A lot of great things happened on The 100 last night. We got deeper into the show’s delicious lore. We learned more about ALLIE the AI from Eureka. Some great looking gals had some great looking candle-lit naked times.
Spoilers ahead...
And then, something very very familiar happened. The lesbian died.
In Lexa’s case, she was murdered because her favorite advisor was trying to protect her from Clarke, and he has terrible aim. Their conflict was beautifully seeded all season. As was the foreshadowing of this event.
Something bad was absolutely going to spring out of Clarke and Lexa’s affair, and it would have everything to do with Lexa loving an outsider over the Grounders. A coup to rival the Ice Nation’s was percolating. All the political machinations happening in the Grounder world were going to explode, and it was going to be great.
Lexa’s death was also foreshadowed. Often, the foreshadowing hit like an anvil. Yet a lot of folks (myself included) blithely ignored the hints of her upcoming death, because Lexa was a queer lady—and The 100 would never do something as callous and trite as kill off the queer gal. That’s what tone-deaf shows do.
Then Lexa went running into a room in the middle of a gunfight.
Look. There is nothing wrong with killing off a love interest. Clarke’s the main character and she’s got to be riddled with pathos, because that is how main characters in TV shows are constructed nowadays. Main characters are miserable until the finale—when they finally die, or someone pulls a happy ending out of their rear.
There’s also nothing wrong, in theory, with killing off a gay girl. Gay girls are just like straight girls. Gay girls can have adventures! They can love and lose! They can die! Their sexuality should not determine their role in a story! They should not necessarily get a free pass in moments of conflict.
Except that, unfortunately, the gay girl never gets a free pass in a moment of conflict. With few exceptions, gay girls die.
A lot.
They get decapitated on Xena, shot in parking garages on Orphan Black, buried under some rando’s house on Pretty Little Liars, and offed for Ollie’s manpain on Arrow.
And on Buffy they get hit by a bullet meant for the main character.
Killing off Lexa in a fashion ripped straight from Joss Whedon’s playbook isn’t new or edgy. Worse, it isn’t shocking. For a show that’s all about playing with tropes and expectations, killing this gay girl was just lazy.