Star Wars novelist strikes back at gay character slurs

Chuck Wendig, author of the new Star Wars novel Aftermath, has told fans who have objected to his inclusion of a gay character that “You’re not the good guys ... You’re the shitty, oppressive, totalitarian Empire.” And added: “If you can imagine a world where Luke Skywalker would be irritated that there were gay people around him, you completely missed the point of Star Wars”.

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Published last week, Star Wars: Aftermath has already risen to number four on the New York Times bestseller list and been hailed by SciFiNow as “a journey that is both breathtaking yet restrained, throwing you headlong into a story that reaches its crescendo at around the half-way point and maintains this pace throughout”. But the novel has found itself swamped in angry reviews on Amazon, with 41% of its 500-odd write-ups giving it just one star.

Set after the destruction of the second Death Star, with the Emperor and Darth Vader rumoured to be dead, Aftermath follows the adventures of former rebel fighter Norra Wexley, as the enemy gathers on the remote planet of Akiva. Wendig also introduces a new character, Sinjir Rath Velus, who is gay.

Wendig, who tweeted that it previously took him three years to accumulate 300 reviews on his novel Blackbirds, 62% of which were five-star, attributed the critical slamming to various factors, from simple dislike of the novel, to the fact he is not Timothy Zahn, author of previous Star Wars novels, and apologised to readers who were hoping for “a laundry list of details about what happens between this and the new movie”.

But on his blog, Terrible Minds, Wendig hit back at readers who accused the author on Amazon of “blatantly pushing a gay agenda” and suggested that the franchise was no longer “children friendly”.

“If you’re upset because I put gay characters and a gay protagonist in the book, I got nothing for you,” Wendig wrote. “Sorry, you squawking saurian — meteor’s coming. And it’s a fabulously gay Nyan Cat meteor with a rainbow trailing behind it and your mode of thought will be extinct.”

“You’re not the Rebel Alliance. You’re not the good guys. You’re the fucking Empire, man. You’re the shitty, oppressive, totalitarian Empire. If you can imagine a world where Luke Skywalker would be irritated that there were gay people around him, you completely missed the point of Star Wars. It’s like trying to picture Jesus kicking lepers in the throat instead of curing them. Stop being the Empire. Join the Rebel Alliance. We have love and inclusion and great music and cute droids.”

He later told a reader who attacked his confrontational approach to his critics that he would not engage in a conversation on the issue. “Because on this, I am not interested in conversation,” he wrote on his blog. “If your problem with the book is only the inclusion of gay characters, then no conversation is possible. Because that’s homophobia, that’s bigotry, and there’s nothing to be done or said. Someone wants to talk to me about the writing style or whatever, sure, I can have that discussion. On this, no.”