Gay Sulu Shows that Star Trek has gone soft
Star Trek was at the cutting edge of social issues in the 1960s. They were getting away with stuff that no one else could, and they pushed it to the limit.
Now? The people behind Star Trek apparently say things to themselves like: “Oh, hey, let’s have a gay character. Make it Sulu, because, you know, George Takei is gay! Everyone will love it!”
Now, I say this not as a fan boy opposed to any slight alteration to the sacred canon of the franchise. Far from it. ‘Canon’ in a franchise like Trek is often just an excuse for editorial laziness. Star Trek does need to have some constants to be what it is; those constants are: Kirk, Spock, Dr. McCoy, Enterprise, Earth, Vulcan, Klingon, Romulan, Federation, space opera, boldly go where no man has gone before. That’s about it. Beyond that, everything could — and should-be up for grabs, changing as the story demands: from the precise nature of the Federation’s government and society, to the hair color, skin color, or even sexual preferences of the characters. Sure, it would be a hard sell for Kirk to be anything than something of a ladies’ man, but that aspect should stay because it works with the character and the story, not because Gene Roddenberry Said It Should Be That Way.
This is why I’d ardently hoped that this new generation of Star Trek films were would be a complete reboot ala Battlestar Galactica, not this ‘alternate timeline’ nonsense. Clear the decks, start from scratch, and make something good. So I’ve no problem with mixing it up.
But…what they’re doing here is possibly the least-riskiest thing they could have done.
In fact, the only way it could have been less risky is if Sulu comes out as gay in a film that is, basically, a remake of The Trouble With Tribbles, with an added twist of time-travel to early 21st century Earth in which the characters do a lot of tsk-tsk’ing about how primitive those 21st century types were, and end up helping James Kirk’s great-great-great-great grandfather by getting him to a doctor who happened to be Leonard McCoy’s great-great-great-great grandfather, while narrowly avoiding a car accident with Benjamin Sisko’s great-great-great-great-great-great grandmother.
If they wanted to be ballsy here, they’d have someone unexpected come out. Like Dr. McCoy. (Hey, he never explained why he got divorced from his wife…) THAT would subvert expectations and open up a more interesting character study.
Maybe the story examine how and why a man would marry a woman in one phase of his life, then fall for a man later. (Just as former Sen. Harris Wofford has done.) That would mean we’d have to talk about how things such as sexual preferences might actually be somewhat malleable, or certainly less binary than we’d all like to think.
But why stop there? Give us a Muslim character who has a crisis of faith when confronted with the realities of 23d century science. Star Trek has been afraid to touch the religion issue for most of its history, except for the maladroit Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, but it’s high time for it to go for it. Roddenberry’s naive materialism has permeated the franchise for its entire existence, but if there’s anything that the still-young 21st century has proven to us, it’s that humans are not always motivated by mere material concerns. We often make choices based on different priorities.
Can a character honestly be religious in the Star Trek universe, in which every material want and need is provided for nigh-effortlessly? What happens to the devoutly religious in that universe, where problems are just viewed — as they were in 1960s America — as a mere question of science, engineering and economics? What happens to the religious man if he decides that he can’t reconcile the demands of his faith with 23d century science (and, for that matter, the social norms of that universe)? Could a religious person honestly continue to participate in Starfleet, giving his last full measure of devotion to what is, essentially, an organization that seems to ask that its swashbuckling heroes embrace a Richard Dawkins/Carl Sagan vision of the universe?
Or how about a human character who aspires to be Vulcan so much that he considers surgery, and wants to be considered a member of the Vulcan race, legally. (You see where we’re going there…THAT would be cutting-edge…and controversial.)
Considering the headlines that are exploding across the news services this week, this month, this year…I agree with the feelings (if not the argument) of George Takei: this is weak beer. It just seems so…tacked-on.
Maybe it’s time for a new space opera that will actually ask tough questions of ourselves, just as Star Trek used to do. Lord knows, we could use one nowadays.
