“Oh noes! Johnny Storm might be (whisper) black this time!”

As it turns out, the reboot of The Fantastic Four films may cast a new Johnny Storm, and word has it that he could be . . .

Wait for it . . .

. . . black.

(Which also means that Sue Storm may also wind up being . . . . *whisper* black.)

Shhhhh!

I know we’re not supposed to be noticing that, being that we’re all post-racial and colorblind and all. But it doesn’t stop folks from pitching a fucking fit. Some shit about it betraying the original vision for the character or something. Y’know, kinda like Heimdall in Thor.

If anybody has seen Chronicle, the option of having Michael B. Jordan play Johnny Storm makes a whole lot of sense. Young, hot-headed dude who loves the fact that he’s a fucking superhero? Yeah, I can see it.

But when it’s Benadryl Cucumbersnatch playing an iconic man of color villain who was so awesome that even James T. Motherfucking Kirk had to show respect, all of a sudden it’s about the best person for the job.

Riiiiight.

I seent yo’ ass.

Historical Inaccuracy: No Homosexuality in Medieval Europe

Anyone who has spent any amount of time in the realm of  Fantasy Fandom is bound to come up against a most foul lot who would crusade for marginalisations and non-representation in fictional worlds based on myths of Medieval Europe. “HISTORICAL ACCURACY!” is what they would bellow shrilly, believing that they have triumphed with their superior yet concise reasoning. Yet they fail to perceive history’s lack of frail folk whose ears are tipped and who often are caricature of the supposed supremacy of the supposed white race. Nor do they question the existence of terrible winged and scaled worms who vomit the element of fire: creatures which have not been proven to have lived in the Middle Ages.

The Concept of Fantasy is, however, not powerful enough to destroy this wretched enemy. It must be wielded with its twin, the Uncovering of Historical Lies, in order to strike the Dudebro Inquisition at its very foundation. For you see, the great irony is that their Historical Accuracy is inaccurate.

…

Now is where I drop the gimmick and say that this shall be the first post in an irregular series which tries to debunk myths about history. Specifically, history which is drawn upon by works in the fantasy genre. This one, as the title says, will be about homosexual attitudes and behaviour in Medieval Europe.

If there were no homosexuality back then, why would the Church have rules against it? Did they throw charges of sodomy at everyone they did not like without knowing what the word meant? Of course not. Homosexuality was heavily suppressed during the Middle Ages, but there’s a difference between that and total non-existence. It is possible to create a culture where a people who once normalises or glorifies homosexual acts would come to lose the ability of same-gender attraction. But to completely eradicate these impulses which are so natural that they are observed in about 1500 animal species? Impossible.

Norwescon 36

Hello everyone, I had the great honour of driving down to Seattle last weekend and meeting up with the super awesome Dennis Upkins!

And not only that, but I got an interview with him too!

And then I recorded a panel he was a part of called Next Gen Publishing.

Apologies for the shakiness of it, and the audio as well. This was literally a last minute arrangement so things were not the best, but as the questions were explained by the panel, hopefully, you’re not missing out on much.

Enjoy!

Book Premise FAIL, or, Some Books I’ll Never Be Reading

So I dithered about posting on these because I don’t like bringing the authors any additional publicity.  For many books, the worst enemy is obscurity.  But I had to share my pain, folks.

Remember Victoria Foyt and Save the Pearls?  Remember how we all wondered how any author could hit such serious WTF territory?

I bring you the latest Foyt-esque forays from two other authors.  You’re welcome.

The Evil Queen, Snow White, and Mammy

It’s still February, so y’all ain’t off the hook with this Black shit just yet.

Just kidding. This is Ars Marginal. Every month is Black History Month here. Or, to be more accurate, Everybody But Straight White Men’s History Month.

Anyway, this is something of a follow-up post to this one I made a while back about the Strong Black Woman stereotype and my identifying with the Head Bad-Ass Mother Fucking Bitch In Charge (HBAMFBIC) Regina Mills (aka the Evil Queen) from ABC’s Once Upon A Time.

I read this Tumblr post (and you should too) when a line caught me by surprise and hit me right in the Blackness.

That is not a stepmother. That is a house slave.

When you look at Regina’s situation, that’s exactly what the fuck she is.

Sinking Ships – The Ginnifer Torpedo

Hello everyone, and welcome to a special episode in which I discuss actress Ginnifer Goodwin’s homophobic comments about the fan ship, SwanQueen, which si the pairing of Regina Mills and Emma Swan.

And here it is again on blip.tv.

Enjoy!

Look at more of Linnpuzzle’s artwork here.

Look at more of hamstr’s artwork here.

Is it only empowerment when a White girl picks up a sword? (Revised and reposted from Tumblr)

Here’s something I wanted to talk about every time a movie comes out that shows us an “empowered” White girl and says how she’s some sort of role model for all women because she shows that women don’t have to be fragile or delicate.

As much as I loved Brave and despised Snow White and the Huntsman, people saying this sort of thing really, really irritates me.

Know why it irritates me? Because so many women don’t get to be seen as fragile, delicate, or vulnerable. Most of these women are women who look like me.

The New Dresden Files Book — I Can’t Be the Only Person Who . . .

Trigger warning for discussion of rape.

“Just Don’t Watch It”

As I watch many many many programmes and critique them I inevitably get someone saying the same damn thing:

“Just don’t watch it!”

There are many replies to this, but irritation has worn me down until even I, who am not generally given to swearing, have to ask

“What the fuck do you expect me to watch?!”

Seriously. I’m a gay man who likes to watch the fantastic – primarily Urban fantasy, what do I watch? Because we’ve now reviewed 37 television series from start to finish (or current) and we’ve got two – TWO – with a GBLT protagonist. Lost Girl, headed by a bisexual woman and her true love/primary love interest is already underscored as being a man. And Sanctuary where Helen Magnus is a bisexual woman – you may have missed it though since it was one reference in one episode of 4 seasons – the rest of the time was focused on men. We don’t even have a GBLT person as part of an ensemble cast.

20 of those don’t have even a brief, token GBLT presence. Not for one second, not a bit actor, not a one off, not a thing. Completely and utterly straight from start to finish. Some of them have managed to reach their 5^th season without any GBLT people.

4 of them have a GBLT character who appeared for one or two episodes – out of 8 seasons in some cases (yes, Supernatural, that’s you. Though your subtext means the slash fans love you and ignore your erasure) Of course that doesn’t stop these shows have a running commentary of bad gay jokes (Being Human US, Misfits – ye gods Misfits, the very poster child of a hot mess) or used these single episodes to push the horrible tropes (Being Human UK with the gay vampire killing his human lover).

2 of them have a recurring token. But, frankly, that’s generously deciding the Manscaping medieval prince who faints at the sight of blood (the dead Renly) and his lover, the knight of flowers count as tokens rather than one-offs on Game of Thrones. And despite Danny being nothing more than a token who only shows up in one episode in four whenever one of the straight characters needs something, Teen Wolf will always be loved by the slashers (If you want any greater evidence of how this damages us, both Racialicious and Kiss My Wonder Woman have actually praised Teen Wolf for their handling of sexuality while criticising it for its greater inclusion of other marginalised people. Yay for homophobic double standards!)

2 of them have recurring minor characters – but while I love Dark Angel’s Original Cindy, as the series progresses she just becomes more and more of a support character for Max. It’s pure desperation that has me include Bill Forbes 5 episodes on The Vampire Diaries a recurring character – and after his conversion therapy episode I could do without that as well.

So that leaves me with 7 shows with major GBL characters. With the protagonists that brings it to 9 out of 37

And these 7? We have American Horror Story with raped and murdered gay men, raped lesbian and graphic depictions of conversion therapy. Yay. I couldn’t even watch it in one sitting.

Almighty Johnsons has Sjofen, “the goddess who goes both ways” who has a one night, off-camera fling with Axel (a man) when he’s magically turned into woman and then focuses entirely on men from then on – but they make lots of jokes about her.

Hex and it’s many many many many, ye gods many, dead gay men and lesbians. Sometimes the same character died twice.

True Blood which I’ve already complained about.

Bedlam with a closeted character who was finally revealed as gay, had one kiss with a guy before vanishing without explanation.

So, that leaves Warehouse 13 (which, on day, will stop putting Jenks in the plot box and leave the gay jokes behind), Buffy (which wiser folks than I have complained about)

This is the genre I’m watching. This is what I get served up to me. So, again, what the fuck do I watch? What do I watch which doesn’t prompt me to criticise? And this is just criticising on grounds of sexuality – throw in race, gender and ability as well and the hot mess just gets hotter and messier.

There now follows a moment where everyone tells me to watch Glee or Modern Family or some other soap and sitcom, completely ignoring the genre that interests me. It’s ridiculous that when faced with an entire genre of erasure and shit – multiple genres of erasure and shit – the answer is to try different genres! I don’t like sitcoms, I hate soaps, I loathe high school dramas and I don’t remotely see the attraction of musicals. I don’t want to be bored to tears so I can cling to a show that actually realises we exist.

This is the same reason I rarely boycott shows, because I end up boycotting my entire genre and all the shows I have any chance of actually enjoying. Is that depressing? Yes, of course it is – but that’s reality but that’s also why I want to change things.

Which is why I won’t “stop watching it”. I will keep watching it. I will keep watching it and I will find the parts I enjoy and I will continue trying to be part of the genre I love. And I will continue banging on the window when they try to shut me out, continue shouting when I’m missed and demand that it be better, that it does better. For me to stop watching it would be for me to finally give up on the genre, for me to decide it can’t be fixed and needs to be rebuilt before I get involved again – I’ve already done that with some book genres, and it wounds me to feel driven to it.

This genre has a problem with marginalised people. MY genre has a problem with marginalised people. And it’s not going to be fixed by closing my eyes and pretending the problems don’t exist. Nor will it be solved by anyone who is hurt by these problems being driven away by people demanding our silence, demanding we “just don’t watch it.”

Link: Once Upon a Time and Family-Friendly Relationships

I feel a little odd posting this here because I haven’t even seen enough of Once Upon a Time to follow all the excellent meta that’s been posted here already; I’ve only seen a handful of episodes.  But I thought it was worth sharing:

“They’re Not Going to Kiss. It’s a Family Show.” (link to my blog)

But seriously, we live in a world in which we can have a show that vomits romance and True Love and Kissing Solves Everything Even Dark Magic(tm) all over the screen and when I say I want a certain romance to happen on that show, when I say, “Man I want those two characters to kiss already!”, the response can be . . . “Nope, sorry, it’s a family show“????

The rant is more about society than it is about the show itself: the way OUAT has set itself up with the “family show” label, and the double-standard that means they can show gobs and gobs of opposite-sex kissing but the chance of a same-sex relationship is slim to none.

Which, what?  Why does a show have to be “edgy” for even a sweet, non-explicit same-sex romance to be likely?  Why can’t we apply the same standard to same-sex kisses that we do to opposite-sex ones?  Why, when I watch a show overflowing with couples, is the one romantic pairing I like dead before it started, just because it happens to be two women?  What the fuck is that?

I don’t mind that OUAT wants to give itself a “family” label.  But I feel infuriated that “family” somehow means, “keep the queer out COOTIES!!”  It’s homophobic and shitty and really just stupid.

(Note: I’m not privy to OUAT’s marketing strategies, so maybe I’m totally off base and idiotically assuming and they don’t consider same-sex couples to be taboo at all.  Maybe they’ve been building up the couple I like from the beginning.  It’s possible.  I will gladly, GLADLY proclaim I am wrong on this one if that happens.)