Television: Less Than Letter Perfect

Aiming to make lesbians visible in the Queer Eye era, The L Word is lusty but otherwise lackluster

When Showtime premiered Queer as Folk, its series about horny gay men in Pittsburgh, Pa., the title (taken from the original British series) was not meant to be subtle. (This, kids, was way back in 2000, before Carson Kressley rendered the word queer as humdrum as a Gap sweater.) Now, unveiling a series about horny gay women in Los Angeles, the network is playing it more coy. The L Word (Sundays, 10 p.m. E.T.), says its title sequence, is also about "liberty," "life," "love" and, presumably, llamas and lemonade too. The L Word, this implies, is about more than just lesbianism.

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