A "Star Wars" fan contacted actor Mark Hamill via Twitter to ask him whether his character in the films, Luke Skywalker, is bisexual. Hamill's response surprised the fan so much that she had to immediately share it with all her Twitter followers.
The main reason for the surprise is because Hamill said he can be whatever fans want him to be, although social media and some media outlets seem to take Hamills response as a definitive "yes." Judging from the screenshot shared by Twitter user a(nakin)ddie, however, it's really hard to make such an assumption.
Check out Hamill's answer below.
"[As] cool (and correct) as Hamill's answer is, it's also pretty much applicable to almost any character in fiction," Eric Diaz said. He went on to remind readers that Luke showed no sexual interest to anyone except for Princess Leia, who turned out to be his sister.The attraction, however, was still mild. We agree on those points since Luke did seem to only have a crush or puppy love towards Princess Leia and he was more preoccupied with fighting the dark side of The Force.
The truth of the matter is that, unless Luke says it outright in the film or George Lucas confirms it, just like how J.K. Rowling confirmed Professor Dumbledore's sexual orientation, it's still up to the fans to decide.
Sure, Luke had married Mara Jade Skywalker out of love and they gave birth to Ben in the now defunct "Star Wars" Expanded Universe books, but that does not make Luke any straighter than it makes him less bisexual. All it means is that Luke is a powerful Jedi who fell in love with a female Jedi who didn't accompish her mission of killing him because she went rogue.
Then again, it was only the "Star Wars" books author Timothy Zahn who wanted the marriage to happen. "At first [LucasFilm] was unwilling to have Luke and Mara married, engaged, whatever. They wanted it left ambiguous. I said those were the two things I feel are needed for closure: if it wasn't agreeable someone else could do the book," Zahn said in an interview.
So what is Luke Skywalker's sexual orientation? Just as Hamill said, it's up to you to decide. You just won't get the glaring confirmation you want.
