3 reactions
I'd love to see Star Wars go back to a more simplistic take on the Jedi in the future.
warning: I wrote this for a school project so its quite long, but please I would really like feedback. This is also a reaction to yotuber Life Stories of Old's nebula video: The Last Jedi Hotakes.
The Jedi idea's really simple, I think. What's weird is I don't see that simplicity coming up much in the actual stories, or not as much as it should. There's quite a bit of exploration into what effect the Jedi have on the world, but not much exploration of what the Jedi actually stand for and why they do the things they do.
The Jedi ideas can be more than just philosophy or mythology. They can be a statement of the transformative power of kindness, humility and connection, just as the original trilogy was. Star Wars could really commit to that hopeful, transformative empathy, in a way a lot of other franchises can't. Some of the most popular heroes and stories in modern pop culture are based on that.
The most recent I can think of that really spelled it out was 'Everything Everywhere all at Once', and that movie laid it all out thus (paraphrased):
"When I choose to see the good side of things, I'm not being naive. It is strategic and necessary. It's how I've learned to survive through everything. The only thing I do know... is that we have to be kind. Especially when we don't know what's going on. I know you see yourself as a fighter. Well, I see myself as one too. This is how I fight."
That's it. That's the Jedi. 'Saving what we love, not destroying what we hate.' In his movie, Rian Johnson had the Resistance commit to becoming the heirs of the Jedi ethos. Those are ideas that mean more than the 'Jedi' name, and they are beautiful ideas, that no story-teller would feel comfortable abandoning. It feels as if they are what Star Wars media keeps trying to reach back toward - but it also feels like it's reaching blindly, like it doesn't understand the idea at the heart of the original movies well enough. Even the characters who you would think would understand it the most - Obi-Wan, Luke - are portrayed as confused, despite the simplicity of it.
And it is a simple idea. Everything's connected, and everyone, in lots of subtle ways. So don't look at things in isolation, look at the world in terms of relationships. See how related it all is, and how percieved differences don't mean as much as we think.
Obi-Wan touches on that when he tells the Gungans they ought to care about the Naboo, because what happens to one will affect the other. Yoda tries to teach Luke that just as a rock and an X-Wing are much more similar than he thinks, so are Luke and his father. And Luke wins when he commits hard to the idea that he and his father are the same, and understands that if he can face the Dark and say no, then his father can too.
So, live like that's the case. Hold good feelings in your heart, and give them to others. Recognise the bad feelings for what they are, understand them, and let them pass away. Don't let longing for the past or fear of the future drag you away from appreciating the world around you now. Help others with their troubles, but at peace in yourself, because life goes on and it always will. Open yourself up and let the world in, let it carry you along. It leads to a kind, wise, and serene kind of person.
Against that you have the Sith, who say something very different: that you matter. In fact, you matter more than everything else. Don't look at the world as a whole, focus on yourself and your perspective. You should have the power to save what you want to save, punish what you feel is wrong, and take what you want to possess. But over time, that ego-focussed viewpoint leads to loss of perspective, and paranoia and fear eventually lead a person to see power as an end in itself, power to hold back change. Grip the world, and twist it to your will.
It's not about good and evil as cosmic forces or abstracts, or even as political expressions, but ways in which the world is tangibly, observably healed or poisoned by the empathy, warmth, coldness or cruelty of the people in it.
Often I read people talking about attachment, how the Jedi deny them while the Sith embrace them. But it's more complicated than that, in that the Jedi embrace connection with the world, while trying to avoid getting too attached to any one thing in favour of another. While the Sith grip their attachments close, but deny any connection, they deny the idea that these attachments have any power or influence over them. In the prequels, it's Anakin's possessive, obsessive love for his wife - his attachment, his wholly internal desire - that destroys him and others. He fights to control that relationship. In the original movies, it's Luke's unselfish, sacrifical love for his father - their connection, their tangible, mutual emotional link - that saves them both. He lets go, and trusts his fate fully in the hands of another.
TLDR: A story that tries to get past the confusion of the prequels' meaning, and recommits to the ideas of kindness and empathy as transformative forces at the heart of the originals and the Jedi, would be nice.
#video #movies
warning: I wrote this for a school project so its quite long, but please I would really like feedback. This is also a reaction to yotuber Life Stories of Old's nebula video: The Last Jedi Hotakes.
The Jedi idea's really simple, I think. What's weird is I don't see that simplicity coming up much in the actual stories, or not as much as it should. There's quite a bit of exploration into what effect the Jedi have on the world, but not much exploration of what the Jedi actually stand for and why they do the things they do.
The Jedi ideas can be more than just philosophy or mythology. They can be a statement of the transformative power of kindness, humility and connection, just as the original trilogy was. Star Wars could really commit to that hopeful, transformative empathy, in a way a lot of other franchises can't. Some of the most popular heroes and stories in modern pop culture are based on that.
The most recent I can think of that really spelled it out was 'Everything Everywhere all at Once', and that movie laid it all out thus (paraphrased):
"When I choose to see the good side of things, I'm not being naive. It is strategic and necessary. It's how I've learned to survive through everything. The only thing I do know... is that we have to be kind. Especially when we don't know what's going on. I know you see yourself as a fighter. Well, I see myself as one too. This is how I fight."
That's it. That's the Jedi. 'Saving what we love, not destroying what we hate.' In his movie, Rian Johnson had the Resistance commit to becoming the heirs of the Jedi ethos. Those are ideas that mean more than the 'Jedi' name, and they are beautiful ideas, that no story-teller would feel comfortable abandoning. It feels as if they are what Star Wars media keeps trying to reach back toward - but it also feels like it's reaching blindly, like it doesn't understand the idea at the heart of the original movies well enough. Even the characters who you would think would understand it the most - Obi-Wan, Luke - are portrayed as confused, despite the simplicity of it.
And it is a simple idea. Everything's connected, and everyone, in lots of subtle ways. So don't look at things in isolation, look at the world in terms of relationships. See how related it all is, and how percieved differences don't mean as much as we think.
Obi-Wan touches on that when he tells the Gungans they ought to care about the Naboo, because what happens to one will affect the other. Yoda tries to teach Luke that just as a rock and an X-Wing are much more similar than he thinks, so are Luke and his father. And Luke wins when he commits hard to the idea that he and his father are the same, and understands that if he can face the Dark and say no, then his father can too.
So, live like that's the case. Hold good feelings in your heart, and give them to others. Recognise the bad feelings for what they are, understand them, and let them pass away. Don't let longing for the past or fear of the future drag you away from appreciating the world around you now. Help others with their troubles, but at peace in yourself, because life goes on and it always will. Open yourself up and let the world in, let it carry you along. It leads to a kind, wise, and serene kind of person.
Against that you have the Sith, who say something very different: that you matter. In fact, you matter more than everything else. Don't look at the world as a whole, focus on yourself and your perspective. You should have the power to save what you want to save, punish what you feel is wrong, and take what you want to possess. But over time, that ego-focussed viewpoint leads to loss of perspective, and paranoia and fear eventually lead a person to see power as an end in itself, power to hold back change. Grip the world, and twist it to your will.
It's not about good and evil as cosmic forces or abstracts, or even as political expressions, but ways in which the world is tangibly, observably healed or poisoned by the empathy, warmth, coldness or cruelty of the people in it.
Often I read people talking about attachment, how the Jedi deny them while the Sith embrace them. But it's more complicated than that, in that the Jedi embrace connection with the world, while trying to avoid getting too attached to any one thing in favour of another. While the Sith grip their attachments close, but deny any connection, they deny the idea that these attachments have any power or influence over them. In the prequels, it's Anakin's possessive, obsessive love for his wife - his attachment, his wholly internal desire - that destroys him and others. He fights to control that relationship. In the original movies, it's Luke's unselfish, sacrifical love for his father - their connection, their tangible, mutual emotional link - that saves them both. He lets go, and trusts his fate fully in the hands of another.
TLDR: A story that tries to get past the confusion of the prequels' meaning, and recommits to the ideas of kindness and empathy as transformative forces at the heart of the originals and the Jedi, would be nice.
#video #movies
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