Online, conservative media writers are upset over a recent episode of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series that featured a gay romance.
Lindsay Kornick wrote on Newsbusters, the series “unfortunately seems to be continuing its sad decline into liberal propaganda,”
In the latest episode, “Homecoming,” Carlos, the High School musical coreographer, asks a male cast member, Seb, to be his date for the homecoming dance. At first, Seb appears to have rejected Carlos, but eventually he arrives at the Homecoming dance and the two do a slow dance together.
“The only thing worse than the horribly dull and pandering plot is the media glorifying it,” Kornick added. “Hollywood will stop at nothing to normalize any degeneracy, and it looks like Disney+ is just another platform to do it.”
On CBN.com Steve Warren called the episode “the latest blatant example of children’s media producers pushing an LGBTQ agenda on children… Disney and other Hollywood elites have gone out of their way to embrace the LGBTQ agenda.”
Kornick observed that this show “assumes that people beyond Hollywood degenerates are clamoring for kids to talk about sexual orientation.”
Tim Ferdele, one of the producers of the show said “I saw in Frankie (Carlos) what I see more and more in a younger generation, which is a freedom of expression, of really being who they truly are in a way that I certainly didn’t feel when I was in high school and I was in the closet,” so he sympathizes with this character and his sexuality.
A lot of people assumed that Ryan Evans in the original 2006 High School musical was gay. “I think we kind of forget where we were 13 years ago. Gay marriage wasn’t legal, so even though it seems like that was 50 years away, it really wasn’t,” said Ferdele.
Carlos and Seb’s love story is not the only way “High School Musical: The Musical: The Series” touches on LBGTQ themes. Nini (Olivia Rodrigo), who plays Gabriella in the theater kids’ production, has two moms. Ricky (Joshua Bassett), who plays Troy, sports a Pride T-shirt. Seb lands the role of Sharpay, originated by Ashley Tisdale.