The 50 Greatest Gay TV Characters

From: The Backlot

39. 

Andrew Wells,

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Actor: Tom Lenk

2001-2003

Previous rank: N/A

When a character’s introduction to a TV series comes in the form of a Wizard of Oz reference, he’s clearly someone gay fans are going to want to watch. Although Andrew was ostensibly a classmate of Buffy and the Scooby gang, he wasn’t introduced until Season 6, as part of a mini big-bad, a “Geek Trio” of former Sunnydale students turned super-villains (at least in their own minds). Andrew’s evil genius claim to fame, we’re told, was unleashing “demonic flying monkeys” to attack the school. Even so, it was clear he wasn’t so much into being bad as pining over head baddie, Warren. And who among us hasn’t been there, joining some club or fraternity we hated just to cozy up to that hottie correspondence secretary?

Andrew’s great change of heart came in the classic Season 7 episode “Storyteller,” when, camera in hand, he sets out to chronicle  the recent trials of “Buffy, Slayer of the Vam-pyres,” from his own highly skewed perspective. After annoying the hell-mouth out of his interviewees, he eventually confesses to his misdeeds and sets out on a poignant, if comic, path to redemption.

Although he never identified himself – or was labeled by others – as gay, his sexuality was fairly obvious to anyone with eyes and ears. It was obvious, say, when his video camera barely paused on some hot girl on girl action, instead lingering over handyman Xander. Or in double entente-laden dialogue (sample: “I’ll find it if I have to check every hole in my body — and yours!”). In this sense, Andrew was an early case of what became a common, and irritating, TV stereotype: the guy who remains clueless about his own sexuality despite the fact that everything him about his shrieks “gay.” And yet, his part was so hilariously written – and adorably portrayed by out actor Lenk – that we couldn’t help but be won over. How could we not love someone with a Star Trek reference for every occasion, not to mention a tendency to fantasize over Scott Bakula?