trans people who felt an emotional impact from I Saw The TV Glow, can i ask what it is you felt that emotionally resonated? why did it have the impact it did?
also the idea of time and memory not working right, and being caught in this everlasting present moment where you don't really have a past or a future but instead you just *exist*
well at the risk of being a bit too overshare-y, after i started HRT but before i realized i was trans there was a moment where i had gotten the idea in my head that without the constant suffering of my testosterone-tormented brain there wasnt really anything left of me and almost stopped HRT
so the scene is sort of a "this could have happened to you if you were slightly stupider" except there also wouldnt have been a Twenty Years Later card for me
Transition is death, it's the murdering of he who walked before me. It was easy to keep pushing all the evidence back until I hit rock bottom and realised I wasn't even living, just barely existing. But I remember how easy it was to roll on, given how utterly life-upheaving that decision would be
Once I figured out what being trans was it pretty much all clicked into place, but the quiet suffering without fully understanding what was going on but still feeling the weight of the impact was yeah
Owen was a character that strongly represented the kind of kid I was. stiff and awkward because my body felt wrong and I didn't know why. and then, after I did know why, just continuing on even though it was getting harder and harder to breathe.
it's complicated and i think less 1 to 1 allegory than most people talk about it as but the suffocating atmosphere of the mundane parts of the film versus the ideal fantasy of reaching that which lays just out of reach if you're willing to leave everything behind is bleak.
off the dome summary:
It really grappled with the fear of having "what if i do?" and "what if i dont?", and very much made me think about that what if i can only think of now as a transitioned trans femme. I felt those fears and regrets and found a path, but there was always a chance i didn't and That hits me hard
i agree with all of this, and i wanted to add that the final shot was extremely affecting, the way he was apologizing to people who weren't listening for a reaction they didn't seem aware he'd had
even now i struggle with that, bc all my life i was conditioned to feel my emotions were inappropriate
(this is probably only partly a trans thing and is also an AuDHD thing but maybe there's a reason there's a bigger than usual overlap between those two groups?)
*Not to imply that autism or adhd is a disability, more just anything that forces us to shape ourselves to the society and hurt ourselves in the process, physical and mental stuff all the same
honestly i might say any kind of marginalized person who's internalized the message that we're all fed, that the things which make us different, the things for which we're marginalized and othered, are inadequacies on our part that we must beg forgiveness for
YES
It broke me. Him apologizing for his own suffering and own need for help, from a "community" that will not. While it is very tied to the trans metaphor of that, that scene hit me on multiple levels of Trauma
As a late transitioner, the whole “time to be a man and focus on my family” followed by flashing forward 20 years to the screaming realization you’re dying hit me like a truck
it's a lot, especially as a very late transitioner whose transition and surrounding life aren't living up to potential, the themes of lost time and hope hit like a freight train, and a lot of other things too, holding oneself back, not facing it, committing, I had a VERY bleak read on the ending
Oh my goodness, I’m not sure I could put it into words. Or at least not into microblog posts. I feel like…I came so close to being Owen. So, so close. The deadness in his eyes, and no one really noticing, I just…yeah, I can’t truly explain it. I’m sorry.
it was maddy's speech. time moving too fast, slowly dying and terrified of taking the risk i knew i needed to. i can think of several points where i could have made the brave choice but ran away instead. it was like watching the years of misunderstood dysphoria and depersonalization
Without spoilers? I feel like for some trans people it might be a little bit of a power fantasy …I’ve never seen on film something which I perceived about my life
The whole fact that he ignores it all no matter how blatantly obvious it was that Something Is Wrong. He's got a family that he loves very much... But you never see them. Everything just feels disjoint and disconnected and Wrong in a fundamental way.
on top of what most have said (esp. @melissanarchy.bsky.social), it was a visceral reminder of how many clues I had growing up that I never pieced together (esp. putting on the dress, feeling free, then forgetting) and instead repressed and simply let life Happen To Me while years flew by
also like what Melissa said but in a different direction: the football one killed me, but because I came out as soon as my egg cracked and had to wait five years before starting HRT. five years of knowing what's wrong but being stuck in the liminal space and only being able to supress
