Oscar Isaac wishes for gay romance with Finn and Poe, but ‘people are too afraid’
We recently talked about Oscar Isaac – albeit briefly – in our previous article about JJ Abrams implying that there would be an LGBT character in The Rise of Skywalker. Unfortunately, within that article, it was confirmed that there would be no romance between Finn and Poe, Isaac’s character.
However, it doesn’t end there. As Isaac said during his interview with Variety, “personally, I kind of hoped and wished that maybe that would’ve been taken further in the other films, but I don’t have control.” Actors rarely do, but it was nice to see that Isaac stood with the LGBT community in expressing his disappointment.
Yet while the interview confirmed that a romantic relationship between Finn and Poe wouldn’t be happening, there was no real reason why that was the case in the first place.
Even Isaac had no real answer to why it wasn’t included, saying, “it seemed like a natural progression, but sadly enough it’s a time when people are too afraid, I think, of… I don’t know what.”
Isaac doesn’t say who ‘people’ are, but if one was to think it would be about the general public, then we’re not too convinced. People have been asking for LGBT characters and relationships in Star Wars for a long time, even before The Force Awakens.
Regardless, it doesn’t bode well for the supposed LGBT representation that Abrams wants us to look forward to in The Rise of Skywalker. If people are ‘too afraid’ to include a relationship that had a natural chemistry, we doubt that we’ll find anything meaningful in the next movie.
However, we like to be proven wrong.
I’m pretty sure the “people” Isaac is referring to are like, y’know, the studio execs whose demands for astronomic profits from every film they produce means they won’t touch gays with a ten foot poll and not whatever “general public” you imagine. Also to say “people” in general want LGBT representation in Star Wars (which I just want to point out Star Wars has quite a bit of in the new Expanded Universe; I know it’s not the same as the movies but it’s false to say Star Wars in general has no rep) is a vast overestimation and simplification in my opinion that ignores not only reactionary audiences in the US, Canada and other Western markets but whole foreign markets that are vital to Disney’s profits that literally forbid LGBT content. This response to me reads as extremely ignorant and uninformed of why this is a problem to begin with.