Barring the introduction of any further evidence (leave a comment if you have some!) I will now definitively announce Captain Jack Harkness as science fiction's first openly gay male leading character. And one of the few openly gay male characters at all. Isn't that something?
Let's break it down:
Science fiction: for the purpose of this discussion, "science fiction" is defined narrowly. No fudging the rules by broadening the category to "speculative fiction."
This is because on the issue of homosexuality, the horror and fantasy genres are cleaning our collective clock. Sadly, science fiction remains in the dark ages with regards to sensible, grown-up discussions of sexual orientation.
Openly: yesterday we discussed the case of Lt. Felix Gaeta from "Battlestar Galactica." Gaeta was "outed" by the show, in one brief scene, in a webisode series which few people have seen. His homosexuality was never referred to again, either by the show or by the character himself.
For the purpose of discussion, a fictional character whose homosexuality remains off-camera and out of context can be described as "not openly gay." This situation doesn't completely map to "closeted," because - as John Scalzi has aptly pointed out - not everything about a character makes it to the page.
There's a lot of stuff about any given character which the author leaves out as irrelevant to the story. And there are plenty of characters for whom no orientation is ever explicitly stated. In which case it's your own fault for assuming they're straight. YOU TERRIBLE PERSON. (Just kidding!)
Gay: Two points to be made here:
1. More specifically, Captain Jack is bisexual. As a matter of fact, three of the five gay male characters I've found so far are also bisexual. All three of the bisexual characters are on TV. In fact, male homosexuality in visual science fiction mediums is represented 100% by bisexuality.
Doesn't that strike you as odd? My cynical suspicion is that this allows them to occasionally kiss girls, thus defusing the "ick" factor for science fiction's traditional target demographic.
2. I have decided, with the editorial powers bestowed upon me by the internet, to officially strike Ianto ("Torchwood") and the Doctor ("Dr. Who") off the list.
In both cases, their only qualification for homosexuality is that they have snogged Jack Harkness. Which I think says more about Jack Harkness than it does about Ianto and the Doctor.
Male: Isn't he just? Rrowr!
Leading Character: every other homosexual character I've found so far has been strictly a secondary character at most. And having a random tertiary character wander into the foreground and mutter something about "my boyfriend" hardly counts as progressive.
I shouldn't be shocked that science fiction is still stuck in the dark ages on this issue. But I am. I think of science fiction as being progressive, as showing us the way to the future, as introducing its audience to new concepts, and addressing society's broader themes. First inter-racial kiss, and all that. Sadly, science fiction still has a long way to go.
