Anna Daniels
The Love, Simon TV series has a new streaming home and a new name. The half-hour comedy series based on the 2018 teen LGBTQ romantic-comedy has now been moved from Disney+ to Hulu, with the new title Love, Victor, named after the show’s new protagonist. Love, Victor, which will premiere on Hulu during Pride Month this year, was initially set to debut on Disney+, but was reportedly deemed inappropriate for the family-friendly streaming service.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the Love, Simon TV series that was originally developed and produced for Disney+ has been moved to Hulu. Now officially titled Love, Victor after Michael Cimino‘s protagonist — a new student at the same Creekwood High School that was the setting for the Nick Robinson-starring movie directed by Greg Berlanti — the 10-episode series follows in the footsteps of Zoe Kravitz’s High Fidelity reboot in making the jump to Hulu.
While Hulu is going all in with the release of Love, Victor, setting the show’s release during Pride Month in June and opening the writer’s room for a second season, the move is a little shifty, especially with THR reporting that Disney “thought the half-hour comedy featured more adult themes than it was comfortable featuring on family-focused Disney+.” Sources tell THR that the “adult” themes such as alcohol use, marital issues among parents, and sexual exploration, “would not resonate with families who watch the service with young kids.”
This is a bit of a bummer, since Berlanti’s Love, Simon was a groundbreaking film for featuring a teenage boy struggling with his sexuality within the confines of a cheesy teen rom-com. Love, Victor has the potential to introduce those elements to younger audiences who could benefit from positive depictions of LGBTQ characters in a lead role. We don’t know yet the extent to which Love, Victor explores these themes, and how mature it gets, but if Disney+ can feature the often inappropriate comedy of The Simpsons or the violence of The Mandalorian, it could stand to feature a teen struggling with his sexuality.
However, THR notes that its sources believed Love, Victor a better fit alongside Hulu’s YA fare like PEN15 and the limited series Looking for Alaska as well as Freeform’s Black-ish spinoff Grown-ish, which similarly explore coming-of-age themes with a dark edge.
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