The Mysteries of Velma Dinkley and the OMG FINALLY CanON CANON IN THE MOVIES
People are using clips from a show to promote the fact that the character is finally being shown as gay.
“OMG LESBIAN VELMA FINALLY CANON CANON IN THE MOVIES LETS GOOOOOO,”one person tweeted, with a clip showing Velma getting googly-eyed over a female character named Coco Diablo.
Other clips have also been circulating on social media, including one in which Velma tells fellow sleuth Daphne that she’s “crushing big time” and asking for advice on what to do.
The kind of background that usually signals a hit is what Hbo Max has with Velma. The show is Executive produced by veteran TV auteur Mindy Kaling, who also voices the animated series’ title character. Like Riverdale before it, Velma also takes a kids’ entertainment staple and gives it a new, winkingly adult twist. The show has become the new favorite punching bag on the internet, despite all of that.
Tony Cervone, supervising producer on the “Mystery Incorporated” series, posted on Instagram during 2020 Pride Month about Velma and the character Marcie in a photo that used Pride colors.
I am one of the key people that represents the version of Velma Dinkley that I do not represent. The caption stated that we made our intentions clear ten years ago. Most of our fans got it. I suggest that you look a bit closer.
The show tried to make fun of the culture wars. Parodies take aim at the plot lines. Forbes has chronicled the backlash. Showrunner Charlie Grandy, “a frequent collaborator of Kaling’s” and “the son of a former Love Boat star,” has apparently “been accused of being a ‘nepotism’ case,” one post declared. As another put it, succinctly enough, “Everyone Hates Velma.”
The full truth is complicated. The biggest animated series premiere of all time, Velma, was watched by people despite the animosity. They are watching it through the lens of the entire history of Velma and the series as a whole.
For one, Velma opted for color-blind casting, with its title character now being a South Asian woman. For another, this Velma is portrayed as more overtly queer. But while it might be easy to chalk up backlash against the show to the usual racism and/or homophobia that tends to accompany this kind of thing—and there’s likely still a bit of that in play here—what’s going on with Velma runs deeper than that.