The latest season of Bridgerton has received widespread praise for its touching coming out scene, which sees Benedict opening up to Sophie about his sexuality.

Luke Thompson’s character was confirmed to be queer during the show’s third run, where he was seen engaging in trysts with both men and women.

Benedict is Bridgerton’s first openly queer lead character, and his coming out scene took the show’s writers into new territory.

“I am capable of caring for you, just as I have cared for women I have known who are of the Ton,” he told Yerin Ha’s character, Sophie, in season four’s sixth episode, which premiered on Netflix last week.

“Just as I have cared for some men whom I have known intimately,” he added. “And I refuse to be at all ashamed about that.”

Since the episode’s release, showrunner Jess Brownell has explained why it was “hugely important” to her that this scene be included.

“I think any queer person knows that no matter who you end up with, queerness is a part of your identity,” Jess told Business Insider. “It never goes away. And I think one of the messages of this show every season is that the only way to truly be loved is to be your true self.”

After Benedict’s coming out, Sophie assures him: “Love is always a thing to be proud of. The world needs more of it.”

But to Jess, there was never any doubt about how the character would react.

“Sophie is someone who’s been through so much and has lived in the downstairs world and been friends with people of all different classes,” she claimed. “And I do think she’s probably encountered people of different sexualities.”

Before the series was released, Jess stressed that it was “really important” to her that Benedict’s queerness remain a key part of his character, including after he began to pursue a romantic relationship with a woman.

“There is a really harmful and untrue stereotype that bisexual men are actually just gay men. More often, we see bisexual men ending up in media in homosexual-presenting relationships,” Jess told Variety last year.

“And it felt fresh and important to see a bisexual man ending up in a heterosexual-presenting relationship and still owning the fact that he is still queer.”

Benedict is not the only queer character in the world of Bridgerton.

Jess has previously said that Hannah Dodd’s Francesca will enter a same-sex relationship in a future season.

At the end of Bridgerton’s third outing, Francesca is introduced to her husband John’s female cousin, Michaeala Stirling.

Fans of Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton book series will know that in the novels, this character is written as a man called Michael, with whom Francesca finds love after John suddenly dies.

However, he has been gender-swapped for the TV adaptation, with Michaela being played by Masali Baduza.

All four seasons of Bridgerton are available to watch on Bridgerton now.

Yerin Ha has explained why one of fans’ most-anticipated scenes in Bridgerton’s fourth season wasn’t nearly as sexy to film as it was to watch.

The moment in question sees Yerin’s character, Sophie, enjoying a steamy encounter with Benedict, played by Luke Thompson, in a bathtub.

However when it came to filming this sequence, it turns out that languishing in warm water for hours on end to achieve the perfect sex scene comes with occupational hazards.

“Basically I put baby powder all on me because I was told it would help dry my skin to put the intimacy wear on with the tape,” Yerin recently told Capital Breakfast.

“And then basically the next day after the bathtub, I got hives all over my body, and I got folliculitis, so I needed steroid cream.”

She joked: “But I blame myself, because I think it was a combination of baby powder and the bath water. So it’s me, I’m a sensitive gal!”

Benedict chipped in to reveal that the scene took seven whole hours to film. Let it never be said that actors don’t suffer for their art…

The bathtub scene in question was included in the second batch of episodes for Bridgerton season four, which arrived on Netflix earlier this week to mixed reviews from the critics.

Part two follows the developing romance between second eldest Bridgerton son Benedict and maid Sophie, after a complicated road including a masquerade ball, a wicked stepmother, and an absolute misfire when Benedict asked Sophie to be his mistress during a pivotal cliffhanger.

While that’s it for season four, there are at least a couple more series of Bridgerton in the pipeline, as we wait to see which of the remaining siblings’ love story is next.

Showrunner Jess Brownell previously teased who will step up to the plate in seasons five and six of the Netflix Regency drama, leaving fans to guess between Eloise and Francesca, played by Claudia Jessie and Hannah Dodd, respectively.

Bridgerton season four is streaming on Netflix now.