I initially wrote and published this post as Top Five in honor of our fifth birthday (for which we published a series of Top Fives), ten years ago, partially in honor of Alex Vega, co-founder of Autostraddle Dot Com, but also in honor of the popularity of the name “Alex” for queer characters. Since 2014 we have all grown and changed, but Alexes have continued to multiply on television, as addressed briefly in How To Name a Lesbian or Bisexual TV Character.

But, friends, I do believe the tide is shifting. I do believe our period of Peak Alex is over. I have recently become mildly obsessed with playing “baby names” games on Sporcle and have been shocked to witness the slow decline of “Alexandra.” (Girls simply named “Alex” have always been rare and never managed to rank in the top 1000. “Alex” is most usually a nickname.) (A nickname for a lesbian.)

“Alexandra” literally peaked as a baby name in the 90s, after a swift rise that began in the 80s — but it has fallen 252 spots since then, with similar fates suffered by the less popular Alexa and the more popular Alexis. It’s hard to say what lesbians of the future will be named, Perhaps they will be Harpers, Peytons, Addisons, Olivias, Parkers, Emmas and Bradleys. Perhaps they will be Olivias who change their names to “Alex.”

But for now, we live in a field of Alexes, Alexandras and Alexises. They’re especially popular for guest characters, which make sense — it’s the easiest thing to name a random, low-stakes lesbian. But nowhere do Alexes thrive quite like they do on lesbian webseries — LezWatchTV lists a whopping 20 characters named Alex in web-first properties! Today however we will focus on mainstream television. Let us begin!

15. Alex Portnoy, Light as a Feather

2018 – 2019

“The Lesbian Storyline on ‘Light as a Feather’ Ended Up Being Stiff as a Board‘ is one of my favorite headlines we’ve ever published and absolutely ensured I personally would not view this show. It sounds like things were going well for this Alex and then they stopped going well for this Alex, so I am mostly just sorry to this Alex! Brianne Tju is fantastic though and has also played gay in I Know What You Did Last Summer.

14. Alex (Shannyn Sossamon), Mistresses (US)

2013

If you’ve ever wondered, “what would Shannyn Sossamon look like in a sunddress?” This storyline from Mistresses in 2014 is your big chance to find out.

13. Alex (Anna Torv), Mistresses (UK)

2008 – 2010

Before there was the US version of Mistresses, there was the UK version of Mistresses. As with most things, the UK edition was way better. This particular Alex was more into plaid than sundresses, however, as I recall.

12. Alex Bates (Sydney Morton), Manifest 

2018 – 2023

This Alex missed being on the mysterious disappearing-reappearing flight at the center of Manifest by failing to show up for her escape to Jamaica with her girlfriend, Saanvi Bahl, for whomst she planned to leave her husband. But when the passengers return, Saanvi reaches out for help, and feelings remain. Her husband should’ve known when they got married that she was a lesbian character due to her name being “Alex,” so that is sort of on him, sorry.

11. Alexis Simms (Sepideh Moafi), Falling Water

I will watch Sepideh Moafi do just about anything, including apparently play a cop at least three times, including her stint as the only non-dreamer in Season Two of Falling Water, a two-season USA television show that never really succeeded either conceptually or critically. I’ve watched nearly the entire series and I am still really unclear on what happened or is happening. To be honest it’s on right now as I work on this though so maybe I should’ve been paying more attention.

10. Alexa (Grace Edwards), Modern Love

2021

I think the world would’ve really fallen for Alexa if she’d had more than five minutes of screen time in the 22-minute installment of Modern Love dedicated to the lesbian experience. Despite being based on an essay about a writer coming out to herself in her late twenties, Modern Love set this self-discovery story in high school. There’s a lock-in and it’s pretty cute.

9. Alex (Ashley Romans), Shameless

2019

Shameless had a rocky road with lesbian characters and we braced ourselves when Debbie Gallagher seemed to decide she hated men enough to become a lesbian — and it was Alex who ended up being her first experiment in sapphistry. The thing about Alex is that Alex was really hot, and the writers really blew it with their whole narrative. But Debbie meets Alex on the job as a welder, where Alex passes as male to earn respect on the job. Such a classic Alex trope: playing with the androgyny of the name like that. She’s also one of three Alexes on this list we’ve seen in overalls.

8. Alex Neilson (Zoe Ventoura), Home & Away

2019 – 2020

I’m not personally privy to the universe of legendary Aussie soap opera, Home & Away, but the relationship between Dr. Alex Neilson and Willow Harris aka #willex was certainly beloved by the program’s fans, who were of course devastated when Alex left Summer Bay for a new job in 2020. But the couple’s most notable scandal was when fans realized a kiss between the two women that aired in New Zealand had been edited out of its Australian broadcast version (the network disputes this intentionality). More important to us all here now is that the YouTuber who first reported these differences was, of course, also named Alex.

7. Alex (Rosie Dwyer), The A-List

2018-2021

The A-List is one of those teen shows that landed here without much fanfare — about a summer camp on an island that holds dark secrets, with its first season on the BBC, and its second picked up by Netflix. But Alex, who loves ghosts and shies from attention in their flannels and hoodies and toques and overalls and plaid, was one of a very small cohort of non-binary characters when the series debuted. Their sweet romance with the more popular and outgoing Petal made the whole series worth watching, and its abrupt cancellation more devastating. It also addressed another key element of the name Alex: it’s a name that works for every gender!

6. Alex Nuñez (Deanna Casaluce), Degrassi

2003 – 2007

I had real actual feelings about Alex Nuñez and Paige on Degrassi and I really wanted Alex and her hoop earrings and white tank-tops to swoop into my life and bring me danger and intrigue. She transformed and challenged Paige. It was so unusual to witness a high school storyline like Alex’s when this one happened. South of Nowhere and The L Word had just entered the world and transformation of the entire television landscape felt imminent. Degrassi has always been a pioneer in representation, and despite multiple missteps in that area over the years, they remained committed to you know, always going there.

5. Alex (Ally Xue), Creamerie

2021 – 2023

Alex is in the middle in the overalls and flannel shirt, obviously

Alexander may be a consistently more popular name for men than Alexandra is for women, but a world without men does not mean a world without Alexes. Nowhere is that more apparent than in Creamerie, a dystopian comedy from New Zealand set eight years after a virus that wiped out all men. Now under the thrall of an allegedly feminist organization called Wellness. Alex, who lives on a dairy farm with her two best friends, is an outspoken critic of Wellness who is perpetually causing trouble, as Alexes are wont to do.

4. Alex Vause (Laura Prepon), Orange is the New Black

2013 – 2020

Tall and mean and hot and honestly usually pretty terrible (though rarely as terrible as her beloved Piper), Alex Vause came into our lives like a wrecking ball, inspiring an entire community to want to smuggle drugs internationally in a bad wig. Ultimately, Vause absolutely goes down in history as one of the most legendary queer Alexes to ever appear on television, likely tied with the #2 character on this list for that particular honor. Furthermore, Piper and Alex’s shipper name #Palex unfortunately overlapped with Paige and Alex’s shipper name from Degrassi. That’s what happens when you get an embarrassment of riches like this many Alexes.

3. Alex Eastern (Janelle Monáe), Homecoming

2020

The second season of the psychological thriller based on a podcast originally starring Julia Roberts gave Janelle Monáe their first lead TV role, and although the writing often disappointed, it was thrilling to have them there. As Natalie wrote: “Aside from the fact that you’d be hardpressed to find someone as imminently likable as Monáe — which endears you to her character before you even know anything about her — this type of story is one that Monáe’s been telling for years.” In Homecoming, her possession of the generic Alex lesbian name, like her white v-neck tees and oversized button-up chambray shirts and her ponytail, is a blank slate for the mystery inside, one she herself spends the series trying to truly understand.

2. Alex Danvers (Chyler Leigh), Supergirl

2015-2021

For 126 episodes of network television, the iconic lesbian sister to Supergirl, Alex Danvers (Chyler Leigh), made and remade herself, fell in love and lost it, found it again, and ended the whole run with a gorgeous wedding, a happy family, a thriving sister. She protected her sister and protected the earth. Ultimately she is amongst all Alexes, the most Alex, the longest-running Alex in queer television history. She did extraordinary things.

1. Alex Kelly (Olivia Wilde), The O.C.

2005

I’m ending this epic list of Alex’s just as the original ended, because birthdays are a time for looking back. When this girl and her hairdo and her belts arrived on our television screens there were no Santanas or Emily Fields, let alone the 100-175 TV shows a year with queer characters we get these days  — but for like five episodes, we had Alex Kelly and Marissa Cooper, kissing in the rain! We had Marissa discovering her new confusing feelings! Alex was unapologetic about her bisexuality in a way so few were or could be in their real actual lives, back then. She wasn’t a brand new queer figuring her shit out in high school or Cook County General Hospital, she was a cool, worldly babe with an ex-girlfriend and everything.

She was Peak Alex.

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