Star Wars 7x7: A Daily Bite-Sized Dose of Star Wars Joy

TV & Film
**Star Wars 7×7: A Daily Bite-Sized Dose of Star Wars Joy**

The Star Wars 7×7 Podcast is Rebel-rousing fun for everyday Jedi, generally between 7 and 14 minutes a day, always 7 days a week. Join host Allen Voivod for Star Wars news, history, interviews, trivia, and deep dives into the Star Wars story as told in movies, books, comics, games, cartoons, and more. Follow now for your daily dose of Star Wars joy. It’s destiny unleashed! #SW7x7

Latest Episodes:

2,157. Did Vader Actually Care About Saving Luke From the Emperor? May 30, 2020

Show notes

So here's how this happened...

In looking at The Rise of Skywalker and comparing it to Return of the Jedi over the past few days, I've been thinking a lot about the theme of redemption in Return of the Jedi, and how it's the main theme for that movie, but only a secondary theme for The Rise of Skywalker. Well, the more I started thinking about Vader "redeeming" himself in Return of the Jedi, I got to thinking - is he, though?

I'll explain my well-nigh sacrilegious take on this subject, and how the subsequent 37 years of storytelling supports the case - but you can make the case merely by what happens in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. We'll also speculate as to how this may have made George Lucas decide to have Vader scream "NOOOOOO!" in the Special Edition. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,156. The Remarkable Rise of Skywalker Improvement Over Return of the Jedi May 29, 2020

Show notes

Imagine with me, if you will, a different Return of the Jedi. The primary protagonist/antagonist conflict is not with Luke and Palpatine, it's with Luke and Vader. And yet they don't spend a heck of a lot of time onscreen together. It's only near the end of the second act and into the third that they finally confront each other. Can you imagine what it would have been like if they encountered each other multiple times throughout the movie? Like, for example, if he got word that Luke was back on Tatooine, and headed out there?

Now, contrast that with The Rise of Skywalker. Again, Rey/Palpatine isn't the real conflict here, it's Rey/Kylo. And their issues get a lot more attention... Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,155. TROS Variations on the ROTJ Structure May 28, 2020

Show notes

When we looked at The Force Awakens, it was remarkable how much it lined up with the events of A New Hope.

Then we looked at The Last Jedi, and while it had elements that lined up with The Empire Strikes Back, it also shook things up.

Today, we look at The Rise of Skywalker. It has a lot in common with Return of the Jedi, but it actually explodes the structure of ROTJ, spreads it out across the movie, and even repeats those structural elements as the movie progresses. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,154. ROTJ and TROS Themes: Redemption Versus Identity May 27, 2020

Show notes

Return of the Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker start their bad guys in similar places. No one walking into Return of the Jedi ever thought that redemption was in the cards for Darth Vader. And - if you pretend you never saw the original trilogy - you would likely say the same thing about Kylo Ren while walking into The Rise of Skywalker.

Thematically, however, Return of the Jedi is very concerned about the idea of redemption. And that shows up not just in the main conflict of the story, but also in smaller ways for Luke, Han, and Lando. (Leia? Not so much. What does she have to redeem herself for, after the events of The Empire Strikes Back? Not much, as it turns out.)

Meanwhile, though The Rise of Skywalker does concern itself with the redemption of Kylo Ren after all, it's a secondary theme when considered in light of what's really going on thematically - a war of identity. I'll explain my thinking on today's episode... Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,153. ROTJ and TROS Structure: Timeframes and Final Boss Battles May 26, 2020

Show notes

As we dive deeper into our examination of The Rise of Skywalker, and the comparison of it to Return of the Jedi, structure is where we want to head next. But before we get there, there's a related pair of topics we need to consider.

First is the question of the final boss battles - the "big bads," if you will. Because the primary job of both movies is for the heroes to strike the winning blow, and it needs to be against something that presents the greatest challenge our heroes have seen yet.

And the other thing we need to consider is the timeframe. By an interesting coincidence - if it is, actually, coincidence - both of these final movies in their trilogies take place about a year after the events of the previous movie. There's a very clear reason for that in Return of the Jedi. As for The Rise of Skywalker, the answer is not so clear, but with the application of a couple of thought experiments, it turns out that it had to be closer to a year than the five or ten years we previously discussed on the show.

I'll be addressing both the big bads and the timeframes on today's show... Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,152. "Recontextualizing" With Return of the Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker May 25, 2020

Show notes

Last week, we spent time talking about The Last Jedi, and comparing it to The Empire Strikes Back - which is similar to what we did a while ago when we talked about The Force Awakens in relation to A New Hope.

Well, it's time to complete the cycle! On today's episode, we're starting a series of looks at The Rise of Skywalker, in comparison with Return of the Jedi. And in particular, we're going to pick up right where we ended with The Last Jedi - on the concept of recontextualization.

Both Return of the Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker offer us changes that are supposed to make us rethink a bunch of things that came before in their respective trilogies. In one sense, they're very different - one of them comes completely out of the clear blue sky, while the other is relentlessly hinted at. And in another sense, they're very similar - the change doesn't add drama so much as it resolves it, and changes the foci of the final fights. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,151. Episode 1: "Directing" (Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian) May 24, 2020

Show notes

The end of 2019 was remarkable in a lot of ways for Star Wars. One of those reasons was The Mandalorian, the first-ever live-action Star Wars series. It was so remarkable, in fact, that Disney is putting together an eight-part series under the "Disney Gallery" banner to go behind the scenes of the creation of The Mandalorian.

Today, we're following that series with a look at the first episode, "Directing." And we'll cite some notable elements about each of the directors. But as we go through this, we're also going to pay particular attention to Executive Producer Dave Filoni. This time, we'll get to hear him talk about this storytelling and animation background, leading up to his work on The Mandalorian. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

Episode 2,150. "Recontextualizing" With Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi May 23, 2020

Show notes

The "I am your father" reveal from The Empire Strikes Back is the ultimate "recontextualization" in cinema history. Recontextualization is a heavy word, one definition of which is:

To place or view (a work of literature or art, for example) in a new or unfamiliar context, especially in order to suggest a different interpretation.

As we've been comparing The Empire Strikes Back to The Last Jedi this week, we're going to wrap up the conversation with a discussion of recontextualizations. The Last Jedi has more than one of them, and so does Empire, for that matter. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,149. The Theme of Failure in Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi May 22, 2020

Show notes

I hinted at us coming to this episode earlier in the week, about a thematic similarity between The Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi. Well, here we are now: ready to talk about failure.

The Last Jedi wears this theme on its sleeve, so to speak - failure is actively spoken of, and Yoda identifies failure as one of the most important lessons Luke could ever have passed on to Jedi students. Luke, Leia, Rey, Poe, Finn, and Rose all faces failures in particular ways, and their character arcs are built around them learning lessons from those failures in order to succeed when things are at their darkest hour.

As it turns out, The Empire Strikes Back is very much about failure, too. We watch the Rebels suffer their first major onscreen defeat; we watch Luke fail time and again with Yoda on Dagobah; for every heroic deed by Han, the odds against his success get worse and worse until finally it all comes crashing down; and Leia, our take-charge heroine, has all control taken away from her.

We'll talk about this and more on today's episode... Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

2,148. Comparing the Structure of Empire Strikes Back and The Last Jedi May 21, 2020

Show notes

There was a funny meme going around back in the day, which had two images, which were the same shot of protesters with torches and pitchforks. And one photo depicted people complaining about The Force Awakens for being too much like the Star Wars of old, while the second photo depicted the same people complaining about The Last Jedi for being too different from the Star Wars of old.

Well, as it turns out, The Last Jedi has a lot more in common with The Empire Strikes Back than you might expect. Part of that is because of the setup J.J. Abrams gave Rian Johnson, and we'll explore those similarities (and a few differences) on today's episode. Punch it!

***I'm listener supported! Join the community at http://Patreon.com/sw7x7 to get access to bonus episodes and other insider rewards.***

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Star Wars 7×7: A Daily Bite-Sized Dose of Star Wars Joy

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected