Pixar director Enri Casarosa drew heavily om faiar g-out stori and other "gay narrative" trop for his animated movie Lu. (It’s all there, om nversn therapy to passg privilege.) But he’s still nyg any gay ntent, shuttg down queer viewers who see themselv the film. The bate mirrors other s, om Star Wars’ Le Skywalker to Anthony Mackie’s ments on The Faln and the Wter Soldier, where LBGTQ+ viewers terpret stori through their own lens, and the creators try to ny them. Here’s why eedom of terpretatn matters.
Contents:
- HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?
- IS LU PIXAR’S FIRST GAY MOVIE? MAYBE
- DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?
- SORRY, FOLKS, PIXAR’S LU ISN’T GAY
- LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE
- 'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP
- IS LU A GAY METAPHOR?
- WA A SEC — ARE THE MA CHARACTERS PIXAR’S ‘LU’ GAY?
- LU DIRECTOR SAYS DISNEY FILM NEARLY FEATURED GAY ROMANCE BETWEEN MA CHARACTERS: ‘WE TALKED ABOUT ’
- LU FANS ARE NVCED 'S A GAY LOVE STORY AND THE MEM ARE INIC
HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?
Lu is marketed as a "metaphor for anythg" but the sea monster setup is a perfect allegory for a gay story, and LGBTQ viewers n read that way. * is luca gay from disney *
When director Enri Casarosa says he didn’t tend to make Lu a gay romance, I believe him. OK, but isn’t still a ltle b gay? Still, there have been so many siar discsns about queer inty Disney movi that you n almost predict the disurse ahead of time: “They’re gay!
IS LU PIXAR’S FIRST GAY MOVIE? MAYBE
* is luca gay from disney *
” “But why do they have to be gay? ” “But why n’t they be gay?
DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?
For both live-actn and animated movi, the stud has overhyped what have bee known as “exclively gay moments, ” ty morsels of reprentatn that are eher so subtle you hardly notice them (a kiss between two women the background of a Star Wars movie) or so plot-irrelevant that they n be easily chopped or overlooked by ternatnal censors (here’s lookg at you, Endgame’s unnamed Grievg Man). Meanwhile, while Disney has ngratulated self and claimed to blaze new trails, plenty of other animatn studs have been ahead of them: Laika’s ParaNorman, for example, featured an openly gay character way back 2012.
SORRY, FOLKS, PIXAR’S LU ISN’T GAY
Ironilly, the Disney movie that gave the term “exclively gay moment” the first place took a different tack: The live-actn Bety and the Beast’s LeFou is more the spir of the stud’s long-standg tradn of strongly queer-d, if not explicly gay, villas.
Fans have sce picked up on homoerotic unrton Raya and the Last Dragon and the live-actn Mulan, but the movi rema rabow Rorschach tts, wh dienc havg to read between the l or project their own meangs to fd queer reprentatn. How gay is ?
LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE
Whatever the director’s stated tent, the answer seems to be: as gay as you want to be. That outle holds an obv potential for queer allegory, and ed many Pixar fans trackg the film’s velopment quickly labeled Lu as the stud’s “gay movie”—a g-out story to be placed on Pixar’s mantle alongsi s medatns on grief, artistic exprsn, lonels, Ayn Rand-ian objectivism, and parentg.
” That suggts a limed unrstandg of gay growg up, particularly of when our feelgs of affectn and special closens and difference n first velop. That character, played tartly but briefly by John McCrea, is slightly ls of a scrap than the embarrassgly ballyhooed “exclively gay moment” 2017’s Bety and the Beast—but Artie still barely registered amid Cella’s cynil clamor. Last year, Disney punted Love, Victor—a seri spoff of the feature film Love, Simon, the first stud film about a gay kid g out—om Disney+ to Hulu, clarg the young adult show a better f for that more grownup streamg service.
'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP
Greg Gayne/HuluThe first season of Love, Victor very much felt like a show tend for Disney+ that somehow wound up alongsi Handmaid’s Tale. Love, Victor season two admirably exam life post-g out, as Victor (Michael Cimo) navigat his nascent relatnship wh barista Benji (Gee Sear) and tri to get his mother, Isabel (Ana Ortiz, queen of playg TV moms of gay kids), to fully accept his inty.
IS LU A GAY METAPHOR?
Victor and Benji grapple wh tra-gay nflicts jt as much as they do wh the wary nsiratns of the straight world.
Jt a ltle over halfway through Pri Month, we are seeg people flock to Twter to prent their theori on why and how the lead duo Disney and Pixar’s latt g-of-age animated feature film, Lu, is, fact, gay.
So do Lu have a gay character after all, or is this jt a se of fans creatg a headnon that’s gag tractn and onle clout? Do Lu have a gay character?
WA A SEC — ARE THE MA CHARACTERS PIXAR’S ‘LU’ GAY?
While Disney has not e on the rerd sayg that Lu and Alberto are gay, we (and many a Twter er!
) believe that the great mds at Pixar may have meant for the movie’s plot to be an overall metaphor for gayns and acceptance.
LU DIRECTOR SAYS DISNEY FILM NEARLY FEATURED GAY ROMANCE BETWEEN MA CHARACTERS: ‘WE TALKED ABOUT ’
I KNOW #Lu isn’t an explicly gay movie.
LU FANS ARE NVCED 'S A GAY LOVE STORY AND THE MEM ARE INIC
So while no character Lu has been intified by Disney outright as gay, we n very well read the subtext, metaphors, and straight-up visual evince (all of those nocent touch! Lu is marketed as a "metaphor for anythg" but the sea monster setup is a perfect allegory for a gay story, and LGBTQ viewers n read that way.