Insatiable Homophobia on "Insatiable"

I thought the Netflix series Insatiable (2018), starring former Disney teen Debbie Ryan, was a porno about a girl with an insatiable sexual appetite.  Turns out she has an insatiable appetite for revenge.

It has gotten considerable criticism for demeaning the overweight. I didn't care about that so much -- fatophobia is endemic in gay communities -- but I wanted to see about the gay characters.

I didn't realize that it was set in the South, or I wouldn't have bothered.

Shows set in the South are always time warps to the 1950s.  Even if they talk about cell phones and streaming videos, they dress, look, and act like it's a hot July day in 1956, and William Holden has just come to town on a Greyhound bus and ordered peach pie from Carol Jean at the Hidey Ho Cafe before heading out to the 4th of July picnic.




For the less literary, imagine Thela and Iola planning how to seize control of the Church Lady League on Mama's Family.

(Side note: who sits at the dinner table with their chair pulled out and their legs spread?  Unless their director said "Make sure your bulge is visible."

So you know it's going to be time-warp 1950s homophobia to the present, and pretend that that's what life is like for gay people now.






 Patty Bladell, a high school girl bullied and harassed for her weight, goes on a crash diet and loses like 70 pounds  Then, with the help of Bob Armstrong (Dallas Roberts) , a civil rights lawyer and former beauty pageant coach, she enters beauty contests:

Miss Bareback Buckaroo - I guess there was no one gay around to tell them what bareback means;

Then Miss Magic Jesus -- um, that's the term nonbelievers use to make fun of Christianity, and this is a Bible Belt fundamentalist community, except for all of them being Catholic (TV Trope #101: All Christianity is Catholic).

Patty  also manages to seduce her crush, Brick (Michael Provost), who happens to be Bob's son (top photo).

There are also other soap opera things going on, lots of people suspected of infidelity, scheming to break each other up, finding sex tapes, getting pregnant, with jokes about rape, pedophilia, and other unsavory topics, but I fast-forwarded through all that to get to the gay stuff.

Bob wears pinks and purples, and flutters and sashays and talks about fashion with that studied flamboyance of a straight actor going for a gay vibe, so it comes as no surprise when his best enemy, Bob Barnard (Christopher Gorham), seduces him. 

 Bob #1 is horrified, disgusted, confused, and so on, and so on, all the things that happened when you were struggling to come out 50 years ago.   Plus he is still in love with his wife, Coralee (Alyssa Milano).  Bob #2 explains that he is in love with his wife, too, but they can be together on the downlow.

So they're bisexual, right?  No --  they're gay, Bob #2 explains.  They're drawn to men emotionally and romantically, although they happen to be sexually attracted to women: "They're like soft pillows filled with marshmallows."

Um...I'm pretty sure women don't feel like that.

And I'm pretty sure that gay men aren't interested in sex with marshmallow-filled pillows.

When Bob #1 is outed, the whole town rejects him in homophobic contempt.  Especially Coralee: "Our whole relationship was a lie!  Don't ever talk to me again!"  His son Brick says "It's not the gay thing.  Be whatever you want.  It's the lying."

Yeah, right.  It's the gay thing.

They both get divorced and move in together.  I hear that they eventually bring in a lady so they can enjoy emotional intimacy with each other while fondling her pillows, but I didn't see the episode.   I was busy checking the premiere date.

August 10, 1956, right?

This is a remarkably homophobic show.

See also: Southern Baptist Sissies