I've said many time zippy that Ste's coming out was just as ridiculous as Dougs, not the having same sex feelings or falling for someone as charismatic as Brendan but the sudden, eeeh I know nowt about about women they do nowt for me etc etc that they came out with as soon as it happened.

I don't really get why they are so quick to want to box off the bisexual option, surely in the long run it widens the storyline possibilities.

I've got a feeling that someone important behind the scenes has got a problem with bisexuality.

It just doesn't make any sense to have people who are questioning their sexuality come down so definitely on one side.

Interesting. I've never disputed the facts behind the Doug storyline. There's really nothing that unlikely about a 20 year old guy realising he was attracted to another guy when he hadn't been before. But as a storyline, everything was wrong with it. No build up, terrible writing, clearly just invented on the hoof. I thought it was demeaning to the whole experience really.

I find Doug completely asexual. But at least he looked at Texas and Lynsey with something like lust. Whenever he looks at Ste, he always just looks like he wants to cry.

*waves Stendan flag proudly*

There was a much slower build though, zippy, with Ste. We watched him watching Brendan and becoming fascinated by him and wanting to impress him and seeking advice from him and wanting to be near him, and when Ste said what he said about Callum, it didn't feel levered-in. And there was also his background, where it was obvious what his parents and the kids in the arcades would have said and done if he'd shown signs of being gay. It's easy to see why he would have repressed any feelings, consciously or not.

With Doug, he had conservative parents, but he's been away from them for a long time, he was well travelled and independent, he's taken all kinds of risks to make a living and had no ties to keep him in a place where he felt he couldn't be himself. It just didn't ring true that he would have been fearful of his sexuality.

I know everyone's different, and I don't know that there's much point in rehashing these discussions at this stage in the game, so I'll shut up now.

Oh I agree there's definitely lots of biphobia in tv shows etc., storylines like these can make it worse because they feel a need for it to be black and white. I wouldn't go so far as to say that HO have a problem with bisexuality as they have Texas who is bisexual, and with Jodie- well, Jodie's not bi, she's pan, so it shows that they're not necessarily phobic of it.

To be honest I think that they rush it a lot so they can make way for other aspects of the story. E.g., Stendan was a DV plot at the beginning, so they were probably too eager to get on with that.

Morning!
Don't have anything interesting to say except that Doug is gross. "Delighted", really?
I hope Leanne and Texas go with him to NY and never come back.


Preach it.

Well I'm not sure Jodie counts zippy.

I would also be very surprised if they ever mentioned Texas's trip to girltown again.

Although with HOs you just never know.

Brendan's counsellor is on Doctors.

Ha I've just worked out what the next triangle will be.

Texas will fall for Sienna and we will have yet another family that plays together.

You just wouldn't bet against it would you?

Don't shut up! I think this is it, completely. With Ste, it was just written with more care, but there was just something believable about it, coming from his background, and with his personality. It just came together like a dream, that he fell head over heels for this older fella who showed him how great sex could be.

Everything about Doug's story was wrong. It just didn't fit at all with the Doug we'd seen. They made it this massive sentimental thing, where he was in love with Ste before he'd even tried kissing him, and crying (a lot), and making big teen girl declarations about tummies flipping, and then within 6 months he's proposing. It's so childish.

What I loved about Ste and Brendan was, it was sex. For the longest time, it was that they just wanted to rip reach other's clothes off, and couldn't stop, and Ste didn't give a damn that it was a fella, and the feelings developed later. It just felt like a story for adults, really refreshing, totally original.

Oh god, even worse, Dodger falls for her, incest seems to be all the rage recently.

Ewww, why do I freak myself out like this?

Lol well yeah bisexuality and pansexuality are different things but at least it shows that they're open to exploring some of the sexual minorities... (Though I am still pretty desperate for a trans character over here! Maybe not another Jason, though)

Oh I didn't mean Jodie didn't count because she was pansexual I meant she didn't count because after about 15 minutes of her first appearance it was obvious (to me anyway) that she wasn't going to last.

I agree with what you're saying about the Stendan stuff because it's a very unique story and great for all the reasons you said, but I'm not sure that I agree that it has to be like that to be mature. :/ For instance my older brother (who's 27) met his girlfriend over sodding World of Warcraft and he's lived with her over in Norway for about two years now, and they're very happy. I definitely think that you can fall in love before sex/kissing happens. But then I'm 19 and very naive and unable to do anything romantic until my body is corrected, so maybe that's just me.

ETA: Oh I see Ally. Yeah she was a bit plot-devicey. Another Noah. Dexas' Noah. Though I liked her friendship with Treeza.

Yes, c&s, Stendan's story was challenging and ambiguous with many shades of grey from the start, but most importantly it was believable from the word go. With Ste and Doug it just felt so cynically made and presented. It would have been a progressive storyline for Grange Hill back in the day, with a couple of fourteen year olds who didn't need their characters manipulated to fit it. The extreme emotional dependence, the feeling that life is only worth living if the boy you love is giving you some attention, the hearts and flowers and cutesiness and sexlessness, would have been better suited to an audience of children going through the same first love kind of thing, straight or gay. It was never going to stand up in comparison to Brendan and Ste.

I did wonder about that in the article, when it says he meets her first before finding out that they're related. I know nothing will have happened, and he's with Tex now, but if there's Dodger's usual level of flirting, then that's going to play on his little mind.

Are they due another incest plot?

Oh, I know, you can meet and fall in love in all kinds of ways and in all places, but like Sarah said, the way they presented Ste and Doug just seemed like a cliche of love straight from a 13 yr old girl's brain, and not a bright one. Ste was supposed to be a sexy, experienced, 22 yr old guy, just coming out of a very difficult relationship. Doug was meant to be some dude who'd been hanging out in Thailand. And suddenly they're crying over each other and declaring love (which there was no sign of when they were just mates) and writing love letters and such. Right up to Doug's daft proposal, the whole thing just sets my teeth on edge.

Ste and Brendan was challenging. Ste and Doug was utterly patronising. It was kind of a shock.

Mind you, I am also the kind of person who would have Love Actually expunged from the earth for the good of mankind, so maybe it's a personl thing.

Oh I see what you mean. Yeah it was pretty.. manufactured and a bit cliché if you ask me. :/ I think that Doug is adorable to see in a relationship (contrary to popular opinion) but I would love to see him in a genuinely engaging love plot. Honestly I think that PJ would really excel in that- like when he was crying in that scene forever ago after Ste finished with him the first time, my heart was breaking for him even though I don't really like Stug. I think all the cliché lovey-dovey stuff is slightly insulting to us as viewers and him as an actor because we know he's so much better than that. And Kieron too, but we know that already because of Stendan

Love Actually is a cultural masterpiece.

I'm terribly bored, and ill, but whilst browsing through stuff I've saved over the years, I came across this and it cheered me right up. Genius.

Everyone must read it if you haven't already.

It's also interesting seeing how much has changed.

ETA: Made by Mojo and C&S, if I'm remembering correctly.

Special mention goes to the prediction that Doug's gay.

I've never seen Love Actually and have no plans to do so, unless there is a gun pointing at me.

I remember that report maya.

We have had some brilliant stuff on here over the years.

Aww, it's lovely to read that again.

Oh but the reality, Maya. How wrong it is in reality

That "Made for each other" though. How true that is.

It can stay then. But only for you.


*shoots self*