Well, here we are again. The day we see each other for the first time in ten years. We didn't leave off on the best terms, you seemed to believe that expensive special effects and heavily choreographed fight scenes made up for your bad story (what actual story there was), gaping plot holes and extremely hateable characters, and I disagreed.
Yet despite all the faults, despite the fact that you felt I had to be there for trade route talks and murder of children, despite the cumulative hours my friends and I have spent picking your latest trilogy apart as well as the repeated instances of unnecessary changes you keep making to your original trilogy, and even despite your decision to disregard over 20 years of really excellent writing by many talented people, despite all of that, I'm excited to see you. No, excited isn't the right word to describe it; I'm nervous, I'm happy, I'm doubtful, I'm optimistic, and I'm uneasy.
You've been a part of who I am for as long as I can remember; since early childhood I've played with plastic swords and made lightsaber noises, I've player out whole scenes with my friends, and I've gotten my ass kicked for how much I loved you, but I never quit loving you. You helped me understand that just because someone is stronger doesn't make them right, that looking out for others is better than just looking out for yourself, and that power not tempered with morality and compassion can corrupt, but redemption, though hard, is not impossible.
I've seen you at your best, and I've seen you at your worst, and now I'm getting ready to see you again. I've blinded and deafened myself to any outside sources, leaks, theories, anything that would color my impression of you one way or the other. I'm going to get dressed up to see you, something I never do with anything else, I'm going to show you just how much you mean to me. But I need something from you;
I need you to be great.
You've burned me before, Star Wars, three times in a row. Four if you count Clone Wars. We're older now, we're supposed to be beyond what petty thoughts provoked that schism between us, we're supposed to be better. The bar isn't set any lower since the original trilogy, don't expect me to walk out saying "well it's at least better than phantom menace..." because that's not how this works. You need to make me care about the characters, you need to engage me in a story that doesn't have a big nonsensical twist just so you can say I didn't see it coming. You need to be genuinely good; not just sort of good but bad in hindsight, but the sort of good that gets discussed later among friends.
I need you to show me that you care about us too.
I'll see you tonight Star Wars, and regardless of everything, I'll always love you.
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