J.J. Abrams: ‘Star Wars’ will have gay characters - really?
If J.J. Abrams, the director of Star
Wars: The Force Awakens, has his way with future scripts, expect
homosexual characters.
Abrams was hosting a pre-Academy Awards event at his production
company Bad Robot when asked about prospects for homosexual characters. He
responded, “Of course, of course. When I talk about inclusivity it’s not
excluding gay characters. It’s about inclusivity. So of course.”
Abrams like everyone else in Hollywood was talking about
inclusivity in response to all this year’s nominees for acting Oscars being
white (though largely unnoticed was the prominence of gay or transgender
storylines). On the larger issue of color—or lack thereof—Abrams had told the Daily
Beast, “It’s shameful. We all need to do better to
represent this world. It’s something that is important to me, and is something
that we’re focusing on at Bad Robot.”
Speculation immediately began about the close relationship
between two leading male characters, Poe (Oscar Isaac) and Finn (John Boyega),
in Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens, which has
already grossed 2 billion USD worldwide.
Everyone from the Daily Beast to the British Express wondered: Will the sequel,Rogue One, set for release by
Christmas, see new and openly homosexual characters take the stage or will the
already close friendship between Poe and Finn turn into something more?
Isaac clearly thinks he was in more than a buddy movie. He told
the audience of theEllen talk show, “You have to watch it a few
times to catch all the little hints. But there was. At least I was playing
romance. In the cockpit I was playing... there was a deep romance.”
Allmagnews.com noted, “After their crash landing on
the desert planet, Finn seemed rather distressed that Poe
may have been lost. All that was left of
the pilot was his leather jacket, and Finn wore it
as he made his way through the planet.” Cinema Blend commented
about their happy reunion late in the movie: “Did you see that
look Poe
gave Finn when he told Finn that his
jacket looked good on him?”
Moreover, Mark Hamill, who plays Luke Skywalker in the original
Star Wars and appears for just a moment in the latest one, has emerged as a
contender for the gay stakes because of a mysterious tweet to a fan asking
about his character’s sexuality. “Luke is whatever the audience wants him to
be. So you can decide for yourself.”
Finally, the latest novel in the print series, has introduced
three new LGBT characters to its parallel story line. Though its fictional
reality is parallel but not identical to the movie series, its corporate
universe is identically dominated by Disney and LucasFilm. At least in print they
believe their fans are ready for a gay hero named Sinjir Rath Velus, an
Imperial officer who has crossed over to the Rebels.
So far, parents of preteens and early teens have only had to
worry about excessive violence (The Force Awakens is rated among the most
violent episodes and the darkest). Now must they go the theatre in December
2017 with their “gaydar” units turned on? Does it matter?
“Of course it does,” Dan Gainor, vice president of the
conservative Media Research Center, told LifeSiteNews. “Hollywood is mass
marketing propaganda. If it isn’t environmental and anti-American propaganda in
Avatar, it’s sexual propaganda. There are a lot of gays in Hollywood. But it
doesn’t mean that the rest of America is like that.” The MRC has summarized its
beliefs succinctly, in a 2012 report titled “Hollywood: Driving the Homosexual
Agenda for 40 Years.”
Homosexuals are presented as healthy, normal, living in married
relationships with children, a picture that differs significantly from the
woeful health and relational patterns of most homosexuals, warns Gainor.
“They are presented as far more common than they are in reality.”
He cites a 2015 Gallup poll showing 53 percent of Americans believe that
from 20-25 percent of the population is homosexual, up from 13 percent who
believed this in 2002. “That’s Hollywood’s work,” said Gainor. “It means we are
deciding policies thinking we are accommodating a sizeable group when it’s a
miniscule minority.”
The direct influence of the entertainment media on popular
attitudes is well documented. A 2012 survey of “likely voters” by THR showed,
according to the Hollywood Reporter, that “27 percent said gay TV made
them more pro-gay marriage, and six percent [said it made them] more anti.
Obama voters watched and 30 percent got more supportive, 2 percent less
supportive. [As for] Romney [supporters]… 13 percent got more pro-gay-marriage,
12 percent got more anti.” Concluded the Reporter: “Social conservatives who
fear the influence of gay-friendly TV are evidently right to fear it.”
But movie studios are far behind TV in pushing homosexuality,
laments the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, which noted only a
slight increase in homosexual content between 2013 and 2014. “Of the 114 films
GLAAD tracked this year [for 2014], only 20 (17.5%) included depictions of LGBT
characters, and some of those would have been better left on the cutting room
floor,” it reported.
But anecdotal evidence indicates a shift last year to movies
with dominant homosexual or LGBT themes. While GLAAD could find no transgender
characters in 2014, last year saw the release of The
Danish Girl, a biopic about a Danish artist in the 1920s who died from
complications of sex-change surgery; Carol about a 60s housewife having an affair
with a shopgirl; and Freeheld, about a lesbian
police officer dying of cancer and fighting for her partner to get her death
benefits. All featured major stars such as Eddie Redmayne and Cate Blanchett.
Still, for Gainor, nothing tops the popular, well-made new TV
series called Lucifer. “I’m unshockable.
Why should I get upset about a gay character in Star
Wars when
there is now a TV series marketing Satan as the good guy?”
