I have news for everybody else on the planet: “Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith” is not supposed to be the last movie in the “Star Wars” collection. There are supposed to be three more!
Yes, I know that everybody is saying this is the last “Star Wars” movie. That’s even what director George Lucas is saying:
http://www.cnn.com/2005/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/17/star.wars.overview/index.html
But here’s how I figure it. Take out your Bullfinch, and look up the great epic poems by Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey. If you don’t have Bullfinch or can’t find it up in your attic somewhere, just look on-line instead:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iliad
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odyssey
The great epics of classic literature are supposed to:
1. start in the middle of the action,
2. have someone recap the earlier events,
3. drive toward the final gripping conclusion.
Okay, well the Iliad doesn’t exactly work like this, but the Odyssey does pretty well:
1. starts in the middle (Books 1-7). Imagine all this in dactylic hexameter:
Sing, oh Muse, of brave Odysseus,
Beloved of Calypso, she who keeps him in chains of love,
Whilst Penelope, at home on Ithaca, tries her best
To fend off a bajillion suitors and pay the mortgage,
etc.
2. someone recounts earlier events (Books 8-13)
So tell me, mighty but forlorn Odysseus,
How came you to this benighted shore?, quoth some literary flunky,
And why backwards do your sentences run?
I’m glad you asked that question, replied the great mariner.
Achilles and I did upon the Trojan shore leap out,
And smote with all our strength the Achaean walls,
etc.
3. the gripping conclusion (Books 14-24)
At last! cried Odysseus, and drove with his mighty bow
the arrow through five suitors’ bodies at once!
Nice shot, remarked Telemachus,
Can I have my turn now?
etc.
You get the idea. I figure that George Lucas, being fully aware of the great Homeric epics, back in 1977 decided to model his great “Star Wars” epic on the poems of Homer. I swear I thought of this in 1980, when “The Empire Strikes Back” came out and we all learned that it was episode V! Why else would George Lucas just make a set of movies backwards? He didn’t – of course he was emulating the great sagas of ancient Greece. “Star Wars (4)” starts the action in the middle of the tale, “The Phantom Menace (1)” recounts earlier action, and future Episodes 7-9 are supposed to pick up where “Return of the Jedi (6)” left off.
Of course, we have an obvious problem: George Lucas was 32 when he made the first “Star Wars” movie, and he is 61 years old now. From various interviews I gather that Lucas does not have three more “Star Wars” movies left in him. He also doesn’t have a story, having tied things up all-too-neatly at the end of Episode 6. Drat. No, make that, Double drat!
But that little difficulty should not stop some ambitious young movie director from picking up where George Lucas is leaving off. Come on, somebody out there! Get the gleam in your eye!!! Think great thoughts! Dream fantastic dreams! Finish the greatest epic story of the 20th century! I would do it myself, but I’m still face down in meteorology graduate school.
You can do it!
