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Ep 3.6-R2D2 sticks his d*ck in a light socket to prove a point
18 Plays18 days ago
Moving on to Empire, it's the relationships episode! We discuss Han and Leia's toxic burgeoning romance, Luke and Leia's Force connection, R2 and 3PO's slightly strained marriage, Han and Luke's queerplatonic friendship, Yoda and Luke's training montage, and Chewie and Lando, the casanovas of Kashyyyk and Bespin respectively!
Covers Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Recommended
Transcript
Humorous book discussion and unique storylines
00:00:00
Speaker
We can talk about the teeth. Because I don't know where else to talk about the teeth besides here. i don't know where else to talk about the teeth besides here. Yeah. so I was not expecting that.
00:00:13
Speaker
I'm currently about 45% of the way through to Ravish a Rogue by CM Neskosta. So I've talked about being a monster fucker on the pod. We know this. I don't know if I've outed myself as a CM Neskosta enjoyer.
00:00:26
Speaker
If you know, you know. sincere CM Nascosta enjoyer. The only one that's bad is the Cambridge Creek florist shop one. That one sucks. There is a snake man with two dicks and she makes it boring.
00:00:45
Speaker
that's It should be interesting by default. But the solution seems to be that the competing flower shop that opens up, which is basically like an equivalent to Amazon outcompeting this local business. It's weird. It's not good. All of her books are about local businesses for some reason. Except for this one. Except for this one. well I guess piracy is a type of local business. It's local to many places. But so this one is different.
00:01:13
Speaker
This one takes place in the same universe as my least favorite Katie Roberts series. But it's called Ravish a Rogue. They're pirates and they're fucking, but plot twist.
00:01:27
Speaker
They're both monsters. Yeah. And there's teeth where teeth should not be. And I have no idea what kind of fucking monster. I think that I have a pretty good sense of the, the catalog of monsters at this point.
00:01:40
Speaker
I have never I've never met one with the I wait what does a lamprey look like is this like she's got like a lamprey mouth up in there that is a legitimate thing though it's not a monster werewolves are a thing dogs aren't a monster I wholly, wholly did not see this coming.
00:02:00
Speaker
There was a lot of coming in the book, but that's different. No, i that I wholly didn't put all of the pieces together until like pretty much right before the reveal, which is how a good the twist should be done.
00:02:16
Speaker
That was solid writing. Yeah. I am I don't want it spoiled i am very curious to see i won't what what happens here I genuinely want to know for the plot no I will I will say nothing yeah this shit this was my first Nascosta book what what an entrance yeah I yeah there's teeth inside it but um But oh my God, I didn't tell you this.
C.M. Nascosta's storytelling style and themes
00:02:44
Speaker
I was walking through this section of my city that I don't usually go to today. I had unavoidable appointment in the area and figured, you know what, fuck it. I'm going to go to this very nice bakery that's over here and get myself something good to eat. And I was walking back to my car from the bakery and there was a guy standing out next to his motorcycle. was, if you're confused about genders,
00:03:09
Speaker
go milk a bull. And I was like, I so wanted to be like, I have a book for you. That was my immediate response was like, well, it didn't occur to me for a second that that was just a random transphobic shirt on the streets of my very liberal city for a second. And then I was like, wait a second. And it was like, double wait a second. Yeah. I mean, if you want people who are into that,
00:03:38
Speaker
That sounds like it's an invitation. yeah Can i I would never have a copy on me, but i never wanted to just have a copy of a book on me than,
00:03:49
Speaker
than to be able to just walk up to that guy, hand him a copy of Morning Glory Milking Farm, and walk away If you want a book by someone who, i would say, waxes poetic on the subject of minotaur milking, there is no one who loves it more than C.M. Nascosta does. Yeah.
Exploration of erotica and personal opinions
00:04:13
Speaker
I feel like To Ravish a Rogue, she's showing her hand a little bit with that. There's just a light. If you know, you know, you can see her interests. The details, which I feel like i don't need to go into on the pod, but there are many things, especially from the Gargoyle book. It's like, I see you and I respect you and I will read your whole book.
00:04:30
Speaker
She's definitely ah got some kinks that are a little bit outside the norm. This one is really out there. have a lot. I've read a lot, a lot of CM Nascosta books. I think I've read all of them, except for one that was announced but never published and there was drama about it for some reason. I want to read it. That series is just okay, though. But I i am a diehard CM Nascosta fan.
00:04:57
Speaker
This one is a lot, even for her. So this is not the only weird ass erotica book that I have read recently. Because i finished the other day Wicked Pursuit by Katie Robert.
00:05:12
Speaker
he Which, wow, that one's fucked up. Yeah. That one's colossally fucked up. I think you would ask me if I read it. And then I remembered and I was listening to it while I was training for my 5k last year. So I've just classically conditioned myself to associate that book with running. And I was thinking, oh, I should go for a jog.
00:05:33
Speaker
There is a lot of running in that book. I was gonna say there's multiple primal scenes in that book. Mm hmm. And also some other really fucked up shit. Oh my God. I'm not going to like.
00:05:46
Speaker
It is. It takes place in sort of Katie Roberts giant overarching world. And I think I think she's somehow managed to if if you plotted all of these points out and little subtle references.
00:05:57
Speaker
I think everything she writes exists in the same world. Even the super supernatural stuff. Even the supernatural stuff. Because you can transfer across different realms. Yeah.
00:06:09
Speaker
Oh, that's true. yisa says's multi So if it's not in the exact same realm as everything else, it's just in a slightly, you know, parallel universe type thing. But at least the Sabian Valley books, which she stopped the series, the Carver City ones, Dark Olympus, and with Wicked Pursuit, she folded in like her old Mafia romance series that she wrote way, way back.
00:06:37
Speaker
And I've read most of those and they're not great. I didn't even bother with those. No, they're not great. They're fucked up, but like not as fucked up.
00:06:49
Speaker
they're They're in the same realm of like the Carver City ones. where It's like all of these people are criminals. And you know that they're probably doing some fucked up things. But weirdly, somehow we just kind of write it off and they're actually good people at heart.
00:07:06
Speaker
I have, I think, said this on the pod before. The thing about Dark Olympus and Carver City that I couldn't put a finger on for the longest time is why it felt so weirdly squeaky clean, despite people saying, oh, this person is super dangerous. They have a really bad reputation. But they're just kind of doing cartoon violence most of the time. There's ah almost no drugs in the Katie Robert world. There are there are some But not nearly to the extent that you would expect in the real crime world. And then once I noticed that, I feel like a lot of other stuff made sense. It's abolished. It's the sexy version. And that's what we're here for, is we're here for the sexy version of the dark underworld.
00:07:49
Speaker
No, yeah, that didn't occur to me until you mentioned it now. Mm-hmm. Wow. they're Okay. Yeah, because the only person who canonically does any kind of substances is, i think, Dionysus.
00:08:02
Speaker
Everyone drinks. Well, everyone drinks, true. Everyone drinks. beyond beyond drinking there's nothing There's no pills. There's no cocaine. There's nothing. There's no trading of drugs. There's no selling of drugs. There's no doing of drugs. People are always conveniently stone cold sober when they need to make decisions that would require consent, which is good. we This is what we want because, again, this is a fantasy.
00:08:26
Speaker
And there are multiple scenes in which that this is discussed when people are too drunk. Mm-hmm. ah But that is kind of one of the things that I think Katie Roberts just went, nope, this isn't going to be a thing in my world. And I'm fine with it. But once I noticed it, it made so much sense.
00:08:42
Speaker
Well, and then you go from that to this guy fucking her in the blood of the man whose throat he just slit. Yeah.
00:08:54
Speaker
After he stalked her for potentially years, she's... home threatened to murder her friends nah nah fucked up that one is what the ring that has spikes in it so she can't take it off without shredding her finger you can really tell that katie robert was getting burnt out on romance by that point which they have said as much in their newsletter which is I think the only newsletter I'm subscribed to certainly the only one I consistently read but they've said multiple times like hey I'm kind of sick of romance I'm gonna do something else for a while and at that point it was just no fucks left to give a yeah yeah and they've said they're not writing anything else with this which is a little bit sad because now that I've read two incredibly fucked up
00:09:47
Speaker
books i'm like wait where's where's more of this you know who else has a really unhealthy sexual relationship
00:10:11
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Fandom Apprentice.
Star Wars Episode V context and production insights
00:10:16
Speaker
My name is Rin, I'm one of your hosts. I grew up with Star Wars and a number of other pieces of fantasy and science fiction media introduced to me by my dad and that formed a lifelong love of spec fic.
00:10:29
Speaker
Now as an adult I have made it my mission to inflict my childhood media upon my dear friends whenever possible.
00:10:41
Speaker
Hello, I'm Sam. I'm the other one. i am the one having the media inflicted upon me, and I'm here for it. I'm having a great time. Today we're talking about the second Star Wars movie, The Empire Strikes Back, which we watched many weeks ago in real time, and so I needed a major refresh. I basically rewatched the entire movie to try to remember what happens. Oh, I fully rewatched the entire movie pretty much entirely this afternoon with Tori sitting in my bed.
00:11:08
Speaker
this is i will quibble with your second Star Wars movie, but only for semantics. Please do. Because this was released. as Star Wars Episode V, The Empire Strikes Back.
00:11:23
Speaker
And yes, it was the second Star Wars movie released. Hi, just as a quick, if if you're new to the podcast, because I know we're still sort of fairly early at here in Season 3, we read through all of Lord of the Rings, which Sam had never read before. Then we read through all of Murderbot, which Sam had read before by the time we recorded these, but that I introduced her to.
00:11:41
Speaker
And now we are watching Star Wars, which again, I grew up with. Sam did not. We started with The Mandalorian. We watched A New Hope and now we are on, as I said, Star Wars Episode 5, The Empire Strikes Back. And that's what this was released as. That was what was at the beginning of the opening crawl.
00:12:01
Speaker
That must have been very confusing in the 70s.
00:12:05
Speaker
Probably. I mean, this was 1980. Was released 1980. It was probably very confusing in 1980. Yeah. So, I mean, the title, The Empire Strikes Back, had been leaked, apparently, in 1979.
00:12:19
Speaker
So people knew that's what it was called. But to have the Star Wars Episode five This was, i guess, they were sort of hedging their bets with A New Hope, which it wasn't until now when they renamed it A New Hope.
00:12:35
Speaker
They were sort of hedging their bets because they weren't sure if it was going to flop or not. And then it ended up being one of the biggest movies of all time, including still to this day, 50 years later.
00:12:46
Speaker
So suddenly they had... A lot more creative freedom and a lot more creative control and a lot more budget, which they still ran over $14 million jesus in nineteen eighty money I wasn't sure if you were about to go do math on that.
00:13:04
Speaker
No, had kind of assumed that you had already done it. And if not, oh I hadn't. and I'm just spitballing here. The original budget for the movie was supposed to be $8 million. dollars
Character dynamics and cultural impact
00:13:13
Speaker
Total budget ended up being closer to $22 million. The special effects budget alone was $8 million. dollars I remember saying when we were watching it together, oh, they clearly had a bigger explosion budget for this one because there are three explosions in the first five minutes.
00:13:29
Speaker
Yeah, apparently they did they're like legitimately put a bunch of dynamite in the snow to simulate like a landing the landing of the probe droid. Yeah, the filming of this one was kind of a mess.
00:13:43
Speaker
And critics apparently had mixed reviews about it because They thought sort of the first one was like your classic kind of campy, family friendly sci And this one got a little darker and people kind of weren't sure how to take it.
00:13:59
Speaker
But in the context of Star Wars as a whole, which is ultimately how we're going to be looking at all of these stories is as part of a larger overarching tale.
00:14:12
Speaker
This is one of the best ones. I don't know how it's more violent or darker than Luke's crispy, deep fried aunt and uncle whose corpses we fully see. That seems pretty dark.
00:14:28
Speaker
Yeah. and They exploded Leia's entire planet. I feel like they're comparable, but I also haven't read any reviews because the whole shtick is that I go into this fresh. So I don't really know the context. I haven't done a comparative side by side of the violence, but I felt like they were pretty similar.
00:14:48
Speaker
Yeah, I don't I think it was more like we see more of this up close and personal rather than like a skeleton. and yeah And in explosion in space, where we're not thinking about the probably billions of people that were just killed by the Empire in a mass genocide.
00:15:07
Speaker
Or there's the ice monster thing whose arm gets bloodily ripped off. You know, there's there's stuff that I guess, but I'm desensitized to it, so... Do we want to start off, I guess, just going through the movie in chronological order as we as we have in the past?
00:15:30
Speaker
I think that sounds excellent. We haven't established this. Do we want to read the opening crawls? Well, yeah, so we have our opening scroll, which I'll just read and we can cut it if we want.
00:15:40
Speaker
Sure. So we have our opening scroll. It is a dark time for the Rebellion. Although the Death Star has been destroyed, Imperial troops have driven the Rebel forces from their hidden base and pursued them across the galaxy.
00:15:51
Speaker
Evading the dreaded Imperial Starfleet, a group of freedom fighters led by Luke Skywalker has established a new secret base on the remote ice world of Hawk. The evil Lord Darth Vader, obsessed with finding young Skywalker, has dispatched thousands of remote probes into the far reaches of space.
00:16:09
Speaker
So my immediate thing that I took away from this girl is why is Luke in charge of anyone? What is he? They call him... Is he a commander? i't i don't remember what his rank is. Commander Skywalker.
00:16:21
Speaker
Why the fuck is he Commander Skywalker? He knows nothing. He joined the Resistance not very long ago. i get that he's the chosen one or whatever and he has a special destiny, but it is bizarre to me that he is in charge. He's so young. There's lots of people who are obviously much older and more experienced than him.
00:16:42
Speaker
It's... I don't know. It's just giving... someone coming into an activist group with a couple of leftist blue sky threads under their belts and thinking okay I can be in charge here it's this weird and don't know colonialist power fantasy which is not the most egregious thing to critique about Star Wars but just the fact that this this young white boy just rolls up and is suddenly in charge for no reason don't I don't get it so there this has been three years since the battle of Yavon
00:17:20
Speaker
Okay, three years, but still. But still, i mean- He did good in one battle. Three years, he was ultimately responsible for the destruction of the Death Star, and he's a space wizard. This is- This is common knowledge. He's just walking around with his lightsaber on his belt.
00:17:36
Speaker
But he's not a very good space wizard. No, i guess a shit space wizard at this point. I a very good space wizard is better than no space wizard. Yes. I'm just a heavily critical of Luke Skywalker. He's going to have to do a lot to earn my favor.
00:17:49
Speaker
No, that's very fair. We do learn, right, as as we said, he is Commander Skywalker, and we have Captain Solo. So Han Solo's got himself in official rank, which made me wonder, i ah because I do not know the rank structures of the US military or other militaries around the world off the top of my head, despite reading and listening to so much military sci-fi in my life.
00:18:12
Speaker
That is the kind of thing I would expect you to know off the top of your head. Yeah, weirdly, and well, and, you know, family members who have served in the military or worked with the military at various times.
00:18:24
Speaker
Commander is not a rank. Most the uniformed services of the United States. Fascinating. don't know about abroad, but for four of the six, seven?
00:18:41
Speaker
How many are there? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. There's eight. Half of them, actually. Well, and it's because technically the U.S. Public Health Service and NOAA use the same rank structures as ah as the Coast Guard.
00:19:01
Speaker
I didn't know this. Yeah. So which uses a similar rank structure to the Navy. Mm In the Navy and the Coast Guard and the United States Public Health Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, commander is one rank below captain.
00:19:20
Speaker
Captain is also a title. it is both a It is both a rank and a title. You can be a commander and also a captain if you are a captain of your own ship.
00:19:32
Speaker
But you are not necessarily... it but Not all commanders are captains, and not all captains are captains of their own ships, necessarily. So they are a captain, but they're not captain of the vessel, necessarily. And that also, conversely, means like an admiral, theoretically, could also be a captain.
00:19:53
Speaker
This is very confusing. Yes. Yeah, but commander is more of sort of typically just a general title. It's whoever's in charge of sort of this.
00:20:05
Speaker
Who's your commander? Who's in charge here? Yeah, that's right
Romantic tension and character interactions
00:20:09
Speaker
how I kept calling Grief Cargo the manager. Well, and a lot of sci-fi does default to like naval ranks. Mm-hmm.
00:20:22
Speaker
But then we also have generals. And generals are not a naval rank. That is a land or air forces rank. Huh. It is equivalent to an admiral.
00:20:34
Speaker
Crickets are chirping in my mind. Yeah. So not that that really matters, but what I was trying to figure out was, does Han outrank Luke or does Luke outrank Han?
00:20:46
Speaker
And if we are purely going based what we assume to be their ranks, based off of the rank structure of the United States Navy, Han outranks Luke.
00:20:59
Speaker
However, if Han gets the title Captain Solo because he's captain of the Millennium Falcon and doesn't actually have a rank within the structure of the Rebel Alliance, then that all goes out the window. And this has been military sci-fi moments with Catherine.
00:21:16
Speaker
Going back, we have probe droids being launched and then we're on you know a vast field of ice and we see a little stop motion tauntaun.
00:21:27
Speaker
I like it. It's really cute. It was so cute. Tauntauns are repto mammals. Repto mammals. I love it. i love the clever camera shots to only ever show like bits of their head and neck when we have actors in the shot. Like there is never a shot where you or um I think never a shot where somebody is sitting on the back of a tauntaun and you can see the tauntaun's full like head and face full on.
00:21:55
Speaker
I didn't notice that. Yeah, there's there's a section, there's a couple of sections where you, like, just see the back of their neck. The head's not even there. Then there's a few sections where, like, you see some of the head in profile or, like, you see it front on.
00:22:09
Speaker
Because they they did build a life-size tauntaun neck and head, but they didn't have a fully built animatronic tauntaun. Just a piece of one. I also noticed that Luke's tauntaun has a broken horn. Aww. Aww.
00:22:23
Speaker
I'm not sure what caused her to get the broken horn because she is referred to as girl. And then the Yeti that attacks Luke and the Tauntaun, which is, by the way, called a wampa.
00:22:37
Speaker
That's not addressed properly. in Empire, but ah that is the name of the creature. It is a wampa. It also has like curvy downward horns, which again, biologist moment, like what the fuck does it use this for?
00:22:51
Speaker
I also have further questions about wampas, but we can get there in a little bit. All right. Which the wampa attack coming right at the beginning, this was not filmed in chronological order. It was not filmed like so shot by shot, scene by scene.
00:23:04
Speaker
There is This hasn't been confirmed by anybody involved with the production team, but there was some speculation. Mark Hamill was involved in a pretty major car accident in 1977 and required some reconstructive surgery.
00:23:20
Speaker
And so there is speculation that the Wampa attack and scarring that we see on his face, it was a in-universe explanation for any residual scarring or change of appearance to audiences.
00:23:34
Speaker
I mean, that makes sense. isn't it Mark Hamill was also told that if he had not survived the car accident, his character would not have been recast. They would have replaced the character with something else with somebody else.
00:23:47
Speaker
Yeah. Because you can't just recast Luke Skywalker. Mm-mm. So after the Wampa attack, I just want to read directly from my notes because occasionally they're funny.
00:23:58
Speaker
It may be cold, but Han is hot. Chewie, as always, is doing actual work on the Millennium Falcon while Han is swishing his hair around dramatically and bothering Leia, who is also trying to do actual work in some kind of control room.
00:24:10
Speaker
Yeah, I was like, Chewie's pissed at Han. And I have half theories as to what's going on. Also, I noticed he's holding up the goggles rather than wearing them.
00:24:21
Speaker
Because they probably don't fit on his giant head. Right, right. They're human goggles. They're too small for him. But he is still using proper PVE. He is protecting his Wookiee eyes. And I love that.
00:24:34
Speaker
The immediate awkward eye contact between Han and Leia and the little grin she tries to hide, they have definitely already fucked. Oh, absolutely. And not talked about it.
00:24:47
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And I have a number of theories about what the fuck happened. it's Did somebody say something awkward? Did somebody just like up and leave at the end of it? did All that heated rivalry.
00:25:02
Speaker
Yeah. Did he not make her come? Like, what's the deal here? Well, I was sending you earlier. This was inspired by a different moment later on. But there is a gimmick Tumblr called Does This Character Eat Pussy? And so people will submit a character and then you can vote yes or no.
00:25:21
Speaker
And so I pulled up Han Solo, obviously, because I knew it was going to be on there. And the results were an overwhelming yes. But you had the insightful commentary that he probably didn't start out that way.
00:25:33
Speaker
And so maybe this is related to our lore that we've constructed for him. No, i think I think by the end, Han absolutely eats pussy. But I do think that was a Leia-induced change.
00:25:47
Speaker
I do think he's he seems like a character. The character we meet in A New Hope seems very much like the kind of character who is convinced in the power of his dick and only his dick.
00:26:00
Speaker
and then someone has to whip this boy into shape if you want to keep your head you gotta give head exactly yeah if anyone's gonna fucking do that it's princess leia organa literally love her. I think I had more commentary on their relationship later, but I love them.
00:26:20
Speaker
it's It's just delightful. I love how much shit he's giving her. you know, she runs out after him. Han, yes, your highnessness. I love all the little All the little nicknames that he has for your worship.
00:26:36
Speaker
Didn't want to leave without a goodbye kiss? I'd sooner kiss a Wookiee. I can arrange that. sister could Use a good kiss! ah Speaking of Wookiees, Chewie absolutely fucks, no question.
00:26:50
Speaker
i This was another piece of lore that it was in our earlier discussion. is i think Chewie is whatever the galactic equivalent is of straight for your own species.
00:27:03
Speaker
Wookiee gender doesn't fucking matter but I do think Chewie is like strictly Wookiee oriented but among Wookiees that is the fucking Casanova no doubt Wookiee chic I also love love listening to 3PO and r two interact because it's always just like offhand bullshit and Anthony Daniels like I have no idea how much of it is improv'd Because obviously Anthony Daniels is just having a one-sided conversation here.
00:27:37
Speaker
And we're always coming in in the middle of a conversation. There's obviously so much else that we are not privy to and we are just getting their little domestic spats. They're arguing because R2 apparently turned on the heater and melted the ice in Leia's chambers and got all of her clothes wet.
00:27:55
Speaker
Because they live in a series of underground ice tunnels. I also love Threepio just yammering on and Han just putting his hand over Threepio's mouth.
00:28:05
Speaker
Everyone is really mean to Threepio in this movie. And sometimes he's mildly annoying. But he is most of the time just doing his job. And people could just politely ask him to tone it down. But instead they're all just so mean to him constantly. But at least it's funny. But um Luke has not come back and nobody knows where he is.
00:28:28
Speaker
Nobody's heard from him. He hasn't checked in and it's getting to be night. And so Han goes to ride out to find him. And the various officers are like, it's it's getting colder out there. And Han's like, yeah, my friend's out in it. And they're like...
00:28:43
Speaker
Your tauntaun will freeze before you reach the first marker. And he goes, then I'll see you in hell. Which is so sweet, especially because earlier he had had all this blustering about how he was leaving and saying, you know, there's a price on my head. I owe Jabba the Hutt. I'm getting the fuck out of here. and everyone goes, OK, except for Leia, who tries to convince him to stay via loud public argument.
00:29:03
Speaker
But then as soon as Luke is in trouble, he is dropping everything, risking life and limb to go get him. And that's nice. I like it. So I started reading The Other Significant Others by Raina Cohen today.
00:29:15
Speaker
isn't And longtime listeners of this podcast will know that we are no strangers to platonic love and queer platonic friendships because we're in one.
00:29:26
Speaker
But I was like, oh, Han's romantic spats pale in comparison to his friendship with Luke. The three years that these two have been fighting side by side, they have...
00:29:39
Speaker
become the closest of friends where hannah's ready to leave to go deal with his problems and get the death mark off of his head because he owes jabba a fuck ton of money and nothing including the woman he's clearly head over heels for will keep him there until he's like well where the fuck's luke and just tears the fuck out of there no preparation just puts on his coat grabs a pony, and leaves.
00:30:09
Speaker
listen There'll probably be more commentary in future episodes from The Other Significant Others because it's it's a good book. I look forward to it.
The Force and Yoda's mentorship
00:30:18
Speaker
Anyway, Luke is hanging upside down.
00:30:21
Speaker
And we get a statement of the Force theme over Luke stretching out his hand and rolling his eyes back into his head and concentrating to try and get the lightsaber to move from the snow underneath him into his hands so he can cut himself loose. And it works eventually.
00:30:34
Speaker
But he's not held, he's not like frozen to the roof. He's tied there with leather straps or something similar. So the Wampa understands tool use. Hmm.
00:30:47
Speaker
So there is there is clearly a base level of cognitive development going on here. with what like they're Wookieepedia, which is the Star Wars fandom site, amazing declares them semi-sentient, which is a fancy way of saying they're in the Stone Age.
00:31:07
Speaker
And I don't have a ton more commentary on that, but it was noticeable. It was like, so again, i think we've talked on this podcast before about these circumstances that lead to cognitive development and how it frequently is yeah more useful for species that are pro-social.
00:31:27
Speaker
isn Make sure I'm actually using the term right. Yeah, I think we might've talked about this way back in Lord of the Rings. So good to have a refresher. Yeah, so this is not always the case. And in animal behavior, we don't say certain animals are intelligent or not, because that implies human-like traits to them.
00:31:46
Speaker
Certain animals have certain cognitive abilities. that we would, you know, in humans associate with like, yeah, babies develop this at the same time they develop this, but the animal's never going to develop Y. They're only going to develop X. Because Y is not evolutionary but evolutionarily beneficial to them.
00:32:04
Speaker
But the Wampa does not seem to be a social creature. We don't see evidence of other Wampas. We don't... It seems to live alone in a cave and haunts hunts tauntauns. Also, other question, where do tauntauns live?
00:32:25
Speaker
How do tauntauns find their food? Though horns are such that like that could be used to like dig through snow or like push snow aside. But if tauntauns will freeze to death at night out there, they may also be largely cave-dwelling.
00:32:42
Speaker
But they clearly are built for running in open spaces. doesn' Again, it's science fiction. These animals develop because the special effects team thought it was cool. Because they wanted to make a big weird puppet.
00:32:57
Speaker
Yep. Or a really little weird puppet for stop motion. So true. However, I, a biologist, by profession and by interest, will question these things from time to time.
00:33:10
Speaker
and We are five minutes into the movie. Yeah. but Anyway, Echo Base closes their doors and Chewie lets out this mournful wail as the doors close. Yeah.
00:33:25
Speaker
Luke has gotten himself free from the Wampa Den and he's crawling through the snow in a very like clearly Western movie inspired dying man crawls through the desert.
00:33:40
Speaker
Experiences a mirage of somebody that tells him to keep going. yes He sees Ben Kenobi's force ghost who tells him to go to the Dagobah system and learn from Yoda, the Jedi master who instructed me, which,
00:33:55
Speaker
Yeah. Ish. But that's a, that's a point for the next movie that we watch. Spicy. Yeah. Han shows up. Han stuffs Luke inside a Tauntaun sleeping bag because the Tauntaun dies. And so Han has to cut open the Tauntaun, shoves Luke inside it. And ah i thought they smelled bad on the outside. Oh,
00:34:22
Speaker
until he can get up v ah the tent, the emergency shelter, so that they can ride out the night. And the next morning they're found by searching speeders.
00:34:35
Speaker
The speeders are calling out over over their radios, and they get back from Hana. Good morning! morning! Nice of you guys to by!
00:34:48
Speaker
Which I thought was very charming. I like that. He's such a shit. I love him. So then they go back. Luke goes into some kind of healing vat, which is probably, you know, potentially addressing the scarring and appearance changes that you mentioned before.
00:35:04
Speaker
Leia and Han get into it and they're fighting about stuff. She calls him a scruffy looking, bleh, I was saying that five times fast, scruffy looking nerf herder, which is delightful.
00:35:19
Speaker
Why, you stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf-herder! Who's scruffy-looking?
00:35:31
Speaker
I love the moment the two of them start bickering, which is the moment they're both in the room. The eye-roll... Luke gives in the background he's like oh here we go again god I'm just imagining ah poor Luke probably overheard that one hookup that they had and he just being this quaint little virgin was probably like huh what are they doing in there well and Luke never got the talk do you think his aunt and uncle gave him the talk no no absolutely not I think well I think he he
00:36:07
Speaker
got the talk from bigs dark lighter o i think bigs dark lighter gave him the talk because did you see that man's mustache there that that was a 70s porn stash if i've ever seen one you know somebody had to do it so thank you bigs but then leia full-on in the argument to one-up han full-on kisses luke on the mouth Remember last time when I said they hadn't done anything really egregious with the siblings? There was still some plausible. And I get that, you know, probably in the writing at this point.
00:36:42
Speaker
but Well, no. Okay. So if this was released as episode five, did they not already know that they were siblings? Had the writers not already decided this? The writers had decided there was going to be a long lost sister.
00:36:56
Speaker
They had not yet decided if they wanted to add another character or whether they wanted to just use Leia. And like, you know, it's fine. Like I said, we're not looking for moral purity here. It's, oh they accidentally kissed their sibling in the movie about war and genocide and shit.
00:37:12
Speaker
Who cares? But also... In Star Wars, the movie about moral purity and the good and evil being very separate, obvious things. But also I'm just like, come on.
00:37:23
Speaker
Come on, guys. We didn't have to. But then I think after that, Luke kind of like kicks his feet up and puts his little hands behind his head, like suck it Han, which was pretty funny.
00:37:34
Speaker
No, he, he very much. It's funny. Cause his, his, the look on his face is a little bit like, it's not even directed at Han. It's not even like, oh man, I just got kissed by a princess. It's like, well, all right, then i have now been involved in this argument. Okay.
00:37:52
Speaker
Which that's the other piece. Mark Hamill did know that they were considering making Leia his sister. So Mark Hamill is having to deal with this. Mark Hamill was one of the only ones, this leaping ahead to the end, Mark Hamill was one of only four people that knew that the actual line was going to be, i am your father.
00:38:16
Speaker
yeah, because that was dubbed over, right? He said something different on set. dubbed And that it was in part because David Prowse, who was physically portraying Vader. Sorry for Empire Strikes Back spoilers, guys.
00:38:29
Speaker
David Prowse, who was physically portraying Vader, was apparently notorious for leaking information. m And so they gave him a false line to say. They told him that the line was, Obi-Wan is your father or was your father or something like that. And so Mark Hamill knew what he was acting to.
00:38:50
Speaker
Yeah. But nobody else did. So Mark Hamill's got an idea of what the overarching storyline might be so that he can do his job.
00:39:00
Speaker
But nobody else does at the moment. And apparently that caused some tension on set. Yeah, I can see people being a bit miffed about not being in the loop on that one.
00:39:11
Speaker
Mark Hamill was also kind of pissed, apparently, that most of his scenes were with, like, puppets or robots or people whose lines were going to get dubbed over.
00:39:24
Speaker
And so he was mostly just one-sided talking. Mm-hmm. pretty much to a wall he was never like acting off with somebody so he said he felt like apparently lonely and kind of overlooked and left out of things oh but apparent apparently later on in life he said that like the challenges were all worth it yeah it's so hard being the star of the biggest movie franchise ever oh no such suffering Especially because apparently he had an earpiece during all of the scenes with Yoda so he could hear what the lines were supposed to be.
00:40:01
Speaker
And it didn't work. Oh no. And so he was just trying to remember a line. Maybe that's why he fucking hates Yoda so much. ah Yeah, so the Empire finds them.
00:40:13
Speaker
We
The Millennium Falcon's escape and Cloud City events
00:40:14
Speaker
do get a shot of Star Destroyers, and then we get a shot of a bigger ship, Vader's personal Star Destroyer, the Super Star Destroyer, which makes the Star Destroyers, which we talked in our first New Hope episode about the massive ship, the the massive Star Destroyer that...
00:40:35
Speaker
you know You have the little starship flying in on that first shot and then the Star Destroyer following and it just fills up the screen and keeps going and keeps going and keeps going. And so you get a sense of scale and just how much bigger this ship is than anything else.
00:40:52
Speaker
And now this is the tiny ship. and soon You're like, oh, okay. Power level has changed. Yeah. But they have the, the good thing about the Hoff base is they have a big shield. So they're defended from orbital bombardment.
00:41:07
Speaker
So they can't just sit in space and shoot them into smithereens. So there's a ground assault and to get through the blockade, they will fire the ion cannon, which like temporarily disables ships, uh,
00:41:21
Speaker
like an EMP cannon weapon thing. But for whatever reason, standby ion control is a line that lives forever in my brain. Standby ion control.
00:41:36
Speaker
Along with... The first transport is away. The first transport is away.
00:41:45
Speaker
These are lines that just periodically repeat themselves in my brain at random times with no other context and have since I was about 10. ten Well, now if you say them out loud, now know where they're from.
00:41:57
Speaker
This is what, you know, half the time when somebody says something about the first something is something or something is away, my brain automatically will repeat it and I'll be like, or, you know, somebody saying stand by anything. My brain just goes, stand by ion control.
00:42:18
Speaker
And it has been almost years. Of my little brain earworms. Anyway, the Luke and his fellow pilots are out fighting the big walkers.
00:42:35
Speaker
Apparently there was some comparisons made to the Vietnam War for this scene. Very much about a technologically superior force bringing in technology that is unsuited to the terrain. Mm-hmm.
00:42:50
Speaker
and in instead And then just using it to annihilate the local freedom fighters with sort of no regard for the rules of war. In this case, y'all, the Empire is the United States.
00:43:03
Speaker
Yes. Read How to Hide an Empire by Daniel Imberwar. It's a very, very, very good book. Yeah, there is commentary being made here in Star Wars. Politics in my sci-fi?
00:43:15
Speaker
No, never. Luke gets shot down and we get a whole new meaning to step on me. Because one of the AT-ATs, the giant walking tanks, crushes his speeder and he manages to get out just in time.
00:43:32
Speaker
But he gets away and there's all the scenes of running through the base and getting out and making sure the Millennium Falcon is working at the last minute to escape. Yeah, and Han is going back into the collapsing command center to get Leia, who's still there issuing orders up until the last minute because she's an amazing leader and we love her.
00:43:52
Speaker
And Darth Vader's in there walking around being creepy. And everyone's trying to get the Falcon off the ground. And Leia goes, would it help if I got out and pushed? Which is so good.
00:44:04
Speaker
i also, okay, we're sidetracking again. But I also have questions about Leia's mental state. we're We're three years past the events of A New Hope.
00:44:16
Speaker
But we don't see like any of the other commanders left. in the collapsing command center. And she does give the order for everybody else to get to their transports.
00:44:27
Speaker
But it doesn't seem like she's about to get to the transports until Han physically drags her out. Yeah, I don't know if her sense of self-preservation is very strong right now.
00:44:38
Speaker
Right. To what degree is she passively or actively suicidal three years after the destruction of her entire home planet? You know, where she she had to watch from orbit as every everyone she's ever known was murdered.
00:44:55
Speaker
i I feel like that might fuck with your psyche a little bit. Yeah, it's very much glossed over. i don't know if there's more in later films, but no in in A New Hope, there was no pausing to reckon with it. And now she's had three years still actively fighting, but at least to maybe kind of breathe and try to process it a little bit.
00:45:18
Speaker
Yeah, she's probably really fucked up. She's probably intensely traumatized, not to mention... The getting held prisoner, expecting to be executed, and then suddenly getting pulled out by a random fucking farm boy and a smuggler. Mm-hmm.
00:45:37
Speaker
And an old man you used to know, who you never ended up talking to he just fucking died 30 feet away from you. Or maybe didn't die, just disappeared and became one with the force. Mm-hmm.
00:45:49
Speaker
Yeah, but we're never actually going to touch on that because George Lucas doesn't care about women's feelings. No. ah She is set dressing. But not in our hearts. In our hearts, there is room for Leia's inner complexities.
00:46:02
Speaker
There is room for whatever Leia wants. Anyway, while all of the chaos is happening, we then flash to Luke and R2 and they're very leisurely making their way out. Mm-hmm.
00:46:14
Speaker
It's like there's there's like a se another transport and like a slow setup like just out on the ice field as the base is collapsing. And everyone there is very leisurely. Yeah.
00:46:26
Speaker
Which I thought was very funny. And Luke does not seem to care about getting a message to anyone about, hey, sorry, I'm going to the Dagobah system. I'll be back. I got to find this Yoda guy. He does nothing to communicate this besides just kind of muttering while Han is rescuing him.
00:46:44
Speaker
diggo take over a system and i guess there's a lot happening the base is collapsing but somewhere in that leisurely niz he could have at least sent a little ping you know sorry don't follow me i will be back i have to do this thing nope nothing so everyone else is just gonna assume that he died i guess after han risked himself to save his stupid life Yeah, i I have to assume that somewhere in there, he told Leia, I feel like I feel like that might be the only person Leia or maybe Han that, hey, I have some other stuff to do. I'll meet you when I meet you, which I have other questions about time. And I know
00:47:30
Speaker
That this is a rule of fantasy, that time responds to story, story doesn't respond to time. But the whole arc on Dagobah, how long does that take?
00:47:40
Speaker
Is that a day? Is that a week? Is it four months? How long is his training montage? I interpreted it as four days max, not long.
00:47:54
Speaker
Yeah, because because timing-wise, he shows up in Cloud City not terribly long, maybe 24 to 48 hours after Han and crew do, which their escape, because they can't jump to hyperspace when they leave Hoth.
00:48:15
Speaker
So they're running from the Empire and they go and hide in the asteroid field inside the giant space penis worm. isn' How long are they inside the giant space penis worm?
00:48:26
Speaker
Now, why is it a penis? Is it just because it's a worm? It's because doesn't seem to the head was a little bit flared out. I guess. It was very kind of semi-wrinkly. I read it as a sock puppet. It was it was penis looking.
00:48:41
Speaker
Yeah, no, I can see it. But yeah, how long are they hiding inside the giant space penis worm snake? Which that is what is it's called in my notes is giant penis worm snake. I love it. Add that to the list of cringy terms that erotica authors will use. His giant space penis worm snake.
00:49:01
Speaker
I would read that book. You know I would. Opened its mouth and suddenly there's teeth where teeth shouldn't be. And then meet what's her face? Lady whatever.
00:49:12
Speaker
Lady Charlotte. Just see what happens. teeth on teeth it's like when you when you kiss somebody and your teeth collide and it doesn't go well it's uncomfortable
00:49:29
Speaker
Except while fucking. Anyway. um Full body ick. No.
00:49:38
Speaker
Anyway, yeah. How long are they clinging to the back of the Star Destroyer? like How long is this whole escape? is And then how long is the travel to Bespin, to Cloud City, at sublight speeds?
00:49:53
Speaker
listen Again, is this day, is this... a week, I
Darth Vader's motivations and iconic scenes
00:50:00
Speaker
have to assume that it is some time, but not, not a ton of time.
00:50:07
Speaker
I would say, you know, all of this together is like no more than a month. h but also it could be three days. Yeah. It's very unclear. Exactly.
00:50:18
Speaker
So just a, just a thought. Cause like it feels like the Dagobah arc takes a lot longer in time than the Millennium Falcon Cloud City arc.
00:50:31
Speaker
But the Millennium Falcon Cloud City arc feels like it takes 48 hours and the entire Dagobah arc apparently happens within that time. Yeah. So anyway, point is. Speaking of Dagobah. Speaking daydawatt.
00:50:41
Speaker
I want to talk about the most exciting thing in this movie as a new Star Wars person, which is yeah fully encountering Yoda for the first time, who was completely different than I expected. Because as i as we say every show, I have a general sense of Star Wars because I live on Earth and I can recognize these characters.
00:51:06
Speaker
My impression of what I thought Yoda was, was this kind of stoic mentor who talks funny, but mostly stands around dispensing sage advice, you know, do or do not, there is no try. We are luminous beings. Very poetic, very nice, a little mysterious, but, you know, sort of your standard fantasy mentor.
00:51:30
Speaker
Mm-mm. he's a fucking nightmare. The moment that he meets Luke, he instantly starts rummaging through his stuff, eating and then insulting Luke's food, asking him how he can grow so big with food like this. Then digging around in his shit, throwing things like...
00:51:53
Speaker
Far, throwing things hard for no reason, he gets into a literal slap fight with r two within seconds of their meeting. And then he decides that he's just gonna fuck with this kid and pretend that he's not Yoda to just...
00:52:10
Speaker
see what happens fucking around if you're generous you could say this is some kind of test of Luke's character and getting a sense of who he is if he doesn't know who Yoda is and you know what is this young man really like and can I train him no I don't believe that I believe Yoda's just fucking with him for no reason but to be fair to Yoda Luke is also a massive dick to Yoda for no reason he is Come out of a very intense situation and he's young and dumb and, you know, maybe didn't have the most social upbringing. But if you know that you are going to a strange planet to meet an important person who you have got no physical description of whatsoever.
00:52:56
Speaker
It's safe to assume that you should at least be marginally polite to anyone you might meet. Because even if they're not Yoda, because what are the odds that the first person you meet on this planet is Master Yoda? They might know where Yoda is. They might be helpful in this completely foreign land.
00:53:13
Speaker
But instead, you're just mean right away. It's stupid and it's very entertaining. Yoda has lived entirely alone for 20 plus years.
00:53:26
Speaker
So that would mess with the head of pretty much anyone. Yeah. Granted, you know, he is over 800 years old Which also blew my freaking mind. I did not know he was that old.
00:53:41
Speaker
Yeah, he's been training Jedi for 800 years, which means 800 years ago he was a fully trained Jedi master. So he's upwards of 800 years old. This contextualizes how Baby Yoda is still a baby at 50.
00:53:55
Speaker
Yes, exactly. That's the point. I know Yoda and everything else. And he does do the dispense great wisdom thing and also the gremlin thing.
00:54:05
Speaker
But also immediately he does, in fact, dispense great wisdom. isn And then when Luke kind of responds to it by brushing him off, then he's like, no, I'm going to fuck with this kid.
00:54:19
Speaker
Yeah. He starts off, Luke points his gun at him, and Yoda's like, I mean you no harm, and then asks basically what he's doing there. goes And Luke says, I'm looking for a great warrior.
00:54:32
Speaker
And Yoda's first response is, wars not make one great. And Luke, again, kind of just brushes him off. And then Yoda's like, and now I'm going through your shit.
00:54:44
Speaker
Yeah. And now I'm assessing your character. And also, I've been alone for 20 years. I don't really, i don't interact with people. This is just what's happening now. Yeah, we keep flopping back and forth because we are in multiple places. So we have the Han and Leia Millennium Falcon storyline. We have the Vader piece because we get little pieces of Vader here, which is kind of fun.
00:55:10
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And then we have Luke on Dagobah, which Luke's cave that he goes into to defeat himself used to terrify me as a kid. Oh, yeah.
00:55:24
Speaker
Which one of the things that we've been keeping track of through past now or we're planning to keep track of as i've brought up is what is the force what does the force do how does it work which the answer is however the plot needs it to work but we are who we are and we like nitpicking shit so we establish now that certain places can be strong or weak in the force That the dark side is not more powerful necessarily.
00:55:54
Speaker
It's just more seductive. It's easier. It's a different path. Yeah. And you have to be in the right headspace to be able to distinguish what What is good, righteous motivation and what is the dark side tempting you?
00:56:10
Speaker
And that's why Luke fails his trial in the cave. Right. I mean, he starts out by taking his weapons. Yoda says, your weapons, you will not need them.
00:56:21
Speaker
And Luke buckles on his weapons belt and goes into the cave. He has not learned to trust Yoda or still doesn't trust him despite whatever training he's doing.
00:56:33
Speaker
I'm looking at your notes and I'm seeing the Yoda cave bit. And does Rin know more about the mythological origins of this trip when we're talking about the cave? Of course you do. I feel like such a dumbedown. see, that's the thing is I don't.
00:56:49
Speaker
I don't know if the cave was a deliberate mythological nod to something. However, now that I think about it, now that you asked the question, that's a Katabasis. Yeah, that's why I was like, oh, of course Ryn would know.
00:57:05
Speaker
Yeah. In my defense, I was throwing this together on my lunch break. I forgot about the Katabusi. Yeah, the journey to the underworld or the... This is this is somewhere between Katabasis and Ghost of Christmas Future. Yeah. like This is being confronted with your own...
00:57:28
Speaker
Not mortality, necessarily, but your own fallibility. That's exactly the word I was about to use, yeah. One of the things that I was noting here, it's kind of similar to what is the Force, what does the Force do, is this is an interesting opportunity to see what Yoda thinks are the qualities of an ideal Jedi.
00:57:50
Speaker
Because this is another thing that, you know, existing in the world, ah sure, Jedi, everybody knows what a Jedi is. But do we? Do we know what a Jedi is? I don't. So for the uneducated, what appears to be the qualities of an ideal Jedi, which then we can use to compare and contrast as our characters grow, is being patient, serious, not craving adventure or excitement. I'm not sure what is supposed to motivate a Jedi, maybe just kind of general...
00:58:19
Speaker
vibiness with the force but they're not out for glory or excitement they're motivated by something else being trained since childhood is apparently extremely important yoda is very skeptical that luke can learn because he's too old the dark side is characterized by anger fear and aggression And once you start down that path, once you let those things motivate you, there's no turning back. There's no quick little dip into the dark side and then changing course. At least the way that Yoda is presenting it.
00:58:52
Speaker
As soon as you succumb to that temptation, even a little bit, you're fucked. One of the interpretations that I've seen before is that the force is an ocean and the light side of the force is your very, very thin light layer.
00:59:10
Speaker
And the power of the force is whatever's beneath. And the dark side is seductive because it's just calling you to that power. It's just calling you to go. But it will crush you.
00:59:23
Speaker
And so you can successfully utilize or look into more powerful aspects of the force But you need to have the right foundation. You need to have built yourself a proper submersible.
00:59:41
Speaker
You need to have cloaked yourself in the light to withstand the crushing pressure of power. Mm-hmm. Yeah, that makes sense. And I can see why you wouldn't want to necessarily throw a young adult into that immediately. I can see why that's like a very subtle kind of moral system. It involves a lot of self-control. You would want to be really sure of the character and the abilities of the person that you're introducing to these more advanced skills. Yeah.
01:00:12
Speaker
Whereas if you have kind of an already fully formed adult who has their own goals and their own ambitions, I can see that being kind of dangerous. if you go, okay, here you go. Here's your super wizard magic powers.
01:00:25
Speaker
I do want to bop back to and Leia for a minute while they're hiding in the giant space penis worm snake. Because their little confrontation and the kiss.
01:00:36
Speaker
Listeners, I'm fanning myself. Oh my god. It's, you know, things shake. She falls into his lap. Mm-hmm. I was saying, don't get excited. Being held by you isn't enough to get me excited.
01:00:48
Speaker
Well, I don't have time for anything else. Yeah. it well it's it's He lifts her off his lap so easily. Mm-hmm. Because she is so much smaller than him.
01:01:01
Speaker
She is teensy. She is so small. And he just, like, he doesn't, he's not even, like, using her, like, armpits to lift her up. He just hands on the side of her torso, just maneuvers her into a standing position.
01:01:16
Speaker
But, like, clearly isn't, like, having her stand up. He physically lifts her and puts her down again. Mm-hmm. And I was like, hang on a minute. I'm sorry. Can we go back and watch that again?
01:01:28
Speaker
Yeah, just for personal reasons. so I was screeching and just kicking my little feet. i loved it. So good. And then we go back to Dagobah and then we come back to them.
01:01:41
Speaker
Yeah, he gets, we get the, you know, you're trembling because I'm a scoundrel. And she's like, I happen to like nice men. And then they kiss and it is, and are immediately interrupted by 3PO because of course they are. Mm-hmm.
01:01:58
Speaker
And 3PO, like, they're still kissing while 3PO is, like, halfway through his sentence. And 3PO just still is talking until they finally break apart and look at 3PO like, what the fuck, dude? Read the room, please.
01:02:13
Speaker
Captain Nita is... the captain of the Star Destroyer that has been tracking Han and the Millennium Falcon. And when he loses them, Captain Nita goes over to Vader's ship to apologize.
01:02:26
Speaker
Vader has previously killed a guy for failing him. So we catch the very tail end of Captain Nita getting force choked and dropping to his knees. And it's unclear if he's alive or dead.
01:02:37
Speaker
but Vader has his hand up in the force choke and he kind of, the camera's on Captain Nita and it rises up to Vader on Vader's back. He goes, apology accepted, Captain Nita, as Nita collapses.
01:02:53
Speaker
And here's the thing. It's a villain line. It is a great villain line. But the problem with the villain tone is that it overlaps incredibly strongly with Dom tone. And Vader's in that all black leather getup.
01:03:07
Speaker
But like that apology accepted... ah Particularly if you're fucking with your sub in a particularly kind of nasty way.
01:03:20
Speaker
whoo who that that would that would do it m that's something it certainly is i had another thing about darth vader that's unsexy actually the opposite of sexy is whoever the fuck he's talking to via hologram call this wrinkly old man is he the emperor maybe is he somebody else i don't think that he's identified ah He is.
01:03:50
Speaker
that's That is the Emperor. we do We do learn that the Emperor wants to speak with Vader. I must have just glossed over that part. Okay, so he's having a hologram call with the Emperor. And it's short, but I thought that conversation was very interesting.
01:04:02
Speaker
Yes. Which is, he, the Emperor, is breaking the news that Luke is definitely 100% Anakin's son. And seems to imply that he knows that Darth Vader is Anakin. I don't know if he actually knows or what, but Darth Vader is getting the message. And he hesitates. And it's so interesting to see. i feel like I want to watch it again more closely to see what body language is giving this away and the pacing of the dialogue because we have this expressionless mask.
01:04:36
Speaker
But I think it's pretty clear that he doesn't want to kill his son. Learning, okay, you know, whether or not he suspected this previously, I don't know. But as soon as he has this information confirmed, he does not want to kill him and tries pitching the angle that, well, maybe he could be a powerful ally and we could lure him to the dark side. Wouldn't that be great? And I do think that that is a sincere motivation, especially later.
01:05:02
Speaker
Not that it makes him a good person, but it is really interesting and humanizing to see him... sort of quickly try to recalibrate and find a way to not have to kill his own kid because we've seen that he clearly has no problem killing people who are important to him who just mildly inconvenience him which is also a terrible way to run your military it's the revolving door his command just has be nightmare if Evil overlord tip.
01:05:34
Speaker
Don't kill people when they fuck up because then people will hide their fuck ups from you. And that can be exploited by heroes to take you down. Anyway, the Millennium Falcon is just chilling on the back of the fucking Star Destroyer looking like another giant ass greeble.
01:05:51
Speaker
she Which leads me to more hard sci-fi questions in our space fantasy about artificial gravity. o Because the artificial gravity of the the bottom side of the Millennium Falcon is adhered to the back, what we perceive as the back of the Star Destroyer.
01:06:13
Speaker
which means people standing in the Star Destroyer would be perpendicular to people standing in the Millennium Falcon. You'd get feet to waste. Huh.
01:06:24
Speaker
And this doesn't seem to affect each other. So artificial gravity... In this case, is restricted to the ship. But then there doesn't appear to be any difference in gravity inside the giant space penis worm snake.
01:06:39
Speaker
Has to get the full name every time. And I do love that I clocked immediately when they sort of wander out into the giant space penis worm snake. And a reasonable mind may wonder, okay, are they going to wear spacesuits? Is there air? They are wearing nebulizer masks, which I recognize instantly because one of my siblings has asthma and I would just see him, you know, every night in his little nebulizer mask shaped like a fish. And I'm just looking at you like, oh my God.
01:07:09
Speaker
Yeah, that's that's just a nebulizer mask from some medical supply place. It's well done. Yeah, so there's gravity. There's either gravity inside the worm, which this asteroid does not seem large enough to have its own internal gravitational pull.
01:07:26
Speaker
Everything has gravity. I'm not a physicist, but I do recall AP physics. Everything does have gravity. But
Betrayal, escape themes, and emotional impact
01:07:35
Speaker
the gravity of the asteroid is not such that it would keep our heroes adhered to the bottom of the giant space penis worm snake.
01:07:45
Speaker
isn Now, I don't know what sort of forces are at work inside that creature. Or you know how susceptible to some form of gravity it is.
01:07:58
Speaker
Or, yeah, what sort of air is being created its cells, I guess, it expels oxygen inside its gullet. Yeah, I was kind of thinking it's digestive systems maybe producing some gases that they can breathe.
01:08:13
Speaker
Yeah, and not freeze in the cold of space. But also, it's a space fantasy. But my question there, my my gravitational question there is, is there a gravity field that is projected around the ship?
01:08:28
Speaker
Which then led me to wondering about if there's a grout if the system is a gravitational field around the ship, how does that interact when you have two ships docked on each other?
01:08:43
Speaker
So is there, can you sort of restrict or expand the gravity field? Again, we will not get an explanation for this because this is a fantasy in space.
01:08:56
Speaker
This is not Star Trek. Despite what certain people may accidentally get confused at the beginning of recording their podcast, this is not Star Trek. Anyway, Vader has employed the services of bounty hunters to track to track down the Millennium Falcon, which again, that's another one of my questions about how long this has taken, because if it's been like 24 hours, why the fuck is he outsourcing? Yeah. Yeah.
01:09:20
Speaker
Unless he is so, he's like, I know that my soldiers are not going to fucking do this. So I'm just going outsource to people who will. But again, if it's been like 24 hours, that feels like too little time to summon a bunch of bounty hunters to your ship to give them a side job.
01:09:38
Speaker
Speaking of bounty hunters, is one of them Boba Fett? And is he a Mandalorian? Because I feel like that's a familiar looking guy. I feel like I've seen that guy before. That is Boba Fett. We don't know his name yet, but that is Boba Fett.
01:09:51
Speaker
In the Disney Plus release slash the modern release of the movie, Tamira Morrison, who plays Jango Fett, who is another Fett, in Attack of the Clones, is Boba Fett's father.
01:10:08
Speaker
has dubbed over all of the lines that were originally performed by a different actor, whose name I don't have straight here, but I can find it momentarily.
01:10:20
Speaker
Portrayed physically by Jeremy Bullock and voiced by Jason Wingreen. and Jason Wingreen was not credited until 2000, until his voice was taken out six years later to be replaced with Tamira Morrison.
01:10:33
Speaker
But yes, that is Boba Fett. As to whether or not Boba Fett is a Mandalorian, that is a different question, and we will not answer that at this time. Okay.
01:10:43
Speaker
I'm patient. I can wait. But that is Mandalorian armor that he is wearing. Oh, dear. Okay. I noticed, because we're about to get a whole lot of Chewie roaring in Cloud City when shit happens,
01:10:57
Speaker
m There's little holes in Chewie's tongue and it's clearly like either breathing holes or like eye line. Like I don't know which, but it's something for Peter Mayhew to see out of.
01:11:11
Speaker
That's delightful. Or breathe out of. like it's i don't know whether that's what it is but otherwise they're not like black spots they're like very clearly holes in the costume is they arrive at cloud city they meet lando calrissian played by billy d williams the smoothest motherfucker alive oh my god he so he starts he comes out guns blazing saying shit to han locks eyes with leia immediately changes his tone greets her adoringly with this lingering hand kiss and while this is happening leia is staring over lando's shoulder glaring daggers at han going basically see why can't you do this this is nice why can't you be nice this is what i deserve this is the princess treatment
01:12:05
Speaker
There is an alternate universe in my mind, which honestly, maybe even this universe after things settle down, where they can put aside their differences and the three of them all fuck because the sexual tension is off the charts.
01:12:18
Speaker
Yeah, no, i think I think the three of them absolutely need to work something out. We're going to have also a whole lot to talk about with Lando, particularly after we watch Solo, which is not going be for a while. but And i can't look things up on AO3 for the bit because I might see spoilers. So I'll just have to trust and believe that the the good people of the Star Wars fandom have already taken care of this.
01:12:43
Speaker
Lando is so smooth that Leia will give her fuck buddy, I can't call him boyfriend yet, but Leia will give her fuck buddy shit about how Lando is smoother than him.
01:12:54
Speaker
But he's so smooth that Leia's getting suspicious. isn' And of course, she has good reason to be, because... They go to dinner and of course Vader's there, which is a classic villain bit. Yeah.
01:13:10
Speaker
And I love that Han's first instinct is just to fucking shoot at him. I mean, that seems like a good impulse. I'd try it. Because you'd feel really stupid if you didn't try it. It could have worked. It's the kind of thing you got to try it once.
01:13:24
Speaker
mm-hmm the empire takes them all captive throws them all in a cell there's like a loud siren going on that's clearly torturing chewy briefly has been shot to pieces chewy starts to put them back together han is strapped into some weird ass looking torture device that also scared the shit out of me as a 10 year old that would have given me nightmares as a child There's a lot of things about these movies that would have genuinely terrified me. So I think it's probably for the best that I'm experiencing them now.
01:13:55
Speaker
It terrified me and also probably led to something. um Yeah. There's a reason I am the way I am.
01:14:06
Speaker
and this isn't all of it. But speaking of that, Lando tells Han and Leia That, oh, he offered them a good deal to basically leave Cloud City alone was what I had to do.
01:14:21
Speaker
And then Vader's like, oh, now we're taking Han. And Lando's like, that was never part of the deal. And again, another villain line that has Dom undertones. I am altering the deal.
01:14:33
Speaker
Pray I don't alter any further.
01:14:36
Speaker
whoo yeah there's also there's a lot of people getting choked out in this movie and because at one point chewy then chokes out lando when he gets the chance and leia's look down at lando as chewy's choking him at present she's not but if she wanted to there was a second on her face where its like she could straddle that villain dom line if she wanted to oh my god that would be amazing actually Talk about women's wrongs.
01:15:08
Speaker
Yeah. Well, it's like that was a moment of she could go villain or she could just channel that into dominatrix or both. Doesn't matter.
01:15:20
Speaker
They're trying to escape at one point. They reunite because Luke has arrived with R2. Luke goes after Vader, which is a trap. He knows it's a trap, but he still goes after Vader.
01:15:30
Speaker
And... But wait, before. this Yes. wait. No, never mind. Maybe I'm getting things slightly out of order. I didn't want to skip the whole carbonite situation. Oh, the carbonite situation. That's kind of a big deal. that That is a big deal. Yeah, we do need to talk about that. Okay.
01:15:46
Speaker
So there's the choking situation. Vader wants to not just take Han and kill him or torture him or whatever. He wants to put it. Oh, oh my God. So many disorganized thoughts.
01:15:58
Speaker
When Han is coming back from his torture situation, he says that they didn't even ask him any questions. Yeah. which they were just torturing him for cruelty's sake, which is so heartbreaking. And then Leia's like petting his head to make him feel better. oh Oh my God. So they go to a different room and then we find out that Darth Vader wants to encase Luke in carbonite. And so he's going to test the machine on Han first.
01:16:26
Speaker
So there's this, you know, sort of tearful goodbye. is accepting his fate, telling Chewie to take care of Leia. We get the most heartbreaking kiss. And then the classic famous, everybody knows it. I love you. I know.
01:16:42
Speaker
Before he's sent down into the pit. Why does he say that? Why doesn't he say I love you too? I'm sure this has been debated in fandom for a gajillion years. Does he not realize that he loves her yet? Is that why the fuck? If you think you're about to die, you might as well just say it to make her feel better. Like, why does he say that?
01:17:03
Speaker
So couple of things. There's the there's the writing reason. Apparently they had written a whole confession of love and discussion and then he gets pulled into the carbonite. and But apparently on filming, it was like too sappy.
01:17:21
Speaker
It didn't come across as sincere. And so apparently, one of the producers basically just told Harrison Ford to wing it, like just improv, and they did a bunch of takes until he was like, I'm doing one more take.
01:17:37
Speaker
And that's when he did the I know on the last take. Devastating. Improvised. And then there's the continuity piece of, and like in canon, the whole beginning argument as they're leaving Echo Base is about the fact that Han is trying to get Leia to admit that she has feelings for him.
01:18:00
Speaker
isn And so this is the first time she's clearly admitted that. Yeah. So he has probably, you know, no, see, that's what happened in their hookup. He blurted out, I love you after they fucked. Oh, oh no.
01:18:15
Speaker
Like, that's what that's definitely what happened. Oh, no. Yeah, you're going to be solo after that, all right. ah Because secretly underneath his shitty exterior, he's ah he's he's a sap.
01:18:31
Speaker
But this is the first time that Leia admits it. And so it just, it brings the whole arc together. And if he doesn't come out of that fucking carbonite, I am throwing my laptop into the ocean.
01:18:43
Speaker
and there will be no more episodes of the Phantom Apprentice. I... need Harrison Ford to come back so I can think more of your thoughts about him. And also for Leia's sake. And I love that for you and your journey.
01:18:56
Speaker
And also we're not touching Return of the Jedi for a hot minute. Like I said, I'm patient. Because I'm an asshole. And i as I told you, this is an order designed for maximum emotional damage.
01:19:10
Speaker
And then my response is to just go, okay, yay.
01:19:16
Speaker
It's like that if we have any Gen Z listeners, I hear that the Gen Zs enjoy hit film Madagascar from our childhood era. And Mort going, yay, I'm a sacrifice. That's me.
01:19:31
Speaker
ah I'm just happy to be here. I mean, we do learn that he is alive. Lando does say he's he's survived the process and he's in perfect hibernation. r2 goes to help the group escape 3po tells r2 to like plug into the mainframe and r2 goes to and gets himself electrocuted and 3po is like i'm a translator i'm not supposed to know a power socket from a computer terminal but r2 certainly should which this is another moment i think
01:20:05
Speaker
R2 gives no shits. He is the most competent character on screen and gives zero fucks. Later on, when they're escaping on the Millennium Falcon and they can't escape because the Empire has disabled the hyperdrive, R2 knew this the whole time.
01:20:22
Speaker
Just didn't tell anyone. it was He found out from the the the city's computer and just didn't tell anyone. Which means... fully 3PO was like do this thing and R2 went alright I really need that R2 miniseries that I concocted in my mind last time i need so much because he is a fascinating fascinating little guy r two stuck his dick in a light socket to prove a point if that would also be a really good title for the episode
01:20:57
Speaker
but on a more serious note Yeah, we have a giant ass fight. Which we can do more exciting tricks with the lightsabers now. That's fun. Yeah, and Luke does a lot of flips.
01:21:10
Speaker
Yeah. And this is where we get Darth Vader making his pitch to Luke about, you know join me, we can rule the universe or the galaxy or whatever, yay.
01:21:22
Speaker
Being able to end the conflict. And granted, his vision of how we are ending this conflict is bad. It is with him as the supreme leader of everything. We do not want this.
01:21:33
Speaker
But I do still think that he sincerely wants to find a way to spare his son. And maybe even sincerely believes that he's doing the right thing. Because all the best villains think that they're the good guy, right? So, like, I don't know Anakin. I don't know his whole deal. But...
01:21:52
Speaker
I am inclined to believe that especially if he's a Jedi who's gone down the wrong path, he's probably jaded from dealing with other Jedis and they probably told him to do a bunch of shit that he didn't believe in. And now maybe he thinks that he's on the right path, which again is not me agreeing with Darth Vader. But I do fully think that he's sincere.
01:22:15
Speaker
i don't think that he's trying to manipulate Luke. in this moment. I think it's manipulative in intention only so far as he's trying to sway him to the dark side.
01:22:28
Speaker
Yeah, he he's definitely manipulating him, but not lying. Yes, yes. I think that's that's the bigger piece. That's the more accurate word, yeah And as as we said, David Prowse physically portraying Vader and saying the lines on screen for Luke to act, or for Mark Hamill,
01:22:47
Speaker
to act off of did not know the line was apparently kind of pissed when he found out also had been kind of pissed about the first movie and so wasn't going to come back and then was offered more money and it was job stability and so he came back yeah but luke refuses to join in vader vader cuts off his hand And Luke drops off a cliff.
01:23:14
Speaker
He's finally learned his lesson about temptation and not succumbing to the dark side. Mm-hmm. And Luke it falls out of the maintenance shaft, like, onto greeble on the bottom of the station and is just hanging there and mentally reaches out to Leia.
01:23:32
Speaker
And just in a grand story theme, Leia hears him. So knowing, of course, we know that they're siblings. Mm-hmm. But here they don't know they're siblings. Mm-hmm.
01:23:45
Speaker
his first His first call out is to bet. And then immediately his second is, Leia, hear me. And Leia goes, Luke, I know where he is. And they turn around. So we're we're planting seeds here that in being his sister, she is also the child of Anakin Skywalker.
01:24:07
Speaker
Mm-hmm. which means she also probably has some degree of power. Which I'm sure will be subtly and thoughtfully explored, giving her so much depth and interesting motivations as a character. Oh, absolutely. George Lucas totally meant to give her powers.
01:24:27
Speaker
That wasn't completely glossed over until other people were in charge of story. I'm rolling my eyes, dear listeners. ah but of course this sort of subtle little like you know they hear each other because they're family or they hear each other because they're both strong in the force thing is immediately fucking undermined because they retrieve luke and luke is put on a bed in the millennium falcon leia like pulls up a blanket on him and then gives him another little kiss on the lips when she runs back to the cockpit
01:24:59
Speaker
I don't know why people are always kissing each other in moments of intense stress. Like, I don't know if you survive this, that could be awkward later.
01:25:09
Speaker
Seems like weird choice, but he does get his hand reattached, which I thought was kind of a cop out. I was really hoping that he was just only going have one hand for the rest of this. It seems like his hand getting cut off was complete. It had no consequences. It had no stakes.
01:25:25
Speaker
Because he is just fine after that. And they just glue it back
Visual textures and thematic contrasts
01:25:29
Speaker
on because they were conveniently able to get his hand. It's it's not his hand. It's ah it's a robot hand. Oh, it's a robot hand. Okay. It's a robot hand. Very advanced prosthetics. Okay. But I somehow have a feeling that Luke will not end up being visibly disabled for the rest of his arc. And his hand will probably just function exactly like it was a totally original OG hand the whole time.
01:25:53
Speaker
We shall see. Listeners, Rin is making mysterious eyebrows at me. No, i there are... i i don't know if there were like specific reasons behind Luke losing the hand. I know there's specific reasons behind other things that happen in the series that parallel stuff that happens in this first trilogy.
01:26:17
Speaker
But from a practical effects standpoint, making it... so that Mark Hamill visibly only had one hand for the rest of the series would probably have been fairly difficult because you can't just digitally edit it out.
01:26:34
Speaker
So they could just have him not get his hand cut off. He could get some kind of other injury. It just seems like it kind pointless. Yeah. I don't fully know why they decided to make the decision.
01:26:46
Speaker
But I don't make movies. And that is all of my notes. Do you have other things you would like to discuss before we take it out? Not really. I really like the visuals in this one. I thought there was a lot of nice texture, especially in the beginning on Hoth. There's so much white on white, but there's different textures and subtle things to it that I really like. And then it makes a very nice contrast between the white light side good guys black dark side bad guys you know very obvious but it's fun and i enjoyed it i think this movie covers a lot of ground i really enjoy that luke can fluently understand r2 which it seems like he could in the first movie but even more so in this one it's just he's learned his language and it's delightful
01:27:34
Speaker
there is a little screen that it flashes to in the x-wing that seems to be a readout of what r2 is saying oh i didn't notice that that's really fun but yeah them's the thoughts overall i enjoyed this movie tremendously and the thought of evil dominatrix leia is gonna live in my brain now so thank you for that You're welcome.
01:27:59
Speaker
Any queer reading thoughts or costume thoughts for your end that you want to provide for this one? Not presently. I like your angle that you had about Luke and Han's friendship at the beginning. I thought that was very good.
01:28:16
Speaker
And I will be keeping and keeping my gay little eyes out on the platonic relationships in this series. But at present, I think that's all the thoughts.
01:28:27
Speaker
Okay.
Future Star Wars discussions and podcast promotion
01:28:28
Speaker
So we're going to travel into a radically different world. We're going to jump back 35 years in the timeline.
01:28:38
Speaker
And we're going to next time pick up with Star Wars Episode one The Phantom Menace. You said before you don't know Anakin. You don't know his backstory.
01:28:52
Speaker
Let's go get Anakin Skywalker's backstory. and We now know that Anakin Skywalker is Darth Vader. How did we get here? So that's going to be our focus for a hot minute because we're going to go with that one. We're going to go with Attack of the Clones. Then we're going to dive into the Clone Wars TV series, which will be a lot of fun.
01:29:14
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And I'll decide how we're doing the Clone Wars TV series. And at some point, I haven't decided whether I want to do, we just talk about some episodes, but we watch every episode. We only watch some episodes because there's seven seasons of the show.
01:29:34
Speaker
yeah And granted, they're like 20 minute episodes, but still seven seasons. That's a lot of show. It's a lot of show. And there's definitely episodes that don't really need discussion.
01:29:47
Speaker
So I think we can probably like watch a batch at a time and go through that way. And then we'll get to Revenge of the Sith and go from there.
01:29:59
Speaker
All right. So we'll see you all next time with The Phantom Menace, which I'm very excited about. We'll be entering into the prequel era. So this will be you know nearly 20 years after the release of empire in our time and 35 years prior to the events of Empire in Star Wars time.
01:30:27
Speaker
So until then, thank you so much for listening. You can get notified as soon as we drop that Phantom Menace episode by subscribing to the Fandom Apprentice, wherever you get your podcasts, wherever you're currently listening, on a different podcast platform if you prefer that podcast platform, on a different podcast platform just to juice our numbers a bit, whatever you like.
01:30:48
Speaker
You can follow us on our social media. We are at fanapppod, F-A-N-A-P-P-P-O-D, on any and all social media that we have made accounts on. Most of them I'm not terribly active on, but...
01:31:03
Speaker
I believe all of them have our link tree in the bio at the very least. So you can find us and connect with us various ways through that. If you would like a response to any of your thoughts, if you would like to send us thoughts, if you would like to send us ideas for future episodes, if you'd like to send us things that we should be...
01:31:24
Speaker
looking out for things that you think would be fun for us to discuss as Sam makes her way through the Star Wars universe for the first time. And I make horny jokes about the Star Wars universe for the one hundredth time.
01:31:39
Speaker
ah Send us an email at thefandomapprentice at gmail.com. That is thefandomapprentice at gmail.com. I promise you will get a response within three business days. Now, what days of the week are business days for a podcast that does not make any money is anybody's guess. However, it will be speedier than if you message me on Twitter, which I don't open.
01:32:06
Speaker
We release every other Tuesday if you're new to the show. I don't believe we've said that yet this season. Mm-hmm. So you can come back in two weeks to hear our next movie episode.
01:32:18
Speaker
Until then, thank you so much for listening. And may the force be with you. And also with you. but This is not an in with your spirit house.
01:32:32
Speaker
Get that shit out of my face. ah With your force ghost, however. The Fandom Apprentice is produced and edited by Rin and Sam. Our music is composed and performed by James.
01:32:43
Speaker
You can find more of his work on Spotify and Bandcamp under Beiruz, B-A-E-R-U-Z. Our art is by Casey Turgeon. You can find more of her work at KCT Designs on Instagram.
01:32:55
Speaker
The content discussed is the property of the original copyright holders and is used here under fair use.
01:33:39
Speaker
Give me your Star Trek crack ships. Actually, I want that so bad. Once I have enough characters under my belt, give me the weird. Star Trek. Fuck, I said the wrong star thing.
01:33:52
Speaker
Kill me now. Stinger found. have forcibly ejected from the podcast. No, that's good. I haven't had a stinger for the last couple ones, so that's good. Future me.
01:34:02
Speaker
Put that as the stinger.