Back when I was watching this show, (Mind you I was 14-15) there was something exciting about the character. It was interesting. However, the show quickly got weird with him and then I wasn't able to see the later seasons online. Back then I was honestly confused about the whole having sex with a guy when you are transitioning. It bothered me that they did that. (Not saying that's the case now) And then he was getting T illegally I think. I think they just made trans guys seem crazy and stuff lol
I was about that same age when I was watching The L Word too. At the time Max was a God send to me. He was how I really got exposed to being transgender so sure enough I followed him hard to learn more about it. A lot of the things he talked about were things that I have actually thought about before so I was shocked to learn that other people thought the same thing. For example one of the things he said was that he thought about killing himself so he could be reborn into a male and that hit me because I had thought about doing that. I knew he had a lot of T in him and he got a lot of roid rage which was one thing that scared me off from wanting to transition. I was a little disappointed at the time when at the last minute he decided he didn't want bottom surgery. Then I stopped following him after he got involved with Jodi's interpreter and had his child. It did make me confused and I just had the "well you do what you do >.>" type attitude. Aside from that I thought it was kind of hot when his friend of his gave him a bj. Overall I felt for the guy as he has a sweet heart....tourmented of course but never the less sweet.
I liked the scene where Grace gave him the BJ too. I was like "FINALLY, a woman who actually gets it!!" I thought that most of Max's romantic interactions were respectful in that way - like with Billie and Tom. Even Jenny was doing her best to be supportive even though she decided she could only be with a woman in the end. It was handled very well imo.
But I did have issues with how he got T. When I saw it the first time, it made it all seem very "underground" - it sort of worked to demonize transition in a way, even though he got on the proper, monitored dosage later on in the series. They should have introduced legal methods earlier on, because that sort of image sticks in people's minds and even after you correct it, they still envision that.
I can see why he was on The L Word, given that he was a lesbian pre-transition, but they could have used a lesbian MTF on there. That would have been even better, because they didn't even touch that at all. Well, there was Lisa, but don't get me started on that...
At first he was pretty much all the negative stereotypes of transitioning to male rolled into one.
It kind of pissed me off too, the way they portrayed him (oh, and that totally unconvincing facial hair...)
It felt to me that the show was very consciously orienting towards empowering women, so no-one male came out looking very good. Mind you, the women were all crazy too :) . I guess the writers were going for drama rather than reality, so it wouldn't have been as "exciting" if Max had just decided to transition and had a great time with it.
Oh, and I think Daniela Sea is stunning. When I saw her in Shortbus playing herself as Little Prince (which is her faerie name) I thought "That's who I want to be!"
If it wasn't for Max on the L Word and my friend watching it all the time in the boarding house and making me watch it too so she could talk about it to me then I might still not have known about FTMs and realised that not all trans people are the like the bad stereotype MTFs (I'm not really sure how to phrase that without it sounding a little offensive, so just to clarify, I don't have anything against MTFs just the only thing I'd heard about them before was totally negative and things like "my dad got chucked out the house for wearing a miniskirt"). I hardly even knew that FTMs existed other than a half remembered comment from when I was about 6 about someone's cousin who had always felt male and transitioned.
Until Max I'd never heard anything about T and I can't remember why but something on there made me look it up and I came across the Hudson's FTM guide and it just clicked. Everything that I wanted from my body was what T would give me and then I tried binding and it was just totally definite in my head that it was what I wanted and worked through my memories and realised that a lot of stuff like my reaction to puberty all made sense.
I had to steel myself just to watch the first few episodes on DVD, and I got no farther. So I can only report what my trans friends have said about Max. They weren't too pleased that he was taking T illegally, and there was some talk about his sexual escapades that I never quite sorted out. They also seemed to think that he became a real ->-bleeped-<- on T and that the show portrayed T as making that happen? Does that sound right?
First my take on The L Word in general: poorly written with characters and actors that were under utilized. Of course it wasn't near true to life and the crappiness about a bunch of relatively wealthy older gender conforming lesbians was really super duper blah, uninteresting, and more blah.
ONWARD!
Max to me, could've been a game changer. He could've been a big impact on the show. He could've been an educational and big point on the show. He wasn't. He was a background character who never really had a prominent plot line. There are however, some key points in his character and plot like that bother the crap out of me. It's all in the writing.
1. He's low income and gets T illegally, taking a super high dose while having wealthy friends and being in an area where there is a trans health clinic.
2. He transitions overnight almost literally. His employer doesn't know he's trans, and somehow his name doesn't really come up on their background check (?). He has facial hair in places that facial hair tends to grow the slowest pretty quickly. He gets pregnant after being on T for 2-3 years.
3. Changes that we know happen didn't really happen to the character. There was zero change in voice (I know, actors can't exactly have a whole new manly voice but there could've been some vocal training to talk at a deeper register). Skin texture didn't really change which could've been done with make up.
4. He seemed to get an appointment for top surgery relatively quickly (and didn't seem to travel at all for surgery).
So my main complaints are on inaccuracies. The writers could've asked trans men about this info, or do some google searchin'.
Also, in one episode where he's talking to a bunch of trans guys DJ from DJKnowsDicks is featured.
Inaccuracies like the time scales of things (how fast changes happened/waits for top surgery etc) were probably more simply due to the fact that it was a TV show and there was only limited time available to them, but I don't know how long it was shown over or whether it ran to the same time as real life (i.e. whether each episode was supposed to be a day or the next week or whatever). I think most people realise that TV isn't the best place for reference, especially on things like these but it was quite an eye opener for me as I said earlier and probably some other people even if it wasn't that accurate so I don't think it was a total fail.
I never came so far to watch max in the seire, the closest I got was to see a music video on youtube where it start with him being in the girls room and a girl say "this is a girls room get outa here!" and he says "im a girl"
I was alittle... wtf? because I wouldnt go to the girls room but even if I did I wouldnt really responce like that..
I dont think I would.. maybe as for fun?
whatever..
but there was another transgender person earlyer at the L word, not so famour.
you know theres this black woman who fall for someone who is like a dragking but also a trans as I know.
I dont remember the name? but must admit I didnt find it super realistic.
Quote from: Natkat on August 03, 2012, 06:23:59 PM
the closest I got was to see a music video on youtube where it start with him being in the girls room and a girl say "this is a girls room get outa here!" and he says "im a girl"
I was alittle... wtf? because I wouldnt go to the girls room but even if I did I wouldnt really responce like that..
He wasn't out at the time. He was still living as a lesbian and was "mistaken" for a guy all the time.
Quote from: Alex000000 on August 03, 2012, 06:03:57 PM
Inaccuracies like the time scales of things (how fast changes happened/waits for top surgery etc) were probably more simply due to the fact that it was a TV show and there was only limited time available to them, but I don't know how long it was shown over or whether it ran to the same time as real life (i.e. whether each episode was supposed to be a day or the next week or whatever). I think most people realise that TV isn't the best place for reference, especially on things like these but it was quite an eye opener for me as I said earlier and probably some other people even if it wasn't that accurate so I don't think it was a total fail.
Well, the reference would be Beth and Tina's baby to determine how much time it is between episodes and stuff. They reference how long things have been for the baby. Ex: the end of one season Beth and Tina break up, and the first episode of the next season Tina is very obviously pregnant and says she got IVF right before they broke up. Then I think the next season starts around their baby's 1st birthday.
Quote from: Natkat on August 03, 2012, 06:23:59 PM
but there was another transgender person earlyer at the L word, not so famour.
you know theres this black woman who fall for someone who is like a dragking but also a trans as I know.
I dont remember the name? but must admit I didnt find it super realistic.
Ivan Aycock is the drag persona. Not sure if that character identified strictly as a drag king or something else.
I like the new pic, Nygeel.
Quote from: Arch on August 03, 2012, 07:47:12 PM
I like the new pic, Nygeel.
I second that! You look AWESOME!!!! 210% PASS!
Quote from: edderkopp on August 03, 2012, 06:27:51 PM
He wasn't out at the time. He was still living as a lesbian and was "mistaken" for a guy all the time.
ah okay it makes sense..
LOL thanks, working on getting it centered in the forums. For some reason it's coming off centered in my posts while it's off centered in the other direction in my main pic at the top.
Quote from: Nygeel on August 03, 2012, 07:01:57 PM
Ivan Aycock is the drag persona. Not sure if that character identified strictly as a drag king or something else.
I feel like that character did identify as trans to a degree. They constantly dressed and kept up the persona.
Quote from: Andy8715 on August 04, 2012, 12:00:43 AM
I feel like that character did identify as trans to a degree. They constantly dressed and kept up the persona.
And the scene where Kit walks in on Ivan pretty much naked, seeing his packer and binder and such. Seemed almost to be a better representation of dysphoria in some ways than what Max went through.
I loved the mirror scene with Max, btw. It really captured how it feels sometimes.
Yeah that seen with Kit is what I was thinking of that pretty much nails it for me that I believe Ivan was a trans man.
I haven't watched the L word in probably 3 years.
I loved The L Word until Max's character was introduced. As others have said, he embodied, for a long while, the worst qualities of your stereotypical man. After that, he was just a whiner who seriously messed up. And come on, really... he got pregnant after a year or two on hormones? Those must have been some wacky illegal overseas hormones that managed to help him grow facial pubes--- er, hair--- but failed to raise his testosterone levels sufficiently to render him infertile. The human body is pretty sensitive to hormones; even if an ftm guy were to become pregnant while on T, which is HIGHLY unlikely, there's no way he could carry the pregnancy to term. Fetuses can't survive with a hormonal imbalance that extreme.
The L Word ended abysmally, in my opinion. I wish the writers had chosen simply to omit an ftm character, as he only served to besmirch the name of ftms everywhere; maybe then, they might have come up with a better way to close the series.
Quote from: Luc on August 04, 2012, 01:00:32 AM
The human body is pretty sensitive to hormones; even if an ftm guy were to become pregnant while on T, which is HIGHLY unlikely, there's no way he could carry the pregnancy to term. Fetuses can't survive with a hormonal imbalance that extreme.
I know a guy who got pregnant while on T (he went off cold turkey), his wife (mtf) had been on estrogen for 10 years. There are plenty of guys who have gone off T and managed to conceive. Thomas Beatie was on T for 8 years. Matt Rice, not sure how long he was on T, couldn't find a reliable resource, but long enough to grow a beard (not saying much that is but I'm guessing a few years). There are others too, but I couldn't find much.
It is possible though not sure about how plausible the situation of him getting pregnant and carrying the baby to term while still on T.
This website is very helpful about pregnacy in trans men. [size=78%]http://notanotheraiden.com/faq-transmen-and-pregnancy/ (http://notanotheraiden.com/faq-transmen-and-pregnancy/)[/size]
It says basically that T doesn't make you infertile but does make eggs less viable.
I think the show's treatment of Max was pandering to a prejudice, sort of "you're female, so stay female". They wouldn't just let him be himself.
It's highly implausible, yes, that a man on T for so long would become pregnant. Thomas Beatie had to be off of T for 9 months and take hormones before he could become pregnant. We have no idea how the hormones might affect a developing fetus. As per the information on "Not Another Aiden," the author has no professional credentials and, therefore, his statements are quite possibly spurious.
I'm just saying it is possible, it just may not work for everyone. If a dude wants to stop T and try to get pregnant, good for him.
I don't get how he's been on T long enough to get facial hair yet his voice still squeaks like Minnie Mouse. Haha, unrealistic.
Quote from: Andy8715 on August 04, 2012, 01:44:08 AM
I'm just saying it is possible, it just may not work for everyone. If a dude wants to stop T and try to get pregnant, good for him.
I typed up an awesome response the other day then forums went down after it was typed up so it never went through.
Max never stopped T, nor did he try to get pregnant. He didn't know he was pregnant until he went for his top surgery consult which they did a pregnancy test during and found out he was pregnant, and could not get top surgery (ouch). This story line was written right after Thomasn Beatty and was sooooo very unoriginal in that sense. There was also no educating in the show. Anyways...I think after he finds out he goes to a gyno or something and then finds out he's maybe 3 months along? 4? He's far enough along that he's not planning to abort. I forgot if his partner was cool at first and wanted to raise the baby together as part of why he wanted to keep it, or if the guy ditched (I know he ditches at some point). I tried to find out when during his pregnancy he finds out yet was somehow linked back to here in a google search.
:|
Thank you, Nygeel; this is absolutely what I would have said if I'd gotten there first. Obviously, ftm guys have every right to get off T and get pregnant if they want to. Being on T and getting pregnant, however? It's highly unlikely. No, no one who wrote the Max character seemed to have any idea of the intricacies of the transgender condition.