The Two Kinds of Andrew

[deird_lj]

So – Andrew being gay.

I get a little sick of the constant assumption throughout fandom that he is (Mainly because I’ve never seen him as gay, and everyone has to agree with me. About everything.), but I can deal with that.

The problem is, I don’t actually like gay!Andrew. The guy sucks.

Normally I wouldn’t say making a character gay/straight/whatever would have too much impact on their personality. Ship away! I’ll still like the character! But with Andrew it’s not quite that simple.


See, Andrew is obsessed with Xander and Spike. Obsessed. (For proof, please watch Storyteller, Damage, or just about any other time Andrew is on-screen. Ever.) He is utterly nuts about them.

Which, if he’s gay, would probably mean that this is how Andrew deals with guys he has a crush on.
[ETA: I really don't mean to imply that he couldn't be gay and obsessed with them for non-crushy reasons. I'm just talking about the way I tend to see him portrayed in fanfic.]

Gay Andrew is obsessed with guys, and moons over them all day, every day.

Here’s an excerpt from a fic (not mine), demonstrating what I mean:

“I thought you guys like Andrew,” Angel said, confused.

Xander shrugged. “He’s alright. I just get a little tired of him-”

“Pining after you relentlessly? Mooning after your fine ass night and day? Doodling ‘Mr. Andrew Harris’ on the back of all his notebooks?” Faith suggested.

“Two words, Faith: singing telegram. He sent me a singing telegram on Valentine’s Day.”

I do not like gay!Andrew. He’s a pain.


However…

If he’s straight (or asexual), and yet still obsessed with Spike and Xander, then the obsession has nothing to do with him having crushes on them.

Why is he obsessed with them? Because he’s obsessed with heroes. Andrew is nuts about stories, storybook heroism, larger-than-life people… they’re just wonderful.

Straight Andrew is obsessed with stories, and finds heroics much more exciting than girls.

Here’s an excerpt from one of my recent fics, demonstrating what I mean:

Dawn closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and plunged right in. “So… when it comes out, do you want to go see it?”

“Well, yeah! Of course! It’s Green Lantern!”

“I sort of meant… um… with me.”

Andrew paused, and looked at her, a slightly confused expression creeping onto his face.

Any moment now, he was going to say “of course” again and she was going to have to spend the next half hour trying to explain that, actually, she’d meant something romantic rather than just seeing it as friends. And Andrew was going to be completely baffled, because really, why on earth would you want to be romantic when you could be watching Green Lantern instead, and the conversation was going to get lengthy, and confusing, and why had she decided to do this, again?

Straight!Andrew is dorkish, and cute, and kind of adorable.

It’s not that he doesn’t like girls, he just doesn’t think they’re nearly as interesting as all the other stuff he’s into…


So, yeah – I think that’s why I get so annoyed by people writing Andrew as gay. If you work on the assumption that he’s gay, he actually becomes a character I’m much less interested in reading about. And that’s kinda sad.


Questions? Comments?

Comments

[rahirah]

Why couldn't Andrew be gay (or bi, or asexual) and still be obsessed with heroes? He seems to crush on Anya and Buffy, too.

[deird1]

Well, he could, but I've never seen him written that way. People tend to assume Andrew is gay and has a huge crush on Xander - which is why he acts the way he does.



(ETA: I've added an in-post ETA to that effect. I really hope this post didn't come across as at all offensive - it really really wasn't meant to be...)

[me-llamo-nic.livejournal.com]

I can see either, though I think I prefer straight Andrew. I don't think he's very sexualized at all, but is simply childish/child-like in his view of the world. Sex is one of many complicated things that Andrew just doesn't care to have in his life. It seems to me like Joss probably meant him to be gay, but I like him better straight asexaul.

[deird1]

I don't think he's very sexualized at all, but is simply childish/child-like in his view of the world.

*nods* Absolutely.

[penny-lane-42.livejournal.com]

If he’s straight, and yet still obsessed with Spike and Xander, then the obsession has nothing to do with him having crushes on them.

Why is he obsessed with them? Because he’s obsessed with heroes. Andrew is nuts about stories, storybook heroism, larger-than-life people… they’re just wonderful.

Straight Andrew is obsessed with stories, and finds heroics much more exciting than girls.

I can agree with all this. You've convinced me!

I've always seen him as asexual, actually. He fixates on specific people (Warren, Spike, Xander, Anya), not for any sexual reason, but because he's drawn to the narratives they let him create.

[deird1]

I think I'd probably see him as asexual, if not for the fact that I ship him with Dawn...

[angearia.livejournal.com]

I view Andrew as a boy with an unrealized and unexplored sexual naivete who is obsessed with stories and heroes. I just don't know what his orientation is and I think he doesn't know either. I think he just knows that guys are supposed to find 'girls hot' and he is enamored of heroic showman like Spike and more down-to-earth heroes like Xander.

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

Yep. Word.

[deird1]

*nods*

Quite possibly.

[spiralleds.livejournal.com]

For me he pinged as attracted to men way before he began his stay as a guestage in Buffy's home and hero worshiping the Scooby gang. Particularly around his relationship with Warren and First!Warren. To me the vibe was Warren recognizing Andrew's attraction to men and using that knowledge to manipulate Andrew into doing what he wanted him to do.

I also think Andrew's overriding characteristic is his desire to escape reality and the responsibility it brings by framing everything in larger-than-life stories.

[deird1]

To me the vibe was Warren recognizing Andrew's attraction to men and using that knowledge to manipulate Andrew into doing what he wanted him to do.

Interesting.

I can see what people are talking about when they see him as gay, but I've really never seen him that way. Angel, on the other hand...



I also think Andrew's overriding characteristic is his desire to escape reality and the responsibility it brings by framing everything in larger-than-life stories.

Absolutely. I really loved how that was addressed in Storyteller.

[next_to_normal]

I have no opinion on Andrew's sexuality (I think he could go either way, or both ways, or maybe he loves penguins), but this:

Why is he obsessed with them? Because he’s obsessed with heroes. Andrew is nuts about stories, storybook heroism, larger-than-life people… they’re just wonderful.

is spot on.

[deird1]

Oooh. *likes being spot on*


What would the Andrew!penguin be like?

[mabus101.livejournal.com]

Huh.

I started writing Andrew in a gay relationship simply because everyone I knew in fandom seemed to think he was gay. (Also, there were those Klingon love letters...)

[deird1]

So, who do you think the Klingon love letters were addressed to? :)

[jnb71976.livejournal.com]

Well, I ship Andrew and Dawn HARD, so thank you for your erudite thoughts on his obsession with the menz. He's obsessed with heroes - YES. Not obsessed with their penises.

I don't understand all the Andrew hate out there either. I adore him. And I don't see Dawn "maturing beyond him" either. The way they both approach the world is very complimentary.

[deird1]

Agreed. :)

[ms-scarletibis.livejournal.com]

I don't remember Andrew fanboying over Xander in the same manner he did with Spike (or maybe even Warren a bit).

With such comments as, "He is *so* cool... (catching himself) And, I mean, the girl is hot too," or "Isn't he just cutest thing?" (I'm pretty sure he said about Jonathan) or referring to Spike as "beautiful." He may very well be straight and an obvious total geek, but I think he's totally gay for Spike and maybe even Timothy Dalton. And that's okay (with me).

[deird1]

What about in Storyteller?

The filming of Xander's repair jobs, and rewatching Anya and Xander's conversation over and over...

[parcae-lj.livejournal.com]

Hey, any other guys here? Anyone? Anyone?

I'm so lonely.

See, as a straight guy, I can absolutely, 100% confirm that straight guys do not act the way Andrew does. There's a scene in Storyteller where Willow and Kennedy are making out, and Andrew's camera passes over them to focus on a windowframe Xander repaired. There is not a single straight guy on the face of the earth who would do this, and there never has been.

As for heroics - Xander? Seriously? I love Xander, but he's not exactly the biggest hero in S7. If it's just that Andrew is into heroics (and he is), then why are all his obsessions guys? I mean, he hero-worships Buffy, but Spike, Warren and Xander are on a whole different level.

[deird1]

...what about asexual guys, though? :)



(Plus - at least two of the other commenters are guys. And I'm pretty sure they're straight.)

[quinara]

OK, my Andrew is now asexual. (Don't ask me why I've never thought about this possibility before.) Because, dude, the moment you said it it all began to fit - Andrew's reaction to Spike and Xander is never that they're hot, it's that they're cool. He doesn't want Spike doing something sexy in his video, he wants him being cool and chucking a cigarette in his face. He cares about Xander's craftsmanship and interactions with Anya as much as/more than his Xander-shapedness. His instincts are to observe relationships rather than participate in them. People think he's childish (in the words of a friend, my reaction to people snogging at parties is very much an eleven year old's). I could see him anywhere on the romantic spectrum (maybe biromantic with a leaning towards homoromantic? If not aromantic), but he is so asexual.

Now I need to find the fic. :D

[deird1]

(Seriously, how have you not thought about Andrew being asexual before? I mean really...)

He doesn't want Spike doing something sexy in his video, he wants him being cool and chucking a cigarette in his face. He cares about Xander's craftsmanship and interactions with Anya as much as/more than his Xander-shapedness. His instincts are to observe relationships rather than participate in them.

Exactly.

[sueworld2003.livejournal.com]

If you want a deadly serious answer to this, well I view Andrew as a (barely) repressed gay man, as written by a bunch of writers too nervous to go the whole hog and deal with his sexual identity in a serious manner like they did Willow.

All the character traits they gave him came across as a caricature of a gay man, so much so my gay writer friend grew to loath poor Andrew and Joss's approach to male gayness because of this. :(

Yes, Andrew is also a big geek, but so were the rest of the trio and they didn't come across as half as camp as he did I'm afraid. Sorry.

[silver_galaxy]

When I was watching season 7 for the first time, I never even considered the possibility that Andrew was gay (of course this was before I got into fandom & discovered that there was such as thing as slash!)

To me he always come across as kind of childlike and there were things in his life that he considered more important than romantic relationships, kind of like what was in that fic excerpt that you quoted in your original post.

Considering the way he was written/portrayed on screen, it would just be too easy to make him gay. Falling back onto gay stereotypes and cliches. I would find it much more interesting to have a straight man who had personality traits that are normally associated with gay men.

Also Andrew/Dawn shipping!!! Best reason to consider Andrew to be straight :P

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I always have the impression that Andrew is still a 'don't know' right up to the end of BtVS (and in his cameo in Angel) - he is still more into telling tales of heroic deeds than 'insert tab A into slot B'.

He is pretty much asexual but could easily head in any direction - in that respect I think that at some point in the future he would probably class as 'bi' if he needed a label.

Oh - I know - I once wrote Dawn thinking about both Willow and Andrew that they had ‘vacillating sexuality’.

It was a description that Dawn had thought suited Willow well – after Kennedy there had been a couple of males before the next female companion; but she thought it suited Andrew even better. In fact Dawn had once thought that if both of them were in a hetero phase at the same time they could probably do worse than getting together with each other. Well apart from the ‘Your friend killed the love of my life’ bit, and the ‘You flayed my friend alive’ bit – but then everyone carried around some emotional baggage!

Gosh - I wrote that a long time ago - it's nearly five years since Ten Years After!

[duh-i-read.livejournal.com]

Hmmm.

I find myself mostly agreeing with the thoughts that Cannon!Andrew is mostly asexual, as in his obsession are on the heroes (or in Warren's case, villains) and this is not hampered by the gender of said obsession.

I think later on down Andrew's life, this translates to bisexuality, as I see an added layer of fluid sexual desired on top of hero worship.

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

My opinion appears to change depending on which comment I'm reading.

I think Andrew is ambiguously written in the show. I think there's plenty of arguments to be made in any which direction. Personally, I see Andrew as being largely immature and unaware of his own sexuality. He hero-worships the guys around him that he admires and likes to play with romantic fantasies (including putting himself in the female role as we see when he's mouthing along to Anya's lines while playing back the Xander/Anya conversation).

However, I think a lot of this is Andrew playing with narratives without giving much thought to himself. I think he would totally play the role of being attracted to another man, but might be at a loss as to what to do if that ever actually bore out in reality. Likewise with a woman.

So I could see Andrew going either way (or both ways...or no ways). I think there's room for him to develop and grow. Personally, I like him being gay because I have a thing for Spandrew. But mileage varies.

[coalitiongirl.livejournal.com]

I've always seen Andrew as bisexual, but almost childishly so. (Like in Seeing Red, his reaction to Warren's betrayal is "he never love- liked hanging out with us" or something similar.) He's got crushes the way a little kid might have on an older acquaintance s/he admires. And yeah, maybe people think that he's gay because of how he admires Spike's physical appearance, but I'm totally straight and I can still appreciate beauty in others of my sex. It doesn't make him straight or gay or confused, but just prone to hero worship like you suggest. :nods: And yeah, straight Andrew is way more fun. :D

[lavastar.livejournal.com]

This is very very interesting.

I feel like having Andrew have any sort of healthy, stable, non-hero-worshiping relationship during the series is totally not gonna work - and all we see of him, obvs, is in series, so because of the male hero worship/gay body language (that I feel is really apparent, but obviously YMMV, haha) - people tend to write him post-Chosen in fanfic by translating his immature S7 self over to any relationship he's going to have.

Whereas a straight version, since whether or not you see gayness in the show, he's never had a straight relationship either, is usually going to automatically have him being more mature, because people don't associate his straightness with the same level of immaturity and lack of growth.

So I feel like gay Andrew would be just peachy if his fantasy tendencies weren't carried over, and if fic writers allowed him to have some emotional growth. Obviously one of the most fun things about Andrew is his obsession with stories and heroes, but there are crazy-stalker ways to portray that, and there are fun-eccentric ways.



I feel like NONE of that made any sense. I was trying so hard to have coherent thoughts, and then, didn't really work. Oh well.

[neutralalienist.livejournal.com]

I do think the writers intended for Andrew to be gay, most of the time, eventually. But that doesn't mean he is, on a Watsonian level.

I always saw his fixation on Xander, Spike, and indeed Warren* as a mixture of his obsession with heroics and attraction. He didn't act the same way around the female heroes - he clearly admired them, but I never saw the same sort of vibe.

*Warren certainly wasn't a hero, but at the time, I think Andrew cared more about the "really cool, larger than life" bit than the altruistic parts.

[gillo]

I don't think Andrew understands sexuality really, so labels are not really relevant. I suspect he'd be gay if he had any clue what those feelings were about, but as it is he just has massive crushes on all the people he sees as being more like comic-book heroes than he could ever be. He's defined, and defines himself, almost entirely through his relationship to others - Tucker's brother, Warren's friend and so on. His cluelessness is what makes him endearing, when he's not just plain annoying, not any sexuality.