Star Trek makes fan-favourite couple canon

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25 years later, Star Trek: Lower Decks finally makes a fan-favorite couple from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine canon. Spoilers for Lower Decks ahead.

Star Trek: Lower Decks  episode “Fissure Quest”, follows up with Captain William Boimler, the transporter duplicate of Lieutenant Brad Boimler who was assigned to Starfleet’s Section 31 after faking his death. Captain Boimler’s crew is assembled from alternate reality versions of Star Trek legacy characters from across Star Trek‘s multiverse of timelines, including Star Trek: Enterprise‘s T’Pol, a pre-Jadzia Curzon Dax, and a bevy of Ensigns Harry Kim.

The USS Anaximander’s medical officers are based on potential realities from Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. This holographic Dr. Julian Bashir is ostensibly based on the Long-term Medical Hologram that engineer Lewis Zimmerman started building in DS9 season 5, episode 16, “Dr. Bashir, I Presume”. Holo-Bashir shares medical duties with an alternate reality version of Elim Garak.

Dr. Julian Bashir and Garak Are Now A Bundle of Sticks

The epsiode makes Dr. Bashir and Garak a couple, 25 years after Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ended. Captain Boimler’s voice-over introduces Starfleet Garak and Holo-Bashir as a married couple, and the delightful (if somewhat antagonistic) banter that ensues between the long-term pair is a perfectly believable extension of their DS9 characterizations.

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Netflix renews queer dating show The Boyfriend

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Japanese LGBTQ+ dating show The Boyfriend will return for season two on Netflix. Following the likes of I Kissed A Boy, I Kissed A Girl and Queer Love: The Ultimatum, season two of the queer dating show will drop on Netflix next year. The streaming platform announced the news on Sunday (15 December).

The Boyfriend is Japan’s first same-sex reality dating show and season one featured gay and bisexual Japanese and East Asian looking for a romantic connection. It followed a group of men living together in beachside accommodation where they had to foster connections with one another while running a coffee truck.

The Boyfriend | Official Trailer | Netflix

Executive producer Dai Ota said: “Thanks to the love from our viewers, it is exciting to return for a new season. Being the first same-sex romance reality show in Japan, we paid careful attention to ensure that the story is an authentic portrayal of these relationships.

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Something About Alex

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Alex, a troubled and isolated teenager, finds a true and supportive friend in Hendrik, his sister’s boyfriend. When Hendrik and Annelies announce their plans to leave the family home, Alex must face what is troubling him.

Click the CC button in the bottom right corner for subtitles.

Young Royals star Edvin Ryding features in 28 Years Later trailer

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The first trailer for Danny Boyle’s post-apocalyptic horror film 28 Years Later has just dropped, and it stars Young Royals actor Edvin Ryding in his most exhilarating role to date.

28 Years Later is the threequel to Boyle’s previous horror hits 28 Days Later (2002) and 28 Weeks Later (2007), and is set some time after the latter, with the violence-inducing “Rage Virus” making a terrifying comeback.

A new group of survivors, including Kraven The Hunter’s Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Killing Eve’s Jodie Comer, and Harry Potter’s Ralph Fiennes, will have to survive in a world once again overcome with hordes of aggressive infected.

28 Years Later - Official Trailer - Only In Cinemas June 20

Actor Edvin Ryding, who is best known for his role as Prince Wilhelm in Netflix’s sweet queer drama Young Royals, stars in the film as gun-toting soldier E. Sundqvist, brought into the fray to help fight off the zombies.

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‘Young Hearts’ is a disarmingly sweet account of first love

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Casting directors take note: Lou Goossens in this first film role is an actor to watch out for, naturalistic and able to convey subtle shades of inner turmoil, despite his young age. He plays Elias, a 14-year-old living in rural Belgium with his loving and mostly normal family — the slight exception being his father, Luk, who, while a pretty straight arrow in a personal sense, is enjoying unlikely success as a midlife pop sensation, with a hit single in the pipeline.

The film opens with dad belting out his signature number, which is all about how “first love lights the fire in your heart,” which of course turns out to be a decent summary of the film. Shortly after, the family get a new neighbor in the form of Alexander.

YOUNG HEARTS - Official Trailer

Elias lacks the emotional vocabulary to articulate quite what the sense of awkwardness and intrigue that he feels around the newcomer might mean. He and his school friends talk about “love,” but it’s pretty clear that Elias at least has no real idea what he means by the word, at least in a romantic sense. When Alexander is welcomed into their group, Elias is blindsided during a one-on-one conversation with the new kid, as Alexander tells him quite casually that he himself was previously in love with a boy.

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My Personal Weatherman

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Adapted from the manga Taikan Yohou by Taino Nikke and starring actors Higuchi Kouhei (Segasaki Mizuki) and Mashiko Atsuki (Tanada Yoh), the Japanese BL My Personal Weatherman is a sexy, tantalizing story about aspiring manga artist Yoh and his unusual contract with sexy weatherman Segasaki. There’s an alluring air of ‘why’ to the erotic premise that lends a mysterious and fascinating promise of dark quirkiness. Read on…

My Personal Weatherman (gagaoolala)

The scandalous & spicy films of pre-code Hollywood

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The Hollywood Production Code, also known as the Hays Code, came to define LGBT+ representation on screen in Hollywood for decades – it made sure that queerness was only ever presented in deeply coded ways.

“The code was written in 1930 but not really put into effect until 1934, and those years from 30 to 34 are very interesting years in Hollywood history because a lot of the classical genres – horror, gangster, musical – really codify in those years,” Harry Benshoff, a film professor at the University of North Texas says. “Those years are called the ‘pre-code’ years, which is paradoxical because the code was written, but it wasn’t enforced yet.”

America was going through the Great Depression, and Hollywood was putting as much sex and violence into its films as it possibly could to keep cash-strapped audiences going to the cinema. Naturally, that led to calls for censorship, Benshoff says. 

“They came up with this system called ‘the seal of approval’, so a film that abided by the code got the seal of approval, and that would play in the major theatres, which were also owned by Hollywood. So it was another way of consolidating their monopoly or oligopoly.”

The Scandalous Films of Pre-Code Hollywood

Sebastian

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Sebastian the story of one man and his two identities. When we first see Sebastian we assume this is his first time as a sex worker. Pale and anxious, he claims to be 24 years-old and hailing from Edinburgh. He gives everything to please his corpulent, older client. Afterwards, there is a look in his eyes questioning what just happened and wondering how he became that person.

In the ’real world’, Sebastian is Max, an ambitious, aspiring Scottish writer now living in the London, who freelances for a magazine and is about to have his first short story published in Granta. He is trying to craft his first novel, and has joined the website Dreamy Guys to experience the life of an escort, telling himself that his time as Sebastian is purely for research purposes. Preparing for a coveted interview with Bret Easton Ellis, he takes some inspiration from a writer often accused of moulding autobiography into eye-catching fiction.

Sebastian - Official U.S. Trailer

Max approaches his time as Sebastian like an actor preparing for a role. He shaves his chest, works out at the gym and scrutinises his features in the mirror before another encounter. His clients are also participating in a kind of performance, as they enjoy the release of no-strings sex with a willing young man; the film is sex positive and explicit without feeling gratuitous. Sebastian attracts older clients, who are relieved that he has been truthful about his age and boyish good looks. “It’s so nice that not everyone is deceptive,” says one satisfied customer

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