alexander the gay

Was Alexander The Great gay? This new Netflix series says hell yeah—& homophobic history buffs are mad

Image Credit: ‘Alexander: The Making Of A God,’ Netflix

They say history is written by the victors, and that’s certainly true of Alexander The Great, a Macedonian king who fashioned himself a god among men and went on to create one of the largest empires in history.

But for many, many years, whoever was writing Alexander’s story was leaving out a very crucial detail: The dude was gay—or “bi” probably fits the bill even better.

However you might want to look at it, there are now plenty of experts who have gone on record to acknowledge that, yes, one of history’s most powerful military commanders was part of the LGBTQ+ community (of course, no one was actually calling it that in 300-something BC, but you get it.)

It’s an observation that’s really rankled the ire of a certain type of history buff, i.e. homophobes who like to pretend straight white guys are solely responsible for the miracle of modern civilization. And it’s a fact that once again has found itself under the spotlight and is receiving quite a bit of scrutiny.

And that’s all thanks to a new dramatized documentary on Netflix called Alexander: The Making Of A God, a six-part miniseries that reexamines the man’s rapid rise to power and—spoiler alert!—scandalous death at 32 (which is good as proof as any that he was gay because any young twink will tell you that hitting your 30s feels like death anyway).

Just how gay is Alexander: The Making Of A God?

At the time of writing, Alexander currently stands at #2 on Netflix’s ranking of the top TV shows in the U.S., proving that there is a real appetite for history lessons out there—at least when said history lessons are this sexy.

That’s because Alexander: The Making Of A God isn’t your typical docuseries. Oh sure, there are plenty of historians hamming it up in talking-head interviews and excitedly dishing out the drama as if it weren’t thousands of years old. But it also offers up fairly compelling reenactments of epic battles and clandestine meetings, keeping you rapt in the story with a little spectacle and a whole host of gorgeous actors looking fire in period-appropriate clothing.

Honestly, it’s not all that different from an episode of Spartacus, except, instead of the intermittent softcore sex scenes, we occasionally get to watch khaki-clad archaeologists dig around present-day Alexandria, Egypt.

But we will have you know: The Making Of A God doesn’t skimp on the gay stuff either. It only takes about six minutes for the first episode to travel back to Illyria, circa 336 B.C., where Alexander (played by Masters Of The Air‘s Buck Braithwaite) has been banished from his father’s kingdom and apparently spends his days playing sparring—nearly nude!—with his bestie Hephaestion (Will Stevens).

A moment where Hephaestion tackles his pal to the ground and remains pinned on top of him, their faces centimeters apart, will have you shouting, “KISS!” at the TV screen. Is it just us, or was that intentionally homoerotic?

Well, we have our answer in the very next scene, when the two buds are bathing together and begin to make out, smashing their beautifully chiseled bodies up against one another. The extra-steamy, man-on-man moment makes all that homoerotic stuff on The History Channel look chaste by comparison. It truly didn’t need to be this hot, and yet? We’re glad it is.

As our narrators tell us, Hephaestion—one of Alexander’s two closest friends alongside Ptolemy—was “not just a cherished companion, but perhaps [his] greatest love.”

While the guys sensually caress one another, we’re told that “same-sex relationships were quite the norm throughout the Greek world. They didn’t flat-out call it “gay,” or even hav a word for homosexuality—”it just wasn’t in their vocabulary whatsoever.” Instead, “there was just being sexual.”

Why homophobes are mad at Alexander: The Making Of A God

Image Credit: ‘Alexander: The Making Of A God,’ Netflix

So, you mean to tell us nobody gave a sh*t about who was gay back then, and just let everyone love who they wanted to love? Oop, there goes ancient history again, pushing that woke agenda on us!

We’re joking, of course, but—surprise, surprise—that seems to be the reaction from some conservative viewers who apparently did just want to tune in to The Making Of A God for the same old stodgy history lesson they could’ve read on Wikipedia.

(Side note: Imagine watching something—anything—for the sole purpose of having it just affirm everything you already know and believe. What the hell is the point of that? Don’t we want the things we watch to challenge us, excite us, and open our eyes to new possibilities? We digress…)

Some of the “shocked and offended” reactions to Alexander and Hephaestion intimate connection in the series are just downright hilarious:

Y’all… Netflix didn’t “make” Alexander The Great gay. It’s called history, babe—learn some!

History repeats itself: The controversy around Alexander (2004)

But we’ve been here before. The same sort of complaints arose when director Oliver Stone’s 2004 epic Alexander hit theaters, which dared to show the ancient warrior as the (literal) bi king he really was, played by a beautifully coiffed Colin Farrell with an effete Jared Leto as his lover, Hephaestion.

Christians and conservatives even went so far as to boycott the movie. And while Alexander was one of Hollywood’s most notorious box office bombs, that had less to do with the fact that it dared to “queer” ancient history, and more because it was a total mess. (For our money, the 2014 re-release edit Alexander: The Ultimate Cut is a much better version of the movie, and well worth a watch.)

Anyway, we’re pleased to see Alexander: The Making Of A God doing so well on Netflix—maybe enough folks will see it so we can stop trying to re-write history. Your cunning and cutthroat military strategist and all-power leader? Yeah, he thought guys were hot. Deal with it!

On that note: We don’t want to oversell anything; Alexander and Hephaestion might have a couple super sexy scenes right there at the beginning of episode one, but that’s about as hot and heavy as The Making Of A God gets. Still, their relationship plays out through the remainder of the series in a way you might find compelling. Who knows, you might even learn something!

And if learning’s not you’re thing, you can always just skip right to ogling the hunky actors who play our ancient history homos. Check out some hot shots from Buck Braithwaite and Will Stevens’ Instagram pages below:

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