Star Trek turns 50 on Sept. 8 in a year that has seen the franchise journey to new frontiers: In Star Trek Beyond it’s revealed that Sulu, played by John Cho, is gay (though original Sulu George Takei wasn’t a fan of the choice). Then, at the TCAs in August, showrunner Bryan Fuller broke the news that his Star Trek: Discovery series for CBS All Access also will feature a gay character. “Amen, man. It’s about f—ing time,” Chris Pine told THR. “The fact that there’s still a conversation about it means that there’s still room to go in terms of it being normalized.”

Continues the face of Armani Code fragrances: “My only rebuttal to George Takei — no matter what kind of creative differences he had about Sulu being gay, and I can understand his creative differences — is the fact that our job is to make people feel less alone. If there’s one kid in Middle America who feels any amount of self-loathing because he feels different, or is being bullied because he feels different or looks different or sounds different, if our film can give him solace and make him or her feel less alone, then abso-effin-loutely we should do it all the time, every day of the week.”

Captain Kirk himself says that he’s “proud” to be a part of a franchise that puts that message out in the world that “doesn’t share in the kind of cynicism and negativity that some of these other superhero films do, and that ours is one of hope and positivity.”

A version of this story first appeared in the Sept. 16 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.

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