EastEnders’ most iconic – and impactful – LGBTQ+ moments from the past 40 years

British soaps are more than just light weekday entertainment; they can be vehicles for vital discussions and shapers of public opinion. When it comes to LGBTQ+ representation, EastEnders has led the gay way.

Over the course of 40 years, the TV favourite has given Britain its first televised gay kiss (Colin and Barry), tackled misinformation around the HIV/AIDS epidemic head on (Mark Fowler) and provided us with a number of queer couples we’d happily go to war for (most recently, Suki and Eve).

To mark the soap’s 40th birthday, we’ve ranked the soap’s 12 most iconic – and impactful – LGBTQ+ moments.

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12. The first lesbian couple arrive (1994)

Hairdresser Della Alexander (Michelle Joseph) made EastEnders gay history by becoming the soap’s first lesbian character, albeit closeted, with her secret girlfriend Binnie (Sophie Langham) arriving a few months later.

By extension, this gave ‘Enders fans their first ever lesbian kiss, too. Sadly, this duo was defined by Della’s internalised shame, homophobia from the square’s residents (most notable Natalie Price), and the desperate attempts of a man (Steve Elliot) in getting Della into bed. They departed a year after they arrived with little mark left, but hey, at least they didn’t die: the pair strutted into the Ibiza sunset together.

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11. First trans man introduced (2015)

There’s a lot of history-making on this list, and this time, it’s the turn of actor Riley Carter Millington. He became the first trans man to portray a trans character in a British soap in 2015 when he was introduced as Kyle Slater, the half-brother of the jem in Albert Square’s crown, Stacey Slater.

Having such a formidable relative made Kyle’s appearance all the more exciting, but it lasted just a year. His biggest storylines involved almost but not quite shaking his nemesis Andy Flynn off a ladder and having a transphobic mother. He left for France after bagging a fancy cheffing job, and that was the end of that. 

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10. Sonia’s shock lesbian kiss (2007)

I am being sadly very serious when I say that Sonia Fowler’s brief lesbian love affair with her nursing coworker Naomi (Petra Letang) was my first example of seeing sapphics on screen. It dominated tabloid headlines at the time, with viewers shocked that this fierce (she’s delivered eight slaps during her EE time) future matriarch of the Fowler clan could be a little fruity.

Backlash from the community ensued, as the show’s first lesbian relationship since Della and Binnie ended with Sonia jumping straight back into bed with her husband Martin, and actress Natalie Cassidy cited the storyline as one of the reasons for her departure in 2007. She’s since returned – though will soon leave again – with the writers being very clear this time around that Sonia puts the B in LGBTQ+.

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9. Johnny Carter comes out to dad Mick (2014)

It’s hard to know how to feel about Johnny Carter (then played by Sam Strike) coming out to his hard nut dad, Mick (Danny Dyer) back in 2014. Mick’s response starts out well – “It would be OK [if you were gay]. Just wanted you to know that me and your mum, we’d be OK with it” – before taking a seismic nosedive – “If I had a son who wore makeup and was all camp and that, I would find it a bit weird” – and then coming back to sweet again: “But I know that being gay, it’s not a choice. It’s just in you. It’s just who you are.”

I guess it’s a fairly true-to-life, or even optimistic, reaction from an East End man’s man, and the writers’ hope was to inspire other men to accept their queer kids. Props to them for that. Sadly, Mick’s wife Linda (Kellie Bright) practically had a breakdown over her son’s sexuality reveal, essentially leaving Mick’s “Born This Way” approach redundant.

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8. The Prince Albert opens, and Walford celebrates its first Pride (2019 and 2021)

Roughly 60 per cent of gay venues in London have closed since 2006, but that’s not a stat the Walford residents need worry about. Thanks to Kathy Beale and the sale of her conveniently-priced £100,000 necklace in 2019, EastEnders is home to her hilariously named gay bar, The Prince Albert. Sharon, Kat, Linda and co. can enjoy Charli XCX bops and tequila shots in peace! It’s a fun little addition to EastEnders, which has found fans as much for its frequent over-the-top camp as for its hard-hitting storylines. The arrival of the first ever Walford Pride in 2021 was the cherry on the rainbow-layered cake.

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7. Ballum (2022)

As one of EastEnders’ most volatile and unlikely pairings in recent years, Ballum – Ben Mitchell (Max Bowden) and Callum Highway (Tony Clay) – invigorated the soap and gave megafans a new couple to cling to. Ben was his own worst enemy, and Callum was a puppy-eyed antidote of sorts, but the self-destructive Mitchell son’s demons got the better of him and he was left imprisoned and alone after a drugs bust in the US.

Their pairing didn’t alter the soap’s DNA, but they’ve still got dedicated social media fan accounts reminiscing about their romance, and that surely counts for something. 

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6. Ben Mitchell comes out as gay (2011)

While I’m not often one to presume someone’s sexuality based on tired stereotypes, at the time, I presumed Ben Mitchell’s sexuality based on tired stereotypes. His adoration for Lady Gaga and West End musicals, incongruent with the Mitchell clan’s typical machismo, was a hint of what was to come.

Ben, played then by Joshua Pascoe, was by this point far from EastEnders‘ first ever gay character, but his coming out hit a little different: we’d seen him grow up from childhood among a family of blustering geezers, with his father Phil as one of the Square’s most formidable characters. The journey to acceptance was likely to be a longer, but altogether more profound one.

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5. Paul Coker’s homophobic murder (2016)

While EastEnders gets major props for pushing the envelope with its queer kisses and weddings, the soap has also gone fairly far in tackling some of the more devastating consequences of being LGBTQ+. This was on display in extremes in 2016 when market trader Paul Coker (Jonny Labey), then boyfriend of cantankerous Mitchell bad boy Ben, was brutally murdered in a homophobic attack after a night out.

Some may cry “Bury Your Gays”, but I think it was more a crushing, and necessary, depiction of the prevalence of hate crimes. Today, it feels all the more revolutionary, and all the more pertinent.

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4. Mark Fowler’s HIV diagnosis (1991)

Though Mark Fowler (Todd Carty) wasn’t an LGBTQ+ character, the revelation of his HIV diagnosis was an astonishing moment in soap history that had an immeasurable impact on the soap’s LGBTQ+ audience.

Mark was the first character in a British soap to ever be diagnosed with the virus in 1991, at a time where HIV was seen by the press and public as an illness exclusively experienced by gay men. The plot helped to combat prejudice and misconceptions about the virus, proving that a diagnosis wasn’t a death sentence, as Mark continued his life on EastEnders for well over a decade after the plot.

It wasn’t a perfect storyline, but it sure made a huge difference at the time.

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3. The Square’s first lesbian wedding (2025)

It’s taken four decades of gay EastEnders drama to finally see the show’s first ever lesbian wedding. It’s been a long, winding and frequently near-fatal journey to get here, and right up to the very last moment, the nuptials between the steely yet secretly squishy-soft Suki (Balvinder Sopal) and Gentleman Jack-esque heroine Eve (Heather Pearce) almost didn’t happen (darned poisoned champagne!) Thankfully, it’s been worth the wait: the duo have ascended to a level of sapphic couple goals rivalled only by the likes of Hollywood titans Sarah Paulson and Holland Taylor.

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2. Christian and Syed’s gay romance (2009)

The secret romance between BRIT School Johnny Bravo Christian (John Partridge) and Disney Prince Syed (Marc Elliott) was one of the foundational bricks of a golden era of EastEnders in the late noughties.

Appearing at a time where LGBTQ+ representation and acceptance were in a weird purgatory – gay characters at the time were tolerated, but not celebrated (a scene showing this pairing in bed prompted hundreds of complaints to Ofcom at the time) – Christian and Syed were pivotal in pulling soaps into the modern age. Because if an atheist gay was just about acceptable, a Muslim gay person was still unthinkable. After a very rocky road, Christian and Syed eventually rode the DLR into the sunset. 

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1. The very first gay kiss (1989)

And here we are, EastEnders‘ first gay kiss that sparked a thousand other gay kisses (and a thousand or so complaints). Back in 1987, Colin (Lord Michael Cashman) kissed his boyfriend Barry (Gary Hailes) on the side of the head, prompting a huge wave of backlash and media scandal.

Yet, instead of cowing to the bigoted mob, EastEnders bosses leaned towards them: in 1989, Colin and Barry delivered the first lip-to-lip kiss between two men in a British soap. It had an undeniable trickle-down effect, emboldening legions of queer people during an era of intensely grim homophobia (Margaret Thatcher’s Section 28 law was introduced in 1988), and daring other soaps to one-up it.

Without Colin and Barry, there would be no Ballum, no Suki and Eve, no Christian and Syed. For that, we salute them.

EastEnders is streaming now on BBC iPlayer.