Internet-distributed television has taken over visual audiovisual and presents audiences with progressive and evolving aesthetics. New audiovisual platforms, like Netflix, HBO and amazon prime have facilitated new aesthetics and representational practices in relation to sexuality, gender, and gender identity. as there are now “more spaces for the expression of diversity than had previously been the case, during the network television era”, and have we “passed an age of ‘difficult men’ to a much more diverse set of difficulties traversing multiple, ethnic, gender and sexual identities”.

I’m going to use the drama series ‘Euphoria’ as a media example which portrays the development of audio-visual aesthetics. The drama series highlights how digital audiovisual aesthetics have transformed, perhaps along with society’s values, as the show deals with multiple forms of diversity, intersectionality, also teenage drug use, and queer and transgender issues. Euphoria explores many topics which have been considered taboo for decades, and thus shows progression within the world of television. Undoubtedly There is a link between the new affordances of digital, internet-distributed platforms and more transgressive and minority group content on television.

However, we must remember that “media acts as a staging ground for the types of lives that are permitted to become real and shape reality in turn, thus representing trans is a crucial debate that includes concerns about who can speak for trans people and how trans lives should be represented.” For instance, in Euphoria the main character Rue is portrayed to be unreliable and unpredictable, is this a connotation of homosexuality? We must consider that “for the longest time trans representation were closely tied to narrow and problematic depictions of gender non-conforming people as either dangerous psychopaths and sexual predators, or victims with little agency. I want to include not just trans people in this argument, but all members of the LGBTQ community who have been labelled negatively.

I want to add that when HBO produced euphoria, it is suggested that in doing so they were trying to make a point and almost outdo Netflix, proving they were just as diverse a streaming platform.

References:

Koch-Rein, A., Haschemi Yekani, E. and Verlinden, J.J. (2020) “Representing trans: Visibility and its Discontents,” European Journal of English Studies, 24(1), pp. 1–12. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/13825577.2020.1730040.

Goddard, M.N. and Hogg, C. (2020) “Trans TV Dossier, III: Trans TV re-evaluated, part 1,” Critical Studies in Television: The International Journal of Television Studies, 15(2), pp. 162–164. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1749602020918957.

Tia Brown