Oscar Isaac pushed for Finn-Poe romance, but Disney wasn’t “ready”

Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is currently in theaters, delighting fans and dividing opinions. Finally, we see what became of the characters introduced in The Force Awakens back in 2015. I’ll try not to spoil too much, but it probably won’t surprise too many people to learn that Finn (John Boyega) and Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac) did not become boyfriends.

It may have upset some people, though, because there was a push to make that happen. The fandom even had a name for the pairing: “Stormpilot.” Even the actors heard about it, and it ends up that Isaac even argued for it behind the scenes. “I think there could’ve been a very interesting, forward-thinking — not even forward-thinking, just, like, current-thinking — love story there, something that hadn’t quite been explored yet; particularly the dynamic between these two men in war that could’ve fallen in love with each other,” he recently told IGN. “I would try to push it a bit in that direction, but the Disney overlords were not ready to do that.”

Boyega has weighed in on Stormpilot as well — I mean, he didn’t call it that, so far as I know, but he did talk a little about it to Variety:

"Personally, I kind of hoped and wished that maybe [Poe and Finn’s relationship] would’ve been taken further in the other films, but I don’t have control. It seemed like a natural progression, but sadly enough it’s a time when people are too afraid, I think, of… I don’t know what … They’ve always had a quite loving and open relationship in which it wouldn’t be too weird if it went beyond it. But at the same time, they are just platonic at the moment."

So Poe-Finn didn’t happen, but The Rise of Skywalker did feature a same sex kiss at the end of the movie. However, it was between two minor characters who barely had a line of dialogue between them. It kind of felt like something Disney slipped in there to help market the movie towards people in the LGBTQIA community, but the moment is so blink-and-you’ll-miss-it short that the studio can easily lift it out if any foreign markets with backwards cultural policies demand it, as indeed some have.

Anyway, I don’t think many fans seriously thought Disney would go there with Finn and Poe, but I’m glad it inspired some discussion.

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