Insomnia Comes Home: The Queer South Asian Series Returns to YouTube

Vishaal Reddy
Jun 15
2 min read

After a wonderful few years on Revry, Insomnia is returning to where it all began: YouTube.

When I first created Insomnia, I wanted to tell a story I was not seeing on screen. The series follows a queer escort navigating fear, family, identity, intimacy, and sex work through a darkly comedic lens. At its core, Insomnia was born from a desire to create a South Asian character who was bold, flawed, assertive, complicated, funny, vulnerable, and unapologetically himself.

Far too often, South Asian characters are flattened by stereotype, expectation, or respectability. With Insomnia, I wanted to push against that. I wanted to build a character and a world that allowed for contradiction, humor, desire, messiness, and humanity. The result was a series that challenged what queer South Asian storytelling could look like—and who gets to be at the center of it.

Making this series has been one of the great joys of my creative life. I had the privilege of collaborating with an incredibly talented group of artists, filmmakers, actors, and friends who helped bring this world to life. What began as a passion project became something much bigger, and I remain endlessly grateful to everyone who contributed their time, talent, care, and belief to the project.

WATCH

EPISODE ONE

ALL EPISODES ON YOUTUBE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ME-2GgjHg0U

Now, we are bringing Insomnia back home to YouTube through the Snarky Elephant channel, making the series more accessible to anyone who wants to watch, revisit, or discover it for the first time.

Independent storytelling grows because people show up for it. It grows when audiences watch, share, talk about the work, and help it reach the communities that may need it most. If Insomnia resonated with you, I would be incredibly grateful if you shared it with your friends, family, colleagues, and communities.

Thank you for watching, supporting, and coming along for the ride. I am excited for a whole new audience to discover Insomnia.

See you on YouTube.