Advocate.com: Op-ed: Why Days of Our Lives' Will & Sonny Might Be the Most Important Couple on TV

[cassadine1991]

http://www.advocate.com/commentary/2014/05/15/op-ed-why-days-our-lives-will-sonny-might-be-most-important-couple-tv

[quartermainefan]

important is the wrong word. Had they been a gay couple on The Walking Dead with millions of people watching a gay couple break every stereotype in front of impressionable young people then perhaps, but DOOL just has too small an audience to make any sort of impact. All they say about the show showing gay characters is true, and it is a far cry from MP and Matt Fielding. Maybe "groundbreaking" is what this article is looking for. 30 years ago Jesse and Angie were the only black couple of any significance on daytime, but did that make them more important than Greg and Jenny?

[Nate4]

I'm sorry but really.

[cuzIsaySo]

I think wilson is one of the most boring couples daytime has had in a while gay or not. I was lured back when it was announced that will would come out but quit after a while becuz watching paint dry seemed more compelling.

[Gray Bunny]

Will and Sonny still follow the same rule as MP's Matt Fielding and Dynasty's Steven Carrington. They're pretty but not effeminate. They can pass for straight and maybe even masculine, but not a jock. In the end, they're all asexual and therefore inoffensive to middle America.

They cannot design. They're not jamming to Madonna. They're not making butt sex innuendos. It's safe.

[beebs]

But that's why the Advocate loves them so! Fem bad! Gay male sexuality = threatening! Isn't it nice that the gay community have their very own Cleavers! PROGRESS = heteronormative conformity!

[marceline]

This is one of those threads I love because I learn a lot about what kind of stories different people from the LGBT community really want to see. As a member of a different minority group, I really like seeing the discussion.

[John]

Well if you read a reccent Interview or was it at DC cant remember but Blake Berris basically said that Days wants Wilson to be this great thing and thats why they are so solid. Days doesnt want to mess with that. I wish Days would let Wilson have gay pals that are not all masc. Thats why I loved QAF. The gay roles were diverse

[cuzIsaySo]

Thats why in spite of me loathing Felix, i like the gay set on GH more than WilSon. You go from princess Felix to uber butch Lucas with Brad bridging the gap somehow.

WilSon are way too similar for their pairing to gennerate any excitement. There is hardly a personality clash possible becuz theyre written as carbon copy of one another with different haircolor.

[KMan101]

But not every gay man rages out to Madonna or follows the so-called cliche stereotypes either.

I agree they're boring as !@#$%^&*] but that doesn't mean they need to fill the stereotype cliches either. There's more to a lot of gay men than that.

Not at all trying to be offensive to anyone, but every person is different. They shouldn't fall into any stereotype. And they still are because they're written as boring and as inoffensive as possible. I agree with that but that doesn't mean they should be ready to guest on RuPaul's drag show either. I've met many different types of gay men, feminine, basically straight but surprise, they're gay. I think Will and Sonny need more shades of gray and when they try it just falls flat because they're boring.

I don't think I'm making my point very well but it's sounding like they either need to be raging queens or boring. I don't agree they need to fall into either category.

I agree with your first statement but there's definitely much more to many gay men than what you listed. I don't think Will and Sonny need to be filling that stereotype.

[Nate4]

+1

So true. You would never see someone shaped like Eric Martsolf as a gay man on a soap.

[Soapsuds]

And that all gay men watch the Golden Girls...well most do....lol..thats another stereotype. But I agree gay men dont need to fall into any stereotype...as for Rupaul..use to love his music when I was younger but have never watched his drag show.

The only difference I find between Wilson and say Nuke or Luke and Reid was the marriage and the afterglow...lol....everything else was done before on other shows. Are they boring gay couple?? Yes they are. Going back to Luke and Reid....I loved the way Reid wouldnt give Luke the time of day and when he did he would call him rich boy...

[allmc2008]

I don't think it is so much as the writers trying to make gay characters act straight so they wont scare off the homophobes as much as it is that the writers just don't know how to write for gay characters. In the past if you wanted to create a non-WASP character that properly represented the group you would make them non-stereotypical like Angie on AMC or Dominique on Dynasty. But with gay characters when you make them non-stereotypical people will accuse the writers of making them "WASP Friendly". Of course you do have your stereotypical gays and your non-stereotypical ones but trying to create characters to balance it out may seem a bit hard for the writers.

[Soapsuds]

Might be true and might not be. Some writers might not want to push the buttons. Days writes gay characters as snow white....and GH's Ron writes gc over the top and offensive.

[cassadine1991]

You hardly see any written with any middle ground