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Transfem @lemmy.blahaj.zone
fadingembers @lemmy.blahaj.zone

Comfort shows without transphobic jokes?

I've been feeling down lately and I started re-watching futurama for some good nostalgia, but it keeps making transphobic jokes which is kind of just making me feel worse. Anyone have any suggestions for comfort shows to watch?

106 comments

  • To add what has already been mentioned: She-Ra and Steven Universe.

    • Steven, especially the first few seasons is super feel good low impact chill show.

      Gravity falls is also pretty great for this.

  • My ultimate comfort show is Star Trek: the Next Generation. If it's just me in the house and nothing good in my video queue that's what I'll turn on for noise.

  • My partner and I have been really enjoying Spy X Family. Its a nice little found family/comedy series with very wholesome content.

    The premise is that the titular Spy has an assignment to make contact with a total shut-in who only appears in public for events at his son's school. So the Spy adopts a child from a shady orphanage and meets a woman who is willing to fake being his wife to get his child into the elite school. Of course, the child he adopted can read minds and the woman he fake married is secretly an assassin. No one but the child knows the truth about everyone and they're each so focused on hiding their own secrets they don't catch on to the others. The series isn't complete yet, but so far the major theme is them coming to genuinely value their little family as more than a convenient facade.

    Its just such a cute show, and I go back and forth between cackling and tearing up at how cute they all are. The only thing I think is particularly off about the show is the assassins brother. He's a secret police officer and also incestuously obsessed with his sister. Its a weird inclusion, but he is made fun of by the narrative for his behavior and that is enough for me to still enjoy how good the rest of the show is

  • Dogs in Space

    Farscape

    She-ra and the Princesses of Power

    All are scifi, the top two are sillier and the bottom two are longer and get a bit serious and emotional at times.

    If you haven't seen Farscape and you like scifi space opera wackiness and Jim Henson puppets, seriously give it a go. It's very comforting and fun.

    • Farscape is a deep cut.

      Even Sillier than that is a British comedy called “Red Dwarf” and as far as I recall there is no transphobia. The closest I remember is an episode where the main character ends up in an alternate dimension with the female version of himself. They hit it off and the male main character of the series ends up pregnant, to his distress. At the time I remember it being a really interesting way to bring up gender dynamics without being too laboring, though it’s been a while, and I also haven’t seen the new seasons they apparently made after the show got cult status.

      Edit to add: a Reddit thread has this to say about Red Dwarf and being trans

      In series 8, Kryten is assigned to women's prison wing, just because he doesn't have a penis when he clearly resembles a male, sounds like a male and acts like a male. That's regardless of the fact that he has no chromosomes because he's an android (not even gynoid, so another good point). The show makes it out as ridiculous that the only reason why he's treated as female only because of his lack of penis.

      Also, in the episode DNA, it's shown that when he's turned into human male, he's still an android on the inside because he clearly feels discomfort from certain dysphoria, where he finds appliances sexually attractive and inability to adjust to human biology lacking robotic features.

      Edit to add to the edit, I forgot the ships on board computer actually does upgrade themselves to present female

    • Farscape is problematic as well.

      Humans! Are! Superior!

      I joke. But Farscape got me through more than one breakup. Very queer friendly. It didn't shy away from being fetish friendly as well. Rigel in a dominatrix suit still delights me. Described by one critic as, "One American's introduction to the Australian S&M scene."

      Since most of the effects were practical, they aged far better than my other faves, DS9 and Babylon 5.

      The Expanse is the best television I have ever seen and is extremely queer friendly. It's dark, but so was Farscape.

      • Eh I'd quite confidently say Farscape is far less problematic than any other show of it's era and a great many after it.

        And humans are not superior in that universe, they once believed they were and evolved into universally hated (but really hot) hyperfascists. Bringing them down was one of the biggest eventual arcs in the show and it wasn't done by Chriton being superior, he just had wormhole weapon tech in his head that he didn't want and believed nobody should have.

        Chriton is one of the most basic life forms in that part of the galaxy too, he's barely more sentient than food and it's mentioned almost once an episode. He gets by by the skin of his teeth and his only real skills are maths and making friends/pissing people off.
        (I do like that he also looks like a bit of a gormless idiot too, and testament to the writing and actor as he never comes across as an entitled white boy either.)

        Babylon 5 has held up better than DS9 in my opinion, like both are good but B5 is just very clearly much better. The Expanse is fantastic though I agree with you fully there.

        (Btw I'm not really arguing with you about anything here, I just wanted to rant about Farscape a little as I love it dearly.)

  • I've heard good comments about Orange is the new black, although I've never watched it.

    I just remembered The Last Of Us series came out, but I forgot to check it out.

    I rewatched Sailor Moon not too long ago, and it's pretty LGBTQ+ friendly for something out of the 90s.
    Whatever you do avoid the dic dub at all costs.
    The VIZ dub is pretty good, but the DIC dub is garbage.
    The originals can get repetitive at times.
    The reboot has better pacing with a less helpless main protagonist, but some of the story bits made more sense to me in the originals.

    YMMV

    • Holy shit. Orange is the new black is great and I like the show, but the biggest trigger warning in the world for trans femmes. There is some incredibly disturbing, and accurate depictions of trans hate crimes. :/

  • If you're of OG Futurama age, King of the Hill is pretty good about not being transphobic. I will always love Hank refusing to speak to Peggy's friend Caroline when she answered the phone in boy mode. No, he's looking for his wife's friend Caroline. Please don't try to confuse him with stories about who she used to be. He used to sell jeans, and only people close to him know that.

106 comments