Discerning the Spirits of the Force, Episode VII: Another Hope

       So... when I said that an Episode VII would coincide with the release of Rise of Skywalker (if you don't know what I'm talking about, read this), you didn't think I would start a "third trilogy" and not finish it, did you?  I mean, once I start a series of commentary posts on Star Wars and label each post an "episode," it hardly seems fitting to end on seven, rather than finishing out the final "trilogy."  Perhaps it will be worthwhile to give each of the three actual trilogies of movies it's own final consideration, in order of their release.

       This upcoming long-awaited conclusion merits revisiting the earlier movies of the saga (most of them, at least).  With this latest viewing, something struck me about the movie that started it all: Star Wars, Episode IV: A New Hope.  Of all things, I was struck by the irony of the title - and let's just set aside for now all the discussions about when Lucas decided that "A New Hope" should be the title and whether this is in fact the "real" title of the movie and just acknowledge that it has been the title for decades, regardless of whether it was on the date of the movie's release.

       If you've read my thoughts in this series before (particularly, in Episode III, in which I discussed how Rogue One was a fitting prequel to it), you know that I have often been intrigued by the importance of HOPE as a key theme to this dawning moment in the saga, as well as the corresponding fittingness of this title that Lucas eventually decided to attach to the movie that started it all.  But, the aspect of this that struck me as even more significant (and I'm sure others caught this long ago) is the ironic connection of the title to one of the most iconic lines of the whole movie: "Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi.  You're my only hope."  Leia firmly believed that: her only hope was Obi-Wan.  Yet, Obi-Wan was waiting for a new hope, a very specific new hope.  The movie's whole sense of this moment of fulfillment that has finally arrived, after enduring decades of the dark days of the Empire, points to the truth: there is a new hope that is dawning.  Yet, the irony is that as the trilogy progresses, it becomes clear that this hope refers not simply to Luke alone, but as Yoda says "There is another," and as Obi-Wan later clarifies, "The other that he referred to is your twin sister."   

The great irony in Leia's famous words identifying Obi-Wan as the only hope is not only that the point of this movie is to introduce a new hope, but even that she herself is a part of that new hope.  Yet, she still looks desperately for hope elsewhere.  Even after Obi-Wan is gone, she then promptly begins to speak of finding a flaw in the Death Star plans as their "only hope" (ahem, Rogue One, anyone?). In reality, a new hope arrived at Yavin in the Millennium Falcon.  But, it wasn't the Death Star plans. It was her and her brother.

How often do we begin to lose hope when that in which we had placed our hope doesn't turn out as we had planned?  Can we accept that hope is simply misplaced, not lost?  Do we have our eyes open enough to recognize where hope is still alive around us?  Do we have enough faith to recognize when we ourselves might be a vessel of the hope that is still alive?  Perhaps a helpful paradigm for pondering these questions, when the plans in which we had placed our hope fall apart, might be the Serenity Prayer: 

Lord, 
grant me 
the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, 

the courage to change the things I can, 

and the wisdom to know the difference.  

Amen.

 

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