The Radical Empathy Of Netflix's Queer Eye

The Radical Empathy Of Queer Eye

In its seventh season, Netflix's Queer Eye is still great, but lacks the edge that made the previous editions such standouts, writes Joshua Muyiwa.

I’M pretty sure there isn’t a single person out there who has somehow managed to avoid watching at least some of the previous six seasons of Netflix’s Queer Eye. One was fazed or one was floored, but in either case it was binged once initially sampled, out of confusion or commitment.

Just in case you’ve been living off the grid and have no friends, here’s the premise of this reality television show. Five queer men — the Fab Five — muscle into the lives of sweet schlumps — called “heroes” in the series — and over the course of a week, shake them out of their daily grind. There’s stylist Tan France changing up their clothes; chef Antoni Porowski teaching them a recipe; hair expert Jonathan Van Ness giving them grooming tips; interior designer Bobby Berk transforming their homes; and culture and lifestyle expert Karamo, who… I’m still not sure what he does exactly. With their powers combined, they remind these heroes (and each one of us glued to our screens) that the power is ours too. I know, I know, this sounds so sappy. It is. And it seems like I’m not selling it, but I am.

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A LIFE MAKEOVER

The Fab Four Five Make A Comeback

By Joshua Muyiwa

THE seventh season of Queer Eye is no different. This time, they’ve headquartered in New Orleans and help seven heroes. There’s a house-full of lost college frat boys trying to save their house crumbling around them; a sports-crazed lesbian setting up home with her girlfriend while negotiating internalised homophobia; a gentle twenty-year-old living with a spinal injury caused by car crash that killed his mother and aunt; a passionate principal who has let her profession take over her personal life; a grumpy deli owner who performs prickly pear; a formerly incarcerated matriarch who is free but still imprisoned and a mixed raced urban farmer working for food sovereignty but ignoring his own development. And each one of these episodes has a little hidden gem to look out for. But overall, this season doesn’t pack a punch as much as the past ones.

I mean, the Fab Four Five still manage to cut through the syrupy and saccharine with their sparkling, stinging one lines. (Tan and JVN are still the shining stars. I’ll reluctantly add Antoni to this list. And Bobby seems to be finding his claws too. What does Karamo do in the show you ask? When you find out, tell me too. Thanks in advance.) The formula of the show is its very radical acknowledgement that any one of us could be the heroes. It shows us that any one of us could just as easily fall into a rut and how the smallest of changes has the ability to make a giant difference.

However, this season doesn’t have any awkwardness, or the political polarity of the previous seasons, and therefore it has no edge. Rather, each of the heroes are happily amenable to every single direction of the Fab Five. One of my favourite mini-seasons of this series remains Queer Eye: We’re in Japan! It is because of the visible and clear clashing of Western and Eastern cultural concepts of self-betterment and self-identity; one is individualistic, the other isn’t. The concept of the show seems to find itself constantly navigating the opposing ideas of these notions with its Japanese heroes; which seem like a brand-new yet universal knowledge received through American reality television shows in the first place. Perhaps, experiments like the Japan episodes challenge this show’s format and the Fab Five to find out something else about themselves. And in turn, allow us to learn something entirely new or see something familiar about ourselves too.

One of my favourite moments of the series is still the times that the heroes cannot understand the absolutely queerspeak catchphrases of the Fab Five at all. And this season, the one that recurs is between JVN and a few of the heroes. JVN says, “Look at your face! I can’t stand it. Can you stand it?” And the Deli Dan hero assertively replies, “Yes, I can stand it.” And both of them look confused. It is brief but beautiful. And yes, yes, for you straight folk, JVN means, he’s got such a handsome face, he can’t bear it. And so, the hero is supposed to reply, “I can’t stand it either!” As a queer man, I’m on the constant lookout for these sweet drops.

Just for the Queer Eye stans with all the deep cuts who want to play a drinking game: Tan does wear an ugly pair of shorts; JVN beautifully flirts with everyone including a bundt cake; Antoni doesn’t add avocado to a dish but mentions it and feels attacked by a hero’s hate for it — I think this is two drinks back-to-back at least; Bobby is still painting walls black, and skipping the Karamo bits goes a long way in refreshing drinks, replenishing snack bowls and reloading tissue boxes.

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