#positive representation
For years I have actively avoided all things super hero related for various reasons, but mostly because Marvel makes it all look like a bunch of white boys running around fighting which gets old. Thanks to DC’s Legends of Tomorrow and Supergirl, I have changed my mind. Not only do I ship Avalance and Dansen so hard (without those couples I’d have never given the shows a chance), but I love how both shows bring representation of so many to the forefront and I’m a sucker for how much they promote positive relationships in all forms; i.e. female friendships, close male friendships, strong support systems for friends/partners, sincere apologies when someone fraks up, but the others forgive and help them be better without guilt.
Our Flag Means Death became the very thing SPN fans needed to cope with the bullshit that was the end of Season 15, Destiel and everything CW.
SPN fans, hellers, all of y'all - come over to the queer pirates side. We have representation!
It genuinely is, though.
But at the same time, it sort of underlines just how easy it was to do. Every bit of representation they managed to wangle into OFMD (and there’s SO MUCH of it) is treated with respect and consistency and care. When stuff matters in this show, it matters.
Even though there is great care and attention paid to all the rep on the show, at the same time, it’s done with such a light touch. To the point where it almost feels like a fantasy in and of itself (imagine it - meeting up with your auntie the nun after however many years as a non-binary person and she just accepts you as-is, no arguments or shaming or telling you you’re going to hell or anything?! wow, what a dream world!).
David Jenkins might say ‘fuck your history books, Blackbeard’s now a leather daddy’ but his writing shows how effortless it can be to infuse positive representation and how little it takes to be kind.
David Jenkins gives us so much in OFMD, just because he can, and with this show and Rhys and Taika (and seriously - the whole fucking cast, every last one of them), I think it’s going to be even harder for those arguments against representation to stick.
Because, lookit - these two guys who are definitely grown-ass men with full lives of their own, figuring out that they’re in love with each other. Just two regular guys.
And it’s just a thing like falling in love, like people do, and it’s magnificent. Each of them is very much their own person, with their own way of doing things, but they see something in each other and it’s just immediate and just chemistry and fate and they just KNOW.
And that same level of attention and care and detail feels like it’s being applied to every last character and scenario in the show. And as a writer who has lost the will to live on more than one occasion because of Buckleming and the terrible things they do to show canon, I can tell you, OFMD is such a gift.
