Animated LGBTQIA+ Characters That You May Have Missed
From childhood favorites to modern classics, queer representation is everywhere
Spongebob, Oaken from 'Frozen,' Spink and Forcible from 'Coraline' and Gobber from 'How To Train Your Dragon.'
With Pride month on the edge of culminating, we cannot bid it goodbye without an appropriate farewell. Anyone who watches animated films knows the magnitude of their impact on not just children but also adults. Over the years, they’ve been key in incorporating all the colors and combinations of the rainbow. We compiled a list of some of the characters belonging to the LGBTQIA+ community who are queer with no fear.
Spongebob (Asexual) – Spongebob Squarepants
The eponymous happy-go-lucky wide-grinned and highly absorbent teenager was confirmed to be asexual by Stephen Hillenburg, the creator of Nickelodeon’s Spongebob Squarepants. Although Hillenburg reminded everyone that real sea sponges reproduce asexually through ‘budding,’ the almost human-like Spongebob is much more relatable than any ordinary sea sponge. His identity is important for not just the queer community but also for asexual children who may need a helping hand in understanding their identity. Spongebob is independent and has a great group of friends. What else could one possibly want?
Gobber the Belch (Gay) – How To Train Your Dragon
One of the main supporting characters in the How to Train Your Dragon franchise, the adorable and humorous mustached Viking Gobber, has been a part of all three films. The speculations of him being gay began in the second movie when the creators stated that he did not get married for an “undisclosed reason.” However, by the end of the third film, How To Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World [2019], the creators confirmed his sexuality by making him fall in love with Eret, another minor character.
April Spink and Miriam Forcible (Lesbian couple) – Coraline
Based on the 2002 Neil Gaiman novel, the surrealist horror film Coraline shows an elderly couple. Often mistaken as friends and spinsters living together, Gaiman confirmed their sexuality on Tumblr. Miss Spink, a retired burlesque performer, and Miss Forcible, a retired burlesque actor, were lovers since the beginning but had many male suitors in their youth. Still, their relationship status is not disclosed in the movie.
Bucky and Pronk Oryx-Antlerson (Gay couple) – Zootopia
This loud and cross-specied gay couple made an appearance in the 2016 movie Zootopia. Their relationship status is not referred to in the movie at all and thus raised suspicions from the fans as they share the same last name but are from two different species — Bucky, a kudu and Pronk, a gemsbok. Later, co-director Jared Bush confirmed their relationship.
Oaken (Gay) – Frozen
Disney’s Frozen (2013) is the most popular animated film of all time. Oaken appears, for an extremely brief moment, where he is shown waving to a man and four children and saying “Hello, family!” but his sexuality remained ambiguous, leaving an open-ended assumption for the viewers. Writer and co-director Jennifer Lee later said that it was a deliberate choice to incorporate the ambiguity to have the audience perceive Oaken as they will. Thus, the viewers voted queer!
