He has earned back a scintilla of respect from me. Personally I would feel pandered to and offended.
I agree. Takei has ALWAYS been liberal. Since he "came out", he's ALSO been very vicious and mean towards anyone who doesn't agree with his agenda as well. Weird that he's become some kind of Twitter "star" now that he's in his 70s.
But the fact he's willing to stand up for the integrity of his character and point out its a butchering of the source material gives him kudos from me. If this rumor is true, I pray the morons in Hollywood listen and delete the "gay Sulu" scene.
Patrick Stewart also gets brownie points for me because he spoke out against forcing Christian bakers to make "Celebrate Gay Marriage" wedding cakes, even though Stewart himself is ultra-liberal and loudly pro-gay marriage.
Still, gay agenda aside, it would be no difference than if Hollywood tried to pander to ME by saying "We've never had an openly Catholic character on Star Trek, so Captain Kirk is going to reveal in the next film that he's Catholic and goes to Mass every Sunday and prays the rosary every night in his quarters". I'd oppose it for the same reason: it does not fit with the way the character has been portrayed for decades, and it is an insult to the way Gene Roddenberry established the Star Trek universe. They could create a new character that is very similar to modern day religious Catholics to tell a compelling religious story and use sci-fi as an allegorical device. But they couldn't make Captain Kirk INTO a Catholic without seriously insulting the source material.
"Sulu is gay and married to a man" is right up there with the last film's "Khan is a white British guy" revisionism.
Still, I'm going to take a wait and see approach. I skipped Deadpool in February because the filmmakers were crowing that he was "openly pansexual" but then I saw the film on DVD and that wasn't the case at all. The only character he hits on in the film is a female. A lot of the internet "rumors" trying to generate "buzz" for a film are just that, rumors.
But if they screw up the 50th anniversary of Star Trek and give us ANOTHER shallow action movie that insults the source material, fans WILL go on the warpath and it will be the end of the JJ Abramsverse. Stick a fork in her, she's dead, Jim.