May the Force Be with You!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rQSJDLM8ZE
(you should click here for appropriate background music to read by)
May 1977, I saw Star Wars at the Tower Theater in Springfield MO. I was 21. It was fantastic (awesome wasn't a word back then) and the Force soon permeated the culture.
To this day Star Wars is iconic and generational.
In 1977, I like, many in my generation, probably identified with Luke, a rebel with a cause. Looking for ourselves in a world that seemed to only want to funnel us into a universe of materialism and stability. We didn't like Uncle Owen, he just wanted us to work, work, work, but we wanted adventure. Not the kind our just older friends had experienced in the just ended Vietnam war, but something fantastic and with a REAL purpose.
Obi Wan got himself killed, nobody wanted to be him.
Han Solo wasn't somebody I identified with. He was a space cowboy/punk/hood who really just thought of himself and money. He reminded me of those high school and college jocks. Popular and egotistical. He did somewhat redeem himself at the end of Star Wars, but he just didn't appeal that much to me.
Yes, I wanted to be Luke, but in reality, I turned into Uncle Owen.
Then in 1980 came The Empire Strikes Back: Episode V. Something had changed. I'm not sure if it was Han or it was me, or both. Han's semi-commitment to Leia ( " I love you." "I know") and his rescue of Luke, made him more like a person more like me. A responsible, heroic and caring man. I wanted to be Han. I could no longer identify with the unfocused Luke, who was still trying to find himself, whining to Yoda in the swamp.
In Episode V, Han Solo was a great role model, loyal, smart mouthed, bold, brash and not the sharpest light saber in the drawer. He turns out to be lovable and loved and would do anything to help his friends.
When Luke does find himself in this movie, he loses his hand and his innocence. Luke dresses much better, but Obi Wan, is hanging around in Luke's head with the Force.
Han just goes on his gut feelings and loyalty. Much better to be Han.
1983 brought the "galaxy far far away" back to our galaxy again. The Return of the Jedi was a good movie in my opinion, although many disagree.
I didn't care much for the Ewoks/Care Bears cuts fading in and out between the serious fight scenes of Luke and Darth Vader. Luke is older and more mature, in control, mostly.
I'm almost 28, and I too am so much more mature, so much so that I don't think about who I identify with, it was just a good continuation of a story I liked. Real life was working for minimum wage in a bad economy, hoping for something better, as were all the characters in Return of the Jedi. Yes, even the Emperor and Darth Vader. That I could identify with.
Now I'm 58. This Sunday is May 4th, and Star Wars is still here. Bigger than just about any of it's peer movie franchises or anything new.
My boys grew up with it and so have my grandsons. Jaxon, who is 4, knows all the characters and I believe the Star Wars theme plays in the background of his brain all the time.
Tonight I spent time with college students who are the age I was when Star Wars came out. They aren't steeped in it like my clan, but they do know the iconic "May the Force be with You!".
In my conversations with them, it came to my mind that I am now identifying with another Star Wars character. Yes, I am finally Obi Wan Kenobi, not Ewan McGregor from Episode I-III, but Sir Alec Gunniess from Episode IV-VI.
I find myself spouting things that sound old and sometimes wise (sometimes just wise-cracks) and sometimes just very dated. I speak warnings about how to live. Suggestions to be patient. Telling them to follow their hearts, the force inside, the passion. Sometimes I'm just wishing to become a hermit living among the Sand People.
Maybe that's how it goes for a Star Wars fan. The phases of life take you from Luke to Obi-Wan, and then eventually to Yoda.
Yes, I expect that at some point in the future, I will lose the ability to speak in whole grammatically correct sentences, will have a short crooked cane and wear a thread bare robe as I wander about the gardens at Windrock. I know this will happen and as far as looking like Yoda. Well, I have a good start on the wrinkles and every man that lives that long gets the ears. True, that is, you know.
Peace and truly May the Force Be With You!
