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4. Jawyer
There's got to be a queer tucked away somewhere on that island. Until the producers of Lost figure out who she or he is, fans will have to be content to fantasize about Jack and Sawyer while watching the brilliantly edited Jawyer: The Movie by Lostaway. Structured as a trailer for a forthcoming (tragically imaginary) film about the great love between Jack and Sawyer, it features a number of songs, some cleverly edited dialogue from the show, and even gay icon Dolly Parton singing “Traveling Through” from the Transamerica soundtrack.

There's yet more clever editing, as well as brilliantly conceived subtitles, from Trefenwyd, with a sweepingly romantic soundtrack borrowed, ironically, from Mel Gibson's Braveheart.

5. Is There Some Unresolved Sexual Tension in the House?
In fandom terms, it's known as “unresolved sexual tension,” or UST. And nowhere in fandom is it more evident than in the relationship of House and Wilson from Fox's House. Kiwi from Hell drags the subtext right out in the open in a video set to Stephen Lynch's “If I Were Gay,” featuring the deathless lyrics: “ If I were gay/We would swim in romance/But I'm not gay so/ Get your hand out of my pants.”

How about a combination of angst and UST with a look at House's drug problem? It's breaking Wilson's heart, but he won't give up on House without a fight. Of course, if you prefer your House/Wilson sexual tension resolved, you can always resort to the magic of animation.

6. Birds Do It, Bees Do It … and Hobbits, Too
The Lord of the Rings' Aragorn and Legolas rank high on slash quotient and provide the extra novelty of being different species as well as the same sex. Whether the vidder is using the theme to Brokeback Mountain or Bon Jovi's “You Give Love a Bad Name,” Lord of the Rings slash is characterized by an overwhelming sense of romance and destiny — even when the music is incongruously borrowed from Dirty Dancing.

7. Slash: It's Not Just for Fictional Characters Anymore
Sometimes it's just not enough for fans to put their favorite fictional characters together. Sometimes they have to create what's known in fan fiction as “real person slash” or RPS, the imagined pairing of two actual actors, musicians or other real people, usually at least one of them straight.

Few real people have been slashed as frequently as “Viggorli,” the nickname for the pairing of Viggo Mortenson (Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings films) and Orlando Bloom (Legolas in the Lord of the Rings films, Will Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean films). In a romantic video, obloomlover uses clever editing to craft a Viggorli love story set to Hoobastank's “The Reason.” Vidder Arianne put together still photos with film, news and behind-the-scenes footage to tell the story of a doomed three-way relationship, set to “Just Breathe” by Anna Nalick.

Gale Harold and out gay actor Randy Harrison, who portrayed Brian and Justin on Queer as Folk, frequently get the slash treatment, but unlike Viggo/Orlando, most of the slash vids made about them are humorous. One of the funniest is Wendy's “Oh, Juliet”, which uses Queer as Folk behind-the-scenes footage to poke gentle fun at RPS. Don't miss the closing credits, or the same vidder's shorter take on the subject, “Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps,” featuring some of the same footage and a bit of intriguing audio from an old Larry King interview.

8. When Subtext Becomes Text
There's never been a show quite like Nip/Tuck before. This strangely compelling, albeit gory drama about two straight plastic surgeons with a boatload of UST between them did something no other television show has ever done: It took its long-established subtext out for a textual spin. In the beginning of the fourth season, Christian's shrink looked him in the eye and asked if he was in love with Sean, setting off a sometimes serious, sometimes farcical plot line that was designed to appeal partly to gay men and partly to women.

The creators of Nip/Tuck seem to have made their very own slash vid for Christian and Sean, but until they did, fans filled the void nicely, from a seven-minute exploration of issues deeper than are usually tackled in fan videos, to an UST-y clip montage backed by Polaroid's “So Damn Beautiful.” Sean and Christian's maybe-love will probably never go anywhere on the show, but it will live on forever in the hearts, fiction and videos of fans.

9. Star-crossed Lovers
Jack and Daniel from Stargate have a loyal fan following all out of proportion to how well-known the show is. And the sky, or in their case, the stars, are probably the limit to how many slash videos exist depicting their love. A great sample can be found on the jackslashdaniel.com video archive site.

10. Rum, Sodomy and the Lash
The Pirates of the Caribbean movies are ideal slash fodder, and not just because Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow is such a pretty pirate, although that helps. It's because they borrowed some UST from the guys at House and put it on a pirate ship. What's a pirate to do? Fan vidder ASHko shows us, in a video set to 12 Stones' “The Way I Feel,” which ends with a brilliantly manipulated kiss between Jack and Will Turner.

And if there's a fandom without a tearjerker slash vid set to Evanescence's “My Immortal,” it's hard to find. There must be some subliminal homoerotic message in that song. But if you're looking for tears and a little Will/Jack pirate love, Ariel Lindt delivers it.

So if you're feeling a certain lack of same-sex love lately on television and at the movies, why not do what the fans do? Go out and make your own.

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