There hasn't been a whole lot of action (in any sense) for the gay characters of Daytime TV in the last few months. On As the World Turns Luke & Noah are together but still not sleeping together for some inexplicable reason.
Since I last wrote, they really haven't had all that much of a storyline. Luke's shady biological father Damian sent him a huge advance on his trust fund, as some sort of unexplained peace offering or bribe. Luke initially planned to reject the money, but instead he decided to put it to good use and form a charitable foundation. His Grandmother Lucinda hired one Brian Wheatley to run the foundation for Luke and though Brian seems personally fine with Luke being gay, he's been adamant about not associating the foundation with homosexuality, on the grounds that many potential donors would be scared off. Most recently, he's threatened to quit because Luke handed out flyers for the foundation at a gay student film festival.
This, needless to say, has caused ongoing tension between Brian and Luke, and that's really been the only story of their own that Luke & Noah have been involved in since I last wrote about them. The good news is that the kisses continue to come freely and I have to imagine that those in the viewing audience who may have been uneasy about it at first are probably fairly used to it by now. (I'm not, of course, talking about those hardcore nuts who are no doubt still calling & writing in disgust that there are even gay characters on their TV at all, let alone ones who kiss each other. They'll never change their minds because they'd have to open them first.)
Finally, though, after months of nothing much, a new story is starting for Luke & Noah. This past week, we found out that Oakdale University's Gay Film Festival (which Noah was in charge of this year and hopes to make an entry for next year) is under fire from offended benefactors of the University who were horrified by the gay content. The show got in a nice little dig at their own horrified viewers by having Luke ask "Just because they show two guys kissing in bed together?"
Anyway, Luke & Noah went to a meeting, where it came out that the University was letting the decision of whether or not to kill the Festival's funding be made by the Student Government itself. The deciding vote on the issue will be cast by whoever wins the upcoming election for Student Body President, and guess who the only declared candidate is? If you guessed that it was Luke's former best friend and high school love interest Kevin, who did not take Luke's coming out at all well, give yourself a pat on the back.
Luke & Kevin had an awkward reunion and Kevin remained non-committal about his stance on the film festival. Reg, the guy who was interested in Luke when he and Noah were on a break, noticed that Kevin got a rather disgusted look on his face when he saw Noah put his arm around Luke and decided that it did not bode well for their chances of saving the festival.
All of which lead to Luke deciding to step up and run for President himself, so that the GLBTQ community and their allies on campus could at least have a chance to make their voices heard.
This story is just getting under way and I'm feeling (foolishly) hopeful that it will be worth watching, especially with the reintroduction of Kevin as Luke's electoral nemesis.
Meanwhile, there is some good news on the gay character front over on All My Children. Groundbreaking lesbian character Bianca has returned to the show and she'll have a new partner, played by former General Hospital and Days of Our Lives star Tamara Braun. So, the number of GLBTQ characters on daytime has just doubled and the casting of Braun in the role is hopefully a good sign that it's going to be a big one.
Of course, there is also the rather sweet love story between Kyle & Eric (the latter played by out actor Chad Allen) on SoapNet's General Hospital: Night Shift, but that doesn't really count as daytime.
I have to say that I've become addicted to the German Soap Verboten Liebe (Forbidden Love), which you can find with translated English subtitles on YouTube. The love story on that show between Christian & Oliver really puts anything I've seen on American soaps to shame, story wise. What's even more impressive is that nearly ten years ago, in 1999, the same soap had a love story between two gay characters named Tom & Ullie, which is also being subtitled on YouTube and was also pretty amazing. Between the Germans and the British (with their fantastic John Paul/Craig & John Paul/Kieron love stories on the soap Hollyoaks), its easy to see just how behind the times and repressed we still are over here in America.
Still, it's getting better all the time, right? I mean, gays can now marry in three states and counting (Yay Connecticut!). Which reminds me, if you live in California, please make sure and vote No on Proposition 8!
Honestly, if I'm going to continue this blog, I'm going to have to branch out to new topics because there really isn't much of interest to say about gay soap characters that can't be said once every other month or so. I'm really not sure why I ended up focusing on just one topic so completely, given that there is a lot more to me than being a fan of soap operas who is also gay.
I've had questions via e-mail about why I don't write about politics any more, like I did when I started this blog. I'm not really sure, other than that I just never felt like I was that great at writing about them. I follow what's going on, and I love having discussions with my friends and family about it all, but I always just felt that when it came to writing about it, it had already been done, and better, by others, many of whom you can find in the links over on the side.
So, we shall see. I'd like to start writing about other things in the near future on this blog, though of course I'll keep updating on Nuke and any other gay characters who may come along.
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