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Revenge of the Sith?
Garrett has a couple interesting posts on some dreams he had about the next Star Wars movie coming out. Reading that reminded me of something I’ve been meaning to write for a while now.
The original (good) Star Wars trilogy was all about the good guys rising back to power. But this new one is all about the bad guys rising to power. Does that creep anybody else out - especially in regards to world events? Way back in the day, we got to spiritually experience “The Return of the Jedi” but now we’re being forced to endure “The Revenge of the Sith.” And I’m starting to feel like this is neither coincidence or just “mere” entertainment.
I’m reminded of a recent commenter who connected Ridley Scott’s various war movies to certain conflicts which the USA got involved with, and which helped prepare and load the American psyche with the mythos-programming for war. Using that kind of intuitive connective non-rational thinking, are we then being prepared for the unveiling of our own “Darth Vader” as he comes into the zenith of his dark power? Am I reading this correctly in saying that the “Phantom Menace” has created an army of “clones” in which to manifest itself and now is about to take “revenge” on the feeble out-dated slow-witted Republic depicted in the Star Wars movie?
I also have to wonder: what happened to George Lucas? Back when I wrote my report on the so-called Secret Gray-Robed Christians, a reader asked me whether I thought Lucas was part of this invisible gnostic underground. In my mind, if he was, he’s no longer. The original series seems to be all about breaking out of the Black Iron Prison, and “The New Hope”, so it makes me wonder what caused him to turn all that around. Was he co-opted by the system? Did he just sell out? Jeremy (I think) recently brough up the end of Philip K. Dick’s Radio Free Albemuth. At the end of it, Phil Dick the sci-fi writer is sitting in a prison camp. The authorities want him to write and release sci-fi books under his name which will further their agenda. He refuses and they do it anyway, and the public is none the wiser. Did this happen to Lucas on some kind of at least symbolic level? How else could you explain the sheer inanity of these other Star Wars movies? They make almost no sense with the original message and vision of the originals.
Or maybe it’s just as simple as he lost his touch. He got successful and stopped reaching so far and so hard. Whatever the root cause though, I’m a little bit concerned that one of the defining mythological stories of my generation is currently undergoing a total reversal and inversion. What’s going to be squeezed out the other side is anybody’s guess.
- Something smells like Sith in here…
- The Death of Sci-Fi
- The Suffering Christ
- “Only a Sith deals in absolutes.”
- The Catholic Matrix
- Prev: Jumping Out of the Movie
- Next: RAW Kabbalah
April 18th, 2005 at 12:37 pm
Even the first Star Wars movie was evil. Its core myth is not hope or freedom, but “identify the bad thing, violently destroy it, and everyone will be happy.” That’s pure fascism, the same thing Hitler and Pol Pot were thinking. And Star Wars was so successful that since then every blockbuster has to be a serious cartoon where the good guys violently destroy something bad to make everyone happy. Before Star Wars, only James Bond movies were like that, and now most movies are.
Also, the final scene in Star Wars is lifted straight from the Nazi rally in Triumph of the Will: troops standing in perfect rectangular formation with a gap in the middle, up which the important people walk to be honored.
Also, notice the similarities between Star Wars and the popular myth of the 9/11 operation: Idealistic outsiders in flying craft, inspired by a bearded man from the desert, totally destroy a giant grey monolithic structure representing the control of a giant empire.
April 18th, 2005 at 12:45 pm
yeah those are really good points as well. i guess all they are doing now is “taking the gloves off” in some way
actually, your article on the star wars 9/11 connection was what brought me to your site originally long ago. i had been meaning to write that same thing myself but then saw that youd beat me to the punch.
April 18th, 2005 at 1:02 pm
It was I who asked whether Lucas could be a Grey-Robed Christian and this post is kinda what I had in mind. However, I was kinda going in the opposite direction with it when I asked. More like, this final movie shall symbolize the crystallization of pure evil in the real world and perhaps this final installment is something of a call to action for an entire generation brought up on the influence of Star Wars.
If I recall correctly, one of Lucas’ answers back in the day about why he started the saga with episode IV was because the first half of his story was far too dark for the audience at that time. I also seem to remember an old interview where Lucas also intimated in no uncertain terms that the first three would never be made. What changed.
For one, I believe Lucas has financed episodes I through III completely on his own citing creative freedom. Therefore, in some ways I wonder if Lucas’ vision of evil triumphing isn’t simply a closing of a loop. He could be merely completing the cycle of evil rising, but good at the end (or beginning depending on where you start watching) always has it’s day too. Because if you think about it, how could anybody have an opinion about this third and final installment without having first seen the original three with the rise of of the rebellion and the human dilemma of evil and good? That, I wonder, could be of some particular design as it completely jibes with the world as it was back in 1977, ‘80 and ‘83 and the final three coming in chronological disorder, but more effective for a later turn of the century audience. After the Revenge of the Sith, everybody knows what happens next. That could be the message — A message of hope instilled thirty years before, thus preparing us for the harrowing but very temporary triumph of pure evil that precedes the reaction of the forces of good.
Either way, none of this explains the unfortunate phenomena of Jar Jar Binks, which only goes to prove that Lucas is still painfully human.
April 18th, 2005 at 1:34 pm
yeah i really like that interpretation, the whole idea that the seed of hope was planted long ago, and now that evil is on the rise, all we need to do is look back at that hope within us. thats a really awesome take
April 18th, 2005 at 5:36 pm
Tim,
Don´t you think Cardinal Ratzinger looks (and is in some ways) like Senator/Emperor Palpatine? Does Sith and Nazi have the same etimology?
Keep walking, great blog.
PD. After Crusade and Episode III, we have The War of the Worlds. Seems that some one just wanted to film different versions of Huntington´s Clash of Civilizations? That by the way, this “scholar” wrote a famous study for the Trilateral Commission in the 1970s about the “dangers of democracy”….
April 18th, 2005 at 9:25 pm
Please, Please, you have to post my paper when I finish it tonight or tomorrow. I outline the entire Star Wars story-arch (yes, I already read Ep 3) and compare it to the metaphorical history of religion and the occult.
Anakin Skywalker, “the chosen one”, is Christ (and to some extents, Mohammad).
Palpatine (or Sidious) is Monotheism (and Tyrrany), and can be seen as the Gnostic
Demi-urge.
Obi-Wan is the Occidental occult of magic (Hermes Trismegistus, Thoth, Merlin, Apollonius).
Yoda of the prequel trilogy is Hinduism, but as we find out in Ep 3, he takes on the Gautama role, sees the truth (fights Maya, the Devil, Palpatine, the Gnostic Demi-urge), thus becoming the Buddha of the original trilogy.
Qui-Gon Jinn of Episode 1 represents the magi of Persia, and fulfills the role of finding “the chosen one”, much like the 3 Magi. He also trains Obi-Wan who becomes the true representation of Magic.
The introduction of Darth Maul is much like the introduction of Zoroastrianism and duality (creating a good side and a bad side). When Darth Maul kills Qui-Gon, it’s like Zoroastrianism killing the shamanistic religions of Persia.
Darth Tyrannus or Count Dooku represents Judaism.
When Anakin kills the Tusken Raiders (for killing his mother), he creates an internal conflict (the Ep 3 book describes it as a dragon), and this internal conflict is Islam. Thus your conflicts between Christianity and Islam are internal conflicts.
When Dooku injures Anakin, it is much like the early relationship between Judaism and Christianity (and now the relationship between Judaism and Islam).
Anakin then (in Ep 3) kills Dooku, much like the Anti-Semitism that stems from both Islam and Christianity (cough, cough Nazis cough cough Ratzinger cough cough).
General Grevious, the main villian of Ep 3, is a representation of the evils of Technology, or in other words, when the scientists lose their soul during the Age of Reason.
The Clone Wars that began in Ep 2 and end in Ep 3, were just a front, a proxy war. They were meant to allow Palpantine to rise to power, much like Monotheism and fake Democracy (Tyranny in disguise) has risen.
Anakin (in Ep 3) then goes and kills many of the Jedi, launching an assualt on the Jedi Temple. This much like Christianity and Islam converting mass numbers of people and killing off the heretics. The burning of the Jedi Temple is similar to the burning of books by Christianity.
Thus, as Joseph Campbell said, the Age of Reason (General Grevious, Death Star, etc) combined with the rise of Christianity (Darth Vader), and to lesser extents, Monotheism as a whole (Palpantine, Demi-urge) killed the occult (the Jedi). The only Jedi that survived were Obi-Wan (magic, perhaps even psychics) and Yoda (Buddhism, Qi-Gong, Taoism, Tai-Chi, etc).
That is why the original trilogy was SO POWERFUL. It was the return of the Hero (Campbell’s Hero With a Thousand Faces), and the hero combined everything to conquer the Demi-Urge, and The Empire (Philip K Dick’s Empire?????).
That is why Lucas released IV first. It was hopeful. It was emotional. It was surreal. The prequel trilogy is too real, too sad, too depressing; it is the FAILURE of the Hero (failure of Christianity/Islam). That wasn’t going to sell for a struggling filmmaker. The hopeful overtones of the original trilogy sell.
The original trilogy also outlines what we must to overtake the Demi-urge. Combine the tenents of Magic (and other Occidental practices), Buddhism (and other Orient philosophies), and combine that with Christ’s reverance for life, as well as other Gnostic teachings of Christ, along with a solid understanding of Science and Technology. Technology is just a tool, for both us and the Demi-urge (or Archons) to use.
That is the Gnostic philosophy behind Star Wars, though I doubt that was what George Lucas intended. George Lucas is a stout Christian, who was impacted by myth, and what he created can be viewed from multiple angles. Even if Lucas didn’t consciously create Vader as a representation of Christianity/Islam, that doesn’t mean that his unconscious soul didn’t intend for this to be seen. Myths are living, and when you combine them, you create a living mirror of the world.
Now, your outlook on life determines where in the trilogies we are. I think we are somewhere between Ep 3 and Ep 4, but a pessimistic person may point towards the growing Fundamentalism (and the war on terror as a “clone war”) and say we are somewhere right after Ep 2. Likewise, an optimistic person would look at the return of the occult, and perhaps place current time somewhere around Ep 5 (before or after). It all depends on your outlook, but just remember, that Lucas wrote a rough story arch for ALL 9 (even the trilogy that probably will never be made) in the late seventies.
***It is good to note that Christ is not evil, nor is he fake, it is Christianity that is Darth Vader. This is why both Luke and Padme (in Ep 3) proclaim that there “is still good in him”. Also, about Palpatine, George Lucas shaped the original Palpatine after Richard Nixon (and probably Stalin/Hitler). Ratzinger similarities are after-the-fact (but not necessarily coincidences).
April 18th, 2005 at 9:32 pm
Ooo, and by the way, Jar Jar is a representation of the less serious, animalistic side of humanity. Yes, he is designed for children, but at the same time, if you follow his development (in role as well as speech), it is much like the domestication of animals, or perhaps the domestication of humanity from pure, innocent human to a “socialized” human under the control of the Demi-urge (because it is Palpatine in Ep 2 that suggests that Jar Jar put forth the motion that eventually leads to Palpatine becoming Emperor). So his childish nature (at least in Ep 1) is a representation of the child or innocence of untamed humanity.
That’s my take on Jar Jar.
April 19th, 2005 at 3:27 am
It is about the failure of democracy in fear-the fear that stems from powerlessness and rage suddenly empowered. Unchanneled rage is destructive and easily channeled into evil deeds, (not evil personified-DV is the wayward, the prodigal) while the son (luke), trained in the hard-won wisdom of the old ways (greeks who founded democracy) learns to wield power, resist the temptations of evil, of power, and the flesh (leia). The father is redeemed through good works but must die because (like the buddha on the road) he must for progress to be made. Leia is the other half of the coin, the rationalization of power through sublimating the overt (force as in the threat of physical attack) into the covert powers of persuasion, reason, and love.
It’s just another ink blot test like the Bible, isn’t it?
April 19th, 2005 at 12:21 pm
[…] es. Catholicism by focusing on Christ’s suffering is a little more like the upcoming Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. In it, darkness rises to power and almost tri […]
April 20th, 2005 at 6:22 am
Jon Headlee, you bring tears to my eyes.
Allow me to make a prediction. Rough, by all means. Totally uncalled for. But here it is anyhow.
This next episode shall affect some people.
That’s the singular magic of this moment in sociological weirdness. Even if nothing is wrong and all we’re proving to be are highly imaginative chicken littles, we and our archived imaginations will go on until they are purged.
Don’t think otherwise people. We seriously are living in the beginning days of a true and blue revolution. We merely await an assymetrical response from those to which our idle speculation threatens.
Perhaps nothing will ever come of anything. Therefore, enjoy the ride and be ready to be wrong.
Being wrong about now would be one of the nicest feelings.
May 26th, 2005 at 6:39 pm
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June 1st, 2005 at 11:57 pm
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