"Oz, the Great and Powerful": A walking penis (not in a good way) finds true love, two wicked witches, and a flying monkey

  

Last night for movie night, we saw Oz the Great and Powerful (2013), a Disney retread of the Oz mythos, with reflections of both the original books by L. Frank Baum and the 1939 movie.  It had some visual appeal, but the heteronormativity was so intense and unyielding that it burned.

In black-and-white 1905 Kansas, Oz (James Franco) is a circus sideshow magician who seduces every woman in sight -- three in the first five minutes.

Easter Egg: The circus is run by Mr. Baum.

He has an assistant (Zach Braff), whom he treats horribly, and an ex-girlfriend (Michelle Williams), who is in love with him but plans to marry John Gale instead because he doesn't want a "normal" life, the heterosexist trajectory of job, house, wife, and kids.  Not because he is gay, because he is irresponsible.

Easter egg: It's not mentioned, but the ex-girlfriend is going to become Dorothy's mother, then die, so Dorothy can go live with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry, and get zapped to Oz in seven years. 

Oz's act comes to a halt when he admits that he can't cure a disabled girl in the audience.  

Then he has to flee when the circus strongman and clown  (Tim Holmes, Brian Searle) get angry over the seduction of their wives. Oz jumps into his balloon, and is zapped through a tornado into Oz.

I figured a guy playing a strongman would have some beefcake photos,but Tim Holmes doesn't.  Instead, we have him saying that he's visiting his kids "to see his grandchildren"..with his hand on one of their bellies.  No baby in there, buddy; those are your twin sons. 

Left: Eugen Sandow, the original strongman.

Back to Oz.  The wilderness is brightly-colored, with singing foliage out of Fantasia, and things that keep zapping you in the face (the film was originally 3-D).

Oz meets the Good Witch Theodora, who happens to be traipsing around the wilderness with no supplies.  Discovering that he is coincidentally named after her country, she concludes that he is the Wizard prophesied to free the kingdom from the evil Wicked Witch, so of course he seduces her.  Is this supposed to be an endearing trait? 

Next they go to the Emerald City, picking up a flying monkey in a bellman's outfit (Zach Branff) along the way.  Evanora, the Witch in power, will be happy to hand over the throne, as long as he saves them by breaking the wand of the Wicked Witch, which will kill her.  

More Oz after the break

Matthew Jeffers: Elizabethan earl, comedic foil, gay dwarf who fights aliens. With bonus short guys.

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Zach Garcia: searching through tearjerkers, cowboys, podcasts, j/o, Alistair Patton, Tab Hunter, and a lot of dicks

 

I'm tired of finding photos of some guy I never heard of on one of the nude-celebrity websites, where one expects to find celebrities, and after two hours of research he turns out to be a musician who appeared "as himself" on one episode of a reality show, or a random hunk with a youtube channel.  Random hunks are off-topic.  I only  profile men who have performed in movies and tv shows. 

So when I found a j/o video of Zach Garcia, it wasn't enough to vaguely remember him from one of those high school soap operas like Riverdale.  I checked the IMDB for acting credits.  He has 11, so let's move forward.

In an interview in Voyager. Zach notes that he began modeling at age 12, but specified that he wouldn't model in his underwear.  No problem: soon he was appearing on billboards and in magazines.  Then his agent said that he should start acting, so he auditioned.  A lot of auditions, but only a few roles.

A 2015 episode of Grandfathered: "confirmed bachelor" John Stamos discovers that he has a son, Josh Peck, and Josh has a son, making him a grandfather.  Zach doesn't play the grandson.

"No One Knows I'm Gone," a 2015 short.  A bullied 12-year old runs away from home.  He doesn't play the bullied 12-year old.

On the day of Zach's auditon for Chicago PD, his aunt had just died of breast cancer, so he didn't want to go, but his mom talked him into it.  Guess what -- it's a tearjerker.  His character is supposed to be sad all the time.  He got the part.

Also, the spirit of his aunt was in the room, helping him out.

He stuck around for 7 episodes as the kidnapped and otherwise sad son of cop John Seda.  He returned for an episode of the spin-off Chicago Fire.

Typecast as an eternally sad figure, Zach found the roles easier to come by:

Poor Guy, 2016: Two misfit brothers and The Girl dream of California. Zach didn't play one of the brothers.

Chasing the Blues, 2017. Two rivals and the Girl try to acquire a famous jazz record. Zach didn't play one of the rivals.

Four episodes of Major Crimes, 2017, as Miguel Diaz, a undocumented juvenile accused of killing his father.

One episode of The Rookie, 2020, as Hector Duran, who went to juvie for theft and drug posession, and now is enrolled in a Scared Straight program along with his brother, Christian Ochoa.

One episode of Generation, 2022, about "high school students exploring modern sexuality."  It had some gay, bi, and trans characters, and some dicks floating around, but I don't know who Zach's character was, as it is currently unavailable for streaming.

Bloom, 2022, not to be confused with other 2022 Bloom, about girls in a flower shop falling in love.  This one, which is unavailable anywhere, tells us that: "After going his whole life drowning in many dark thoughts, a 20 year old young male, finally breaks through with the courage of his sexuality."  Ok, F for grammatical errors, the awkward "old young," and the nonsense "break through with the courage"  Zach doesn't play the 20 year old young male.

Since 2022, Zach has been working as gaffer and grip on projects such as Desire Within, Emory Woods, and When a Flame Dies Out, so that must be his new career.  

Zach's Instagram has a few provocative pictures, like this one of a boyfriend reaching into his pants.

And lounging naked.  I can't figure out where the boyfriend's body is.

On to the j/o 

Wait -- I didn't notice before, but the j.o. guy doesn't look like Zach at all!  

So who the heck does this dick belong to?

More after the break. Caution: Explicit

Jesse Bradford: The gay and gay-subtext roles of yesteryear have vanished, but he still has a physique. And a cock.

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Matt Smith: Who doesn't want to see the penis of Prince Philip, Charles Manson, Christopher Isherwood, Superworm, and Dr. Who?

 

We've been watching the 2011 series of Doctor Who, the seemingly endless British sci-fi series that sends the last remaining Time Lord through time and space to save Earth, an alien planet, or the entire universe.  Again and again.  Oddly, when his world-saving takes him to modern day Britain, there are plenty of exteriors, but when it is a distant planet or the far future, all we see are endless corridors. 

Doctors regenerate every few years, getting new bodies and personalities.  Right now it's Matt Smith, an effervescent, jokey type, with an inner trauma that sometimes comes out.  After all, he saw the destruction of his people, and he's over 1,000 years old, so dozens of human companions have died, gotten lost, or left him to go on with their lives.

Matt Smith has appeared as the Doctor in dozens of projects outside the show itself: videos exploring odd corners of his universe, video games, a lot of four-episode miniseries, spin-offs starring former companions Sarah Jane and Amy Pond

The children's program Blue Peter. 

Comic Relief: Red Nose Day, An Adventure in Time and Space...I got tired of counting.  You have to be British to really understand his amazing popularity.

The Doctor would be enough for a career, but Matt has played a wide range of other characters, mostly based on real people:

Christopher Isherwood, the gay author of A Passage to India and Maurice, in Christopher and His Kind, a 2011 adaption of his memoirs. Left, the one without the biceps.

Rowing star Bert Bushnell in Bert & Dickie, 2012.  Neither was gay.

Prince Philip, the consort of Queen Elizabeth, in The Crown, 2016-7.

Robert Maplethorpe, the controversial gay artist, in Mapplethorpe: The Director's Cut , 2018  

Left, the one with the ring

Hippie cult leader Charles Manson in Charlie Say, 2018

Plus a variety of fictional characters. As far as I can tell, they're all heterosexual.  I guess he only takes gay roles if they're of historical significance.

A detective fighting witchcraft.

An evil clone with a nice bulge.

A zombie-fighting parson in the Regency era.

The case worker of a refugee family facing evil

An evil spirit in the psychedelic 60s

A tourist in Morocco for whom things go terribly wrong

More Matt after the break

The Jonas Brothers: I wanna be like you

 

The Jonas Brothers, consisting of Nick (born 1992), Joe (born 1989, left), and Kevin (born 1987), were already popular performers, recording several albums and appearing on MTV, the Cartoon Network, and Nickelodeon --  not to mention the White House -- before Disney took notice around 2006.

But after that the group was a Disney Channel juggernaut, recording new versions of movie classics like "I Want to Be Like You" (from The Jungle Book), appearing on Hannah Montana and Camp Rock, and finally getting two tv series of their own, The Jonas Brothers: Living the Dream (2008-2010) and Jonas (2009-2010).

That didn't keep them from releasing new songs: 14 singles and 16 music videos between 2005 and 2010, plus two more in 2013.

And from releasing beefcake photos.  Like Justin Bieber, they drew the special interest of fans looking for random arousal.  Joe seemed especially vulnerable; his moments were tagged "joners."

Like most boy bands, their lyrics were heterosexist, with lots of "girl! girl! girl!"  But some dropped pronouns.  And their version of  "I Wanna Be Like You"  sounds decidedly homoerotic:

What I desire is man's red fire
To make my dream come true
Give me the secret, mancub
Clue me what to do
Give me the power of man's red flower
So I can be like you

I wouldn't mind getting a little of that power of man's red flower myself.

The brothers are gay allies.   In an interview with The Advocate in 2012, Nick (left) noted that they loved their gay fans: "They’ve been incredible over the years. My brothers and I totally look forward to meeting them, because they really respond to our style."

In 2013 they appeared on the cover of Out magazine.

Their boy band days are long past, but Jonas Brothers are stil performing together.  Joe has also embarked on a solo career, and appeared as himself in tv shows like Dash and Lily and The Righteous Gemstones.

Joe nude, sort of, after the break

Theo James: Why is he naked all the time, and has he done anything gay-positive?

 

In White Lotus Season 2, Cameron and Ethan (Theo James, Will Sharpe) and their wives visit the Italian resort, and start flirting with every woman in sight, plus each other. In Episode 4, Cameron even says "I want to be inside you.  I want to do stuff to you."  But it is just queerbaiting; the two never lock lips.  In fact, they hate each other.

You could probably figure that White Lotus, well known for its shocking homophobia, would never portray an actual gay romance.  After all, it was created and written by Mike White, aka The Devil. 

But Theo James is not personally homophobic; he has been interviewed an a dozen gay magazines, he wants to play a gay action-adventure hero, and he was in the running to play gay pop star George Michael.  Let's check his previous work for gay roles.

The Time Traveler's Wife (2022) features (straight) lovers stymied by the guy's frequent involuntary time slips.  Heterosexuals all the way down, although it does give us some nice rear and frontal nudity.

Sanditon (2019-22) is an adaption of a novel that Jane Austen left unfinished at her death in 1817. There is actually a gay character, outed in the second season. Theo plays Sidney Parker, whom focus character Charlotte love/hates with the "He's arrogant!" trope.  

In the animated Castlevania (2018-21), Theo plays Hector, whose plot is propelled by that horribly cliched Dead Wife Trope.  

Archive (2020)?  Another guy with a Dead Wife, who he tries to recreate with an android.  Yawn.  I'm beginning to think that it will be tired cliches as well as heterosexuals  all the way down.  Are the butts and dicks worth the trouble?

Lying and Stealing (2019)? Caper romance between two thieves.

How it Ends (2018)?  "In the midst of an Apocalypse, a man struggles to reach his pregnant fiance, who is a thousand miles away." That's actually the motive behind about half of the characters on The Walking Dead: "I'm looking for my wife!"

Before The White Lotus, Theo was most famous for the Divergent series, four movies set in a teen dystopia where people are classified according to their primary virtue: Candor, Dauntless, Erudite, Abnegation, and Amity.  He plays Four, a Dauntless instructor who romances focus character Beatrice. 

Ok, let's try Theo's future projects.  In the upcoming The Gentleman (2024), he plays Eddie Halsted, who inherits his father's estate without realizing that it is the front for a drug empire.  And he...falls in love...with...

I give up.

Bonus: Theo dick after the break