Nor is the theory that he remained unmurdered by Blackbeard for a whole year and a half because they were fucking a wildly unlikely theory.

Right -- another thing I love is that this is a wholly plausible theory, and much more plausible than any number of other plot twists in any number of other "historical" shows -- and I feel like the showrunners know this, know that queer history is about reading these gaps and interstices in the official records.

-We know queer relationships happened
-Here's an odd explanatory gap for some human behaviour
-Here is a totally reasonable explanation for it: a queer relationship