Gangs of London: A gay assassin, his boyfriend, a gay mafia son, some sex parties, and a lot of violence and dicks

 

In dramas about crime families, the youngest son is traditionally gay -- think Deran in Animal Kingdom, Ian in Shameless, and Kelvin in The Righteous Gemstones.  So I'm reviewing the first episode of Gangs of London, on Netflix, to see if the traditionl continues.

Scene 1: An upside-down view of a cityscape.  Telling us that this is an alternate world?  No, it's a guy hanging upside down from a tall building, crying and begging Sean (Joe Cole, left) not to kill him.  But he says "What choice do I have?", douses him with gasoline and sets him on fire.  Soon the rope snaps, and the burning body falls. Kind of an overkill.

Scene 2: Irish Traveler Darren (Aled ap Stefan), who apparently works as a hit man, gets a new assignment -- "nobody, just some pedo," and invites his Buddy ( Darren Evans) along.  They park, and Darren goes up the stairs to an apartment, where he waits to shoot the guy.

Downstairs, the Buddy has trouble from a group of toughs.  Then Finn Wallace arrives!  The hit is on the head of the biggest, most important, most brutal crime family in London!  He tries to call Darren, tell him to cancel the job, he's not who they said,  but it's too late, Finn Wallace goes upstairs, and Darren shoots him.

Meanwhile, his Driver Jack ( Emmet J. Scanlan) is terrorizing the Buddy.  When he hears the shot, he runs to the car for his gun.  All the Buddy can think to do is run him over. 

Scene 3: While Darren soaks in a tub, being horrified, the family gathers for the funeral.  

We meet Family Advisor Alex (Paapa Essidue) and a little boy named Danny, who may grow up into a main character.  The costumes seem a little quaint, so I'm thinking that this is all a flashback

They watch the guests arriving, wondering if any of them ordered the hit.

Scene 4: Sons Billy and Sean (Brian Vernel, Joe Cole) play Dad's favorite song, "Suzy Q," so loud that everyone is disturbed.  

We saw Sean being brutal in Scene 1.  Billy is the gay one, and a recovering heroin addict, naturally.  

Left: Horror Hunks claims that this is Brian Vernel, but the one in Gangs of London is younger, with black hair

Family Advisor Alex advises them to not look for the killer, or they'd have a war on their hands.

More dicks after the break

"English Teacher": Gay teacher, his ex-boyfriend, and his homophobic buddy face woke culture and get naked

I spent the worst year of my life teaching English at Homophobe State University in Hell, aka a far northern suburb of Houston, Texas. The minute I submitted the last of the final grades, I got in my car and drove nonstop until that blessed "You are now leaving Hell" sign was receding into the distance.

So the new Hulu series, English Teacher, about an English teacher in small town Hell...I mean Texas...piqued my interest.  I could relive how hideously horrible it was, from the safe distance of my living room a thousand miles away.

Score -- none of the promotional materials let on, but this English teacher, Evan, played by Brian Jordan Alvarez,  is gay.  Let the rampant homophobia begin.

Left: the worst place in the world

And Brian Jordan Alvarez's cock, to take your mind off the horror.

Wait -- in English Teacher, everyone knows that Evan is gay.  Not a problem.  The problem is, he's kind of a jerk.

The much more woke students want to cancel him, for instance, because he said that he couldn't understand why lesbians aren't attracted to men.  Lots of people aren't attracted to men, idjit!

In the first episode, a parent wants him fired, claiming that he turned her kid gay by kissing his then-boyfriend and current hookup, played by Jordan Firstman, in front of the class. 

Left: Jordan's dick.

More after the break

Gemstones Season 3 Memes, Part 3: A bare-butt massage, plowing, posting, and what kissing is for

 

This is a series of memes -- jokes -- featuring Kelvin and Keefe of The Righteous Gemstones, their friends, and a few random hunks.  Most don't require you to have any background knowledge of the show.

1. The locker room is empty, so...

2. The proper terms are partner, boyfriend, and snuggle-bunny

BJ: It's Kelvin's friend

Gideon: Don't you mean dude bro?

Amber: Companion.

BJ: Best dude friend of a cousin?

Gideon; Boy toy

BJ: Kelvin's one fucking guy?

Amber: Special friend?

Gideon: Butt buddy?

BJ: His main man?

Gideon: Dude bro?

BJ: You tried that one already

Amber: His partner?

BJ: That's disrespectful to the gay community.

3. Throw in your penis, and we have a deal.

This is after the breakup:

Kelvin: Who wants to see us discuss getting back together as boyfriends while pretending that we're just work buddies to keep you guessing?  No?  Ok, then, who wants to see Keefe fondle my bare butt?

4. Ok, butt it is

5. Throw in your butt, and we have a deal.

6. How about giving Tony's dick a chance?

Adam: He was massaging my butt, and he was taking some liberties, 'cause when you have to show your penis on camera...

Tony: I waz just staying in character, Bro.

More after the break

"How to Die Alone": Airport hijinks, death by Umlaut, a gay hookup, DeShawn's cock, and three Lizzos.

I never understood this fear of "dying alone."  You'll probably die in a hospital bed, with a lot of tubes in you, while doctors and nurses mill about, so problem solved.

It really means "not having a romantic relationship." But those things aren't for everybody.  Emily Dickinson never dated anyone, and she is one of the greatest American poets.  What makes you so special?

So I wasn't going to review How to Die Alone, but it's set in an airport, aka Hell on Earth, so there's bound to be some cancelled flight, over-enthusiastic TSA agent, and horrible one-rack bookstore nightmares.  And gay characters -- we know that 90% of male flight attendance and 20% of male pilots are gay.

Scene 1: Melissa (Natasha Rothwell), a self-identified "fat black woman," is having a bad day: the plastic bag with her lunch splits open while she's on a moving sidewalk, she's tackled by a TSA agent; and she gets jostled on her job as an electric cart driver.  And, when she hangs out with gay best friend Rory (Conrad Riccamora), she discovers that Alex (Jocko Sims. top photo and below ), a guy she dumped,  is getting married in Maui!  Did you expect him to mope around forever?  

Rory wants to fly out and ruin the party-- "I've never broken up a straight wedding before" -- but Melissa is afraid of flying.  

Their conversation is interrupted by Tina, "the one with the big titties," texting them that Lizzo is at Gate 6A. I don't know who he is.  Melissa has a medical transport to do, but off they go.

Scene 2: They find Lizzo  -- a woman -- at one of those Hudson News snack-and-trashy novel shops, and shriek "Lizzo!" at her.  This convinces her to tell her companion that she "has the shits" and jump on the cart, and they zoom through the airport, shrieking in ecstasy.

Josh, the chunky redhead who works a food stand, sees her, shrieks "Lizzo!!!!", and jumps on the cart.

Who the heck is Lizzo, anyway, the sister-in-law of the show's head writer?

Scene 3: They arrive at the gate, where there is a giant apple and a lot of people walking away from their flight as "sultry R&B music plays."  They all shriek "Lizzo!" and have orgasms as a muscular black man with a beard walks in slow motion toward them.  Wait -- Lizzo is on the cart with them.  Maybe they weren't shrieking her name, they were notifying her that the...um, actor?  singer?  sports star?  was in the airport.  This is the real Lizzo.

The two women want to have sex with him, but he's only into men, but not chubby "versatile bottoms" or femme "gaysians."  He walks right past them, not knowing or caring that he is the man of their dreams.

Whoops, they're so busy gawking that they crash, and the giant apple rolls away.

Scene 4: Melissa in Human Resources, filling out an accident report. HR guy tells her to be more careful, or she'll be demoted to baggage claim.

Hey, HR guy is the ex-boyfriend who has invited her to his wedding in Maui!  Small world!  She pretends to be happy for him, although she's really roiling with anger; why isn't he spending the rest of his life moaning and crying?  

He asks about her plans for tonight, hoping that she'll be lonely and miserable without him. Thai food and karaoke with her gay bestie.

Scene 5: In the Aerowest VIP lounge restroom, gay bestie Rory is wiping off the coffee that got spilled on him when they crashed, when male Lizzo comes in.    Busy having an orgasm, Rory can't think of any opening line except "Nice shoes."  

"Thanks," Male Lizzo says. "Saks."

Rory thinks he said "sex."  "No, if I said sex, you'd know."  Gaysian's gonna hookup with the singer?  actor?  chess champion?.

Meanwhile, Melissa is having a cigarette break out on the tarmac, when one of the luggage wranglers -- Keilyn Durrel Jones, left  -- starts flirting with her.  

Melissa is upset because she and Lizzo are both fat black women, but Lizzo has accomplished something, and she has not.  Wait -- not a scene earlier, they identified a muscular black male as Lizzo, and before that a thin black woman.  Is Lizzo even a real...um...singer/actor/model, or was he or she made up to confuse viewers? 

Two other luggage wranglers appear, Deshawn complaining to Shaun about how much he hates his girlfriend or wife. 

Terrance complains that smoking will kill you, but Melissa counters that she is a black person in America, so she'll be killed by the police long before lung cancer can develop.  At that moment, a police car zooms by, and Melissa and Deshawn freeze, but neither is killed. 

Scene 6: Melissa is waiting for bff Rory so they can go to Thai food and karaoke -- he's bailed many times because he had a chance to get some dick, but tonight he's bailing because his wealthy Dad is forcing him to host a fundraiser.  I figured he would have a date with male Lizzo.

Alone, Melissa hangs out in her happy place, a Swedish furniture store called Umlaut, and tries to flirt with the salesclerk.  But he's oblivious, so she buys some stuff instead.  There's a gay couple strolling arm-in-arm behind her.

She makes it home, fields a phone call from her overbearing mother, and assembles her new cabinet, ignoring the instructions that call for two people. As she stops to argue with a rat that's trying to eat her fried wontons, the unsecured cabinet falls onto her and kills her.

More after the break

Studs from the Steppes: Twelve Mongolian musclemen, Uzbek boyfriends, and Kyrgyz cocks

When I was in about sixth grade, I bought an atlas of world history in the gift shop of the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. One of the maps showed the Khanate of the Golden Horde covering most of Eurasia, from Mongolia to Poland.  Who wouldn't be fascinated by that?

Later I read The Empire of the Steppes, with Genghis Khan, Attila the Hun, and Tamerlane shaping world history, and did a research project on gay personal ads in Central Asia.  I got my M.A. from Indiana University, where you can study Central Asian languages, but I decided on Mandarin instead.

 I don't want to actually visit these places: endless steppes sound a little boring, and they have some of the most homophobic governments on the planet.  But a quick look at some Central Asian hunks might be fun.

1. Mongolian guy on a gay dating site, top photo.

 Mongolia is not all nomads living in yurts. Check out the skyline of modern UlaanBataar.  

2. Ulaanbataar boy on Grindr.  A little skinny; I'd hold out for the wrestler.

3. Kazakh guy from Almaty. previously Alma-Ata, previously the capital.

4-7. Shirtless dinner in Koshetau, Kazakhstan

8. Tatar sheep-wrangler from Kazan, which is actually in Russia, a 13-hour drive from the border of Kazakhstan.   But he's cute, so who's complaining.

More after the break. Warning: explicit

Joe Gaydar breaks unwritten gym rules, some involving penises and bondage

When Tony was staying in Chicago, he got a hotel gym boyfriend, Joe Gaydar.  Not his real name -- I don't post the real names of non-actors, if there's nudity involved - but close.  I imagine that the guy got a lot of homophobic bullying in grade school.

Joe works as a corporate health specialist, "Empowering Your Employees for Optimal Wellness and Unprecedented Success!" The all capped first letters was his idea, not mine. 

But his main claim to fame is an entertaining Instagram, filled with humorous POVs:

 "Old lifters vs. new lifters"

 "Things we all do at the gym"

"When that guy at the gym keeps staring at you"

"When you see Hugh Jackman, aka Huge Jacked Man, looking like a chiseled Greek god."

"When you've already gone to the gym, and the day's main mission is accomplished."

And my favorite, "Breaking unwritten gym rules."  

1. "I don't have to wipe down the equipment or put the weights away. Someone else will do that for me."  I hate walking up to a machine and seeing someone's sweat or that disgusting disinfectant slime on it.

2. "Grabbed two different brand dumbbells.  It's the same weight, right?"  Definitely a violation of an unwritten rule.

3. "Even though it's peak hours, I'm gonna use multiple machines, because my workout is more important than yours."  That's just being a jerk

4. "Let's load the plate with the logo facing in!"  Absolutely unthinkable.

5. "I got a 45 and a 45.  One's iron and one's rubber.  Same difference, right?"  Again, unthinkable.

6. "Looks like somebody left their stuff here.  They can't be trying to reserve the machine, so let's move it."  Wait -- you can't reserve a machine, unless you're standing right next to it.  The guy who left his stuff there is the jerk.

7. "13 reps.  It's ok to end a set on an odd number, right?"  In all my years of going to the gym, I have never ended a set on an odd number.  It just seems wrong.

8."All done with my set, so I'll sit here on my phone for 15 minutes."  Sometimes I walk up to them and say "If you're just resting, can I squeeze in a set?", and they stare like I just grew a second head.

9. "I've got a big dick, so I don't need to use a towel in the locker room.  Guys should be happy to get a peek." Not a problem, buddy: show your dick all you want.

More rules and a dick after the break. Caution: explicit.

Gemstone Season 3 Memes Part 2: Kelvin dates, Keefe blows, and that's not Jerry O'Connell's cock

This is a series of memes -- jokes -- featuring Kelvin and Keefe of The Righteous Gemstones, and friends, and a few random hunks.  Most don't require you to have any background knowledge of the show.

1. Which Gemstone gets him as a birthday present?

2. No one misses you at all

Kelvin: Since you left me, everything is going great. No one misses you at all.

Keefe: BJ and I play pickleball on my lunch hour three times a week.

Kelvin: Well, I meant...

Keefe: Judy took me jewelry shopping yesterday.

Kelvin: She was just being nice...

Keefe: Jesse and Amber had me over for dinner last Saturday.

Kelvin: They never invite me over for dinner....

Keefe: Daddy Eli is taking me fishing next week.

Kelvin: Since when do you call him...

Keefe: Gideon invited me to a movie.

Kelvin: Dude, that's my nephew!  Are you guys...

Keefe: Martin's kid has a music recital, and he asked me to...

Kelvin: Now you're just showing off.

3. You'l never get any action if you leave his ring on.

Jesse: I shouldn't have given them my monster truck.

Amber: Support Jesse in everything, no matter how stupid, or you'll end up alone, like Kelvin.

Kelvin: Leave his ring on or take it off?  If I leave it on, guys will think I'm still marr..engag...a dude bro

4.  Let your bi flag fly, Kelv Baby

Kelvin: Daddy said "No more workplace romances.  They always blow up in your face." Well, this time I hired an assistant who I do not find attractive in the least!  Taryn is nice and all, but no way would I...she's a fierce tumbler....and she's got a quirkly fashion sense...I love her laugh.  We have to discuss the youth ministry, right?  Why not over dinner at Luigi's?

5. Bi Boy from Barcelona

6. If things go well, maybe you can talk about cum later.

Kelvin: I'm going on my first date since Keefe and I broke up.  Any advice?

Jesse: Stay focused.  Don't talk about cum.  Tell him who the fuck you are.

Keefe dating after the break-up after the break

Noah Centineo: The Boyfriend of Your Dreams, with five butts, three bulges, one penis, and no gay characters

 

I've used stills from Noah Centineo's j/o video as illustrations twice, but I don't know who he is, only that he filled in when Jake T. Austin left The Fosters. So, time to do some research.

He was born in 1996, and first appeared on screen with a kids' film, The Golden Retrievers, in 2008.

He appeared in three episodes ofAustin & Allie, the first Disney Channel teencom to feature a canonical gay character, but he didn't play the gay character.

More guest spots on teencoms like Marvin Marvin and Shake It Up, and then his first starring role, How to Build a Better Boy, 2014.  He plays Jaden, the jock that science nerd Mae is crushing on, so she builds a cyber boyfriend to help win him. Matt Shively, left, plays her brother.

There's some rear nudity in SPF-18, 2017, but it's not Noah, it's Jackson White, a depressed musician.  The focus character has to choose between Jackson and Noah, who is mourning the death of his father.  It gets a 3.3 rating on Rotten Tomatoes, probably because it is advertised as a romantic comedy, but is actually a depressing angst-fest.  

After 53 episodes of The Fosters, 2015-2018, Noah starred in To All the Boys I've Loved Before, 2018, but he's not the one loving the boys.  He's the Love Interest of focus character Lana, whose letters to her secret crushes are made public, destroying her life. 

In Sierra Burgess is a Loser, 2018, loser Sierra gets the help of the school's It-Girl to win the Boy of Her Dreams, Noah.  It also stars Will Peltz, left, as Spence, the It-Girl's boyfriend who dumps her.

More butts and one cock after the break

Max Brumberg: Slovakian flute crafter, drag theologian, Russian-Austrian-Uzbek actor. With bonus Uzbek dicks

 

I don't know what led me to the 2021 movie Play it Cool, with someone named Reggiemolo (Alex Jason Lee King) on a cross-country trip where he's mistaken for a criminal and meets The Girl -- the trailer shows them kissing a thousand times, so it's definitely a "no way!"  But far down the cast list was a cute guy named Max Brumbaugh.

The name resonated because when I was a kid, there was an abandoned "haunted house" on my grandfather's property that belonged to the Brumbaugh family.  So I decided to research him.

Rather a difficult task.  First, his last name isn't Brumbaugh, it's Brunberg.  No, it's Brumberg, with an "m," and there are a lot of Max Brumbergs out there. 

1. Max Brumberg who makes flutes in the traditional manner, with traditional materials.  He makes Slovakian fujaras, Moldavian kavals, overtone flutes, double flutes, and many other types, out of his store in Sainte-Croix-Vallée-Français.

Another Max Brumberg is Max Brumberg-Kraus, he/him or they/them, the co-founder of the House of Larva Drag Co-operative.  They perform as drag persona Çicada L’Amour, produce both small acts and full-length queer peformance art, and belong to ARC community: "a creative collaboration for theopoetics."

They graduated from the United Theological Seminary in 2020 with a  M.A. in theology and the arts, and research interests in queer temporality, queer and feminist theology, cosmology, mythopoetics, ancient tragedy, midrash, embodiment, and reception theory.   They're the author of The(y)-ology: Mythopoetics for Gay/Trans Liberation.

Then there's the grad student at the Institute of Russian History in Moscow, and his aroused cucumber.

From Linkedin, IMDB, and an article in Voyager, I've pieced together the life of Max Brumberg, actor.  Of Uzbek and Russian Jewish ancestry.

Top photo: Uzbek guy

Fluent in English, French, German, and Russian.  Not Uzbek?

 Grew up in Vienna got a M.S. in real estate from Newcastle University in Britain, and took a job in Real Estate Structured Finance Sales, traveling between Vienna, Belgrade, and Bucharest while acting in commercials and doing stand-up comedy. 

Left: Tajik guy from Russia

While he was working as a manager at Saxon Bank in Zurich, Max realized that "something was missing...there was a void in my life." So he moved to L.A. and enrolled at the Stella Adler School of Acting. 

So far he has only six acting credits on the IMDB:

More after the break

Santa Clarita Diet, Episode 1.9: A Medieval Serbian book, a gay subtext, daddy/twink porn, and maybe a Skyler dick

 

I haven't reviewed an episode of Santa Clarita Diet for awhile, mainly because the first episode I watched was kind of gross.  Also, after posting reviews of twelve of Skyler Gisondo's movies, four photo collections, and a lot of stuff on Gideon Gemstone, I'm running out of pictures of Skyler with his shirt off. 

And no cock shots at all, unless you count the one in the bonus photos, below.  So we'll have to make do with a fully clothed Skyler.

The premise: Suburban housewife Sheila has become a zombie.  She's fully sentient, but she lacks impulse control, is unusually horny, and has to eat human flesh.  While looking for a cure, her annoyingly amoral family helps her find victims. Skyler plays the guy who knows their secret, next-door neighbor Eric, who happens to be an expert on zombies.

I'm reviewing Episode 1.9, "The Book," because it involves the search for a medieval Serbian manuscript, and who wouldn't be interested in that? 

Scene 1: While Zombie Sheila bags up human meat for later, Husband Joel (Timothy Olyphant, left) has had a breakthrough: Anton, who owns the Medieval Serbian book that mentions a zombie cure, has finally responded to his emails and texts. He can meet them at a paranormal conference in Oxnard today.

But then a cop appears with daughter Abby, who was arrested for runing a stop sign in a motorcycle with no plates or VIN number, wearing a jacket saying "Pussy Magnet."  Hey, the "Pussy Magnet" is legal. The girl likes what she likes.

Abby is obviously in psychological pain from dealing with the zombie situation, so Sheila will spend the day with her.  Husband Joel can go to the paranormal conference with ally Eric. 

I'll review the two plotlines separately.

Mother-Daughter Bonding

Scene 1: Zombie Sheila and Abby return the motorcycle of a guy she killed to his brother, Lonnie (Alex Scuby), who runs a chop shop out of a storage locker. He took Abby's money but didn't fix her bike, so she wants her money back.  Wait, I thoiugh it belonged to the dead guy? Were there two bikes?

Lonnie tells them that his brother was a "stupid fucking idiot" who ripped people off, so they're out of luck.  He closes the garage-door and won't let them in. He's not responsbile for his brother's debts, ladies.

Left: Alex Scuby has appeared in a porno about two older-younger gay couples who swap partners.

Scene 2: In their storage locker, which is the size of a small apartment, Sheila and Daughter Abby look for something to use to get the money back from Lonnie.  There's teargas that Abby stole from Eric's stepfather before Dad killed him, but Sheila wants to teach Abby a life-lesson and use a non-violent solution: how about Raffi, that annoyingly repetitive kids' singer?  What makes you think Lonnie is still in there?

Scene 3: Hours  of playing and singing along to Raffi later, they give up, but Lonnie yells from inside "Turn Raffi back on!" They decide to tear gas him instead, but when they drop the tear gas canister down the vent, it hits the wrong storage locker!  Two innocent guys rush out.

Scene 4: Abby wants to know why Mom  Sheila is so dead-set, so to speak, on teaching her life lessons.  She explains that she is slowly decomposing, so she won't be around much longer, and has to make sure Abby will be ok.  Aww.

The Paranormal Conference

Scene 1: When Dad Joel arrives to pick up Eric, his mom announces "You have a gentleman caller."   Gay joke, har har.  Embarrassed, Eric tells her to not make everything sexual.    

He asks for advice on how to pack a hoodie, and claims to be upset over Joel murdering his stepfather with a shovel, but he's joking: the guy was an asshole. Is this casual attitude toward murder supposed to be humorous?

Scene 2: At the conference, Eric buys a churro-saber, but it's too long to be phallic.  

When Joel is rejected by the first person he talks to, Eric explains: these are all introverts with low self-esteem, and he scares them away by being too aggressive and too handsome: "with those piercing eyes and perfect posture."  So you think he's hot, Eric? 

Scene 3: They find Anton, Derek Waters, talking to a crowd about government conspiracies: During the 1950s, they exploded thousands of nukes over Bikini Atoll in the South Pacific.  In 2012, a man in Florida eats another man's face.  Coincidence?  "If you believe that, I've got a Japanese sex doll to sell you. Unused."  Because he gets so many partners that he doesn't need it?

Nerd Ryan, Ravi Patel, asks about an outbreak of the undead in 19th century Poland.  Yep: Rybik, 1870. Three priests walk into a tavern, and get eaten.

Joel asks about the Medieval Serbian book.  Yep, Pozica, 16th Century.  

More after the break. Caution: Explicit.