again, I think it's like, if
you just have to put a guy in that position. If you had a guy who came to a girl, who leant over, stroked
her hair and then was like, oh, you had a bit of makeup on your face. Like that's such a
classic cliche of, like-- - Yeah, absolutely. - Heterosexual romance moment, or like, oh, there's an
eyelash on your cheek, like that kind of thing. - Bloody straight people. - So this is from a TV
show called Supergirl. - Okay. - Have you seen Supergirl before? - No.
- Okay. - The flowers, oh my God. You can't. You can't, like there's just so much stuff that would just be so romantic-- - Yeah. - If it was a heterosexual couple, like such a coding thing,
and I think with this show, I'm guessing based on the
fact that she's a Luther that the whole thing is
that you're not meant to maybe trust her or not trust her, so maybe the look, it's the
same with the Teen Wolf thing, where it's like, oh,
his look of realisation is actually about the case. It's like, oh, maybe her lingering look-- - Is actually-- - Is actually, ooh, she's
lingering 'cause she's evil and she's looking at her and stuff, but I'm like, you don't be
like, oh, you're my hero, oh, I've never had a
friend like you before. There's all of these
interesting little coded words. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. - That are super queer coding, so the idea of oh, you're
different, you're special, I've never had a friend like you before, we're special friends, it's all that kind of coding
that's the same as like, oh, yes, my spinster aunt who has special friend for 80 years. - Yeah, and I feel like it's almost like the kind of language that we
grow to hear and get used to, when we're growing up gay, all that language we do use
before that we come out, and all that kind of language
that we hear used around us, when people speak about us, and then suddenly, you're hearing it here, and it's like a deliberate undertone. - Yeah, exactly. - Of being queer, and
again, I just feel like, watching it, I was just imagining
some young 14-year-old kid who's a lesbian or gay or
queer and just sitting, watching it and feeling like, oh my God, like oh my God, I'm gonna
see myself on the screen. - Yeah. - And then uh-oh, absolutely not. - So this was a little bit different. So this is a film which
has said, explicitly, in the press material that
it has a gay character. - Okay. - And then these are the scenes with that gay character in, so. - Oh, God, I'm gonna be
so disappointed, aren't I? - This is Sulu in Star Trek. I'm gonna get my glasses on, 'cause I've gotta see the exact timestamp. So, this is clip number one. - [Jim] Of our extended
stay here in outer space. And the personal sacrifices they've made. We continue to search for new life-- - That was clip number one. Clip number two, hang on. I wrote down the time code. - Oh, no. - 10:41. - What I hear is that the
parks here are excellent. (swelling music) - Hey.
- So glad you-- (speech drowned out by music) - That was it. - That was, you know what? It makes me really sad
because even that little bit of a shred of a thing, I was like, ah. Like I'm so happy to see,
the fact that just seeing that little tiny moment
where it was even like, it was not explicit at all, and just like, but in the first clip, it shows a picture of just the daughter. - Yeah, it does, Calum. - And it's like--
- Yeah, it does. - If he's a gay character, and you wanna pop that in your press tour, then why is it just a
picture of the daughter? Why isn't it a family
picture of them together, or a picture of the
daughter and the husband? - Yeah. - And like, and when
they do have that moment, if you're watching that,
it could very much be like, oh, but, are they gay? Is that his friend? Is that the uncle? Is that the brother? - I know a lot of people who
thought it was his brother, and thought that the girl was
either the brother's daughter and so it was a niece,
or it was his daughter, but it was staying with his
brother while he was away. - Yeah. - Because otherwise, why wouldn't you have a picture of both
of them on your control? - It's such, it's the classic example of doing the absolute bare minimum. - I picked this outright, so
I very specifically was like, this is the, you have to
watch now for the gay. But I know people who
went in like, had no. - I might, yeah, I feel like, yeah. - Definitely no one who
hadn't heard the press before had any idea, and especially not, so my rule for representation
is whoever the target audience of the film is has to be able to know that that's what's happening
without having heard anything about it outside of the film. - Yeah. - And Star Trek is a family film. Like there's a film that
the whole family's meant to be able to come and see. That's what the age restriction is on it, and I don't think any
kids would've picked up on that whatsoever. - And the fact that, and I do feel like, if you hadn't been like,
okay, gays are coming, Calum, look at gays coming. - Look at the gays. - Like it was literally
like, blink if you miss it, and there was so many ways you could interpret that, and the fact that we are
people who we literally work in an industry where we
talk about representation and LGBT+ media all the time, and the fact that even we could miss that. - Yeah.
- Says a lot. Like, I feel like I've
got an eye like a hawk when I'm watching a
movie, like, gays, gays, where are the gays, where are the gays? And if we can miss it then you know, you want a 10 year old
kid to be able to spot it. - I'd also like to point out the fact that we have just watched
previous scenes of queerbaiting where the shows have said
those characters aren't queer and they kiss, and they
sent each other flowers, and they have had
romantic swells of music, and then we have this, which
is meant to be representation, and we had fuck all.
- Fuck all. - This is the character of
Trini, or the Yellow Power Ranger from the new Power Rangers movie, and this was one of those
ones that got announced in the news or at large that
she was a queer character, and I think that people went,
thinking they were gonna get either she was out or
that the movie itself was gonna allow her to
have a coming out story. - Yeah. - And like, this is the scene. - Nobody ever has to get to know me, and my parents don't have to
worry about my relationships. - [Zack] Hmm. Boyfriend troubles? - Yeah, boyfriend troubles. - Girlfriend troubles? - My family is so normal, too normal. They believe in labels. They'd like for me to dress differently, talk more, have the kind of
friends they want me to have. - So basically, that's how the scene goes, so it's like-- - That was stupid. That was so stupid. I don't know if that's just
been poorly made or what, but that was so not clear. The way she's like,
yeah, boyfriend troubles, and then out of nowhere, out of the sky-- - Mm-hmm. - He responds with oh,
girlfriend troubles, and then she doesn't confirm it! And then she goes on to talk really, in a really obscure way. - Generic way about my family is normal. - Yeah, and it's like--
- And like-- - Speaking in riddles. - And I think that, again,
this is one of those ones that this is a family movie. So it'd be like tweenagers
would be watching this, and I don't think that
if they'd've seen this, it's like, oh, it's kind of revolutionary that we even get the mention of possibly girlfriend
troubles in here, cool. But actually commit,
especially because she's given a straight answer to the
boyfriend troubles question, and especially because
this doesn't then become a coming out story. Like it's not like this is just one scene that eventually becomes
this coming out thing, and I think that, I get
that people might be like, oh, well, they thought
this would be the first in a number of Power Rangers movies, and maybe she'd come out in the later one, but I do think that with
the context of queerbaiting, you can't just hint at
nothing in the first one, because it's just as
easy for you to be like, oh, that didn't test
well, so we'll just gonna, it's great, 'cause now for the second one, we can just not have that bit in there. - Yeah, it's frustrating,
because they are trying to take a step forward
in the right direction, and I do have an appreciation for that, but it's like, it's
just been done so badly and so, they're being so safe with it. - And the thing about not liking labels, that annoys me so much,
because there is nothing wrong with someone not wanting
to label their sexuality, but to do that as representation, and to get away with it by being like, oh, she doesn't like labels, so therefore, we don't have to-- - So we're not gonna say it, uh-oh. - I'm like, just because
you don't like labels doesn't mean you can't
articulate yourself. It doesn't mean you can't
have discussions with people, can't be open with people, can't, or even if it's a closed-off character, have, as part of her character arc, have her trust someone, her
have an actual conversation, 'cause you can still explain in sentence, so I'm confused about this,
and I kinda feel this way for someone, but not for anyone else. I don't wanna label it
with a particular word-- - This is how I feel, yeah. - Like not liking labels
doesn't mean you just don't use words ever to describe anything. It just means that there's
not a particular label that suits you that's
like, gay, straight, bi. - Yeah.
- And that's fine. I do think that, as much
as possible right now, with the representation we have, we should be using labels, or at least having those
labels be discussed and offered up as options,
and then it's like-- - And then if you don't-- - Explicitly saying what, how you feel, and not just being like,
are you gay, straight, bi? And them being like, I don't like labels, and saying nothing else about it. - (laughing) And then moving on. - 'Cause that's not how that works. - Yeah, no, not at all. - So you ready? - I have-- - Here we go, the grand fucking finale, these two clips. So we're gonna start with, do you want to start
with Beauty and the Beast or do you want to start with
How to Train Your Dragon 2? - I have heard so much about
the Beauty and the Beast thing. - Okay, here we go. - That I've not seen it. I'm, oh, I know it's gonna make me angry. - Okay, right, you ready for it? - Yup. - Are you ready for it? ♪ Song as old as rhyme ♪ ♪ Beauty and the Beast ♪ - That was it. - That was it?
- That was it. - Wow. (Rowan chuckling and clapping) Oh, that's the stupidest
thing I've ever seen. All that hype, all that
hype about this movie having a gay scene, we get what, a second? - And the thing is, I get the idea that it might've been like, the director has a throwaway
comment in an interview where he's like, oh, yeah, we
have this sort of gay moment that we inserted in
there, and they're like, ooh, it got blown out of
proportion by the press, but I'm like, you have to
know, if you're making Disney, this was the only
representation of LGBT people that the Disney Studio made
the entire year of 2017. This guy just put the report out. There was no other representation and that was what counted
as representation. - (sighing) It just, it
literally leaves me speechless. That's so frustrating. That's so unbelievably frustrating. It's not even noticeable. Like people, what we've gotta remember is when we do things like this,
when we do reaction videos and when we talk about things like this, in the context of what
we're talking about it, you're really looking out for it, and you're really studying
every single scene. That's not how people consume content. - No. - We don't listen intently
to every single thing. - You don't watch every single-- - We don't watch every little scene. If I was watching that, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have even noticed. - Especially with this song. I can guarantee you if
I was listening to this and didn't know about it, I'd be fucking like belting this song. (Calum laughing)
I wouldn't be like, looking at the screen to
be like, oh, it's a dance. Let's see who's dancing with each other. I would be like, ♪ Beauty and the ♪ Like really intensely, so
yeah, no, completely agreed. - In the bin, in the bin. Do better, Disney. - Yeah, this is from How
to Train Your Dragon 2. - I can, wait, before you play this, I can already see that the
timestamp for this video is, it's four seconds. So very excited for this representation. - So this was also announced
previous to the film. This, I think, was actually
the first film-based version of this trend we're seeing, where it got announced beforehand. This was the first one
that I was aware of. - This is why I never married. This and one other reason. - That's it. Do you wanna see, I don't know if you missed that. Do you want it again?
(Calum laughing) - This is why I never married. - It's why I never married. - That and one other reason. - That was it, that was the entire. - Side eye, apparently-- - That was the entire thing. - Apparently side eye now
counts as LGBT+ representation. - This is the main character, Hiccup. This is his random dad's mate. They are looking, in the
context of this scene, they are looking at Hiccup's parents, who have just reunited. - Ah.
- After years and years apart. And I think they're like, I can't even remember what
the parents are doing, if the parents are arguing
or they're being weird or they're being gross or something, and Gober, Goober, whatever
the fuck his name is, that pioneer of LGBT representation, is basically saying to him,
about them being gross, this is why I never married. Oh, this, and one other reason. The one other reason,
apparently, being that he's gay. - Because you can take, you can really read that from this scene, 'cause he looks to the
right for one moment. - This is one of those ones, I think there are some of
these where you're like, do you know what? We might see two men
dancing and be like, oh, that, we understand what gay people are, and therefore, be like, oh,
dancing with a man, okay, blah, blah, blah. This, not even that kids
won't understand it, genuinely, you didn't understand it. We're here. - And we watched it multiple times. - Talking about it. You understand the context of this. I would never have known
if I hadn't have been reading all the gay media that
was talking about this film. I would have no idea. - That is so stupid, and also, can I just add one final thing to this? - Mm-hmm. - Is that the reason that he never married is because he's gay? - Yes, that is-- - Because that is also a great
message to send out there. - Mm-hmm.
- That's just brilliant. - I mean, they live in a Viking society, but it's also Viking
society with dragons-- - So you know, could
change thing up a bit. - In the movie, I remember
watching this scene, and thinking, oh, this is the
first hint of what's to come. - And then nothing. - And then that was it,
that was the whole thing. - I hate this. - I hate everything we had to do tonight. - This is worse than just
not having a gay character. You know?
- Mm-hmm, absolutely. - Like that does not count
in any way, shape or form. - Mm-mm. - I just, in the trash with this. - In the trash with all of that. - In the trash with all of it, honestly. - So I'm very sorry to
have put you through that extremely stressful situation
that we just had to go through and watch all of that trash. - I feel like I need to sit down and watch a load of LGBT+ movies now. - Yeah, actual representation. - With actual queer people existing. - They have those? If you wanna have a chat about it, have a chat in the
comments, we'll be there, or just on all of our social media. The links will be in the description. - Yay! - So until I see you next time,
