Despite taking place a long, long time ago in a galaxy far away, the Star Wars universe has been sorely lacking in LGBT representation on the screen. But amidst the dozens of Star Wars TV shows there has to at least one canonically gay couple. The Star Wars: Resistance executive producers confirmed that there is, and they’ve been hiding in plain sight.

We’ve finally found the Star Wars gay representation we’ve been looking for. But we didn’t have to look far, according to Star Wars: Resistance executive producers Justin Ridge and Brandon Auman. They were there from the start of the Disney Channel animated series in Orka and Flix, the “partners” who own the Office of Acquisitions on the Colossus, the ship where the show takes place.

“I think it’s safe to say they’re an item,” Ridge said on the Coffee With Kenobi podcast (via io9). “They’re absolutely a gay couple and we’re proud of that,” added Auman.

The characters are played by Bobby Moynihan and Jim Rash, who confirmed that they have been playing the duo as a gay couple since the show premiered last year. Moynihan in particular was excited for the news to get out.

“Oh, I’m so happy we’re allowed to say it,” Moynihan said.. “I have had a sentence prepared for a year and a half if someone would finally ask me. I would say, ‘All I can say is when Flix says ‘I love you,’ Orca says ‘I know.'”

The couple have been a source of speculation for a year, and Ridge and Auman have said they have certainly been seeding in hints. A clip from the show, titled “Pay Attention,” in particular ay have keyed fans into the relationship, the producers said.

This is a big step in the right direction for representation in Star Wars. There have been other characters in canon whose orientation has been confirmed to be LGBTQ, though they’ve mostly appeared in books, and not in a major TV series watched by thousands of kids. It may be better than Disney’s last “exclusively gay” gestures at representation. But Star Wars still has a long way to go. Flix and Orca notably aren’t human — Orka is a Chadra-Fan and Flix doesn’t have an official species — but they are both coded as male. But hopefully the day comes that we get a canonically gay human couple in Star Wars, and it won’t require investigative skills to find them.

Star Wars: Resistance returns for its second and final season on October 6, 2019.

The post The First Gay Couple in ‘Star Wars’ Has Been Hiding in Plain Sight appeared first on /Film.