Welcome to #TransTuesday! Through all of 2022 I tracked every movie and tv show I watched to bring you TILLY’S 2022 TRANS REP IN MEDIA! We’re going to talk about where trans people appeared or were discussed, and under what context, and see if we can find some conclusions!
Before we dig in, a couple caveats. This isn’t going to cover all movies and tv shows that were released in 2022. I am but one woman, I cannot possibly watch everything that comes out.
Further, so much new stuff is released so frequently, we don’t always hear about it right away or aren’t always able to get to it quickly. So this list includes things I SAW this year, even if they might have been released a year or two ago.
I’m going to include the titles of everything we watched, and how many trans/non-binary/gender non-conforming people appeared in them. And I’m going to include titles even when NO trans people appeared, because you need to see just how prevalent that is.
Also a warning: there will be discussion of transphobic stories and jokes, and I know that not everyone is in a place where they can hear about that. If that would make you uncomfortable, you may want to skip this installment.
I tried my best to catch all the trans people but may have missed some, because not every trans person knows every other trans person. And also because sometimes it’s not mentioned that a character is trans at all.
And that’s something I’m really torn on. Because you shouldn’t HAVE to mention a character is trans if you’re not telling an explicitly trans story, right? We’re so much more than just our transness.
But that only works if we live in an ideal society where trans people show up in media all the time. And that is sadly very much not the world we live in. If you don’t mention a character is trans in a visible, clear way… people will miss it.
And the problem with that is when our representation is so few and far between, when it does happen (and is good representation and not bad), the trans people watching need to know. AND SO DO THE CIS PEOPLE WATCHING.
If you need a refresher on the perils of BAD REPRESENTATION and the harm it can do.
And if you need a refresher on the importance of GOOD REPRESENTATION and the joy it can bring.
Please note whether or not a trans person appeared in something is not intended as an arbiter of quality. I really liked and even loved many things that had zero trans people in them. But it’s also difficult to love something and then wonder why there was no place in it for you.
Okay, let’s dive in. Movies first.
The Batman – 0
Bros – 3
Played by: Miss Lawrence, Ts Madison, Eve Lindley. Great rep, discussed in dialogue, varied personalities. Very well done.
Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness – 0
Encanto – 0
Enola Holmes – 0
Eternals – 0
Everything Everywhere All at Once – 0
Finding Ohana – 0
Free Guy – 0
Glass Onion – 0
Lightyear- 0
No Time to Die – 0
Prey – 0
The Princess – 0
Red Notice – 0
A Shadow in the Cloud – 0
Sorry to Bother You – 0
Spirited – 0
Thor Love and Thunder – 0
There’s a somewhat stealth transphobic joke in here, where Astrid says he wants to be called Axl and Thor says he’ll call him what his father named him. I don’t think that it was INTENDED as a dig at trans people.
But it definitely reads as “we only accept what your parents named you.” And THAT definitely reads as transphobic. A small thing, sure, not really worth getting upset about. But indicative of the culture.
Turning Red – 0
Wendell and Wild – 1
A trans boy played by Sam Zelaya. I’m very conflicted on this one. On the one hand, trans boys and men seem to get even less representation than trans women and non-binary folks do, and the character of Raul is developed and well-rounded and really great.
And you do find out he’s trans in the story! BUT you find that out by him getting deadnamed on screen, and misgendered when someone’s talking to his mom on the phone. And these things definitely really happen to us!
But this wasn’t a story about Raul being trans, it wasn’t even Raul’s story. And so to reveal his transness in that way seems like it’s making his existence revolve around the trauma he experiences at the hands of cis people, and that doesn’t sit right.
There’s also the issue that Raul seemingly came out and transitioned while attending an all-girls school, and nobody once mentions that as he is a boy, he does not belong at that school because *he is not a girl*.
As it is, it feels like it never occurred to the filmmakers that a trans boy wouldn’t want to be at a girls’ school, and the fact that all his classmates and teachers don’t talk about this tacitly implies that they think he BELONGS there, or they feel he isn’t really a boy.
He’s a great character and I hope a lot of trans boys felt seen by him. I just think he could have been handled with a little more nuance to avoid those sorts of implications. You definitely don’t want young trans boys thinking all cis adults think they belong with the girls.
The Woman King – 0
That’s it for new(ish) movies we saw, and the totals aren’t great. In fact if you removed Bros the numbers would be truly abysmal. There’s a larger point to be made about stuff made FOR queer people, but we’ll get there in a bit. Okay, let’s move on to television!
I’m only including things we saw an entire season of. Shows we’re watching that are still only part way through their seasons are not included, because until the season’s over I obviously have no way to know how many trans people appeared.
Abbot Elementary s1 – 0
Andor s1 – 0
Arcane s1 – 0
Barry s3 – 0
Book of Boba Fett s1 – 0
Cobra Kai s4 – 0
Trans people were mentioned… in two jokes. Thankfully not at our expense, but to show how out of touch Johnny Lawrence is.
Cobra Kai s5 – 0
Dragon Age Absolution – 0
The Expanse s6 – 1
Sanjrani is non-binary, but that’s not mentioned in dialogue (other than “them” pronouns used by others when they are not around). I only caught this because we did an entire Expanse series rewatch this past December and noticed it the second time through!
The first time through I had NO IDEA the character was non-binary, BECAUSE IT WAS NEVER SAID OUT LOUD. And if the audience doesn’t know that character is non-binary, how can it count as representation? This is part of what I was talking about before.
Flash s8 – 0
The Flight Attendant s1 – 0
The Flight Attendant s2 – 1*
There’s a caveat on this one. Non-binary actor Mae Martin plays Grace, but Grace is a woman and referred to as “she.” So this one falls under rep for trans/non-binary actors, but NOT for trans/non-binary characters. Grace was seemingly presented as a cis woman.
I want to take a moment to note this is FINE and GOOD. Trans and non-binary actors CAN and SHOULD get roles like this! But if the character’s gender isn’t stated to match the actor’s, then I think that’s only sort of half representing us in the story, if that makes sense.
For All Mankind s3 – 0
Foundation s1 – 0
From s1 – 0
Gentleman Jack s1 – 0*
Gentleman Jack s2 – 0*
Okay this one’s really complicated, as gender can sometimes be. The main character is a real woman from history, Anne Lister, played by Suranne Jones. Suranne Jones is a cis woman. Anne Lister was… well she was a woman who loved women. And she did not like men.
And did not want to be associated with them. But she also bucked the trends of what was considered acceptable “womanhood” and had no need for most things associated with femininity.
I’ve not had the time to go through and read the actual Anne Lister’s diaries the show was based on, so I’m not qualified to say if she might have been trans or non-binary, even though she likely fell somewhere under the “gender non-conforming” umbrella.
As the show itself portrays Anne as a cis woman, and she’s played by a cis woman, I don’t think we can count this one as anything other than a cis woman. BUT it’s like a… gender-curious cis woman, maybe?
For more information on how Trans People Have Always Existed, and why it can be difficult to spot us in accounts of the past, see the trans tuesday on TRANS HISTORY 1.
I Am Groot – 0
These were just like five minute shorts, and yet… in Groot Takes a Bath, at one point he sprouts lots of leaves and makes different looks with them, one of which is a dress. The dress makes him VERY HAPPY…. and then he gets attacked by a bird.
In none of the different looks he made was he attacked, but the moment he makes a look that doesn’t conform to his presumed male gender, he’s punished for it. I mean GROOT IS A TREE PERSON and yet is gendered? It’s odd.
I also doubt this was consciously intended to be an anti-trans statement, but boys and men getting made fun of when they do anything remotely feminine is a HUGE trope in our entertainment and is an implicit bias woven into all of us.
A League of Their Own s1 – 1*
Lea Robinson is non-binary, and plays the non-binary Uncle Bert. This one is GREAT because it’s clear about who Bert is, and it also deals with what it was like to exist as a Black trans person in the 40s…
But it’s not all about the trauma inflicted on us by cis people. While that is present (and would have felt disingenuous were it not, given the show’s tone and setting), the show also makes it a point to show Bert’s trans JOY.
The show all around celebrates queer people and queer joy, which is really great. But this one gets an asterisk for the character of Max. Max is played by a cis woman and is portrayed as one, but part of the show is Max’s queer awakening.
At one point she says she feels like she’s “in the middle,” but it’s not clear whether this is in reference to gender or sexuality or both. So Max MIGHT be non-binary, but there’s not enough information to conclusively say.
I did a Trans Tuesday about this show, and specifically how it brought out the IMPLICIT QUEERPHOBIA in some cisgender heterosexual folks.
Legends of Tomorrow s7 – 0
Loot s1 – 1
Michaela Jaé Rodriguez plays the head of a charity foundation. The character is great and well-rounded and fabulous… and is never once mentioned as trans. In fact, I have a friend who said he was watching the show and looked up the cast and that’s how he found out.
And this is why I say again it’s so important to work in somewhere that we’re trans… I mean it could be as simple as having a small trans pride flag on her desk or something. Because how many people who watch the show are going to research the cast? Very few.
And if you don’t know someone is trans without researching them, that’s not really representation IN THE SHOW, right? Trans people watching might not realize they’re actually getting to see themselves in this story.
And cis people watching aren’t getting that representation either. They’re not getting to see us be just normal people in society, like someone who runs a charity. And that’s so, so important for normalizing our existence to so many people who don’t yet know any out trans people.
It also makes you wonder if the character is trans or not. Maybe she was playing a cis woman. That’s what cis people are going to assume if you don’t give them a reason not to, because many cis people still see cis as the default.
Anyway, this is a great trans role and great trans representation… if the character were mentioned as being trans somewhere, it’d be perfect. I hope they rectify that in season two.
Los Espookys s2 – 2
Two non-binary supporting cast members, Sebastian Ayala and Spike Einbinder. The former plays Oliver Twix, who I ADORE, but I’m not sure if any gender or pronouns are ever used to refer to them.
The latter plays Water Spirit, who is… a water spirit, who’s mostly non-vocal and only begins to learn to talk toward the end of the second season. I don’t believe either are mentioned as being non-binary, but they’re also not mentioned as being cis.
So it’s a little murky, again because without giving voice to it or putting it on screen visually we can’t know for sure. But it’s NB actors getting seemingly NB roles, and that’s great.
Love Death + Robots s3 – 0
Midnight Mass – 0
Moon Knight s1 – 0
Ms. Marvel s1 – 0
Murderville s1 – 0
Never Have I Ever s2 – 1
Alexndra Billings appears in a small recurring role as a guidance counselor, but she is never mentioned as being trans in dialogue or on screen. Again great to show us in jobs like this, but need to work in that she’s trans.
Never Have I Ever s3 – 1
Terry Hu appears in a small recurring role as a non-binary teen. They’re not mentioned as non-binary in dialogue I don’t think, but “them” pronouns are used.
But also in season three there’s a misgendering joke. Devi, a cis teen girl played by a cis actress, answers the door in a blue hoodie with the hood up, and the delivery man says “Sorry little boy, I have the wrong house.”
Which again seems innocuous, right? But when you think about why that’s supposed to be funny… it’s because this cis man thought a cis girl was a cis boy because she had on a gender-neutral hoodie in what society says is a “boy” color.
So she’s literally just getting misgendered, which happens to trans people a lot and is very painful, and here it’s supposed to be funny. Again, I do not believe this was a dig at trans people.
But it IS another case of the implicit biases of society saying anyone who doesn’t conform to rigid gender roles is “other” and therefore bizarre and worthy of ridicule. And for people who actually get misgendered, it’s not a fun moment to watch.
Obi-Wan Kenobi s1 – 0
Only Murders in the Building s2 – 0
One joke from a teen about an old man “messing up when I inevitably change my pronouns,” which makes it seem like it’s something every teen does on a whim? It kind of undermines how important it actually is when a trans person comes out and needs to change those.
Our Flag Means Death s1 – 1
Vico Ortiz plays the non-binary Jim, and it’s perfectly done.
Paper Girls s1 – 0
This one had no real trans representation, but in a weird confluence of events ended up giving me something from my past that I never got to have. I did a whole Trans Tuesday on THE PAST 2: THE NEW PAST, and often having to find our own representation.
The Peripheral – 1
Alexandra Billings again appears in my favorite trans role I saw all year, the inimitable Inspector Lowbeer. I love her so very much but also… SHE IS NEVER MENTIONED AS TRANS. So how many people watching have no idea, despite how famous she is?
Queer as Folk – 3
One trans woman main character, Jesse James Keitel, and two NB main characters played by NB actors, Fin Argus and CG. This show gets all the rep right, and has the added bonus of Episode 6 kicking me right in the guts.
It was the most accurate trans woman experience on screen I’ve yet found, and even now just thinking about it gives me so many complicated feelings. I’ve never ever EVER felt more seen. Honestly I felt a little exposed, it hit that close to home in so many ways.
Just a brief note of caution on this, the show is very heavy and deals with a queer community coming together and healing after a shooting at a queer club. It took a long time to get through, not because it was bad, but it was just hard to see people like you going through that.
You never see the violence on screen, but the impact and ramifications of it are felt through the entire season. So just be prepared going in. It can be funny and biting, but it’s also sometimes completely devastating.
Raised By Wolves s1 – 0
Reservation Dogs s1 – 0
Cheese introduces himself with his pronouns multiple times, but he also seems to be “the woke one” and nobody really knows how to react to him. Not really used as a joke, it’s just how his character is.
Reservation Dogs s2 – 0
One “he/she/they” joke relating to pubic hair, a “man moon” running gag in ep 1 about Native men who got periods. It’s implied these are cis men, and not trans men, unless I somehow missed that. Which makes this a joke for cis people about how funny it would be for men to menstruate.
…which many trans men actually DO. So that’s not great. Cheese also calls the Creator he/she/they because he doesn’t know which pronouns to use, and Cheese still introduces himself with he/him pronouns…
But after one of those times it’s to have a joke about the guy he’s talking to confusing sexuality with gender. So the tally here is at zero representation, but there were at least three jokes about things related to transness.
Resident Alien s1 – 0
Resident Alien s2 – 0
In one episode the alien Harry, who can sometimes change shape, becomes a woman and it’s utilized very well to explain some of what women go through that men do not. But there’s no mention of trans people being a thing that exists.
And then a joke is made that Harry, in his human woman form, was going to have sex with a woman “with my penis.” But he was a WOMAN saying that, see? Ha ha isn’t that so funny a woman with a penis! Ludicrous and hilarious! This joke is actually very transphobic.
If not by intent, then by omission… the omission of remembering that trans people are living human beings that exist and for some of us what you’re laughing at is just the way we are, and are often attacked and made fun of for.
Resident Evil s1 – 0
Russian Doll s2 – 0
There’s one joke involving pronouns, at the expense of someone who thought it was “chic” to not label a baby with them… again treating pronouns as if they’re some cool fad and not something important to us getting the respect we deserve as humans.
Rutherford Falls s2 – 1
Jesse Leigh is non-binary and plays a non-binary character and they steal EVERY scene they’re in. An absolute highlight, wonderful representation.
Severance s1 – 0
This one kind of bugs me, because I LOVE the show… but when your entire PREMISE is “who would you be with no memory of who you were and no expectations to live up to,” to NOT delve into the inherent transness of that bothers me! Still fabulous though.
She-Hulk s1 – 0
There’s one joke where Jen, looking disheveled in the ladies’ room, gets told, “You’re better than him, or her, or they.” This one is a joke that acknowledges trans people, but it’s not at our expense or anyone else’s. Still, it’s us in a joke when we’re otherwise unrepresented.
Star Trek Discovery s4 – 2
Blu del Barrio is non-binary and plays a non-binary character, stated explicitly in dialogue. Fabulous representation.
Ian Alexander is trans and plays a trans man character, but it’s NOT stated explicitly in dialogue. They allude to it subtly and his character once refers to “my transition.” But he plays a Trill, an alien species. Some Trill have a little slug symbiont that lives inside them.
When the symbiont merges with the host, they become a new person that’s a meld of the host and symbiont. When the host dies, the symbiont goes to a new host. So in this instance, “my transition” is a little vague given the symbionts transition from host to host.
The rep is otherwise great across the board here, and having Ian Alexander’s character be Trill is a nod to all the “finding our own representation” that Star Trek fans had to do for decades with Trill main characters from Deep Space Nine, Jadzia and Ezri Dax.
Dax is still going to get an entire Trans Tuesday someday, the character was that important to me (and a whole lot of trans people), but that’s another post for another day.
Star Trek Lower Decks s3 – 0
Star Trek Picard s2 – 0
Star Trek Prodigy s1 – 1*
Zero is a sentient alien gas cloud (it’s Star Trek, you gotta roll with it) who uses they/them pronouns. Their non-binary-ness is discussed in dialogue.
But they’re played by Angus Imrie, who as far as I know is a cis man. Which is not ideal, as it can imply non-binary people aren’t really different from cis people, and also because non-binary actors don’t get enough chances to play non-binary roles.
He plays the part wonderfully, mind you. This isn’t a knock on his performance, I love Zero dearly. But it’s not giving any non-binary actor representation, even though we get non-binary character representation.
Star Trek Strange New Worlds s1 – 1
One non-binary guest star, Jesse James Keitel. I got SO excited because we still haven’t had a trans woman in Star Trek, and Trek is my absolute favorite and so near and dear to my heart. And I thought the moment was here at last!
But her character is very clearly non-binary. And a villain! Which is great! We can be villains too. But I’m still waiting for that elusive first trans woman character in Trek.
Stranger Things s4 – 0
Superman & Lois s2 – 0
Tales of the Jedi – 0
Upload s2 – 0
This is the saddest one, because there’s two jokes at our expense. One I think was intentional, and the other was maybe implicit.
So on the show people live in this digital world, and one of them gets a new digital baby. Someone says, “It’s a boy, right?” And the answer: “It appears to be, but of course that’s for them to decide.” And it’s not delivered earnestly, the moment is meant as a joke.
The whole “it appears to be” is incredibly wounding to me, as it implies what our genitalia looks like is what our gender SHOULD be, which leads you right to the very idea of trans people being a joke or wrong. Very uncool.
Later the lead character is talking to someone about these digital babies, and finds out in this digital world men can carry the digital baby. And there’s a poster with an image of a pregnant man which horrifies him.
I know some cis people are scratching their heads here, so let me remind you that SOME TRANS MEN CAN GET PREGNANT. It is a real thing that happens. And here, this joke, this entire SCENE is predicated on the concept that the very idea is worthy of mockery.
I think this one is implicit and not intentionally aimed at trans men, because this likely comes from a bunch of cis writers who have been conditioned by society to think only cis women can get pregnant and anything else is preposterous.
So it’s another joke of omission, by forgetting (or just never being consciously aware of) trans people’s existence. But both jokes come at our expense and are hurtful and transphobic.
Wellington Paranormal s3 – 0
Te Maero is a large hairy monster. The Maero are a supernatural people from New Zealand (in real life I mean, not the show), and I’m not overly familiar with them or the mythology around them and ways in which they may or may not intersect with gender.
But the one the characters encounter is played by a cis man with a deep voice, who says SHE is actually a woman and men of her species are so hairy and their voices are so low (as if neither of those applied to her, which they do).
This one feels wrapped up in all kinds of transphobia, again as if the idea of a hairy person with a deep voice being a woman is something to laugh at and not just the reality for some real humans who exist.
Wellington Paranormal s4 – 0
“The bogey man” is the ghost of a white golfer who made bogeys, and gets told he “should really say bogey person”. The intended laugh is that this man, calling himself a man, shouldn’t do that because it’s not being inclusive? It’s very weird. Feels like a dig at inclusivity.
In another episode O’Leary is playing Guess Who? with Satan (it’s a bonkers show) and Satan asks “are you a man or a woman?” and O’Leary answers, “I find that offensive.” O’Leary is very much a cis man played by a cis man. I’m not even sure why this is supposed to be funny.
BOTH of these jokes seem to come at the expense of trans people, and the belief that our existence is funny by default and is great to make jokes about.
Werewolf By Night – 0
Westworld s4 – 0
This entire season’s story was INCREDIBLY transy, but I don’t think it was intended to be that way.
What We Do in the Shadows s4 – 0
The Witcher s1 – 0
The Witcher s2 – 0
Yellowjackets s1 – 0
So what do we have? Across 22 movies and 62 seasons of television, I found:
22 trans people (two trans people showed up twice in different shows)
15 jokes ABOUT trans people
And a lot of that came from shows specifically made for queer people. Which is fine and great, but we need to appear in all media, not just stuff made explicitly for us. If you take out just Bros and Queer as Folk, which I suspect a lot of cishet people didn’t watch…
We’re down to 16 trans people, and 15 jokes ABOUT trans people. And not all 16 of those trans people play characters you know are trans, and you might not even know the actor is.
That’s DREADFUL. We should get to see ourselves as humans more than people making jokes about how our existence or anything relating to it is just so hilarious to cis people.
And also realize that of the queerest shows I listed, the ones that advertised “hey we’re for queer people!” – Queer as Folk and Gentleman Jack were canceled, and A League of Their Own has not yet been renewed as of early January 2023. That’s a LOT of lost queer representation.
Trans people are human beings, and our media needs to do MUCH better at trans representation. Art can change hearts and minds, and when all out war is being waged against our right to exist, we need it now more than ever.
Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com
ADDENDUM 1/18/2023
A kind person out there let me know that Patti Harrison is in an episode of She-Hulk. There’s no confirmation the character is trans, which is why I missed her entirely, and goes to show you how important actually letting the audience know someone’s not cis is.
Regardless, I’m glad to see more rep for trans actors (she played a bride who was getting married, I believe), if not necessarily trans characters, and I think this makes her the first trans person to show up in the entire MCU.
Which is great… until you add up how many movies and tv shows it took to get to this point. That’s a little depressing. Let’s hope it doesn’t take as long to see the next one.
ADDENDUM 1/26/2023
I’ve just learned Janelle Monae is non-binary! This means Glass Onion gets updated to 1* – non-binary actor rep is present, but the character(s) they play are 100% cisgender women.