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Boycott Disney: New Marvel Show Hyped as 'Gayest' Show Yet

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In case you needed a reason to boycott a new Disney/Marvel series, the entertainment giant certainly isn’t shy about giving you one.

“Agatha All Along,” a nine-episode Disney+ sequel to 2021’s excruciatingly meta “WandaVision,” was called “the gayest project that Marvel has ever done” by a Variety interviewer on the red carpet — something one of the stars agreed with.

The whole “gayest project” quote came from a reporter from Hollywood outlet Variety, but co-star Sasheer Zamata agreed with his assessment.

“Witches are queer inherently,” Zamata said at the premiere. “Just because we are outcasts and like, set aside for many reasons.”

“And this show shows a really good representation of different types of people, and that we can all use the power we have within to like, go forth and be great,” she concluded.

That thought was echoed by Zamata’s co-stars, as well:

Do you think Disney will ever return to its former glory?

I have zero idea what the end of Zamata’s word salad meant, but I think every executive at cash-hemorrhaging Disney was pretty much in a fit of inchoate panic by the time she got to the rambling about “go forth and be great.”

Now, granted, Zamata is only one part of a cast that includes Katherine Hahn, Aubrey Plaza and Joe Locke … the latter two whom also praised the show for its overweening gayness.

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Locke, who plays the character Teen, as per Variety: “It’s got many layers and gay is one of them. That’s one of the great things about the show. … Teen is a queer guy on the show, but it’s not the driving force, which I think is really great. It’s really nice to just have these positive queer characters.”

Plaza, who plays Rio Vidal: “It will be a gay explosion by the end of it.”

Explosion, indeed, might be the right word to describe it.

First, rest assured that if you didn’t watch “WandaVision” or aren’t up on the details of the outer fringes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this probably already isn’t for you, no matter how much you like the other work the actors have done. (Plaza is best known for her stint on “Parks and Rec,” Hahn also for “Parks and Rec” and “WandaVision,” Locke for the Netflix series “Heartstopper” and Zamata for “Saturday Night Live.”)



Basically, Hahn is the titular character, Agatha Harkness, who is a witch from 1693 Salem that, in “WandaVision,” arrives in the present investigate the fictional show “WandaVision” being created by the titular character of the actual show “WandaVision” and ends up trapped in the fictional town of Westview, New Jersey. “Agatha All Along,” according to a logline for the series published by Variety in July, puts together a new coven of witches to travel “the legendary Witches’ Road, a magical gauntlet of trials that, if survived, rewards a witch with what they’re missing.”

If this all sounds like you accidentally took eight doses of Robitussin, “Agatha All Along” isn’t for you. But then again, it might be for that many people, period.

While the MCU is a complicated enough thing that a person could complete several “Final Fantasy” games while it was explained to them, “Star Wars” is not. It’s part of our collective unconscious. Luke. Yoda. Leia. Han. Lando. The Force. Jedis. Darth Vader. Darth Maul. Darth [Insert Malignant-Sounding Name Here]. Chewy. Sarcastic robots. Just throw a few of those elements into the plot and everyone will get what’s going on.

However, when “The Acolyte” — the latest series in that universe — came out on Disney+ in June, it also came out, with the creator declaring it the “gayest ‘Star Wars’ yet.”

“People have told me that it’s the gayest ‘Star Wars’ ever, and I’m frankly into it,” said creator Leslye Headland, who identifies as lesbian.

And guess what? It got canned two months later, when the series wasn’t picked up for a second season. I wonder why?

Apparently, people weren’t into the queering of “Star Wars” with, among other things, sections like that — which sounds more like the hidden track on a Yoko Ono album than anything from a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

And it’s not like official media critics panned it like, say, the wretched “Solo: A Star Wars Story.” It has a 78 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which means that critics generally thought it was good enough.

Given that “Star Wars” is a reliable IP, that should have been enough to secure it a second season — unless, of course, fans decided they didn’t want to commit to eight episodes of a home DEI seminar about LGBT representation in fiction. It also didn’t help that the eight episodes of said seminar cost $180 million to produce, according to The New York Times, at the same time Disney is losing money like a drunken poker player.

In fact, the only major Disney success to report in 2024 — aside from the fact that it only lost $18 million on its Disney+ streaming service in the second quarter, a considerable improvement over the $659 million it lost last year at the same time, according to The Wall Street Journal?

That would be “Inside Out 2,” a Pixar movie which, shockingly, creators decided not to make the “gayest film about anthropomorphized emotions ever.” That film exceeded box-office expectations with no wokeness involved. Imagine that.

Look for Pixar to screw that up with “Cars 4,” in which a former auto athlete transitions to “Caitlyn McQueen” — and don’t you dare deadname him as “Lightning!”

I’m kidding, of course. I think. I hope. Please, Disney, don’t get any ideas.

You’re apparently getting bad enough advice already from your showrunners. You don’t need it from me.

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C. Douglas Golden is a writer who splits his time between the United States and Southeast Asia. Specializing in political commentary and world affairs, he's written for Conservative Tribune and The Western Journal since 2014.
C. Douglas Golden is a writer who splits his time between the United States and Southeast Asia. Specializing in political commentary and world affairs, he's written for Conservative Tribune and The Western Journal since 2014. Aside from politics, he enjoys spending time with his wife, literature (especially British comic novels and modern Japanese lit), indie rock, coffee, Formula One and football (of both American and world varieties).
Birthplace
Morristown, New Jersey
Education
Catholic University of America
Languages Spoken
English, Spanish
Topics of Expertise
American Politics, World Politics, Culture




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