Charlie and Gilda

This entry documents characters of gender and sexual diversity, and its portrayal on Supernatural.

Charlie Bradbury a lesbian geek girl who becomes a hunter, is the only queer character to appear in multiple episodes, along with Crowley whose sexuality is probably best described as "complicated." God aka Chuck Shurley was revealed to be bisexual (or possibly pansexual) in 11.20 Don't Call Me Shurley -- "I dated. Yeah, I had some girlfriends. Had a few boyfriends."

There have been, to date, no transgender or non-binary characters. Both angels and demons have been seen to switch between vessels of different gendered appearance, although it is often not known by which gender a vessel's owner identified. For example both of Raphael's vessels may have identified as female, or nonbinary. The intent of the writers appears to be to show angels and demons possessing vessels of different genders, although this does involve a rather binary and cis view of gender. In scenes where angels are in vessels of different gender than their original vessels, the show generally doesn't clarify the pronouns to be used. In 6.22 The Man Who Knew Too Much, Crowley expresses this confusion in regards to Raphael who is currently in a female vessel. Raphael doesn't clarify the issue, but later says "your own brother" while pleading for their life with the Purgatory-souls powered Castiel. In 14.09 The Spear, despite being in a female vessel, the Apocalypse World Michael is referred to exclusively as male. Similarly, despite having several female meatsuits, the crossroads demon Jael is specifically called "he" during 12.06 Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox. In 12.10 Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets, Dean is shocked to learn that the angel Benjamin, despite his masculine name, is in a female vessel. Castiel tells Dean that "Benjamin is an angel. His vessel is a woman."

The show has been nominated three times for GLAAD Media Awards, which are awarded by the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) to "recognize and honor media for their fair, accurate and inclusive representations of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community and the issues that affect their lives." The nominated episodes have been 3.13 Ghostfacers, 5.09 The Real Ghostbusters, and 8.11 LARP and the Real Girl

Queer sexuality has been positively portrayed on the show. Queer characters have storylines in which their sexuality is not the sole focus, and they appear as diverse in their background and roles. The revelation of a character's sexuality is always well-received by the Winchesters. In Castiel's brief stint as a deity he stated that he is "utterly indifferent to sexual orientation" and it is also revealed in 8.23 Sacrifice that Heaven has cupids bring people of the same sex together. In 10.22 The Prisoner, while talking to Eldon Styne, Dean suggests that Eldon's enhancements could used to impress "the ladies or the fellas" and states "I don't judge." After meeting Charlie Bradbury and learning that she is a lesbian in 7.20 The Girl with the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo, Dean shows no reaction to her coming out besides being able to talk Charlie through flirting with a male security guard to Sam's great amusement. In subsequent episodes, Sam and Dean only ever react positively to Charlie's open queerness, though given the number of oblivious male admirers she had in 8.11 LARP and the Real Girl, Charlie didn't appear to broadcast her sexuality despite being out and proud. When Dean told her Apocalypse World counterpart that he knew his Charlie well enough to know that she was a lesbian, the alternate Charlie took it as a sign that Dean really did know her, sharing an identical sexuality.

Over the seasons, Sam and Dean have often been mistaken for a gay couple to which they react with equanimity (and some confusion on Dean's part, though Dean has been known to play along, knowing it will annoy Sam). For a list of these occurenacens see They're Brothers. A number of characters have made jokes about both Dean and Sam being Castiel's "boyfriend." The brothers famously discovered that fans write Slash about them, and Dean later learned that fans write about him and Castiel being a couple (for more on that see Wincest and Destiel).

The show has generally not used slurs related to sexuality or trans status, except for the following examples:

In 3.05 Bedtime Stories, referring to Sam's knowledge of fairy tales, Dean says "Dude, could you be any more gay?"

In 8.23 Sacrifice when Castiel and Metatron are trying to track a woman who a man is about to fall in love with so they can steal a cupid's arrow, Castiel reports back to Dean and says, "there was one female, but... I don't think she was female." Since we do not see the interaction, the line can be considered debatable as Castiel could have come across a cross dresser.

In 11.15 Beyond the Mat, the crossroads demon Duke says, "Well it's kinda every demon for him/her/zhimself." Zhim is a gender neutral pronoun. On the episode it does sound like "shim", and does appear as such in the closed captions. That word is a slur used against trans and gender diverse people. However this tweet from writer John Bring clarifies that intent was for it to be a gender-neutral pronoun.

In 2010, on the night 6.09 Clap Your Hands If You Believe... aired, #FightTheFairies trended on Twitter. Some people on Twitter thought the hashtag was a homophobic slur. Ben Edlund, who wrote the episode, mentioned the incident at Paleyfest in March 2011. Here is video of Ben talking about "Fight the Fairies."

In 2015, Charlie's death caused widespread controversy in fandom as an example of the tropes of "Bury Your Gays" (where queer characters are killed at a disproportionate rate to their representation) and Women in Refrigerators (where women characters are killed solely to advance a male character's story). See links below for further discussion of these tropes, especially in relation to a number of character deaths on TV in 2016.

Fandom of course loves to queer a text up and play with gender in our own creations, especially through Slash and also more generally through shipping. Some fans see Dean as coded as bisexual in the show's text. Many Destiel fans argue that the show's failure to have a same-sex relationship between Dean and Castiel is indicative of the paucity of representation of non-heterosexual relationships on television, and accuse the show of queer-baiting. This term refers to the concept that a TV show may intentionally imply a homoerotic tension between two characters with no intention of it being realized, purely to attract or satisfy viewers, particularly queer ones.

Queer actors

Thunderbird Dinwiddie, who played Pamela Barnes, is bisexual

Hugo Ateo, who played Cesar Cuevas, in 11.19 The Chitters is gay.

DJ Qualls, who played Garth Fitzgerald IV, came out as gay in January 2020. He made the announcement when he joined former Legit co-star comedian Jim Jeffries on stage during a gig in San Diego on January 10. He later tweeted: "It is 11:20pm. I just came out on stage at a @jimjefferies show in San Diego. Yep, I'm gay. Been gay this whole time. Tired of worrying about what people would think of me. Tired of worrying about what it would do to my career." He got lots of tweets of support from fandom and the SPN cast.

Trivia

On the site Television Without Pity, which was a major base for early Supernatural fandom, the graphic for the show pages and forum was a dragon called Raoul. He became known as the “Big Gay Dragon” or the “Big Gay Supernatural Dragon.”



