Fallout Isn’t Gay Enough

Television

Things are going well for the Fallout show. Fans and critics alike seem to be pleased with it, and while it hasn’t officially been renewed yet, the producers are already talking about season 2. But there’s a problem, something many hadn’t considered, but the brave folks at Pride.com are bringing this issue to the forefront so we can remember what’s really important: Fallout isn’t gay enough. I know, I know… why even bother watching it now? I’m sorry to have ruined your anticipation, but isn’t it worthwhile to know beforehand so you don’t waste your time on some boring show that doesn’t have pride flags and characters who mention how gay they are in every conversation? You’re welcome, America.

According to Pride.com, “Textual queerness is only fleetingly on screen and none of the main characters — at least so far — have explored a queer romance.” I don’t know what “textual queerness” is, and when I looked it up, I couldn’t find it mentioned anywhere else, with none of the permutations of the phrase seeming to fit the context Pride.com uses it in, so I assume it was made up on the spot to make this whining sound more thoughtful than it is. Presumably, nobody on the show is gay, and that’s pissing off Pride.com, despite the four preceding paragraphs lovingly praising the series. But, apparently, the Fallout games have a “queer history,” and Fallout “was one of the very first games that allowed for same-sex romances.” As I’ve never played the games, I looked this up: you can choose to make characters gay in the early Fallout games, and Fallout 3 and on feature gay or bisexual characters. Fair enough; it’s the modern era of Hollywood, so I’m sure there’ll be plenty of this on the show in future seasons, and if it’s in the games, that makes sense.

But that’s not enough; why didn’t it kick off with wall-to-wall gay? That’s what Pride.com asked Jonathan Nolan, Geneva Robertson-Dworet, and Graham Wagner, an executive producer and the two showrunners, respectively. Can you imagine approaching the three people in charge of a new hit show and asking them why it isn’t gayer? I mean, I get it; it’s Pride.com, and this is kinda their raison d’être. But jeez, can you maybe wait a week or so before making the popular new show that most people seem to love all about you? Of course not, so Nolan, Roberston-Dworet, and Wagner were forced to answer this. However, the answers they gave are fascinating, particularly those of Nolan and Wagner. Here’s part of Nolan’s answer:

“It’s one of the things that I was struck by the very first time I played Fallout, is that it’s not necessarily about the end of the world. It’s about the beginning of a whole bunch of new worlds, different worlds, and the absence of these cultural hierarchies. It is [that in] being smashed to pieces along with everything else, people get a chance… [This speaks to queerness] within this universe within this new world, it’s a blank slate, that people get to chart their own course, and that these communities get to reassemble themselves with their own set of rules, which I think in a way to me speaks to the thread of optimism that runs through the games. It’s not the zombie apocalypse, it’s about if the world goes away, and we have a chance to build a new one, what does that world get to look like?”

I love that answer. It’s not about seeing yourself literally in every last bit of the story, but in seeing the various themes of starting over and forming a new society and applying those to whatever aspects of yourself or your community you want. That’s how good fiction works, and it makes me even more interested in Fallout. Again, I’m sure there will be gay characters later – Geneva Roberson-Dworet effectively confirms it – but hearing this from Nolan makes me think they could be handled well instead of thrown in there to appease the Pride.com types.

But the showstopper has to be Graham Wagner’s answer:

“I struggled with it a bit as a straight white dude… we’re in this great moment where there is finally money to tell queer stories. It’s not my money. Those are stories for queer storytellers to tell. I sometimes feel a little gun-shy about tackling those issues, because I know that there is a market for that, it belongs to my fellow writers who are from that demographic, and who can do a better job of it than me. But maybe that’s a cowardly approach. I’m not sure… it’s part of their conversation in the room every day.”

That one made me laugh hard. He’s right; the same faction that insists there be gay characters in everything also gets mad when a “straight white dude” writes them. That’s the perfect way of throwing it back at them, insisting that he doesn’t want to take this away from gay writers who are better suited for it. Again, I really want to watch this show now.