Brandon
Although I was a Xena fan -- and a passionate one -- I never participated in that fandom in the way I mean now when I talk about "fandom." Queer as Folk is my one and only experience of that. So part of what I'm about to say comes out of a lack of fandom experience, because it involves the issue of minor characters, and I have come to understand that making minor characters into major characters in fanfiction is an established fandom tradition.
Nonetheless, it took me my surprise the first time I saw it happen in QAF, and it continues to feel a bit odd to me. We do it with all kinds of minor characters, from Rodney to Gus to Stockwell to Leda, and whether that's successful or not usually depends on the skill of the author. However...
What makes those stories hard for me to incorporate into my fannish little mind is that I view all of those characters as plot devices. I don't see that as a failure on the part of their creators or the writers; I think that's what they are intended to be. The role of minor characters in canon is to further the plot or characterization, and not to have identities, storylines, and backstories of their own.
It's not that their impact can't be major; it would be hard for any character in all of QAF to have much more impact than Gus on both the storylines and the characterization of Brian, Lindsay, and Melanie. Without Stockwell, we'd have had no Season Three at all, and while Rodney fades into the background a bit, few minor characters are as vivid as Leda.
What makes them "minor characters" is not that we don't see a lot of them, or that we don't get a strong feeling for who they are, but simply that they're not there for themselves, they're there for the rest of the cast and the plot.
It's why, for instance, Loretta isn't a plot device in Season Five, because her story barely relates to the ongoing plot and doesn't touch anyone except, very minorly, Debbie. It's also why her inclusion in S5 is a waste of time, because she's grafted onto the series instead of being an organic part of it. Despite his limited screen time and low-key characterization compared to Loretta, Rodney was a character with ten times the impact, because his character massively moved the series' plot several times, and triggered changes in Michael, Ben, Debbie, and of course, Vic.
But this post is entitled "Brandon," and here's why.
Certainly Brandon, like Leda, was a memorable, vivid minor character. Some fans find him attractive (I'm not one of them, but that's irrelevant). But without question he's a strong minor character and he has a huge impact on the plot and on Brian, with secondary effects through Brian on just about everyone he interacts with including Justin and Lindsay.
But he's still a minor character because nothing Brandon contributes to the series is about Brandon. He has no independent plot, and we don't learn about him so we'll know him better, but so we'll know Brian better. He's a plot device. It's what he's meant to be, and it's a function he serves well and memorably.
Brandon brings me to the issue I have with minor characters perfectly. Although I tease vl_redreign Brandon fans all the time about not understanding what they like about him, of course I do. He's interesting and meant to be attractive -- and apparently, at least to Red, he is. ;)
But I can't find anything to say about him in meta, and can't imagine using him in a post-S5 fic, because Queer as Folk introduced him, used him, sucked his character dry, and tied it up with a neat little bow and dropped it in the trash. There's nothing left to examine, mine, interpret, or follow up on -- Lindsay did that for us, in the attic, and Brian administered the coup de grace in his loft when he sent Brandon out, and provided even an epilogue in the scene when he tells Ted not to throw Brandon out of Babylon.
There's nothin' left, babes. Nothing at all. The show got it all.
Now, I understand that in fiction, fandom (not just QAF, but "FANDOM") enjoys taking minor characters and giving them their own storylines. This is where all the Gus fic comes from. Gus has no characterization in QAF and no storylines of his own. When we write Gus in our fiction, we are essentially crafting an original character, and when we write storylines centered on Gus or Brandon or Rodney or Leda, we're writing fanfiction/original fiction hybrids. They're like crossovers, in a way.
This isn't where my interest lies, but that's nothing but a personal preference and as meaningless as whether or not I think Brandon is attractive.
What I don't think is just a matter of preference, however, is meta about Brandon. I have seen a couple of relatively recent meta discussions about him that seemed to suggest the writer believed there was still something left to explore about Brandon, that QAF left his meaning and role in the series open-ended.
Certainly BRANDON as a character has lots of loose ends, but that's because he's not a character, really -- he's a plot device. That's not an insult from me; Gus, too, is a plot device in the series.
But Brandon's role in the series? His thematic importance? What's left to say that wasn't already said?
That's not a rhetorical question. I'm genuinely curious. Is there something Brandon represents or sheds light on as regards Brian or the themes of the show -- the overall "boys into men" theme or the Season Five theme about change -- that still has depths to be mined?