Gemstones Episode 3.4: Wieners, betrayals, a burning a-hole, and Kelvin at his jerkiest. With nude Steve Zahn bonus.

 

Title: "I Am Come Not to Bring Peace But a Sword." A famous quote from Jesus in Matthew 10:34.  Things are going to get dark. 

Some premium fuck dolls:  Keefe and Taryn are leading a Teen and Parents Together "ice cream and wieners" party.  Keefe has apparently never done any ministry without Kelvin, so he is very nervous.  He is not wearing his "wedding ring," maybe worried that it would out him.

The background song is about your lover finding someone new, but:

I say it's misinterpretation, a case of your infatuation
I know it's me who's on your mind,  I know you're only killing time
You'll be back eventually, you'll be back permanently.  You're still in love with me.

Wait -- has Keefe broken up with Kelvin to date Taryn?  Or is this a precursor of another break-up, coming later?

The parents point out that they know very little about Keefe, even though he is a youth minister, in charge of nurturing their children.   Before Keefe has a chance to answer any questions, Biker Clarence, the owner of the store that he bought out, drops by to praise him for buying "every last butt buzzer I had in stock!"   He invites Keefe to check out the new merchandise coming in: "We got some premium fuck dolls!"  Inappropriate, dude! You're in an ice cream shop. Don't you notice the kids around? 

Top photo: Biker Clarence is played by George Paez, who doesn't have any nude photos online, so I substituted Steve Zahn in Saving Silverman

Taryn and Keefe assure the parents that "it's not what you think."  That is, Keefe isn't actually gay, he bought the toys for a project "we did with your kids."  Even worse!  But didn't the parents know about Smut Busters?  You have to get permission slips every time you take the kids off church property.

The boys at the Citadel: Next, Jesse and Amber complain to their teenage son Pontius that he has too many tattoos,  he shouldn't be having sex with his girlfriend, and he's been rejected by every college he applied to.Come on, he's a world-famous Gemstone.  Christian colleges will fight to get him in.  

Jesse wants to send him to the Citadel, the South Carolina military college: the boys there "would split your ass like a pair of damn Chinese chopsticks." He means that the boys would harass Pontius, but the threat of anal sex hangs in the air.

Sunday morning: after  "getting ready for church" scenes, the Gemstones and Montgomerys walk down a hallway the Salvation Center. The shots in the trailer caused considerable fan speculation: why do Kelvin and Keefe look so angry?  I still don't know.

Loud and Proud:  We see the beginning of the service, a Christian rock number, with May-May disapproving and Cousin Karl loving it.  Then it's time for the family dinner at Jason's Steakhouse, and a practically endless series of queer codes.  Interesting that the guys start being obviously a couple immediately after the Cousin's Night romantic interlude.

May-May disapproves of her sons' silk suits: too shiny, "like a lady's neglige.  A little loud and proud for me."  In other words, they make the boys look gay.  Jesse yells at her for "talking trash." Implying that someone is gay constitutes "talking trash"? That's homophobic, dude.

Judy defends the boys from the "accusation," saying that they are attractive to women. So you turn gay because you can't find a woman?  Laying on the homophobia, aren't we?

As he listens to his family's homophobic banter, Kelvin looks like he's about to cry.   And Keefe -- that's the look your boyfriend gets at Thanksgiving Dinner, when your parents told you to not "cause a scene" by coming out, and then Uncle Bob starts complaining about "fags taking over." Cavalero got it exactly right.

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Holding Hands under the Table:  Peter Montgomery -- Steve Zahn -- enters, announces that he has a new militia compound "on a farm," and invites his sons to join him.  They refuse, so he circles the table, threatening that retribution is coming.  

As he circles, Keefe moves his right hand under the table.  Then Kelvin moves his left hand under the table. These are not random acts:  Boyfriends who are scared (and closeted) would look for reassurance by holding hands.

Their hands stay under the table until Peter threatens Judy, and Eli steps in, telling him to leave or he'll be shot.  Everyone in the family except Gideon, Kelvin, and Keefe pulls out a gun.  A gun expert on the fan board pointed out that only Amber and BJ are holding them properly.  

Then Kelvin,  frightened (of his family's guns?), says something indecipherable to Keefe, who moves his hand back to the table top and makes a finger-gun.  Kelvin looks around for a weapon, and brandishes a fork.  His left hand is still under the table, and stays there, holding Keefe, until Peter circles the table again.  

Now the "wedding rings" are fully visible, matching men's silver wedding bands with black diamond inlay (the real thing sells for over $4000),  on the ring finger of Kelvin's left and Keefe's right hand.  

They will be emphasized several times during the season, especially when Kelvin is thinking about or talking about Keefe.  They are symbols of the relationship, which means that the guys exchanged them deliberately.  They have a permanent commitment.  Kelvin can't say that they are lovers, but he can show it.

For a little while, anyway.

It makes my a-hole burn: The backlash to the ice cream-and-wieners party begins when Kelvin finds a letter in the Teen Time suggestion box: "Keefe is weird. I am not comfortable with him around kids." Is "weird" being used as a euphemism for "gay" again?

He yells at Keefe for messing up: "You had one job! It's your only responsibility."  Dude is missing the point entirely.  He should be concerned with defending Keefe's character.

He wants to know what went wrong.  Keefe explains that the porno shop owner "outed me in front of the parents."  Not outing him as a participant in the Smut Busters: that wasn't a secret.  Bike Clarence made it sound like Keefe bought the butt buzzers and fuck dolls for himself, thus "outing" him as gay. 

Well, did Keefe explain that he bought the toys on church business?  He tried, but he couldn't really articulate how buying sex toys helped the church.  Kelvin gets even more angry; Keefe's inability to handle this incident without outing himself -- and by implication, both of them -- suggests that he is not qualified to be assistant youth pastor.  So, are you going to fire him, or what?

What about the parents' concerns? "This kind of talk makes my a-hole burn."  Keefe responds: "I hate to think that I'm responsible for your a-hole burning."

I have never heard anyone use that expression to mean angry or upset, nor can I find it online.  It's quite likely that Kelvin's real a-hole is burning: remember that he just stopped withholding anal sex. If your partner is too big or too enthusiastic, as he is bound to be after a drought, he can create tiny tears, resulting in rectal burning and itching.  In Season 1, Kelvin's a-hole burned  after a similar experience, tied into his guilt over being gay  Now it's the possibility of being outed, and its impact on his career, that burns him. Will he be backing away from the erotic again, to maintain the illusion that he and Keefe are just good buddies?

Sip and Paint: A scene of Kelvin/Keefe problems will inevitably be paired with BJ/Judy problems.  They are on another date night, at a sip-and-paint studio. Why do they get so many dates, when Kelvin/Keefe get none?  

Someone sends BJ a dick pic!  He wants to email the guy to explain the mistake, because "some lucky gal's missing out on that glorious cock shot."  Did you forget that gay men exist, Buddy?  I'm sure your brothers-in-law would enjoy looking at a glorious cock.  Uh-oh, Judy realizes that Stephen, the guy she had the affair with, sent it on purpose to big-dick her husband!

The White Slap: Next, Jesse gets is initiated into the Cape and Pistol Society, for the elite of evangelical ministers. He sparrs with rival Vance Simkins, and uses so many cuss words that he's sentenced to a "white slap" -- literally being slapped by someone wearing a scary white mask. 

Then Baby Billy confronts him: "You are so hell-bent on running this church the way your daddy did, but you ain't your daddy." This line in the trailer led to widespread speculation that Eli had died, but it was just a misdirection.  Then Baby Billy suggests that a performance by Aimee-Leigh, Eli's dead wife and a famous gospel singer, would get some butts into the seats.  But how can she perform? 

Probably there are videos of her singing at the Grand Ole Opry or something. Baby Billy may explain, but who's paying attention?  Viewers are pushing the fast-forward button, anxious to see what happens with Kelvin and Keefe.

Rumors Swirling:  At the church food court -- notice the booths for Fancy Nancy's Chicken, Jason's Steakhouse, and "Wok on the Water" --  Kelvin, in virginal white instead of his usual green to emphasize his purity, listens to parental concerns about Keefe.  

"We do not feel safe with the assistant youth pastor. We heard he's a devil worshipper" and "I don't want him influencing our children."  

The most obvious conclusion from the sex toys debacle would be that Keefe bought them for pedophile grooming, but no one accuses Keefe of child molestation.  You don't say that a pedophile is a bad influence, you say that he is a danger. They think that Keefe is gay.  

This is Kelvin's chance to exonerate Keefe by coming clean: "Buying the sex toys was all my idea. I thought it would be a good teen project.  Keefe was just following my orders."  But instead he throws the guy under the bus in order to stay closeted: "I vouch for him.  He is one of my closest personal friends. He is my dude."  

A parent (Nick Arapoglou,  left) responds: "With all the rumors swirling about you, can't you see how strange this all looks?"

"There's rumors swirling about me?" Kelvin asks, shocked.  He thought that he was adequately closeted, and maybe he was -- Evangelicals often have trouble conceiving of a Man of God being "that way," so they may have let his feminine mannerisms and lack of interest in women slide.  But with Keefe outed, the rumors are bound to swirl. If Kelvin is outed as well,  his career as a youth pastor...as a pastor of any sort...as a Gemstone...

"Remove him, or we remove our kids." a parent demands. 

Kelvin literally runs away. 

It gets worse after the break

The Top 12 Hunks of "School Spirits," living or not. A surprising number have posted dick pics.

 

School Spirits (2023-) stars Peyton List as Maddie Near, a high school student who suddenly finds herself wandering among the ghosts of other students (and one faculty member) who died at Split River High.  They have more lax rules than the ghosts of Ghosts: they can eat, change clothes, read books, and manipulate objects (although everything resets); but they cannot leave school property, and they cannot communicate with the living.  Except Maddie can.  Her ghost and living friends work together to solve the mystery of her disappearance.  Spoiler alert: She's not really dead.

There's some gay representation, and the beefcake quotient is very high.  Here are the top twelve hunks (with their dicks after the break):

1. Kristian Ventura as Simon, who had an unrequited crush on Maddie, and now can see and talk to her.  He's one of the main suspects in her disappearance.

2. Josh Zuckerman as Mr. Martin, a chemistry teacher who died in a lab explosion in 1968.  He runs an Afterlife Support Group, and gives the students assignments that supposedly will help them move on to the afterlife.  But he has a lot of secrets.

3. Nick Pugliese, top photo and left, as Charley, who died of a peanut allergy in the 1990s, just after a fight with his boyfriend (who is now a teacher at the school, so Maddie asks Simon to arrange an apology). 

4. Miles Elliot as Yuri, who died in the 1970s.  In order to avoid Mr. Martin's activities, he pretended to be cycling (only semi conscious, repeating the same action over and over); but in Season 2 he joins the gang, and starts dating Charley.

5. Zack Calderon (left) as Diego Herrera, the older brother of Maddie's living friend Nicole.

6. Milo Mannheim as Wally Clark, who died at a football game in the 1980s (the stadium is named after him).  He insists that the gang watch only sports movies, and continues to work out, leading one to conclude that ghosts have functioning cardiovascular systems.  In Season 2, Maddie and Wally start dating.

Dick pic after the break.  Caution: Explicit.

"Strip Law": Animated comedy about an inept lawyer, male strippers, and Las Vegas. With nude Adam Scott and Drew Tarver

 I have a bad feeling about Strip Law (2026), a new animated series on Netflix.  Its animated comedies tend to be dark and nihilistic, like Bojack Horseman, or mistake disgust for humor, like F is For Family.  But Strip stars Adam Scott, who has played gay characters a few times.  And gotten naked, although this is obviously not his real cock (not Jason Schwartzman's, either).

Janelle James, last seen on the gay-friendly Abbott Elementary; 

And Drew Tarver, who played gay characters in The Other Two and Running Point (and gotten naked; this is definitely his backside).

Plus the first episode promises a male stripper. 

Episode 1.1: "Finally, a Show about Lawyers."

Scene 1: Lincoln (Adam Scott) is in the courtroom, interrogating an Austin Powers impersonator.  His story is complex, involving an erotic buffet, performers dressed as Elmo, and something about bodily fluids too disgusting to record here.   The jury isn't paying attention anyway; they're all watching the Big Game. A female stripper comes in to announce closing arguments.  Lincoln wants to be a real lawyer, and doesn't approve of this circus atmosphere.

Scene 2: A tv commercial  A lawyer wants to move forward with the case but when he hears that their opponents are Nichols and Gumb, he tries to shoot himself. 

Nichols (Keith David) tells us that his partner Gumb has died, so he's going to fire her inept son, Lincoln.   His new slogan: "He fired Lincoln Gumb!"

Cut to Lincoln watching the commercial, upset because it's still playing after six months.  We meet his inept team:

Glem Blorchman (Stephen Root), dressed in a 1970s leisure suit, has been disbarred in most states due to his ongoing scandals. 

And Lincoln's niece Irene, a butch teenager doing bicep curls, who hasn't actually been to school in three years. 

They have no clients, they're out of money, so Lincoln plans to kill himself.  Glem can go live on the S.S. Pain Palace, where a "weird millionaire" makes men fight to the death.  Irene will fall in with a bad crowd and turn delinquent. Turn delinquent?  

Glem: "Hey, we have a client.  That big wet hunk of beef in your office."

Scene 3: Turns out that Mom Gumb took on the Hunk's case pro bono, and Lincoln has inherited it.  

Commercial: "Ladies, gay and bi dudes, come on down to the Brushfire Club, where we have the studliest hunks this side of the studinental divide!"  They do show men and women both cheering for the gyrating musclemen with bouncing bulges.

The problem: On "Freaky Friday," the strippers eat the customers' keys.

Lincoln: And that's popular?

Hunk: The customers love it!  But it's making us sick." 

So they're suing for medical bills. Problem: The club is being represented by the super-competent Steve Nichols (the one who fired Lincoln when his mom died).

Scene 4: Cut to Steve Nichols and the sleazy club owner eating spaghetti off a naked lady and discussing how they're going to win the case.  It's personal to Steve, because he hates Lincoln Gum and wants to destroy him. 

In his office, Lincoln complains that he'll never win the stripper case now.  He's disgraced his Mom's legacy. She jumps out of her photo to complain that because of his incompetence, she's in hell, where they have a disgusting process for going to the bathroom (I'm not describing it).

 He leaves to go get drunk, past Dennis the snake eater, the 666 Club, and Friendigan's.  Suddenly he comes across a street magician whose trick involves shooting a deck of cards: the bullet stops at the card you selected. 

Scene 5: Lincoln's assistants, Glem and Irene, visit client Bob Henderson, the used car king: "If you can find a better deal on a Toyota, you can kill me."  Seems that a guy found a better deal, and wanted to kill him, but the lawyers got him to settle for a maiming.  Now they want to be paid.  This is getting a little too cringe for my tastes. Why so many people inviting their own deaths?

Meanwhile, Lincoln talks to the Magician, Sheila Flambé , "magician and three-year all-county sex champion." Does he want to hire her or date her?

Turns out that she was Juror #5 on his last case.  Where he went wrong: "it was like a funeral for Saltine Crackers. This is Vegas!  You got to do it big!"

More after the break

Recker Eans: The gaydar boy on "Beyond Waverly Place" drums in gay-friendly videos, but is he gay or an ally? With bandmate dicks

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