Too many jokes!
Too many surprises!
Too many porgs!
There, now you don’t need to write that in the comments section.
Let’s move on to discussing how The Last Jedi is the most psychologically complex Star
Wars film ever made.
Star Wars has a lot to say about emotions.
The original trilogy encourages us to feel our emotions, quiet our minds, focus on the
present moment.
This is called mindfulness.
We see it when when Luke destroys the Death Star, during Yoda’s Jedi training, and it’s
what helps Darth Vader turn against the Emperor.
The prequel trilogy warns us about the dangers of avoiding emotions.
This is called experiential avoidance.
Anakin never wants to experience the pain of losing someone he loves ever again.
This is why he becomes obsessed with trying to protect Padme and it’s what leads him
to the dark side.
The Force Awakens is mostly about new characters set against familiar Star Wars ideas.
It doesn’t say anything new about emotions.
We see Rey use mindfulness and Kylo loses his temper, just like his grandfather and
a lot of people who struggle with experiential avoidance.
It does has some new ideas about heroism, but nothing about emotions.
The Last Jedi goes into a very different direction.
It’s a story that explores the oldest, most universal emotion -- fear.
To explain how, I have to get into spoilers.
If you haven’t watched The Last Jedi, pause this video, go see it because it’s awesome,
and then come back here.
Star Wars has discussed fear before, but it did it badly.
In The Phantom Menace, Yoda says "Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate…leads
to suffering.”
Fear doesn’t necessarily lead to anger or suffering.
Fear is an emotion that is activated when we sense danger.
It transformers your body to run faster, jump higher, and fight harder.
It also focuses all of your attention on your immediate threat.
For a long time researchers have known fear leads to fight or flight - a drive to face
danger head on or run away to safety.
We see this a lot in The Last Jedi - Poe’s instinct is to attack when threatened.
Finn is afraid of being captured by the First Order and tries to leave the resistance on
an escape pod.
Luke is afraid of who he has become and is hiding at the first Jedi temple on Ahch-To.
While fight and flight has dominated fear research, in 2000 psychologist Shelly Taylor
introduced a new idea: Tend and befriend.
Tending means taking care of yourself, those around you, and helping people to feel calm.
Befriending is about connecting with other people to make your community safer.
We see a lot of this in The Last Jedi too - Leia is focused on protecting the resistance
and connecting with allies.
Rey tries to help Luke and Kylo in the hopes that they will join the resistance.
Rose saves Finn’s life and tells him, “We're going to win this war not by fighting what
we hate, but saving what we love.”
We’ve never seen such a detailed exploration of fear before in Star Wars and we rarely
see it in Hollywood.
While everyone is capable of both, men tend to rely on fight or flight strategies while
women are more likely to tend and befriend.
Since most films are created by men, stories tend to glorify fight or flight while tend
and befriend is an secondary response at best and a cowardly act at worst.
The Last Jedi breaks this trend by showing us both approaches are equally important to
survival.
That’s why the most awesome moment in this film belongs to Vice Admiral Holdo.
She is the integration of fight or flight and tend and befriend.
She spends the whole movie protecting the resistance but attacks when it’s the only
way for the resistance to survive.
The Last Jedi also shows us what happens when we’re haunted by our fears.
Luke sensed a powerful darkness growing in Ben Solo and for one brief moment activated
his lightsaber with the intention of killing Ben.
Ben destroyed Luke’s Jedi temple, killed many of its students, and transformed into
Kylo Ren.
Luke is traumatized by this.
He runs away to Ahch-To, closes himself off to The Force, and decides the Jedi order must
die with him.
Luke’s story is an honest representation of trauma.
It’s not seeing something horrific that makes an event traumatizing.
Luke’s seen plenty of people die before and he’s killed a lot of people too.
Traumas happen when an event challenges your fundamental beliefs.
Luke was taught the Jedi are the guardians of peace and justice but now as a Jedi he’s
contributed to his nephew’s turn to the dark side and the rise of the First Order.
When we avoid talking about trauma, as Luke has, we get stuck.
The normal healing that’s supposed to happen never does.
Luke is stuck thinking about his guilt letting down Han and Leia, he’s disgusted with Jedi
teachings, and ashamed about what he’s become.
The only way to move forward after a trauma is by finding a way to integrate the experience
into your life.
This means talking about what happened, re-examining your role in the event, and revising your
beliefs to accurately reflect the trauma.
This is what Rey and Yoda help Luke to do, realize that he can learn from his failure
and help those who are in danger.
That’s why the second most awesome moment in this film is seeing Luke confront his trauma
through a peaceful nonviolent sacrifice.
The Last Jedi defies our expectations and challenges our fundamental beliefs about Star
Wars, heroes, and villains.
I know a lot of fans are struggling with what happens to Luke Skywalker.
The original trilogy is a mythical heroes journey about Luke’s call to adventure,
transformation into a Jedi, and restoring peace to the galaxy.
That’s how myths work: heroes always do good and they defeat evil.
But myths aren’t real.
Sometimes heroes make mistakes and have to live with the consequences.
The Last Jedi is an honest account of what happens to real life heroes, what it means
to be brave in the face of fear, and the consequences of facing traumatic situations.
Like Luke, Star Wars was stuck in myth.
But you can’t renew Star Wars by repeating mythical formulas.
By embracing reality, Star Wars has grown beyond what it was and is reborn into something
completely new.
What did you think of The Last Jedi?
Let me know in the comments below.
There’s one more way we can react to fear - we can freeze.
We see that when Kylo Ren intends to kill his mom but freezes when the moment comes.
I didn’t talk about that earlier because this video is already longer than what I intended
and I couldn’t find a way to easily squeeze it in so I’m putting it here.