Do you think LGBT characters will feature more prominently?
- Thread starter Curios_Gelatin
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How much time does it take to 'set up' someone who's gay? They found time for Kirk to engage in sex scenes, flirt in a bar, flirt with colleagues while in uniform on duty... They found time to establish and feature plenty of characters who were straight, in fact. Spock and Uhura was even a new addition to the reboot they found lots of time for.
I always found it weird how many homosexuals and women love Star Trek when Star Trek has no respect for either mostly.
There's a movie, and someone said "How's your penis?" as a greeting, where the hell is that from?
AH!
And back on track, Todd turned out to be a closeted gay man overcompensating while pretending to be straight like in all those supposedly straight men in bad 80s movies. Although I think once he started perusing boys, that his language and methodology didn't change, even though Todd was after a completely different gender.
There's a movie, and someone said "How's your penis?" as a greeting, where the hell is that from?
AH!
And back on track, Todd turned out to be a closeted gay man overcompensating while pretending to be straight like in all those supposedly straight men in bad 80s movies. Although I think once he started perusing boys, that his language and methodology didn't change, even though Todd was after a completely different gender.
It's a good point that it can be kind of messed up that many gays like me love Trek when it's not had a lot of respect for me.
But what exactly was I supposed to be watching in the 80s and early 90s as a teen and young adult that did respect me?
Trek had a positive message I responded to, and while Trek has fallen behind mainstream society over the years in LGBT representation, my love for the franchise was pretty well entrenched by the time it became obvious that it was becoming regressive instead of progressive with all hetero gel rub downs on Enterprise.
The novels started doing better in the mid 90s at least going forward, and that's a big part of my fandom focus.
And for what it's worth I'm a Bryan Fuller fan as well and have seen all his previous shows, so I have high hopes he'll finally move Trek's message of diversity forward.
I don't disagree. Cisco would be a very easy character to present as a gay character. I just suspect that DC may avoid it because of some of the 80's Vibe's baggage. Well the whole Detroit Justice Leagues baggage, but Vibe was the worst of it.
If you have never read the Justice League America books from that time (and I fully understand why you wouldn't. They were the all time low point for the company and the book, this was the last sprint before the JLA got cancelled and reworked into simply Justice League/Justice League International and became a comedy book. ) Anyway Vibe was one of the new replacement leaguers. In constructing him DC did everything possible wrong. They wanted to make a then modern edgy streetwise character. So they made him a Puerto Rican from the hood. They made him an edgy disrespectful playa. Who liked to breakdance in the street. And do grafitti. And dress like Michael Jackson. Vibe was written as a straight character. But by the time they finished laying on the offensive stereotypes you had a character that likely got kicked out of the Village People for being to open and flamboyant. And yet DC did not realize they had created him as such. He was a hoodlum. A street thug gone good... to them. They took a lot of flack for Vibe, and finally swiftly killed him off in Crisis on Infinite Earths. As I said above it would not surprise me if they view making Cisco gay on Flash as "too easy" with just a touch of deep embarrassment from the old days. They may do it, but I can see why they might not.
As far as LGBT representation on Star Trek. Star Trek is the one show where a gay character would be the dull conservative boring one. I mean Riker left the animal kingdom behind years ago in his personal journey of intergalactic discovery and exploration, and was working his way through some of the more explosive areas of the periodic table last anyone saw. In case nobody has noticed it, Geordi seems to get along better with AI driven companions. He would appear to be that which Bender fears most. The "Robosexual." We will not speak of the places that "Threshold" took us, just know that we can never look at Janeway and Paris the same way ever again.
As a female ethnic minority where I reside, the same can be said for me. TOS was a space western, most if not all westerns were pandering to White Male Anglo Saxon Americans. The rest of us managed to find something to identify with when we watched TOS. For me it was Uhura, Charlene Masters, Dr M'Benga, and Richard Daystrom, despite the real life attitude Caucasians and TV had to brown skinned people (and worse for females) back in the day (I grew up in the 70's and 80's) at least a fictional future showed they had stopped treating us like shit.
Now its time to have the same attitude to sexuality between consenting adults.
I'm afraid the horse really has bolted on this one and frankly I'd hate to think that writers were including character traits purely to ensure all the correct boxes were ticked. That would not add to the show, merely shoehorn it into a formulaic pattern. Soap operas have been doing this with peoples sexuality for decades, it's too late to be grasping at "relevance" now.
I'd rather see characters that are written as interesting and fully rounded individuals and then accept whatever sexuality the writers feel flows naturally from their creation. If a particular character is in some way enhanced or more interesting/believable as a result of being gay/lesbian/bisexual - great, but not if they are simply there to pick up a demographic or tick a box, that's just a crass and overplayed card.
In any case it would ultimately be secondary to that characters role in the crew and the bigger picture of the show. I'm not sure about anyone else but when I watch trek the characters romantic lives, whilst potentially interesting, are background and b plot material. I want to see what's out there, who the crew meet and what problems they solve. There are hundreds of shows out there about people's sex lives to the point that it is overkill, there is only one Star Trek.
I'd rather see characters that are written as interesting and fully rounded individuals and then accept whatever sexuality the writers feel flows naturally from their creation. If a particular character is in some way enhanced or more interesting/believable as a result of being gay/lesbian/bisexual - great, but not if they are simply there to pick up a demographic or tick a box, that's just a crass and overplayed card.
In any case it would ultimately be secondary to that characters role in the crew and the bigger picture of the show. I'm not sure about anyone else but when I watch trek the characters romantic lives, whilst potentially interesting, are background and b plot material. I want to see what's out there, who the crew meet and what problems they solve. There are hundreds of shows out there about people's sex lives to the point that it is overkill, there is only one Star Trek.
As far as costumes changing significantly between the pilot, the main show and the movies; I just chalk it up to Hollywood trying to figure out what looked best on camera. Costuming is as much a part of storytelling as dialog and music, although far more subtle. While in real life, most miltaries wouldn't introduce new uniforms that rapidly, and those new uniforms would reflect modern fashion sensibilities, "classic aesthetics", as well as practical concerns.
And in honor of Fleet Week here in new york, I happen to think the modern navy "cracker jack" uniform looks more like pajamas than anything kirk or picard wore on duty :P
What do I want to see? A married couple, either both men or both women, who are either working together in the same post, finding it difficult to separate work and marriage, or maybe dealing with working at different posts. I would like to see a relationship in action.
What I don't want to see? 1--and only 1--gay character, whose relationships will be a trivial part of the story.
What I don't want to see? 1--and only 1--gay character, whose relationships will be a trivial part of the story.
You know how Picard was invited to a poker game every week and refused out of some unnecessary sense of propriety?
Imagine if the new Captain is invited to an orgy every week and refuses out of some unnecessary sense of propriety?
(Which I think is something that happened in an episode of Hyperdrive when we were introduced to the HMS Camden Loch's orgitorium, although we saw the bridge crew have an orgy in Starhyke.)
Imagine if the new Captain is invited to an orgy every week and refuses out of some unnecessary sense of propriety?
(Which I think is something that happened in an episode of Hyperdrive when we were introduced to the HMS Camden Loch's orgitorium, although we saw the bridge crew have an orgy in Starhyke.)
That probably be the best way to approach a same-sex relationship, have it an established one with all the ups-and-downs that all marriages have--made all the harder by being in Starfleet and the demands that places upon them.
One thing which is cool about the original Star Trek, is that it just jumps ahead over, say racial or nationalistic issues, which makes them seem even more petty.
A show during the Cold War, nobody cares that Checkov is Russian, during the civil rights era and nobody cares that Uhura is Of African descent etc.
It's the future. They are beyond that. It's genius.
When the show deals with discrimination of Spock or some other alien race, it is all the more poignant because you see how they have moved beyond "our" hang ups. Uhura is treated like every other officer on the bridge by Kirk. It isn't just arguing for equality, it is showing us what it looks like.
Anyway, if you were going to have a LGBT character (which I don't know why people assume there hasn't been one, they don't look like aliens and we don't know all their sexual preferences) I hope they will do it like that.
Have a transgender person. Have a romance. Whatever. The important part is, have none of the other characters bat an eye one way or another. It's the future.
A show during the Cold War, nobody cares that Checkov is Russian, during the civil rights era and nobody cares that Uhura is Of African descent etc.
It's the future. They are beyond that. It's genius.
When the show deals with discrimination of Spock or some other alien race, it is all the more poignant because you see how they have moved beyond "our" hang ups. Uhura is treated like every other officer on the bridge by Kirk. It isn't just arguing for equality, it is showing us what it looks like.
Anyway, if you were going to have a LGBT character (which I don't know why people assume there hasn't been one, they don't look like aliens and we don't know all their sexual preferences) I hope they will do it like that.
Have a transgender person. Have a romance. Whatever. The important part is, have none of the other characters bat an eye one way or another. It's the future.
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