Fans of canceled LGBTQ+ forward shows like Queen Sugar and The Owl House know what it's like to lose their favorite characters. Unfortunately, according to a recent report from GLAAD (the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation), this trend isn't going anywhere. The media watch organization's 2022-2023 edition of Where We Are on TV, an annual analysis of LGBTQ+ representation in media, reports that more than 20 percent of characters counted as representatives in the study won't be back for next year's edition. In addition, GLAAD observed a decrease in all LGBTQ+ characters counted. But what could be causing this trend — and what could it mean for representation in TV going forward?

RELATED: GLAAD Media Awards Honors Hacks, Eternals, and More in 2022 Ceremony

The History of GLAAD

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Image via GLAAD

Like many Hollywood stories, the history of GLAAD begins in print. It was founded in 1985, originally for the purpose of pushing back — The New York Post's coverage of the AIDS epidemic was deemed insensitive, and GLAAD stood up against it. They even persuaded large publications and news outlets, such as the Associated Press, to change their language policies.

From there, the group set its sights on the magical world of Hollywood, beginning to work as both a watchdog and a representative. GLAAD has been asked to review media before release, as they did with the unaired reality TV special 'Seriously Dude, I'm Gay.' In the show, men would compete to see who could come off most "convincingly" as gay — unsurprisingly, GLAAD did not like it, and it never saw the light of day. Since 1989, they've also hosted the GLAAD Media Awards, which recognize exemplary representation — and whose winners include Pose and Marvel's Eternals. In short, the group has undoubtedly changed the landscape of media forever, making huge strides in queer representation. So why are we backsliding?

Where We Are on TV

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In order to get a rounded idea of representation, GLAAD counts all forms of television when putting together its report — including primetime scripted shows on broadcast networks, streaming shows, and shows on cable. Primetime scripted shows saw a 1.3 percent decrease in recurring LGBTQ+ characters (22 less than last year), while streaming services fared slightly better: They lost only two LGBTQ+ characters.

What's even more interesting, though, are what kinds of representation are found on these shows. Only eight characters among those counted were living with HIV — 1.3 percent of all characters -- and only 32 characters were transgender, with the most representation given to trans women. (GLAAD also tracks intersectional representation, including characters in Spanish-language shows and BIPOC characters. Interestingly, over half of the characters counted in this study are people of color.)

So yes, while there aren't as many characters counted in the 2022-23 report as last year's, it's not that bad, right? In fact, the overall count only dropped by 41 characters. But this is where the other shoe drops: Out of the 596 representative characters in the report, a whopping 29 percent, or 175 characters, won't be back for the next report. According to the study, this is largely due to cancelation. (140 characters are gone specifically because their shows are being canceled!) It's not only this, of course — some shows have simply ended, or, like The White Lotus, their format makes them a limited series already.

Even outside the LGBTQ+ community, fans have begun to notice a much faster cancelation cycle. Still, throughout the report, GLAAD's comments about a general decrease in representation are notable: "This decrease across all broadcast networks cannot become a recurring trend," they say, "and must be left behind as a blip on the radar of LGBTQ inclusion." Could it be that we're already leaving a golden age of representation? Perhaps one of the more important points of analysis from this study points to a changing media landscape as one of the possible reasons for an increase in cancelations — shorter seasons and binge-watching, they say, could be causing faster abandonment.

"What is even more concerning," GLAAD says in the report, "is that many of the series getting cut are LGBTQ- inclusive programs, leaving a large demographic of viewers constantly searching for new programs only for them to ultimately be canceled before a satisfying conclusion." Some of the canceled shows listed include: Killing Eve, The Midnight Club, Riverdale, and Wellington Paranormal. GLAAD also ranked streaming services and networks by LGBTQ+ character inclusion — The CW is broadcast's winner, with 14.8 percent of all recurring characters as LBGTQ+, while the streaming award goes to Netflix, with 183 representative characters.

What Does This Mean for Queer TV Going Forward?

Perhaps it's less about what happened, but what's going to happen. There are still a huge number of LGBTQ+ characters in television despite the reported decrease — but this could be a ripple that grows into a wave. GLAAD has been tracking representation in media for years and has identified the trend as a problem. The cause isn't so simple — any form of representation is influenced not just by cancelations, but by many other societal and political factors.

Still, it seems we can glean this from GLAAD's latest: The increasingly high rate of show cancelations is impacting representation negatively, and this rate is likely influenced by binge-watching patterns. Some of the solutions offered in the report include increasing transgender representation in comedies, green-lighting new queer shows on cable, and providing larger marketing budgets to LGBTQ+ forward shows. (Comparable with the marketing budgets of other shows on the same platform.) "It has been shown time and time again that when networks and streamers put advertising and promotion behind LGBTQ-inclusive programming, their viewership only goes up," GLAAD says. Only time — and the next Where We Are on TV report — will tell.