Yesterday I traveled through time and space.
I visited an alternate reality, one in which I was able to watch Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith on the big screen.
It was EPIC.
Today, I’m back in my current reality. One where 20 years ago, I was living abroad as a missionary in a foreign country, unable to see any movies on the big screen for a period of 2 years. In an era of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Pirates of the Caribbean Dead Man’s Chest, Casino Royale, and Batman Begins, I longed for a galaxy far far away where I could escape my busy life on this solitary planet, and witness the monumental conclusion of the Skywalker saga.
While abroad, I caught glimpses of a long-haired Hayden Christensen with a light saber from pirated footage on occasional bus rides or video stores, but in an attempt to not spoil the story line and save myself for a at least a minimized DVD full experience when I returned home, I forced myself to look away. These were not the droids I was looking for.
Alas, once I returned home from my 2-year church mission, I entered the now ancient ruins of a Blockbuster near me and rented this experience alone from an itchy couch, cheap headphones, and crappy laptop. Far from the big screen, but even still, the Force was able to to penetrate through this admittedly Dark Side of a viewing experience and I absolutely LOVED THIS MOVIE.
I have loved it and watched it many many times since. But I always felt cheated in some way that this was the only Star Wars movie (besides the originals) I had never seen in a movie theater.
Until yesterday, when an opportunity in the form of an unexpected 20th Anniversary Celebration re-release presented itself as this movie returned to the big screen. I danced around the house with excitement that I could FINALLY experience this trilogy finale in all it’s immersive, Dolby Atmos, high resolution, popcorn chomping and soda popping glory! Mediocre plans and reasonable bedtimes were put on hold as I hauled my Jedi wife and padawan children to the movie theater, skipping all along the way.
As I watched the film, I reflected in my mind on why I love this and all the prequel movies.
Nostalgia
I will not deny that much of my love for these movies is deeply entrenched in nostalgia. Of COURSE it is. How can you not be romantic about Star Wars? I don’t own shelves of Star Wars memorabilia or anything, I just really enjoy movies with originality and creativity. And for a man like George Lucas to think up this incredible universe of Star Wars and share it with us, well, it really inspires me. I can only dream of creating something so memorable, entertaining, and profound.
In 1995 I was 10 years old and in 4th grade. Back then when it was Halloween, you did a parade around the halls of your elementary school to show off your fun costumes. You know, the good ol’ days. I’ll never forget seeing my friend Jared strolling down the hall wearing a Darth Vadar mask and black cape. He looked so cool! I stood there, wrapped in toilet paper, feeling embarrassed about my feeble attempt at a mummy costume, and decided I needed to know more. I knew OF Star Wars, but had never seen the movies. I knew OF Darth Vadar, but in reality had no idea who he was. All I knew was that he was a bad guy who carried a lightsaber and he was somebody’s father.
Over the next few years, between friends houses and recorded VHS tapes from our TV at home, I watched all the original Star Wars movies and fell in love. Lightsabers, blasters, spaceships, light-speed, super-natural powers, robots, aliens… as a 10-12 year old boy, what’s not to like????
At that age I even picked up on overarching themes of good vs. evil, light vs. dark, romance, friendship, loyalty, hope, honor, betrayal, destiny, redemption… Star Wars had it all.
Then in December 1998, shortly after my 13th birthday, I’m sitting in the movie theater with my family waiting for some movie to start, and I see a trailer for Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.
WHAT
I was stunned. I had no idea there would be more Star Wars movies. I did not fully understand that the Star Wars movies I had previously seen were part of a larger untold story. We were going to go back in time to learn how Darth Vadar became Darth Vadar???? ARE YOU KIDDING ME????
My 13 year old brain exploded. I was so excited. I was EXACTLY the target audience for this film. The following year when Phantom Menace came out, I went and saw it in theaters and loved every second of it. Zero complaints. Not even about Jar Jar Binks; he made me laugh. The pod racing scene was JAW DROPPING, I had never seen anything like it. My parents later got me the Pod racing computer game and I played it constantly. To this day it’s one of my favorite racing games I’ve ever played and I currently own the Nintendo Switch version of the game and play it occasionally with my young sons. I loved all of the new characters and couldn’t get enough.
Three years later in 2002 at age 16 I went and saw Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones with my family. Then again with my friends. I remember discussing at length with my best friend Seth how much we loved the movie and all of our favorite parts, especially Anakin’s speeder chase scene on Coruscant, Obi-wan’s fight scene with Jango Fett, and of course the final battle arena scene on Geonosis. Oh and storm troopers are clones? And they used to be good guys? Yoda kicking ass with a lightsaber? HELL YES.
I was primed and pumped for the next and final installment of this trilogy. The nostalgia was real, and it continues to this day.
Narrative
It wasn’t until several months after seeing Attack of the Clones that I started to hear negative talk of the prequel movies. Keep in mind, I was in high school at the time and I lived a cell phone free and social media free life. The internet was a place I barely visited on our home computer except to do school assignments, download music on Napster, chat on msn messenger, and look up Homestarrunner videos. Other than that, I was basically unaware of what the outside world thought of the Star Wars prequel movies.
Over the next year or so, more and more people I knew hopped on the Star Wars prequel hate bandwagon. Hayden Christensen’s bad acting, overreliance on CGI, Jar Jar, cheesy dialogue, lack of emotional depth, and so on… I could see what people were saying, but I honestly just didn’t care. I did not want to hop on this hate bandwagon, but I was also a teenager desiring to fit in with my peers, so much like my love of N’SYNC music, I had to keep my love of the the Star Wars prequels to myself and my pleasure slowly transformed to the guilty variety.
I remained a closeted prequel fan for the next decade or so, only revealing to trusted family and friends just how much I love these movies. Some time around 2011 I finally bought episodes 1-6 on blu-ray and have watched them several times a year since.
Over the past decade, and especially over the last five years, I’ve noticed something happening. People are hopping off the prequels hate bandwagon. The narrative has changed. Audiences are tired of the corporate sludge movies and are desperate for creative original stories. They are more willing to overlook some movie making flaws and cling to the actual story being told.
For Star Wars, I believe this is mostly sparked by the critical response to the sequel movies, episodes 7-9. Now don’t get me wrong, I enjoy those movies as well! But there is one very clear difference that I think people are starting to realize, and it revolves around THE ultimate Star Wars hero-turned-villain-turned-hero again.
Yes, I’m talking about George Lucas.
Storytelling
Say what you will about George Lucas, but he made the movies he wanted to make, he told the story he wanted to tell, and nobody told him what to do. And for that, I give the man the highest creative praise. He was honored as a legend of creative story telling and movie making with the original trilogy, only to then be torn down and Death Star hate-blasted into oblivion after the prequel trilogy. He has probably endured more undeserved backlash than any creative writer and filmmaker out there. All for what? Telling the story he wanted to tell. Some people think that because George Lucas shared his story of Star Wars with the world, somehow this story belongs to everyone. I could not disagree more. Here’s why:
Take out George Lucas from Star Wars and what do you get? Star Wars episodes 7-9. Great movies, sure, but rather than a story being told by one man with a plan and a vision, it’s a story being told by a corporation. And I think that consumers of entertainment have realized that a concise and well told story with some bad acting and mediocre CGI, is preferable to sloppy money grabbing corporate machine-fed story, with great acting and amazing CGI.
George Lucas had a vision. He gave us an amazing hero’s journey with Luke Skywalker. We were all along for the ride. But he understood one of the most important aspects of any story:
Every story is only as good as the villain.
Imagine a world where 1977 Star Wars was the only Star Wars movie ever made. EPIC movie, obviously. But what do we really know about Darth Vader from this movie? Almost nothing. Cool villain, amazing name, master of evil, killed Luke’s father supposedly, and… that’s pretty much it. Good vs. evil. Good wins. Darth Vader defeated. Death Star blows up. The end.
George Lucas understood what a lot of story-tellers today still don’t understand about villains: They need to be relatable in some way. We need to understand what motivates them and maybe even care about them.
Every story is only as good as the villain.
So in 1980 when Empire Strikes Back came out, people were likely confused. Episode V? How can this be the 5th installment of a movie franchise that doesn’t exist? George Lucas took a huge risk in 1980 by letting the world know that he had a plan. He would finish his hero’s journey with Luke, but then there was a much larger plan that didn’t revolve around Luke Skywalker. And that story is much MUCH more interesting. In Empire Strikes Back we’re teased with possibly the greatest reveal of all time, Darth Vader IS Luke’s father. Ugh how I wish I could go back in time and experience THAT for the first time in a movie theater. It’s at that moment that George Lucas hooked us. He opened our minds. Made us ask questions. Questions the world wouldn’t get answers to for another 25 years.
Finally with the prequels, he took his time and he told that story.
I actually remember this moment, when I was walking into the movie theater to see Attack of the Clones for the first time, I walked by the door of a theater just finishing up the movie and I could hear John Williams amazing score of “The Imperial March” playing through the door. I thought to myself Oh my gosh, Darth Vader’s going to be in this movie! That’s his song! This is it! But that’s not what happened. Yes, the theme song played at the end of Attack of the Clones, but Anakin Skywalkers transformation had not fully taken place yet. George Lucas took his time, he knew exactly what he was doing. He had a plan.
He gave us innocence in a young child Anakin Skywalker, a slave with the gift of piloting a pod racer. He turned that innocence into a young adult Anakin: a talented jedi, arrogant, impulsive, tortured and afraid. He gave us Jedi heroes to admire, mainly a young and familiar Obi-wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor truly is one of the BEST characters in the prequels). He created depth in a familiar villain, Palpatine, who tortured us as we, the audience, knew he was playing both sides, but the characters in the story did not. We got to see how that villain was able to manipulate Anakin all along the way, using his romantic relationship with Padme to get Anakin to complete his journey to the Dark Side.
IT’S A GREAT STORY. It’s RELATABLE. Cheesy line delivery and mediocre acting be damned, we CARE about Anakin. After seeing this on the big screen last night, I don’t care what anyone says: Revenge of the Sith has great emotional depth. What wouldn’t we do to save the ones we love? I really FEEL for Anakin as in a moment of desperation, he turns to a man he doesn’t realize is manipulating him, and pledges his allegiance to the Dark Side. Who hasn’t felt that feeling of Well, I’ve gone this far already, it’s too late to turn back, I might as well lean in. I know I have. We then witness Anakin become the “the very thing he swore to protect” and it truly is sad. We watch hate quickly consume Anakin and next thing we know, he is truly lost.
For me, the emotional peak moment of the Revenge of the Sith is when Obi-wan Kenobi, our constant beacon of light in this increasingly dark consuming world, after having defeated Anakin and left on the ground him limbless and dying, turns back to him and says:
“You were my brother Anakin, I loved you!”
It gets me every time.
The Best Part
I think good, authentic, original story-telling is making a comeback.
There will always be the corporate sludge; entertainment executives who have money to spend and no risk if it doesn’t work out. Just throw it all against the wall and see what sticks, as long as money keeps coming in and they check some political and cultural boxes, they’re happy to keep the machine running. In all sincerity, I don’t blame them. In fact, I think they are necessary. They are the counter-balance to true creativity. They help us see the creative stories more clearly. There is value in learning what not to do, as Anakin Skywalker’s prequel journey illustrates.
The best part is it’s not the end of the journey. Sure the Galactic Empire might rule and oppress the universe of creative stories for a while, but eventually a new creative hero comes along, reveals the Dark Side for what they are, defeats them, and reminds us all of a better way.
The icing on the cake is the story of redemption. Yes even those prequel movie critics, those bandwagon haters who unleashed upon George Lucas, Jake Lloyd, Hayden Christensen, and even Jar Jar Binx, might come around one day and speak the same words Anakin did to Luke at the end of his journey:
“You were right… you were right.”
Mikey He Writes It 