Was Kyle gay?

Nah, I think he was getting excited watching Delia at the dance.

I just watched that episode today, and thought the exact same thing. From my perspective it seemed to foreshadow a future storyline. Not saying I'm right, but yeah I got that inclination too.

Haha, wow. He was just watching everyone dance and Ricky and Delia took center stage so the entire gym was watching the two of them. He was not *watching* Ricky--I don't even see how this is remotely implied. And I also have never once viewed him as being sexually worked up in any way during this scene.

Sharon realized the dude is a simpleton/dumb jock without much going on upstairs, that's all it was as far as why she doesn't feel the way she did before and this is illustrated repeatedly in following episodes.


"It's Minnie Pearl's murder weapon."

Although everything you said makes total sense because it confused me too about Sharon talking about morals and that he turned out to be someone else and blah blah blah...him getting excited at the dance was just about how Sharon wanted to dance but he was not into it. Then when he was getting excited watching Ricki and Deliah dance it pissed Sharon off ("Why can't you get excited about dancing with ME" is what she would have been thinking). It was just another little reason to make sharon not want to be with him!

I have never gotten the impression that Kyle is gay from that scene. What I've taken away from it is that he was watching Ricky and Delia let loose and truly enjoy themselves, even in a room full of peers who might be judging or mocking them. I didn't see Kyle's expression towards (either of) them to be lustful or anything like that; instead, I think it's sort of admiration and a little envy. When you're popular, a lot of pressure comes along with that. You're expected to behave a certain way and not be too different, etc. Kyle was a jock and a bit of a meat-head and would never be able to let loose like that without being endlessly mocked for it by his jock friends.

I'm not saying popular kids have it rough or anything. I just mean, the grass is always greener, you know? There are pros and cons to being popular, and pros and cons to being unpopular/unknown/or a little weird. Ricky was always one of the "alternative" or "a little weird" kids because of his style and sexuality. So he could dance the way he did without defying anyone's expectations of him. I think there was also a little bit of a "Good for them" look in Kyle's eyes. Like I said, some admiration for letting loose and just having fun without caring what anyone else thinks.

Or Kyle could have just been staring off into space and not thinking anything.

Lastly, I don't think Sharon's nonsensical rant really meant anything. She was always going off on little tangents like that and not making 100% sense. It's like half the explanation was in her head and half was coming out via verbal diarrhea, so it didn't make a ton of sense to an observer. She was probably trying to make sense of it herself - but I think she had just grown apart from Kyle & lost her attraction to him. Once that happened, him being a cute jock wasn't enough for her to put up with his annoying traits.

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Having watched the episode recently, Kyle looks to me like he's admiring the way Rickie can dance. Saying that he's attracted to Rickie in that scene is just a guess. Sharon's "he's not who I thought he was," seems to me to be that she just assumed a boy she gave herself to must have a comparable mind to her. When this turned out not to be true, she was disappointed. Also, one overall theme seems to be that sex to girls (other than Rayanne) is far more emotionally meaningful than to boys, and sharon couldn't accept that (at first). Kyle knew she got "hot" by watching Brad Pitt in movies - which is why he brought it up later. Perhaps he was smarter than she gave him credit for. But maybe in a Season 2, Kyle would have experienced doubts about his sexuality - we'll never know.