Recurrence, Remediation and Metatextuality in Queer As Folk

Abstract

This article examines how recurrence functions diegetically within the series Queer As Folk (Showtime, 2000-2005), and how variations on the same event – the gay-bashing of Justin – are deliberately woven into the narrative. As a charged element within the soap opera framework of the series and within its political discourse, the bashing is reprised in a series of inset remediations (comics, theatrical show, storyboard to a Hollywood film, short sequences of animated film). This intermediality can be read as a form of hypertext and of multiplatform storytelling, as well as the series’ metatextual image for itself. I will argue that remediation allows the series to articulate subversive messages, both in highlighting the queer subtext in established mainstream popular culture genres (comics, action hero films) and in highlighting the series’ own singular achievement, beyond the creation of an “out” gay comics hero: the queering of soap itself.

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