Bury Your Gays
Up until a couple of years ago, when a lesbian character was introduced in a show it was fairly easy to guess how their storyline was going to conclude. A handful of those characters got a happy ending, most of those happy endings involving never talking about their sexuality again. An even smaller selection of those happy endings were with a partner, either a wedding or the series ending with the characters in a stable relationship. There was a chance they were going to be conveniently written out of the show or suddenly get significantly less screen time. But let's not forget, there was a good chance they were just going to be killed off.
This problem came to a climax in 2016, when many fan favorite characters were killed resulting in very vocal opposition. "Autostraddle's Ultimate Infographic Guide to Dead Lesbian Characters on TV" in 2016 provided research that had never been done on the subject and revealed the blatant mistreatment. Of all the lesbian/bi characters on a tv show that had ended, 31% of them died, 28% were guest characters with no conclusion to their story and only 10% received a happy ending. At that time, there were 95 dead lesbian/bi characters and only 30 lesbian/bi characters with happy endings.
But that's not necessarily a bad thing, right? Those characters could've been evil or the death might've been crucial to a plot line. After all, LGBTQ+ people just want equality and straight characters die all the time.
That may be true, if it weren't for the specifics of some of these deaths. Especially the one death that brought this to my, and most people's, attention.
On the CW show The 100, a romance was introduced in season 2 between main character Clarke Griffin and the new side character, Lexa. Lexa was introduced as a brutal leader of a violent group of people who initially served as an enemy to Clarke and her more civilized people.
Lexa's character soon evolved over the next season and a half, revealing a strong moral code ("Victory stands on the back of sacrifice"), emotional complexity ("I lost someone special to me too. Her name was Costia... Because she was mine... they tortured her, killed her, cut off her head."), and eventually a relationship with Clarke that resulted in her trying to change her people's ways for the better.
And then she was killed. More specifically, Clarke and her were allowed one moment of intimacy and then she was killed. Lexa was a warrior, a leader, and had recently become a political activist, so of course her life was in danger. So was she killed when a clan tried opposing her rule and attacked her? Was she killed fighting in a battle with her people, an honorable death?
Or was she killed because her advisor disliked her relationship with Clarke and attempted to shoot Clarke, but accidentally shot Lexa who was unfortunate enough to walk into the room after hearing the first gunshot?
The death of Lexa was disappointing and heartbreaking, causing an uproar from the lesbian community who had been noticing deaths similar to this in every lesbian story they stumbled across. More importantly, it revealed a flaw in the television industry and forced a positive change. It showed that when people are passionate and rise up together, they can actually make a difference.
And then she was killed. More specifically, Clarke and her were allowed one moment of intimacy and then she was killed. Lexa was a warrior, a leader, and had recently become a political activist, so of course her life was in danger. So was she killed when a clan tried opposing her rule and attacked her? Was she killed fighting in a battle with her people, an honorable death?
Or was she killed because her advisor disliked her relationship with Clarke and attempted to shoot Clarke, but accidentally shot Lexa who was unfortunate enough to walk into the room after hearing the first gunshot?
The death of Lexa was disappointing and heartbreaking, causing an uproar from the lesbian community who had been noticing deaths similar to this in every lesbian story they stumbled across. More importantly, it revealed a flaw in the television industry and forced a positive change. It showed that when people are passionate and rise up together, they can actually make a difference.
