The Gays’ Gaze: Being Gay Is Dope In CW’s “Jane The Virgin”
By Sophie Lilla and Nicole Boyce
The Gays’ Gaze is a queer entertainment column — the most NYU (but not the most Gallatin) thing to ever happen.
If we told you five years ago that one of the best shows on television would be on the CW, you would probably laugh in our faces. But here we are, 2015, and we just can’t. stop. watching. Jane the Virgin. That’s right, the CW isn’t just for watching vampire sex and catching up on the latest goss between Serena and Blair anymore. It’s also for watching an incredible story about love, family, and friendship unfold out in front of you like a beautiful flower slowly blooming in the spring right after you’ve finished your last final.
The show, which season finale airs Monday the 11th, centers around Jane, played by the angelic Gina Rodriguez. So angelic, she even won a Golden Globe for her portrayal. Jane is at first just your average hard working girl engaged to a cop, while living with her mother and abuela. She’s also a virgin, so things get kinda topsy turvey when she accidentally gets artificially inseminated during a routine PAP smear. While to many of us this sounds like your typical Sunday brunch scene, it pretty much throws Jane’s life for a loop. Especially when it turns out the sperm she was inseminated with belongs to her old crush, Rafael Solano.
And — and here’s where it gets gay — it was the Rafael Solano, “the dad’s,” lesbian sister who artificially inseminated her! That’s right — the doctor and catalyst for the whole show is Dr. Luisa Alver — an out and proud lesbian. Gay and a doctor! Wow! But just so you’re aware, this isn’t TV’s first Dr. Queer, in fact, Luisa comes after a long history of lady queers in scrubs. So it’s too bad that everyone kind of hates her for accidentally artificially inseminating a virgin.
Rafael first brings up Luisa’s queerness by asking how her ex wife is doing. While we both assumed it would be a character whose queerness was only mentioned but never seen, we were happily proven wrong. We can’t exactly say too much, because it’s hard to say more than a few sentences about each episode without accidentally giving away a spoiler.
What we will say though, is that Luisa has a torrid illicit affair that rivals the L Word in terms of campy secrecy mixed with legitimate chemistry. Instead of just a quick cut to two women kissing, it’s a legitimate relationship that is shown as being important to both characters. She isn’t dressed in a trademark ”gay” way either, as often happens by networks trying to link character’s gender presentation to their sexuality. We hope this doesn’t spoil anything, so don’t think about it too hard, but there is a relationship between two femme women, who typically present in a stereotypically feminine way.
It’s nice to indulge in a queer relationship that feels just as campy and satirized as all straight relationships on CW shows. It can be a relief at times to not have to watch another queer couple die at the hand of a homophobic or suicidal storyline. We could indulge in a sappy couple who were not there as a gay representation quota filler, but because it was a genuinely interesting and well written plot twist. The joy of this show is that every character plays their role to the height of earnestness, and in the twists and turns, you never stop caring about them.
This show is as cute and fun as it is wild and crazy, for gay and straight characters a like. This show is above else, aware of itself as a white people telenovela remake, and isn’t afraid to play out storylines at the highest stakes possible. That’s why having a lesbian character on this show is.the.best.thing.ever. If you’re like the rest of and tired of another possessive, power hungry, dumb man dominating your television (macbook) screen, then Jane The Virgin might just be the change you need.
RATING: 4.5 out of 5 Ellen Heads
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