Time was you may have had to watch countless hours of television just to find a single salacious crumb of an LGBT storyline. You would sit through entire series of straight plots until you found a character who might be questioning something about their sexual identity. And then Netflix came along, populating our screens with a million gay teenagers – in love, lust and everything in between.
Okay, the history of LGBT television obviously doesn’t have quite such a, uh, straight line. Along the way, there have been serious dramas (lots of those), sitcoms (not quite as many) and even a horror series or two. These are Esquire’s picks of the best LGBT TV shows: not to belabour a metaphor, but there’s a show for every shade of the rainbow.
Looking
Patrick (Jonathan Groff) is a 20-something videogame designer (the type of job people only have in television shows) living in San Francisco. Patrick’s friends also have jobs that belong in the HBO universe: aspiring artist Agustin (Frankie J. Alvarez) and wannabe restauranteur Dom (Murray Bartlett). Though there was a simmering will-they-won’t-they between Patrick and his boss (played gruffly by Kevin), the joy in this intimate and sexy show was the mundane every life, from dating to work disappointments. And plenty of frank discussions about sex. After two critically acclaimed but under watched seasons, HBO axed the drama, though resurrected the team for a feature film, directed by Andrew Haigh.
You can watch Looking on Sky Atlantic, NOW and Amazon Prime Video
Please Like Me
Australian comedian Josh Thomas wrote and acted in this unconventional story about hapless young Josh, who realises he’s gay after being dumped by his girlfriend. Enter young, hot Geoffrey. There’s a cast of supporting characters, who literally have to be very supportive of the wayward Josh, who provide the foundations for this gentle, searching television show.
You can watch Please Like Me on Amazon Prime Video
Yellowjackets
A plane carrying a group of hockey players – all teenage girls, apart from their male coach and assistant – crashes into an expanse of Canadian woods. This horror-series follows their attempts at survival in the woods and 25 years in the future, as the survivors rebuild their lives with varying levels of success. While it doesn’t nail all of its many plots, the show’s portrayal of a young lesbian romance – and its adult counterpart – is remarkably well done, with its suggestion that love can flourish and falter in circumstances both chaotic and cool.
You can watch Yellowjackets on Paramount+
Queer as Folk
A quick test: What is Russell T Davies’ most iconic gay television series? I suspect many might now say the mawkish AIDS drama It’s a Sin, but really Queer as Folk is his finest. Set in Manchester, we follow alpha ad exec Stuart (Aiden Gillen), the dorky Vince (Craig Kelly) and newcomer Nathan (baby-faced Charlie Hunnam) over two seasons of raucous TV. It’s subversive, sexy, and in its later episodes delightfully off the rails. The American adaptation, which transplants the action to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is not too bad either.
You can watch Queer as Folk on 4OD
Young Royals
If you are in the mood to watch school students fall in love – and it seems some of us never really grow out of this stage – I’d skip Hearstopper and head straight for another Netflix offering, Young Royals. Set at an elite Swedish boarding school – where else would it be set, truly? – the drama follows Prince Wilhelm (Edvin Ryding) as he settles into his miserable settings and attention-guzzling crush, Simon (Omar Rudberg). The show is unafraid to go there in terms of royal dilemmas (pleasingly dramatic and silly) and tender growing pains (likely more relatable). Its supporting cast also have actual personalities, and even better, its two leading actors can… act.
You can watch Young Royals on Netflix
Happy Endings
Only one of this sitcom’s six lead characters is gay, but Max Blum (played by the always-game Adam Pally) is such a fresh gay man – sexually-depraved, literally dirty, happily a shambles – that it’s worth watching. The Chicago-set comedy, from David Caspe, about a friendship group navigating a break-up (at the church altar, no less!) is sublime in its second and third season, in part down to Max, who does all the things a straight man would but... in a gay way, which is surely its own type of representation. The surrounding characters’ questioning and joking of his lifestyle feels lightly radical, rather than preachy, or worse, patronising.
You can watch Happy Endings on Amazon Prime Video
The Last of Us
While the apocalyptic drama – in which a fungal parasite has turned the most of the human population into zombies – was not to everyone’s taste, it’s hard to deny The Last of Us’ break-through LGBT representation in the video game adaptation sector (not exactly an esteemed sector, but a flourishing one). One of its leads, Ellie (played by Bella Ramsey), has a gay romance in the first season, while its third episode focused on a love story between two men (played by Nick Offerman and Murray Bartlett). The first season’s contemplative final episodes certainly made up for an exposition-filled first half.
You can watch The Last of Us on Sky Atlantic and NOW
Master of None
Master of None’s third season was a total reimagining of what had come before, partly because of allegations against co-creator Aziz Ansari’s conduct (which he has denied) and partly because of the pandemic. So instead, we have Lena Waithe take the lead as Denise, a writer who lives in upstate New York and is married to Alicia (British actor Naomi Ackie). For some, the narrow but deep perspective of this five-episode run may be too limiting, but there’s plenty to like here, from Ansari’s intimate direction to the central performances (Ackie, in particular, has star power: later, she would secure the role of Whitney in the big-screen biopic I Wanna Dance with Somebody).
You can watch Master of None on Netflix
A Very English Scandal
A Very English Scandal, fittingly, feels like only a drama that the English could come up with. Written by Russell T Davies, directed by Stephen Frears, starring Hugh Grant and Ben Whishaw, about an English political scandal from the 1970s? It’s like a gay version of The Crown. In the three-part series, MP Jeremy Thorpe (Grant, on brilliant form) is dealing with a volatile ex-lover Norman Josiffe (Whishaw, never less than compelling); an affair which is threatening to undo his life and career. A searing, funny investigation into power and attitudes of the past.
You can watch A Very English scandal on BBC iPlayer
The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story
Like A Very English Scandal, the history section of this list is not particularly happy, but this entry into Ryan Murphy’s crime anthology series has a propulsive, schlocky energy. Darren Criss (of Glee game, lest we forget) stars as Andrew Cunanan, the man responsible for the death of Gianna Versace (played here by Édgar Ramírez) in the late ‘90s. Over nine sprawling episodes (they always re with Murphy), we learn more about Cunanan’s troubled identity issues, America’s gay scene and the fashion. It’s sometimes uncomfortable, but it’s always moreish.
You can watch The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story on Amazon Prime Video
Severance
Not to get too philosophical, but what even is an LGBT show in 2023? While the push for representation is far from over, the days where a show featuring queer storylines would be labelled as “landmark” feels long gone. Enter a show like Severance, a smart sci-fi about workers whose memories have been split between their office and personal lives, which a stand-out tender gay storyline – and it’s not even the main event. It’s hard to talk about Severance without giving too much away, but the romance between Irving (an excellent John Turturro) and Burt (Christopher Walken), two employees at the nefarious Lumon, is a tear-jerking heart of this series. That it is a relationship between two older man, played by talented actors, makes this essential television.
You can watch Severance on Apple TV+
Special
![preview for Special: Season 1 | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix](https://hips.hearstapps.com/vidthumb/images/screen-shot-2019-03-27-at-12-24-25-1553690732.png?crop=0.884xw:1.00xh;0.0896xw,0&resize=1200:* "Video player poster image")
Ryan (played by Ryan O’Connell) is a gay man living in Los Angeles, hoping to become a writer for an online magazine. So far, so 2010s. He also has cerebral palsy, which affects almost everything: his writing, his hook-ups, his . More delightful than you’d expect, and probably just as heart-wrenching, there’s nothing quite like Special elsewhere on television.
You can watch Special on Netflix
Henry Wong is a senior culture writer at Esquire, working across digital and print. He covers film, television, books, and art for the magazine, and also writes profiles.
