So, it’s done.
There was a time when I’d get on my high-horse and spout off about how much Lucas sucked, and how he did such a terrible thing to the franchise by introducing shit like Jar-Jar Binks and Midi-clorians and the horror that was Hayden Christensen’s abilities as a thespian. Now, I just don’t listen to that old man anymore. And I don’t mean Lucas; I mean the old man in me.
I started listening to this little boy I know and he introduced me to one I’d completely forgotten about and been neglecting for a really long time. I’d been waiting for years to begin introducing my son to the things I found fascination and joy in as a child, and here my son was showing me! As those of you who regularly read this blog know, I’ve recently started reading to him from a selection of my favorite authors. The introduction to Star Wars happened more than a year ago and he was immediately enthralled. He’d actually sit in the living room, entranced, as I moved from level to level. He loved all the voices and characters, and I have to admit that Knights of the Old Republic rekindled in me the spark of love for the whole fandom. I’d tried to show him the movies before, but he really wasn’t captivated by them at the age of three. After the success of KotOR, at age four, I decided to try the movies again. He loved them. And no, I didn’t start with the original three, Episodes IV, V, and VI, I started with Episode I.
Oh stop gasping and looking shocked! I didn’t own Episodes IV, V, and VI. I refused to buy them on VHS and I skipped that whole laserdisc era. I did have Episodes I and II on DVD (and have since gotten IV, V, and VI on DVD and we’ve watched them), though, so those were the first Star Wars movies Devin watched. And I repeat, he loved every single frame! I sat there watching him realizing what my face must have looked like when I saw Episode IV in the theater with my Aunt Renee in 1979 (yes, 1979…we were in a very far flung town in upstate NY). It occurred to me then that, as before, Lucas made the films for kids. Devin loved Jar-Jar’s antics and laughed and laughed at the slapstick of it all. Admittedly now he’s a little wiser and thinks Gungans are stupid, but hey. He got it first time around and can I help it if a little of daddy’s cynicism has rubbed off? No, I can’t, but it doesn’t really matter. He’s hooked. He plays Star Wars: Battlefront and Star Wars: Republic Commando on the X-Box even now, and he sits down with just as much enthusiasm to watch daddy play Knights of the Old Republic II as he musters to watch Star Wars: Clone Wars. And pretty soon we’re going to start in on some of the novels.
The point here is that Star Wars is not, I repeat not, high-brow, academy award winning stuff. It’s a Saturday afternoon serial gone horribly, horribly wild and gimantic (yes, that’s a word because I say it is). It’s an adventure and a visual feast and a bed-time story all rolled into one. In the past I’d gone to the releases with my mind and my heart steeled against what I was sure was going to be a bastardization of everything I’d come to love. No surprise that the hardened eye of the cynic found so much to despise.
This time I didn’t do that. This time I left the cynical old man at home. I took my five-year-old, my wife, and my Aunt Renee with me, and I made sure to bring along that eight year old who saw Episode IV on a ginormous (also a word, shut up) screen in an old, smelly theater in Potsdam, NY. We met up with some great friends and we went to see Episode III. The eight-year-old and the five-year-old absolutely loved it. The five-year-old sat entranced and riveted while the eight-year-old was moved and stunned and pleased. The eight-year-old cried when the Organa’s held baby Leia as the strains of Leia’s Theme wafted out and the Lars’, plus baby Luke, watched the twin suns of Tatooine set to Luke’s Theme.
Star Wars is my connection to my childhood. Star Wars is something my son and I have terribly in common. If you’ve lost the eight-year-old, I highly suggest you find him or her. You won’t look back, and Star Wars will be everything you always remembered it was and could be.
