Well it’s a brand new year and we are still the same people we were last year… or are we? The only way to find out is to sit down and get into some television and cinema experiences with lesbian, bisexual queer and trans characters on HBO Max, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Paramount+ Showtime, Starz and Peacock.
Top Row: Death and Other Details, Sort Of, SkyMed, True Detective Bottom Row: Hightown, Hazbin Hotel, The Traitors, LOL: One Last Laugh Ireland, Love on the Spectrum, All Fun and Games
HBO Max’s Queer January 2024 Content
Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project (2023) – January 8
Giovanni, one of the world’s greatest living artists and commentators, plays with the lesbian poet’s fascination with space travel as it “reckons with the inevitable passing of time through a collision of memories, moments in American history, live readings, and visually innovative treatments of Giovanni’s poetry.” Drew wrote of the film, “what makes this portrait of Nikki Giovanni so special is it makes her contradictions, her elusiveness, her boundaries, part of the film itself.”
True Detective: Night County: Season 4 Premiere – January 14
The fourth season of this lauded crime series stars lesbian icon Jodie Foster as Liz Danvers, a detective in Alaska investigating the disappearance of eight men from a research station with her partner, Iñupiaq cop Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis), with whom she shares a complicated past. Isabelle Star LeBlanc is Liz’s queer daughter Leah Danvers. Queer actor Fiona Shaw also stars as “a survivalist with a past full of secrets.” It appears that Jodie Foster’s character is straight, but showrunner Issa López describes Navarro and Danvers as “two characters that love each other, found each other and fell in love, and then fell out of love terribly. Now they’re enemies. And that’s when we meet them. And the show is the story of how they fall back in love. This is friendship. But in the end, it’s the same thing.”
Sort Of: Season 3 Premiere – January 18
The final season of nonbinary creator Bilal Baig’s TV series, an Autostraddle TV Awards favorite, finds Sabi coping with grief and an unanticipated feeling of freedom after their father’s death. Free of his expectations, they confront big questions about their identity and start making big life choices in their typical messy, hopeful, sort of way.
Netflix’s Queer January 2024 Shows & Movies
Black Sails (Starz): Seasons 1-3 – January 1
This Starz show is about pirates, set in New Providence Island and intended as a prequel to the 1883 novel “Treasure Island” and there are quite a few queer female characters aboard this ship.
Loudermilk (Audience Network): Seasons 1-3 – January 1
Ron Livingston stars as a music critic and recovering alcoholic “who regularly doles out clever but acid-tongued critiques to his clients, his friends, and any random person he interacts with.” Anja Savčić is Claire, his young queer sponsee who’s life is also a bit of a mess.
This is Us (NBC): Seasons 1-6 – January 8
The legendary tearjerker about the lives of a set of parents and their three kids across multiple time periods ended up adding a very cute queer storyline in Season Three with one of the kids in the cast.
Love on the Spectrum: Season Two – January 19
People on the autism spectrum navigate the wonderful world of dating and amongst them is Teo, who’s seen expressing excitement for a lady-date in the trailer.
Queer Eye: Season 8 – January 24
Non-binary hair queen Jonathan Van Ness returns for the eighth season of this reliable tearjerker — which’s also Bobby Burke’s final season!!! Who is going to remodel an entire house in three hours after Bobby leaves???!
Amazon Prime Video’s January 2024 Streaming
Hazbin Hotel: Season One – January 19
This animated series follows Charlie, the Princess of Hell, a young whippersnapper full of ambition who’s built the Hazbin Hotel, a facility that aims to rehabilitate demons, thus making them suitable for Heaven and thus no longer taking up space in her kingdom of Hell. Most of her pals and colleagues scoff at the idea, but her girlfriend Vaggie (voiced by Stephanie Beatriz) and her adult-film-star pal Angel Dust are in for the ride.
LOL: One Last Laugh Ireland: Season One – January 19
Graham Norton hosts this reality television program in which 10 comedic stars gather to make each other laugh without ever laughing themselves. Whomstever can last the longest without cracking up will win $50k for their charity of choice! Amongst the funny people on this program is queer comic Catherine Bohart.
Hulu’s January 2024 Gay Streaming Opportunities
Grandma (2015) – January 1
Lily Tomlin stars as the titular Grandma, Elle, a lesbian poet and widow who gets a visit from her teenage granddaughter who needs money for an abortion. Thus the two head on an all-day journey into Elle’s past trying to score the cash to make it happen.
Good Trouble: Season 5b Premiere (Freeform) – January 3
It’s time for the final episodes of this spinoff of lesbian Mom TV show The Fosters, which has become a queer powerhouse in its own right.
All Fun and Games (2023) – January 5
A critically panned thriller about a group of teens in Salem who find a cursed knife from the 17th century that turns children’s games into horrorshows. Laurel Marsden is Sophie, a lesbian on her way to Smith College and the best friend of Billie, one of two protagonists.
Echo: Season One (Disney+ and Hulu) – January 9th
The latest hotly anticipated Marvel series is, let’s face it, unlikely to have any queer women characters — but the show is still worth noting for everything else it’s got going on. Indigenous actor plays deaf Cheyenne hero Echo (aka Maya Lopez), queer indigenous actor Devery Jacobs and Jacobs’ Reservation Dogs co-star, Zahn McClarnon.
Death and Other Details: Season One Premiere – January 16
Centered on the “brilliant and restless” Imogene Scott, “Death and Other Details” is a locked room murder mystery set on a lavishly restored Mediterranean Ocean liner, where every guest and every crew member is a suspect. Imogene must team up with her nemesis, Rufus (Mandy Patinkin), “world’s greatest detective” to solve this little crime. Non-binary actor Karoline plays a “very rich lesbian heiress.” Queer actor Lauren Patten also stars.
Peacock’s LGBTQ+ January 2024
Ted: Season One – January 11
This television series set in the ’90s is apparently the prequel to the apparently very popular film Ted, about a dude who’s best friend is a teddy bear who came to life voiced by Seth McFarlane. Max Burkholder is John Bennett (the dude with the best friend) and Giorgia Whigham plays his cousin Blair. And yes there is a storyline that is relevant to your lesbian interests!
The Traitors: Season Two – January 12
The second season of this incredibly popular reality television competition show hosted by queer icon Alan Cumming has a cast chock-full of reality veterans, including the newly-out Survivor winner Parvati Shallow!
Paramount+ Showtime January 2023 Gay Streaming
The Changemakers: Docuseries – January 1
This eight-part documentary series “follows an A-team of impassioned campaigners as they discover the work of several remarkable activists and their respective communities around the world.” Amongst them are Black, queer, feminist migrant Trinice McNally, known for her work around inclusive college campuses.
Basic Instinct (1992) – January 1
Famous for its truly appalling bisexual stereotypes, Sharon Stone stars as a depraved bisexual murderer in this ’90s thriller.
Chasing Amy (1997) – January 1
A film that hits different now than it did back then, Chasing Amy is Kevin Smith’s film about a straight male cartoonist who falls in love with his lesbian pal, Alyssa (a character inspired by Smith’s friend, Guinevere Turner.)
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2011) – January 1
Bisexual hacker Lisbeth Salander (Rooney Mara) helps Journalist Mikael Blomkvist track down a woman who’s been missing for 40 years! This celebrated film is chock-full of trauma, dark mysteries and cold landscapes. It’s possible that Ronney Mara made you gay when you first saw this film, or perhaps you were already gay after seeing Noomi Rapace play Lisbeth in the Swedish film that came out in 2009.
Chloe (2010) – January 8
This erotic thriller finds Julianne Moore hiring a sex worker played by Amanda Seyfried to test her husband’s fidelity but then stuff happens between Julianne Moore and Amanda Seyfried, obviously.
SkyMed: Season Two – January 11
All nine episodes of this series that “follows the personal journeys and jaw-dropping medical rescues of young medics and pilots who fly air ambulances across Northern Canada” drop January 11th, and the preview is teasing a romance between Lexi (Mercedes Morris) and new character Stef (Sydney Kuhne).
Starz’s January 2024 Lesbian Show
Hightown: Season 3 Premiere – January 26
The final season of this drama series led by queer actor Monica Raymund will see her character, Massachusetts State Trooper Jackie Quiñones, unemployed after falling off the wagon — but her lack of official authoriy won’t stop her from trying to help save “the most often ignored and forgotten victims in Cape Cod, sex workers.”
Psst, you forgot a detail! Alaqua Cox plays Echo.
It seems that this month, like last month, is not a pleasant month for WlW (GL) fans
The only show I’m excited about is Hazbin Hotel
Chance are low that we’ll see a queer love story in True Detective, but I’ll watch it for Jodie Foster. I hope it will be as great as the first season.
New season of Dimension 20: Fantasy High on Dropout too! Jan 10!!
^^^ came here to say this!!!
Also Hazbin Hotel is a musical series voiced by broadway star Erika Henningsen who was the OG Cady Heron on Bway! Jeremy Jordan,Christian Borle and Alex Brightman also star!
Nikki came and spoke at my community college in Knoxville (her and i’s hometown) when I was like 19 and talked extensively about space and that when she was ready to die she wanted to be sent up into space, so I am very excited to watch this doc. Def my favorite hometown hero.
Another season of Hightown is exciting. The good-hearted funny messed-up can’t get it right character that usually only men get to play (as anything but a punchline), done well.