The De-gaying of Zach
Michael Jensen and Brian Juergens over at AfterElton.com have a couple of articles discussing the sexuality of Claire’s sidekick Zach. I had originally thought that Zach was an outsider that was crushing hard on Claire, but as of the Episode ‘Homecoming’, it was pretty evident that he was being written as gay. It seems that the creators of the show disagreed despite the characters obvious homosexuality. From the article:
A few things are clear, and can be backed up by evidence from interviews with the show’s creators and in the show’s official publicity materials: Zach was conceived as a gay character, he was developed as a gay character, and as of the November 20th “Homecoming? episode, he was a gay character. And yet a decision was made by someone – be it studio execs, talent management, or otherwise – to “straighten him out?.
Jensen’s article seems to have gotten the attention of Heroes creator Tim Kring. Kring responded to Jensen’s article in this email and follow on story by Juergens:
I am very sorry this has caused concern for the readers of your website. It was certainly not our intention to confuse the issue of Zach’s character being gay.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out and whether or not it will be addressed in the next few episodes. Read the rest of Krings response here.
December 14th, 2006 at 12:55 pm
Their article is interesting and raises some good questions. But what if it was just simply story evolution. What if they saw a stronger story in a potential relationship, or crush on Claire? I agree that the show kept throwing the “gay” theme in Zach’s direction, but it could also have been the tired old cliche of “different” that you see in so many super hero works. He could have been used simply as a foil to get shove that point in everyone’s face. Just because someone calls you gay and that you don’t mind being called gay doesn’t mean you are gay. I don’t read much about the show outside of what happens in each episode so I can’t comment on the creators promoting the character as gay outside the show. But it’s well within their rights to change their mind, several characters have changed since the beginning and some of them were slated to be killed. Stories and characters evolve. That’s what happens with serialized fiction. I don’t care if Zach is gay or straight, more power to him either way, but I don’t guess it matters since he’s leaving the show anyway.
December 20th, 2006 at 3:46 am
I don’t know if you mentioned this before, Keith…there were some myspace pages set up for Claire and Zach, and Zach’s page had something to the effect of “Sexuality: Uncertain.” I was pretty amused by that at the time. I thought it was probable that Zach was gay, but the fact that they left it unclear actually kind of impressed me.
I totally agree with you, chrispian. Just because you get called gay doesn’t mean you are. And just because you used to identify as gay or straight doesn’t mean you can’t shift one way or another. This reminds me of Willow’s gay conversion on Buffy The Vampire Slayer…her hetero relationship with Oz was genuine, but later she decided that she identified as gay.
I just hope the decision to “straighten him out” was made as a story decision by the writers and not as a marketing decision by the suits. There have been rumblings about making the show more family-friendly, after all…maybe they decided that sexual ambiguity had to be cut along with sticking your hand in garbage disposals.
December 20th, 2006 at 11:10 am
Here’s an interesting bit on the Zach situation…apparently his people weren’t too thrilled about the “gay” direction of his character. Maybe that’s why his memory was erased…so he can be moved to the background as a minor character. It will be interesting to see how they resolve this.
http://www.tvguide.com/News-Views/Columnists/Ask-Ausiello/default.aspx?posting={C0A6A661-5EA8-4F30-BF05-CE9C2F22CAB3}