A metropolitan bubble? Photograph: BBC
So there's a gay on the Square. Christian, Jane's estranged brother, like so much human flotsam and jetsam before him, has washed up in Walford. Notwithstanding the clumsiness of his introduction - over a dinner with Ian and Jane during which he behaved so monstrously the pair would have got up and left - his appearance in E20 is to be welcomed. There hasn't been an 'omosexual in EastEnders since Naomi briefly turned Sonia sapphic. And Naomi wasn't so much a character as a plot device charged with shaking up Sonia and Martin's relationship - so often the fate of a soap's lone gay character before they're packed off to Manchester/Scotland/Holby City.
Christian, on the other hand, appears to actually resemble a real character, even if painted in only the broadest strokes. (The believability of Jane taking him in is somewhat questionable but that's another discussion. Suffice to say, Christian is here to stay.) He is good news, because he brings EastEnders a step closer to more accurately resembling London (see also the Muslim Masood family).
More significantly, Christian is a) obnoxious as opposed to happy/harmless and eager to befriend all and b) in possession of a sex drive. Not for EastEnders the desexualised gay man usually resident in Soapland: on Friday he was leching after Steven in the café. This was a far more believable scenario than him bouncing in like a loveable Tigger bantering with soap matrons. So while our fingers remain crossed that Steven isn't the character Christian has been introduced to "turn" - indeed let's hope he hasn't been introduced to turn anyone - it is refreshing that he has an edge.
But I would say that, I suppose. I live in a metropolitan bubble where gay people mostly live happily - or at least in misery of their own making rather than inflicted on them by others. How will the vile, queeny Christian go down beyond said bubble? Does his behaviour simply reaffirm prejudices about gay men being predatory?
I dare say there will be complaints when Christian's one-night-stands start rocking up in the Beale house - not least from Ian, the designated character whose tolerance is surely to be tested - and these may have some merit. When Roxy boasted on Christmas Day that she could barely walk after a night of passion, it was unnecessarily coarse - and what's bad for the gander is bad for the goose. EastEnders doesn't, and shouldn't, give us blow-by-blow accounts of characters' sex lives so why should it do so with a gay man? Are gay men so defined by their sexuality that either they have to be voracious man-eaters or else chaste, confirmed bachelors?
We'll see what the future in Walford holds for Christian. But I wonder: is EastEnders' audience ready for a more realistic depiction of a gay man?
