La Ron S. Readus
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I Saw The TV Glow Explained for Straight People (VIDEO SCRIPT)
🕑 Added 2024-10-09 20:00:05 +0000 UTCI Saw the TV Glow is a 2024 psychological thriller that, unsurprisingly, left a lot of straight people confused when they watched it.
This confusion came in multiple forms, but each of them can be summarized instead into multiple questions.
/Questions like, “Where’s the relevancy? Why isn’t the threat given more focus? Why is Justice Smith’s character wearing a dress? Like, I know he gay in real life so he probably does that in his spare time, but why attach that to the main character?”/
Before I continue, yes, I know. They’re dumb. As shit. Real talk.
Because when the movie came out, a lot of people who didn’t relate to the experience going on in the movie said with the confidence of Kevin Hart with they whole-ass chest, that they either couldn’t or refused to acknowledge that this thriller that was marketed as a horror movie is one big allegory for being trans.
They instead focused on how the plot device of the TV show was underutilized as a horror element or how the emotional nostalgic connection we have to old comfort movies and tv shows was the ACTUAL allegory the movie was trying to make.
As per usual, they looked at their plate of fried porkchops, candied yams, mac & cheese and collard greens that is this movie, ate everything except the gay-ass collards and pretended they never saw them on their plate in the first place. All while critiquing that the meal felt incomplete; that it was missing something.
GEE, I WONDER WHAT, OLIVER?
Because the thing about “I Saw the TV Glow” is that the collards are part of the meal for a reason. They are the basis of what this plate is and what keeps the other themes presented on it together. To ignore the collard greens just because the only green things you eat are green Jelly Beans and TOOTHPASTE is to ignore the meal itself.
/Thankfully, I realized this about the movie the moment the opening scene started to play. So while I admit that I did want to see more of the supernatural element that made this a psychological thriller present, I DEFINITELY saw the writing on the first wall I saw upon approaching the fucking house./
And it might be because I’m Bi, but because I did, I saw this movie in a SLEW of more perspectives.
Because my bisexual ass accepted the films transness -- which you wouldn’t think is a problem for other queer folk, but is actually becoming more of one with the amount of queer respectability Terfs popping up all over the place now -- seeing the way both queer people in general can relate to the main character and how queerness over the course of history has been embedded in the themes and culture displayed across this movie became INCREDIBLY easier to do.
And that’s why, for today’s lesson, I wanna extend that feeling to YOU. The Straights.
Specifically the ones that just can’t understand why transness and queerness are both essential to this story, simply because you can’t relate to it.
And my goal is that once you do, you’ll walk away from this video with the knowledge, the consideration, and maybe even the empathy to resist that want to declare something uninteresting and irrelevant just because it doesn’t involve YOU
Consider this my community service for the year of 2024. Let’s begin.
____________________
Hey, Readers. La’Ron here. Offering you analysis and perspective on your favorite bits of geek and pop culture media
If it wasn’t obvious from the intro, this video will in fact contain spoilers for the movie I Saw the TV GLow. It’s currently available to stream on Max, so give it a watch if you haven’t seen it yet and don’t want me to spoil pivotal points of it for you in this video.
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That’s the syllabus. Now onto the lesson.
So, the thing about straight analysis...
Is that there are individuals in the realm of media literacy nowadays that like to completely gloss over either the allegorical queerness or the ACTUAL queerness in a body of work, only to say that the blanket said queerness was actually nestled under is the only theme that is worthy of being the main analytical focus of the piece.
Because heteronormative stories are the societal norm, those who are brought up, identify as, and fall under that same norm are given a privilege to assume that their point of view is the one that should be taken as top priority, even if the story isn’t about or promoting heteronormativity at all. The American concept of Whiteness in regards to race and ethnicity works the same way.
/In the case of I Saw The TV Glow, these individuals are presented with themes of queerness and transness, and instead concentrates on the blanket that’s covering them. And what the blanket represents here, are the “horrors” of fandom nostalgia when you develop a dangerously obsessive parasocial relationship with it./
Because of the supernatural elements that we experience over the course of the narrative, the visuals and cinematography, and even the promotion of the movie itself, they only see this possible hold that the television show The Pink Opaque has on Owen and Maddy in choosing them to be the new vessels for the fictional characters Isabel and Tara respectively, in order for them to carry out its canceled sixth season.
/And according to them, this is proven in how the former constantly resists the call to let Isabel take over while using the latter’s decision to be reborn as Tara as an example of what happens when one allows this Season 6 pre-production ritual to be done on them./
Is this a wrong way of interpreting the plot of “I Saw The TV Glow” or even how we’re supposed to look at both Owen and Maddy? No, because this definitely presented itself and was a prominent plot point over the course of the story
But it was done for the purpose of disguising queerness, because the idea of trans realization even being entertained was impossible for them to achieve willingly.
You would think that empathy could help these individuals think outside of the “No Homo Bro Zone,” but not even that doesn’t. Because patriarchy keeps these individuals making themselves the main priority, and they don’t even notice.
With that, any empathy to experience someone else's anguish and inner battles is thrown out the window the moment they realize they can’t see themselves in the main character and moves on to the next side hustle.
Because I guarantee you; making the active decision to simply focus on this aspect of “I Saw The TV Glow” as a way to take eyes off the story’s transness by those who call themselves critics is definitely a choice.
Because this topic alone of how obsessively parasocial people get in a fandom of fiction -- even if it IS done in a way that DOES utilize some eldritch or chthonic connection to deliver its metaphor -- is HEAVILY associated with both queerness and the queer community; especially in regards to how we take in and digest fiction.
It’s to the point where it is literally impossible to talk about bitches obsessed with the fandom of their favorite show, movie, or book series without associating it with the queerness that enables it -- both in individuals and even as a construct.
We unhealthily obsess over fictional characters ALL THE TIME! For most of us, placing our personalities on fictional people played a part in how we found out we were even queer to begin with!
We hyperfixate, we over-analyze, mostly because we need to know who’s behind our fucking backs. We allow a ridiculously significant amount of room in our mind becoming emotional over a fake scenario in a made-up world featuring pretty and problematic people that persistently need permission to exist.
And for some of us, it claims a significant amount of our time and focus because it allows us to project. Allows us to relate. It allows us to be inspired to continue existing, thanks to the main hyper-fixated focus at that time in our life.
This excessive level of parasocial relationships with fiction fandom is in the very lifeblood of modern queer culture. So even if you never acknowledge the trans allegory, you still cannot -- for the life of you -- say that it has no queerness whatsoever. Yet because of their heteronormative privilege in media literacy, they do.
That’s why for example, when bigots complain about a comic book character revealed to be bi, they say it came out of nowhere because they think Context Clues is a show on Nick Jr.
Meanwhile, those of us with empathy and attachment issues -- ie, queer people -- pay attention to every single bit of dialogue, vocal delivery of that dialogue, unique character quirks and decision-making choices, and even the expressions made by the actors portraying them to have accepted no other verdict on the matter.
It’s through that obsessiveness thanks to having something to carry our Relatability Box around for a while that we realize we have the same goals, the same drive, the same determination and resolve, finding our true selves as a result.
/And considering how apparent it was that Owen was struggling with even ACKNOWLEDGING her true self throughout the movie -- just to circle it back -- it just doubles down even harder on how ridiculous it sounds to say that no trans allegory exists in this movie AT ALL/.
But that also means we have to come to an understanding why the film’s plot device The Pink Opaque even took this shape at all instead of something else. What makes using a melodramatic tv show aimed at teenage girls in the 90’s the perfect vessel for representing both the surface level and barely hidden allegories in the movie?
Well the best way for us to answer this question of “what do Queer Theory and Media Literacy have in common?” is to talk a little bit...
About As Told By Ginger.
As Told By Ginger was the stepping stone in introducing the girls and gays into melodrama. At least if you had Nickelodeon.
/It was done in a way where it was able to produce a relatable character a lot of queer and femme-leaning individuals could project themself onto because she’s going through all the same things as them./
Navigating personalities, dealing with intense feelings and complex emotions for the first time, insecurity and exposure via bullying, navigating various forms of relationships. This show was IT for a lot of the other Millennials that I grew up with.
Not me, though. I wanted a PlayStation 2.
Considering that fans of the drama that was dished up in Sheltered Shrubs, CT are still around to this day -- I know, I’ve befriended them -- that shows you the power this show had. This was just as impactful as the 90’s slate of Alex Mack, The Adventures of Pete & Pete and The Mystery Files of Shelby Woo -- all excellent live-action Nickelodeon shows that did a great job catering to Millennials’ tweens and teen development if they had cable back then.
/And if Nickelodeon making the intentional decision to have their first theatrically released movie be an adaptation of Louise Fitzhugh’s Harriet The Spy should tell you anything, it should be that they were aware of this./
/I Saw The TV Glow’s own television show The Pink Opaque gave off a lot of those vibes for me as I was watching the movie, to the point where I was able to pinpoint the network it was airing on as a Nickelodeon-inspired channel even before I heard how the channel transitioned to their version of Nick @ Nite during the movie’s scenes in the 90’s/
(It’s the last show on the block before they switch to black and white reruns for old people)
Turns out this was intentional, because the vibes that were made to reflect the childhood of the films own writer and director were confirmed when it was revealed which Nickelodeon show in particular inspired The Pink Opaque.
/While I thought it was The Tomorrow People, it was ACTUALLY Pete & Pete./
In hindsight, I should’ve realized it was gonna be Pete & Pete after I saw the “Monster of the Week” in the first episode Owen ever watches. Hell, Danny Tamberelli -- Little Pete himself -- has a cameo in this movie.
/So if the Mr. Softy monster in the first episode Owen watched wasn’t an indicator, then seeing his face definitely will be./
And while Pete & Pete’s tone fit the “surreal slice-of-life” vibe of both the in-verse television show and the very movie itself, that meant the action and drama portions that the show gave off in Maddy and Owen’s mind came from somewhere else.
And while, I admit, I once again thought it had to have come from The Tomorrow People, the single writer and director of “I Saw the TV Glow” said it was actually inspired by a gay cult classic: The WB’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Now I’ve never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer or its spinoff Angel. And honestly, considering my relationship with Joss Whedon, I probably never will. I haven’t even watched any of the other primetime non-Whedon WB shows like Charmed and Gilmore Girls that are usually associated with those two.
But that doesn’t stop the fact that one of the biggest unintentional demographics that make up the fan bases for those shows -- unsurprisingly -- are queer people for various yet related reasonings.
We associate ourselves with the supernatural because being magical or monstrous goes against the religion that’s constantly used to persecute us or treat us as outcasts.
There are elements of found family that a lot of older queer folk gravitate toward because of the lack of familial acceptance, and the need for family in their support network after being disowned by the one they were born into.
Some of us see ourselves AS the likes of Buffy and other characters in those shows, similar to how most of the black and white films starring the Golden Age divas of Hollywood were written by, and about, queer men first and foremost...
Before the gender of the main character was swapped from male to female so that studios would buy their movie scripts without interference from The Hays Code.
This was something that occurred to Owen after she saw The Pink Opaque’s melanated main character, Isabel, for the first time.
Yes, you have the “horror” that applying the What If question to the concept of someone forming dangerous parasocial attachments with a TV show meant for children yields.
/Maddy and Owen watch the show together during very important mental and emotional states in their lives. And in doing so, the energies of the show’s main characters Tara and Isabel respectively claim Maddy and Owen respectively as their new vessels so they can resolve the important cliffhanger episode that turned into the show’s finale when it was canceled after its 5th season./
As a fiction writer myself, that sounds like a great plot vehicle to relay the dangers of holding on to the blissfulness of nostalgia until you just get lost in it and completely fall out of touch with reality.
But like I previously talked about how prone queer individuals are to project their quirks and personalities onto characters if it means there’s any chance of seeing any form of representation...
You would be surprised hearing how many times a queer person learned about and discovered an aspect about who they are just because they gravitated toward a specific character in one of these melodramas. It’s something we’ve been doing on outcast characters like the classic monsters of Universal Studios for DECADES.
/Owen seeing her first commercial for The Pink Opaque that centered Isabel, Owen watching her first EPISODE of The Pink Opaque and being properly exposed to Isabel, and then The Pink Opaque making enough of a connection in Owen that she started DREAMING about Isabel heavily foreshadows a trans experience. Owen that night had a thought that was the equivalent of the one gender dysmorphia meme “Do I wanna DATE her, or do I wanna BE her?”/
Because a lot of queer people begin their journey of self and re-discovery in real life thanks to looking at characters that either reflect what they want or show them what’s missing, I think it’s safe to say that’s a bit more important than any plot device of a psychic connection established between the IRL watcher and the TV character they watch between realms.
It’s because “I Saw the TV Glow” actually knows this, that we get to see how these two allegories interact and collaborate with each other, using moments over the course of Owen’s life to share how her experiencing Isabel’s want to be released from the limbo of the TV show is relatable to her discovering her transness.
/The moments of her growing comfortable in it, the moments of her being ashamed of it, the moments of her masking it, and the moments of her pleading for it. Instead of blindly seeing only the aspect that has nothing to do with queerness like some people, queer folk -- especially those who are trans -- see how both allegories actually compliment each other, once you’re no longer afraid to acknowledge that both are present in the film./
But despite this being an accurate and understandable explanation as to why choosing to say this film has no queer allegories is just blatant queer and transphobia at this point, we get clear readings of the queerness of being trans not just from the moment the film starts.
And that’s because another valid reason why this film should be looked at through the trans lens first and foremost -- nevermind a queer one...
Is that it's trans because they said it's trans.
So I know that when it comes to media literacy -- even fandom sometimes, real talk -- respecting authorial intent is more of a suggestion than a given.
In a queer sense, we do this whenever we ship two cis het male characters in a TV show together, or when someone imagines that the MCU version of Peter Parker is actually trans; top surgery scars and all.
Because the majority of the characters that are given the go-ahead to exist by the big money factory Film and TV are being treated as slaves to patriarchal heteronormative capitalism, seeing ACTUAL LGBTQIA+ characters was rare until the discovery of Rainbow Capitalism.
And even when the handful of kids shows with those characters initially intended to be present go into production, only 2 out of 10 of those shows didn’t get heavily bombarded with cans of the studio exec’s “Make it Straighter” spray.
Disregarding authorial intent plays so hard in the queer community. Especially when those who deny our existence in fiction often are cut from the same cloth of individuals who can’t see the symbolic meaning behind why the door is red because they never took 9th Grade English.
When we find the right combination of worldbuilding and characters within, we gain a connection with a selected handful of them via points made previously, and use those familiar threads to tug on and experiment with various desires. And that’s because up until recently, we haven’t seen anything in the media that can prove to be an actual representation of how we live.
So when Jane Schoenbrun -- the nonbinary writer and director of “I Saw the TV Glow” tells EVERYONE that this movie is about The Egg Crack moment related to one discovering their transness, we as queer people can’t help but celebrate and display it.
Finally, authorial intent where the intention immediately had us in mind.
And because it was made by someone who KNOWS that the self-prioritization of heteronormativity won’t accept anything less than you blatantly shouting it in faces that refuse to break away from it, there’s nothing about how the trans allegory was delivered -- other than the blatant ignorance and homophobia of the individual watching this movie -- that leaves anything about it to the imagination.
It’s because we have this nice respite of disregarding authorial intent, that we read every single experience that was thrown Owen’s way over the course of this movie AS queer and trans, because this time it actually is.
/We can see the scene of Maddy crying because she finally realized she and Tara are the same AND be correct that something queer was happening because of how familiar that moment can be to every one that watched it. We can look too deep into things and overanalyze the way Owen’s decision-making progress was over the course of the film like we do in fandoms with characters that we habitually have to adjust to make work for us, only for us to be correct in our theories because Owen is a character that was already made to work for us by proxy./
Finally, a movie where I can look at every single crevice of its runtime with the queer lenses I look at the world through.
It’s for that reason -- as well as how well his role affects the overall struggle she has with her queerness over the trajectory of the movie -- I found the movie’s use of Owen’s dad to be very powerful.
/Owen -- in wanting to watch PInk Opaque -- asks to sleep over another’s house. And in order to get permission, she has to ask her father, in which she sheepishly asks her mother:/
(Can you ask him for me?)
And she does, because she’s a good mom and Owen is a good kid. (waves off) We find that out later.
/But thanks to both Danielle Deadwyler’s acting and even the cinematography, we were able to pick up the idea that whatever intimidation Owen might feel toward her father being such an imposing force, is shared with Owen’s mom as well./
So when we grow up with Owen and see that her father gives off the stereotypical features of a white conservatively masculine 45-year-old, the palpable feeling of worry and panic we felt earlier feels right at home with his character.
/And that’s because the moment he critiqued Pink Opaque -- the show that Owen wanted to stay up past her bedtime to watch -- in a way that came off as dangerously opposing, a good amount of us queer folk knew where this was going./
(Isn’t that a show for girls?)
I say that because I, a cis man, have felt the intimidation of wanting to express myself in ways outside of traditional masculine patriarchy.
I wanted the Easy Bake Oven, I wanted the fashion. I wanted to be an actor instead of an engineer like my mother wanted me to be in case Hollywood didn’t want me.
And in my pursuit of these things that bloomed into very important flowers in my garden, I got questioned by parental figures, peers and role models and felt a bit lesser because I wasn’t getting all of my food from the only buffet line.
I felt that even in my bisexuality. Discovering my bisexuality. Acknowledging my bisexuality. ACCEPTING my bisexuality. This queerness is something that exists out of the bubble of societal norms for someone who presents as a man.
/A lot of queer people feel the pressure that comes from facing that system that the father represents. It’s trauma from being reprimanded just for declaring who you are. For feeling comfortable in your own skin. Having to lie to it in order to operate in your state of normal, or even in an attempt to divide from that state of normal in hopeful assimilation./
And because Owen carried this feeling with her as she continued to grow and live with it, it was doubled-down upon her as she continued to live a lie.
Despite that relatability in queer culture as a whole, it absolutely makes sense for this to be a prevalent feeling in discovering one's transness.
In the eyes of society and gender, it’s a “sign of unthankfulness” because you don’t want to play in its sandbox. You are returning a blouse to the only boutique in the neighborhood after you were gifted it from a friend, and they don’t know why.
/Owen’s experience with her dad visualizes this, especially as she goes through the discovery and acknowledgement of her transness. You can even see how it affected her after he died and how she channeled her inner Chappell Roan lyric paraphrasing to do everything she could just to stop the feeling. Especially when you remember that the end of the movie wasn’t the ONLY time she’s ever sheepishly apologized to the purveyors of patriarchal masculinity./
(Sorry I was late, there was a downed power line stares)
Conclusion
Can straight cis men relate to the despair, the fear and the frustration Owen feels in “I Saw the TV Glow”? ABSOLUTELY, they can!
There are plenty of straight-led stories where -- for example -- a guy wanted to draw comic books over or instead of playing football, or something. Shit, even Waterboy is a subversion of that situation to teach late teenage boys that the wolfpack masculinity they were brought up to believe was a lie.
The thing is, because these men are still naturally in the binary, the sense of relatability is diluted because of their ability-turned-privilege to not be weighed down by it.
They don’t have to worry about coming out. They don’t have to worry about being accepted over something that’s not socially normalized already. Shit, they don’t even have to worry about accepting THEMSELVES. They don’t have to worry about constantly struggling with these aspects being part of them and possibly get exiled from the tribe to survive these harsh conditions alone because of it.
Maybe for other reasons, but not in a way where the trajectory of one’s entire life will possibly change if they do.
/That’s what’s so noticeable -- so pungent -- about Owen’s journey. Everything over the course of it was so obviously satisfying. Even the ending when it showed us how that fear can keep us trapped until we’re finally ready to live out loud./
But I digress, Readers. Your homework assignment for the day:
Write in the comment section below what you thought of I Saw The TV Glow if you’ve seen it.
Or if you feel like sharing with the rest of the class, a film or tv show you’ve seen that offered blunt and direct but brilliant queer allegory, but was ignored in favor of the more evergreen option?
Whichever question you decide to answer, I’d love to know your thoughts.
/A HUGE shoutout to my Patrons both big and small for helping make this channel possible.
Make sure you check out the card at the end of the video to join, or click the link to it or any of my affiliates in the description box below.
But until then, this is Readus 101. Class dismissed./
