Pixar's Onward Features Disney's First Animated Openly LGBTQ Character

Meet Officer Specter, an openly LGBTQ cyclops police officer voiced by gay Emmy-winning Master of None actress and screenwriter Lena Waithe in Onward.

By Corinne Heller Feb 22, 2020 5:17 PMTags
Lena Waithe, Onward CharacterDisney/Pixar/Getty Images

It's a new era for Disney: Its new Pixar film Onward features its first animated openly LGBTQ character.

Meet Officer Specter, a cyclops police officer voiced by gay Emmy-winning Master of None actress and screenwriter Lena Waithe.

In one scene, the character and her cop partner, voiced by Ali Wong, pull over a driver who claims he was distracted because his girlfriend's sons have been acting up. Specter then commiserates, "My girlfriend's daughter got me pulling my hair out," according to Slate.

Late last year, Disney-owned Lucasfilm's Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker famously featured a blink-and-you'll-miss-it kiss between Amanda Lawrence's character Commander D'Acy and a female resistance fighter. And many viewers have speculated that certain characters in Disney movies, such as Elsa from Frozen and Li Shang from Mulan, were secretly gay or bisexual, and such noting perceived subtext in the relationship between Gaston and Le Fou in the live-action version of Beauty and the Beast.

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Stars at Disneyland & Disney World

Chris Pratt and Tom Holland portray the main characters in Onward, teenagers Ian and Barley Lightfoot, who embark on a road trip to resurrect their dead father for 24 hours.

Watch: Chris Pratt Confirms "Anyone With a Pulse Will Be Moved" by "Onward"

Onward is set for release on March 6.

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