'Unique joy': Netflix, pleasure and the shaping of queer taste

This article discusses the 'Netflix imaginary' and how it shapes our understanding of queer taste and legibility in contemporary visual culture. While Netflix has promoted itself as a bastion of LGBTQ inclusivity and other forms of 'diversity', this article considers the platform not on the basis of celebrated LGBTQ 'Netflix Originals' such as Sex Education or Queer Eye but rather on how our navigations of the platform's content throw our queer attachments and recommendations into pleasurable chaos. If the 'Netflix imaginary' is built around personalisation - that is, the promise of knowledge and insight - it more often generates bewilderment and surprise. But the article argues that this uncanny algorithmic meddling also has the potential to generate its own source of fun, entertainment and queer pleasure. By analysing what consumers are led to understand of the site's dependence on and commitment to collaborative filtering, algorithmic signposting and customer agency and choice, I consider how we might employ a queer method for engaging subversively with Netflix's representational inconsistencies and inadequacies - how we might see Netflix itself as a queer method for reconfiguring queer taste.

Automated summary

This article focuses on the concept of the 'Netflix imaginary' and its impact on our perception of queer tastes and legibility in contemporary visual culture. While Netflix promotes itself as a champion of LGBTQ inclusivity and diversity, the article looks beyond popular LGBTQ 'Netflix Originals' and explores how our exploration of the platform's content disrupts and surprises queer attachments and recommendations. It argues that while the 'Netflix imaginary' promises personalization, it often generates confusion and astonishment. However, this uncanny algorithmic intervention can also create its own sense of amusement, entertainment, and queer pleasure. By examining Netflix's reliance on collaborative filtering, algorithmic signposting, and customer agency, the article proposes employing a queer method to subversively engage with Netflix's representational inconsistencies and shortcomings, transforming Netflix itself into a queer method for redefining queer tastes.