Poe Dameron: Dashing Resistance operative. One hell of a pilot. LGBT cinematic icon?
I'm a gay Star Wars fan, and this blog is my effort to collect and contribute to musings about LGBT characters in sci-fi, geek culture, and beyond. Welcome!
In 2011, he was featured in Sucker Punch, a mostly-ghastly Zack Snyder film. I am a sucker (lol) for visual design, cartoonish violence, and tawdry sexualization, so I enjoy a little Zack Snyder from time to time. And while Sucker Punch really delivered in the art direction and combat choreography departments, the movie's overall cracked-out incoherence was just too much for even my questionable taste.
Oscar Isaac had a whole number, however--Roxy Music's Love Is the Drug--and his performance is dreamy. Check it out:
Don't judge me too harshly, but I just recently finished Chuck Wendig's Star Wars: Aftermath (tagline: The War Is Not Poe-ver). As everyone obviously already knows, this book is a big deal because it introduces us to the first gay male hero in Star Wars: Sinjir Rath Velus.
Just so I get this timeline right--the first LGBT Star Wars character was technically Juhani from BioWare's Knights of the Old Republic, and she appeared well over a decade ago. Juhani was a lesbian Cathar who had an optional romance subplot with female player-characters.
(And I guess if I'm talking about that, I should also mention that same-gender romances were available in later expansions of BioWare's Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO. My Sith Marauder was so Force-grabby with that Theron Shan! Made me blush, honestly.)
Then, lesbian Imperial Moff Delian Mors turned up as a villainous antagonist in Paul S. Kemp's novel, Lords of the Sith, released in April 2015 (and no, I haven't yet read that but I intend to... someday?).
Finally, last fall, Wendig went big with LGBT characters in Aftermath. In addition to Sinjir, there's a fleeting but heartbreaking mention of a war orphan's deceased gay dads in a side-story interlude set on Naboo. And another main character, Norra, has a lesbian sister, Esmelle. She and her wife, Shireen, share several scenes with the protagonists and are well-conceived characters in their own right, although not really central to the plot.
Dead-on Sinjir fan art by makeramidying
But Aftermath really makes a big gay jump to rainbow-streaming lightspeed with Sinjir Rath Velus, the Imperial defector. No question, a cinematic version of Sinjir would pass the Vito Russo test as an overtly gay three-dimensional character who is integral to the narrative: he is our first LGBT hero in Star Wars storytelling media.
...Sort of.
Sinjir has serious substance abuse issues. He is an Imperial deserter who kind of remorselessly admits to being "a bad man." In his prior life as an Imperial Loyalty Officer, he was responsible for conducting witch hunts to ferret out un-Imperial conduct in the Empire's ranks. The novel is pretty explicit about Sinjir's chilling ruthlessness in capturing, interrogating, torturing, and punishing offenders. He is unapologetic in his self-interest and, for most of the novel, it appears likely that he will somehow betray his comrades. He is judgmental, narcissistic, and largely indifferent to suffering.
But Sinjir works as a compelling protagonist because Wendig balances those dire character flaws with interesting and authentic positive attributes. Sinjir realistically struggles with a profound crisis of conscience, not unlike Finn's at the beginning of TFA. Sinjir seems sincere when he hints at wanting to "do better," and when his loyalty is ultimately tested, Sinjir's nascent better nature prevails. Not to mention, when it comes to action sequences, Sinjir is a fucking ninja (which is obviously the finest attribute a character can have, as far as I'm concerned).
To sum up, Sinjir is not really our first LGBT Star Wars hero. Sinjir is our first LGBT Star Wars antihero.
I had mixed reactions to Sinjir being so complicated and messy. A part of me was disappointed, and was like, "Really? The one gay guy has to be a raging alcoholic and a treacherous war criminal?" It's almost as if portraying Sinjir as a classic hero was too far-fetched--he had to be seriously flawed so he would "make sense" to a straight audience who would view homosexuality as entirely incompatible with heroic virtue.
My other reaction was, well, why not? Aren't antiheroes more interesting and more fun as characters anyway? But more importantly, I started to see this as a evolutionary arc, as if Lucasfilm is priming the pump for the inevitable widening inclusion of gay people in Star Wars stories--maybe even movies. Stick with me here:
They started off pandering to the all-too-familiar trope of the villainous homosexual with Moff Mors. Plus, Mors is a lesbian, and therefore is less threatening to straight men's concepts of masculinity. Thus, Moff Mors is well within the audience's comfort zone.
Then, the franchise ramps up the challenge to introduce Sinjir, a gay male protagonist, but who still retains the trappings of the familiar homosexual villain. In that sense, Sinjir is like a transition phase for a homophobic audience, blending comfortable stereotypes with a preview of what's in store.
The final step in the process would be Poe. As a gay male, he would be a more direct and serious challenge to cultural assumptions of masculinity. And he would be a no-holds-barred virtuous hero whose sexual orientation exists harmoniously with his goodness and valor.
I know. I can't even take seriously my own suggestion that Lucasfilm producers have some secret blueprint for gradually introducing gay Star Wars characters. But at the same time, as Chuck Wendig heroically and hilariously ranted on his blog in response to the vile reactions to Sinjir, TFA, and anything else not white and straight and male in Star Wars:
Nice thing with Star Wars is, it is happening. Look at the protagonists of The Force Awakens. Look at Lucasfilm. They’re openly committing to finding a woman director for Star Wars. Kathleen Kennedy notes: “Fifty percent of our executive team are women. Six out of eight of the people in my Story Group are women. I think it’s making a huge difference in the kind of stories we’re trying to tell.” Some of the story group are also people of color. It’s a start. Especially when it’s starting in one of the biggest SFF franchises ever. Perfect? No. Nothing is. But it’s nice to see changes happening. It’s nice to see some equity there between the audience that consumes this stuff and the people who make it. Stories matter to people. Characters matter. Creation matters. Nobody should be excluded. Inclusion is awesome.
And if you oppose that — you know, hey, fuck you. Go on and throw pebbles at mountains. Go on and boycott the sun. Let me know how that works out for you.
Meanwhile, I’m gonna be over here enjoying what’s to come. I suggest trying it. Loving stuff instead of hating it. Accepting the world as it is, not the world as you mistakenly hope it will be.
Sinjir has grown on me. He is a terrific LGBT antihero and I can't wait to see what he does in Wendig's sequels to Aftermath. I am thrilled to have him in the Star Wars universe--it is much better (and much much sassier) for his inclusion.
And if they weren't separated by a generation, I'd totally ship SinPoe. Right? Opposites attract!
As you might know, the Bechdel test was developed in the 1980's as a way of assessing a film's treatment of its female characters. To pass the Bechdel test, a movie must have at least two female characters (preferably named) who have a conversation about something other than a male. This seems like a really low bar, but only a small handful of major studio films pass every year. Basically, the Bechdel test shows us that mainstream films continue to hew to a long misogynist tradition in popular culture to marginalize the female experience.
Since Poemosexuality has become a thing, I've been thinking a lot about gay characters in media, and specifically in sci-fi/action films--and whether anyone tracks the treatment of LGBT characters along criteria like those of the Bechdel test.
I discovered that GLAAD does an annual Studio Responsibility Index (SRI), which surveys and inventories major film studio releases. For purposes of the SRI, GLAAD groups films into 5 categories: comedy, genre (sci-fi, action, and fantasy), animated/family, drama, and documentary. The SRI then identifies as "inclusive" any film that has LGBT characters of any stripe, major or minor. Next, as part of their evaluation, GLAAD applies the Vito Russo test, inspired by the Bechdel test, to assess an inclusive film's treatment of its gay character(s). Under this standard, a movie includes a meaningful LGBT character if the following are true:
The film contains a character that is identifiably LGBT.
That character must not be predominantly defined by their sexual orientation or gender identity. This refers to the depth of the character: flimsy two-dimensional stereotypes vs. actual characters who have personality and attributes beyond just their gayness.
The LGBT character plays a meaningful role in the narrative. In other words, the character is not window dressing to provide commentary or situational humor, like gross-out or gay-panic jokes. Rather, the character must be significant enough to the plot that the character's removal would noticeably alter the story.
I was gratified to see that the gay characters in Cloud Atlas passed the Vito Russo test a few years ago. I know that the Wachowskis' films have not been great since The Matrix, but at least they're doing LGBT representation in film right!
Aside from that, the 2015 SRI, which reviewed films released in 2014, reveals what I've been bitching about all along:
Other than documentaries, genre films had by far the lowest percentage of inclusive films out of the other categories: just 6.5%, which means that only 3 out of 46 genre films released in 2014 had LGBT characters in them at all. And it's not getting better. In 2013, GLAAD counted 43 major release films in the sci-fi/fantasy genre, and 4 (or 9.3%) had LGBT characters.
It's not so easy to discern from GLAAD's summary exactly which 2014 films it counted as the 3 inclusive genre films. (Maybe Exodus: Gods and Kings? ...Not sure what the others were.) But as far as I can tell, no sci-fi films passed GLAAD's Vito Russo test in 2014. That means there were zero characters of substance in any major studio sci-fi film the entire year. Zero.
[gratuitous fan art]
I understand that people might dispute whether Oscar Isaac's lip bite and his other acting choices are enough to substantiate Poe's character as canonically gay. What I don't get is people who think that LGBT representation in modern pop culture is just fine, and that we gay fans are somehow being too greedy in wishing/hoping that Poe is gay, and that we should just be satisfied with comedies and dreary awards-focused dramas that include LGBT characters. But as the surge of the Poemosexual Agenda has demonstrated, we fans of sci-fi/fantasy in general and Star Wars in particular are clearly not satisfied that there are no LGBT protagonists in a major studio genre film.
I really want the first to be Poe, because Star Wars has been my jam since 1977 and it would mean the galaxy to me as a gay fan to be able to say that Star Wars broke that ground. If he was just "identifiably gay" in a way that didn't rely purely on innuendo or code, he would clearly satisfy the other two criteria of the Vito Russo test, and we would have our first heroic LGBT protagonist in a major studio sci-fi/fantasy film.
As previously mentioned, The Force Awakens is up against another Oscar Isaac feature, Ex Machina, for the Visual Effects Academy Award. Ex Machina, in terms of effects and composition, is basically the exact opposite of TFA: where the Star Wars effects are all majesty and scale, Ex Machina's visual effects are intricate and precise--tiny moving parts and glimmering spider-threads of lights that quietly whir and buzz beneath the transparent synthetic skin of Ava, the Clockwork Girl. The visual effects of Ex Machina are truly arresting, and while I don't necessarily expect it to get the award, it is definitely a memorable work of art.
You can tell by now that I love Ex Machina. It's a claustrophobic, paranoid, and contemplative film about artificial intelligence and human emotion and the uncharted tidal waters where the two bleed into each other. Alex Garland wrote and directed Ex Machina, and it had the same old-school classic sci-fi thriller feel of 2007's Sunshine, which he also wrote and which I also loved.
The tiny cast of Ex Machina is amazing. Alicia Vikander is so great as Ava, a cunning artificial intelligence who has a chilling agenda of her own--or maybe she just thinks it's her own? General Hux plays the hapless subject of a Turing test that is not at all what it seems.
Our boy Oscar Isaac stars as an odious and narcissistic tech bro demon-god... and manages to make casual sleaze, pathetic self-destruction, and pathological self-aggrandizement hopelessly sexy. I hate myself for finding the character so attractive, but just look at him:
More like SEX Machina, amirite?
THOSE MOVES. Not fair, Mr. Isaac, not fair at all.
Probably goes without saying that the film has no LGBT characters. But when you think about it, the entire plot is based upon the work of an LGBT icon, Alan Turing. As you'll recall, Turing basically invented computers and was the subject of the biopic The Imitation Game, which won last year's Academy Award for writing and was nominated in a slew of other categories. The story is a tragic one, ultimately, as Turing's reward for revolutionizing technology and human experience was chemical castration, his sentence for the crime of being gay. But through it all, Turing's unfailing devotion to the memory of a childhood crush, who he memorialized/deified as a computer, was beautifully played by Benedict Cumberbatch.
And Ex Machina examines the questions that Turing's own longing and creativity raised: What is it about creating thinking machines that we find so irresistible? Why are we so drawn to the idea of artificial constructs that we can love or lust after? Maybe it's the idea that we can love them while closely controlling them to eliminate the risk of heartbreak, rejection, disappointment, or loss? Why do we aspire so greedily to create an intelligence that can fool us into thinking it's human, but then not be willing to extend to the intelligence the humanity we so desperately want it to emulate?
Like all good sci-fi, Ex Machina is thought-provoking in addition to being fun to watch. Support this film--we need more like it.
What is happening this week? When Star Wars moved the Ep. VIII release date back to December 2017, it set up a big epic box office battle with Avatar 2, which will be the first in a sequel trilogy to 2009's Avatar, and which was also set for December 2017.
Turns out that Avatar 2 has been delayed... indefinitely. The studio did not comment on the cause of the delay, but Cameron has repeatedly referenced the monumental complexity in designing and plotting all three films of the trilogy at once. Yadda yadda, welcome to being an egomaniacal perfectionist, Jim.
Between us girls, I was not a huge fan of Avatar. It was gorgeous, but it just didn't have any heart. What it did have was Sam Worthington, who I will never get enough of, and who I wished was not CGI-morphed into a big blue alien for most of the film.
I'll take the drumsticks, please.
I know Sam Worthington is occasionally kind of a douche, but he's just so dreamy. His bare thighs draped in that hot little utili-kilt were the only two things that made the Clash of the Titans remake watchable. The sequel, Wrath of the Titans, did not have nearly as many lingering shots of those gams, sadly. Would not recommend.
Starwars.com announced yesterday that Episode VIII will be released on December 15, 2017--seven months after its previously-announced release date of May 2017.
The Starwars.com announcement did not provide an explanation, but, and this is huge, the speculation is that the script is being revised.
Weren't we just talking about script revisions to accommodate a certain character's sexual orientation? Could it be that Rian Johnson is adjusting the story to fit Isaac's gayed-up Poe-trayal of the Resistance's most daring pilot? Is Disney preparing to thumb its nose at China and its restrictive media policies?
This passage from today's Comics Alliance article by Andrew Wheeler is just spot on:
Still, I cross my fingers and wish for a gay hero like Poe Dameron; for the kids he could inspire, and even the adults who never had that, and whose confidence could use a boost. But wishing won’t make it happen. It’s up to companies like Marvel and Lucasfilm, and their parent company Disney, to acknowledge and accept that same-sex relationships deserve to exist in their worlds.
Maybe this time it’s real, and we exist, and we matter. Maybe Poe Dameron is our hero.
Wheeler makes the fair point that Poe was not originally scripted to survive TFA's first act, much less be gay. Nevertheless, the synergy between Isaac's charismatic performance and the surge of positive fan response could be capitalized upon and incorporated into Ep. VIII script revisions...
... if it wasn't for the Poe Dameron comic that comes out in just a couple of months. *sad trombone*
If it's true that Poe was not originally conceived as a gay character, is there reference to Poe's orientation built into the comic plot? If so, can Marvel feasibly accommodate a shift in Poe's character from straight to gay? Would they even if they could?
It'd be a shame if there was a consensus between the fans and the creative team to change Poe's character, but timelines and production schedules made it impracticable.
The Hollywood Reporter announced today that the R-rated Deadpool has been banned by China's media regulator. Although film studios often edit films to accommodate China's policies, apparently Deadpool is just too sexy and bloody to edit out the offending material without altering the plot (yay! :D ). There are no plans to adjust the film to screen it for audiences in China.
I find this really interesting. Marvel is owned, just like you and me, by Disney, and 20th Century Fox produced Deadpool. In effect, this is the exact same media/entertainment team that brings us the Star Wars franchise.
Remember The Telegraph article that discussed the big financial stakes involved if China, the world's second largest film market, bans a film, say, for containing a gay character that is portrayed in a positive light? Maybe this is an indication that Disney and Fox will not necessarily put the breaks on a major property film just because it won't play in China.
Also, get this. The Force Awakens opened two weeks ago in China on January 9, but it was only the 20th biggest opening weekend box office for a film in China, as opposed the number 1 biggest opening weekend film in the U.S. Also, in the U.S., the box office dropped 33% after the first week, and another 51% after the New Year. In China? The box office dropped 61.3% after just one week.
So Star Wars, while still huge in China, certainly doesn't have the same momentum there as other cinematic classics like Transformers: Age of Extinction (lol wut?). The box office takings would be diminished by China banning Episode VIII, no doubt, but would it really be enough to not tell a good story that's worth telling? Let's see what happens with the Deadpool numbers.
I'm no box office analyst, but if I was a studio exec deciding whether to take a risk on including content that might get a Star Wars film banned in China, I might say, "Fuck it, make that helluva pilot a helluva homo!"
Check out @GayHotDameron on Twitter. It's Poe tweeting about his misadventures in flirting into and out of trouble, sorting through his powerful but confusing feelings for his "buddy" Finn, and generally being a well-intentioned knucklehead. Very cute.
I’m not a pin-up boy. Sure I do pictures for the Resistance but a guy’s gotta earn a living, right? And I am hot. It would be a waste not to
Remember when I went on and on about the Wachowskis and rhapsodized about how much their films mean to me as a gay science fiction fan? Jupiter Ascending managed to sweep up a bunch of Razzie nominations last week: Worst Actor (Channing Tatum), Worst Supporting Actor (Eddie Redmayne), Worst Actress (Mila Kunis), Worst Directors, Worst Picture, and Worst Screenplay. Holy Wach-OUCH-skis! That's pretty bad, although I submit that Kunis and Tatum should have also been nominated for Worst Screen Combo. Seriously, there's more chemistry involved in paint drying than between those two.
"A Razzie? Well fuck you very much."
I do take issue with Eddie Redmayne being a "worst" actor. In 1977, Sir Alec Guiness delivered with commitment, style, and charisma stultifying dialogue like "He feared you might follow old Obi-Wan on some damn fool idealistic crusade like your father did," and "Now, that's a name I've not heard in a long time... A long time." And he was nominated for an Oscar for BEST supporting actor in Star Wars. (Peter Cushing and other actors of that generation were the same: it didn't matter if they were in the cheesiest science fiction schlock acting on sets with paper mache boulders. Every line was delivered with the same care and drama as if it were Shakespeare.) Redmayne did the same thing in Jupiter Ascending. Sure, he spent much of the movie flying into inexplicable rages, posing and hissing and sparkling like a drag queen who is just done with your bullshit. And maybe the reason so much of the final cut's set pieces were digital was because Redmayne chewed up and swallowed all of the original scenery. But I thought he did an amaaaaazing job with the material (and co-stars) he had to work with--he vogued and camped and shrieked his way right into my gaysci-fi fanboy heart. I was genuinely rooting for him by the end of the movie.
Ah well. The good news is that I may get to see Jupiter Ascending again during our annual Razzie viewing party... so, silver lining.
Rian Johnson, the Episode VIII director, tweeted this adorable fan art from Jeffrey Winger (whose Tumbler is equally adorably called "Poe Dameron more like Poe DAMNeron).
So cute!
Also, because I am not very busy at work the Friday before a long weekend, I took some time to do some cyberstalking online investigation. It turns out that the group of people that Johnson shares the image with have shared other images of Finn and Poe among themselves today (here and here). So it seems more like a case of a group of friends who were having a laugh about all the shipping, as opposed to the director telegraphing any actual intent.
But who knows? I'll take the director-endorsed poemosexuality any day.
Here's the more complete image, where you can see BB-Yente a little more clearly:
USA Today has reported an April 2016 release date for a Poe Dameron comic series! The title will cover the story of Poe's mission to find Lor San Tekka, so it picks up right after the end of Poe's story in Before the Awakening.
It also will introduce a new villain from The First Order just for Poe. Perhaps it will be a nemesis TIE fighter jockey (sort of like a Snoopy-vs.-The-Red-Baron scenario?). Or will it explore the fan theories of Poe's Force sensitivity with a Dark Side villain?
And although I'm not getting my expectations up too high, I will note that Marvel, while not awesome about it historically, has been increasingly good about portraying LGBT heroes (Northstar, Richter/Shatterstar, Hulkling/Wiccan).
The Force Awakens received Academy Award nominations in the Film Editing, Original Score, Sound Editing, Sound Mixing, and Visual Effects categories. I know a lot of us, in our bias as fangirls and boys, were hoping for a Best Picture nomination, not to mention Production Design and Cinematography. Five nominations seems like a paltry number of awards for one of the top grossing feature films of all time. As of today, after just under a month in theaters, its box office is at $822M domestically, and $1.7B worldwide. It broke the domestic box office record earlier this month, and is currently sitting at #3 worldwide (behind Titanic--which will never let go, Jack--and Avatar).
"Thanks Princess. It's an honor just to be nominated."
Still, 5 nominations makes The Force Awakens the second most Oscar-nominated film of the Star Wars franchise. Episode IV received the most nominations, 10 total, including Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor (Alec Guiness), Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay. It wound up winning 6 awards: Original Score (John Williams), Costume Design, Sound Mixing, Art Direction, Film Editing, and Visual Effects, plus a Special Achievement Award for Sound Effects Editing.
Episode V trails The Force Awakens with only 3 nominations, and won only for Best Sound with a Special Achievement Award for Visual Effects. Episode VI won a Special Achievement Award for Visual Effects, but did not win any of its other 3 Oscar races.
Let's not get into the prequels, which among them managed only 5 nominations, and 0 wins.
I really hope John Williams gets the award for the score--he's been nominated for numerous Star Wars films but won only once, in 1978. He's up against Thomas Newman and Ennio Morricone, who have both been nominated numerous times but (I was surprised to see) have never actually won an Oscar.
The nominations were pretty sci-fi and geek-culture focused this year, with huge recognition going to films like Mad Max: Fury Road and The Martian, plus several technical nods to the excellent Ex Machina (I will obviously be rooting for TFA for Visual Effects, but would be completely happy if Ex Machina takes it). I love to see these kinds of films in theaters, so I'm always pleased to have a few horses in the race come February.
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to start lobbying the Academy to create a Best Come-Hither Look category.
So the fan theory du jour about Poe is that he is a sleeper agent of The First Order after some off-screen mind-melding by Kylo Ren.
From a narrative standpoint, the theory admittedly has some superficial appeal. It explains how Poe got off of Jakku (without bothering to find BB-8), which is never satisfactorily explained in the film. It also incorporates the well-established plot device of Kylo Ren's Force abilities.
But, seriously? The only thing that could make that prediction more heartbreaking is if it turns out that Poe is both secretly a villain and gay. That's right, yet another gay male villain who, if that's true, would likely get smoked by the protagonists.
I don't think I could take a bait and switch like that.
Fortunately, as several commentators and reddit responses have observed, the official TFA novelization describes how Poe survives the TIE fighter crash and gets back to the Resistance--all without assistance or brainwashing from The First Order. I hadn't planned on reading the novelization, but I feel like I need to read that sequence for myself and lay this theory to rest.
These are the only three images I got of the jacket--THE JACKET--from the Episode VII exhibit at Star Wars Celebration last spring. When it comes to iconic costume pieces, this will be right up there with the shirts from Brokeback Mountain (omg *ugly-cries just thinking about it*).
Obviously, there are already a bunch of knock-offs available online. Whoever is manufacturing the one with the cheap black plastic buckle clip on the front needs to just stop it. I think I like the one from American Leather Jacket the best: it doesn't have that clip on the front at all and the color is not as nicely distressed/washed out as the original, but it's actually leather and seems to get the weight correct.
He looks adorable and what a sweet moment--pointing to himself in a poster for a movie that he's in! He also looks vaguely puzzled, as if to ask, "If I'm in a major Hollywood release like this, why am I still carrying take-out home on the subway?"
I find the condensation on the iced coffee beverage strangely alluring.
THAT MAN PURSE THO.
Ayn Rand and her philosophy are gnarly, but trust me, I've overlooked far more serious character flaws than adherence to icky conservative political philosophy. And I don't think there's anything about being a libertarian that would interfere with an actor's ability to play a healthy, happy, and heroic LGBT person in a science fiction movie. So I'm good.
Oscar Isaac as Poe-lish local politician, Nick Wasicsko.
I selected Show Me A Hero from the in flight entertainment options on a long post-holiday Virgin America flight last week, largely because of Oscar Isaac. I was fully prepared to just watch the first hour-long episode, get my fill of his 1980's pornstache, and then move on to other shows. But it turned out that Oscar Isaac got way more mileage out of that pornstache than one would ever expect, so I ended up watching all six hours.
The late 1980's. It was well after the Civil Rights Era, so everyone knew--or was supposed to know--that deliberate racial segregation was unlawful. The problem was that the people in power remembered a time when it wasn't, even in northern states like New York and cities like Yonkers. And those people were not going down without a fight.
That's the climate in which Nick Wasicsko tries to make his political mark. Elected as the youngest mayor of any U.S. city, he inherits a decades-old housing desegregation lawsuit that is threatening to destroy the social and financial fabric of Yonkers. Wasicsko is a new guard politician who sees the inevitability of desegregation and takes on the city's enduring leadership (played to greasy perfection by an unrecognizable Alfred Molina). He succeeds in getting the integrated housing construction off the ground, but almost in spite of himself and his ambition.
The show was really remarkable for several reasons. First, I expected that the conflict would be between white property owners and the racial minorities who would be the beneficiaries of the desegregation settlement. But in fact, virtually all of the tense confrontation scenes were about white people shouting at and attacking other white people.
Looking for a vulnerable exhaust port, maybe?
The explanation? There's a scene maybe midway through the series where Wasicsko observes how, by the late 1980's, racists had learned that society would no longer tolerate overt racism. But bigots had adapted, learning to speak in code and cloaking their prejudice in terms of "property values" and "personal autonomy." Instead of burning crosses, racists warned and punished minorities by letting their dogs defecate on the lawns of public housing. Racism had become (and largely remains, with alarming exceptions of seemingly increasing regularity) a matter of passive-aggressive suburban nuance and neighborly menace, which the miniseries portrayed with chilling accuracy.
The second thing that impressed me was, of course, Oscar Isaac. Wasicsko saw in the desegregation fracas an opportunity to make a name for himself. He certainly felt that he was also doing the right thing, but Isaac played that almost as secondary motivation. And in a later scene, as his career is in ruins, the camera lingers on his conflicted expression as he is left to ponder his own question, posed to an embattled resident of the new public housing: "Was it all worth it?"
You're pretty sure he thinks it wasn't.
The portrayal is nuanced and balanced between narcissism and sincerity. You rooted for him even though you can't help but question his motives and, ultimately, his tactics. It's not an easy thing to do for an actor to do, especially with the molester-y mustache and bad Cosby-era sweaters.
And you know who else is in it? Winona Ryder! She's just terrific, and ably proves that someone in my generation can have chemistry with Oscar Isaac, which somehow, some way proves that a Poe Dameron-focused Star Wars fan blog by a middle aged gay guy is not at all weird.
Oscar Isaac wins a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Yonkers local politician, Nick Wasicsko, in "Show Me a Hero." Very well deserved.
More importantly, Variety reported that during the press interview backstage, he offered his phone number for anyone with Star Wars questions. *waits with pen and paper handy*
The Telegraph's Poe article noted the absence of gay characters in action films with the exceptions of gay characters in The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones and V for Vendetta. And I have thoughts.
First, to be honest, I don't know a thing about The Mortal Instruments YA series. I've seen bits of the movie and it didn't seem great, and the books don't particularly interest me. So I will take The Telegraph's word for it and cheer from afar for some bad-ass gay characters in The Mortal Instruments. Yay.
What does interest me, however, is the name drop of V for Vendetta, originally a graphic novel by Alan Moore that was adapted by the Wachowskis into a film. Seriously, I am a HUUUUGE Wachowski fanboy. HUGE. And I am a zealous and blindly faithful Wachowski fanboy precisely because the Wachowskis have been incorporating LGBT characters and queer themes into action and science fiction films for nearly twenty years--something I can't say for any of my other favorite fandoms, including Star Wars (...or can I?). If you blinked and missed the other awesome LGBT-positive characters in Wachowski films, here's your crash course in why the Wachowskis are my LGBT science fiction heroes.
Bound for glory
First, I cannot talk about the Wachowskis without first talking about Bound, which turns 20 years old this year. True, Bound is a noir crime film and not science fiction, but if you want to understand the Wachowskis' science fiction projects, you have to start with Bound. It's about two women, played brilliantly by Gina Gershon and Jennifer Tilly, who fall desperately in love and concoct an elaborate scheme to rob a dangerous mobster. It all goes south, of course, and you spend the second half of the film gnawing your nails to the quick and rooting for the coolest, cleverest, and most resourceful lesbian characters you will likely ever encounter. If you have even the slightest interest in LGBT film and you haven't seen Bound... well, first of all, what is wrong with you? Second, after reflecting very carefully on your life choices, watch Bound immediately. You are welcome.
Oh hey, I forgot that Christopher Meloni is one of the mobster thugs in Bound. You are welcome again.
After the Wachowskis proved their chops with Bound, they got The Matrix green-lit. Say what you will about the whole trilogy, but The Matrix was a tremendous film. There are a million little Easter eggs and puzzles in The Matrix, but the one I love the most is Switch. Remember her? She is the member of Morpheus's crew who helps to wake up Neo, and she's notable for being one of only a handful of redpill characters in the entire trilogy who wears white.
She's also totally queer. It never overtly comes up in The Matrix, but just look at her. In fact, the original story treatments portrayed Switch as a male character in the real world, but female when her personality substantiated in the fantasy world of The Matrix. In the final film, of course, Switch is a female both in and out of The Matrix, but she retains an undeniable androgynous/LGBT presence.
I love Switch because she is badass, queer, brave, and loyal. Unfortunately, she's a supporting character who gets killed in a terrible way, and her defiance in the face of her doom is heartbreaking. She's one of my favorite LGBT characters in science fiction, but we lost her too soon.
Another minor LGBT character in The Matrix trilogy pops up in the final film, Matrix Revolutions (did you even see it? I honestly wouldn't blame you if you didn't). Again, her sexuality is never explicitly addressed and it doesn't even matter, but anyone with even a blip of gaydar can tell that Charra, one of Zion's volunteer dock defenders in the real world, is totally a dyke. She's such a bit part that there's not really much to say other than to point out the fact that her minor role is why the Wachowskis are so great with LGBT representation. Charra just sort of shows up randomly, does some cool things that are brave and maybe a little foolhardy, and, well, meets an untimely end, like many of the human soldiers in the final Matrix installment. It's the fact that she's kind of an unremarkable denizen of the Wachowskis' universe that makes their LGBT inclusion so remarkable.
V for Vendetta came next, and the Wachowskis continued to work with source material that depends heavily upon LGBT concepts. Through a series of flashbacks, we see how the anarchist terrorist, V, is inspired to overthrow the fascist regime after learning the life story of a lesbian, one of V's fellow prisoners, and how she is arrested, put in a concentration camp, and is tortured because of her love for another woman. The lesbian characters are truly at the heart of the film, and injustice against gay people is portrayed as one of the cruelest forms of inhumanity. V teaches us that love and beauty--no matter their form--make us human, and when society turns against them, their protection is worth sacrificing everything. Love it.
[We are all going to pretend that Speed Racer never happened. LALALALALALALALALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU.]
[Moving on.]
Cloud Atlas came out in 2012, and was an adaptation of a gloriously tiered Baroque wedding cake of a novel. I really recommend reading the novel; its narrative construction is just so magnificent and exhilarating, and it's just not possible to accurately portray it on screen. Nevertheless, I loved how the Wachowskis played with the idea of souls or personalities floating across time, cloaked in different colors of skin and differently shaped eyes and different genders and sexualities. But our humanity is not any of those things, and regardless of superficialities like race and sex, we are always facing the same opportunities to make things right, with the irrepressible human urge to create always being the key to finding ourselves. Cloud Atlas has overtly gay male characters, but again, they're sort of unremarkable against the sweeping Big Ideas that propel the Cloud Atlas narrative.
Jupiter Ascending, the most recent Wachowski film, doesn't really have any big ideas, alas. But it has Eddie Redmayne as a deliciously campy villain who is super-gay. I know, I know, another mincing and ridiculously overwrought gay villain, but at least he doesn't rape-murder anyone like my buddy Baron Harkonnen. And if it's going to be done, Redmayne and the Wachowskis are the ones to do it.
I fucking love him. He's serving us evil space Liberace realness.
Also, what could possibly be gayer than Channing Tatum, as a werewolfy-elf soldier thing, gratuitously taking off his shirt to fight a bunch of bad guys? ...Oh, nevermind. This is way gayer.
So there you have it: my exegesis on why the Wachowskis' oeuvre is the best thing to happen to LGBT people in science fiction film, and why The Telegraph's reference to V for Vendetta was accurate but maybe a little underinclusive. Still, as much as they have done and as much as I love the Wachowskis' work, they have not (yet?) offered a gay heroic science fiction lead character.
This post is already too long, but I have to include, as just a final thought, Lana Wachowski's acceptance speech at the 2012 HRC Awards when Cloud Atlas was coming out. It's long, but it is hugely important to me as a gay fan of her and her brother and their films.
According to the Coen Brothers, the beasts that collectively played Ulysses the Cat in Inside Llewyn Davis were total dicks. I wonder if any of those cats are openly resentful of the success Oscar Isaac is now enjoying.
So it's been out a couple of weeks, but I finally had a chance to read Star Wars: Before The Awakening. Currently, it's Amazon's #1 New Release in Children's Science Fiction Books.
... Shut up. I like reading young reader books. They make me feel super smart.
Anyway, this book is a nice little collection of three short stories, one each for Finn, Rey, and Poe. As expected, it's an easy quick read (for an adult *cough*) and well worth it.
Finn's story has a lot of scenes involving Phasma, and she just oozes that gleaming, faceless ruthlessness that Gwendolyn Christie so would have nailed if she'd been in TFA for more than a few moments.
In addition, the short story introduces us to the other members of Finn's Stormtrooper fire-team. For example, the hapless FN-2003, or Slip, is the Stormtrooper that Poe expertly snipes during the opening raid sequence on Jakku, and who leaves his bloody hand print on Finn's helmet. Knowing more about the relationship between Finn and Slip definitely adds dimension to Finn's crisis of consciousness during the Jakku raid. If Finn only knew who killed Slip, the Stormpilot ship might enter some treacherous waters...
Also, the Internet is abuzz with the compelling theory that fan-favorite TR-8R is another one of Finn's former team members.
And again, reading Before The Awakening will certainly deepen the impact of this scene. [TR-8R is Nines, confirmed on starwars.com the same day as this post.]
Rey's story was really atmospheric and well-written, but it provides zero insight into her backstory. There's nothing about the x-wing pilot doll, who dropped her on Jakku, or any other tidbit that offers any clue about her mysterious past. Still, worth a look.
The centerpiece of the collection is Poe's story, and I'm not just saying that because I'm a fanboy. It has a good amount of character backstory, and I mean all the way back, like to his parents on Yavin 4 after the Battle of Endor. It turns out that he is just a Poe boy from a Poe family.
The story includes multiple well-written zero-gravity dog fighting sequences, and of course, a few "D'aaawwww" BB-8 moments. It follows Poe as his resourcefulness and dedication expose a conspiracy, which ultimately leads up to the moment of Poe receiving his mission to locate Lor San Tekka from Princess General You-Know-Who. It's a great tie-in to the film and really fun to read.
I can I assure you, I was scrutinizing every word for some clue to Poe's sexual poe-clivities, straight or gay, but no dice. I was looking so closely, in fact, that one passage in particular, taken totally out of context, made me giggle:
Leia was looking up at Poe, smiling ever so slightly. “Flyboys. You’re all the same.”
“Some of us are flygirls,” Poe said.
*SNAPS* OOOOOOO GIRL! Or should I say: FLY GIRL?
That's right, In Living Color, bitchez.
But seriously, Poe is portrayed throughout the story as a consummate professional and treats his fellow pilots and Resistance colleagues of both genders with respect, warmth, and camaraderie. Other than him acting like an all-around awesome guy, there's nothing overt to go on here.
Bottom line: Looking for some satisfying but fluffy reading for your weekend? Pick up or download this book. But don't expect any revelations other than "Wow, Poe really is that dreamy."
Since December 18th, there has been nary a moment that I have not been thinking about Oscar Isaac. He is now my desktop background and my phone lock screen. I've texted pictures of him to at least half a dozen acquaintances, former friends who have cut me out of their lives because I won't stop talking about Oscar Isaac. I'd seen him in other films before, but something about watching him fly that X-wing... It's a nightmare. A steamy, multi-ethnic, Juilliard-trained nightmare.
Obviously, I've been thinking a lot about why it matters to me that Poe could be a central and heroic LGBT character in the Star Wars universe. Why should a gay guy who grew up in the 1980's care so much about finally seeing a positive and courageous cinematic role model for gay science fiction geeks? The answer basically comes down to this asshole:
Fucking Baron Vladimir Harkonnen from Dune.
Specifically, the portrayal of Baron Harkonnen in the 1984 David Lynch adaptation, in all its grotesquely homosexual and homicidal horror.
First, let me just acknowledge that Frank Herbert's Dune is a monumental achievement in science fiction literature. The text is clear that its chief antagonist, Baron Harkonnen, is gay. And because the book came out in 1965, very pre-Stonewall, it's not particularly surprising that a gay villain is portrayed as a conniving sadist. It's perfectly consistent with the prevailing binary tropes of gay male characters being either effeminate clowns or dangerous sociopaths.
Second, please don't mistake me: I love David Lynch. It's impossible to overstate how hard Twin Peaks rocked my world. Mulholland Drive is easily one of my all-timefavorite films. I even kind of enjoyed the delirious lunacy of Lynch's Dune adaptation when I later revisited it on videotape--Patrick Stewart and Kyle MacLachlan were great, the Bene Gesserit were darkly fabulous, and Sting made me feel that intoxicating combination of excited and scared. You know what I'm talking about.
Did I mention that Sting was effing glorious?
But here's the problem. The year is 1988. I am solidly in my mid-teens, definitely past puberty and secretly (so secretly) aware that I'm gay. By then, everything about my imagination and personality has been shaped by Star Wars and my passion for all things space and science fiction. Lynch's Dune, which flopped in theaters in 1984, has been horribly adapted for a televised mini-series event.For whatever reason, that televised versioncomes on at my grandparents' house. I can't imagine why they are letting us watch it--my grandmother was a seriously devout member of an extremely insular Christian church in rural Ohio and anything not-the-Bible was just confusing to her. My grandpa didn't care so much about the church, so maybe he was watching it? I don't know. In any event, this bullshit pops up on their TV:
I mean. WHAT. THE. ACTUAL. FUCK. My first instinct, as this is airing in my ultra-conservative grandparents' TV room in the depths of 1988, was mortified panic. How was I supposed to outwardly react? Like all closeted kids, I was an expert at maintaining a poker face or, if pressed, making a homophobic comment when something seemed too gay. But what response could sufficiently camouflage my own gayness in such confusing and disgusting circumstances? I was at an utter loss. I was so flustered that I simply left the room. But the inner conflict I experienced was far more haunting. I knew I wanted to be with boys, and I knew I loved science fiction. But as far as I knew in 1988, this scene was the only way I had ever seen those two dimensions of my personality reconciled on-screen. And it was full of gag-worthy pustule drainage and fear and victimization and bloody rape-murder. Was that about me? This scene could easily disturb any kid--but a confused and lonely gay teen? It seriously wrecked me. It would easily be another decade before less rapey and murdery gay characters would start appearing in pop culture, but not usually in science fiction and certainly not as protagonists. In very real ways, the specter of Baron Harkonnen has been casting his corpulent shadow over my perception of what it means to be gay in a science fiction movie for nearly 30 years. Then, Poe Dameron shows up, and he is the exact polar opposite of Baron Harkonnen. He's loyal, funny, dignified, passionate, charismatic, and courageous. Gay kids could see all those things in someone they can closely identify with, instead of just seeing detestable villains or, worse, cowering victims whose only future is to get their hearts (literally) ripped out. Could Poe be the hero we are looking for, who can save science fiction films from a century of toxic cinematic stereotypes of gay people? It's a lot to ask, but I am dying to see him try.
Yes, this is happening. Embrace it. And then snuggle it, coo loving goodnights to it, and drift off to sleep as you play big spoon to it.
Your very own Poe Dameron body pillow.
The one on the left, for sure. The bondage one goes to a dark place I'd rather not visit right before bedtime. Also, it doesn't look as much like Oscar Isaac as the other one. Am I overthinking it?
I thought I was being all clever and cute when I thought up Poemosexual, but a quick search proved that--once again--people on the Internet are always more clever and cute than I'll ever be.
Seems like a lot of people reference or hashtag "poemosexual" in reference to either poetry, or less frequently, Edgar Allen Poe. But those brainiacs are doing it wrong. Obviously, it's much more hilarious and timely to use it in reference to the Poe-tential (it's only going to get worse, buckle in) that Poe Dameron is gay--or more commonly, in reference to shipping Poe and Finn.
A search for poemosexual on Twitter shows that poemosexual was first used in reference to Poe's sexuality on opening day, 12/18, in a Tweet by user @twelvicity in response to this fan art:
There have only been a handful of the poemosexual hashtag on Twitter since then.
Meanwhile, over on the Instagrams, I could only find one posting. I fully support and endorse @chrispan91 and his proclamation of his poemosexuality.
By now, Poemos are literally Poe-ing out of the woodwork--as of this entry, there are over 700 slash fic entries in the Archive Of Our Own.
!!!!
Time to start reading--and to start hashtagging "poemosexual" with wild abandon!
Here is the Ellen interview with the three leads right before TFA opened in December, 2015. At about 2:12, Ellen asks if there's any romance between any of their characters, and Oscar Isaac's response is... well, see for yourself.
Building on the hype, this Hypable article by Natalie Fisher thoughtfully dissects the film's innuendo and what it might mean to have a gay central character in the franchise. I was surprised to learn that she is a newcomer to the fandom because she definitely captured the gravity of the possibility and what it would mean to fans new and old.
The Telegraph picked up this story in an excellent feature by Helen O'Hara a week later. It talks a little more about the practicalities at stake regarding global release and Darth Mouse's financial risks. Good read.
Great, now that the homework is out of the way, let's get to trolling the Internet for more!
