Beijing – Two men exchange longing glances, a frisson of sexual tension in an on-screen relationship which must otherwise go unspoken — China’s “boys’ love” phenomenon is gripping video streamers, slipping by censors of LGBTQ themes with their subtlety.
The genre rose to prominence in 2018 as adaptations of web novels about same-sex couples, known as “dangaiju,” were increasingly picked up by on-demand services, propelling Chinese actors to stardom.
In “Word of Honor,” a blockbuster adventure from video platform Youku, two handsome martial arts heroes develop a close bond, but refer to each other only as “brothers” as the heavily insinuated romance between protagonists fails to emerge.
Although China decriminalized homosexuality in 1997, same-sex marriage is illegal and taboo surrounds LGBTQ issues.
The community is facing renewed pressure, with web content censored and depictions of gay romance in films banned.
Yet boys’ love adaptations are booming, screened by streaming giants such as Youku and Tencent Video, mostly fueled by demand from straight women and their growing interest in a more delicate form of masculinity.
Tickets for a “Word of Honor” themed concert in Suzhou sold out in seconds last month, as hundreds of thousands rushed for a spot.
The series quickly racked up millions of views after it was released in February, while Tencent Video reportedly made 156 million yuan ($24.1 million) from advance viewings of a similar show.
For video platforms in China’s boisterous, hypercompetitive streaming sphere, changing social mores means one thing: money.
“In pop culture, creators look to subcultures for new stories or original material,” said Liaoning University lecturer Bai Meijiadai, an expert in fan culture.
“The rise of boys’ love content suggests the on-screen industry is aware of young women’s consumption power.”
The red pen of the state may have supported the video phenomenon.
Authorities have cracked down on “illegal” writing on the web, censoring content deemed too risque for Chinese readers. In 2018 a novelist was sentenced to 10 years in jail for writing and selling “pornographic” books.
“Sexual content in (same-sex) web novels has reduced since authorities embarked on cyberspace cleanups and platforms introduced review-and-report mechanisms,” said Bai.
This makes their story lines — many of grand, period adventures flecked with martial arts — easier to adapt for television, with more sexually explicit content removed, she added.
Around 60 TV adaptations are now under way.
But the genre attracts mixed reviews among China’s queer communities.
“They break the mold of heterosexual relationships being the norm on screen,” said a gay civil society worker who wanted to be known only as Shuai.
“But they do not reflect the LGBT community’s struggles and difficulties.”
Once lead actors attain fame, they also avoid suggestions of gay identity to maintain popularity, he added, doing little to counter the airbrushing out of LGBTQ lives.
The television adaptations mainly appeal to women.
An e-commerce worker surnamed Xu said boys’ love allowed her a precious escape, unlike many other TV shows in China which serve a barrage of stereotypes in their depictions of women’s gender roles.
“It allows me to think about fewer things and relax,” the 29-year-old added.
Handsome, boyish young men, including those from the TV serials, have also become a preferred fantasy love interest.
“That’s been influenced by boy band success from South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, since even the 1980s,” said Derek Hird, a senior lecturer in Chinese Studies at Lancaster University.
To surf the wave of popularity, more people — mostly amateur scribes — are writing boys’ love stories for the web in the hope they may be adapted for TV.
While authors are mostly part-timers who write for extra cash, “popular writers can earn more than 10,000 yuan a month via subscriptions and rewards from readers,” said a fiction editor who gave her name only as Chu.
Up to 40 million yuan was paid for rights to a novel in the genre, official periodical Banyuetan said.
Experts say the genre could prove useful to China’s soft power ambitions.
The country so far lacks a breakout entertainment product matching the global popularity of South Korea’s entertainment industry or Japan’s anime and manga.
Martial arts and period dramas are “really marketable aspects for China,” said Hird.
But there is tension between explorations on gender and the “fear of a masculinity crisis,” he added.
In January, China’s education ministry pledged to improve physical education and “pay more attention to cultivating” masculinity.
For now, the boys’ love industry has steered clear of regulators through subtle portrayals of same-sex moments or “normalizing” shows’ endings.
“For example, you may have deviations in your teenage years, but once you grow up, you still go back to reproductive ‘normalcy,’” explained Bai of Liaoning University.
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