Gad-forsaken!

Oh, and their treatment of circus
bears. I mean, holy shit Russia...

Just to be clear, when I complain about Russia, as I'm about to do, I'm not ragging on the Russian people. They, like us, I'm sure take way more shit than they deserve because of their country's crazy element. I'm making the distinction because I sometimes have a tendency to refer to Russia as a homophobic rusted-out, mafia-run shell of our former rival super-power and I don't want you to think it's out of blind xenophobia, but instead because of things like the Sochi Olympics, what they did to Pussy Riot and hey, what's the other thing? Something about the election...and meddling...and undermining our faith in democracy...oh who can keep track...Oh! But did you read the President's unfounded accusations that President Obama wiretapped the Trump campaign?

I don't know about you, but I'm outraged. Outraged and completely distracted from the unceasing shitshow that has been the administration.

Sure, why not? You know, it's a good thing we're all idiots...

Broad stereotypes of course, being
the highest form of safe bet.

Where was I? Oh, right, Beauty and the Beast. So there's a new live-action version coming out because Disney loves money and safe bets, but in a surprising move, Josh Gad's character, LeFou is gay. If you need a minute to clean up the shattered remains of the tea cup you dropped in surprise, go ahead. Back? Good. If you don't remember the character being gay in the animated version it's because he wasn't, this is a new element for the character because, according to the director, this is a live-action adaptation and as such the characters needed some fleshing out.

Also, it's 2017 and surely we're at a point now that a gay character isn't that shocking to...oh, right...sorry, I suddenly forgot pretty much everything going on in the world right now.

Gad plays LeFou, the antagonist's side-kick who's also a buffoon. In fact
his name is French for 'the fool.' Wow Disney, we've sure come a long way...

They once went after a dairy because there
was a rainbow on their milk cartons. No shit.

Russia, if you didn't know, isn't all grey skies and consequence-free domestic violence, it's also super-anti-gay. It should come as no surprise then that the Ministry of Culture is mulling over banning the film under pressure from the country's conservatives who believe it may violate Russia's ban on gay propaganda. What's gay propaganda you may ask? Why anything. Anything. This is conservative reactionary crazy we're talking about here so anything.

Drive-in proprietor, biblical
scholar, Carol Laney does it all!

Fortunately for us, we, as a nation are past all this now, right? Nope. Because Alabama. Well, not all Alabamans of course, I should be clear on this point, just Carol Laney and her husband who, despite not having seen the film are not going to show it at their drive-in, you know, because of the Bible. And before you go thumbing through your copy, I'll tell you right now it doesn't specifically cover drive-ins and gay Disney characters, but it is implied. You know, in the back somewhere.

Jesus, of course, never mentioned anything
about gay people. Lucky for us then that
Carol Laney came along to fill in the blanks.

Laney, in a phone interview with the New York Times, had this to say:

"I have family members that are homosexuals. I have a relationship with them. I love them. It does not mean I'm a bigot. I'm not judging them when I tell you that God's word says this, that's not me. That's God's word."

-Carol Laney, owner of the
Henagar Drive-In, and God's
chosen representative on Earth.

Look, I don't want to pick on Alabama (Russia on the other hand...), but I wonder if people like Carol Laney get how she sounds to the rest of us. Like, just so we're clear, announcing that her drive-in won't run this movie because there's a gay character actually does make her a bigot. Like, textbook, right? And then hiding behind religion? Pretty lame. I know she runs a drive-in, but she knows it's not actually the 1950's anymore, right?

Because if there's one thing drive-in movie
 theaters should be right now, it's picky.