Two and a Half Men will feature a gay adoption storyline involving Ashton Kutcher and Jon Cryer for its final season.
CBS president Nina Tassler revealed at the TCA Press Tour that season 12 will see Walden Schmidt (Ashton Kutcher) proposing to raise a child with Alan Harper (Jon Cryer) during an "existential crisis".
"He wants to find a way to add more meaning to his life so he decides he wants to adopt a child and in doing so, he starts the process and realizes that it's very difficult to adopt a child as a single, straight man," Tassler told reporters.
"So once and for all he decides, 'I'm going to propose to Alan and we're going to get married and adopt a child as a gay couple'."
Tassler went on to say that she is not concerned with a backlash from the LGBT community.
"I think it's a very positive statement that, you know what, I am going to adopt a child as a gay couple and the reality is, he can do that," she later told The Hollywood Reporter.
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"And in a universe where at one point you couldn't do that and now you can do that, I think that's a much more positive statement that he's making."
A spokesperson for GLAAD urged Two and a Half Men to depict the "greater scrutiny" faced by same-sex couples in the adoption process, in addition to "the progress made in acceptance of gay and lesbian couples".
Two and a Half Men previously introduced Amber Tamblyn as Charlie Harper's long-lost lesbian daughter Jenny, who was depicted as being in an on-screen relationship with Aly Michalka.
The final season of Two and a Half Men premieres on October 30.
Justin is a freelance entertainment journalist and writer. He first joined Digital Spy as a freelance entertainment reporter in 2010 and also worked as a sub-editor for the brand, serving as Night News Editor from 2016 to 2024. Over more than a decade, Justin has covered numerous major entertainment events from the US and has interviewed a wide-ranging group of public figures, from comedian Steve Coogan to icons from the Star Trek universe, cast members from the Marvel Cinematic Universe and reality stars from numerous Real Housewives cities and the Below Deck franchise. Justin has also been on the ground to cover major pop culture events like the Star Wars Celebration and the D23 Expo. He's written for titles across the Hearst network, plus the likes of CBR and Us Weekly.
