0/5

Rumour: Home and a gay?

Has Summer Bay voted Yes and decided to introduce a new gay character in 2018?

This may give a whole new meaning to the term “Flamin’ hell….”

After the nation voted in favour of same sex marriage, there are rumours that Home & Away maybe planning to introduce a gay character.

Summer Bay is a lone outpost in not including an ongoing same-sex character, with Erinsborough long addressing inclusion years ago.

Speculation doesn’t indicate whether such a character would be male nor female, nor whether it would be a regular resident (let alone whether they will be afforded an on-screen love life).

TV historian Andrew Mercado told TV Tonight, “Home & Away is the only soap in the western world NOT to feature gay characters these days. Neighbours has had several for years now, and in a G-rated timeslot. And even Days Of Our Lives, which is considered the most conservative US daytime soap because it is set around a Catholic family, now has core Horton family members who are gay.

“Given Home & Away’s promo for 2018 indicates that new River Boys are coming to the Bay, let’s hope they try something different for a change instead of the endless tales about drugs and crime – I for one would be fascinated to see the fallout if one of their blokiest boofheads came out as gay.”

Home and Away has featured gay / bisexual characters fleetingly in the past, as far back as 1995. But the last inclusion of any note in 2009 attracted headlines, objections and sent network execs into meltdown, editing out a same-sex kiss for Charlie (Esther Anderson) and Joey (Kate Bell). Eventually Charlie hooked up with a character of the opposite sex.

It isn’t clear just when a new gay character will arrive, if at all, but cast member Shane Withington hinted at it on social media.

25 Responses

  1. Home and Away might get away with it this time. Last time they had a gay character Today Tonight (on the same network) did a savagely homophobic story about it where a young fundamentalist Christian was able to fulminate against it with no attempt at balance with a pro-gay viewpoint. I was really staggered when I saw that report. Shortly after that, the gay character was written out when she suddenly turned straight and hooked up with a bloke.

  2. While EastEnders, Emmerdale, Corrie have had or have LGBTI characters. Since the mid 80’s for EE and mid 2000’s for the other. Hollyoaks has the most LGBTI characters of all soaps.
    Even radio soap the archers has a gay couple who are married !
    While in the US, even in primetime is still considered controversial. Daytime soap As the World Turns had a big gay super couple in it’s finale years. Days has had Will Horton for a few years now.

  3. Neighbours has had gay characters as regulars since 2010. Currently the 2 LBGTI gay characters have been in the soap since 2015 / 2016. While Stef ( Carla Bonner) has been on the show since 1999 but returning with a lesbian partner in 2015.

  4. If they do, please don’t be stereotypical! Not all gay men are loud, feminine, ridiculously good looking, loves fashion and shopping, hang out with girls, etc… Nick Jonas’ character in Kingdom is a good example of breaking stereotypes – an introverted masculine boxer.

  5. You would have to imagine that the creative think tanks who look ahead for the future of their long running TV shows have a list of trending social political values that may need some inclusion at some point in the future, this certainly seems to be the case for some shows in the USA and UK where gay sex can appear out of nowhere almost for its shock value, this can only be interpreted as being voyeuristic and not a social statement supporting SSM, like it or not the prejudice expressed regarding homosexuality will not quickly go away.

    1. Not sure which shows / scenes you are referring to. A writer may use a sex scene, regardless of genders, for honesty, intimacy, lust, power, indulgence, violence etc. as part of their overall story. Merely including same sex scenes should not be misinterpreted as “shock value” any more or less than opposite sex casting.

    2. What an odd post. When it comes to classification, regulators treat gay sex scenes in exactly the same way as ‘straight’ sex scenes, which is as it should be. There should be no greater ‘shock value’ from a same gender sex scene than an opposite gender one.

  6. The last time they dared to introduce a gay charter, Joey and hook her up with Charlie. Shit hit the fan and the producers bowed down to the groups that opposed this. So I hope when they introduce this person they don’t listen to those horrible groups. Neighbours has done this for years and nobody has objected so not sure why it’s so different for home and away. Hopefully this is true!

  7. “And even Days Of Our Lives, which is considered the most conservative US daytime soap because it is set around a Catholic family, now has core Horton family members who are gay.”
    I’d probably say that Y&R is more conservative than Days, having only recently featured bisexual characters and so far treading carefully there. In Days it’s mostly the Brady family that are Catholic, before they were introduced in the 80s, the Hortons were more a Protestant denomination, although yes as a whole they seem to only use the Catholic Church service these days.

  8. Not another batch of River Boys! A gay character in H&A sounds like a good plan, but since Summer Bay took over from Mount Thomas as the town with the most criminal activity with constant shootings, car crashes, drug deals, rape, kidnappings, and murder, I won’t be coming back to the show for one new character. They need to bring the show back to what it’s original plot and purpose was. I’ve seen the promo for 2018 and nothing in it will draw me back so far. Plus even if I did come back, all the cast look the same, for every blonde girl that leaves the show, her doppelganger is cast as a new character. Bringing back opening titles would at least identity its not the same person.

      1. Was hoping there would be guest/cameo appearances of some of the original and other cast from the past. Not holding breath, as it’s a completely different show to what it used to be.

  9. Home & Away hasn’t been appealing for a long time and whenever I do see a promo it pretty much the same sh*t just a different day, a shooting or a car crash, or a disaster of a wedding day. h&a is a bit like neighbours. someone moves to town and before to long the whole flaming family is in town only to be slowly killed off or their perfect marriage is torn apart.

  10. “TV historian Andrew Mercado told TV Tonight, “Home & Away is the only soap in the western world Not to feature gay characters”. Must be missing something. Who is it in Bold & the Beautiful?

    1. @Jason, I thought the same thing when I read Andrews comments. He may be referring to Maya, who is transgender, after the writers changed her whole back story to reveal she was once a man. I always thought recurring character Jarrett Maxwell, the reporter, was gay, but it turned out he wasn’t. Caroline has two “mothers”, but they haven’t been on the show in years. It does appear that B&B is in the same boat as Bogan Away, as I like to call it, as far as gay representation.

      1. The whole Maya being trans is such a terrible storyline. It’s rarely, if ever, mentioned and there are many aspects that could be explored.
        They should have made Wyatt gay. The (over)acting in his every scene could be explained away with him being a screamer.

  11. It amazes me how far behind the real world this show is. Neighbours has been doing these storylines with their main characters for at least 5 years, the British soaps for 10-15 years.

  12. Home and Away lacks any diversity at all, maybe they can add a character or two that reflect the multi-cultural make up of our country while they are at it? Regards the gay character, when the UK soaps first introduced regular gay characters about 25 years ago (yes, H&A is that far behind) it was a female, so I’d guess that will be the case here too. That said though, isn’t Pippa’s son gay? What age would he be by now?

    1. Christopher did come out a few year’s back when visiting the bay. They could write him back in but suspect they will want someone younger. Imagine if the character was trans! That’ll probably take another 50 years.

Leave a Reply