![]() For others, it felt like bait.Ĭonsidering how there’s more straightforward representation in the film, like Rosie Perez’s Renee Montoya and her ex played by Ali Wong, queer coding feels incredibly regressive. For some, it set off an exciting prospect of more representation and, frankly, two deliciously weird gay villains. While at first they demurred, ultimately MacGregor said, “More than likely, yes.” Messina, who already had one arm around MacGregor, kissed him on the cheek. In advance of the film’s release, Ewan MacGregor and Chris Messina were asked if their characters in the movie are gay, given some internet chatter to that effect, which was itself fueled by the movie’s own marketing. That damaging trope shows up in films where queerness is explicit, like Silence of the Lambs, Basic Instinct, Dressed to Kill, and The Talented Mr. Moreover, the prevalence of queer coding villains primes audiences to think of queerness as evil, particularly if queer coding and the stereotypes it trades in go unexamined. LGBTQ characters are still portrayed more flatly and stereotypically than cis, straight ones, harkening back to when queer characters fit into specific roles to signal their identity to the audience. The tendency to show queer characters as morally corrupt and then kill them off is the genesis of both Queer Coded Villains and the Bury Your Gays tropes. While the Hays Code ended in 1968 and most other rules were corrected rather quickly, the impact on LGBTQ representation in film – as well as television, and our broader cultural stereotypes of queer people – continues today. In order to make queer characters acceptable under the Hays Code, even though they were coded, was to show them as morally bankrupt villains who are killed at the end of the film. After, however, filmmakers were forced to signal that characters were queer through visual cues and stereotypes, leaning into “the sissy,” using an effeminate voice and mannerisms for gay men. But it also prohibited depicting “sexual perversion.” Prior to the Hays Code, there was more LGBTQ representation on screen than modern audiences might expect. This list of 36 rules prohibits many on-screen depictions, like violence and sex. This came about due to the Hollywood Production Code of 1930, more commonly referred to as the Hays Code. As a result, many villains have been gay favorites, and many queer-coded femme characters have similarly been more feminist as they break with gender roles in other ways. Historically, villains have been “allowed” to be coded as queer because villains get more leeway and don’t have to conform to strict gender norms, unlike heroes. Queer coding villains isn’t necessarily all bad – for a while, it was the only representation we had. ![]() ![]() Whether sarcastic and arch, or with literal limp wrists, plenty of villains over the years have been coded as queer, particularly in animation, from Hercules ’ Hades to Ursula in The Little Mermaid, who was literally based on the drag queen Divine. ![]() Even the villain from Ben Hur was meant to be not only queer, but Ben Hur’s ex. A decent number of Hitchcock villains, from Norman Bates in Psycho and Leonard in North by Northwest to Bruno in Strangers on a Train and the two killers in Rope. Think Jafar and Scar preening and speaking with effete accents, and literally everything about Bowie’s Goblin King from Labyrinth. ![]()
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