Welcome to Trans Tuesday! How did TV go in terms of trans rep in 2025? So glad you asked, because here comes TRANS REPRESENTATION IN 2025 MEDIA part 2: TV part 1!
If you haven’t read TRANS REP IN 2025 MEDIA, part 1: MOVIES yet, do so! It’s got all the contextual goodness that explains what the heck I’m doing (and not doing) in this report.
Okeydokey, onward through complete seasons of tv I watched in 2025!
TV
Alien: Earth s1 – 0
The opening of the season, especially the pilot, reads as really trans. I’m not sure if that allegory sort of falls apart as the season goes on, because I haven’t examined all eight hours of it super closely. So it might hold up, but it also might not.
In one episode, a cis man marine says “I should’ve called in sick,” when looking at a crashed ship they have to search. And the cis man marine next to him says, “that’s okay, I’ve got extra panties in my pack”.
Like… because not wanting to go into a crashed spaceship makes you a girl who will piss herself, I guess? UGH.
Arcane s2 – 1
Trans woman Eve Lindley (mentioned back in Part 1 for her starring role in National Anthem) voices the character Lest. Lest is not mentioned as trans.
The Bear s4 – 0
In the premiere, Ebrahim and Tina misgender each other for fun. Again. This is turning the one time this happened in season three into a running gag, I guess. But misgendering isn’t funny, y’know?
The Chair Company s1 – 1
Eileen Noonan (a friend of mine!) plays Westie in three episodes, though the role is small. Westie isn’t mentioned as trans. Eileen was one of the first guests ever on the podcast version of Trans Tuesdays! Listen to her way back in episode 4 on TRANS ROLES AND STORIES (and who gets to play them and tell them).
Clean Slate – 9+!
This show was definitely the GOAT of trans rep last year. It was, as is all too common with deeply (and visibly) trans shows, summarily canceled shortly after the first season debuted. It’s a charming sitcom about a trans woman moving back home to live with her dad.
Trans woman icon Laverne Cox co-created and stars in the show, trans woman icon Alexandra Billings appears in the pilot, trans woman icon Nicole Maines has a hilarious role in one episode (I know her, she’s lovely), and trans women Jojo Brown, Eva Reign, and Jazzmun also appear.
Trans man Jett Garrison directed an episode (I know him, he’s lovely), there were two (Two?! Unheard of!) trans women writers on staff, Shadi Petosky and Shomari Kirkwood (a friend of mine, who was on the podcast version of Trans Tuesdays, check out episode 110 on HORMONE REPLACEMENT THERAPY and episode 111 on PUSHBACK OVERKILL.)
Okay dang I didn’t realize I knew so many people who worked on this show.
As a gentle caution, there’s some deadnaming and misgendering in the pilot, because the dad “needs to figure it out.” But it’s not malicious, it’s presented as a thing an older cis person with no trans experience might struggle with.
The lead is allowed to be flawed and real, and it’s about her adjusting to small-town life and kinda falling for a guy. It’s a kind, heartwarming show, if you need trans rep like that in your life right now.
Cobra Kai s6 – 0
There’s a baby gender reveal party this season, and it just sucks to see that same kind of terrible “cis boys and girls are the only option, and we decide it at birth based on their genitals” ideas continue to perpetuate not just society, but also our art. Not going to count this as a joke or anything, but can we just stop with those already? We didn’t used to have them! We can get by without them!
There’s also a scene of a couple old guys calling each other “pussy” and getting mad about it, so it’s cool that “association with something typically seen as feminine” continues to be just the worst thing that could happen to dudes.
This one definitely goes in the joke column.
Doctor Who special The Star Beast – 1
Yasmin Finney plays Rose, the trans/nonbinary daughter of Donna.
The plot kind of hinges around her being outside the binary, and it felt a bit like they had to invent a reason to have a trans person on the show, rather than just saying hey Donna’s daughter is trans.
There are multiple instances of Rose being deadnamed, and also accidentally misgendered while she’s not around, which is presented as something that’s tough for the cis people in her life (but we never see Rose’s side of it, and she doesn’t really have much going on outside of what she needs to remember about the Doctor for the plot, so she feels like half a character to me). Soooo that’s not great. Imagine a show including a trans character… and then immediately diving into CIS GRIEF. See the Trans Tuesday on that if you wanna learn about some bullshit.
And it feels like they do all of this to show you that she’s trans, but the word “trans” is never said, when it’s the easiest thing to do. The episode also has a misgendering joke when the doctor shows someone his psychic paper, and it lists his title as “mistress” instead of “mister,” and he grumbles about it not keeping up (the Doctor’s previous incarnation was a woman, played by Jodie Whittaker). But this moment? It’s entirely for laughs. Ha ha, this man identified himself as a woman, oopsie. Blerg.
Allllso… when Jodie Whittaker’s doctor regenerated into David Tennant’s Doctor take two, his clothes changed from her normal outfit to Tenant’s standard suit and long coat. No other doctor in the modern incarnation of this show up to that point, when regenerating, had their clothes change. They were always a new Doctor in the old Doctor’s clothes. So here, they changed the clothes with the regeneration to avoid putting cis man Tenant in cis woman Whittaker’s clothing… even though her costume was incredibly gender neutral, by Whittaker’s choice!
And I mention all of this only because they went to lengths to change the clothing with the regeneration to avoid the “uncomfortable gender stuff” of seeing a cis man in a cis woman’s costume, but then made a joke about “isn’t it funny that his psychic paper still thinks he’s a woman.”
It’s a bit weird. I felt like the heart was in the right place with this, but it all felt a little inelegant to me. And it’s def not good that all the cis people and their feelings were centered over those of actual trans character Rose, who didn’t get to be much of a character at all. This one is both a joke and actor and character rep, tho.
Doctor who s14 – 3
Rose returns several times, and is often the tallest person in the room (this is trans girl realism, even if unintentional). She, sadly, never really has anything to do, and doesn’t have much of a character. And that’s extra sad, because Yasmin Finney has shown us how good an actor she is in Heartstopper.
In the episode The Devil’s Chord, Maestro (a campy villain) is non-binary, and played by transfem nonbinary actor Jinkx Monsoon. During the episode, the Doctor calls them “that thing.” Ruby, the Doctor’s companion, later calls Maestro “this creature.”
Yoooo, what the hell?! Like, yes, the Maestro is a demon, but… how can you not be aware of the dehumanization of trans people? Enough to call them a “thing” and a “creature?” It’s a bad look.
These don’t count as jokes, mind you, but the execution of the representation felt like maybe it shoulda been run by some trans people first. This is why you need trans writers on your writing staff, friends.
In the episode Dot and Bubble, trans man Pete MacHale plays Gothic Paul. The character is not mentioned as trans.
So what we’ve got here is three trans actors, one of whom doesn’t have much of anything to do or in the way of character, one who’s othered and called a “thing,” and one who could have been playing a cis character. None of this counts as jokes or bad representation, but I also wouldn’t call any of this good representation either.
Doctor Who s15 – 2
Rose again appears in the season finale, but only has a couple of exposition lines and it literally would be no different if she weren’t there. Sigh. As these were all separate appearances for Rose (and not all within the same season), I’m counting them as three separate appearances for a trans character and actor. But remember that when we get to the totals, because it’s going to maybe make things look like there’s more rep than there is.
The episode The Interstellar Song Contest is a pretty fabulous trans allegory, and was written by trans woman Juno Dawson. After seeing this episode I posted on BlueSky “Doctor Who says trans rights!” and Juno liked that post, so it feels pretty likely the allegory was intentional. But alllllso… Juno Dawson said she intended it as an allegory about Ukraine and Russia, and there’s also a lot of context about Eurovision that I just didn’t have, which makes this episode a Palestine and Israel allegory, and not in a good way. Credit to my friend and lovely human Jessie Gender for getting me that context I was missing. Here’s a very good explainer about it, along with the hit or miss history of British colonialism allegories in Doctor Who.
Duster s1 – 0
In the pilot in response to hearing about a lady FBI agent, someone says, “They got lady dicks now?” And the characters (two cis men) don’t laugh or treat it like it a joke, but the show kind of does. Because it seems like you’d only word it that way if the concept of “lady dicks” was meant to elicit a chuckle?
Foundation s3 – 0
Hacks s4 – 1
Nonbinary actor Carl Clemons-Hopkins plays Marcus, who is a cis man.
There’s a minor character named Ceecee Heauxmeaux, which is beyond the purview of my writeup on trans rep, but that sure feels like a kind of regressive thing to think is funny. Unless a queer person wrote it, which changes the context entirely. No idea who came up with that line, the credited writer on an episode didn’t always write every line or joke that appears in it, but it’s… well I’m gonna classify it as “weird.”
In one episode there’s a joke from Debra about how she shouldn’t have to be told someone’s pronouns when she didn’t ask. We’re still making jokes about pronouns, apparently.
In another episode there’s a joke about not wanting to hear complaints about the gender of Mr. Coffee. C’mon.
In one episode a cis woman jokes she’s “doing no nut November.”
In another episode Jimmy Kimmel, guest starring as himself, tells Debra to “Go shove your dick up Fallon’s ass.”
In another episode Ava, a cis bi woman, buys books for a baby, and the titles of two of them are jokes about gender – “One Fish, Two Fish, They Fish,” and “Which Bathroom is Nonbinary?” She says she got so excited when she saw them. The mom of the baby blinks in confusion. I want to note that if this scene were played earnestly, it’d actually be a good commentary about how kids actually should have books about being nonbinary, to better understand themselves or others. Instead the scene is played as a joke about how “wacko liberal” Ava is.
The penultimate episode of the season has a Harry Potter reference, a man throwing a purse over his shoulder and swinging it around for comedy, and a cis woman saying to a cis man, “We’re a couple of business guys.” Not gonna cool it as the season winds down, I guess.
Then in the season finale, Deborah says Ava needs “a boyfriend, or a girlfriend, or a theyfriend” … and for once it’s not played as a joke! Great. Yes. We can learn and grow! Buuuutt the same episode has a couple jokes about… Ace Ventura, and what the hell. When you reference one of the most transphobic movies ever made, that kinda casts doubt on the authenticity of your “you need a theyfriend” line, and now I wonder if it was meant as a joke that just didn’t land.
Look, I love this show a lot. It’s got really brilliant acting and writing.
But also in my past trans rep in media reports, it’s been one of the biggest traffickers in this kind of tired gender humor that pokes trans people in the eye. And the wild thing is there’s no reason for it, the show is brilliant otherwise! What are you doing with these lazy, gender essentialist jokes? I tallied eight of them this season! Stop it!
Hazbin Hotel s2 – 0
Heated Rivalry s1 – 2
Trans Man Harrison Browne appears in one episode in a small role, with only a few lines. He was a professional hockey player in the National Women’s Hockey League and the first out trans athlete in professional hockey, and he helped form the first ever transgender policy in professional sports. It was a lovely nod to include him, but as he’s actually an actor and director now, it would have been extra great if he had more than a tiny role that didn’t impact anything.
Trans woman Miss Niki Nikita appears in episode 5 as a makeup artist, but has only one line and isn’t mentioned as trans.
The show is fearless in the ways it depicts love and sex between (cis) queer men, and includes a lovely, awkward coming out scene that I think trans people will resonate with.
Ironheart s1 – 1
Nonbinary actor Shea Couleé has a recurring role as Slug, and they/them pronouns are used. I think this makes them the MCU’s first official non-cis character! Which is amazing, but also when you think about how many characters have appeared in every Marvel movie and tv show combined… incredibly depressing that there’s only one, and it took eighteen years for it to happen. Ugh.
On the show Slug is a villain, and you could make a case they might be overly sexualized, but there’s nothing otherwise damaging about the portrayal.
Jentry Chau vs the Underworld – 0
Last of Us s2 – 1
Nonbinary actor Bella Ramsey continues to star as cis girl Ellie.
It seemed like they were possibly toying with the idea of letting Ellie be nonbinary too. There’s a scene where Ellie finds out her girlfriend is pregnant (by an ex-boyfriend), and says “I’m gonna be a dad.” It’s not played for laughs, it’s a genuinely sweet moment.
Bella said they wore a binder under their costume during “ninety percent” of filming (see TUCKING AND BINDING for more). The binder seems visible under their top in some shots, so I thought they really were gonna make Ellie nonbinary as well.
But later they take off their shirt, so someone can tend to wounds on their back and… there’s no binder. So it seems the times it might have been visible is because Bella was wearing it, with no intent to have Ellie be seen in it.
And that’s fine, trans and nonbinary actors can play cis characters. The reverse is not fine, mind you, for reasons outlined in TRANS ROLES AND STORIES.
But it’s allllso fine for Ellie to be nonbinary. There’s no reason the character must be a cis girl. You can have the character come out as nonbinary, too, and let Bella rep who they really are through the art they’re making. It doesn’t change the story at all!
Leverage Redemption s3 – 1
The show has a nonbinary writer on one episode, which includes the line, “Ladies and gentlemen, and all the beautiful people in between.” Hey, that’s cool.
Come back next week for part 3, as we discuss some shows that have a decidedly weird track record when it comes to trans rep.
Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
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