Star Trek creator's son Rod Roddenberry unsure of reboot's gay Sulu

The son of late Star Trekcreator Gene Roddenberry says his father would have been on board with an Enterprise crew member being portrayed as gay, but he's unsure if it should have been helmsman Hikaru Sulu.

Rod Roddenberry said his father would have been supportive of a gay Trekcharacter and commended the Star Trek Beyondfilmmakers for featuring aLGBT character. Roddenberry died in 1991.

"I think he would be 100 per cent in favour of a gay character in Star Trek," said Roddenberry during an interview Tuesday.

"There's so much going on in the world today. I think he would love any sort of social issue being brought into Star Trek."

Star Trek Beyondactor John Cho told Australia's Herald Sun last week that a scene in the upcoming film plainly presents Sulu with a male spouse raising an infant daughter.

Cho said he liked that the approach doesn't "make a big thing" out of it.

However, original Sulu actor George Takei called the decision unfortunate.

• Gay Sulu for Star Trek Beyond is a disappointment to actor George Takei

The openly gay 79-year-old actor told The Hollywood Reporter that he thought the character had been altered and would have preferred for filmmakers to create an entirely new gay character.

Star Trek Beyondactor andscreenwriter Simon Pegg defended the choice in a statement and said the filmmakers wanted aLGBT character to be "someone we already knew because the audience has a pre-existing opinion of that character as a human being, unaffected by any prejudice."

Roddenberry understands Takei's opinion that his father likely didn't intend for Sulu, who never had an onscreen love interest in the original TV and film series, to be gay.

"In a way, it's George's character," Roddenberry said.

"I can understand why he feels strongly about it. I don't see why everyone is bickering about it. It's about [expletive]time. Let's just do it."

Roddenberry, who is serving as an executive producer on the upcoming Star Trekseries on the CBS All Access online video service, said his father would have likely created agay character to be featured in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.The spin-off of Star Trek: The Next Generationran from 1993 to 1999.