Asexual Representation: Greta Moreno in Generation

Transcript Transcribed by Laura M.

Courtney: Hello everyone and welcome back. My name is Courtney, I am here with my spouse, Royce, and together we are The Ace Couple. And today we are reviewing yet another television show that was unfortunately cancelled after season one but nevertheless has an almost certainly asexual character who deserved better, but is still very much worth talking about. The show today is Generation, and the character in question is Greta Moreno. And Generation is really really interesting to me because we have talked about what we have come to refer to as the teenage sex shows, and we’ve compared and contrasted them, and especially where it comes to asexual representation, they fall into a lot of very similar tropes. And it also so happens that these shows often have a much larger audience than other forms of ace rep.

Courtney: So it’s certainly worth critiquing and calling attention to the tropes that are starting to emerge in more mainstream media, but I struggle to watch the shows we’ve referred to as teenage sex shows, and this one I actually really liked. I think it still technically is, but there are things that they did differently from other shows we’ve critiqued. I’m talking about things like Euphoria. I’m talking about things like Heartbreak High. Where if we were not watching it to see what the ace rep was, we just would not be watching the show on its own. But we genuinely enjoyed Generation, and I want to talk about not only the ace character but some of the things that I think they did differently here that make a show like this a little more palatable to at least someone like me. And perhaps other aces that are closer on the sex repulse side of the spectrum, like myself.

Royce: So Generation ran on HBO and I think that, given that it was created for that network and ran for its only season in between seasons one and two of Euphoria, I think it could have ended up going down the route of aforementioned other shows in this genre. And we talked a little bit amongst ourselves about why this one just felt more, I don’t know, real, believable, genuine, something like that. Some combination of those things.

Courtney: And also not overly sensationalized.

Royce: Yes, yeah, a bit more grounded. And part of that was because the co-creators, Daniel and Zelda Barnz, are father and daughter. And she was, I believe, 19 when this aired, so a little bit younger during the creation of the show. And I’m just assuming a lot of the other shows in this genre don’t have a lot of young input into their creation.

Courtney: Probably not. So let’s– let’s see, what order do we want to do this in? Maybe we should talk about Greta first – the character likes, dislikes, tropes, deviation from tropes – and then we can talk more about just other characters we liked or things that we liked about the show, and then we can slide into this genre of show and why this one was more palatable to me than others. By the way, the T in the Generation is a plus. So this is notably a queer show. Very, very queer.

Royce: Also sometimes difficult to track down and find, because putting a plus into a lot of search engines is a special character. [Courtney laughs] So be aware of that. It is a little difficult to track down. The cancellation certainly did not help.

Courtney: No. So Greta, for a character– I’ll say this right off the bat, in this first season she did not say the word asexual. That’s something we usually criticize, but everything points to this being an asexual character, probably an asexual lesbian character, and probably closer to sex repulsion. And I do actually have every reason to believe that, were they to be renewed, they would have actually explored that in more depth and with better vocabulary.

Royce: Well, before we get into examples. After we finished watching the season, I did look up an article and Zelda Barnz was answering some questions fielded about the ending of the show and the cancellation and everything. And there is a quote here about that. Zelda says, “We really wanted to explore the implications of a relationship between one sexual and one asexual person when they experience such strong romantic feelings for one another. I don’t think there’s enough asexual representation in television to begin with, but it’s also a question of the kind of asexual representation. I happen to know several ace people who have had romantic relationships, so why is that so hard to find in the media?”

Royce: And so she continues by saying, “Yes, there was definitely a future for the characters in the show, but they both need to learn some communication skills.” And beyond that, she says, “I’ll admit I’m disappointed that we didn’t get to continue this representation. I think it had potential to be a valuable character arc for a lot of ace or questioning kids.” And so I think it’s pretty clear that had they been renewed for a season two, that would have been a significant focus.

Courtney: and here’s what’s so disappointing about that. Because one of the best examples of asexual representation in the media is famously Todd Chavez from BoJack Horseman. He did not come out as asexual until several seasons into the show, but then had an entire arc about it. Had a series of attempted relationships with a variety of people that did not work, before he found one that did. And he was a character, however, that was already deeply ingrained in the show. He was there from episode one. He was a very important cast member in that show. But there are several times where we have seen there be a teenage sex show– And let’s– Let’s use another animated example of that. So Big Mouth is one that we talked about.

Courtney: Elijah as a character, when taken just for what he is, what they said, what they depicted, they did not depict anything wrong or problematic, and they did at least give us a, you know, a Black teenage boy instead of the white guys we very often see in television being portrayed as ace rep. So demographically speaking that’s a little bit different. But he was not deeply woven into the fabric of the show. Because when they started the show, the creators had no intention of having an asexual character whatsoever, and we found quotes to corroborate that. When they heard from audiences, young audience members that they wanted to see more ace rep, they said, “Oh, okay, let’s do that. Let’s create a character,” shoehorn him in for a season to help the allosexual character who is already here learn more about herself. But as soon as their arc is over this character is out, because he wasn’t a main character to begin with.

Courtney: And you get smaller micro examples of that in like the first season of Sex Education. We had Florence, which we criticized as being a little tokenistic because she just kind of came in and gave like a big emotional PSA to teach the audience what asexuality is and then didn’t continue being an important character for the remainder of that show. So that is a thing that happens. But shows get canceled so quickly and easily. We have Abbi Singh from The Imperfects, who said the word ace from, like, episode one, I think. So we knew she was asexual and she began a relationship that we wanted to see explored more in a season two, but that show got canceled. So it’s a lose-lose situation. Because I feel like if you really care about portraying asexual representation, you have to do it obviously and you have to do it right away. But at the same time I kind of just wish shows had the amount of time they needed to tell the story that they want.

Royce: Well, if it’s not already a known orientation, if it’s a discovery plotline, that takes some time. If you rush it, it’s just going to turn into a very special episode. And yeah, going back to Todd, that was teased at the end of season three, heavily involved in season four, but then was still being, like, resolved in seasons five and six. So that was multiple viewing years dedicated to that.

Courtney: Yes. And so, like, I don’t want to criticize this show for not showing more asexuality faster, because I have every reason to believe that this could have been done very, very well if they just had another season.

Royce: I think– I mean, this was a decently large cast, and I think that the lead into this made sense. There were multiple points throughout the season where this was a source of conflict because the characters didn’t understand what was happening or how to resolve it, and I don’t know how else you’d go about that. I do think that, if I remember correctly, the first sort of indication we saw of this was maybe a little under halfway through the season. The season was 16 episodes. All the episodes are roughly half an hour long. But that’s still not a lot of time when you’re working with an ensemble cast.

Courtney: Yeah. So the character herself and her journey in what we saw, let’s go through. So she is kind of, unfortunately– This is going to bother some people more than others, but if you are the kind of person who watched the latest episode of Heartstopper and you’re still really upset that Isaac is the ace character because he’s so, you know, shy and reserved, you will likely have that same criticism with Greta because she is the shy, awkward one of the cast. And it is a large cast, it is an ensemble cast, so they have a lot of different stories that they’re telling here.

Courtney: I’m inclined to go a little easy on that, though, because I’m– A lot of people do see, you know, the shy, awkward one being ace as a trope, and a lot of people will see that as being a negative one. But there are obviously shy, awkward asexual people in real life. And I think the fact that this is not a socially awkward white guy on screen being the ace rep, I’m a lot more inclined to say that’s not necessarily a negative. Because we have some differences with this character. Like she’s Chicana, and there is absolutely the trope of the, you know, very sexually confident Latina woman, and that is something that real life ace people have to deal with that trope and preconceived notion of who they are based on these racist notions. So we at least have a media example of challenging that notion.

Courtney: We also have, as I said, an ace lesbian, who is not the first. We’ve talked about Everything’s Gonna Be Okay, there was an ace lesbian in that show. There was– Abbi was the ace lesbian, but they got canceled after one season. So the ace lesbians tend to just get canceled after the first season, I think that’s the trope that’s emerging here, unfortunately.

Courtney: And most of what we see of her in the early half of the season is just being awkward around the girl she has a crush on. A lot of fumbling words, a lot of just agreeing with everything she says. The girl she has a crush on is a photographer. So she’ll come up and, like, compliment her photography and she’ll say, “Oh, yeah, let me show you this photo. I took this great photo.”

Courtney: And she’ll pull it up on her phone. She’ll be like, “Yeah, I love that photo, is great.” “Oh wait, no, that’s not the photo. That one’s blurry. Hold on, let me find it.” “No, you’re right, I don’t like that photo.” Sort of– sort of that thing and fumbling through words. So it does take time to get to know more about her and her home life. But she does have a very, very interesting home life that I’m very happy to see once it does get explored further. Her mother, for instance, who is a single mother, was deported before the events of the show started, so she is in Guadalajara. She’s only able to talk to her mom occasionally via Zoom calls. And meanwhile, her aunt, who happens to be a trans woman, is the one who is watching her and her younger brother.

Courtney: But one thing that was maybe an indicator in hindsight, but I didn’t necessarily think in the moment, “Yeah, that reads explicitly ace,” was– there was a scene of her watching porn on her phone, but she was just laughing at it, like she thought it was funny. But then she clicked the wrong button and started getting all of these like spammy pop-ups right when she got a text from someone, and she got really, really, really flustered, trying to close them all and then try to respond to this person’s message. And then it kept auto correcting to, like, suggestive words, like I don’t know what she was typing, but something autocorrected to like moaning or something. And you just see her getting more and more flustered to the point where she’s just like, “Oh no, typing really fast,” trying to fix that. “Wait, I didn’t mean that, wait that–”

Courtney: But the faster she types, the more mistakes she’s making. And she just ends the scene by, like, throwing her phone down and screaming into a pillow. Which is very funny because I think everyone can relate to just feeling embarrassed like that. But to an asexual teenager? I can only imagine that that is, like, even more mortifying. Because other people within this friend group see a lot of humor in sex and sexual things and will make jokes or say words because they think they’re funny or, you know, try to provoke a teacher by saying something a little bit sexual. And so, like, other people in this friend group could have just laughed something like that off, but to her it is mortifying. And I think that’s such an interesting detail, since it does seem that they intended the entire time this is the ace character from the get-go that they included a scene of her just laughing at a porn because it seems so absurd.

Courtney: So, that said, right up until just under halfway through the season I still didn’t know definitively who the ace character was, but there was a moment, just based on the shy, awkward trope, where I was like, “It’s gonna be the shy girl, isn’t it?” And it was. But in terms of tropes, they did have the– what are we calling the, like, Spin The Bottle, Never Have I Ever type games? The– those like sleepover games that when teenagers play get a little sexy. We’ve stated that that is a trope. And it may be a trope for a good reason, because a lot of ace people do have very core memories of being put in a situation where a whole group of people is playing a game like that. I know I have stories like that. I know other ace people who do. So that is like– that’s a trope that is based on reality a lot of time.

Courtney: But given the limited on screen TV show ace rep we have, we see it a lot. We did see it with Todd and Bojack Horseman. We did see it in Heartstopper. I’m pretty sure we saw it in Heartbreak High. It shows up a lot. We saw it in Sex Education. But usually when there is an ace character involved it’s used to call attention to the ace character is the uncomfortable one or the weird one, and I don’t think this show did that. They did play a game like that at one time, but I don’t think she was explicitly called attention to.

Royce: I remember them playing Truth Or Dare during a trip. And I don’t think it involved Greta.

Courtney: Right. So I thought that was interesting, because it’s like there’s the trope that they could have used to further the ace discovery plotline, and often shows will, but they did not. It was on that school trip, though, that we did sort of get her first very uncomfortable moment, and it was an intimate private moment with the girl she’s been crushing on since the first episode – whose name you’re gonna have to look up and tell me, because I cannot think of it right now.

Royce: Riley.

Courtney: Riley. Riley is the photographer, yes. so Riley had also been pre-established and she has a rough home life also that we learn more about at various points. So she’s emotionally, like, very much a wreck, but she’s been pre-established to not really do romantic relationships or hasn’t yet, but she does hook up with people. And in fact, I think, one of her photography projects was like taking pictures of people as they orgasmed, something like that.

Royce: That would have been mentioned very early in the season. I think you’re correct, but I completely forgot about that.

Courtney: So, like she’s known to only hook up with people, and to hook up with people a lot. But they’re on this high school trip. It’s actually the GSA, so they’re all a member of their school’s GSA club. And they somehow managed to get enough funding to take a trip where they were going to go watch Paris Is Burning somewhere in the city. But their bus broke down, so they end up, like, at a seedy motel instead not having anything to do. So Riley gets dared in this game of Truth Or Dare to use her fake ID, that everyone got fake IDs because they were going to try to sneak out and go to a club but now they aren’t actually in the city. So they said, “Use your fake ID to go buy a bottle of wine from the front desk.” And she ends up going and she grabs Greta and they both sort of just sneak a bottle.

Courtney: The front desk attendant is talking to one of their chaperones, so they just sort of, you know, slip it away when no one’s looking and giggling and they’re running back and they’re, like, you know, instead of going back to the party, like, “How about just the two of us go back?” And so they’re alone, they’re having a moment, they kiss. And they’ve had moments before this. So this isn’t the first time they have been, like, physically laying on the same bed together. There was previously, like, a sleepover that they had with one of the other members of the GSA, and the two of them shared a bed and it was a very sweet moment because they kind of cuddled up, you could see them smiling and how happy they were just to be next to each other. There was a sweet moment where Greta was, like, rubbing Riley’s hand, the back of her hand, and singing a song that her mom used to sing her to calm her down.

Courtney: Because Riley’s got a lot of anxiety. I think they all do. They all have mental health issues. So they’ve been emotionally vulnerable around one another leading up to this point. But now they’re literally in a motel room and they aren’t fully making out. But they have a couple of kisses, and Riley sort of stands up and takes her shirt off and then Greta looks like, “What are you doing?” And she goes to unsnap her bra and then Greta kind of has a breakdown. Like she shouts a little bit. Her voice is shaky. She clearly is feeling an emotion that she doesn’t know how to articulate. But she asks what are you doing. And in a way that doesn’t sound very good, because it sounds like it could, you know, accidentally be slut shamey, she says, “I’m not like you, I don’t just hook up.”

Courtney: And so now Riley’s mortified, she’s like using her arms to cover herself up because she just tried taking off her bra and then this was the response she got. And she seems really, really upset. She’s like, “Why would you even say that?” And you can kind of glean from context clues, yeah, she is actually developing romantic feelings for Greta. So this is not to her, like one of her usual hookups, but in Baby Ace Who Doesn’t Have The Language to Describe it Yet’s defense, everyone does know her as the girl who only hooks up with people once. Worded very, very poorly, that was a disaster. Riley ends up storming out and immediately going to sleep with another girl. And then they don’t talk about that night for the entire rest of the season until the very last episode. It is miscommunication station.

Courtney: They don’t even talk about it, they are just upset at each other but not willing to talk it through. And since that seems to be cut off, oddly enough Greta kind of ends up dating Luz, who is the girl that Riley ran off to sleep with. And Riley and Luz kind of decide to just not tell Greta what happened that night. So they just kind of keep that secret. But then obviously Riley has all this pent up resentment for Luz and it’s all very teenage love triangle-y.

Courtney: And I think I would have a lot less patience for it if they didn’t also show just more aspects of each of the characters’ lives. Like, we do get to see their home lives outside of their school lives and their friend group. Because if literally all we were seeing of Greta in this was her relationship and will they/won’t they with someone, I don’t– I wouldn’t like that.

Courtney: Because I don’t like seeing any characters truthfully, but especially not ace characters being only shown and defined in a show in the context of a would-be romantic and or sexual relationship. But we get to see that her aunt is trans. Her aunt actually hooks Riley up with a job at the local Hamburger Mary’s, because her aunt used to perform at Hamburger Mary’s and knows the manager. So Riley gets a serving job there. But her aunt is also, yes, a caretaker of hers, but also kind of like a girl friend, because you know, not literally her mom. And so anytime she can sense, oh, greta has a crush on this girl, there’s definitely the you know wink-wink nudge-nudge kind of comments. Her aunt does go out of her way to be like, “Oh, you’re seeing Riley today, well, we’re gonna dress you up, you have to look nice for this.”

Courtney: And much to Greta’s protestations. She’s like, “No, no, no, I don’t want to look like I’m trying too hard, I don’t want to look like I think anything’s gonna happen.” And so there’s definitely still sort of, like, a pressuring or an expectation from the aunt of like, “Oh, I see you have a crush on this girl I know.” And trying to help, but maybe in a way that doesn’t actually help her. Because we see Greta also just being mortified when she overhears her aunt ask Riley like, “And what are your intentions with Greta?” But on the other hand, when her mother actually comes back home, she does at a certain point, so we get to see her mother trying to catch up on her life and get to meet her friends and see, you know, where she is in this stage. Because we–

Courtney: I don’t think we know exactly how long it’s been, I don’t think we’re told explicitly, but there’s definitely an air of like, “Who are your friends? I haven’t met them before.” And her mom – not nearly as overtly as another mother in the show – is, like, a little bit homophobic. And you get little glimpses of that, especially with Greta talking to her aunt like, there’s a little line where she says, “Oh, I’m just glad that my mom is using your correct pronouns now.” And something like that. So we get these implications that her mom was not very cool with her sister being trans, at least not at first. But in that very final episode of the season, I guess the series since it got canceled, Greta and Riley finally do start to have a conversation. And they’re like, hey, so about that night. And Greta’s finally able to say, “I didn’t say what I said because I don’t like you. In fact I really like you and I’ve never stopped liking you.” And she even says I love you. And Riley says I love you back. Very sweet.

Courtney: But they also start approaching the asexual conversation without saying the word, but doing it in a way that I think is very explicit and well done. Because Greta basically says, “What I’ve learned about myself is that I can like someone, I can really, really like someone, but when it comes to kissing and other stuff, I don’t want that.” And you see Riley’s face. She’s maybe a little hurt, maybe a little confused, but Greta kind of seems to have written off any chance of having a relationship, or at least wondering, because she even says like, “Because I don’t want that, I don’t even know how we could work, even if you still wanted to try. I very much like– I don’t know if this is possible, I don’t know if I can have a relationship.” And I think there even was a moment where she said at one point that she felt broken, not in that conversation, but maybe an earlier one.

Royce: Yeah, I’m pretty sure that language was used at one point.

Courtney: And that is a line that so many ace people will be able to relate to. Very, very realistic there. And aside from her saying that about herself, there are also indications that other people around her have sensed something not quite allosexual about her. Because when she’s kind of dating Luz, for instance, I think Luz even says, “Do you even like girls?” Like, “I’m confused because you seem like you really like me, but then again not really.” Like they’re sensing that she is not sexually attracted to them without saying those words literally, they’re tiptoeing around that.

Royce: Well, I think at one point in time Luz was assuming that the issue was that Greta was a lesbian, but wasn’t comfortable with being out yet.

Courtney: There was also that. Because there was–

Royce: That may have been the first guess that she had. Because I think that’s a common thing at this age. Where some people get comfortable with not being straight sooner than others.

Courtney: Yeah, and there– there absolutely was the line of like, “I’ve already been in the closet, I’m not going back.” But I kind of feel like those were two separate instances. I think there was an instance of like, “Are you ashamed of this? Are you closeted? Are you not out to everyone? That could be a problem for me.” And then, like, “Are you even into girls?”

Royce: Yeah, they have more than one conversation about it.

Courtney: Yeah, and unfortunately that’s where her story ends is that final conversation where they both say that they love each other. Greta explicitly says that she is not interested in kissing or other things, but can really really like someone, and does explain that that night where everything blew up wasn’t because she didn’t like Riley. And I would have liked to see where they took that relationship from there. Especially after a half season of them being very icy to each other and trying to forget the other by dating someone who’s wrong for them or self destructing in other ways. Because even though there have been instances where we have seen a mixed orientation relationship on TV– There are a couple different instances where we have an ace and an allo in a relationship.

Courtney: Everything’s Gonna Be Okay is one of them. Heartbreak High is another. Presumably also The Imperfects was, but again that canceled. I find it interesting that the allosexual party in this relationship – had we seen their story fleshed out even further – is someone who hasn’t gotten romantically involved before but has had a lot of sex with a lot of different people. So that’s someone who does at least know that sex and romance do not inherently go together, but is now going to have to reconcile, “Okay, now I do have romantic feelings, but what does that mean without the sex side of things?” And I don’t know, there’s a lot of things they could have done. I don’t know what they would have and we’ll never know, because the show got canceled. A shame.

Courtney: Other things in general that we liked about the show is that, yes, we have all these queer teenagers, but we also have glimpses of the queer adults that are in their lives and around them. We have, for instance, the school counselor, who is a 30 year old gay man who has, you know, become a mentor to many of these students and becomes the president of the GSA, because the kids like him better than the previous president of the HOA, or I don’t know, the faculty advisor. One of the teenagers has two gay dads, and I am obsessed with her and her dads. [laughs] They might be my absolute favorite. And then, of course, Greta’s aunt being a trans woman. So it’s showing in a way that we don’t always see. Like, yes, we do have all these queer teenagers who are out and proud, but they also do have older queer people in their lives, and what that means and what that looks like.

Courtney: But, conversely, what it means to be, you know, a millennial or a gen x queer person who has queer teenagers in your life. Because the counselor, for instance, is looking at one of these boys in the school and saying like, “I wish I could have been you when I was your age. I wish I could have been this out and proud and, you know, worn fashion like this.” We’ve also got the gay dads, who are just so out of the loop. They say something about Harry Potter and all the teenagers are like, “You can’t talk about Harry Potter anymore! JK Rowling is so problematic.” And one of the dads is like, “I hate teenagers. What, why, what did she do? What happened?” They’re like, “She’s so transphobic!” Like, “I am not online like you, I don’t know what’s happening.” Which is very funny. And that, I realized, you really don’t see too terribly much on television either. Even in shows that are about a queer friend group or about a friend group that have a lot of queer people in it. It’s normally focused on one generation.

Royce: It usually is, and oftentimes the parents are either, like, one of the antagonistic forces, or they are absent, or they are a complete opposite of the antagonistic one, and they’re like, surprisingly, both knowledgeable and supportive.

Courtney: But a lot of the times, the parents in teenage shows are just like, not–

Royce: Yeah.

Courtney: –really characters.

Royce: Just not present, like maybe one or two of the characters will have their parents present in this. And– and I guess in this case we really only– I think we saw three sets of parents, two of them more than others. But one thing that I noticed and I remarked on when we were nearing the end of the season was I realized that there wasn’t– there is one person who is seen as an antagonist throughout the series, and it is one character’s conservative mother. It’s portrayed interestingly here because she is around three other parents who are much more supportive and is pretty consistently arguing with the three of them. So her impact is isolated to some degree. But there isn’t the stereotypical school bully or like antagonistic cliques at high school or anything like that.

Courtney: Yeah, it was actually really interesting. Because, even though they weren’t really their own character, the sort of, like, the guys that would have been like the jock trope were actually very supportive of the gay boy. And it actually kind of felt like some, you know, jock circle people that I have known who are like not necessarily bullies, you might not necessarily have enough in common with them to hang out, but they’re just very charismatic, you know?

Royce: And very loud and talkative if they’re present.

Courtney: Very loud.

Royce: I don’t think these characters were even named.

Courtney: No.

Royce: They just saw that Chester was having a bad time and then just started like hyping everyone up.

Courtney: Yeah, I mean, Chester wears very flamboyant clothing and often gets dress coded, and often gets dress coded on purpose. And he comes to school one day wearing, like, a gray polo and a baseball cap and everyone’s like, “What’s wrong? What happened to Chester?” And so all the jocks are standing up and they’re like, “Everyone! Shirts off for Chester!” And they’re like ripping their shirts off. And I think one of them even is like, “Come on, girls too.” And then one of the actual girls in this queer friend group are like, “That is so problematic. Chester doesn’t even like women,” or something. And they were like, “You’re right! Dicks out for Chester!” And they’re like– I don’t know how to describe them. Because I don’t even know if it’s nice. Like it’s not like Chester needed that or really resonated or everything got better after they did that. But like they’re trying.

Royce: It got a smile in the moment, I think.

Courtney: Yeah, I mean they’re– they’re, they’re trying. They’re trying in their own jocky way. So we don’t have the jock who is probably going to end up, you know, having a heart of gold or whatever, or getting redeemed, or also being shown to have a complicated home life. Like those are the things you see in those shows a lot. But I did see, near the end of the show, the biggest antagonist, if there is to be one, is the mother of two of the kids. They are twins, boy and a girl. Boy comes out as bisexual in the show. Mom cannot fucking handle it. And so she’s generally being awful. But she’s being awful in a very, very nuanced way. She’s not the kind of like– not going all the way to, “I’m sending you to a conversion camp,” not going into, like, “You can’t hang out with any of your friends anymore, or I’m pulling you out of this school.”

Courtney: Not doing anything like that. Not like, “I will not associate with anything or anybody queer.” Because she’s, in fact, friends with the gay dads, which makes it so complicated to watch. Because then, like, she’s having them over for a drink, she’s having them over for dinner. They came to her, you know, eldest daughter’s wedding and they’re talking and chatting. And like, yeah, she’ll say some things that are pretty problematic, but you also have these two guys who are like patiently trying to meet her where she’s at and maybe try to help a little bit. And that can be a dynamic that’s very hard to explain if the only queer people and queerphobes you ever communicate with are online.

Courtney: But when it comes to things like homophobic parents, family members, that gets so complicated to each individual person that I think every queer person I know has at least had some amount of time of trying to reconcile with parents or trying to be patient or trying to teach them. And sometimes that works and sometimes our relationship can continue. Sometimes something is toxic enough that you have to go no contact. And no one can make that decision but you. But I kind of saw a glimpse, near the end, of this mother who was really really trying but it’s really really, really hard and she is not happy about it. And she kind of breaks and says like, “A lot of this is because I am scared.”

Courtney: And so we aren’t going to get to see how that plot line progresses either. But I saw an avenue where they could take a very, you know, biphobic, homophobic mother and give her some growth in a way that is actually realistic to how some people do actually learn and grow. So that’s another plot line I’m upset we will not get to see more of. The dads are really funny, and their little chaos gremlin of a daughter is perfect. She starts so problematic, like, in the first couple episodes she’s saying just, like, openly homophobic things and all of her friends are like, “You have to stop saying things like that. My gosh, you’re such a bigot.” And she’s like, “How can I be a bigot? My dads are gay.” Except instead of saying that, she will say the slur.

Royce: You were talking about Arianna, who is the character who, part way through the series, you were like, “I’m pretty sure she is not the ace character,” but there are some aspects of her story that resonate.

Courtney: I wanted to petition for her to be the ace character. By this point, I was 99.99% sure it was going to be Greta.

Royce: Yeah.

Courtney: However, Arianna, she does show sexual interest in people. She makes out with people. Were they all guys? Is she straight? Presumably. I think so.

Royce: I think so.

Courtney: And not only is she saying just these totally out of pocket things, but her queer friend group is still, like, tolerating her. She’s still a part of the group. She’s closer with some than others. But she’s also just beastly to her dads, like, she will just be awful to them even though they’re trying so hard to be sweet and helpful. And so she clearly does have some problems. But, like when push comes to shove, at one point she talks about how, you know, lucky she is to have her dads and how she was adopted but it’s funny how things work out exactly the way they were supposed to because she was– So like, she clearly loves her dads but she’s also awful to them right now. And her dads are so sweet, but they’re also very, you know, problematic at some points.

Courtney: Like they’re trying to help the mother of the bisexual boy, and they’re trying to talk her through it and being like, “I know bisexuality is complicated.” And like at first that sounds fine, like they’re going down the right direction, but then they’ll say like, “And yeah, I know that every gay man comes out as bisexual first.” And one of them was like, “Yeah, I came out as bisexual first.” So kind of hinting, like, yeah, your son’s actually gay, which is bi erasure. And we don’t love that. But from the generation who is saying I hate teenagers because I don’t know what’s going on with JK Rowling.

Courtney: There was also a hilarious moment during that conversation where, [sighs] what was the line? It was something like, “I know most–.” It was like, I know most bisexual people who– “I know most bisexual people are gayer than a straight man starring in his college musical,” or something. And then the father of the bisexual boy goes, “I starred in all my college musicals.” Oh no! But their kid overhears this conversation. So this poor, like, newly out bisexual boy hears this and hears all of the like, “Yeah, we think he’s probably gay.” And his mom is clearly not coping with that well. And he’s not happy about that. He storms off, he’s having a horrible time, obviously.

Courtney: But then Arianna, in an attempt to make him feel better, is like, “Well, I read my dad’s text messages and they just had a shit show with their third. So they’re just very anti-romance-everything right now. So don’t listen to them when they say that they think you’re gay ’cause I know you’re bisexual, but you know my dads are just–” Just so, casually, they just had a shit show with their third. And little things that she’ll say like that just absolutely had me losing it. Even if she’s being awful, even if she’s being a bitch, even if what she’s saying is wildly problematic. I love her so much.

Courtney: But the reason why I wanted to petition for her to be the asexual character is because, even though she was shown making out with other people, generally, I don’t know, saying horny things or thinking horny thoughts, there was a moment where– And this was another thing that was funny. She had, like, gotten on witch-tok or something, or found witches on Instagram, and decide she’s going to be a witch now. And two of her closest friends within this bigger group come over for a sleepover and they decide that the three of them are a coven now. And they’re having this, like, big, you know, girl power moment, and Arianna’s even lamenting around the similar period of time that she’s like, “There are only my dad’s in the house. There are no other women in the house,” and so, “I’m just surrounded by masculine energy.”

Courtney: And so she’s, like, living off of this witchy feminism, girl power, coven that they’re making. And they all three decide that they’re going to go to the school dance together. But then her other two friends ditch her for a boy and she just cannot handle that. She tells them to their face when they ask her if it’s okay, that it’s okay, but she’s very clearly not okay. And she bites her tongue for a little bit. But then she gets even more awful to her dads and they’re just trying to be sweet. She’s telling them to leave her alone. And she’s like, “Oh, it’s just my period.” And so one dad yells to the other like, “Quick! Grab the Midol!” He comes running with a bottle and she’s like, “No, I don’t want it!”

Courtney: And maybe my favorite scene in this entire show is the dads leaving after she yells at them and coming back a minute later into her room completely silent, not saying a word, with a tub of ice cream and three bowls. And they just sit on her floor and silently start scooping ice cream and eating it. And then she slowly and silently comes to them. Like, she’ll look over the bed. And it’s like getting a cat to like you. You have to like get the treat out or the toy and then ignore her, and wait for her to come to you. But she does. She comes over and sits down and they hand her a bowl of ice cream and they just sit there in silence together. And it is the sweetest thing in the world and I love it.

Courtney: But she does actually have, like, a big blow up when her emotions actually come out and she tells them, “It was not okay that you did this.” True, she didn’t communicate very well, like the conversations very much, “But you said it was okay,” “But you should have known it wasn’t.” But she has a big angry scene where she’s basically talking about how important friendship is and how important female friendship is. And basically, why would you break our plans and break our promises, and why would you put this guy ahead of, you know, what we had with this little witchy coven? And of course then she’s also being spiteful, and she’s like, “Don’t get on the wrong side of a witch!” Because she’s making her little spells.

Courtney: But I love the humor and the realism behind how they depicted the witch-tok thing too. Because she was following like a witch influencer and she’s all in. She’s like, “Yes, I am all in on this witch thing, this is who I am now, this is what I do.” But then we see one little scene of this witch influencer who’s like, “Yes, I feel the power of your coven. This was meant to be, and you should buy my class on this thing.” So absolute, complete grifter, but it goes totally over the heads of these teenage girls who are just all in on it. And I think in a lot of ways it does a good job of validating the feelings of the teenagers and what is real to them and what they’re experiencing, versus also showing how things actually are.

Courtney: Like that witch-tok thing was a part of it, and then there was an instance where, you know, one of the teenagers develops a huge crush on his school counselor. You know, twice his age, very inappropriate. And I think the show does a good job of showing just how crushed and devastated he is when he realizes this teacher doesn’t actually like him back because this is a counselor, this is a faculty member at school. It shows how real that hurt is to him, but it also shows the counselor being like, “No, this was not how this is. I don’t know why you’re reading this.” I think there are several instances of that.

Courtney: But yeah, the being so crushed and devastated that your friends ditched you for a boy and then having that epic meltdown about the importance of that friendship just really want– Like, I– She’s spiritually aspec to me. She doesn’t agree in the relationship hierarchy, like all of the other friends in this queer group. So, yeah, I would not have been mad. I think that would have been a much more subversive option to make her the asexual character actually, but then you could have– It wouldn’t even have to be a retcon. You could have an exploration of, like, a performative sexuality and she was doing what people expected her to or what she thought she ought to, when really, at the end of the day, her friends are all she really wants and needs and she’s very hurt that they don’t feel that same way because, you know, it’s just a friendship.

Courtney: And so, however, even though they did not take the more subversive option and make her the ace character, I’m still very glad that they had that plot point and that they made such a big deal out of that plot point. Because there are other shows we have critiqued where, yes, they have an ace character, and even if they show the things that ace character is doing and saying in a decent way, if the show at the end of the day is, in a case of Big Mouth, mostly about an allosexual puberty, exploring sexuality, being very horny, being very allo, and you just put an ace character there? The show inherently otherizes him. The show will–

Courtney: That show specifically had that character say, “Why am I on this show?” They broke the fourth wall because they knew he didn’t fit, because the entire ethos of the show was a sexual one. There are other shows where I think the point is relationships, the point is romance and/or sex, and sometimes the ace character is just there to be, like, “Hey, we exist too!” And that could even be a criticism one could give to Heartstopper, even though Alice Oseman, famously asexual themself, in that way is able to give one version of a realistic portrayal of an ace character. But that show was less of an ensemble cast than Generation is. It felt to me like it was trying to be an ensemble cast while also trying to keep most of the focus on the main couple, Nick and Charlie.

Royce: There is a casting hierarchy, yeah.

Courtney: Yes. And so if you look at Heartstopper for what it is, the main focus is Nick and Charlie. That relationship is the big focus. But also around them, in their friend group, they have other friends who are also getting into relationships, and those relationships are also very important to those characters. So then, once again, we have Isaac here being just the contrast to that. He is the one character who is being, like, “Hey, wait a minute, this isn’t important to me,” but the show itself doesn’t necessarily point to the idea that relationships are not lesser because they are not romantic in nature. So I think it is cool and good that this show has an asexual character and they– another character who is probably allo, almost certainly allo, but in fact she’s the one who’s really challenging this. And that’s one of the biggest challenges she had in the second half of this season.

Courtney: Because I want to feel like not only is there a character who’s very likely to be the ace character– [sighs] I guess, let’s say it this way: I want the show to challenge amatonormativity, I don’t want the ace character to be the only one challenging it in contrast. Does that make sense? I think it makes sense. It’s like, is it just the ace character that believes this, or does the show really believe it and take it to heart? Because I don’t actually think having the one token ace character is all that challenging to the societal systemic issues that ace people feel in real life. So on that note, let’s talk about why this show was easier for me to watch than something like your Heartbreak High or your Euphoria or your Big Mouth. I think, for the most part, there were fewer sex scenes and the ones they had felt a lot more reigned in.

Royce: Yeah, I think if this same show had been directed by the people who directed Euphoria, they would have lingered a lot. They would have specifically focused on the skin in those situations. There were a couple instances of people having sex, but very little was actually like actively shown.

Courtney: Very little was actively shown. I don’t think we ever saw any of the girls with their tops completely off.

Royce: No, I don’t think so.

Courtney: Like we never saw any nipples. The one instance of, like, taking a shirt off was with the bra. And taking the bra off was like the bra was half off, and now we’re using our hands to cover.

Courtney: We did see after Riley left and went to sleep with another girl, we saw a second of her sitting up like on a dresser and Luz’s head was, like, between her legs. So we saw, like, naked stomach and legs with a head obviously insinuating oral sex. But that, I think, was the most explicit sex scene we saw and it only showed that for a second and then it panned back to Riley’s face where she is, like, crying and clearly having a bad time. And so it felt very, very obviously that the point of that scene was not to sensationalize the sex that was happening, not to linger, not at all to, you know, potentially be arousing, but to show like this person’s really messed up right now and probably not making great decisions. And they showed her face looking like that, and crying, and going through those motions a lot longer than they showed like the bare stomach and the back of a head.

Royce: I feel like there may have been one other instance of sex being depicted, but I can’t remember who it was, and so it might have just been like a kind of a panning shot or a montage sort of shot of a party or something like that.

Courtney: The bisexual boy, early on in the season, with like the eye thing. I don’t want to say any of these words. [laughs]

Royce: Yeah, yeah, no, I– That’s not what I was thinking of. I think that there is another case. But anyway, there are– aside from that, I feel like there were a couple of penises in like photos or like on someone’s phone early on, but considering this aired on HBO, I thought it was pretty toned down.

Courtney: It was pretty toned down for an HBO show, I think. I don’t even mind, like– I think the only actual topless woman we saw was when– was not a character in the show, it was when Greta was watching and giggling at the porn.

Royce: But I guess that’s something to mention, that–

Courtney: Oh! There was– There was one scene that did make me gag a little bit. I do remember that. But that was a solo masturbating in his room kind of a situation.

Royce: Oh, right, right.

Courtney: Anyway, sorry, what were you about to say? I just remembered that.

Royce: Oh, I was just thinking about some of our critiques of Euphoria having a dual plot line that was very focused on child pornography being a major issue that was going on, like a potential legal problem that people in the show were facing while also showing child pornography. I mean, the actors were adults but they were playing people who were underage. And the situation here where a fair bit of the explicit nudity that is shown is like porn or, you know, something, something on someone’s computer or phone or something like that.

Courtney: Yeah, a lot of– A lot of the time, like, genitalia is off screen when it’s the actual characters themselves. There was one instance where one character, like, stripped down because he was about to get in a shower and there was another character in the room. And we did see a little bit of genitalia from, like, beyond the hip. And I do still, in my heart of hearts, wish they didn’t do that when you are telling us these are teenagers. I do still wish that. But, on the other hand, when there were instances of any kind of sex scene, it was, as you said, tame for HBO.

Courtney: And one thing I also noticed, things like the lighting, things like the music, the way the actors were mic’d, were not done in the way that really really bothers me. Because I’ve mentioned, like, mouth noises, like, if you’re making out, even if you’re, like, stripping your clothes off where they’re making out, like, if I hear all of the saliva inside of your mouth so loudly. I hate that. And that was such an intentional choice. You chose to do the sound that way. You, you wanted us to hear every single, you know, mouth shape that they’re making and I don’t like that. Part of that is a misophonia thing, part of that is a sex repulsion thing, but that’s all part of the, like, stylization and the sensational nature of a lot of sex scenes that we have seen. Where it’s like, yeah, you are, you know, changing the lighting, the music is a certain kind of vibe, we’re hearing all of the sounds

Courtney: And that didn’t happen here, because I pay attention to that, because I can’t not. If you give me a gross mouth sound, I will need to cover my ears. They did not do that in this show, like the sex scene we mentioned in the motel room after the fight, the mouth sounds almost seemed intentionally muted and the music was so loud that it was almost like overstimulating to the point of like drawing attention away from any sexual sounds that might have been being made. And I don’t know. Just overall, you said the word grounded earlier, and I wish I could extrapolate on that more. Because this show did still show teenagers drinking, teenagers doing drugs, teenagers having sex, which are things that we’re very well aware some teenagers do, but it did not seem to be depicted in a way that could be inadvertently glamorizing of it. It seemed like a very realistic version of how teenagers do those things when they do.

Royce: Yeah, I mean you say drugs. It’s mostly cannabis, with some other– A couple of times a, like, one person has their wisdom teeth taken out and has some pain meds that are doctor prescribed.

Courtney: I mean, that doesn’t count. I’m talking recreational, like.

Royce: Yeah.

Courtney: It is not legal for you to be doing this thing right now.

Royce: Right, right. But the parties that are going on they somehow inexplicably managed to get a lot of alcohol and tend to have them at like someone’s house that either has parents that are out or are cool with it and are, you know, like have a big enough place to have people over. They aren’t these massive, like, enormous scale events with like a ton of designer drugs all over the place. It’s– When I was in high school, there were plenty of parties at, you know, someone’s house where there would be alcohol and weed, like that was not weird.

Courtney: Yeah, and they also show like the teenagers who do engage in that activity, just like a very realistic way of acquiring those things. And maybe that’s part of the issue with other shows where they are doing harder drugs. It’s like, where did you get all these? Sometimes there’s someone like literally in a gang, It’s like, all right, they’ve got a gang hookup, fine. But this is like, “I grabbed this bottle of alcohol because this is the one my parents won’t know is missing.”

Royce: There is a scene where friends are upstairs while parents are chatting and one of the kids comes down and basically just takes like an ounce or two off of every bottle so that they won’t notice it, but it’s mixed together into something awful.

Courtney: Yeah. But yeah, and even with the sex that is had, like there– there are– There’s kind of an instance. So I don’t think I mentioned this, but the two girls who ditched their friend at the school dance for a guy, it was the same guy. And they convinced themselves that they were opposing the patriarchy by doing an enlightened triad thing in a way that did kind of feel not bad, not morally an issue, but like logically perhaps misguided. And it turns out at the end of the day that guy didn’t actually want to be with two girls at the same time. So he walked that back and was like, “Actually I only want to be with one of you.” And that felt like, if you are going to do a thruple kind of a thing with like 16, 17 year olds, that felt like what it might be.

Courtney: Because, I don’t know, in a lot of the sex positive teenager shows you get these at least semi graphic like threesomes. And in this case, the closest thing we got to that was three people kissing at the same time because they were dared to during Truth Or Dare. No, no, maybe it– maybe it’s just the shock value of it. It felt like nothing was being played for the sole purpose of shock value, which sometimes other shows do feel like, were you just doing this to try to be subversive, to try to be edgy and to try to shock people? It didn’t feel in any way forced.

Courtney: Oh and before I forget, going back to the ace rep and tropes, Generation was not bucking the trope of ace characters and sea creatures. There absolutely was an aquarium scene. I don’t know why or how this happened, but we simply must come to terms with this fact. We love sea creatures and sea creatures love us, obviously. We talked about this in our last episode about Heartstopper, because there was an aquarium scene and jellyfish and axolotls has long been a symbol within the ace community. But for a long time it was just axolotls, it was not necessarily broader sea life. But anecdotally, I know a lot of aces who resonate with a very specific sea creature. So it was kind of funny to see Greta and Riley go to the aquarium and, like, take pictures there and have a moment. So emerging trope alert: aquariums. That’s what the A stands for in LGBTQIA+. The A stands for aquarium.

Courtney: And oddly enough, I think today’s featured MarketplACE vendor does have some sea life related merch. Today we’re giving a huge shout out to Ancient Dreamer Productions. As always, you can find links in the show notes on our website and the description box on YouTube. But in addition to some Ace Flag merch, some Trans Flag merch, I’m seeing a big frog theme. We have some frog throw pillows. Actually, I think I got one of these Ace Flag frog stickers once upon a time. But there are also some prints here, which you can get on a variety of merch, of rainbow coral. A little rainbow coral print. And now I’m not even gonna say that that’s a coincidence, everything happens for a reason. But of course, not everything in this shop is sea related. So please go and find those links, check them out on your own. There’s a big variety of digital art, photography, painting, lots of different styles and lots of different print options from one of our awesome asexual creators. And that is gonna do it for today. Until next time, bye, bye.