Star Wars is one of the most popular and influential stories ever told. It began with the wildly
successful Original Trilogy in the seventies and eighties, and later there was the Prequel
Trilogy – which most people agree was not good. There are also heaps of books, comics,
video games and TV shows which form an Expanded Universe of stories set in the same continuity,
although they’re no longer considered canon now that Disney has bought Star Wars from
George Lucas. Disney is now making a new trilogy, set thirty years after the original
one, so now’s a good time to have a look at what happened in the original three Star
Wars movies, and what that might mean for the new one.
In A New Hope, an evil Empire rules the galaxy, and is at war with a Rebel Alliance. The
Empire has massive spaceships, and armies of Stormtroopers, and of course the iconic
Darth Vader. It also has the Death Star, a huge armoured space station capable of destroying
whole planets. Rebel spies have stolen the Empire’s plans to the Death Star, and hope
to use them to find a weakness to destroy the weapon. At the start of the movie, rebel
leader Princess Leia is taking these plans to rebels on Alderaan, but her ship is captured
by the Empire , so she hides the plans and a message in a robot, or droid, called R2-D2,
who along with C3P0, escapes to the desert planet Tatooine. That’s where we meet our
hero, Luke Skywalker, a farmboy living with his uncle and aunt and dreaming of adventure.
Luke finds Leia’s message in R2 , and takes the droids to Obi-Wan Kenobi, one of
the last remnants of an order of lightsaber-wielding space-wizards called Jedi, who use a “mystical
energy field” called the Force to exert magical power. He says that Luke’s father
was a Jedi who was betrayed and killed by Darth Vader – a Jedi who turned to the Dark
Side of the Force. When Luke finds his aunt and uncle killed by the Empire, he agrees
to go with Obi-Wan to deliver Leia’s plans to the rebels. So they buy a ride on the Millenium
Falcon, a spaceship owned by the cynical, self-serving smuggler Han Solo, and his hairy
sidekick Chewbacca , who talks like this. So they head to Leia’s home planet Alderaan
– on the way Obi-Wan starts to train Luke in the way of the Force – but when they
arrive, Alderaan’s gone, ‘cause the Empire blew it up with the Death Star, because they’re
bad guys. The Falcon gets beamed into the Death Star, so Luke and Han and Chewie go
rescue Leia. There’re disguises, and a trash compactor, and other shenanigans, and
as they escape, Obi-Wan is killed by Darth Vader. And as they leave the Falcon is tracked
by the Empire to the Rebel base on Yavin IV, so the Death Star comes, and there’s a
big space battle, and Luke uses the Force, and blows up the Death Star. It’s a big
victory for the Rebels, and selfish Han Solo has a change of heart in time to come help,
and get a medal with Luke.
In The Empire Strikes Back, the rebels have established a new base on the ice world Hoth.
Luke rides around on a funny ice llama called a tauntaun, and is attacked by a Yeti called
a wampa. He almost dies in the cold , but is saved by Han. This is part of Han’s
transformation from someone who only cares for himself to someone willing to risk his
life for his friends. An Imperial probe discovers the rebel base so the Empire comes in force,
with a big stompy robots called AT-ATs , and Stormtroopers led by Darth Vader. So Han
and Leia flee Hoth in the Millenium Falcon, with Chewie and 3P0, while Luke heads to
the swampy planet Dagobah because he was told to by a force ghost of Obi-Wan, which is
apparently a thing. Han and Leia escape from Imperials, make out – ’cause there’s
nothing like some welding to get you in the mood, and escape from a Freudian space slug
thing. On Dagobah, Luke meets a little green Jedi Master called Yoda , who trains Luke
in the way of the Force. Yoda tells us about the dangers of the Dark Side of the Force,
which is connected to negative emotions like anger and fear and hate. Han and Leia travel
to Cloud City, to meet Han’s old friend Lando Calrissian, who ends up betraying them
to the Empire. Luke comes to rescue his friends, but when he gets there, Han has already
been carbon frozen into a living but inanimate block, and taken by Boba Fett who plans to
sell him to the crime lord Jabba the Hutt. Lando has a change of heart, and helps Leia
and co. escape from the Empire . Meanwhile, Luke dramatically confronts Darth Vader, who
cuts off Luke’s hand and says “I am your father”. Luke refuses to join the bad guys,
and escapes to be rescued by Leia, Lando, Chewie and the droids.
In Return of the Jedi, Leia, Lando, Chewie, R2 and 3P0 infiltrate the Palace of Jabba
the Hutt, who happens to be a gigantic slug. They revive Han from the carbonite, but
get caught by Jabba, and Leia is enslaved in an uncomfortable bikini. Luke turns up,
now a powerful and confident Jedi Knight. He bargains for Han’s life, kills a monster
called a rancor, but ends up getting caught as well. Jabba decides to feed Luke and Han
to a big tentacled sand-mouth called a sarlacc, but the heroes escape – Luke kicks some
ass, Han kills Boba accidentally, and Leia kills Jabba with the very chains that bound
her. Han and Leia meet back up with the Rebels, and Luke returns to Dagobah, where Yoda dies.
The ghost of Obi-Wan tells Luke that Leia is his twin sister, which makes this kiss
kind of awkward. Meanwhile the Empire is building a second Death Star, cause the first
one worked so well, and the Rebels attack, with Lando leading a space battle, while
on the forest moon of Endor, Han leads some Rebels and also some surprisingly effective
teddy bears called Ewoks. There’s a speeder bike chase, and some teddy bear antics, but
in the end Luke confronts Vader, and meets his master, the Emperor. They try to get
Luke to join the Dark Side. Luke struggles with his emotions, and cuts off Vader’s
hand, but ultimately rejects the Dark Side, so the Emperor tortures him with lightning,
and in a final act of sacrificial redemption, Vader saves his son by killing the Emperor,
and he has his helmet removed to look upon his son before dying in Luke’s arms. The
rebels destroy the second Death Star, Han and Leia get together, and everybody celebrates
– the Rebellion has beaten the Empire. So Star Wars has themes of destiny, power,
love, and redemption, but at the end of the day what it’s really about is a simple
conflict between good and evil, with spaceships and lightsabers and robots and aliens with
funny names. It’s not particularly deep stuff or anything, but it doesn’t need to
be, it’s fun. And we can probably expect something very similar in the upcoming Force
Awakens – indeed it still seems to be a conflict between the remnants of the Empire
and the rebellion. But that’s not to say it won’t have its surprises. For example,
based on Luke’s arc in the original trilogy, and his absence from the Force Awakens trailers,
it’s speculated that Luke might have turned to the Dark Side, that he’s a bad guy in
this new movie. There are also lots of cool theories about the original and prequel series
– so comment below if you’d like to see more Star Wars videos explaining these ideas.
Either way, hope you enjoyed this video. Many thanks to
all supporters on Patreon, including Hasmuffin, Ruby Goodnight, Pidgeon Pie is a Lie, Podrick
The Pussy Slayer, and Renly of the House Baratheon, First of His Name, Protector of the Swag.
We’ll be holding a vote soon for the next Game of Thrones video topic – which’ll
be the first video made by a full-time Alt Shift X so thank you for that, again, and
see you next time.