The Power of the Suns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQ42RydMt_c

I’ve spent a couple of reviews discussing some of the fundamental story issues with The Force Awakens, mainly concerning why Rey’s powers both confuse and annoy fans. The issues have varied from general structure to deeper philosophical problems that are helping create these breaks in structure. Now, it’s time to go into detail.

When Han Solo takes Rey and Finn to meet Maz Kanata, she begins talking about Han needing to rejoin the fight. Finn challenges her about the idea of fighting the First Order, and Maz calls him a coward but tells him about some men who will help him run. Rey rushes to Finn, trying to convince him to stay. He says he can’t and asks her to take care of herself. He leaves. Then the escalation truly begins.

Rey hears a strange voice calling to her. It’s her own voice from a distant memory, but for some reason this random voice in her head draws her to a chest in a tunnel under the knock-off cantina. She opens the box. I suppose she’s in a trance at this point, and inside she sees Luke’s old lightsaber. When she touches the lightsaber, she receives a vision.

The particulars of this vision aren’t really important because they are just a bunch of teases that are disappointing. What is important is the number of questions raised around it. How did Luke’s lightsaber end up here? Why is the lightsaber sending Rey visions? Since when did lightsabers send visions? Does Rey have a connection to the Skywalkers since this lightsaber that was owned by two Skywalkers sent her this vision?

The audience is asking all these questions, and no matter how loud the vision might be, it can’t overpower them. And sadly, the answers either never show up or are very disappointing.

Then Maz appears and says the lightsaber is calling to her. A funny thing to say, since presumably Maz has never seen this happen before. Or maybe, the lightsaber is sending out these psychic beacons all the time, and Maz is in the habit of begging people to take this psychedelic saber.

Whatever the case may be, Maz says that Rey’s parents are never coming back—not sure how she knows or why Rey should believe her—and then says Rey can find belonging somewhere else. Rey then whispers, “Luke.” That worked out like a charm.

Despite this revelation that Luke can replace her parents somehow, Rey still refuses to take the saber. She runs off. Not sure where she was planning to go. She clearly needs the falcon to return to Jakku, but anyway.

Rey’s lack of connection to Luke is the first instance of breaking the hero’s journey trope, and this is what confused the audience. Many people assumed Rey had a connection to Luke because, otherwise, why would his saber call to her?

Sabers don’t usually do that. Here, the audience is expecting a trope, something akin to a Charles Dickens character finding out they have a rich uncle who’s died. A little cliché? Perhaps, but there’s precedent for it.

The explanation doesn’t have to be believable, but in the words of Annie Wilkes, it had to be “fair.” In other words, there’s got to be something, anything. You can’t just have something happen because it needs to happen; there has to be some kind of explanation.

But when Maz gives Finn the lightsaber later in the film, Han asks her where she got it, and Maz summarizes the thesis of this entire trilogy, “A good question for another time.”

This vision officially primed the audience for a Rey is the “Chosen One” arc. She’s already been shown to be highly skilled at various things; some of those skills make more sense than others, but this vision doesn’t just provide the audience with a cool visual. It’s teasing that there might be a “why.”

This is what gave Maz’s line about finding meaning elsewhere more weight. This isn’t just a call to adventure. It’s a call to answers, answers the audience will either hate or never receive.

While all this is happening, Hux is giving his “I’m the bad guy speech.” The only thing that I’ll point out about this speech, aside from the obvious visual symbolism, which isn’t exactly subtle, is that during the speech, he says that the Republic has been “secretly” supporting the Resistance.

I have no idea what this means, and it sounds like it might have some implications. Too bad the audience will never hear more about it because of what happens a few moments later. Hux and his men are standing on what is known as the Starkiller Base. Why is it called the star killer? It eats suns. Let me repeat that: It eats suns!

Before I comment further, I’ll just finish this sequence. So, Hux orders the base to fire, and it does. This weapon made out of a planet begins sucking in a sun and shoots out several laser beams at once. These beams traverse the galaxy and blow up several planets at the same time, all of which we are supposed to believe is the Republic.

There is so much here. First, I don’t believe for a second that the entire government of the Republic would be on five planets in one system. There were government officials everywhere in both the Galactic Republic and the Empire, so I’m not buying that.

Some might say, “Well, the Rebels defeated the Empire by blowing up the Death Star.” True, but that’s the problem with being a tyrant. You’re only one guy! A republic has representatives from all across the galaxy. All those planets have armies. All those armies have generals. All those planets have lower representatives who can replace the higher-ranking ones.

Remember A New Hope, the movie this joke is copying? In that far better film, they’d just finished wiping out the last of the Republic and securing their reign? It took the entire time jump between the prequels and original trilogy for the Galactic Empire to secure its position. Why? Because there were more leaders in more than one system. 

Hux declaring this is the last day of the Republic is unbelievable, both when it comes to the rules of basic two plus two equals four logic and the rules set up within this franchise’s universe. This is laughably stupid.

But there’s something I found rather disturbing. I remember what I felt when I saw Alderaan destroyed in the first film. I was horrified. I empathized with Leia, who was watching her people, the family she grew up with, die. I felt Obi-Wan’s pain when he said there were millions of voices suddenly silenced.

The line didn’t only imply a great tragedy; it implied that such a massive amount of death shook the fabric of reality. When the Death Star destroyed a single planet, there was real pain. I couldn’t stop thinking about so many people perishing at the same time. I was just as horrified during this scene too, but for a different reason. It was the callousness of the whole thing.

In The Force Awakens, five planets are destroyed, and, after a brief look of shock and confusion, it’s on to the next thing. The whole thing was presented in such a superficial way. It was treated like just another problem rather than a real defeat, and the reason is simple enough to guess.

 Abrams wanted Rebels versus Empire all over again, and he didn’t really care how he got there. If he had to blow up five planets in about thirty seconds, he was going to do it. Again, he wanted the story beats, but he didn’t understand how they worked. I’ll discuss more issues with Starkiller Base in the next review.