Episode 66: Transcript
Portal Fantasies Are So Gay
Transcription by Keffy
[00:00:00] Intro music plays: Drums with a bass drop and more science fictional bells and percussion.
Annalee: [00:00:02] This episode of Our Opinions Are Correct was recorded live before a Zoom audience for the OutWrite 2020 festival which is DC's annual LGBTQ litfest.
[00:00:20] Welcome to Our Opinions Are Correct a podcast about the meaning of science fiction and its relationship to society. I'm Annalee Newitz. I'm a science journalist who writes science fiction.
Charlie Jane: [00:00:33] I'm Charlie Jane Anders. I'm a science fiction writer who thinks a lot about science.
Annalee: [00:00:40] And today, we're going to talk about portal fantasies. The history of them, why we love them, why we briefly hated them. And joining us to talk about all of this is Na'amun Tilahun, author of the The Wrath and Atheneum series, which starts with the amazing novel, The Root, which you should all go out and buy.
Charlie Jane: [00:00:59] So good.
Annalee: [00:00:59] Thank you so much for coming, Na'amen. The second novel's out, too, right?
Na'amen: [00:01:03] Yeah, the second novel, The Tree, is out, and the third should be out next year.
Annalee: [00:01:07] Yes. Okay, everyone click buy right now.
Charlie Jane: [00:01:10] Yeah! Woo!
[00:01:10] Segment change music plays. Drums with a bass line including bass drops.
Annalee: [00:01:37] All right, so let's start by just talking about what a portal fantasy is. This is kind of a longstanding fantasy genre. Charlie Jane, do you want to give us a quick overview?
Charlie Jane: [00:01:50] Yeah, so basically a portal fantasy, as its name suggests, is about a doorway. it's basically about, you go through a portal or an opening or a wardrobe or whatever, and you find yourself in another world. A world of adventure and usually there's often like, mystical destiny or quests or things as well. And sometimes the person who goes through the portal is chosen and it's basically like someone from our world, from the ordinary world goes through a portal and finds themselves in a fantastical magical world and it's different from urban fantasy like Supernatural, or arguably Harry Potter, or epic fantasy—
Annalee: [00:02:29] Although Harry Potter might be...
Charlie Jane: [00:02:31] Like Lord of the Rings or Game of Thrones because people come from our world and go to the fantasy world. Harry Potter's kind of an edge case.
Annalee: [00:02:37] Yeah, what do you think, Na'amen, do you think Harry Potter is a portal fantasy?
Na'amen: [00:02:41] Yeah, I think if you define portal fantasies a little more loosely, instead of going from one world to another—
Charlie Jane: [00:02:47] Right.
Na'amen: [00:02:48] As going to a new reality or new perspective, then things like Harry Potter sort of fit in there, but it is like a very—it's where two genres merge, really.
Annalee: [00:02:57] Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense.
Charlie Jane: [00:02:59] Totally.
Annalee: [00:02:59] It does have a bit of urban fantasy to it in a way.
Na'amen: [00:03:03] Yeah. I think it's harder and harder to separate genres nowadays.
Annalee: [00:03:07] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:07] That's so true.
Annalee: [00:03:08] That's really true. And I mean, when we were talking about this before the show, I was saying to Charlie that portal fantasies really go back quite a long way, to sort of medieval fairy tales about going to fairy land and being stolen away from your bed at night, taken to another world. And then there's consequences in the real world for what happens.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:28] Yes.
Annalee: [00:03:28] And I think that's a big part of portal fantasies, is some of them deal with the consequences and some of them don't.
Na'amen: [00:03:34] Yeah
Annalee: [00:03:34] But then also, I think, for our purposes today, mostly what we're talking about are the more modern portal fantasies that kind of start with Alice in Wonderland.
Charlie Jane: [00:03:45] Yeah.
Annalee: [00:03:45] [Crosstalk] down a long wet hole. Or Chronicles of Narnia, where you go into the closet in order to become gay, which is very exciting. Na’amen, do you have any thoughts on like, where portal fantasies begin for you, when you look back on kind of Greatest Hits of Portal fantasies?
Na'amen: [00:04:03] I mean, so I think there are three big portal fantasies that are like the big three. And it's Alice in Wonderland. It's Peter Pan.
Charlie Jane: [00:04:13] Oh, yeah.
Annalee: [00:04:14] Wait, of course.
Na'amen: [00:04:15] And a little differently—
Charlie Jane: [00:04:16] Totally.
Na'amen: [00:04:16] It’s Wizard of Oz. Because Wizard of Oz is sort of exclusively American. And it's more of a visual medium than a book series. People are more familiar with the film than they are with the book series.
Annalee: [00:04:30] Yeah. Although the book series was—
Charlie Jane: [00:04:31] That’s so true.
Annalee: [00:04:31] —popular, like it was—
Na'amen: [00:04:33] It was super popular. [Crosstalk]
Charlie Jane: [00:04:36] Yeah, at the time were like, there were like, plays and other film versions. And it was it was huge.
Na'amen: [00:04:40] Well, and the book series actually has a lot of interesting queerness and gender stuff in it that doesn't translate into many of the adaptations of it.
Annalee: [00:04:48] That's true.
Na'amen: [00:04:49] Yeah, I think those are the big three for me that are like the beginning of portal fantasy as we know it.
Annalee: [00:04:54] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:04:54] Yeah. I didn’t even think—
Na'amen: [00:04:57] [Crosstalk] the chains on us for like, people want to go home, sort of ideas.
Charlie Jane: [00:05:03] Oh, right. Yeah, ‘cause Wizard of Oz is all about wanting to go home. And, you know, yeah.
Annalee: [00:05:08] Yeah, it's such a weird—it's so funny that in Wizard of Oz, the quest is to go home. Like, I made it through the portal, accidentally, in this case. And then now all I want to do is go home. Whereas, you know, modern portal fantasies like Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan McGuire, it's basically, please get me back to the fucking portal. Like that's all that the characters want is like they get there and they're like, this is an awesome place. And then they leave and they just spend all their time trying to get back. There's no place like the portal basically.
Charlie Jane: [00:05:43] So we actually have a clip from Alice in Wonderland. This is from the Disney Alice in Wonderland. I'm super excited. And this is her going through the portal.
Alice: [00:05:52] What a peculiar place to have a party. You know, Dina, we really shouldn’t—oh! Be doing this. After all, we haven’t been invited and curiosity often leads to trouble-le-le-le [Sound of harps as she falls]. Goodbye, Dina! Goodbye!
Na'amen: [00:06:18] I mean, I forgot the cat existed, really.
Annalee: [00:06:19] I did too, I forgot the cat being like, “Bye bye!” This is how you know your—
Charlie Jane: [00:06:24] And then her—
Annalee: [00:06:27] Her skirt breaks her fall.
Charlie Jane: [00:06:27] Her skirt turns into a parachute. I love that her skirt turns into a parachute. It’s so great. I love it.
Annalee: [00:06:31] I need to get your dress like that, Charlie.
Charlie Jane: [00:06:34] Yes, I need a parachute skirt. I need an Alice in Wonderland dress super bad.
Annalee: [00:06:37] Okay, so Na’amen, why do you like portal fantasies? Tell us what's good about portal fantasies.
Na'amen: [00:06:42] I mean, speaking for myself, and personally, I love the idea of going to another world. Like just being a queer brown kid, I didn't feel like I fit in anywhere. And that's also why I was so angry at portal fantasies. My mother showed me the Wizard of Oz when I was really young. And I was just so angry at her wanting to go home. I was so enraged, because I was like, go back to the dustbowl? I was like, if I got swept into a mystical world where people like, you might be the chosen one. I'd be like, Oh, cool. I'm here. I've never even been—
Annalee: [00:07:18] Yeah. [Crosstalk]
Charlie Jane: [00:07:20] Totally.
Annalee: [00:07:21] Where you get a cyborg friend and a lion friend, it’s like—
Na'amen: [00:07:23] Right?
Annalee: [00:07:23] Fuck Earth.
Na'amen: [00:07:25] Why am I going home? Also I'm an orphan. That woman is trying to take my dog. I don't need any of this mess.
Annalee: [00:07:32] Yeah.
Na'amen: [00:07:33] I think for me, the idea of going to another land, which was more open and more full of possibilities was something I loved.
Annalee: [00:07:42] What about you, Charlie Jane.
Charlie Jane: [00:07:45] I mean, the thing I love about portal fantasies is kind of the sense of, I don't know, irony, detachment? Because what makes something a portal fantasy for me is that you come from our world. You come from present day, whatever, 20th, 21st century Earth, and then you find yourself in this colorful fantasy magical land. But you still bring all your earth stuff with you. And you still have all your kind of knowledge of Earth pop culture, and tropes. And it's not like you were grown up in Westeros and all you know is Westeros culture. You know this whole other frame of reference, that is what the reader is also bringing to it. So you're kind of like a bridge between the reader or the audience and the rest of the world, which I think is really cool.
[00:08:31] And I think that that's part of why people sometimes don't like portal fantasies, is that level of detachment. It's not like you're a native to the place. You didn’t grow up—I mean, there are characters who grew up there, but the main character usually isn't a native and so I really love that. I think that that makes it way more interesting and way more fun. How about you, Annalee? Why do you love portal fantasies?
Annalee: [00:08:52] So I can say, I mean, I love different portal fantasies for different reasons. But I wanted to say one thing that I think is super interesting about portal fantasies. And this is what was making me think about the queer theorist Eve Sedgwick's book Between Men, which was a 1990s classic of queer theory, where Sedgwick was basically just talking about Victorian novels where two men are obviously fucking, but they can't be and so one of them has a girlfriend. Yay! Oh, I love that cover!
Charlie Jane: [00:09:26] Oh, my God.
Annalee: [00:09:25] Yes. Na’amen is holding up the cover for those of you who can't see what's going on. Awesome.
Na'amen: [00:09:29] It’s delightful.
Annalee: [00:09:30] And so what Sedgwick says is, the way that these novels kind of work out having a queer story without having it is they have what's called a heterosexual alibi, which is basically just one of them has a girlfriend or a wife or something like that. Hopefully, she's dead, you know, so that she's kind of not really in the way. Or she's just off screen all the time.
[00:09:50] And I feel like the secondary world that you pop into through the portal is kind of like that heterosexual alibi. It's an alibi because you're allowed to do whatever the hell you want because it's a fantasy world. So say you go into the fantasy world and you do something naughty, like, you break the law, you commit a crime, you engage in sex that you wouldn't normally or other kinds of stuff. But it's like, it's okay. It's the portal alibi, you know?
[00:10:20] And then when you go back to the real world, maybe there's consequences or maybe not, maybe it's just like, well, back here now I'm, I'm me, I have my regular life. And so I think it's really fun when reading or watching a portal fantasy to see how they work that out. What is it an alibi for? What does it allow you to do? And sort of see what the consequences are, if any?
[00:10:42] That kind of brings me to my next question, which is, are portal fantasies basically inherently queer?
Na'amen: [00:10:49] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:49] Yes. Definitely.
Annalee: [00:10:51] Yes. Moving on, moving on.
Charlie Jane: [00:10:53] I mean, okay, I'm just gonna say, you go through a closet door. In the case of Narnia, you literally go through the closet door and you emerge into a colorful, sparkly world where everything is just like whoo! And there’s people… In The Wizard of Oz, there's witches wearing basically like frou-frou dresses and like, waving wands around and saying, like, I’m gonna give you ruby slippers. It's so… Na’amen, what do you think?
Na'amen: [00:11:23] I agree, it's very queer. I think it also sort of ties into what you were saying, Charlie Jane, about the difference between second world fantasy and portal fantasy about being a native or not? And sort of, do you feel like a native of the culture you're in right now? And do you feel a part of the society you're a part of? And being queer in America, you sort of don't in many ways. And so I feel like the portal fantasy is sort of an allegory for that in some ways. Of going to another space that might be more accepting.
Annalee: [00:11:53] Yeah, basically, you walk through the door of the queer space, and it's kind of a portal fantasy. It's like, oh, now I'm in a club, where everybody's dancing with whoever they want, and whatever gender presentation they want.
Na'amen: [00:12:07] Yeah. All these things that the the quote unquote, real world told me were wrong or didn't exist, are here laid out in front of me.
Annalee: [00:12:14] Yeah, I wonder if the the portal alibi thing is a part of fantasies where people ultimately feel more comfortable in the real world. And they kind of use the portal to go to let off steam but they really just want to get back to the real world. Whereas the queer portal fantasy is where you want to stay inside the portal, and it's like, the real world is horrible. So…
Na'amen: [00:12:42] I think that—
Charlie Jane: [00:12:42] So if you’re not—
Annalee: [00:12:43] Yeah, go ahead.
Charlie Jane: [00:12:44] If you're not fully out yet. It's like, yeah, I spent the weekend in the magical world. And then I came back to my wife and kids and like, oh, that was a business trip I just took and yeah, oh, no, no, I didn't stay there. I just visited oh yeah. Oh, yeah. No, totally.
Annalee: [00:12:59] What happens in the portal stays in the portal.
Na'amen: [00:13:03] Like the book by Catherine Valente, Palimpsest, feels sort of incredibly queer in their groping to get back there. And the sexuality of all of that book. That was, I thought that was really an underated—
Annalee: [00:13:16] I love Palimpsest. I feel like we could talk about that forever. But I mean, first of all, it's about a sexually transmitted portal, which is amazing. Because you can only get into this beautiful dream world by having sex with someone who's been there. And then once you've done that, you get a map, a tattoo of a map on your body, which is one part of the city. And if people can get together, they can visit each other's maps. And it's like, yeah, it's such an incredible novel, very, very queer.
[00:13:47] Again, like Every Heart a Doorway, where it's everyone kind of has their own world that they go to. And what the characters have in common is that they've all been to these other worlds that are very accepting of all kinds of sexuality.
[00:14:01] All right, well, let's take a little break. And when we come back, we're going to talk about why portal fantasies weren't cool. And then they became cool again.
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Charlie Jane: [00:14:21] You know, I remember like, 10-12 years ago, hearing a lot of people say that portal fantasies were over, we're done with them. We don't want them anymore. And, why was that? Why do you guys think that there was this kind of backlash against portal fantasies? Na’amen, do you have any thoughts?
Na'amen: [00:14:41] I mean, I think part of it was the idea that portal fantasies were all about trying to get back to the real world, right? And also, so my little quick theory on that? Misogyny. Because when we talk about the big three, and we're talking about Alice, Peter Pan, and Dorothy. Yeah. All three are young girl characters written by men. And all three of them are sort of written at a time where women didn't have as many options.
Annalee: [00:15:16] Mm hmm.
Na'amen: [00:15:18] And so this sort of prevailing propaganda of, even when women are offered a fantasy world, what they're going to want is to come back to the dustbowl of Kansas. The [crosstalk] home part is where you are. So I think there's this weird linkage in there, which is messed up. And I also think that people had a really narrow idea of what portal fantasy could be. And that happens with every subgenre, like people had a really narrow idea of a second world fantasy for a long time and what it could be.
Annalee: [00:15:51] Yeah, I feel like the—
Charlie Jane: [00:15:52] That makes sense, yeah.
Annalee: [00:15:52] —hatred or not hatred, but I feel like the the kind of rejection of the portal fantasy came roughly around the time that people were really selling a lot of urban fantasy and supernatural romance. Urban fantasy books and movies and TV. Basically, I think Na’amen is completely right, that there was like this view that portal fantasies were very limited, that they had to kind of be a particular type of story arc. And so the only way we could break out of that was to bring the fantasy into the real world.
[00:16:27] But even when you brought them into the real world, one of the many tropes in urban fantasy is that there's a secret underworld of magic. So it's never like, well, sometimes it is fully integrated. Like sometimes you get a superhero story where like, everybody knows about superheroes, but—
Charlie Jane: [00:16:45] There's definitely everybody knows about magic in some urban fantasies, but yeah.
Annalee: [00:16:49] Sometimes. it's pretty rare. I mean, Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell is a really interesting example of a novel where everybody kind of knows about magic but they just don't think it works anymore.
Na'amen: [00:17:01] Also, a series by Kim Harrison, her In the Hollow series, is set sort of like 20 years after a genetic virus wiped out a bunch of humanity and all the supernaturals came out on Halloween. Because they knew no one would believe them so it’d give them a buffer of time to set stuff up before people started to panic.
Annalee: [00:17:18] Oh, interesting.
Na'amen: [00:17:20] Yeah that series is—
Charlie Jane: [00:17:21] That’s really cool.
Annalee: [00:17:21] So everyone knows about the supernaturals, then.
Na'amen: [00:17:24] Yeah, everyone knows, there's a special police force for them. Hilariously enough, tomatoes carried the disease that wiped out people. So now only supernaturals eat anything with tomatoes, because everyone else is afraid of them.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:36] No more pizza. Oh, man.
Annalee: [00:17:38] Oh, man, well.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:40] Pasta, oh man.
Annalee: [00:17:41] At last, the New World punished the people who came and stole all their crops god damn it.
Charlie Jane: [00:17:45] Oh my God. But I mean, I think that part of the portal fantasy backlash does have to do with that sense of like this… the kind of the irony or the whatever of people who are not from the supernatural world or not from the magical worlds. And part of what people… I think, if you've read a million fantasy novels, and you're used to all the tropes, you don't want to follow a character who doesn't already know everything. You want to follow a character who already knows the entire world inside and out. And they're just like, yep, I was born in this world. I am a native, I understand it completely. Because that's the perspective of people who are like really serious diehard fantasy readers.
[00:18:24] Whereas I think portal fantasies originally, were kind of catering to people who hadn't read a lot of fantasy books—
Annalee: [00:18:28] Tourists.
Charlie Jane: [00:18:28] And did want to follow people who were—yeah. Who were visiting from the regular world. And could relate to that kind of like, oh, this is all new to me, kind of thing. So I think in general, what what's happened in genre publishing, in general, is that people… Books are now very much geared towards people who just read tons and tons of fantasy and science fiction and know everything already, and are gonna be like 201 or 301 level readers rather than 101, kind of. I think.
Annalee: [00:19:02] Yeah. No, I think that's right. And I mean, also, I think that with stuff like urban fantasy, where you are kind of often plunged into the world from the perspective of someone who's from the magical underbelly or the magical subway station or however, they formulate it. I think that that… I mean, it allows you to tell things like detective stories or romances, which have their own tropes that are really familiar. So there’s certain ways that the story is familiar, even if you're not a diehard fantasy fan. If you just know, okay, how do detective stories work? Oftentimes, the detective protagonist in those stories is kind of from a marginal place and so they're not… They’re not from high society or someone who lives in a suburb. They’re like, they live in a gritty apartment and drink a lot or whatever. I don't know, I've only ever watched Jessica Jones. I don't know how detectives work.
Na'amen: [00:19:57] Those are all very true.
Annalee: [00:20:02] Well, so why did they come back? I mean, why did portal fantasies come back? That's what I want to know. Na’amen, you tell us why.
Na'amen: [00:20:07] Okay, so I think that what happened is we started to get into a lot more meta narratives in fiction, a lot more boundary-crossing fiction. And people started to see new ways to tell portal fantasy stories. I mean, you were just talking, Charlie Jane, about someone being at a 301 level and wanting to have that. And then people were like, well, why don't I write a portal fantasy, where someone is a fantasy bot, and then get sucked into the [crosstalk] world and knows the tropes and is like, sweet Jesus.
[00:20:49] I read a book, Oh, I wish I could remember the title and name, I'll tweet it out when I remember. Where it's a university that's connected by all these portals to different lands, where they make the students go and pretend to be Dark Lords to keep the energy going to keep the cycle going. And it's like one of my—
Charlie Jane: [00:21:05] Oh my God.
Na'amen: [00:21:06] This is my thesis, I was the Dark Lord on this planet. And then he gets sucked back in. And all the heroes are like drunken messes 20 years later, and he has to pretend to be the hero against the Dark Lord now. So like, there was a lot of interesting stuff happening. I think you also saw it with recent cartoons, like Star Versus the Forces of Evil which sort of flipped the narrative and had the magical princess shuttled off to Earth, because they were like, your magic is too dangerous to be here, right now. Go to earth and train. And so she sort of the narrative person in a reverse portal fantasy.
Annalee: [00:21:41] Oh, right, because Earth is her secondary world, basically.
Na'amen: [00:21:45] Yeah. But it also goes back and forth. So it’s a very sort of meta, new genre-bending place to go with this kind of world.
Annalee: [00:21:54] Do you think it's a new idea that we would go back and forth between the other world and our world. Because I feel like the three big ones that we talked about, like Oz and Alice, it's all like, it's one trip. You go, you work really hard to come back, and that's it. You're done.
Na'amen: [00:22:14] And that's what's interesting, because when we talk about Alice, the show that I remember more than any anyone is, well, number one, the movie with Carol Channing as the White Queen, which is [crosstalk]
Charlie Jane: [00:22:24] Oh yeah.
Na'amen: [00:22:26] So good. It's like, four hours or something. So great. But other than that, Disney had basically a live action TV series that was Alice. And every episode was her going back to Wonderland and hanging with her friends. And then going back to the real world.
Annalee: [00:22:41] Oh, wow.
Charlie Jane: [00:22:43] Really?
Na'amen: [00:22:43] They basically made this TV series where, where door was just open.
Annalee: [00:22:46] When was that?
Na'amen: [00:22:47] Oh, I don't know. I saw the reruns on Disney. I want to say it was the [crosstalk]
Annalee: [00:22:53] Okay.
Na'amen: [00:22:54] But it was like every episode was her going back to Wonderland and then coming back to her real world. And I think with Wizard of Oz, I personally have a very big love for Return to Oz which is the Fairuza Balk movie where Dorothy is in a mental Institute and is desperate to go back to Oz. And I was like, if you haven't seen it, it's great.
Annalee: [00:23:18] I love Fairuza Balk so much.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:21] I have not seen that.
Annalee: [00:23:23] We need to watch that, I stan her because of The Craft. But lots of other things, yeah.
Na'amen: [00:23:30] It’s about her escaping a mental Institute because she kept talking about Oz and being desperate to go back and ending up back in this new Oz with new friends and new enemies.
Annalee: [00:23:40] Interesting.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:40] Wow.
Annalee: [00:23:42] Yeah, and that's that’s kind of inflection point right? Like the sort of the ‘90s and the aughts are when we're starting to see a turn back toward portal fantasies, like the reinvention of the portal fantasy.
Charlie Jane: [00:23:51] I think it's really the last 10 years or so. I don't know. I mean, I was gonna bring up a few things. We talked about Every Heart a Doorway. There's also… and Every Heart a Doorway has that level of irony. It has that level of we're older now and we want to go back. We want to go back to the magical world. And we're also kind of a little bit more fucked up and jaded. And we're kind of just… It's more explicitly queer.
[00:24:15] And similarly The Magicians, the book series. But also, especially the TV series, really kind of comments on the portal fantasy and the idea of going back and forth. And actually, hey, we've got a clip from The Magicians TV show, which I guess…
Annalee: [00:24:27] Here it is!
The Magicians: [00:24:28] It is here that our story begins. A land of magic.
Am I hallucinating?
If you were, how would asking me help?
Annalee: [00:24:38] And hot boys.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:39] And that’s—and very hot boys. Oh my God, look how hot.
Annalee: [00:24:42] I love his vest.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:43] Especially season one.
Na'amen: [00:24:44] I guess I should watch it. I never watched it.
Annalee: [00:24:48] It’s a bumpy ride.
Charlie Jane: [00:24:50] The first—it’s really fun.
Na'amen: [00:24:52] I wasn’t a huge of the book theory, so I was like, I guess I shouldn’t watch the. But maybe I’ll check out the first season.
Annalee: [00:24:57] I think… I mean, honestly, the TV series. It takes it in a different direction.
Na'amen: [00:25:03] Okay.
Annalee: [00:25:04] And Sarah Gamble, who was the show runner—
Na'amen: [00:25:07] Who I love. I’ve seen a bunch of her work, yes.
Annalee: [00:25:10] Yeah, so she takes it in the right direction and the characters are adorable like they're just yeah, it's it's definitely…
Charlie Jane: [00:25:18] Elliott. Elliott is amazing. It’s worth it just for Elliott.
Annalee: [00:25:22] And everybody is humping everybody, and it's… anyway. Annalee’s way of rating a show? Is everyone humping everybody? Well, gets an extra point for that.
Charlie Jane: [00:25:32] So the thing that y'all mentioned about portal fantasies, where you can go back and forth and it's not so much like a trip and then you come home. You know, it made me think about Doctor Who because Doctor Who to me is like a big portal fantasy. The TARDIS is literally like the wardrobe from Narnia except it’s cooler because it leads to all these different fantasy worlds.
[00:25:53] And, you know, in the original Doctor Who series from like the ‘60s ‘70s, and ‘80s, somebody from Earth gets in the TARDIS and they're off on like a long voyage. And they can't go home because the TARDIS can never find their way home again. And so they're just traveling, traveling, traveling, traveling. And finally they get home and I guess in the ‘70s there was a little bit more going back and forth. But in the new series, in 2005, the thing that they changed was that going back and forth was much smoother. And the companions have family and they have friends back home and they check in with their family and friends every time that they go home.
Annalee: [00:26:25] They have a special mobile device that they can use to call home.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:29] It can phone home.
Annalee: [00:26:29] Stay in touch.
Charlie Jane: [00:26:29] Their phone actually works. Yeah, they can. Yeah they can phone home and it's not so much of like you're on this journey and you can't possibly reconnect with your home. It's just like, nope, we're going. Oh, yeah, I'm gonna go home, check out, hang out with my mom and then I'm gonna go back on another trip.
Annalee: [00:26:45] Hmm. I wonder if as we think about like the rejuvenation of portal fantasies to return to that question of like, who's a native of what land. I feel like these are these are definitely fantasies about sexuality and going in and out of the closet, but also about immigration. And who gets to come through because a lot of these are one way portals. It's like, Oh, well, we get to go there. But it's not like all the fucking bunnies and wacky Mad Hatters and shit come here, right? Like, that doesn't really happen.
Na'amen: [00:27:17] I was gonna… An interesting TV show that sort of addressed that badly. But it's still entertaining and ran for like 15, whatever. Stargate. [Crosstalk] which they literally go through a portal. There are a bunch of native people on the other side, some more advanced than them, some less advanced. And a lot of it is negotiating who wants them dead? Who wants them alive? They're not great about race all the time, or most of the time. But, I mean, when the only black member of your team is a former alien slave, you're sort of like, okay, we know what we're getting into here.
Annalee: [00:27:50] Yeah.
Na'amen: [00:27:51] But there's a lot of interesting stuff that happens in that show in terms of colonialism. And an interesting framing of, in the beginning at least, Egypt as a colonizer. Because all the aliens use Egyptian mythology in the beginning. And later in the series, it expands. But it sort of is this weird reversal of colonialism?
Annalee: [00:28:12] Yeah, what about that long running TV series where all of the fairytale characters are like living in Maine or something?
Na'amen: [00:28:18] Oh, yeah. Once Upon a Time.
Annalee: [00:28:20] One Upon a Time, yeah. Although I guess that's different because that's not a portal it's more just a secret underground of fairy tale characters.
Na'amen: [00:28:27] No, it is a portal because they get sucked from their own land. It's sort of like What's that Bill Willingham… The Fable series.
Charlie Jane: [00:28:36] Fables, right. And there is kind of a trend of using magical creatures to talk about immigration more explicitly in a lot of these shows. Grimm is the same way, that TV show.
Na'amen: [00:28:51] Yes, like, exactly.
Annalee: [00:28:52] What happens in Grimm?
Na'amen: [00:28:56] Grimm is about a police officer in Portland, whose aunt who's dying of cancer comes visit him and tells him that he's a Grimm, which means he has—he’s super strong and fast and all that but also he can see these inhuman things called Wesen that hide among us. And a lot of them are based on sort of Grimm fairy tales. So one of the main groups are the Blutbaden, which kind of turn nto wolf-like creatures, and many of them go crazy when they see the color red and attack it no matter what.
Annalee: [00:29:28] Okay. That’s handy.
Na'amen: [00:29:32] But it also becomes about alliances within the community and the community wanting purism because like two different Wesen marry each other and the rest of the community tries to come after them and kill them. So they do weave in other stuff. I watched that whole series during quarantine very recently.
Annalee: [00:29:47] Yeah, I've actually heard only good things about it. So yeah.
Na'amen: [00:29:52] The last the last couple seasons, and there's there's a whole sex assault by magic that sort of gets ignored where I'm like, uh, that’s a problem.
Annalee: [00:30:03] That happens a lot, actually. I feel like that's part of the portal alibi is a little bit like, oh, well, shit happened but like it didn't mean anything because it was magic. And it’s like, uh huh, yeah.
Na'amen: [00:30:15] And also in the reverse direction, the comic book I Hate Fairyland. I don’t know if you guys have read that?
Annalee: [00:30:20] No.
Charlie Jane: [00:30:20] No.
Annalee: [00:30:21] Tell us more.
Na'amen: [00:30:21] [Crosstalk] Girl who gets sucked into Fairyland and has to go on this quest to solve it. But she's unable to do it and is there for 40 years stuck in the same little girl body.
Charlie Jane: [00:30:33] Oh, wow.
Na'amen: [00:30:36] The angry… trying to get laid at certain points. And people are like you're a child. And she's like, I'm 40 fucking years old. I hate everything.
Annalee: [00:30:42] Oh, no.
Na'amen: [00:30:43] And I just want to go home. And meanwhile, other kids come through and like find their way home in like five minutes. And she's just like, I hate everyone. And she turns super violent and starts killing people. But it's an interesting take on like, bitterness and anger and resentment and—
Charlie Jane: [00:30:57] Man.
Annalee: [00:30:58] That is so cool.
Charlie Jane: [00:30:58] I want to read that.
Annalee: [00:31:00] I was just thinking is that another interesting twist on the portal fantasy now is the show Upload, which is about a guy whose brain is uploaded into a virtual world. And we see a lot in that show about class and how your experience of the virtual world depends on how much money you have. And he's in this really fucked up position where his rich girlfriend who he was about to break up with has paid for his upload. And so anytime he wants to get anything in the virtual world, she has to pay for it. Even if it's just like he wants to get… it's anything. If you want to upgrade your avatar or you want to eat a doughnut or whatever. It's like as he walks through the world, money pops up. But it's interesting because it does allow you to have these really obvious class allegories.
Charlie Jane: [00:31:51] Okay, so we're gonna take a quick break. And when we come back, we're gonna ask Na’amen about his portal fantasies.
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Charlie Jane: [00:32:10] Na’amen, as you know, I love The Wrath & Athenaeum series so much, and I'm so excited that the third books is coming out next year. It’s so freakin’ good. And part of what I love about it is that it's a version of the portal fantasy that I've never seen before. Partly because it kind of takes the portal fantasy and mashes it up with a little bit of urban fantasy and a little bit of Game of Thrones-y secondary world fantasy.
[00:32:33] Can you tell us more about that? Like, how did you approach the portal fantasy? And what made you decide to include that aspect in the books?
Na'amen: [00:32:40] Well, it's actually interesting, because it started as two separate books. It started as basically two worlds, as two separate stories that I was doing. And I'd started both of them. And just something wasn't clicking. Second world wasn't working, urban fantasy wasn't working. But I was still liking the stories. And I realized that the mythos was close enough, that if I twisted them together, it could be something different. And it just grew from there. It became really interesting once I did that.
Charlie Jane: [00:33:14] Yeah, because it's like, I've never seen that before, where you have the one character in our world who, creatures are coming through, and he's having to fight them. And he finds out that there's this other world that he has to go to. But then we switch and then we're in that other world and there's someone who's like a native of that other world who's dealing with a whole other set of problems. That was just such a cool approach. And do you feel like portal fantasy gets more interesting when you mash it up with other stuff? Do you feel like it kind of gets a new lease on life when you add other elements to it?
Na'amen: [00:33:45] I think I think adding other elements can add layers to it that weren't there before, especially when you're talking about… one of the things we're talking about is the allegory for immigration and stuff like that. And when you have POVs on both sides in both worlds, it becomes a more nuanced view of what that means for people to cross over and what it means for a world to suddenly have this influx of creatures that they never knew existed or creatures that they have historical records about but view is lesser beings. So how did these people begin to work together and deal with that?
[00:34:20] I think most fantasy when you add an element of almost real world POVs, you get more detailed ideas and more nuanced ideas like the Laurie J. Mark series about colonialism, stuff like that. When you look at it from a different point of view, it becomes something much more interesting.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:38] Yeah. And so did you get any pushback or did people feel like you're doing portal fantasy wrong, or did you…?
Na'amen: [00:34:44] I got a little bit of… I mean, I didn't get pushback pushback, I think. I got a little bit of pushback because there were so many queer characters in it.
Charlie Jane: [00:34:53] Oh, yeah.
Na'amen: [00:34:55] Where it was like it just doesn't make sense for all of them be queer and I was like, queer people hang out queers. I don’t know what to tell you, we have a lot of queer people in our circle of friends. That's what happens. So it makes more sense. Mostly that was the pushback I got. I think I was lucky that when the editor picked up my book, it was someone I'd known for years. And it was someone who knew my politics, really well, knew that I'm a loudmouth really well. Someone who knew that what I was basically going to write was going to be very queer and very POC-focused. And they were down with that.
Charlie Jane: [00:35:29] And did you feel like this was a chance to kind of… You talked about, with immigration, kind of literalizing a little bit of the metaphor that was always there. Do you feel like it was a chance to kind of bring the queerness that was already in portal fantasy kind of a little bit more to the fore and kind of show how it is a metaphor for queerness? Or it is about like, the queer experience?
Na'amen: [00:35:46] Oh, yeah, for sure. I mean, I think that, especially the character… Eric, the character I have in our world, being openly queer and black is already something that's affected his life in a very intense way when we join him. And so, going through the portal, and not even going through the portal, but learning about this other world, sort of gives him this whole new lease on life that was taken from him. And this new option of like, oh, I can do this. This is part of me, too, which I think is really important.
[00:36:20] Like I said, I think portal fantasies are inherently queer. I think all fantasy and sci-fi is inherently queer, just a little bit. That’s me.
Annalee: [00:36:29] I think we're on the same page there.
Na'amen: [00:36:31] Yeah. All, just a little bit queer. It's all just like a queering of the “real world.” And this opening of all these different options. Even if Star Trek, like when you talk about Star Trek, or Doctor Who and stuff like that. Doctor Who recently has gotten a lot of queerness, which I appreciate. But even before that, just having all these worlds that they maybe didn't fully explore left possibilities for people to write novels and audio plays, and fanfiction, and write that queerness into the fabric of it.
Annalee: [00:37:01] Yeah, I do think that the idea that there's another world out there where everything is sort of turned upside down and all the rules are different. Yeah, it is really queer. It's saying that, alright, anything's possible. And nobody's gonna come and bust up your bar for dressing in drag or whatever.
[00:37:22] So, what do you guys wish that portal fantasies would do differently going forward? Like, where do you want to see this sub genre go?
Na'amen: [00:37:29] I mean, I really like the direction it's going now. I really like some of the ideas that are being examined in portal fantasy. There's that recent show the Infinity Train, about a young girl and each—it’s very like Snowpierce. Young girl trying to run away from home ends up on a train and each car is very different. Like one car is a Grecian world with talking corgis who rule it. And another—
Charlie Jane: [00:37:53] What?
Na'amen: [00:37:55] Yeah. And then another car is like—
Annalee: [00:37:56] My two favorite things, Greece and talking corgis.
Na'amen: [00:38:01] And like the king is like I'm the one who brought the Pembrookes and the regular corgis together in peace. Like it's a very…
Annalee: [00:38:08] Love it.
Na'amen: [00:38:08] But I think pushing the idea of what portal fantasy can be. And that's important for it to stay relevant. You can't just let it sit on its laurels. And you see that with the reimaginings of older portal fantasies. The reimaginings of Peter Pan, the reimaginings of Alice in Wonderland. A lot of people didn't like those weird Sci Fi miniseries, they did like Tin Man and stuff, but I was like, I'm here for it. It's very weird.
Charlie Jane: [00:38:34] Oh my god, I forgot about those.
Annalee: [00:38:34] I did not forget. They were interesting. I mean, they were trying.
Na'amen: [00:38:41] The Alice in Wonderland one was like gambling houses and stuff. And I was like, okay, I don't know what's happening. But yeah, okay.
Annalee: [00:38:48] Yeah, just fuck shit up.
Na'amen: [00:38:50] Yeah, why not.
Charlie Jane: [00:38:51] Yeah. I think I'd like to see more humor. I mean, obviously, I like humor. I like funny, weird, silly stuff. I think portal fantasies… there's always something. They just kind of get… I mean, you think about Wizard of Oz, or Alice in Wonderland, they're inherently really campy, they're super campy. It's often like the other world that you go to is a little bit of a pantomime, or whatever. It's a little bit like, woo-hoo-hoo we're all wearing our silly outfits and dancing around and there's lots of dancing. And it’s just very goofy and silly and there is that layer of irony that I mentioned of somebody who's kind of been in the real world and kind of seen all this weird shit in the real world then going to this… More like often the world inside a portal is more innocent in a weird way, which I think can lead to some interesting irony.
[00:39:39] So I feel like I'd love to see more done with that. More done with just the humor and the silliness and the campiness of it.
Annalee: [00:39:45] So you want kind of more of the Wiz.
Charlie Jane: [00:39:48] I guess. I mean, is The Wiz campy? I guess it is. I mean—
Annalee: [00:39:51] Yeah.
Charlie Jane: [00:39:51] Is it more campy than the Wizard of Oz?
Annalee: [00:39:56] Wow, that's a good question. I feel like wizard is…
Charlie Jane: [00:39:57] Nothing is more campy—
Annalee: [00:39:59] The crème de la crème of camp.
Charlie Jane: [00:40:01] I mean, when I was first—
Annalee: [00:40:03] The Wiz is just funkier.
Charlie Jane: [00:40:05] Yeah, it’s junkier, but when I was first kind of coming out and first like, figuring out my stuff, I was part of like a queer scene in North Carolina. And people just quoted Wizard of Oz all the time. Like, I had a gay friend who would just be like, “Oh, what a world what a world.” And that was just like his catchphrase. “Are you a good witch or a bad witch?” It's like, there's nothing campier. And I feel like, you could actually play with that in a more self-conscious way, if you wanted to. I think you both might have read this. I wrote a portal fantasy novel, like a dozen years or so ago, back when nobody wanted portal fantasy.
Na'amen: [00:40:38] Oh yeah.
Annalee: [00:40:37] Yeah, when we were in the writing group together.
Charlie Jane: [00:40:39] I feel like if I go back and ever revise it, I'm gonna just make it much more gay. I’ll take that same story, but make it like 1,000% more gay, because I feel like that's what that story really needed.
Annalee: [00:40:50] I love it.
Na'amen: [00:40:50] Love it.
Annalee: [00:40:50] I think what I want to see, as we were talking about the issues around portal immigration and stuff, I kept thinking about Men in Black. And how that is a show that is about policing the portal, right? The whole thing is like, we got to keep these dirty aliens out and keep humanity from knowing about them. And so I want to see, like a Men in Black… like a defund Men in Black kind of story, where they're reforming border cops, basically. And how do you change the idea of making that portal one way? Or how do you start reimagining the relationship between people on either side of the portal?
[00:41:38] So I'd really love to see kind of reverse Men in Black. Like, the diplomats who help people come over or lead people to the other world and say, hey, these are the things you can do to not be a jerk while you're here eating lollipops made of flowers, or whatever you're doing in the other world. Or don't eat them because people will be offended, you know.
Charlie Jane: [00:41:59] That actually makes me wonder, because there's so many fantasies that are about magical creatures living among us. And those are like that metaphor for immigration. But are there any fantasies about like a bunch of people from our world immigrating to a fantasy world and having like an immigration… like having a human town or whatever in Wonderland or whatever? Like having that metaphor for the other side? Where were the immigrants? Humans are the immigrants?
Annalee: [00:42:22] There’s… I don’t know about the humans being immigrants to a fantasy world, but there's certainly, there's a couple of time travel fantasies, where people from the future immigrate to the present or immigrate to the past, and there's all these issues around integrating them.
Na'amen: [00:42:40] Yeah, I was gonna say,there's that show, The Foreigners where three different times… like cavemen and Vikings are showing up in modern day and they're having to integrate all three. And it follows the first female Viking cop, I think, or something like that. I haven’t watched it yet.
Annalee: [00:42:57] Female Viking Cop is basically my new band. Well, I think that's a good place to end.
Charlie Jane: [00:43:04] So Na’amen, where can people find you online?
Na'amen: [00:43:07] The best place to find me online is probably Twitter, at @naamenism, which is N-A-A-M-E-N-I-S-M. I'm most active there. It's also Naamenism on Instagram, and those are probably the best places to find me.
Annalee: [00:43:22] And your books are available anywhere that fine books are sold.
Na'amen: [00:43:26] Anywhere that fine and wonderful books are sold. If my books aren't there, they only sell trash.
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Annalee: [00:43:42] You’ve been listening to Our Opinions Are Correct. You can find us where all good podcasts are purveyed. Please do leave us a review on Apple Podcasts because that really helps people find us. You can also support us on Patreon at OurOpinionsAreCorrect. And if you sign up and give us things like money or gold latinum, you get audio extras and essays and lots of other good stuff. And you can find us on Twitter at @OOACpod.
[00:44:15] And thank you so much to our amazing producer Veronica Simonetti at Women’s Audio Mission. And thanks to Chris Palmer for the music. Bye!
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