'Brave' Homer Gere goes shirtless
I haven't had the stomach to start the new season, but by now you've undoubtedly heard that HBO’s "Euphoria" recently introduced Homer Gere in a brief shirtless kitchen scene -- and the internet reacted as though viewers had just spotted a rare animal in the wild.
Gere, son of Richard Gere and Carey Lowell, looked fit, attractive and entirely believable as a real 20-something guy -- broad shoulders, trim waist, nice chest -- yet social media became flooded with praise bordering on disbelief because his midsection showed the slightest evidence that he might occasionally eat bread.
In any other era, he simply would’ve been considered hot.
In 2026, he was suddenly “brave.”
The reaction said less about Gere than it did about the impossible beauty standards audiences have quietly absorbed over the past decade, where even supporting actors appear contractually obligated to look dehydrated year-round.
What made the moment refreshing wasn’t that Gere looked “average” -- he very clearly did not. But that, for once, viewers weren’t being asked to pretend that every man in his 20s naturally resembles a fitness influencer three days before a photo shoot -- and instead got a taste of what most of us find truly sexy.
I found this especially poignant -- and helpful -- given that in recent months, as my birthday looms, I’ve caught myself feeling bad after a day of scrolling through photos of guys a fraction of my age, needing to remind myself that most men my age -- rather than of the gay Peter Pan variety -- are grandparents and hardly beating themselves up for no longer being as “hot” as they once were.
Now forgive me while I head to my MRI for my shoulder, which has been killing me since overdoing it at the gym(!).
posted by Kenneth M. Walsh at 5:14 PM
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