Yahoo Movies How Wynonna Earp said no to stereotyping queer romance
Wynonna Earp spoilers ahead.
After five years of Purgatory and its rambunctious refusal to give the Earp sisters a break, audiences tuned in to witness the end of an era when Wynonna Earp aired its final episode this week. Despite palpable frustration over the show ending, there was a sweet fix to this bitter reality: a fabulously queer wedding for two of its most beloved characters.
Waverly Earp and Nicole Haught, fondly named WayHaught, is a pairing which hooked viewers from the beginning. Even before it was confirmed that these two would become an item, brief hints of queerness sent LGBTQ+ fans into overdrive.
However, despite the excitement, many were tentatively curious as to how the series would allow this romance to unfold. Although unfortunate, the sad truth is that the LGBTQ+ community has been stung time and again by pop culture’s over reliance on stereotyping queer romance.
Thankfully, from that first scene where Waverley stumbles over her words while Nicole charms her into a flustered state, fans were given an authentic queer experience. There was no dramatic reveal about either character’s sexuality, which considering that Waverly was in an opposite-sex relationship at the start, is yet another credit to its creators. Emily Andras’ show gave fans an organic starting point for a queer romance that’s helped challenge the norms of LGBTQ+ representation.
Its ability to do this comes from Andras’ understanding that bisexuality is a complex identity, one that isn’t confined by the rigidity of ignorance it’s normally met with. What's more, she recognised that to draw too much attention to sexuality only served to weaken the normality of queerness that the show wanted to achieve.
Instead of sounding a band every time something queer happened, the show handled these scenes with nuance and affection. But most of all, Wynonna Earp handled the growth and exploration of WayHaught with genuine appreciation for the characters and what they represented.
As a community, LGBTQ+ viewers needed this because what had come before was severely lacking. Most queer representation in the years that preceded Wynonna Earp firmly relied on portraying queer romance as disastrous, with a total of 25 queer women killed off in TV shows in 2016 alone. By allowing this trait to endure for decades prior, the industry has ensured that most queer couples on screen were directly linked to tragedy.
Just look at the most memorable queer relationships we'd seen in previous cult shows, such as Willow and Tara. Although the heady days of Buffy The Vampire Slayer’s girl power are gone, there’s no denying the impact this show had on bringing lesbian romance to the fore.
For a lot of fans, this was one of the first times they’d seen lesbian romance span more than a couple of episodes without ending in immediate death. Sadly however, Joss Whedon soon took care of the death aspect, using Tara’s murder to push Willow into becoming the unexpected villain. The way in which Whedon ensured that lesbianism equalled death has even been commented on by Amber Benson, the actress who played Tara.
If that sour note in popular '90s and '00s TV isn’t enough, there were smaller series like Hex doing much the same. Arguably the British equivalent to BTVS, this show again relied on queerness equalling despair to reach its LGBTQ+ audience.
This time however, Hex went one step further and made their lesbian character a ghost, therefore ensuring that a truly tragic romance would follow. Perhaps the creative decision to have Thelma as a ghostly sidekick was foreshadowing later events? By the time Hex was cancelled, it almost felt like its creators excused their reliance on queer stereotyping by hiding behind the show’s supernatural content.
All these markers peppered throughout popular shows have helped normalise the relationship between queerness and negativity. It’s gotten to the point where we’re almost in shock when a queer relationship survives, especially if it thrives.
Yet this is exactly what Wynonna Earp did, giving us a queer couple that faced turbulent times from a position of strength. At multiple points across all four series, the odds were lined up to hit WayHaught with one drama after another, yet they survived. Just look at some of the ways they could have killed this romance off: Waverly getting possessed by the Mitican, when the Widows nearly killed Nicole, or when Nicole sacrificed everything to save Waverly.
Rather than bringing WayHaught’s time to a deathly end, the show chose to fight for their queer characters as ardently as fans did. Even when it looked like the pair wouldn’t make it, when Nicole suffered 18 months alone and unsupported, she still relentlessly fought for both herself and for Waverly. Compare this to Hex’s portrayal of queer romance, which saw Thelma so obsessed with finally having a girlfriend in the afterlife that she willing left her girlfriend Maya under the thrall of Malichi.
These representations are worlds apart, yet the comparison helps highlight how Wynonna Earp never took the easy way out. Instead, the show chose to champion queer romance above all else.
Naturally, it wouldn’t have been a Wynonna Earp finale without some high-stakes mayhem, this time coming from Waverly’s haunted wedding dress. But what’s a wedding in Purgatory without a dress that’s desperate to kill everyone? Luckily, WayHaught was there to bring everyone together so that our favourite Purgatory residence could have a happy ending.
In one beautiful moment, the show rewarded fans for being a part of its journey. For the first time in a long time, we’ve been allowed to watch two queer women grow and mature on our screens, both as separate characters and as a couple. And even more importantly, we’ve been allowed to watch them succeed.
The closing scenes of Nicole’s name being added to the Homestead mailbox, alongside the "Everyone Welcome" sign, is a perfect descriptor of what this show gave its queer audience. It provided a safe, welcoming, and inclusive space. And above all else, it allowed queer love to take centre stage free from tragedy.
Wynonna Earp aired on Syfy UK.
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