Russell T Davies did so much for non-straight characters on television that he was always going to be a tough act to follow in that department. Just look at Captain Jack, the first omnisexual character of what, any family show, ever? But whilst Jack was a great character, he certainly fitted a stereotype; he's a character who ends up mostly in homosexual relationships, but he doesn't like settling down. Moffat introduced Vastra and Jenny as a gay couple, but in actual fact, probably his finest message about non-straight characters in fiction actually came from Canton. We didn't know that Canton was gay, until he told Richard Nixon; again, the joke was on Nixon, and his narrow-mindedness. But in Canton, Moffat gave us a gay character we didn't know was gay. We didn't need to know he was gay. It simply didn't matter, and actually, that's the best message to send out in a family show. We need Jacks to show equality, but we also need Cantons.
