Who here remembers She Ra? The character debuted back in 1985 as a part of the Masters Of The Universe series in order to appeal to young girls in the same way He-Man appealed to young boys, but the character hasn't been seen since 1987. Now, in 2018, She-Ra has not only made a comeback, but she's made an inclusive step in the right direction for all youth-aimed television.
Netflix rebooted the character in 2018 in the series She-Ra And The Princesses Of Power.
Season 1 Trailer | DREAMWORKS SHE-RA AND THE PRINCESSES OF POWERyoutu.be
Growing up as a part of the LGBTQ+ community, you felt the struggle in watching all of the characters you loved play out their extremely heteronormative personal plotlines, and knew it wasn't you being represented on screen. And then, when we began to see ourselves, often our characters would die. But decades later things are starting to change, because of the fight of a million writers and artists.
"It's something that various people have fought really hard to include in their stories, with various levels of success," Noelle Stevenson, an executive producer of the series, says. "Sometimes people get a hard no and they can't do the story that they want to do, so they do what they can to get around that."
But the characters Netossa and Spineralla are two queer women in a relationship with each other, who were introduced very early on in the series.
"As a gay woman, it's something I think is really important to feature in kids animation," Stevenson continued. "Just to show the richness of experience in the world and the different ways that characters can love each other. It's something that I hope is just a very natural and a very inherent part of the show."
If you listen closely, you'll also hear references to a character with two dads, as well as several background characters who are queer, including one pair drawn to resemble Stevenson and her partner.
The conversations starting from the reboot are important, as She-Ra was once seen only in relation to He-Man.
By taking him out of the picture, we get a clear visual of just how bad*ss women and female-driven stories can really be.
It gives our queer hearts hope.
Keep the queer coming forever and ever and ever.
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