The Number's First Gay Couple

Seems like a heteronormative view of a male homosexual relationship.

 

A somewhat overly dramatic fem leaning dude with his non-fem/masculine boyfriend/partner seems like a depiction to make people feel comfortable.

As in "who is the man and who is the woman" in the relationship is heteronormative for a mostly heterosexual viewing audience.

 

That doesn't make any sense because BOTH are acting in stereotypical heteronormative gender roles, not just the masculine leaning one.

 

Right. The fem gay might as well be the actual woman for all that. That is not a certified representation of a gay (man and man) relationship. I guess whoever created/wrote those characters assumed this how gay relationships work...NOT!

 

LOL so here is the thing...notice in my statements I didn't use phrases like "normal" or "real", that is because their are actual homosexual relationships that this depiction does represent. Yes plenty of masc men love fem men and both act upon what can be described as "heteronormative stereotypical gender roles".

My personal issue is with Black male homosexual depictions in media especially by non-heterosexual content creators or writers. The above tropes are the norm or common place which further propagates stereotypes when WE know there are plenty of relationships that ARE NOT depicted and thus limiting in representations.

 

In addition to @Ockydub 's criticisms, it was poorly written. That the writers relied on such a cartoonish portrayal of a black gay couple straight out of a bad rewrite of "La Cage Aux Folles " pretty much makes me not want to even watch the series for ANY of the characters, gay or straight. There's enough hackneyed writing out there without me wasting my life watching it. For the "masc" dude, the issue in real-life wouldn't be the "femininity" of the other dude, it would be his childish, Perez Hilton adolescent behavior. Femininity does not equal imbecility (see also James Baldwin). The whole thing reminded me of the CA article on gay coonery.

Noticed how quick the therapist jumped on the masc dude and his uncleanliness, taking the side of the snap-queen. Real therapists are more like court mediators when first interviewing a couple in session, getting facts, not taking sides, seeing if each person can look at the situation from the partner's viewpoint. As I saw the Deepak Chopra book on the black therapist's bookshelf, I knew this video was going to be an anti-masc-black-male "New Age" hot mess.

 

I co-sign what everyone else has said....I would also expand on Rico's observation that the Gay couple seemed oddly over-the-top compared to the Straight couple. Not just in mannerisms, even in their subtle character revelations.

Melissa and Kevin's bits about the Groupon, Fantasy Football, the 3-words answers...all subtlety reveal character in a realistic way. With Omar and Alfonze, they not only lack subtlety at all, they literally TELL us everything about their characters.

Also, I'll be the one to say this since no one else will: The Network is called "Black and SEXY TV". The actors playing Kevin and Melissa are very attractive. The actor's playing Omar and Alfonze, while not ugly, are not SEXY, as the network name suggests. I'm just saying.

Is this an intentional decision made by the producers and director? I'm sure there are plenty of model type "Chef Julian" looking dudes who would have played gay characters on this popular YouTube channel...especially since its not likely we will ever see these characters in a sex scene.