On Gay Representation, and Thanks to the Team Behind Foundation on Apple TV+
Spoiler Notice: I’m going to discuss season 2 of the Apple TV+ show Foundation up to and including episode 7. If you’re not caught up yet, feel free to save this article for later.
The first gay characters showed up on TV in the 1970’s. That was before my time though. I honestly cannot recall the first time I saw a gay character on TV, but it’s likely to have been Will & Grace. By the time it started airing I understood that being gay was a thing, that it was different than being straight, and that if you were gay, you probably still shouldn’t talk about.
Over the past couple decades, the number of gay and lesbian characters on screen has kept growing but not without controversy. A lot of these characters were two dimensional, stereotypes, or just existed to tick a box on someone’s representation checklist.
I no longer automatically get excited when a show or movie introduces a gay character to me. The bar has risen, if you are going to give me a gay character you better make sure they are a fully fleshed out person who “could actually exist” and not some pandering token character just occupying screen space so you can feel inclusive. No more participation trophies.
The first season of Foundation featured no obvious gay characters, but for sci-fi that’s not so unusual. Outside of Star Trek there isn’t much LGBTQ representation in sci-fi, or if there is I’m just unaware of it.
Imagine my surprised then when I’m watching Foundation and hear mention of this new male character having a husband. I had to be sure I heard right, so I turned on closed captioning and backed it up. Yep, sure enough they did say he had a husband. What a pleasant surprise!
In episode 3 we are introduced to Bel Riose, an ex-general, played by gay British actor Ben Daniels, who disobeyed an order from Empire, saved the lives of his men, and for his disobedience was told his husband had been murdered and he himself was sent off to a life of hard labor. Certainly not your normal gay character, but let’s not get too excited yet.
After a tense scene between Empire and Riose we meet the husband Glawen Curr, played by gay Welsh actor Dino Fetscher, who also happens to serve in the military. What follows is an emotional scene between long lost lovers now reunited. It was well done. In fact, so far, all the scenes featuring just the two of them have been so well acted there’s no doubt about the long, intense, loving relationship between the two of them.
The couple also brings something that was missing to the show’s dynamic: people on the side of Empire that you could care about. Before the story being told was divided in to 3 groups: Empire who was corrupt and doomed to fall, Foundation designed to cause the fall and shorten the period of darkness, and the outsider trio of Hari, Gaal, and Salvor and their wandering path.
Now you have Bel and Glawen who are clearly good people. Glawen would have them support Foundation and fight against Empire, but Bel pulls him back saying that if Empire falls so many people will suffer in the darkness and that he cannot allow that. Good men on the wrong side for the right reasons. As the audience though we know how tragic this is, the fall is inevitable and fighting on the side of Empire will change nothing.
I don’t know what will happen with these two, but I am certain we will have to say goodbye to them when this season is over. That does make me sad, but I’m so happy we got to have them in the first place.
So, my thanks to the team behind Foundation for creating these characters, for giving them depth, complexity, and making them relevant to the story. Thanks also to Ben and Dino for bringing them to life and giving incredible performances.
