From Dark Horizons:

"Star Wars" needs gay or lesbian characters introduced into the franchise according to a recommendation in anti-defamation group GLAAD's studio responsibility index report.

The annual survey of depictions of LGBT characters in major studio releases has given both Disney Pictures and Paramount Pictures black marks this year due to them not featuring any gay or lesbian characters at all in any of their films last year.

Of the 126 major studio releases last year, only 22 of them (17.5%) featured LGBT characters. That was the same percentage of characters that appeared in films in 2014. Over 77% of films with LGBT characters featured gay men, 23% had lesbians, and 9% included bisexual characters.

Only one film had a transgender character that was deemed inclusive, and the LGBT characters that did appear were not racially diverse - in fact the number of LGBT characters of color went down with from 32% to 25% in a year.

No studio earned a 'good' rating for LGBT character inclusion - the best were Fox, Lionsgate, Sony and Universal which all earned 'adequate' ratings. Kevin Hart in particular was called out for both of his comedies "Get Hard" and "The Wedding Ringer" trading on 'gay panic' humor.

"Star Wars: The Force Awakens" has been praised for featuring both a female and an African-American protagonist, but the lack of gay characters in the screen universe has become a sore point with some fans. In regards to "Star Wars" inclusiveness, the report says:

"As sci-fi projects have the special opportunity to create unique worlds whose advanced societies can serve as a commentary on our own, the most obvious place where Disney could include LGBT characters is in the upcoming eighth 'Star Wars' film. 2015's 'The Force Awakens' has introduced a new and diverse central trio, which allows the creators opportunity to tell fresh stories as they develop their backstory. Recent official novels in the franchise featured lesbian and gay characters that could also be easily written into the stories."

Rian Johnson's "Star Wars: Episode VIII" is currently shooting in London.

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"Responsibility Index Report"? Oy vey.

Anyone else just sick to death of all the constant PC stewarding being reported in the media every day?

I work in Hollywood. Trust me, gays get PLENTY of work even if gay characters don't.

Also, for any gays we have on the forums, does this actually bother you? Do you feel it's an issue?

Gays make up 3% of the U.S. population, so if anything the 17% of gay characters is over-representing. Reports like this only further the studio agendas of forcing in gay/female/trans/racially diverse characters rather than allowing them to be organically written into stories.

I'm tired of everything having to go through a PC filter, it's fucking annoying.

Other than Anakin/Padme and Han/Leia, what character's sexuality is explained, let alone is important to the story of Star Wars?

I thought C-3PO and R2-D2 were the gay couple?!?!

And hasn't Mark Hamill implied that Luke may be gay?

Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru. Their love was on fire.

I get how if you just quickly skimmed the article you could come away thinking that's what it said, but I'd think someone working in Hollywood would quickly realize that 1/6 of characters in major studio releases are not depicted as gay.

As for the article, who's to say Force Awakens doesn't already have tons of gay characters? I don't recall the orientations of Ben/Kylo, Rey, Finn, Poe, Phasma or Hux coming up. I understand the bigger picture of what GLAAD is saying, but it seems silly to single out a film where you don't know whether 99% of the characters appearing on screen are gay or straight because it never factors into the story.

more married couples:
Owen/Beru
Shmi/Cliegg

and two dudes who make moves on Leia:
Lando
Jabba


Other than that... it never comes into question for anyone else. No reason to.

Yeah. You'd have to be a dumb fuck to want a perfect trio of things in VII. Rey slaps her vagina w/ another woman for fun. Or Finn sucks some dick.

Or Poe takes it in the ass from Finn or vice versa.

Either way... it doesn't matter what sex a character is.

I think we know that Finn is straight. Wasn't he asking if Rey has a boyfriend? I'm pretty sure he wants to hit that.

This whole thing is stupid. Not everything has to have sexual orientation to it and to push the matter only drives those that are already against it, because of the sexuality, further away than getting them to at least being accepting of a lifestyle that is different than their own.

/thread

Palpatine. Mutherfucker had clones/love dolls of himself. Sick bastard.

Yeah, and I'm sure when old Ben had his late-night visits from a Jawa now and then, they were just talking about the price of moisture vaporators.

I kind of get a lesbian vibe off of Rey.

I hope they give her a black girlfriend so facebook and twitter will implode.

My gay friend insists that Finn is gay, because he not only asks Rey if she has a boyfriend, but clarifies to ask "a cute boyfriend?"

All the vaporators were moist when Ben K hit the cantinas.

I thought that "cute boyfriend" line was odd as well, unless it was intended to be that way.

Maybe the gays are just closeted. After all, it was a long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away.

Not everything has to be same in the Star Wars universe as in our reality. This is probably an offensive thing to say to some people, but maybe homosexuality just doesn't exist in the SW universe. We don't have the Force in our world, or at least we haven't discovered it.