AoU and also crowdsourcing: LGBTQ characters!

[kaydeefalls]

Have seen Age of Ultron twice. Thought it had some pacing issues, and some of the character beats felt off (mostly due to the pacing issues), but in general I definitely liked it. Enjoyed it more the second time, probably because I'd made peace with the things I didn't like as much and could just enjoy it on its own merits. But I generally enjoy Marvel movies more on rewatching than on first viewing, not sure why. Fandom's hate-on for this movie (and all things Whedon in general) is kind of upsetting me deeply, so I'd rather not dissect it further right now. I'm super aware that my fave is problematic and I absolutely agree, but I still really love the Whedonverse, including his forays into Avengers. I don't think the MCU is where he's at his best, and I'm glad he's stepping out of the franchise now, both because I think the MCU in general can be stronger with Marcus & McFeely and the Russo brothers at the helm AND because I want Joss to go back to doing his own thing instead of playing with other people's toys. But all the hate is really dragging me down, and I need fandom to be my happy place right now so I'm just gonna dive back into Steve/Bucky(/Sam/Natasha) fic and ignore the rest of fandom until the dust settles.

Please don't comment on this post to harsh my squee, is what I'm saying, because I really don't want to be guilted for the things I love. Which includes AVENGERS v2.0 OMG I AM SO BEHIND THE NEW TEAM GIVE ME ALL OF THE TEAM!FIC WITH STEVE AND NAT AND SAM AND RHODEY AND WANDA AND VISION (AND BUCKY AND I THINK LADY SIF SHOULD SUB IN AS WELL).

Next up: I'm trying to compile a list of LGBTQ characters in geeky genres for an upcoming trivia and I need your help! Because I don't know all of the fandoms, obvs. I'm looking for TEXTUALLY queer characters (as in, not just subtext/slash goggles) in any of the following genres: sci-fi, fantasy, horror, comics/graphic novels/manga, video games, anime/cartoons. I know sci-fi/fantasy pretty well, but very much need help in the comics/anime/gaming areas. And in particular I don't know of many trans* characters, so tell me what you've got!


TV shows
BtVS: Willow, Tara, Kennedy, Andrew, Larry
Firefly: Inara (is bi, damnit)
True Blood: Lafayette, Tara, Jesus, basically all the vampires to some extent
Supernatural: Charlie
Torchwood: Jack, Ianto, Tosh
Doctor Who: Madame Vastra, Jenny, Canton
DS9: Jadzia Dax
BSG: Gaeta, Hoshi, Cain
Xena: Xena, Gabrielle (these two are pushing it, because I don't think they're technically canon)
Orphan Black: Cosima, Delphine, Felix, Tony
SGU: Camile Wray
The 100: Clarke Griffin, Lexa
Flash: Captain Singh
Arrow: Nyssa Al Ghul, Sara Lance
Once Upon a Time: Mulan
Lost Girl: Bo, Tamsin, Lauren
Warehouse 13: HG Wells, Steve Jinks
Babylon 5: Susan Ivanova, Talia Winters

Comics
Marvel: Iceman, Victoria Hand, Northstar, Wiccan, Hulkling, America Chavez, Mystique, Destiny, Xavin, Karolina Dean, Loki, David Alleyne, Julie Power, Brandon Sharpe, Xi'an Coy Manh, Juilo Richter, Shatterstar, James Howlett & Hercules
DC: Batwoman, Renee Montoya, Maggie Sawyer, Selina Kyle, Eiko Hasigawa, Midnighter, Apollo, Alysia Yeoh, Frankie Charles, Holly Robinson, Cullen Row
Morning Glories: Hisao, Guillame
Saga: Upsher, Doff
Rat Queens: Betty, Faeyri

Movies/Books
Rocky Horror: all of the characters, basically
Harry Potter: Dumbledore (sigh)
Dune: Baron Harkonen (double sigh)
Game of Thrones: Renly, Loras
Raven Cycle: Ronan
Vorkosigan Saga: Aral Vorkosigan, Ethan of Athos, Ges Vorutyer, Dono Vorutyer
Temeraire: John Granby

Anime/Cartoons
LoK: Korra, Asami
Sailor Moon: Michiru, Haruka

Video Games
Fear Effect: Hana Tsu-Vachel
Dragon Age: The Warden, Hawke, The Inquisitor (player characters, female or male, can be whatever you want), Dorian Pavus (gay), Sera (lesbian), Anders, Fenris, Iron Bull, Isabela, Josephine Montilyet, Lace Harding, Leliana, Merrill, Zevran Arainai (bisexual or pansexual), Cremisius "Krem" Aclassi, Maevaris Tilani (trans*)
Mass Effect: Shepard (female or male, can be whatever you want), Steve Cortez (gay), Samantha Traynor (lesbian), Diana Allers, Kaidan Alenko, Kelly Chambers (bisexual or pansexual), Liara T'Soni, Morinth, Samara (are from a monogendered species and can romance anyone regardless of gender)

Comments

[kaydeefalls]

I am totally using this list as my personal to-read list for the future, it is awesome. :D Vorkosigan is the only one I've read, although I haven't worked my way through the full series yet. Thanks for the recs!

For the purposes of this particular trivia, tragically, a lot of these books are probably too "obscure" to work, sigh. (It's a comics-movies-gaming-and-anime sort of crowd, unfortunately -- unless it's, like, Tolkien or Harry Potter or Game of Thrones, a lot of book questions are much tougher to sell, and it's no fun writing questions that NO ONE can answer.)

[rabid_bookwyrm]

Yay! But aw. Yeah, I'm trying to think of mainstreamier queer characters... Doctor Who, 10th Doctor episode Midnight, Sky has just broken up with her wife. There's also the (ugh) tall short fat thin I hate you Moffatt gay catholic space marines. Because who needs names with descriptors like that.

Irene Adler in Sherlock identifies as gay. Since I am prone to take people at their word about things like that, I believe her.

I think that one of the side characters in Caprica was explicitly queer, but I never actually watched it. I didn't watch all of BSG, but were we thrown no bones there?

I'm pretty sure Xena is textually bi.

And the actor who played Ioulus in Hercules also played other characters in single episodes. At least one was a woman. Couldn't tell you which season. I feel like that adds a dimension of queerness, if not exactly what you're looking for.

Every one of the Valdemar books I've read had a queer relationship somewhere in it. Vanyel (Magic's Promise, Magic's Price, Magic's something I can't remember now) is the only gay central figure in the ones I read, but there may have been more after I gave up.

Boston Legal's (male) main characters got married at the end of the series. They were not in a sexual relationship and I believe both identified as straight.

Tamora Pierce, Lioness Quartet - Alanna, the main character, spends the first two books disguised as a boy. She has trans experiences, but does not identify as trans and returns to female identification after she is outed. That's another sort of edge-case.

Except for the last one, I don't know that I would rush to add this batch to your read/watch list.