Hello! Welcome to the pop culture fix, dedicated entirely to news that pops, like popcorn.
What Is Happening Here??
+ I was told that Selena Gomez has a girl crush in the music video for “Bad Liar” so I did my lesbian duty and watched the music video for “Bad Liar,” and promptly determined that life is full of surprises and dappled sunlight and is it 1973 and who knows what else?
Reactions in the Autostraddle virtual office have ranged from Mey Rude declaring “THIS IS MY FAV VIDEO EVER?????? This video is my entire life. Selena is me I am Selena” to Heather Hogan theorizing, “it feels like that one hayley kiyoko video had a baby with every amanda bynes movie and this is the result.” Managing Editor Rachel Kincaid pulled some important results from the comments on YouTube:
Furthermore:
Somebody had to say it! Thank you Amanda!
Here’s a promising theory:
What are your thoughts, friends?
Film
+ The L.A Film Festival has a few LGBT offerings up its proverbial sleeve, according to The Advocate, including but not limited to:
+ “And Then There Was Eve”: Starring transgender actress Rachel Crowl as Eve, the colleague of a photographer who “wakes up to find her apartment has been torn apart and her husband is missing.”
+ “Becks”: Broadway’s Lena Hall stars as the girlfriend of a folk-rock musician, played by queer pop star Hayley Kiyoko, who follows her lady-love from Brooklyn to Los Angeles only to get promptly dumped, and then must return to St. Louis to live with her Mom, a nun, and hang out at a local dive bar where she falls for the wife of an old high school rival, played by Mena Suvari. SOUNDS INCREDIBLE.
+ “Replace”: In Replace, a beautiful girl navigates a relationship with a new girl while also navigating an affliction that causes her skin to fall off her face!
+ “Whitney: Can I Be Me”: Trailers for this documentary, which will debut on Showtime in August, have not emphasized or even mentioned Whitney’s sexual orientation, but The Advocate description makes it sound like her bisexuality and her relationship with Robyn Crawford will be a main focal point of the film as it investigates Whitney Houston‘s relationships with women in the ’80s using archival footage and 30 years of interviews with people who surrounded her.
The director of the film apparently does theorize that her unhappiness was due, in no small part, to her inability to come out as a lesbian.
+ Ellen Page’s new movie Flatliners has a trailer. You could watch it right now if you wanted to, the world is truly your oyster.
+ HelloGiggles talks to the women behind “Brown Girls,” a viral web series that’s headed to HBO
+ Queer people talk to Buzzfeed about 8 Queer Stories We’re Not Seeing Enough Of In Movies
+ Toshio Masumoto’s “Funeral Parade of Roses” : “A restored masterpiece unmasks Tokyo’s underground gay subculture of the 1960s.”
+ The star of Boy Meets Girl wrote a personal essay for PopSugar: There Are So Many Transgender Stories to Tell — and I’m Hell-Bent on Telling Them
+ Documentary Tells the Moving Story of an L.A. Teen’s Transition
+ Exploring queer culture’s history – its beauty and brutality: talking to Daisy Asquith about her new film Queerama, which traces the historic battle for LGBTQ rights and marks the 50 year anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act.
Television
+ I am really stoked for the finale of The Handmaid’s Tale today, but I’m also disappointed in how the show has handled race and failed to address that element of Moira’s identity. Angelica Jade Bastién at New York Magazine explains it all for you in The Handmaid’s Tale Greatest Failing Is How It Handles Race:
…the show doesn’t end up considering the racial dynamics of June’s family, or what it means to be a handmaid of color. In the end, its approach to race is just as mishandled as Atwood’s. The Handmaid’s Tale’s silence on race grows more awkward as the show goes on, particularly in light of its marketing as a politically astute salve for these troubled times, and the girl-power inflected feminism destined to launch a thousand T-shirts with clever wordplay. In reality, though, it’s more concerned with the interiority of white women at the expense of people of color who recognize that Gilead isn’t a possible horrifying future, but the reality of what America has always been.
+ Kate Mulgrew on the finale of Orange is the New Black:
“I think this thing is going to change — big-time. We’re going someplace else,” Mulgrew told BuzzFeed News. “It was extremely live or die; drama at its most heightened. Who knows what’s going to happen when the dust settles — I know nothing — but I don’t think everyone is going to survive that last moment. They may initially, but I think there will be repercussions. There were 10 of us holding hands … I think someone will get hurt. I don’t know who.”
Though she’s in the dark as to what journey awaits Red in Season 6, Mulgrew believes the choice to close out this season on those 10 characters is a sign of what’s to come. “I think that signifies, perhaps, a more concentrated view going into Season 6,” she said.
+ Claws debuted on TNT this week! It’s a female ensemble dark comedy that takes place in a nail salon, starring the always incredible Niecey Nash as well as Judy Reyes as the lesbian character Quiet Ann.
+ The Refreshing Queer Sensibility of Bryan Fuller’s ‘American Gods’
+ That Gay Episode: ‘Ellen’s’ Gutsy Coming Out Ep Is Still Fearlessly Funny
+ BuzzFeed debuts touching new “Queer Prom” series: With a guest appearance from Evan Rachel Wood!
+ ‘Broad City’ Will Treat Trump’s Name As Profanity In Season 4
+ Here’s Your First Look At A Scene From The “Will & Grace” Revival
+ Web Series “The Feels” Portrays Bisexuality the Right Way
+ Kate McKinnon Takes on Jeff Sessions’s Senate Hearing
Music:
+ [….] [….] [???!!] Katy Perry Woke Up. She Wants to Tell You All About It: Ms. Perry, who hit No. 1 with “I Kissed a Girl,” later explained why she holds queer women in high esteem: “I admire that they’re doing it for themselves. They are not doing it for the male gaze.”
+ Nylon has a great piece on The PWR BTTM Problem And The Search For Safe Spaces. … and Billboard reports that apparently they have manged to find a new Manager and rights to re-release their debut album.
+ Ka5sh Makes Their Own Hip-Hop Mythos
+ Stream Beth Ditto‘s New Album, ‘Fake Sugar’
+ How did we get here what’s happening to us: Lady Gaga’s New Starbucks Drinks Will Quench Your Thirst for a Good Cause
I guess now Selena can totally keep her hands to herself
Also tag yourself: I’m teen Selena badly dribbling a basketball wearing hoop earrings staring at the gym teacher
this is the moment I most identified with also. except replace gym teacher with cheerleading coach.
i’m the bump-it that mom selena is wearing in her hair
I’m Selena wearing safety goggles on her head because a science class accident may result in super powers.
I’m Selena-as-her-father’s 70s haircut
i’m the farrah fawcett wig
i’m selena gomez pretending to ride a bike on a winding mountain road where i could easily be killed by a passing vehicle
Don’t tell anyone but Selena Imeanicouldbutwhywouldiwanto Gomez the Wizard of Gayverly Place is coming for True Gay Icon Carly Rae of Sunshine Jepsen’s song of the summer title w this bop
Actually do tell everyone
I heard this song on a long drive home from Kentucky and I felt a very distinctly queer lilt to Selena’s voice, I totally felt like it could be a queer girl anthem!
I’m the disdain on Selena Gomez’s mom-face when she looks at men.
yessssss
Can’t not say that I haven’t wished for this in my deepest, purest dreams.
I had a gif of high school Selena falling for hot coach Selena but it’s not working so this will have to suffice until someone more gif-savvy than I can post the beauty of this moment RIGHT. HERE.
i’m dad selena’s tie
1. if i roll my eyes any harder at that katy perry quote i will require medical intervention
2. do you think selena gomez has ever seen mulholland drive? just something to think about
Newly Woke Katy Perry (TM) is one of the more surreal and yet so stupidly predictable plot twists of 2017.
Teenage me is Selena being bumped into by a heterosexual couple and then apologizing. Adult me is Selena in the men’s locker room hoping her pants look okay.
i’m selena-as-gym-teacher’s hair, that shit is working hard and likely refuses to quit
i’m Selena feeling herself in private/quickly pretending to be asleep as necessary.
Hard same.
i’m young selena who before the timeline of this video obviously came up with an excuse that tricked her gym teacher into agreeing to pose for a polaroid picture she could keep under her pillow:
ha ha yes tennis is also my racquet, i get it, ha ha, could i take a photo of this funny sporting shirt, it’s just so funny you see, thank goodness i coincidentally have this three pound camera hanging from my neck when i ran into you
I saw the Whitney documentary in a movie theater last Saturday and SPOILER
SPOILER
The movie actually ends with the quote of Bobby Brown(who hated Robyn’s guts) saying,”I really believe hat if Robyn had still been around, Whitney would still be alive.” or something of the kind.
I, personally, got the impression of this movie being about the life of a woman with an incredible gift of a voice, who was very entrenched in a system of people controlling and using her.
The one exception to that was Robyn, whose relationship with Whitney they did not dance around exploring or naming. Someone literally said she thought Whitney was Bi.
I got the very distinct impression that this movie was about “why coming out and living your best life is very important, because the alternative will kill you.”
It’s still a Whitney biopic though, and not the “Whitney and Robyn” story.
So be prepared to watch a very sweet girl fall apart over 104 minutes.
Okay, I didn’t read that Katy Perry article, but that comment was pretty dumb. However, if you are so inclined, I just listened to her interview with DeRay McKesson on this week’s episode of his podcast Pod Save the People, which was sort of on the same subject of her “getting woke”, and which was very interesting and which I would highly recommend.
wait just kidding i’m “coming soon…………fetish”
ALAIIIINNNNAAAA
I’ve been feeling this song for a couple days and now this music video has me certifiably obsessed. ?
i’m the token black kid in the chemistry class who’s not even trying to complete the assignment
I’m that awkward dad wave at chemistry
The Bad Liar video is like Orphan Black and Boogie Nights had an uncomfortable threesome with every teen movie ever made. And Katy Perry has been cancelled since 2008, who else remembers ‘Ur So Gay’? I want to slap whichever white gay man said she could be a queer icon.
I just want to exploit Katy Perry. Like, let me enjoy Teenage Dream without celebrating her at all, okay.
You do you! But also: adblock that shit. Steal from Katy Perry 2k17.
I know there are a lot of reasons to not like Katy Perry, but I can remember exactly where I was when I first heard I Kissed a Girl, and I remember my exact thought: “If *she* kissed a girl and she liked it, then maybe someday a girl would like kissing *me*”.
And I was absolutely thunderstruck. I think for people who’ve found Queer Culture (like this site) it’s easy to forget how important mainstream representation can be. And we shouldn’t stop pushing for better. But Katy Perry absolutely did me a huge service and I will always have a soft spot for her and that song.
(Notice I didn’t question if I would like kissing a girl :-D )
Tbh I feel the same about Macklemore. People like to rag him, and for good reason, but I was living in a red state when Same Love came out and the effect it had on my homophobic peers was massive. Made me feel safer about coming out.
Some people are able to live in a queer bubble and forget what it’s like to be outside of it. That’s great for them but not all of us have the same opportunity.
It’s the same thing for those who live abroad. We depend on gay things filtering into mainstream culture to be able to access them and those things have to be palatable for straight people who are the vast majority.
I’m the decor in teen Selena’s room. I think I look rad, but I’m so far from it that people can only look and cringe.
Ok but did anyone notice that there are at least two famous teen movies referenced in the first minute or so
The heterosexual couple she bumps into looks exactly like Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger from 10 Things I Hate About You
And the four girls walking toward her in the hall is a direct image from Mean Girls
Are there more?? My knowledge of teen movies is not vast enough for this game
I see you doing the real investigative work here!!