Warning: Spoilers ahead.
Before we begin, I have a confession to make: for a long time, I was NOT a “Star Wars” girlie. I’ve since come to the conclusion that the age-old “Wars vs. Trek” debate is boring and counterproductive, but I hope that speaking my truth about this important fact will lend weight to my argument.
By the time I officially considered myself a “Star Wars” fan, the kernel of queer awareness was already firmly lodged in the back of my brain. Though I wasn’t yet brave enough to give voice to my gay little thoughts, by that point, I’d already begun to notice the threads of queer subtext woven through many 20th century works of science fiction.
But even to those who don’t view their media through a queer lens, “Star Wars” is beloved for the charismatic manner with which it approaches classic tropes from unique angles. To me, this is most apparent when one considers the contrasting gender roles between twins Luke Skywalker and Leia Organa, especially at the beginning of the saga.
For one thing, not only is Leia one of Disney’s spunkiest and most rebellious princesses — she’s the OG spunky rebel princess. At 19 years old — when the original movie begins — Leia is a high-ranking rebel spy who not only withstands Darth Vader’s mental interrogation droid, but then also lies to him to try and save her planet. Han Solo and Luke may have gone to the Death Star to rescue her, but Leia’s quick thinking and bravery are what really saved the rebellion’s chances of destroying the Death Star.
Leia also rescues Luke when he falls from Cloud City (more on this later) after the Daddy Vader plot twist in “The Empire Strikes Back;” in “Return of the Jedi,” she infiltrates Jabba’s palace with Luke to save Han, who has been frozen in carbonite. None of that sounds like a damsel in distress to me, and this is even before she became a general.
“Leia's gender is mostly subsumed in her political role (also gendered) — that of Princess, which includes statecraft, subterfuge, and military command,” Regina Yung Lee, an associate teaching professor within the department of gender, women & sexuality studies, said in an email.
While she’s not the main character, Leia’s status as a well-established figure within the rebellion is a crucial juxtaposition to Luke’s bildungsroman, or hero’s journey. Compared to Leia’s maturity, and especially compounded by the franchise’s optimistic themes of friendship and hope, Luke’s golden retriever-esque innocence is both endearing and unexpected in a main hero of one of the most beloved trilogies in the history of cinema.
From a queer perspective, there are also other nuanced aspects to the way the twins are framed as foils to one another. Leia’s unironic girlboss energy is contrasted against Luke’s gay je ne sais quoi.
“The very feminized, sheltered innocence sometimes ascribed to princesses is actually most often performed by Luke,” Lee said. “The role reversal and who is actually kind of the princess being rescued is really interesting.”
In my less professional opinion, there’s something inexplicably fruity about Luke. His floppy hair, wide-eyed enthusiasm, and questionably campy fashion choices (the iconic poncho?) is, simply put, very queer coded. It’s hard to give evidence to define exactly how Luke gives off gay vibes, but rewatch “A New Hope” and tell me that the way he looks at Han isn’t a little suspicious.
Luke has piqued many other queer fans’ gaydars as well; he had several turns as the subject of the “chanel boots” meme for his stunning all-black fits, and that one gold jumpsuit Mark Hamill wore in the ’70s created the wonder that is “Disco Luke.” In summary, this meme perfectly sums up the way I perceive Luke Skywalker.
According to Lee, fan scholar Henry Jenkinspostulated the textual poachers theory, which states that fans use mainstream narratives (“canon”) to “deliberately open up and create space for their perspectives, narratives, and alternate universes.” The theory, Lee noted, also explores how “fans deliberately disregard (instead of mistakenly misinterpret) authorial intent in pursuit of that creative process, which is often also collaborative — another challenge to authorial rule.”
I also think that as much as the twins’ enactment of their gender roles emphasizes the contrast between their characters, their actions also highlight the similarities that make them register so strongly on fans’ collective gaydar. Throughout the first movie, before even George Lucas knew that Luke and Leia would become siblings, their relationship never reads as particularly flirty to me.
While Leia’s cuttingly-witty banter with Han is an enticingly scathing rendition of the “enemies to lovers'' trope, the few times she’s teasingly derogatory toward Luke (“Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper?”) don’t land quite the same. The incest kiss, for all its notoriety, has nothing to do with any ill-thought out romantic attraction between them: Leia kisses Luke simply to curb Han’s ego and knock him down a peg, which — throughout the original trilogy — proves to be their love language. We unfortunately never really get to see Leia interact with other female characters her own age, but as a staunch proponent of textual poaching, I don’t think there’s any way to say for sure that Leia doesn’t like girls, too.
As for Luke, I see the argument that his eagerness to rescue Leia could have come from a crush on her holographic image as well as from his moral desire to help a member of the Rebel Alliance. However, my theory is even simpler: both twins are notably strong with the Force, which connects them even before they learn they’re related. The ending to “Empire” is the prime example: Leia senses Luke’s emotions through the Force and turns the Falcon around to rescue him. I also think that if nothing else, Luke’s comphet crush turning out to be his sister is actually pretty hilariously in character for the boy notoriously goofy enough to point a lightsaber into his own face.
Queer sci-fi fans have a long history of reworking texts, through subversive and feminist lenses, into new creations, a process that began long before Luke and Leia blasted their way into pop culture stardom. When asked whether Luke could be bisexual, Mark Hamill wrote in a direct message to a fan that confirmed his character’s sexuality is up for interpretation: “His sexuality is never directly addressed in the films. Luke is whatever the audience wants him to be, so you can decide for yourself.”
