“I Am Also a We”: The Pedagogy of Sense8

Abstract

The Wachowskis' Sense8 is considered one of the most diverse television programmes to date. As its eight lead characters are scattered across the globe, it portrays a range of nationalities, ethnicities and religions. Called a ``LGBT masterpiece,'' it also represents a wide spectrum of gender and sexual identities, including homosexuality, pansexuality, polyamory, transgenderism and gender queerness. This chapter argues that Sense8 queers not only gender and sexuality but also love and family. It celebrates alternative forms of kinship that challenge the heteronormative model of family. To do so, it uses the generic features of the quality drama as pedagogical tools. Indeed, as a Netflix original programme, it recuperates premium cable's rhetoric of quality TV and teaches through cinematic narrative structures, graphic sex scenes and self-reflexivity. But while most HBO-type quality dramas use realism as a pedagogical tool, Sense8 teaches through science-fiction, extraordinary characters and a spectacular aesthetic inspired by action/mystery thrillers.