Because I promised this 3 days ago, I’m C/Ping my coverage of the Teen Wolf panel since I figure that’s what most of my followers are actually interested in XD!

• A bit of background out of fairness: I went into the panel not looking forward to having to interact with diehard Teen Wolf fans who reside in a fandom where hating on the main character, dismissing him with ableist slurs, and telling fans of color to stop “creating” racewank is common place. While I wasn’t overly impressed with the focus on the shipping campaign for characters Derek and Stiles (known as ‘Sterek’) towards the beginning of the panel, there were a few great questions asked during the Q&A that slightly restored my faith in humanity.
• I sat with a friend of mine to my left, a Latina on my right who was a die-hard fan of main character Scott McCall and with a group of Sterek fans behind me who were giggling and referring to Scott as “retarded” before anyone even walked out on stage. I knew I was in for an interesting hour.
• Many of the fans showed up in unofficial character lacrosse jerseys and hoodies, though none of them were wearing Scott’s. Tyler Posey calling them out made for the first slightly awkward moment of the panel.
• Maybe a fourth of the audience was vocally against the idea posed by the moderator that every fan is “married” to the idea of characters Stiles Stilinski and Derek Hale being featured as a couple.
• The biggest news out of the panel for me was when the show’s creator Jeff Davis revealed that one of the women in the main villain group for S3 is a character named Kali. The show is going to center around Celtic and Druid mythology for S3 (as confirmed by Davis), but he was quick to specify that the character of Kali is named after the Hindu goddess. Breakdowns for the characters aren’t up at my regular source yet–Davis said they should run sometime this week or next–but if this role goes to a white woman, all hope really is lost.
• One of the themes of season three was revealed to be the women of the show “finding their power.” I would think that to do this they have to acknowledge how the female characters have been consistently manipulated by the men around them…but that wasn’t mentioned, so we’ll see where that goes.
• The first Q&A question came from a bisexual fan who first emphasized how important it is to have well-written bisexual characters on television and followed up by asking if they would follow through with a bisexual Stiles plot-line since it’s occasionally been teased. I enjoyed that Davis’ answer included the defense line “one of my best friends is bisexual.”
• My favorite question started with, “I am sick of seeing white dudes coming out over and over again,” and ended asking Davis if he would be focusing on Danny Mahealani and his sexuality rather than Stiles and Derek. Here an interesting conundrum was broached: one of the best and most prevalent arguments against the focus on Stiles and Derek as a LGBTQ power couple in media representation is the fact that it erases the presence of Danny, a side character on the show who is gay and also happens to be a PoC (native Hawaiian). If fans shipping Stiles and Derek actually cared about the representation of the LGBTQ community on television, wouldn’t they be repping for the show’s only gay character? Danny was more of a background character during the first season but was more involved in season two as Jackson Whitmore’s best friend. However, it was confirmed this weekend that Colton Haynes who plays Jackson (and Kanye West in blackface!) won’t be coming back for season three. That seemingly limits Danny’s character, as Jackson was his main connection to the group. When answering the question Davis seemed to hint that Danny’s involvement in the next season might decrease, which would leave a hole in the greatly lauded supposed LGBTQ representation on the show.
• Overall, this panel made me long for the day when this sort of show (the campy paranormal teen drama) becomes more inclusive both racially and sexually and a PoC is sitting in Jeff Davis’ seat.