Fear leads to anger, and anger leads to hate, as The Unenthusiastic Critic searches her feelings about 1983's Return of the Jedi.*
The very second movie Michael and Nakea ever watched for The Unenthusiastic Critic—back when it was a blog series—was Star Wars.* Now—on Return of the Jedi's 35th anniversary—she's reluctantly heading back to a galaxy far, far away for the final chapter of George Lucas's original trilogy.
Program
0:00: Prologue: Carrie Fisher at Chicago Wizard World Comic Con, 2016
1:07: Cultural Osmosis: Pre-Viewing Discussion of Return of the Jedi (and Star Wars movies in general)
28:45: Original Trailer for Return of the Jedi
30:09: The Verdict: Post-Viewing Discussion of Return of the Jedi
1:17:41: Outro and Next Week's Movie
1:18:50: Outtake
Notes and Links
* Don't @ Michael about how the films are called Star Wars: Episode Whatever. He saw them in theaters, and he remembers what they were called.
—Film discussed: Original Theatrical version of Return of the Jedi (dir. Richard Marquand, Lucasfilm, 1983)
— Reviews discussed: Roger Ebert; Vincent Canby; Pauline Kael
—Article referenced: "Did ‘Star Wars’ become a toy story? Producer Gary Kurtz looks back," Geoff Boucher, LA Times
—Carrie Fisher's quote is from her appearance at the 2016 Chicago Wizard World Comic Con.
—Listen to additional episodes and read The Unenthusiastic Critic in prose form at unaffiliatedcritic.com.
—Email us, or follow us on Twitter and Facebook. (Suggestions of movies to watch for future episodes are welcome!)
—"Warm Duck Shuffle" by Arne Huseby is licensed under CC BY 3.0.
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2 thoughts on “RETURN OF THE JEDI (1983)”
To the point about characters making nonsensical plans in "Return of the Jedi," Rian Johnson likely had the same criticism, because, in "The Last Jedi," characters' bad planning blows up in their faces.
"Solo" partly addresses the issue you raised that the droids should rise up against the humans and other creatures enslaving them. Lando's copilot, L3-37, is a rights activist who seizes upon an opportunity to lead a revolt both of droid slaves and the flesh and blood kind.
A more straightforward take on robot rebellion than in the convoluted "Westworld" can be found in the British series "Humans," whose third season now airing in the UK is surprisingly analogous to real world events.
Yeah, I need to watch TLJ again—I've only seen it once—but I came out of this viewing of ROTJ convinced Johnson was reacting to it (and often against it) specifically.
And that's interesting about "Solo"—though, since it's a prequel, the Droid Rights activists apparently didn't make much headway…
I really liked the first season of Humans. I keep meaning to catch up with it, so thanks for the reminder.