Fun
Frisky
Nostalgic
Intense
Adventurous
Choked Up
Curious
Romantic
Weird
Fuller House was seriously this close to being progressive, groundbreaking television. A lot of adjectives have been hurled at Fuller House since it debuted on Netflix in 2015, but “progressive” and “groundbreaking” aren’t two that hit, and they definitely didn’t stick. In Season 2, the show went from “I can’t believe a show fueled by nostalgia is this forward-thinking” to “Oh wait, nope, false alarm” quickly. I’ll shamelessly use Stephanie Tanner’s 30-year-old catch phrase and say “How rude!”
I’m talking about Max Fuller, the eight-year-old middle child of DJ Fuller (Candace Cameron Bure), a character that was almost one of the youngest (or possibly the youngest) gay kid in TV history. Instead, Fuller House created a little kid that lets them make all sorts of gay jokes without actually giving the show’s gay audience (which it most definitely has, considering just how massive a hit the show is) any representation.
Let me get something out of the way up top about Elias Harger, the scene-stealing kid actor that makes Max Fuller everything he is: he’s Fuller House’s secret weapon. Obviously people watch the show because they have fond memories of spending Friday (and/or Tuesday) night with the Tanner family. No one really expected any of the new characters to hold their own with DJ, Stephanie, or Kimmy. Max does. Harger kills one-liners, runs through new catch phrases like they’re already his greatest hits, and–most importantly on this show–knows how to pull at your heartstrings. He’s great.
So that brings me to my next point: it is ludicrous for me to pontificate about whether or not a 9-year-old actor is gay or not. I will address naysayers and head-shakers and say that, going from personal experience, I knew that I was gay when I was 9 (my massive crush on Jurassic Park’s Alan Grant still stands today). My husband knew he was gay when he was 9. Most gay men I’ve met have always known, even if they didn’t really know until way later in life (I finally came out to myself at 21). But still, I want to make it clear that I’m talking about Max Fuller, the character that Fuller House created, developed, and then pulled such a severe 180-turn on that it’ll make you scream “Oh mylanta!”
Max Fuller lives for the drama. He reads the Fuller/Tanner/Gibbler clan for filth. He cries over Lifetime movies and doles out fashion advice. He’s fussy, smart, and particular. He will sashay and shantay on command. He’s the character you go to when you need a #hottake. Max Fuller is the kid that dons light-up overalls and basks in the glow of pyrotechnics while presenting a school project on sustainability.
Twenty-something years ago, I was a gay kid. I can recognize Max Fuller as a gay kid character. The frustrating thing, the whole reason I’m writing this article, is because Fuller House recognized him as a gay kid, too–and I don’t just mean hints or affectations, although there’s plenty of that. I mean full-on Max-has-crushes-on-boys level recognition. There was a fun, show-stopping, hilarious, out and proud gay kid character on Fuller House of all places, until there wasn’t. The proof:
EXAMPLE 1: Season 2, Episode 3–”Ramona’s Not-So-Epic First Kiss”
Kimmy’s daughter Ramona (Soni Bringas) is prepping for a first date with a tween boy. Max doesn’t get why Ramona’s going through with it since she didn’t like the guy, and Romana says she changed her mind, and now she likes him. Max gets it, because he’s had his own experience with flip-flopping on a crush:
Max then adds, with a wistful smile, “There’s just something about him.” So… Max has a crush on Blake Shelton, a host on The Voice and a chart-topping country music singer. I can’t imagine a crush more approved by Fuller House’s target audience, and also approved by me. Blake Shelton and his five-o-clock-somewhere stubble can get it! As if Max proclaiming a crush on Blake Shelton wasn’t enough to out him, he immediately starts taking Ramona’s wardrobe to task. She’s going to wear flats on a date?!
The kid peeks out of the closet and five seconds later is setting a straight girl straight. Max is a hero.
This wasn’t the only time, either!
EXAMPLE 2: Season 2, Episode 7–”Girl Talk”
Max has turned the backyard into a chicken coup for his farming and sustainability project (San Francisco’s elementary schools give intense assignments), but he’s bummed that things aren’t going well. Kimmy’s ex/Fuller house freeloader Fernando (Juan Pablo Di Pace) tells Max that his vial of unicorn tears (just go with it) will help save his project. The next morning, Max goes to check on his farm, although he’s not expecting much because he “googled farming miracles due to unicorn tears, zero results.” Then:
Out of nowhere! Four episodes later! Different writers made the same reference to Max’s crush on Blake Shelton. This is part of Max’s character now!
But not for long.
In Episode 12 we meet Steve’s fiancee’s daughter Rose, a girl the same age as Max who (most importantly) also loves Titanic. When Max sees Rose, we get the full-blown TV crush treatment, with all music, slow-motion, and lots of wind. The characters all respond to this crush as if they’ve always expected Max to find a girl and not a young Blake Shelton. The show shifts to accommodate this new reality wherein Max has his soulmate (a word that is actually used). The two recreate Titanic’s “I’m flying” moment, and it’s sweet and innocent (as innocent as children recreating scenes from an adult romance in a hard PG-13 movie can be). It also goes against everything the show just spent a season establishing. This continues into Episode 13, the season finale, when Max and Rose share a pop kiss to celebrate the new year.
You see how close Fuller House was to doing something new only to retreat back to familiar, well-trodden territory wherein nine-year-olds act out adult romance rituals and we all pretend that that’s not at all weird because it’s heterosexual?
That’s the problem, the problem Fuller House could have addressed while still providing audiences with brightly-lit lunacy. Straight relationships get to be innocent, sweet, and appropriate for all-ages. Gay relationships are too mature, too complicated, and too dirty for TGIF. That’s a double standard. Gay relationships aren’t just sex. They’re also crushes and first kisses and holding hands and school dances and teen magazines. And even though all of those things are a part of our gay lives, they are almost never seen in pop culture. Gay people get to be funny adults on TV, or sexy adults on cable, or tortured adults in movies, and dead adults in all of the above. We forget that there are also gay kids, who are also kids, who do kid things like hang up posters of pop stars in their bedroom and pass notes to their crushes in homeroom (or do they text now? How old am I?!). Like Max, they have crushes on Blake Shelton and help their friends pick out outfits for dates! Since we’re fine with seeing Stephanie “marry” Harry Takayama, DJ get a friendship bracelet from Jonathan Brandis, and Max play Leo to Rose’s Kate, we should be fine with moving forward.
This is so important because gay people are told repeatedly, sometimes by their own families, that their love is not appropriate for kids. That’s an idea we have to fight against, and an all-ages smash hit like Fuller House including a gay kid would be a big help. As outrageous and schmaltzy as Full House was, it tackled the issues that kids of ’80s and ’90s were going through (like not buying dope stage outfits when you really need to make band rehearsal). Fuller House can do the same thing, and we are way more aware today that there are gay kids going through some heavy stuff.
Gay kids watch Fuller House, as do the parents of gay kids–including parents that love their gay kids and parents that are worried about their gay kids. The amount of good seeing a positive portrayal of a gay kid, one loved unconditionally by TV’s most hug-prone family, could do is immeasurable. By just letting Max be his bowtie-wearing, finger-snapping, Blake Shelton-crushing self, Fuller House would tell all of those viewers that–and I honestly can’t think of a better way to phrase this–when you’re lost out there and you’re all alone, a light is waiting to carry you home.
♪♩Everywhere you look!♩♪
