'Star Trek: Disvery' Stars Discs Playg The Franchise's First Gay Couple

Contents:

• STAR TREK INTRODUC ITS FIRST GAY COUPLE TO THE UNIVERSE
• STAR TREK’S FIRST GAY COUPLE THAT WASN’T
• ‘DISVERY’ WILL INCLU STAR TREK’S FIRST OPENLY GAY COUPLE ON TV
• ANTHONY RAPP AND WILSON CZ ON GAY ROMANCE "STAR TREK: DISVERY"
• STAR TREK: DISVERY LIGHTS AS GAY UPLE GET A SURPRISE RNN
• IN AN HISTORIC MOVE, STAR TREK: DISVERY WILL FEATURE AN OPENLY GAY COUPLE, PLAYED BY GAY ACTORS
• 'STAR TREK: DISVERY' STARS DISCS PLAYG THE FRANCHISE'S FIRST GAY COUPLE
• ‘STAR TREK: DISVERY’ MA GAY LOVE EXPLIC LAST NIGHT, MATCHG RED PAJAMAS
• WILSON CZ WILL JO FELLOW RENT ALUM ANTHONY RAPP AS GAY COUPLE ON STAR TREK: DISVERY

STAR TREK INTRODUC ITS FIRST GAY COUPLE TO THE UNIVERSE

Showg people of lor as pable officers back then was almost never as the gay rights movement gaed tractn all across the untry after 1969, fans hoped Trek would fally clu a gay character. When The Next Generatn premiered 1987, an openly gay character was still pretty much out of the qutn on a “fay show. The seri that had been on the foreont of clivy was now extremely sheepish about cludg a regular gay st member.

So when Disvery fally announced they were addg not merely a sgle gay character as a seri regular but a gay uple, the form of Lt. For a gay Trekker myself, after wag years to see proper LGBT reprentatn among the regular st of a Star Trek seri, was like reopeng an old wound and pourg salt . The fact that he was killed off so soon after beg troduced, and such an offhand way, relled the way gay characters were “punished” for beg who they are old Hollywood films, and felt credibly outdated brgg Culber back to life, this week’s episo of Star Trek: Disvery fally rights a pretty ser wrong om the show’s first season.

STAR TREK’S FIRST GAY COUPLE THAT WASN’T

Star Trek: Disvery has boldly gone where no Star Trek show has gone CBS: All Accs drama troduced a gay uple to s dience Sunday -- a first the long-nng televisn anchise. Pl Stamets, ma history when he was troduced episo 3, beg the first clearly gay character this universe. 1508180517Star Trek: Disvery was -created by an out gay man, Bryan Fuller.

‘DISVERY’ WILL INCLU STAR TREK’S FIRST OPENLY GAY COUPLE ON TV

Although Fuller has left the seri due to schlg nflicts, Aaron Harberts, who is also gay, remas as the shownner.

Hugh Culber (Wilson Cz), who ma history as the anchise’s first openly gay characters. In 2017, Rapp explaed to ET why ’s so “eply important” to be one-half of the first openly gay uple a Star Trek seri.

But wasn't until the 2017 Disvery premiere that out central characters would bee non: first, gay uple Culber and Stamets, then Adira and Gray, who are nonbary and trans. There, was "a b easier to be a gay person, " she shar. "Star Trek: Disvery broke boundari by featurg a married gay uple as central characters for the first time the anchise's show also entered a new ontier when actor Sonequa Mart-Green beme the first black woman to lead a Star Trek televisn seri.

ANTHONY RAPP AND WILSON CZ ON GAY ROMANCE "STAR TREK: DISVERY"

"I nnot wa for you all to meet the betiful souls and wonrful artists, " said actor Anthony Rapp, who plays one of the show's two gay characters, on Twter.

“My attu toward homosexualy has changed, ” he told The Humanist 1991. I have, over many years, changed my attu about gay men and women. Even after his ath, took another 28 years for the first gay character to appear Star Trek’s televisn seri (although y, novel tie-s, ics, fan works, and other non-nonil media featured a markedly improved number of LGBT Starfleet officers).

STAR TREK: DISVERY LIGHTS AS GAY UPLE GET A SURPRISE RNN

Given that the first openly gay recurrg character on televisn wouldn’t appear until the edy Soap 1977 (and played by Billy Crystal, so not exactly a nuanced character portrayal), pictg one the ‘60s when Star Trek first aired would have been unthkable to most people. Of urse, much of what Star Trek did to highlight actors and characters of different ethnic backgrounds would have been pretty far-fetched for many televisn dienc of the time, too – so what ma gay stori different at the time? But still others were spired – enough that Kirk and Spock’s endurg nnectn to one another has remaed a potent symbol of homosexual love for Trek fans.

Durg a 20th anniversary nventn 1986, show creator Gene Rodnberry was asked by a foundg member of a Boston LGBT science fictn group (lled, charmgly, the Gaylaxian Network) whether or not the recently announced The Next Generatn would troduce gay characters to Starfleet.

We should probably have a gay character.

IN AN HISTORIC MOVE, STAR TREK: DISVERY WILL FEATURE AN OPENLY GAY COUPLE, PLAYED BY GAY ACTORS

That same year, Gerrold (who’s bt known for wrg the TOS episo “The Trouble Wh Tribbl”) began workg on a script which revolved around two gay characters beg afflicted by an curable, tergalactic blood disease that mirrored the spread of HIV. Dpe this, Rodnberry still seemed mted to makg good on his promise to the Gaylaxians, who by 1990 had begun a letter-wrg petn (spurred partly by Gerrold’s stori of his episo’s mise at var nventn appearanc). In a letter to The Advote, Rodnberry wrote that " the fifth season of Star Trek: The Next Generatn, viewers will see more of shipboard life some episos, which will, among other thgs, clu gay crew members day-to-day circumstanc.

Dpe the oddns of a metaphor for gay rights that volv what is ostensibly a heteronormative uple at the center, Soren’s story is still the clost that ‘90s Star Trek ever me to addrsg issu and them specific to the LGBT rights movement, particularly the ia of nversn therapy. The Natnal Associatn for Rearch & Therapy of Homosexualy, an anizatn that still promot this harmful practice, was found that same year 1992.

'STAR TREK: DISVERY' STARS DISCS PLAYG THE FRANCHISE'S FIRST GAY COUPLE

I mean, he was clearly gay or queer or however you want to say . Acrdg to fan mors, early drafts of the screenplay for Star Trek: First Contact ma some mentn of a mor character, Litenant Hawk, beg gay, which was quickly nied by producer Rick Berman (a supposed first draft that surfaced onle refers to Hawk as a naive young Ensign, not a Litenant). While Voyager never explicly featured a gay character, there were certaly behd-the-scene nversatns about dog so.

“There was a pregnant ensign – Ensign Wildman – and she was gog to have gay godparents to her child, ” said Fuller, explag the show’s potential plotle – that never got ma. In 1996, a group of science fictn wrers, fans, and activists associated wh the San Francis Bay Area Chapter of the Gay & Lbian Alliance Agast Defamatn lnched an onle petn known as the “Voyager Visibily Project, ” which at s height gathered more than five thoand signatur om fans every U.

‘STAR TREK: DISVERY’ MA GAY LOVE EXPLIC LAST NIGHT, MATCHG RED PAJAMAS

As was the se wh Litenant Hawk, the Voyager tie- novels often boldly went where the show would not, albe only wh ancillary characters; Harry Kim’s roommate at Starfleet Amy is portrayed as gay Pathways and there are several same-genr upl picted passg throughout the book. “I've approached [Rick] many, many tim over the years about gettg a gay character on the show — one whom we uld really love, not jt a gut star. Rumor had 2001 that Domic Keatg’s character, Mallm Reed, would be wrten as gay, but never me to pass (although Keatg has sce ma jok about havg played him that way).

WILSON CZ WILL JO FELLOW RENT ALUM ANTHONY RAPP AS GAY COUPLE ON STAR TREK: DISVERY

Of urse, the visible gay reprentatn that “Blood and Fire” episo would have given to TNG was not prent here – stead, the episo, ”Stigma, ” revolved around T’Pol ntractg a generative Vuln illns through a md-meld, which at this pot Star Trek’s timele was nsired taboo. Here, AIDS was origally a gay disease, and certaly the middle of the untry that's how was wily perceived and sometim still is perceived to be. 2 billn at the box office, so of urse the news that Star Trek Beyond would feature the first gay character the anchise ma natnal headl.

“I liked the approach, which was not to make a big thg out , which is where I hope we are gog as a speci, to not policise one’s personal orientatns, ” actor John Cho told the Herald Sun, notg that director Jt L wanted to nod to Takei’s real-life stggl wh acceptance and gay rights activism. For his part, Takei exprsed public ncerns that retroactively makg his character gay did more harm to the show’s legacy than good.

Others wanted to see somethg more substantial om Star Trek’s first gay officer than a small tail the background of a scene – pecially when actor John Cho revealed that a “wele home“ kiss was cut om the fal ed. “Absolutely, we’re havg a gay character, ” seri -creator Bryan Fuller said at the Televisn Crics Associatn nference 2016. “Alex Kurtzman, the straight man the team, was tellg me we would need a gay character.