The Book Of Queer (Documentary Series)

This over the top Discovery+ comedic documentary series retells history through the LGBTQIA+ lens it always should have had, showing all who watch that we have always been here, and we’re not going away — loud homophobes be damned. Each of the five episodes focuses on different historical figures, as told by queer historians, actors, singers, and performers; essentially a queer ensemble cast recreating some of history’s most notable moments, and over a dozen scholars of queer history.

Each episode will pull the rainbow curtain back on a variety of historical figures:

1.Kings & Queens - Uncover shocking revelations about Abraham Lincoln's queer affairs and learn about the gay organiser of the 1963 March on Washington, Bayard Rustin, along with stories about Eleanor Roosevelt and Akhenaten. 

2.Sashay It Forward - Some of the greatest artists and scientists of all time were queer! Learn the steamy details about Michelangelo, Da Vinci, Ma Rainey, Alan Turing, Sally Ride and Lynn Conway.

3.Queens’ Work Makes the Team Work - Learning how the power of lust inspired The Sacred Band of Thebes, ancient Greece's army of boy-friends and discovering the history of the rainbow flag.. Also featuring  Alexander the Great, Glenn Burke, Gilbert Baker, Harvey Milk and José Sarria.

4.Gay to Z - Shocking stories about King James and his edition of the Bible, erotic poems from an island of Lesbians and queer secrets about the old American West.

5.Pride or Die - Take a seat inside the Stonewall Inn as the queer revolution begins, and hear about Josephine Baker, the WWII bisexual megastar who was a French spy. Also featuring stories about oan of Arc, Stormé DeLarverie, Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson. 

For only being five episodes, The Book of Queer impressively packs in a lot of information. Each episode is determined to tell the stories of queer people that we may be unfamiliar with. We also have some shocking stories of gay men and women living out louder than we may have realized at the time. This is not your grandmother’s history class. The docuseries approaches telling these tales with the humor and energy and a vigor as if some bunch of drunk friends were having a conversation at a bar. Making people laugh while doling out historical context is trickier than you might think, and Queer does it with equal amounts grace and silliness. Not only does this show remind us of our often erased and ignored history, it tells the stories on our own terms. I could have never thought of educating queers in history in a way that it can be engaging, learning and laughing at the same time. Although, despite it being extremely funny, its hard to binge watch it given the amount of information and data thats thrown at our way. And that one huge negative for me, given how mostly I end up binging anything episodic in nature. Maybe one episode a day is all you should watch, to keep the humor alive. While these comedic sketches barely scratch the surface of our collective history, this is an endlessly amiable and approachable primer on all the stories to explore in more depth. (5/10)