Readers' Choice Poll: All-Time Favorite Gay and Bisexual TV Characters

Who are your all-time favorite gay or bisexual television characters?

Given the role television plays in our daily lives, it's no surprise that the characters we tune in to watch week in and week out can become important to us. And for gay and bisexual viewers, especially those still in the closet, or struggling to come out, or isolated for whatever reason, those gay faces on their television screen can be even more meaningful. Even for those who are out and proud, there's a a certain providence that comes with turning on your television and seeing characters who reflect your world.

Gay characters can often have an impact on straight viewers as well. For many Americans, Will Truman of Will & Grace was the first gay person they ever had in their home. And it's hard not to believe that As The World Turns' teen romance between Luke and Noah has expanded the world-view of many a red state housewife.

With that in mind, we thought it would be be noteworthy — and fun — to let our readers have their say about which gay characters have meant the most to them over the years.

A few weeks ago we asked for help compiling a comprehensive list of every gay and bisexual television character on television. (For this list we concentrated on substantial male scripted characters — we didn't include walk-on roles, or reality show stars, and we left the women entirely to our sisters over at AfterEllen.com.)

Once everyone's suggestions were added and the dust settled, we found ourselves with well over 150 characters.

Now that we have our list, we want to know which of these characters really spoke to you. Which gay TV roles have you identified with, laughed with, cried with, or maybe even fell in love with?

Let us know by completing our online poll.

Just scan the list of characters (alphabetic by show title), check off your favorites (up to 10), and hit submit!

We'll leave the poll open until Thursday, November 22th, and we'll present the list of your top 25 favorites at the end of the month.

After you've voted, feel free to share your selections with others in the comments section below. It's a chance to lobby for your favorites!

Need some inspiration?

To get things started, we asked several AfterElton.com contributors to come up with their own lists:

From blogger Lyle Masaki:

1. Cliff Waters from Brothers holds a nostalgic place for me. I only just realized how lucky I was in having a local TV station that carried the syndicated run of the show. From what I've read very few stations picked it up.

2. While Captain Jack Harkness is still one of my favorite queer male characters, I'd like to specify the Doctor Who version, who was fun and a bit of a maverick rather than the branch manager Torchwood version.

3. Luke Snyder is just such a well-done character. Luke's not just a breakthrough character for soaps — you don't see many gay characters handled this well on TV at all.

4. Oscar Martinez from The Office is a favorite of mine just for being so incredibly mundane and boring. Plus, I like seeing a gay man of color who deals with issues of race and heterosexism.

5 & 6. Along with Luke, I love John Paul McQueen from Hollyoaks and Marco Del Rossi from DeGrassi for being such great gay teen characters.

7. Rick from Rick & Steve became an instant favorite for me with that "I'm sorry I'm Asian" line which nicely condensed a thousand angry "rice queen" rants into four words.

8. Leon Carp from Roseanne is another nostalgic pick.

9. Same for Matt Fielding from Melrose Place, even if part of the fun was joking how he never got to do anything.

10. I hate to have so many soap characters, but nostalgia puts Billy Douglas from One Life to Live as my favorites. I remember Billy's summer storyline fondly.