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:
- DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?
- HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?
- IS LU PIXAR’S FIRST GAY MOVIE? MAYBE
- 'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP
- LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE
- PIXAR REPORTEDLY SCRAPPED GAY ‘LU’ STORYLE: ‘HOW DO WE DO THIS WHOUT A LOVE INTERT?’
DO DISNEY’S ‘LU’ HAVE A GAY CHARACTER?
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. * was luca meant to be gay *
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?
While Disney has not e on the rerd sayg that Lu and Alberto are gay, we (and many a Twter er!
HOW GAY IS PIXAR’S LU?
* was luca meant to be gay *
) believe that the great mds at Pixar may have meant for the movie’s plot to be an overall metaphor for gayns and acceptance.
I KNOW #Lu isn’t an explicly gay movie.
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!
IS LU PIXAR’S FIRST GAY MOVIE? MAYBE
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. Lu has arrived on Disney+ and, spe what Pixar says, the movie prents a strong allegory for growg up gay and fdg a nnectn wh other LGBTQ people.
This elis the fact that beg gay, queer, or LGBTQ+ is not simply a matter of partners or relatnships or sex.
Young gay people often feel very different om others before such feelgs velop, which n occur squarely the age bracket the story plac Lu and Alberto. In the ments, Casarosa is enuragg such terpretatn, meang that, if you see there, Lu is a gay story, Pixar's first feature film wh LGBTQ+ leads. The parallels of the boys secretly beg sea monsters and gay and LGBTQ+ people beg forced to hi their inti cuts closer than other mory groups, ratnalizg a queer readg of the movie.
'LU' DIRECTOR ADMS THEY 'TALKED ABOUT' MAKG THE LEADS GAY BUT CID TO FOC ON A 'PRE-ROMANCE' IENDSHIP
So while Pixar ni Lu is a gay story due to s settg and the age of s characters, viewers should read the LGBTQ+ narrative for what is. 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! ” “But why do they have to be gay?
” “But why n’t they be gay? 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).
LU MAY NOT BE A GAY NARRATIVE, BUT ’S ABSOLUTELY A QUEER ONE
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. 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 ? Whatever the director’s stated tent, the answer seems to be: as gay as you want to be.
PIXAR REPORTEDLY SCRAPPED GAY ‘LU’ STORYLE: ‘HOW DO WE DO THIS WHOUT A LOVE INTERT?’
Unfortunately, none of the tangible romantic chemistry between Lu and Alberto was ever ma official, and Lu director Enri Casarosa explaed that while makg the film's two lead characters gay was fely a possibily, he end up wantg to make the film about a "pre-romance" part of many children's liv. "The news of Giulia almost beg queer Lu on the heels of The Walt Disney Company beg hot water wh a lot of s LGBTQ+ fans for fundg and supportg legislators Florida who support the state's ntroversial "Don't Say Gay" bill. In the same Variety report mentned earlier, was also revealed that Pixar animators jt rtored a same-sex between two characters the upg Lightyear movie after a group of ncerned employe released a statement earlier March claimg executiv at Disney had censored all attempts to portray stanc of "overtly gay affectn" om storyl var Pixar is streamg on Disney+.
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. 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.