Their characterizations aren’t solely defined by their queerness, and they are able to be complex, three-dimensional characters.
Both Ennis and Jack are shepherds who move animals where they need to go, and when they aren’t doing that, they’re ranching or working a rodeo. While much of Hollywood’s portrayals of LGBTQ+ stories and characters relied on, in the past, many harmful and untrue stereotypes about the queer community, there is a refreshing absence of those elements in Brokeback Mountain.
Ennis and Jack are men who loved each other to their core and while they lead typical lives in the outside world, ultimately, nothing came between their love.
