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Before
the summer of 2000, I had never heard of fan fiction. A recent
graduate of UC San Diego's undergraduate writing program,
I spent that summer in self-imposed exile in the middle of
nowhere, an hour east of San Francisco. I was three hundred
miles from my family and friends, living away from my hometown
and completely alone for the first time in my life. I had
left with the intention of finding, in three months of blessed
solitude, a way of recovering and unwinding from the combined
chaos of school, work and my youthful demons. I was resting.
I was writing. And I was watching reruns of Buffy the Vampire
Slayer.
Watching
the show started innocently enough—just a little background
noise to keep me company while I ate dinner. But the more
I watched, the more hooked I was. The show offered a variety
of draws: tight, snappy writing; direction which was unusually
nuanced for television of its time; and feature creatures
who stood as metaphors for the cultural and internal demons
battled in the very scary world of everyday life. But most
notably, the show featured a cast of characters with whom
I fell head over heels in love.
There
was Buffy, the heroine: righteous, glib-tongued, and unfailingly
committed to saving the world. There was former librarian
and mystical mayhem expert Giles, her charmingly tweedy British
mentor. One can't forget Xander, the doofy but steadfastly
loyal boy-next-door. And there was my favorite, Willow, the
insecure, nervous-babble-prone, computer geek. Willow, the
bumbling novice witch. Willow, the budding lesbian.
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Alyson
Hannigan as Willow.
Photo property of Twentieth Century Fox. |
Initially,
I had been excited enough just to find a relatable character
in Willow because she was nerdy and interested in metaphysics.
But gay, too? It was enough to make my bookwormy, astrology-studying,
dykey self all but plotz with delight.
Openly
gay since 15-years old, I was used to getting my cinematic
kicks in the subtext. Gay folks are experts at this because,
up until recently, there were no gay folks or gay relationships
on TV. Subtext was all we had. As a wee queer thing, I crushed
on Nancy McKeon, who played the smoky-voiced, babybutch Jo
on The Facts of Life. Jo's tension-laden interaction
with snooty, preppy Blair made my babydyke head spin with
mischievous, if slightly clueless delight.
As I
grew up and started to figure things out, there was the odd
film about lesbians. But there were virtually no happy endings
for gay women in the movies. They all somehow came to similar
bad ends. They went crazy, went on murderous killing sprees,
or ended up dead—often by suicide—or all three:
crazy, murderous, and then dead. The film landscape was pretty
bleak, and television wasn't much different. Up until Willow
and her girlfriend Tara, the only non-tragic "lesbians" I'd
seen on TV were of the sweeps variety—straight female
characters who tempted the dark side of the force by flirting
with and maybe even kissing another girl, only to scamper
quickly back to the safety and conformity of heterosexual
lovin'.
By the
time I finished college, I had seen this enough, and the eye
candy novelty of it was beginning to wear thin. I wanted real
storylines about women loving one another. I wanted romance.
I wanted characters who were actually lesbians! There were
plenty of gay boys as regular characters on TV at that point.
Sure, they were relegated to snarky celibacy in Bestfriendlandia,
but they were here and they were queer. Where were all the
gay girls?
So like
every other lesbian who watched witchy Willow and Tara lock
eyes and hands and wills, telekinetically sealing themselves
into a laundry room to keep out the bad guys, I knew by the
way they held on to one another longer than necessary that
there was more afoot here than mere spellcraft. I saw it coming,
but I was prepared for Willow and Tara to turn out to be just
another Sweepsbian flash in the pan.
Only
they weren't. Over the course of nine episodes, they spent
more and more time together. Willow started lying to her friends
about where she was spending the night. And the intense way
these two were looking at each other while they held hands
and "did spells" had increasingly less to do with getting
their Wicca on. They were quietly, unobtrusively falling in
love. And then they were girlfriends. Officially. Willow had
a coming out scene with best pal Buffy and everything.
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Amber
Benson as Tara.
Photo property of Twentieth Century Fox. |
I became
more and more starry-eyed over Willow and her shy girlfriend,
Tara, utterly delighted and very much aware that I was watching
two girls fall in love on television for the first time ever.
A big fan of the internet, too, I searched there for more
information about my new favorite show. So it was that I stumbled
across The Kitten Board, an active fan community dedicated
to the Willow/Tara relationship. There, I discovered a group
of folks who found this couple and their budding romance every
bit as magical as I did.
Elsewhere
in online Buffy fandom (already the biggest internet TV fandom
ever, surpassing the efforts of even the Trekkies), the response
to Willow and Tara was less enthusiastic. Buffy websites and
message boards were awash with homophobic vitriol directed
towards Tara in particular, for "converting" Willow, and calling
for "the fat dike [sic]" to be booted off the show. But Willow
and Tara were here to stay: Even the show's creator, producers,
and writers said so, courageously taking a stand in support
of Willow and Tara and gay relationships in general.
I was
disturbed by the harsh reaction on the part of some fans,
but after six years of being openly gay, I was used to seeing
and hearing that sort of ignorant, poorly-spelled drivel.
It didn't lessen my excitement about Willow and Tara one iota.
I was enchanted—ecstatic even. And I wasn't alone. I
threw myself into online Willow/Tara fandom at the Kitten
Board with gleeful abandon. We were a group comprised largely
of gay and bisexual women from all over the world, but we
had our resident lesbros (friendly, mostly non-pervy straight
guys), too. For those of us to whom the relationship meant
so much, The Kitten became an oasis of calm within Buffy fandom,
a safe space to celebrate how amazing it felt to finally see
ourselves and our relationships represented week after week
on the little screen.
Still,
I couldn't help but notice the glaring disparity in the way
the Willow/Tara romance played out when compared to the other
relationships on the show. Buffy and her boyfriend, Captain
Cardboard (Riley), boinked like sex-crazed bunnies, as did
Anya and Xander. Even crusty old Giles was seen with a naked
woman in his bed around the same time Tara was introduced.
Willow and Tara? Months later, still doing "spells."
[continued
on page 2]
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