Xena And Gabrielle Are Officially Gay In The New ‘Xena’ Reboot! Here’s Some Slash Fic To Celebrate
This has been a long time coming.
After six seasons of strong friendship, lingering hugs and sneaky kisses followed by 15 consequent years of explicit erotic fan fiction, it’s finally happening: Xena and her faithful sidekick Gabrielle are getting the big, gay comeback they’ve always deserved. Prepare the gifs. Let out a fierce warrior cry. All those ‘they’re just good friends’ debates with your mum and secret rambling diary entries circa 1999 are vindicated.
The two main characters will be 100 percent out-and-proud gay in the upcoming NBC reboot.
This news comes direct from a recent Tumblr Q&A with the writer and producer of the new project Javier Grillo-Marxuach. Responding to the backlash he received after recently killing off a beloved lesbian character on The 100, he made clear he is “a very different person with a different world view” than his employer on that show.
“Xena will be a very different show made for very different reasons,” he said. “There is no reason to bring back Xena if it is not there for the purpose of fully exploring a relationship that could only be shown sub-textually in first-run syndication in the 1990s. It will also express my view of the world [link added] — which is only further informed by what is happening right now.”
This is no small thing. Like Bert and Ernie and Sherlock and Watson before them, Xena and Gabrielle are one of popular culture’s most heavily shipped gay couples. And, though the showrunners frequently played to this fact in the series’ original run, the relationship was never made overt. It’s a fact which speaks volumes about a serious lack of LGBT representation on TV at the time; one which continues to a lesser extent to this day.
In this way, the show may have carved itself some legitimately useful purpose in a sea of largely redundant ’90s reboots. LGBT fans don’t only want representation, they want redemption. Two years after Xena wrapped, the show’s star Lucy Lawless famously told reporters her character was “definitely gay”. “It wasn’t just that Xena was bisexual and kinda liked her gal pal and they kind of fooled around sometimes, it was ‘Nope, they’re married, man’,” she said.
It’s about time that was made official.
The hell, you say! #Xena https://t.co/C7jRMA3UZX
— Lucy Lawless (@RealLucyLawless) March 14, 2016
On that note, here are some great potential scripts the internet’s been dishing out hard and fast for more than a decade:
– ‘Close Than Blood Bonds’, by maggielassie. Includes a whole lot of Gabrielle reminiscing about losing her virginity while watching Xena take off her breastplate in a stream.
– ‘Heaven Down Here’, by Rebecca Hall. Winner of least subtle title.
– ‘Intertwined’, by kykythealmostguy. In this story, Xena is a star soccer player and Gabrielle is a freshman in college. They occasionally recite poetry to one another, because of course they do.
– ‘Aphrodite’s Gift’, by YesBothWays. An extract for your reading pleasure:
“Gabrielle felt herself smile, as Xena looked down at her lips. They’d spent most of the day in bed already, and they were moments from ending up there again. Somehow, Gabrielle imagined on days like this that the energy from their love making was not spent, but gathered itself instead over the day. All of it seemed ready to flare up now, like a storehouse cultivated over the hours and ready at a moment’s notice. Gabrielle let her hand run down the side of Xena’s neck and over her shoulder and arm. She felt the faint hair on Xena’s arm rise at the feel of her touch and smiled.
“Do you want me to try Aphrodite’s Gift on you?” Gabrielle said.
“Yes,” Xena said without a pause.
It’s not yet clear if NBC’s upcoming reboot will feature a strap-on dildo named after the goddess of love. One can only hope.
