Bi as hell

Texts From Superheroes

I’m at Best Buy to get a pair of laptops for myself and my wife. Specifically, I’m at the counter checking out.

The manager has been helping me, but when I go to pay a sales associate takes over; I guess the manager has been covering for him. She was good at it, too - she’d persuaded me to get the most expensive of the three laptop models I was thinking about.

Sales Guy starts pitching the extended warranties. I politely decline; he keeps pushing them. I decline again, bluntly this time. He keeps pushing them. I ask him to just ring the laptops through. He keeps pushing the warranties, and after this many refusals he should really be letting it go. But he’s still on it, and talking down to me a little at that.

Around this point, the manager (who’s still in the department space) comes back and is just hovering behind him out of his sight, monitoring. He doesn’t notice her because the Computers section has its registers toward the middle.

I say this: “I’ve told you a few times that I don’t want any extended warranties. You clearly feel strongly about it; can you explain why? Maybe I’m missing something.”

The manager’s eyebrows go up a bit.

Sales Guy starts some kind of nonsense story about how these laptops in particular can be unreliable and it’s better safe than sorry.

Me: “Hm; that’s a good point. Better safe than sorry.”

Sales Guy: “Good decision! So–”

Me: “I think I’ll pass on these after all. Nothing worse than unreliable hardware.”

And I walk away, right past the manager, who is now staring daggers at the back of Sales Guy’s head.

Why it’s important to me, a gay person, that Hikaru Sulu is canonically gay in the reboot movies?

I understand George Takei’s hesitation.   He doesn’t see Hikaru as gay because he never played him as gay in the original series.   He doesn’t believe that simply making a character gay is the way to support LGBTQA characters.  His is an opinion that I greatly respect, both as an actor who played the original character and as an out gay man and LGBTQA activist.   

At the same time something that I think Star Trek has always been known for is its diversity.   Of course, the Star Trek Beyond producers and writers could have written in another gay character.    Of course they could have written a character specifically for him to be gay and to Make a Statement.  But the reality is that a new character, one without history, one that was not grounded in the original series would not have the significance culturally that Hikaru Sulu has.

Hikaru Sulu.  Gold shirted, command division, pilot of the Enterprise, eventual Captain of his own ship, Asian-American, fencer, friend, crucial member of the Enterprise’s crew throughout the three seasons and multiple movies starring the original cast.

Hikaru Sulu has a weight to him as a character because he’s been around since the sixties.   Making his reboot character canonically gay is more than just a cultural statement.   I had a conversation with a friend where they expressed their concern about the choice, not because they disagreed with it necessarily, but because they believed it was merely a cultural statement.

Here’s the truth – it is a cultural statement.  But it’s also more than that.  It’s a character whose sexuality was never explicitly stated in the original series, who was significant in a show that celebrated diversity, who was one of the first Asian-American characters to be a primary role in a hit TV show.    Making this character gay says something about Star Trek and it’s choice to “boldly go” to where most major franchises will not go with their main characters.   The willingness to have a gay character is not merely a statement.  I would argue that it’s not even primarily a statement.  It’s a recognition of the reality of gay characters, gay actors, and gay people, and it’s incredibly refreshing.

So Sulu is gay.  He’s precious, and intelligent, and in this movie he is so much more than simply a out, happy, gay man in a committed relationship with a daughter.   He’s showing signs of the captain that he becomes in the original timeline in his courage and leadership in scenes where he protects, directs, and speaks for the Enterprise and its crew.    He’s an incredible pilot, a gutsy pilot, and a husband.   His sexuality is not the most important thing about him in this movie, but that’s part of why it is so nice to see.

So thank you, Justin Lin and the rest of the Star Trek Beyond team.  Thank you for making a creative decision that gave  lots of gay kids the chance to see themselves as part of a historic franchise in a way that did not feel forced.  

Steven Moffat

http://www.withanaccent.com/2016/07/28/sdcc-2016-sherlock-a-study-in-secrecy/