Star Words: Episode IV, Part 30
Oct. 10th, 2019 01:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
matrilWhile our inexperienced heroes have been blundering their way out of the prison block, Obi-Wan has been executing a far stealthier mission to shut off the tractor beam. The glimpses of his quiet, surreptitious progress provide an excellent contrast interspersed with more madcap misadventures. As Leia and Han exchange snarky witticisms, Ben will be part of a much more somber exchange. He knows what is coming. The teacher knows the student as the student knows the teacher.
Vader takes his time. We know that Anakin always had a tendency toward being over-dramatic, and his Sith alter-ego is no different. He basks in the moment, with a speech so carefully crafted you have to wonder if he's been preparing it for years. I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again at last.
"The circle is now complete. When I left you, I was but the learner. Now I am the master."
Obi-Wan easily counters with Only a master of evil, Darth and enters the fight fearlessly. (And though we know that Darth Vader's true identity hadn't yet been fixed when this film came out, it's still interesting to see the Darth title, retroactively, as a way that Obi-Wan has completely divorced Vader's identity from Anakin's. His old friend his dead; only the Sith Lord remains.)
But there is some truth to Vader's words still. Even before the prequels, we had a sense of the tremendous history between these two men, the tragedy of a betrayal. The circle is now complete. The cyclical nature of things is a theme woven into much of the Star Wars saga. Boy becomes man, begets a boy who becomes a man. The Republic falls, then rises again. A friendship is shattered in a violent duel, leaving the student broken and defeated; they meet again and this time the teacher is the one defeated. Vader's mastery, however, is only superficial -- only of evil, not of the true, all-encompassing nature of the Force. And Obi-Wan's defeat is not an ending. It marks a rebirth of the Jedi order -- passing the torch to the new Jedi who has just begun his training. The cycle turns and turns again.
Next time, Ben's calm rejoinder to Vader's taunts....
Vader takes his time. We know that Anakin always had a tendency toward being over-dramatic, and his Sith alter-ego is no different. He basks in the moment, with a speech so carefully crafted you have to wonder if he's been preparing it for years. I've been waiting for you, Obi-Wan. We meet again at last.
"The circle is now complete. When I left you, I was but the learner. Now I am the master."
Obi-Wan easily counters with Only a master of evil, Darth and enters the fight fearlessly. (And though we know that Darth Vader's true identity hadn't yet been fixed when this film came out, it's still interesting to see the Darth title, retroactively, as a way that Obi-Wan has completely divorced Vader's identity from Anakin's. His old friend his dead; only the Sith Lord remains.)
But there is some truth to Vader's words still. Even before the prequels, we had a sense of the tremendous history between these two men, the tragedy of a betrayal. The circle is now complete. The cyclical nature of things is a theme woven into much of the Star Wars saga. Boy becomes man, begets a boy who becomes a man. The Republic falls, then rises again. A friendship is shattered in a violent duel, leaving the student broken and defeated; they meet again and this time the teacher is the one defeated. Vader's mastery, however, is only superficial -- only of evil, not of the true, all-encompassing nature of the Force. And Obi-Wan's defeat is not an ending. It marks a rebirth of the Jedi order -- passing the torch to the new Jedi who has just begun his training. The cycle turns and turns again.
Next time, Ben's calm rejoinder to Vader's taunts....
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Date: 2019-10-10 08:26 pm (UTC)