Star Wars: How the Saga Began

 

     In 1977, an epic movie was released, combining mythology and technology (as its writer put it) in detailing the adventures of a galaxy far, far away, in which two rival factions fought for control.  This epic movie, Star Wars: A New Hope was part of the second (though released first) of two trilogies detailing the life of two brilliant fighters, Anakin Skywalker, and his son, Luke (SuperShadow 1).  These two trilogies (the last movie of the first trilogy is due out in May) have grossed almost three and a half billion dollars (Nash 1).  Even more significant is the impact it has had on American culture; it is perhaps the most influential movie ever.  However, the director and writer of this series, George Lucas, did not have this box office hit simply fabricate in his mind; Lucas combined elements from traditional archetypes, moviemaker Akira Kurosawa’s samurai films crossed with “Flash Gordon”, and other science fiction entertainment, to create the ultimate outer space adventure.

     In most stories, the characters and their lives are modeled after specific archetypes, or something that served as the model or pattern for other things of the same type, accredited to ancient mythology (MSN 1).  In writing Star Wars, George Lucas discovered a book by Joseph Campbell speaking of these archetypes, The Hero With a Thousand Faces (Brennan 4).  This book gave evidence to support the claim that all stories, whether myths or plays, have the same basic setup about a hero’s journey.  This idea was expanded from the theories of a Swiss psychiatrist by the name of Carl Jung, who proposed that all people subconsciously have relatively the same model of a hero and his life of adventure.  Campbell’s extension of this thinking helped Lucas shape his final Star Wars Trilogy (he had written two drafts before diving into Campbell’s book) (Ibid).

     Campbell suggests the basic outline to a hero’s journey that all adventures follow, beginning with the call to adventure, then supernatural help, followed by an inescapable situation, the road of trials, meeting with goddess, temptation from good path, becoming God-like, the ultimate gain, celebration, and finally the freedom to live (Brennan 4).  In Star Wars, this outline is evident, with Luke’s hearing of Leia’s call for help, Luke’s help from Obi-wan, to the bottom of the trash compactor, to his Jedi training, meeting with Leia, temptation toward the Dark side, becoming a Jedi, to finally destroying the Death Star, being awarded for his work, and knowing that the galaxy is safe.  More broadly, Campbell also suggests elements that all stories have including two sides, the mentor, the oracle, the prophecy, and a character who the hero does not know if he can trust.  Once again, Star Wars fits this model, with the two sides being the Empire versus the Rebels, the mentor being Obi-wan, the oracle being Yoda, the prophecy being that Luke is the one to overthrow that empire, and Han Solo as the not so trustworthy character.  With this outline, one can insert any hero’s adventure (Ibid).

     Not only the findings of Joseph Campbell identify archetypes, however.  Many others can be found, including the savior archetype, a title given to anyone who saves the universe, as often in ancient mythology.  Luke is the galaxy’s savior in Star Wars (Sagolla 1).  Also, there is the rebel order archetype which is given to the (usually good) group being taken over.  Usually the savior works for this group. In Star Wars, this group is obviously the Rebel forces.  Also, there is the oppressive order archetype, which is usually bad, and given to the group that has taken control of the world.  The rebel archetype usually fights the oppressors.  Many times the oppressive order has a strong, seemingly invincible, leader. In Star Wars this is the Imperial forces.  Finally there is the old man or mentor archetype that is given to the trainer or father figure of the saver of the world.  This archetype is respected and contributes the most in shaping the hero.  This archetype is Yoda and/or Obi-wan in Star Wars.  With the help of Joseph Campbell, and mythological archetypes, Star Wars was perfected into a “modern myth” (Ibid). 

     Though Joseph Campbell played an integral part in the final shaping of the Trilogies journey, the actual ideas for the feature were modified by Lucas crossing the samurai movies of Akira Kurosawa and the 1930’s serial “Flash Gordon”.  Lucas looked to form ideas from Kurosawa’s Hidden Fortress, Sanjuro, and Yojimbo, and then add the setting and language of “Flash Gordon” (Brennan 3).  Lucas took ideas in the work of Kurosawa, such as the feuding peasants (who would become R2-D2 and C-3PO), an evil general with a change of heart (Vader), the cantina fight scene, and even a symbol that strikingly resembles the Imperial emblem.  In a way, however, Lucas was not borrowing Kurosawa’s ideas, but taking them back to the U.S.  Kurosawa was known for his brilliance in taking American westerns and detective stories, and turning them into samurai tales.  His Yojimbo was a converted samurai movie based on Dashiell Hammett’s 1928 book, Red Harvest (Brennan 3).  If Lucas took the story from Kurosawa he definitely stole the overall atmosphere of “Flash Gordon”.  Elements such as the Imperial versus Rebels, Cloud City, and even the well-known Star Wars roll-up, are present in both features.  The ideas of amazing technology may date back further than “Flash Gordon” to the sci-fi comic strips of Buck Rodgers (who had many of the same guns, clothes, spaceships, gadgets, and creatures as “Flash Gordon”) and even back to novelist H.G. Wells’ 1895 book The Time Machine, in which amazing technology is the fairytale magic (Brennan 2).  Thus, through combining two distinctly different genres, Lucas created the world of Star Wars (Ibid).

     Though Campbell, Kurosawa, and “Flash Gordon” set the skeleton to Lucas’ mastermind, they certainly were not the complete story.  Perhaps the most similar work to Lucas’ Star Wars is the 1963 Frank Herbert novel, Dune, the first sci-fi novel to show that the genre could indeed show literary depth and complexity (Brennan 7).  Earlier writings of Lucas’ script were more like Dune than that of the final product; however, its influences are evident, including the familiar princess (Leia in Star Wars Alia in Dune), the villain turning out to be a relative (he is the hero’s grandfather in Dune), moisture farmers (dew collectors in Dune), a mind trick to control the actions of others (the “voice” in Dune), a training technique which gives internal control and supernatural power in combat (Jedi Bendu in Star Wars, Prana Bindu in Dune), a monopoly on shipping in space (the Trade Federation has this in Star Wars, the Spacing guild in Dune), a sand crawler used in both for mining, Luke and Alia both practice lightsaber and sword techniques against some sort of automated training tool, and finally the similarity between Jabba in Star Wars and Leto II in Dune, both a slug thing that has facial expressions and sits on top of a platform (Ibid).

     Also, many of the advanced spacecraft of Lucas’ masterpiece are descendants of 2001: A Space Odyssey and Space: 1999 (Brennan 9).  This happening makes sense, considering that one of the designers of spacecraft in the aforementioned also worked on Star Wars (Brennan 8).  Yet another sci-fi ancestor of Star Wars is Forbidden Planet.  Star Wars takes many of the setting ideas from this remake of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, such as the video projection of Princess Leia, and the Theed Generator Station (Ibid).

     Yet another movie that influenced Star Wars is Ben-Hur (Brennan 10).  The two film’s striking similarities reveal much to show that though in completely different worlds, movies can be the same.  The two share some sort of important race (pod in Star Wars and chariot in Ben-Hur), the hero’s racing foe (Sebulba in Star Wars, Messala in Ben-Hur), a pro-hatred speech to the hero, and finally a short pot-bellied character who sponsors the hero in the race and bets heavily (Watto in Star Wars and Sheik Ilderim in Ben-Hur) (Ibid).

     Lucas would not have written Star Wars without the inspiration of the first writer of space stories, E.E. “Doc” Smith, who wrote Galactic Patrol (Brennan 12).  This book about warriors who keep peace in a galaxy has formed the idea for Jedi, called so because of “Jidai Geki”, which were Japanese dramas about samurai (Brennan 3).  Also in early writings of Star Wars, Lucas calls the good side of the force Arislan (Arisians were the good warriors in Galactic Patrol), and the dark side Bogan (the bad antagonists in Galactic Patrol were the Boskone).  Also, Smith mentions Coruscant in his book over ten times (Brennan 12).

     Perhaps the most desired gadget out of all movies and literature is the light saber, with its unyielding power and low hum that brings death to those who are struck.  However, from where did this idea originate?  One theory is that it was derived from Loki’s fire sword in Norse mythology (Brennan 13).  “Star Trek” also had laser weapons.  However, it most likely was from Isaac Asimov’s Foundation, which mentioned a pen-knife with a force field (Ibid).  Wherever the light saber’s origins are rooted, however; it is safe to say that it is one of the most popular fictitious pieces of weaponry ever.

     There are many other, lesser details Lucas has drawn from different places to create Star Wars.  The name Skywalker, for example, may come from the Norse god Loki, who is also called Loptr, which is sometimes translated as Skywalker.  Also, it is interesting to note that the Imperials compare quite well to the Nazis, and other fascists who had matching uniforms and a group sign on the sleeve.  Also, taken directly from the Nazi propaganda film Triumph of Will, in which Hitler and two generals walk through a large army standing at attention, was the throne room march in which Luke and company get their medals.  Also, the final attack on the Death Star is greatly influenced by the WWII movie The Dam Busters, in which a flying squad has to destroy an essential German dam with one bomb.  The Death Star scene takes specific camera shots and even dialogue that The Dam Busters has.  On the lighter side, when making the characters Newt Gunray and Lott Dodd, Lucas used names of politicians (Newt Gunray is Newt Gingrich and Ronald Reagan, Lott Dodd is Trent Lott and Christopher Dodd) (Brennan 16).  As evident, Lucas masterfully extracted others ideas, altered them, and created the Star Wars Trilogies.

     Obviously, Star Wars was not just an original fantasy in the mind of George Lucas, nor was it a simple action adventure film but a cinema masterpiece, complete with archetypes galore and as many complexities as a piece of literature.  It included amazing research, astonishing writing, and most of all, an excellent imagination to combine so many diverse ideas into a single, industry changing film that will always be a favorite.

 

Research Paper

 

     Unlike many of the papers I wrote this year, I was interested in the topic I chose; the origins and archetypes in Star Wars.  This idea interested me greatly (also, the 3^rd movie of the trilogy was coming out in a month), and I decided to legitimately take this topic and write on it.  To my surprise, I found a ton of information on the origins of Star Wars.  I was intrigued to learn that George Lucas combined so many different elements from literature and other movies to make his masterpiece.  It was also interesting to note the comparison Star Wars had to so many other works of art, and the model archetypes it contained.  I was truly interested in my topic, and found enjoyment out of learning about the origins of one of my favorite movies.

     Though I did not ace this paper (as some may say), I still learned quite a bit about writing from it.  Besides the writing I did, I learned how the great writer Lucas wrote, and how he combined so many elements of art into a single, original piece.  This paper truly was interesting, learning about the best movie of all time, and about its origins.