Gayest Episode Ever

“You Can’t Win ’Em All” (February 27, 1985) Sara is a one-season sitcom that first came to our attention via a gag on The Simpsons, the context being that it wasn’t a show worth remembering. The Simpsons was wrong, however, and this Geena Davis vehicle does a lot of what we think ’80s sitcoms don’t do. Namely, it has an out gay character who is allowed to have a sex drive. He’s also more than a set of stereotypical mannerisms but he still reads as gay. And Bronson Pinchot, who one year later would become a sitcom star as Balki on Perfect Strangers, does a great job bringing dimension to this character who should have been on TV for a lot longer. Many thanks to Steven Capsuto for collecting historical context around Sara in his amazing book, Alternate Channels: Queer Images on Twentieth-Century TV, which is a great resource for anyone studying LGBTQ representation in media. Also listen to the episode Steve did with us about Love, Sidney. Thanks to Zach Wilson for giving us access to the video of this ep! You

“Valentine’s Day” (February 11, 1989) Consider this a special Valentine’s present from us to you: your regular weekly episode, one day early! Feb. 14 marks a truly terrible holiday that we’d normally encourage you all to ignore. However, it so happens that just in time for 2023’s Valentine’s Day we were reminded of a Golden Girls episode that spins not one but four tales about this wretched holiday. Believe us: They do it about as good as any TV show ever could. Watch Matt Baume’s video that inspired this episode, “Why Do Gay Guys Love The Golden Girls?” Listen to “Glen Writes a Golden Girls,” which is maybe one of the best things we’ve done with this podcast, as well as all the previous Golden Girls episodes. Submit your own suggestions for Box of Compliments compliments here. Confused about Dana Jean Harley and fat country babies eating peaches off a hardwood floor? Watch SNL’s “Country Roses” sketch here. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • G

A heads up: This episode discusses sexual assault in the context of it being something that would get referenced in mid-2000s shows as a marker of being “edgy.” Also, there is a discussion of anal probing in the context of alien abduction, not to be funny but to try and understand why this is a concept that shows up on sitcoms.  “Roger ’n‘ Me” (April 23, 2006) As a follow-up to last week’s Great Gazoo episode, we return to American Dad to try to explain why Roger the alien is such a successful character and, really, a likely reason why American Dad show succeeds. This is an early episode exploring Roger’s relationship with Stan. And while the show suffers from being more like Family Guy than it would be even a year later, there is surprisingly nuance to the way the show deals with these two sharing what amounts to a sexual experience. Listen to our previous episode on American Dad. Listen to the episode of Monday Afternoon Movie about The UFO Incident, with special guest Scott Philbrook from Astonishing Leg

“The Great Gazoo” (October 29, 1965) Not only did the Great Gazoo mark the “jumping the shark” point for The Flintstones well before that was a term that meant anything in TV studies, but also there’s a whole queer backstory for this green imp, who’s allegedly inspired by a guy who taught a legendary class of CalArts animators who went on to make most of the top-grossing cinematic cartoons of the last fifty years. The fact that there’s next to nothing available online about Bill Moore only makes the mystery more enticing. We truly will have a gay old time. Read the Vanity Fair piece on CalArts in which Brad Bird identifies the Great Gazoo as being inspired by Bill Moore. Listen to Talking Simpsons’ What a Cartoon episode about this Flintstones milestone. Watch the Stone Age Cartoons short “Granite Hotel,” which seems like a predecessor for The Flintstones. Read the MeTV article about sitcom couples sharing a bed. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twit

“The Sponge” (December 7, 1995) You know one thing Seinfeld did right that many of its metropolitan sitcom imitators didn’t? It had mean gays — specifically Bob and Cedric, a gay couple that shows up three times throughout the series run to exert queer menace on Kramer. They figure into a plot that’s otherwise centered on Elaine’s birth control, and their demand that Kramer wear an AIDS ribbon allows us to discuss various issues related to virtue signaling, talking talks vs. walking walks and getting called out online. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Twitter • Glen on Twitter Listen: Apple Podcasts • Spotify • Stitcher • Google Podcasts • Himalaya • TuneIn And yes, we do have an official website! We even have episode transcripts courtesy of Sarah Neal. Our logo was designed by Rob Wilson. This episode’s art was designed by Ian O’Phelan. This is a TableCakes podcast.

“The Shining Silver Crystal: The Moon Princess Appears” (November 28, 1992) It's the only Sailor Moon episode of a podcast you will hear this week featuring a surprise cameo by Mia Farrow. About a year ago, we covered Sailor Moon on our bonus podcast, The Cartoons That Made Us Gay. We kicked off 2023 by returning to Sailor Moon, and so we decided to pop the original one onto the main feed. This one is all about the first-season same-sex couple, Kunzite and Zoisite, but if you’re into it, right now on Patreon there is a whole second episode about the other famous same-sex couple from this series, Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune. Listen to that here. And GEE will be back with a brand-new Seinfeld outing in two weeks! But if that’s too long for you, don’t forget that new episodes premiere on the Patreon feed one week early! Miscellaneous notes: Yes, there is a substantial parallel between Sailor Moon and Buffy, though we’d hesitate to declare it more than a coincidence Kotaku’s post on the abomination that i

Greetings! We are combatting the dead zone that is the holidays with a bonus episode: the fourth of Weirdest Episode Ever, our new Patreon series looking at sitcoms that venture into sci-fi, horror and fantasy. If you like this, you can listen to three other episodes on Patreon, with another six to come in early 2023. They’re available for people supporting us at the $5 level or higher. Here’s the full list of episodes we have done/will be doing: The Cosby Show, "The Day the Spores Landed" (a.k.a. the male pregnancy episode) I Love Lucy, “Lucy Goes to Scotland" (a.k.a. Lucy gets fed to a dragon) Perfect Strangers, "Aliens" (a.k.a. Balki is an alien) The Facts of Life, "Seven Little Indians" (a.k.a. the Twilight Zone parody) A Family Matters, "Stevil" (a.k.a. Steve Urkel gets a murderous puppet doppelganger) Benson, "Death in a Funny Position" (a.k.a. serial killer cruise ship) Day By Day, "A Very Brady Episode" (a.k.a. a very strange venture into Brady Bunch land) Two Guys a Girl and a Pizza Place, "Two Guys

“Jingle Balls” (December 13, 2001) We are closing out the year by returning to the only sitcom whose every Christmas episode is also gay: Will & Grace. It’s not great, people. And while this Laura Kightlinger-penned season for ep shows promise, it ultimately pulls back from exploring subjects that it could have done interesting work with: Will’s apparent embarrassment at dating a more effeminate man and Jack’s misguided belief that being gay means he can do design work. At least Parker Posey saves the day with unrestrained homophobia. Got a question you want to ask Drew? Ask anonymously here. Details for how to watch the answering session to follow. Will & Grace, previously: Will and Jack Kiss on Live TV Will and Jack Embrace Every Gay Stereotype It’s a Will & Grace Christmas! BTW, the neurological condition Drew mentions in this episode is real and is called witzelsucht. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. And yes, it’s n

“A Tale of Two Lesbians” (June 19, 2009) It’s not exactly incorrect that you can summarize The Goode Family as “What if King of the Hill but liberal?” But that description makes it seem like Mike Judge’s follow-up to KotH didn’t have potential. It did, and just a few episodes in, it was world-building in a way few other series did, by giving viewers not just one lesbian couple but two — and they were nothing alike either! Imagine! Multiple representations of female queerness onscreen at the same time! We’re joined by longtime friend of the pod Mir Knight to discuss why this series didn’t succeed. Listen to the free preview of our first installment of Weirdest Episode Ever here. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Talk to other GEE listeners on the GEE Discord! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Twitter • Glen on Twitter Listen: Apple Podcasts • Spot

Content warning: In discussing plotlines on Soap, we do bring up suicide and, very briefly, sexual assault. "Episode 4.1" (November 12, 1980) * Finally! It's one of the biggest cult favorite sitcoms of all time *and* it's also a show famous for having a LGBT character in the main cast. The only reason it's taken us this many years to tackle Soap is that it's so much more serialized than mostly anything else we cover, so while we focus on one particular episode, we're also discussing the entirety of Billy Crystal's gay character, Jodie Dallas. Good thing we have longtime Soap fan and TableCakes' Katherine Helmond correspondent Gwynedd Stuart on hand to discuss the show in general and the awesomeness of Jessica Tate in particular. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Also check out Gwynedd's work on Sporked. Listen to Gwynedd’s episode of Monday Afternoon Movie about The Legend of Lizzie Borden. See the full text of "the Soap memo." And then

“Jonathan the Gymnast” (November 18, 1986) Technically, Who’s the Boss? never did a gay episode, but because Danny Pintauro’s sexuality looms large over this sitcom, many episodes seem a little gayer as a result — and this episode especially so. In it, Tony and Angela step into the kitchen to have a frank discussion of why Jonathan is not like other boys, and it really comes off like Who’s the Boss? is asking viewers to overlook this aspect of the character. It’s fucked up that this happened, and it’s one of several occurrences that make Drew utter the phrase “Poor Jonathan.” Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Listen to the episode of Monday Afternoon Movie about The Legend of Lizzie Borden — starring Katherine Helmond but also featuring as a guest Gwynedd Stuart, who will be our guest next week to discuss Soap. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Tw

“Sons and Lovers” (January 16, 1996) This is an honest-to-God follow-up to our previous Wings episode, which was all about the series antagonist, Roy Biggins, finding out his son was gay. Five seasons later, someone at Wings thought to ask “Hey, what if that gay character didn’t cease to exist the moment that first episode ended?” This episode marks one of the few times that a one-off gay character actually got to return. And yeah, we’re re-joined by Massachusetts correspondent Jonathan Bradley Welch. It’s a real journey for us all. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Watch what remains of the attempted British remake of Wings.Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Twitter • Glen on Twitter Listen: Apple Podcasts • Spotify • Stitcher • Google Podcasts • Himalaya • TuneIn And yes, we do have an official webs

“The Man We Love” (June 30, 1996) Last week, we looked at Married… With Children’s take on an anti-Friends. This week, we decided to look at the last episode of a show that aired the previous season on Fox. While it was not designed as a response to Friends, it nonetheless managed to solve some of that show’s major problems. Namely, it’s racially diverse, there’s a queer character in the opening credits, and the characters actually work. It’s also funny, and having been co-created by writers who cut their teeth on The Golden Girls, that’s no surprise. What’s more, this show features an explicitly bi character — and this is something sitcoms almost never did and still don’t. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Watch episodes of The Crew on archive.org. And while you’re at it, watch The Five Mrs. Buchanans too. Read Drew’s interview with Golden Girls writers, including Jamie Wooten and more. Check out Katherine’s new food venture, How to Ea

“Enemies” (April 14, 1996) You may recall a late-series installment of Married… With Children that shifted focus away from the Bundys and onto an apartment of young sexy people who apparently despised each other. This was “Enemies,” a kinda-sorta send-up of Friends that never saw the light of day beyond this one episode. Our theory is that it was a reformatted spinoff that at one point was going to star Christina Applegate and that also features a guy who’s totally a stand-in for Matt Le Blanc. All of this is our take on what would be the Backdoor Pilots Patreon-only bonus podcast that we’re starting this month. Should we do this one? Or should we do Weirdest Episode Ever? Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. According to Pop Culture References, it looks like The Bob Cummings Show was the first TV show to do a backdoor pilot. And here’s that 1996 Levi’s commercial that Drew thinks this episode is reacting to. Buy the new issue of Beyond Sun

“It May Look Like a Walnut” (February 6, 1963)   It’s not the first “weird” episode that a sitcom ever did, but it’s probably the most famous: the second-season installment of The Dick Van Dyke Show where it departed from the usual formula and became a sci-fi B-movie. It turns out to be a dream, of course, but you actually aren’t sure until the final moments, and it’s still one of the stranger sequences you’ll ever see on a mainstream sitcom.   This episode is not all that gay but it is the first of two pitches for our next Patreon-exclusive show. Should we do a whole ten-episode season of the weirdest episodes ever? We will be putting it up to vote after next week’s episode, the other choice, is live.   Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and  Cartoons That Made Us Gay.   Stuff to listen to: Our previous Dick Van Dyke episode about the “seaman” joke The new Halloween episode of Singing Mountain We Love Trash The Square Roots podcast   Stuff to watch: Head of

“Morticia and the Psychiatrist” (September 25, 1964) This year, we’re celebrating Halloween with one of the two most Halloween-tastic TV families of all time — and no worries, because we talk plenty about the other one too. Joining us to discuss the second episode of The Addams Family is Ted Biaselli, director of original series at Netflix, who shares some of his experience developing the new Addams Family reboot, Wednesday, and his lifelong relationship with the creepiest and kookiest family in sitcom history. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Listen to Ted’s previous episodes, The Cartoons That Made Us Gay and Glen Writes a Golden Girls. Also, here is the blog post Drew references as identifying the Addams Family as east coast while the Munsters are west coast.  Also:The new Halloween episode of Singing Mountain The Square Roots podcast Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook

“Fizbo” (November 25, 2009) People have been asking us to cover this show basically since we started the podcast, and so this week we finally decided to cover it… by looking into an episode no one wanted us to do. In our heads, the most interesting part of the show is Cam and Mitchell, and the most interesting part of Cam and Mitchell is Eric Stonestreet’s portrayal of Cam. He’s straight, but we say he delivers a nuanced character who both embraces and defies stereotypes. Also, he’s a clown, it turns out. Which may be appropriate, depending on your point of view. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Twitter • Glen on Twitter Listen: Apple Podcasts • Spotify • Stitcher • Google Podcasts • Himalaya • TuneIn And yes, we do have an official website! We even have episode transcr

“The Boys’ Night Out” (February 13, 1983) More than a hundred episodes later (of All in the Family but also of this podcast), we return to the Archie Bunker primary universe to find out if everyone's favorite bigot got over his homophobia. The answer: kind of? But that is probably just the result of season after season of broadcast TV sanding off his rougher edges. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Listen to Drew talk Street Fighter II and Thrilling Tales of Old Video Games on the Video Game History Hour podcast. Media of note: The Hollywood Reporter interview with Norman Lear about Carol O'Connor  Washington Post article on the cancelation of Archie Bunker's Place  The “Night of a Thousand Stars” video  Beverly LaSalle, RIP (part one) as explained by the Totally Trans podcast Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram 

“There Is Nothing Like the Dames” (February 17, 1990) Believe it or not, Mama’s Family has a deeply queer history. While the final result of — the syndicated revival that returned to TV after NBC canceled the it — bears little of that, this episode goes over all the ways a recurring sketch on The Carol Burnett Show originally told the story of a queer-coded artist who can’t relate to his family back home. It’s all the stranger to consider that Mama’s Family never did an explicitly queer episode, even with all those Bob Mackie costumes. Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Read the article in which Bubba actor Allan Kayser talks about his famously tight jeans. Vicki Lawrence sings the original, non-instrumental version of the Mama’s Family theme song. But also listen to her disco banger “Don’t Stop the Music” and the no. 1 murder mystery pop hit “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia.” Watch

“Cougars” (November 29, 2007) As comedically successful as it might be, 30 Rock is a very straight show. That’s why our best pick for a queer episode is one where the sexually interesting narrative is the C plot and it ends with Judah Friedlander’s Frank convincing himself he can’t like guys because he doesn’t fit prescribed definition of gay. This episode is ultimately harmless but indicative of some traps later Tina Fey efforts would fall into. But hey — it’s got “Muffin Top.” Check out our sponsor, Spaces! And join our spaces for Gayest Episode Ever and Cartoons That Made Us Gay. Buy the new issue of Beyond Sunset here. Listen to Drew and Glen talk Teen Angel on Talking Simpsons. Go shop at our TeePublic store! Follow: GEE on Facebook • GEE’s Facebook Group • GEE on Twitter • GEE on Instagram • Drew on Twitter • Glen on Twitter Listen: Apple Podcasts • Spotify • Stitcher • Google Podcasts • Himalaya • TuneIn And yes, we do have an official website! We even have episode transcripts courtesy of Sara