Tag Gay

Two and a Half Men’s Adoption Arc: A Surprisingly Thoughtful Story or a New Low?

kennyu4 4 Comments

My post today is a way to direct your attention at something that is happening with the final season of Two and a Half Men. Two and a Half Men, for the most part, is a pretty raunchy show following raunchy people. It peddles cheap laughs with a slew of dirty jokes thrown at the audience at breakneck speeds. If there is any opening for a lowbrow joke, you better believe this show will take it. Originally starring Charlie Sheen as the drunken womanizer Charlie Harper (“HAHAHA KINDA LIKE THE REAL CHARLIE SHEEN HA!”), the show followed how his life was shaken up by the arrival of his deadbeat brother Alan Harper who is played by Jon Cryer. After Sheen was fired (thus ruining the integrity of Two and a Half Men for many viewers by sullying its proud name), Ashton Kutcher came aboard as Walden Schmidt, a tech-company billionaire bachelor. A few sitcom contrivances later, Walden has replaced Charlie as the person Alan is sponging off of as a deadbeat tenant. Now, after a few seasons of being with Alan, Walden decided his life was empty, so he decides to adopt a child. Because he can’t adopt a child as a single man, he needs to find someone he can marry quickly (and due to his unbelievably terrible experience with women), he has chosen to marry Alan who he can trust. This is where things get tricky.

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The Trojan Gay Dude: Pop Culture’s Dumbest Trope?

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The answer is yes, yes it is. The basis for so many comedies, coming-of-age stories, and stupid decisions made by several people in real life are plans to “get the girl”. These range from harmless shows of affection, to full on stalker-like attempts, and even to things that make me question whether or not we as a species should be writing fiction. But some of them just reach a level of stupidity that cause me to stop and reflect a little before saying anything about them. In this case I am talking about the occasionally used tactic of pretending to be a gay man to get the girl. This was seen in films like If You Only Knew, Home of Phobia, and even Kick-Ass (an otherwise great film). My question for people who write these stories is… why? There is no light at the end of the tunnel here. Your main character pretends to be gay, to what, show the girl his sensitive side? Hear all her deepest darkest secrets? Watch her as she changes with no fear of repercussion (which definitely breaches into creepy stalkerish behaviour territory)? Taking advantage of every girl’s deep seated desire for a gay best friend is one thing, but straight up lying to her for an extended period of time with the expectation of sex she thinks you can’t possibly want makes zero sense. And since movies are generally wish fulfillment for the writers, the guy usually gets the girl in the end (like in the film version of Kick-Ass but thankfully not the original comicbook) which is all kinds of stupid. But the question I always have for these “heroes”, these masters of disguise if you will, is well… What’s your endgame? Because I can’t see it no matter how hard I try. Sure you may luck out in the end, but I always wonder what the basis was for coming up with the plan in the first place. This is definitely a case of tropes writers never need to do again.

She’ll never see it coming…

Quote of the Day:

You know what the worst thing about being a slave is? They make you work but they don’t pay you or let you go.

– Philip J. Fry, Futurama