There aren’t any dragons, robots or superpowers on Showtime’s series Billions. There aren’t even any likable characters for that matter, though the cast is impressive with Maggie Siff, Paul Giamatti and Damian Lewis leading the pack.
But this week the drama series set in the world of New York City high finance boldly went where no TV show has gone before, featuring a romance and passionate sex scene with a non-binary character.
To back things up a bit, the show featured what was widely acknowledged as TV’s first non-binary character when Taylor, an intern at a top hedge fund, was introduced.
Played by nonbinary actor Asia Kate Dillon, Taylor has all the markings of a financial shark and a supergenius. We’re not sure if that makes them a hero or a villain exactly, but either way, they’re fascinating.
How about we take this to the next level?
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It’s also great to see all the other power brokers at Taylor’s firm use their preferred pronouns. See? It’s not that hard.
Related: Buck Vu of ‘The OA,’ and 10 other totally awesome transgender characters that rule TV
On this week’s episode, Taylor is sent to San Francisco for some high-level meetings with venture philanthropist Oscar Langstraat (Mike Birbiglia).
After Langstraat invites Taylor to State Bird Provisions for dinner (they clearly did their research), the two get flirty over a complicated board game called Netrunner and head back to Langstraat’s tech-infused mansion. So basically your typical SF date.
They passionately kiss, and you know the rest.
Naturally, the scene was met with a mixed reaction by viewers. Many rightfully praised the move, some expressed knee-jerk negativity, and others put their ignorance on full display.
“If you wanna consider yourself non-gender, fine. But if you have sex aren’t you admitting to yourself to being one or the other on some level?” asked one commenter in need of help differentiating sexuality and gender.
Related: College student explains what it means to be non-binary for those of you who still don’t understand
Hopefully, scenes like this one open the door to more and more inclusion of complex non-binary characters and viewers are able to evolve their understanding without always placing the burden on non-binary folks to constantly explain themselves.
It’s a start!
Billions airs Sunday nights at 10 pm on Showtime.
skilos
What is so ground breaking about a man and a woman in a sex scene?
mujerado
It’s not a gay issue. Being non-binary is a gender identity, not a sexuality. It has nothing to do with how or with whom someone expresses their sexuality.
Kieran
Where’s the groundbreaking queer sex scene? All I see is a photo.
Tête Carrée
Come to my house.
jasentylar
@tete LOL
barkomatic
I’m caught up on Billions except for the very last episode and of course that’s the one that has the groundbreaking scene I haven’t watched yet.
Taylor’s character is interesting but so far they’ve been more of a villain with maybe a glint of morality here and there. Most of the characters in the finance industry around them are supportive which at times doesn’t seem realistic right now. I’m not sure if the point is acceptance or just that since money is quite literally the center of everything they all do nothing else matters–so as long as you’re a money maker you’ll be accepted regardless.
BCbreeze
You just took me to church, I could not agree with you more. You do know this will be removed, so I will enjoy it while I can.
Stilinski26
laverne cox already had a makeout scene with a straight man. this is not ground breaking
chris_clb614
It’s Showtime. Not ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, or the CW.
The viewers of Billions should have kept that in mind after all the (I’m assuming here) F-bomb’s, and the TV-MA rating. “Viewer Discretion Advised” can be as much for closed-minded adults (who probably have no problem with violence) as they are for children.