Holmes- because "latent" homoeroticism just isn't good enough anymore.

[Triforcer]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,536643,00.html

 

[schild]

Stupid.

I mean you posting it, or even reading Fox news.

The bar is lowered so positively low that neither Hollywood nor Fox could ever surprise me.

[Nerf]

That can't be real. Please god tell me that's a joke.

[schild]

1. At no point did RDJ or Law say it had anything to do with homosexuality.

2.

Who is going to want to see Downey Jr. and Law make out? I don't think it would be appealing to women. Straight men don't want to see it."

I don't know of ANY straight men, women, gays, etc that WOULDN'T want to see that. It's fucking Jude Law and RDJ. It might not be HOT to half of them but it's certainly not going to turn away anyone. And it's DEFINITELY not going to lower the box office draw by 2/3rds. Rather, it'll probably raise it by at least that much. People are retarded.

[dusematic]

I know a fuckton of people that wouldn't want to see two dudes making out.  What utopia of prejudice are you living in?


Edit:  Oh right.  Texas.  A veritable hotbed of tolerance.

[Nerf]

I'm a pretty big fan of gay people not being gay in my immediate vicinity, but I'd watch jude law and RDJ make out for the lulz.
Edit: that being said, I'd much rather have a non-homo sherlock holmes adventure to watch come xmas.

[schild]

I'm a pretty big fan of gay people not being gay in my immediate vicinity, but I'd watch jude law and RDJ make out for the lulz.
Edit: that being said, I'd much rather have a non-homo sherlock holmes adventure to watch come xmas.

You didn't even read the article. People are just making shit up. He said:

"We're two men who happen to be roommates, wrestle a lot and share a bed. It's bad-ass," Downey told Britain's News of the World. Added much-in-the-news Law: "Guy wanted to make this about the relationship between Watson and Holmes. They're both mean and complicated."

At what point does that say "watch us assfuck?"

[dusematic]

I'm a pretty big fan of gay people not being gay in my immediate vicinity, but I'd watch jude law and RDJ make out for the lulz.
Edit: that being said, I'd much rather have a non-homo sherlock holmes adventure to watch come xmas.

You didn't even read the article. People are just making shit up. He said:

"We're two men who happen to be roommates, wrestle a lot and share a bed. It's bad-ass," Downey told Britain's News of the World. Added much-in-the-news Law: "Guy wanted to make this about the relationship between Watson and Holmes. They're both mean and complicated."

At what point does that say "watch us assfuck?"

Nobody said they were making a homosexual bareback gangbang flick.  They reported that there was a gay "vibe" or undertone to the movie.

[Triforcer]

I don't care in the least, in the abstract sense, if men in movies make out.  Depending on the movie, it may add to or detract from overall quality.

What I do care about is turning a character gay that was never, ever portrayed that way merely for shock value.  I love the Holmes stories (my edition of the stories, printed exactly as they appeared  in the Strand Magazine, is my favorite and most precious book), and if he had started out gay in them, fine.  But don't change things just to be edgy and 2009.  

[dusematic]

I don't care in the least, in the abstract sense, if men in movies make out.  Depending on the movie, it may add to or detract from overall quality.

What I do care about is turning a character gay that was never, ever portrayed that way merely for shock value.  I love the Holmes stories (my edition of the stories, printed exactly as they appeared  in the Strand Magazine, is my favorite and most precious book), and if he had started out gay in them, fine.  But don't change things just to be edgy and 2009.  

Hear, hear!

[schild]

I don't care in the least, in the abstract sense, if men in movies make out.  Depending on the movie, it may add to or detract from overall quality.

What I do care about is turning a character gay that was never, ever portrayed that way merely for shock value.  I love the Holmes stories (my edition of the stories, printed exactly as they appeared  in the Strand Magazine, is my favorite and most precious book), and if he had started out gay in them, fine.  But don't change things just to be edgy and 2009.  

This movie is NOTHING LIKE THE BOOKS, GAY OR NOT, what the hell are you even doing looking for information on it - YE, THE SELF-PROCLAIMED WHITE-KNIGHT PURIST?

[lamaros]

 

[dusematic]

God I love the internet.

[Righ]

So what is the Fox film that they are trying to sink this one for? They've copied it around every single News International web imprint. Google the quote and you'll get an idea. That's exactly the sort of double entendre that you expect RDj to say with a twinkle in his eye. Holmes & Watson aren't going to be gay for each other - they'll do exactly as described - wrestle and share somewhere to sleep. Expect Guy Ritchie or the studio to make a statement some time in the next day or too to prevent gay fearing America from condemning the movie based on a Screws of the World misrepresentation of RDj humor.

[Engels]

Not that I need Holmes to be an 'active homosexual', but aren't there various interpretations of Holmes as, at the very least, a closeted homosexual? I thought it always added to Holmes' intensity that he could never really express himself in Victorian England (or was it Edwardian by then?) and his sublimated sexuality lent energy to his persuit of Moriarty.

Watson, on the other hand, has never been portrayed as even remotely gay to my knowledge, so the project seems a bit off.

[lamaros]

Not that I need Holmes to be an 'active homosexual', but aren't there various interpretations of Holmes as, at the very least, a closeted homosexual? I thought it always added to Holmes' intensity that he could never really express himself in Victorian England (or was it Edwardian by then?) and his sublimated sexuality lent energy to his persuit of Moriarty.

Watson, on the other hand, has never been portrayed as even remotely gay to my knowledge, so the project seems a bit off.

Except that the project almost certainly isn't gay, and is just what Righ said above, with Tri obediently propagating.

[Paelos]

Marketing is fun.

[Engels]

Except that the project almost certainly isn't gay, and is just what Righ said above, with Tri obediently propagating.

Wasn't really talking about this project specifically. I was more addressing Tri's outrage at a Holmes being portrayed as gay 'for shock value'.

RDJ is probably hamming it up to get Fox News air time but would it be so terrible to have a Holmes that does let his hair down?

[lamaros]

Except that the project almost certainly isn't gay, and is just what Righ said above, with Tri obediently propagating.

Wasn't really talking about this project specifically. I was more addressing Tri's outrage at a Holmes being portrayed as gay 'for shock value'.

RDJ is probably hamming it up to get Fox News air time but would it be so terrible to have a Holmes that does let his hair down?

It would probably tend towards the childish fanfic for me, especially if it included Watson, because I can't see how Holmes being explicitly gay either:

A: Relates to Holmes as he is in the books.

or

B: Develops anything interesting about Holmes, the series of books, sexual identity, etc.

Holmes is plenty interesting enough with his obsessive behaviour, drug addictions, arrogant arsehole attitude and so forth without having to make him explicitly homosexual. I would tend to think that those taking it in that direction would be making less of him, not more.

It could probably be done well and interestingly, but I don't think it would.

[K9]

I swear gay stopped being 'edgy' a while ago.

[Hawkbit]

Fox News edges closer to http://www.landoverbaptist.org/

[K9]

That site has to be a troll...

[IainC]

That site has to be a troll...

It is mostly a pastiche of sites like the Westboro Baptist Church. I won't link to their own sites as they don't deserve the hits but here's a work safe demonstration of the crazy.

[tazelbain]

No different than Hamlet making out with his mother.  I can see Holmes as gay.  As long as they the keep it Fraiser-level gay, I wouldn't mind watching.

[Khaldun]

I don't care in the least, in the abstract sense, if men in movies make out.  Depending on the movie, it may add to or detract from overall quality.

What I do care about is turning a character gay that was never, ever portrayed that way merely for shock value.  I love the Holmes stories (my edition of the stories, printed exactly as they appeared  in the Strand Magazine, is my favorite and most precious book), and if he had started out gay in them, fine.  But don't change things just to be edgy and 2009.  

Holmes isn't a bare-chested action hero in the stories, either. Which it appears he'll be in the film. But god forbid an old cultural property get reinterpreted. You probably hate The Seven-Percent Solution as well? There's plenty in there that's not in the original stories, but it's a brilliant take on Holmes nevertheless.

Among the clever things in that reinterpretation is some thinking about Holmes' sexuality. Which in the original stories is pretty non-existent: he's palpably uninterested in women. If I had to pick a 19th-early 20th Cent. pop culture icon that someone could make a reasonable argument was closeted or had had some kind of sexual relationship with a man, Holmes would be pretty high on the list.

[UnSub]

Fraiser-level gay

Guy Richie is directing. Haven't seen all his films, but the ones I have I can't think of a gay character in them.

But it is RDJ. He can play any role he damn well wants.

[Salamok]

Isn't Holmes the deifinitive asexual and despite Watson's obvious mancrush on him isn't Watson interested in the ladies?

[Khaldun]

Watson is married at some point in the original stories, though the details are kind of fuzzy and contradictory: Doyle wasn't terribly interested in continuity. (Holmes is in some respects the original serial pulp/comic book character, complete with 'if you don't see the body, he's not really dead' comeback.)

Holmes' asexuality arguably is of a piece with Doyle's portrayal of him as intellectual, ascetic, obsessive. But some of the details of the Doyle stories look pretty different from a contemporary perspective, such as (most prominently) Holmes' cocaine use, which is a central part of The Seven-Percent Solution. Cocaine was a pretty new thing at that point, and thought by many to be pretty innocuous: Doyle probably had no intent to suggest Holmes was an addict.

For the same reason, it's perfectly plausible to look at Holmes' "asexuality" and think about it a bit. For one, quite a few prominent Victorian and Edwardian men in the US and UK had sex of some kind with other men without being what we'd think of as gay: it was a pretty common thing in elite boarding schools, the military, ship crews, etc. But men who retained a preference for other men outside of those contexts were generally really deeply closeted, Oscar Wilde notwithstanding (and demonstrating why men who were did stay closeted). You're never going to find an explicitly gay popular culture figure in late 19th C. British fiction for that reason. If you compare Holmes with an overtly heterosexual pop cultural figure like Tarzan, who comes along a bit later, his "asexuality" looks pretty distinctive.

[NiX]

Drug abuse? Obsessed? I think I need to pick up some Holmes books. Sounds pretty awesome.

Also, I'm so Canadian that the minute I saw "holmes" I thought of...

[Khaldun]

A pretty good essay on Holmes' cocaine use: http://www.bakerstreetdozen.com/coca.html

[Murgos]

Holmes's complete lack of interest in Women, even when in the context of the story they are described as everything an enlightened 19th century Englishman would want and are throwing themselves at him (in a reserved Victorian way of course) had led to speculation that Holmes was gay a LONG time ago.

I'm pretty sure I had this conversation in an English Lit class 15 years ago.

[Paelos]

Are we trying to out a fictional character? I'm just making sure.

[Lantyssa]

1. At no point did RDJ or Law say it had anything to do with homosexuality.

2.

Who is going to want to see Downey Jr. and Law make out? I don't think it would be appealing to women. Straight men don't want to see it."

I don't know of ANY straight men, women, gays, etc that WOULDN'T want to see that. It's fucking Jude Law and RDJ. It might not be HOT to half of them but it's certainly not going to turn away anyone. And it's DEFINITELY not going to lower the box office draw by 2/3rds. Rather, it'll probably raise it by at least that much. People are retarded.

It's RDJ playing with words, I agree.

FOX has obviously never been to the manga section of a bookstore.  Straight women are fucking crazy about Yaoi.  As much as men are about lesbian lovers that want to do them.  Maybe moreso.

Make one of the participants Robert Downey, Jr.?  Oh yeah.  I think even I wouldn't mind seeing RDJ in this non-existant scene.  The dude is hot and an amazing actor.  He'd make it something I want to see.  I think it'd be something my mom would want to see.

[HaemishM]

Tri, you've made some posts that make me scratch my head at times, but this one is just blindingly stupid. Not only do you link to the bastion of journalistic hackery, you actually follow the tortured line of anti-logic your original link posited to its fullest conclusion at the corner of Retard and Moron?

[Lakov_Sanite]

Some points

1. RDJ was fucking around with words, this is clear.
2. If it were true and there were actual gay undertones I believe it would indeed put off more people than attract.
3. Fox is a bunch of hacks.
4. Sherlock Holmes could have been gay and Spongebob could be into BDSM but you know what? It's never addressed in the fiction so it doesn't matter.