Will the new season of "Big Love" include gay love? Not exactly...

Matt Ross as Alby Grant

This Sunday at 9 PM marks the return of HBO's Big Love. What's queer about a show centered on a polygamist family in Utah? Well, it does include one queer character (stop reading if you don't want to know anymore) and the show was created by two out men, Mark Olsen and Will Scheffer (who happen to be partners in real life). The men were in Los Angeles this week for the Television Critics Association for a panel on Big Love, after which I had the chance to ask them if there might be anything gay on Big Love.

Find out what they had to say after the jump! Be warned — spoilers lie within!

Longtime fans of the show will already know that Alby Grant (Ross), son of prophet Roman Grant, is a big ol' honking closet case (in fact, he'll probably end up being a republican Senator from Utah!). Early on this season, we not only see Alby have an encounter with a man in a public restroom, but he seems poised to be the main foil for Bill Henrickson (Bill Paxton). 

Will Scheffer and Mark Olsen

Getty Images/Kevin Winter

I asked Scheffer and Olsen if this season would explore Alby's sexuality more and how much we would be seeing of him this season. It turns out we will be seeing a lot of Alby, whom the two men describe as a "major player" in the season's plots. But the show won't be dealing that much with Alby's sexuality (which the two men describe as "pathologically closeted"). However, if the show goes to a fourth season Alby's dealing with his sexuality will be a major plotline. 

I was also tipped off to one full-on gay storyline for the season. In episode four, we'll see a gay man and a gay woman being counselled to marry each other (something practiced by a number of fundamentalist churches) as a way to deal with their same-sex urges. None other than out actor Stephen Spinella will be playing the gay man. 

Ginnifer Goodwin, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Bill Paxton and Chloe Sevigny at the premiere
(Kevin Winter/Getty)

Of course, the show has its other gay appeals as well, including Mamma Mia! star Amanda Seyfried as the rebellious daughter to Chloe Sevigny (Boys Don't Cry) as the repressed (and now ostracized) Nicki. 

Do we have many Big Love fans in the room? Who's looking forward to Season 3?