Gentlemen Prefer Hercules: Desire | Identification | Beefcake

“There Are No Ugly Men in Wakanda”: Black Panther, Spectatorship, and the Queer Male Gaze

“…Historically, motion pictures have attempted to justify displays of semi‐nude male bodies by using what Leon Hunt refers to as “transparent narrative pretexts” (70). The peplum focused on “spectacular scenes of strength” (Rushing 166), whereas the action film relied on displays of violence, which “allow for physical contact between the male characters … and often serve as a kind of safety valve for homoerotic tensions” (Schuckmann 675). Thus, homosexuality could be evoked and simultaneously disavowed to maintain the invariably white hero’s heterosexual orientation as well as the heterosexuality of the ideal male spectator.…”