Contents:
- THE LAST OF US’ GEO GAY LOVE STORY COULD NOT BE MORE TIMELY
- ‘THE LAST OF US’ CONFIRMED THAT BILL WAS GAY YEARS AGO
- THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
- HBO’S THE LAST OF US IMPROV ON THE GAME’S IMPLIED GAY ROMANCE
- THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
- THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
- THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
- THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
THE LAST OF US’ GEO GAY LOVE STORY COULD NOT BE MORE TIMELY
Acrdg to crics who have seen the show, we're gettg a whole lot more of The Last of Us' gay characters than we Last of Us follows Joel and Ellie as they travel across a post-apolyptic Ameri tryg to avoid fung-fected zombi. What we got stead was a psule episo, and a particularly bracg one, given the show’s opprsively bleak mood th far: The hour is dited to the love story of Bill and Frank, a gay uple who—due ially to Bill’s skills as a bunker-stockg, booby-trappg, Don’t Tread on Me survivalist—manage to build a largely happy existence together an abandoned and eventually fortified ral hamlet for almost 20 years. Wh Bill and Frank, we were given a portra of love—specifilly gay love—that feels surprisg and urgent.
In our own 2023, we are not exactly lackg for media imag of whe gay men. For one thg, we see gay sire portrayed all s plexy, but wh a touch as light as a breeze playg through curtas.
‘THE LAST OF US’ CONFIRMED THAT BILL WAS GAY YEARS AGO
Bill’s is not a “type” of gay man I n say I’ve ever seen mastream media before, and watchg him slowly reveal and epen that aspect of himself wh Frank’s help—sexually, y (Hollywood: more hairy bear love scen please! But Bill and Frank create somethg else, a ltle oasis of their own that’s regnizably gay, full of quiet bety and joys the size of new strawberri. Frank wants to fix up the block and some of the “not stupid” shops—the we and furnure stor, the clothg boutique—bee he hop they might one day have unfected guts (which they eventually do, the form of Joel and Ts), but really bee makg thgs nice, pecially when nicens isn’t valued, is one of the great gay llgs.
As an echo of the gay experience wh AIDS, is, as veteran activist Peter Staley put a Facebook post, a ftg tribute to the “tenr love & bravery gay men summoned when facg ath durg the plague years, cludg those who did so on their own terms. How powerful, then, to see not only a gay uple given an entire hour of a marquee show, but a gay uple who are held up as the keepers of civilizatn, as stewards of bety, as emblems of human digny and possibily. “Long Long Time” has sparked several plats om the worst si of Twter about how The Last of Us allegedly shoehorned a gay relatnship.
THE LAST OF US’S GAY LOVE STORY BREAKS NEW GROUND FOR AN ENTIRE GENRE
But the fact is Bill has always been gay. So yeah, Bill has always been gay.
After wng turns Lookg, Tal of the Cy and The Whe Lot, he’s fast beg one of the medium’s most proment gay the episo nears s end, and Frank be curably sick, the uple’s last scen together are profoundly movg. The episo is, among other thgs, a subversn of the much-cricised “bury your gays” trope.
Here, y, are two gay characters who die.
HBO’S THE LAST OF US IMPROV ON THE GAME’S IMPLIED GAY ROMANCE
Bill is gay the game, but ’s referenced so vaguely that plenty of players missed . The cisn to keep muted, hted at a sgle le of dialogue and a hidn letter, was both praised and cricized — was easy to overlook, but also avoid a lot of gay-character trop, and allowed Bill to be a human and not “a maniftatn of sexualy, ” as Polygon’s Danielle Rien put at the time.
The game’s storyle don’t avoid trop altogether, though: It was cricized for “buryg s gays.
LGBTQ+ them are not somethg entirely new to The Last of Us anchise, as the first stallment of the seri also showsed a gay NPC and then a very graceful lbian kiss the Left Behd DLC.
THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
Bill is gay and had a relatnship wh a man lled Frank, who is later found ad the game, much to Bill's dismay.
Unlike Da, Bill tri to hi his homosexualy and ially only refers to Frank as someone he had red for. The Last of Us' director for episo three has revealed that he wanted to ‘trick’ dienc to watchg a gay love first two episos of the seri, based on the beloved 2013 game, follow Joel (Pedro Pasl) and Ellie (Bella Ramsey) as they stick together to survive a athly viral fectn that has n rampant across the US. ”Ah y, the old sneakg the shredd rrots to the brownie, who is gay, also spoke on Bill’s sexualy and how his characterizatn shatters LGBTQI+ stereotyp.
I would fely argue that Bill don’t e across as a gay man, ” he said.
THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
Shortly after the episo aired, one person wrote on Twter: “Was not prepared for the Last of Us or Nick Offerman to grab me by the throat and stroy me wh one of the most betiful gay storyl I've ever seen, but here we are. In a world where we see virtually nothg but awful stereotyp of gay men our ntent, the pictn of Bill & Frank (and their relatnship) was betiful and expertly handled. In stark ntrast to the game’s hopels take on their relatnship, the HBO seri’ versn of Bill and Frank feels like a reclaimg of a gay post-apolyptic romance the two never got to see, and the survival of a queer history the world of The Last of Us illtrat is long gone for the next Narrative Adventure About Doomed Teenage Dosrs Feels Too RealOffEnglishAs the HBO show, the game’s Bill is a gff survivalist so guard agast the world that even his partner, Frank, n’t break through and fd a real emotnal nnectn.
” Of urse, he knows Bill don’t have a girl wag for him out there the zombie-fected apolypse, but asks, as most gay men would have the mid 2000s, as a safety buffer to fd out the tth. There are hts of their liv as middle-aged gay men before the apolypse, such as their nversatns which Frank, for his own safety, tak the most direct route possible toward askg Bill if he’s gay, and Bill explag that his only prev partner was a woman. In the absence of existg, often opprsive social stctur, they make their own ntrast to Bill and Frank’s lived experience of navigatg society as gay men, knowledge of queer history feels pletely absent for queer youth The Last of Us, but that don’t feel like an oversight.
” It’s a fascatg se study how queer inty still manifts cultur that don’t acknowledge or teach , but is sad that Lev has to be a trailblazer whout the years of history and ntext of people that me before, and then face the persecutn that isn’t origal to The Last of Us, ’s somethg we see morn queer history, as new generatns of LGBTQ+ kids e up a time after the AIDS crisis took the liv of so many people generatns of gay men and the wir queer muny through the ‘80s and ‘90s.
THE LAST OF US DIRECTOR SAYS HE WANTED TO 'TRICK' DIENC TO WATCHG THE GAY ROMANCE STORY
“It was geo, and I was so not expectg , ” said Darn Lowenste, 41, a vio game nsultant, who is gay.
“Obvly, I’ve played the gam religly and I know there’s gay characters there, but I was not expectg an 80-mute … tearworthy piece of art.
” Queer-themed gam date as far back as 1992’s “Gay Bla, ” acrdg to the LGBTQ media advocy group GLAAD. Though Bill’s role the game is small, and his mentn of beg gay brief, did not go unnoticed by LGBTQ gamers like then, he was his early 20s and still the closet about his sexualy. ”Adaptatn giv gamers hope for more reprentatnSome queer viewers exprsed excement that Sunday's episo would expose even more people to gay vio game characters.