“You think everything’s a gay metaphor.” “Yes, but not a *great* gay metaphor.” This kid gets it.

I do want to take time to point out that Eve and WALL·E, while being specifically coded as straight cisgender, are also a couple that defies multiple gender norms. Eve is work oriented, aggressive, and trigger happy, while WALL·E is her caretaker for a lot of the movie where she’s inactive.

Wall-E was actually the movie that taught me how institutions can create evil without any individual bad actors as a kid.

I could listen to Alex argue with Alex and Alex under supervision of Alex all day

It's all about us projecting onto a cute asexual agender couple.

“Kid’s movies can be profound too. The Barbie movies are a great example of how to execute a perfect gay metaphor.” “You think everything is a gay metaphor.” “But not everything’s a *great* gay metaphor.” Less than two minutes in and I’m already pressing my face to the screen screaming “THEYRE JUST LIKE ME!! THEYRE JUST LIKE ME FR”

While I always read wall.e and eve as male-ish and female-ish I never saw their love as ‘straight’ it always just felt like robot-love completely devoid of human labels, not inferior just untouched by concepts of human sexuality labels

As a cis woman i'm not entirely sure what people mean when they say "gender envy" but i think GenderConstructionist!Alex is giving me it

This made the academic and emotional sides of my brain KISS when previously they were barely on speaking terms.

Unrelated Topic: Has anyone ever noticed how unrepresented gay males are in cartoons? I mean yes, they are represented but not on the same amount of WLW where they get to be main characters. Gay males are always the uncles, dads, or side friends. Do you think it is related to how MLM has always been sexualized by the public. Even in BL series, the only moment gays get the spotlight, they are still fetishized by people. It sucks that despite having She-Ra, Steven Universe, The Owl House, Adventure Time, etc., we don't have much to let kids know boys can like boys, that they can be effeminate and not be less of a person. My 7 year old self would have had a different childhood if I saw that on TV be normal. Idk, I just feel hurt how us gays are always connected to lustful thoughts.

I have never been able to decide if WALL-E and EVE are a trash lesbian and Apple lesbian, or a trash lesbian and femboy. On one hand we have GAY and on the other we have gendernonconforming femboy.

"and they had to be put on this floating cruise ship in this faux capitalist-" _"oh, the c word!"_ "SHH." got me so so good 💀

Loved the video, my inner queer also changes earings every 50 seconds

But Wall-E isn't *about* romantic love and gender. It's more about love in general and rediscovering the beauty of the world around us. Wall-E and Eve's genders aren't mentioned and don't play a part in the story. Since their genders aren't confirmed (in the original source material, being the movie.) , interpretations of their genders rely on individuals and their culture. (Which is why some people see them as lesbians, nonbinary, straight and more. Their identities are basically up to anyone's interpretation.) In addition, the story wouldn't have been told differently if Wall-E and Eve were explicitly coded to be in a queer relationship. They are just two beings in love. Their genders never played a role in whether or not they fell in love. They are simply two people who care about each other. Furthermore, their romantic love isn't what saved the world, but instead it is their mutual care for the planet and each other Romantic love didn't save the day. Love in general did. Yes, the development of their relationship plays a big part in the story. We can even say that their love for one another "saved the day". But to that, I must clarify: Two people caring for eachother isn't necessarily romantic. As someone who is Aromantic and despises 98% of romance depictions, I think that the movie Wall-E shares a beautiful story of love, in all its forms. Love of life, love of nature, love of knowledge and love of everything in the world around us and beyond. It is a story about the importance of caring for what we love. Discovering life and appreciating it. And on a side note, Wall-E and Eve's relationship isn't necessarily romantic. Friends are allowed to care about eachother, lol. But anyways, I think that this part is more up to interpretation. I personally just love their relationship for what it is, I don't really care whether or not they're dating or what their genders might or might not be. The story has a beautiful message and yet so little dialogue. And I think that's rad af In conclusion, I think it's a story of appreciating eachother and the world. Not about how heterosexual dating saved the world, lol.

Kind of in awe of how this video is a wonderful merger of academic theory and pop culture that uses each of its pieces and framing to analyze the perspectives and shortcomings of the others. Such an engaging way to communicate theory to an audience and to actually see it applied outside of purely academic contexts. Kudos to you on finding that balance here with theory, comedy, and sincerity leading to a really entertaining video.

Wall-e came out in 2008, I was seven or eight. It was probably my biggest hyperfixation. I re-drew the entire movie, scene for scene, sometimes shot for shot in my tiny notebook, and drew portraits of all my favorite characters. I spent hours playing games, both digital and imagined by me and my sisters, relating to the movie. And, even at such an age my fascination with long-suffered, repressed gay men was already alive in my obsessive crushes on Mo, that cleaning robot, and Burn-e from the short on the dvd. I think I related a lot to Wall-e. The raw curiosity, and admiration of objects that others would overlook, his messy living space and hoarding tendencies. How invisible he was, small and underfoot. How he mucked around in soil and sand, his gentleness. His self-sacrifice. I would even try and imitate the eye thing that he does, by articulating my eyebrows in that distinctive rhythm. I loved him and tried to emulate him. I felt a deep connection, like the character was made for me or something. I was probably just before the age I became acutely aware of the feminine gender role I would be expected to inhabit. Wall-e was a robot, just a little creachure if you will, and my enby transmasc self felt very seen. Wall-e was a masculine icon for me as well. This wasn't particularly relevant to the video, but the movie was such a big part of my childhood, I guess I just wanted to talk about it. It's kind of strange to think about now, I rarely think of it, yet probably carry it with me in a lot of ways I don't realize or understand. Rewatching the movie as an adult, the muddled messages and sour under- and overtones in the movie stand out sorely, fading the parts of the movie I was drawn to as a child.

The level of research and scripting that Alex puts in every video is unparalleled ❤

A part of me really wants to see you have an intense conversation with Abigail Thorn about philosophy, society, gender, economics, film, art...just a collaboration between you two would be so fun and stimulating to watch!

"Yeah dude, but how that's gonna help the working class ? Or the gays ?" -me @ politics

this video was so well executed and I loved how all the "Alexs" acted, I enjoyed this so much!! You did a fantastic job!! Have a wonderful day!!

I think this is such an interesting concept, setting it up as an actual debate forces me to pay attention lmao

i always click on one of your videos thinking "this is gonna be alright" and then i end up shaking in my lgbtq+ boots

I was always into Wall•E for the aesthetics. When I was younger, it felt like a silent film without the silence because Wall-E didn't *talk* and that made me happy. It was quiet. And at the time my life was anything but (standard POC familial issues ya dig?). Anyway, all that unrelated junk just to say that this new Sanders Sides episode looks great!

‘Love is a universal human experience’ As an aromatic, you sure about that? (Not just in reference to romantic love either, there’s a decent amount of people that have separated themselves from the concept of love entirely, for a lot of different reasons. This isn’t separating from caring about people, either, and even if it was, that’s not an issue really, I could talk for hours abt how empathy or the lack of is fundamentally neutral, like the ableist roots of the idea. TLDR: loveless aros are pretty cool, actually)

I don't think I realized until the moment this hit my feed just how much this film capital A Affected me as a kid. And I'm not sure how much of it I could put into words tbh. My distaste towards AI, me being a queer communist, and the unending desire to be able to easily replace parts of the body when they stop working via advances in scientific and medical technologies (think 3D printed organs and NAD+ injections), it literally all stemmed from here. I was definitely obsessed with the movie as a kid but I never thought about just how much it informed my whole way of thinking.

alex is rocking those earrings 👏👏

I love this. You're so clever and your humor really keeps my interest

My favorite scene in Wall-E is when he teaches the button pushing robot to wave, and then later we see that it incorporated its newly learned ability to bend at the wrist into being a better button pusher and excitedly waves at anyone who passes by. I can’t read that scene as anything but an intensely Marxist allegory

I like how you approached this like a classroom While this video could have been disjointed with so many conflicting viewpoints in a more traditional video essay setting; it came across clearly through the four characters and their constructive criticism of each other's viewpoints. Well done!!

Who else noticed the earring changes? Love the attention to detail in both theory AND production. Keep it up, Alexander!

It’s a video that’s not an hour long, that’s impossible

.... Did anyone else get an ad for omegaverse audiobooks during this, or is my metadata cursed?

i haven’t even watched this show for 1 minute and the phrase “wall-e is a twink” gave me whiplash. 10/10 video i’m calling him a twink from now on 🥰

As an aromantic person, I have some thoughts about love being described as a "universal human experience" in and of itself, but this was a great video nonetheless.

your content is always really well worded and executed, and also really freaking funny. another banger

3:59 Loveless Aro sounds

thank you for this video, there is also a marxist, a gender studies person and a postmodern lil guy inside my mind, and i feel deeply represented in this. Wall-e is also my favorite movie of all time (mostly in an emotional way), is this silly little story of hope that as a kid i really liked how they were able to give so much emotion and bring such good change in the world only by saying wall-e and eva and not one more word besides that. It's a strong story that shows that love and empathy, what ever those really are, are things that should exist and that are good, and that can exist besides the most dire situations, even if we are not "human anymore". Also thinking more about it now, as someone that deals with depression, avoidance of responsabilities, and overall just lazyness, seeing that ship filled with comforted people bounded to at somepoint die from the fact that they dont do anything to change their own situation, and change being able to happen in the context means alot to me.

At some point I just think there is no "capital M meaning" in a mainstream media product under capitalism. Its a fools errand. It goes only so far as its allowed to. We should appreciate that, take it for what its worth, and look to other things for real substance.

I now know I am bisexual but back when I first watched the movie I was under the firm belief that I was a heterosexual girl. Seeing this type of non-stereotypically gendered version of hetero romance was the first time I felt connected to any depiction of love in media. Seeing this made me believe that I could find love too, before that I always felt alienated by how love was "supposed to be". Ofc nowadays it sucks for me that all big relationships in mainstream media are heteronormative, but back then this little movie made me tear up from joy

It makes me sad these kind of videos don't get as many views. Just know Alex that we really enjoy them!

I'm madly in love with a girl and I have a "crush?" on a guy and I cannot tell anyone cause they're my only friends lmao so I just thought I'd just share it here Edit: and wall-e and Eva were definitely a golden-retriever-and-a-hot-dom-fem lesbian couple, no doubt about that

i spent ALL NIGHT binging all of alex's old videos, it really brightened my (very sleep deprived) day when i saw he posted a couple hours later lmao

also, I loved how the middle Alex changed their earrings every scene lol

10:50 cake jumpscare

"WALL-E's the first character that made me feel connected to masculinity" that hits different now

i absolutely love the inner monologue/debate format. its so perfect and relatable

I've never had a video so prefectly capture what goes through my head every time a thought forms

The reason why people automatically assume wall-e and eve are seen as man and woman respectively is just basic shape language. The reason people see these robots in these ways is because the animators animated them specifically like that. So 🤷

Social construct =/= worthless Truth isn't the only thing that matters in the universe, beauty too is of value.

Me, clicking on the video: sweet, more Alex The video: SO MUCH MORE ALEX I think along with the research, writing and characters (can't get over GenderConstruct!Alex's earrings game), I'm impressed you got all this across, so much information and different points of view, in just about ten minutes. Very well done and thanks for the laughs

Well this was incredible, and also made me cry. Thanks. I didn't know I could feel this way from a slightly ironic youtube video vaguely about a kids movie.

Alex I love this video, but its insane to me that the Patreon section is 7 minutes long (not that its bad, but wow, just never realised it was that long)

it's the constant earrings change for me

If we use tropes ironically, is it subversion or just laziness?

Really nice video. I think you really encapsulated what it’s like to have conflicting feelings and ideas over the same subject, even if it’s something like the movie Wall-e. When it the video first started, I wondered if the characters would argue the whole time for strictly comedic value, but the heartfelt consensus they reached solidified something hopeful. Very nice! I really liked this skit. Ultimately, I always hope to care about other people. :)

Just now realizing that I definitely got gender envy from Wall-E (the character) as a small child, but didn't actually recognize it at the time because I didn't know what trans people were yet or that I was one.

Huh… I think you somehow kinda made me like and relate to WALL•E for once while also literally stating why I have never liked or really connected to WALL·E. Damn… Another fantastic video Alex (Also love that title change)

feeling so betrayed that KZfaq hid this from me changing my notif settings immediately. Great video Alex!!

“So a communist, a gender constructivist, and a postmodernist walk into a classroom…”

I swear I love every video you make no matter what it is 😂

Alex is such fun and I’m here for the new video! Legends know the first look from Twitter.

THE PRODUCTION QUALITY! It's amazing to see your channel grow, you deserve all the success your vids are amazing!!

That was great man! I was really confused by the title at first 😂

why am i watching a radio lab spoof abt the queerness of fictional robots?? oscar worthy.

Everyone's talking about how funny is it that the Alexs argue together but I just want that t-shirt Marxist!Alex has because I'm also a marxist Alex

Unrelated, but did anyone notice how middle Alex's earrings kept changing

Huh.... I can't tell if your channel is being suppressed. I have all notifications turned on, but I didn't see this until just now, 13 days after publishing.... Wow this is super funny. I love the change from your previous content, which I really like for itself, though. This was hilarious and I was giggling almost constantly from the start. Thanks, and keep up the great work :)

Unprompted but were you a sander sides guy? It’s giving sander sides ngl

Oh this was amazing!!!

I love that 1/3 of the video are people supporting you. Congratulations!

We just had a Wall-E unit it sci fi lit class.

Huh it's amazing you have 6 minutes of patrons

I love how this video perfectly captures how fucking obnoxious and ridiculously complicated my internal monologue is ^-^

"Loves makes us human" Me, an aromantic: I'm a God then

I've been following your channel for years and you've grown soo much intellectually and artistically! You're so good at these videos

This was awesome! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge in such an engaging way. I really appreciate and admire the work you do :-)

please do more of this, you need to! its so fucking good its probably very hard to make a script like this, but please ITS SO FUCKING GOOD

Alex, amazing work !!

You keep outperforming yourself with each new video. Amazing job. 👏👏👏

and i will be stealing this format of video for at least one school video essay

Love watching the evolution of the production value !!!

I love these short-form videos! I can watch the whole thing in one lunch break :)

I love this format, it's really engaging to me and also kind of comforting? I have thoughts that conflict a lot of times too and it's hard to figure out exactly why until I really delve deeper into it. Being able to communicate the endearing traits and flaws of any media is ultimately why I look up video essays regarding it in the first place. I may not always agree with other people but I learn a lot from just hearing their opinions. If I disagree with them then there must be a reason right? Same goes to the validation of enjoying it for its clear message or whatever I internally interpreted as its message. In the end, even if the conversation strays, if we all experienced the same media then we're able to get a glimpse of other people in their various aspects. It's the middle ground for intimate and casual conversation for me. Given example is when we argue over how gay whatever it was and how it could be gayer!

Alex’s earrings changing between takes is a lovely thing to keep track fo

I can't say I understand the queer reading of WALL-E and Eve's relationship. Generally I feel the need to push back against the reframing of male-female couples as queer in recent years, because even if the individuals themselves are queer, relationships between men and women will always be straight and patriarchal in nature. By definition and per the cultural expression, in order for a relationship to be queer it must go against what is societally expected of a romantic relationship, and a man/woman relationship is The Expectation and therefore definitively cannot be queer. But I will always see value in exploring the queerness of individual characters, so I still appreciate videos like this!

This was a very fun and engaging video, and your humor is impeccable as ever.

Wall-E video WALL-E VIDEO!

Wow that is commitment to your patreons! Almost half the video is just mentioning them!

mark fisher specifically uses wall-e as an example of recuperation

This is one of the best video essays I've ever seen.

10 minutes of video, 7 minutes of patreon names. interesting job you have there. (thanks for the video i enjoy this kind of socratic internal dialogue a lot!)

Your videos resonate with me on ten different levels I struggle to name and at least ten more I'm not even aware of.

I'm watching this video and eating pickles straight from the jar instead of studying for my physics final (vibes)

I'm a very surface level person. My inside dialogue is held between 5 year olds. They laugh at the movie, ask each other if they saw the fart joke, laugh some more. I'm the perfect audience for Hollywood. I wonder if having such a rich inner dialogue between a panoply of identities is a blessing or a curse. Not having one myself, I see blessing.

On a narratological level, this is definitely on a whole Plato's Symposion kind of level

"While that is a level of sincerity that I I'm not emotionally equipped to handle, I ultimately agree." Love the quote, and we really need more sincerity esp. in leftist spaces! Not just intellectual critique or dunking, but actually engaging with how art make us feel. I feel like expressing positive emotions or enjoyment of a thing is considered "cringe," bc the only feelings that are allowed are outrage, derision, and anomie.

well done as always

I was just wondering when you would have a new video yesterday

wall-e is about hot gay robot sex and nothing else

oo this was fun and interesting!! i would watch 20 more videos like this