ANNOUNCEMENT: In an effort to build a space for queer people like myself, every Sunday I’ll be posting interviews, opinion pieces, listicles, reviews, and more focused on the LGBT community (and occasionally about the Latinx community since I am Latinx.) Welcome to Queerly Not Straight! Enjoy and leave a comment below if you have a suggestion for what I should cover next.
Fernando Goncalves, played by Olivier Huband, is an interesting character from the moment he appears on A Discovery of Witches. He is the calm, cool, and collected kind of vampire they all need during these troubling times. And more so than not, he’s the kind of presence that Sarah needs after the loss of Emily. For that, for the reprieve he provided a grieving partner, he has become dear to us.
For those that need a reminder of who he is, he’s Hugh de Clermont’s mate. Hugh was Philippe’s eldest vampire child. Not so surprisingly, Philippe was not accepting of his son’s mate. That’s what happens with bigots who refuse to change and who think the world should run the way they think it should. But back to the story because the bigot doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.
What does matter, and what we’re here for today, is Fernando. His relationship with Philippe imprinted on him in such a manner that when he was executed in France, it never left Fernando. It stuck with him as if it had just happened yesterday even though it occurred centuries ago. And watching him share this pain with Sarah, and the viewer alike, made us feel for him and want to see more of his story and that of Hugh.
Yes, we’d know how it’d end. But isn’t the journey the real story? Because personally, we want to see a world like A Discovery of Witches expand on queer stories. We especially want them to expand on that if it means seeing BIPOC LGBTQ+ men fall in love, have adventures, and thrive despite the world’s many obstacles. Plus if we connected with Fernando, there is a 100% chance that a person just like him stood to attention when this character entered the scene.
Ultimately, we want to see more of this two-thousand-year-old Portuguese and Muslim vampire. We want to see how Fernando met Hugh, the dance that went on between them as they fell in love, and the small intimate moments between them that transformed them into being mates. We also want to see what kind of man Fernando was, how he grew, and how he became the vampire we know now. Basically, we want it all.
This isn’t our only spin-off idea for A Discovery of Witches. But it’s certainly the one idea we can’t stop thinking about and that we hope studios take more of a chance on. Because the audience is there. We just need a network or studio to take the leap and expand on representation that normalizes the lives of everyone, including BIPOC LGBTQ+ men and those like them.
Queerly Not Straight posts every Sunday with opinion pieces, listicals, reviews, and more focused on the LGBT community (and occasionally about the Latinx community since I am Latinx.)
