Tag Archives: Supernatural

Waverly Earp Is the Queer, Demon-Fighting Cowboy You’ve Been Waiting For

Where can you see an attractive girl save the world from demons, wear leather jackets and get into queer love triangles? The answer isn’t just Buffy the Vampire Slayer anymore.

Wynonna Earp has come to your screens. This supernatural Western thriller defies categorization, but it does have two things for certain: It is very feminist, and it is very, very queer.

So who are Wynonna and Waverly Earp?

If you’re a fan of Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Flash, Arrow, Luke Cage or really any of the 7,004 comic book adaptations that are on cable these days, then Wynonna is the perfect addition. It’s based on Beau Smith’s IDW comic books.

The great-granddaughters of Wild West sheriff Wyatt Earp (who’s a real guy), Wynonna and Waverly, fight the Revenants, demons spawned from all of the people Wyatt Earp killed. And boy, has he killed a lot. Wyatt and her anti-demon six-shooter called Peacemaker can barely handle all the trouble that comes her way.

Here’s where it gets gay.

Unlike queerbaiting shows and movies, which either merely hint at characters’ queer sexuality or tout a token queer-ish character in order to drive up ratings, Wynonna puts the queer main character front and center. They even flesh her out!

Waverly is openly queer. She even has a dynamic love interest in Nicole Haught, a confident and charming young officer. GLAAD nominated the show for its portrayal of LGBT characters.

Waverly gets her own coming out storyline, but it’s not what you think. She’s openly gay and relatively proud of it, although she’s still wrestling with some demons of her own. But at the end of Season 1, she comes in contact with an ominous black goo that possesses her with something evil. Inverse says, “Fans suspect that it wasn’t something coming in, but rather something already inside of her coming out.”

Queer female protagonist? Check.

Complicated metaphor for internalized homophobia and self-denial personified as evil goo? Check.

Check out the first season on Netflix!

Get ‘Witchy’, A Supernatural New Queer Comic

This queer Asian witch is growing out her hair to save her father.

Witchy, a new webcomic by Ariel Ries, follows a queer South Asian witch named Nyneve (Nin-eev) who lives in the witch kingdom Hyalin. In Hyalin, the strength of a witch’s magic is determined by the length of his or her hair. The strongest witches join the Witch Guard, a law-enforcing order that keeps the peace during wartime.

But witches who grow their hair too long become too powerful, and are marked as enemies of the state. The Witch Guard annihilates these enemies in an execution called a witch burning. Haunted by the execution of her father and conscripted by the Witch Guard organization who killed him, Nyneve has a choice to make: Should she join the organization that murdered her father or take a stand against the government?

Witchy updates every Monday. Four chapters and hundreds of pages are available so far, so spend a few hours getting caught up in the archive before the next update.

Ries hand-draws each comic. She’s an animation student in Melbourne, Australia.

In addition to putting together her thesis film, Ries is in the process of collecting Witchy Chapters 1-3 into a print volume.

She draws her comics quite large (A4) in order to make all of her uploads high-resolution. Her work has evolved since she began drawing the comic in 2014: She drew the first 20 pages with a dip pen and deleter ink on manga paper, then used Photoshop, and now works primarily with Manga Studio 5 using customized brushes.

No one in Witchy is white. The kingdom of Hyalin is a melting pot of East Asian, South Asian and Oceanic cultures. Although Nyneve is a young adult (age 18), this series is darker than typical Young Adult novels.

Witchy won a 2015 Ignatz Award for Outstanding Online Comic and a 2016 DINKy Award for Outstanding Web Comic.

Check out the comic here, and look at Ries’ other projects here.

Leisha Hailey is Back (Briefly) on Our Screens!!

As Supernatural heads towards its season 10 finale, and we get given an extra special treat. L-word famed Leisha Hailey appears in the show, playing Claire Novak’s mom, Amelia.

Its been over ten years since lesbian drama The L Word first smashed on to our TV screens. An instant hit with gay and bi women around the world, it revolutionised the portrayal of LGBT women on TV and paved the way for more popular shows with gay/bi girls as major characters.

In Supernatural the episode Hailey is in focuses on character Claire Novak, who is back in town after she gets a lead on her long-lost mother, Amelia (Hailey).

Feeling the guilt for what he had done to Claire’s family, Castiel would want to make amends and the only thing to do it is by getting the mother and daughter reunite with each other.

He will do so by asking the Winchester brothers, Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Sam (Jared Padalecki) for some help.

Unfortunately, the summary noted, the group will discover some truth as to what took Amelia. They soon realize that there is a chance that Claire may not get the happy ending she looks for.

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A report from Carter Matt pointed out that this Castiel-centric episode could be a breather for the rigorous Mark of Cain storyline.

According to the publication:

Ultimately, the timing seems right for there to be a Castiel episode … Also, we hope that it can be one that gives Castiel even more great stuff to do. While he has some pretty interesting stuff going on right now trying to manage the guilt that he feels from his past, it took a little while this season for his story to really start to rocket off of the ground.”