Star Wars on Trial (23 page)

Luke, driven by compassion, holds out hope for the redemption of his father in Return of theJedi even as a ghostly Obi-Wan grumpily continues to assert that Vader isn't worth redeeming. Kenobi seems to want Luke to atone for his mistakes in the quickest, crudest way possible-by killing Vader so Obi-Wan won't have to think about the problem anymore. Of all Obi-Wan's faults, this one seems the most petty and grievous. Even after the full revelation of every lie Obi-Wan and Yoda previously fed to Luke, Obi-Wan continues to begrudge Luke the feelings that define him: steadfast love, undying loyalty and unquenchable hope. Nowhere is the contrast between the Old Republic Jedi and Luke more apparent; never is Luke's commitment to his own ideals more critical.

A more arrogant and detached Luke, an old Republic-model Jedi such as Yoda and Obi-Wan might have forged out of a more complacent young Skywalker, would surely have met with disaster in his confrontation with Vader and Palpatine aboard the second Death Star. Palpatine's superiority over Luke is readily apparent; the young Jedi has no defense against the Sith Lord's dark lightning.

Killing Vader outright or disdaining him as beyond redemption would have done no good; then Luke would have died or been suborned to the will of the Emperor in Vader's place. Struggling against Palpatine would have been to no avail, with Luke so overmatched. Only Luke's feelings for his father-his decision to spend what might be his last few breaths pleading for Vader's aid-succeed in turning Vader against the Emperor. The Sith Lord dies by his apprentice's hand, but it is Luke's love and loyalty that put that hand in motion.

At the end of the cinematic Star Wars saga, Luke Skywalker inherits the mantle and powers of the Jedi without the hang-ups that brought the Order down at its nadir-the pompous senses of entitlement, superiority and emotional detachment that his mentors failed to truly kindle in him. Luke faces his destiny as the first of a new breed of Jedi, compassionate and sociable, a more faithful friend and a more honorable foe than the Knights of old. The practical moral qualities he articulates by example are immediately applicable in the real world, and worth aspiring to.

With great power must come a certain amount of healthy selfdoubt, and a certain amount of trust in the people closest to you. In embracing this, Luke's personal triumph becomes the Saga's ethical vindication.

Scott Lynch was born in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1978 and currently lives in Wisconsin. His first novel, The Lies of Locke Lamora, will be released in June 2006.

THE COURTROOM

DAVID BRIN: Your Honor, the Prosecution is perfectly willing to stipulate that Luke Skywalker is a righteous dude and a swell guy. He may be dim, but at no point is he anything other than a stalwart fellow, ethical, brave and true. He well and truly represents what we have already accepted as the superficial-or childlike-moral lessons of Star Wars. For example, "be loyal to your friends," "be brave" and "mean people suck."

Furthermore, we are further willing to admit, as Scott Lynch ably points out, that Luke winds up defying his Jedi Masters, questioning their authority, overcoming their mistakes and helping to bring about a new Order that might-one can hope-rise above the flaming lunacy that both sides of the old Force represent.

Nevertheless, the question at issue here is not the relative goodness of Luke Skywalker, but the lessons that are taught by this science fiction epic.

Both Jedi and Sith get-across all six films-about an hour of on-screen time to lecture us about their horrific light-and-dark versions of nastiness. Are we supposed to then rely on the public to analyze the situation, in the very last five minutes of Return of the Jedi, and say to themselves, aloud: "Aha! Luke and his friends rejected all that Force crap in favor of a world of openness and egalitarian democracy!"

Are we, really?

SCOTT LYNCH: The estimable Persecutor (er, Prosecutor) is being chronologically uncharitable; Luke's rebellion against the old-Order Jedi doesn't come in the last five minutes of the last film; it's already a major plot point in the middle of The Empire Strikes Back. Luke's journey from wide-eyed acceptance of anything Obi-Wan says to sadder, wiser skepticism covers a film and a half. Through out that second half of the original trilogy, Luke sets himself firmly and consistently in opposition to the ascetic, emotionally isolationist philosophy of his elders. Furthermore, it is not the Force that Luke rejects (for the Force itself can no more be rejected in Luke's universe than the laws of gravity can in ours), but rather the idea that a Jedi Knight should be willing to sacrifice his friends and loved ones just so he can stay appropriately Zen.

As for the "childishness" of Luke's moral example, well ... to paraphrase something our chief counsel for the Defense once wrote, I would suggest that the reflexive need to belittle straightforward heroism is too often a defense mechanism designed to deal with the unpalatable fact that we ourselves tend to fall short of our own highest ideals ... that because we have perhaps failed to be the men and women we know we should be, the sight of unvarnished virtue stings as much as it inspires.

DAVID BRIN: Isn't that like asking the public to notice that (in ROTJ) none of the throne-room shenanigans matter at all to the fate of the universe? Yes! Only non-Force guys, like Chewbacca and Lando, actually save the day. But can you count on the fingers of one hand the number of people who noticed that?

SCOTT LYNCH: Actually, that's not entirely true. The seeming sideshow in the throne room keeps the attention of the two most powerful Sith Lords in galactic history fixed firmly on their little family squabble while the Rebel junior varsity goes for the Death Star's jugular. One can only imagine what else might have gone wrong for the Rebellion if Vader had been available to lead the battle on the forest moon himself ("I love the smell of blasted Ewok in the afternoon ... hooooo-paaaaah... smells like ... victory....").

And what if Palpatine had been at leisure to work his own mischief?

Free, for example, to reach out across space and telekinetically set the space-toilets in every Rebel cruiser to "reverse purge" at the same time?

And given that the Prosecutor can no more telepathically analyze the reactions of several hundred million film viewers than I can, might it not be fair to call rhetorical grandstanding on the second question?

DAVID BRIN: Aren't these more likely to be plot accidents, than intentional moral points?

SCOTT LYNCH: That depends on whether or not you can believe that a guy so thoroughly obsessed with the minutiae of his films that he was adding CGI birds, beasts, buildings, clouds and shadows to them two decades after their original theatrical runs would just sort of forget to go somewhere with his story elements. You could certainly argue that they weren't necessarily used to best possible effect, or that another writer/director could have wrung something more (insert positive adjective of your choice here) from them.

However, the addition of the "directorial intention" factor to the discussion muddies it to an infinite degree. If any piece of cinematic evidence can be devalued at will merely by suggesting that it might be an accident, how can any of it be presumed intentional at all? If the Prosecution would condemn Lucas for the perceived inadequacies of his design, it seems only rational that they should allow that what we're debating is his design.

DAVID BRIN: In fact, I agree with much that has been said by the honorable witness for the Defense, Mr. Lynch. But then, if George Lucas wanted to make a point of all this, might he have given a hint, in dialogue, that anything like this was in mind? (It could have happened. One minor Qui-Gon-like character, in ROTJ, could have put a seed in our minds, about a "third way, the way of freedom.")

Isn't the test quite simple? What fraction of the viewing fans of Star Wars would stand up and avow-as my honorable adversary has-that Obi-Wan and Yoda really are a "pair of shifty-eyed sonsof-bitches"?

SCOTT LYNCH: I would lay a bet that the Prosecutor might be surprised. The untrustworthiness of Luke's two mentors is a source of much blather and argument in Star Wars fandom, often with a decidedly comic bent.

In my opinion, it's easy to see that Obi-Wan and Yoda are burdened with a particularly insidious cocktail of survivor's guilt, personal shame and self-serving nostalgia. The instructions they spent years pounding into the most hormonal, emotional and powerful Jedi ever (that, in essence, ajedi must never, ever get laid) almost certainly contributed to Anakin's violent change of lightsaber lifestyle. Given twenty years after a mess like that to brood on the affair and stare at the walls of my swamp or desert hovel, I think I might start cooking up a pile of comforting white lies, too.