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The Star Wars Birthday Special · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha. I'm welcome to Stephan
0:07
Speaker 1: never told your protection of I Heart Radio. Okay, before
0:19
Speaker 1: you start, can I just go ahead and interject here,
0:21
Speaker 1: because if you are listening on this day of it
0:24
Speaker 1: being published is August twenty four. I want to say
0:28
Speaker 1: the year because it doesn't matter. Which is Annie's birthday,
0:31
Speaker 1: Happy birthday, and so it is my birthday, which means
0:38
Speaker 1: I am going to do a very self indulgent rant
0:40
Speaker 1: on the feminism of Star Wars, mostly original trilogy stuff,
0:44
Speaker 1: because that's my favorite and it's my birthday. We've already
0:46
Speaker 1: done episodes on Leah, two parts on My pretty much
0:51
Speaker 1: all the movies, a bunch of the characters, so go
0:53
Speaker 1: to those of you want more facts and less feelings
0:56
Speaker 1: and fond ranting, which is what this is going to
0:59
Speaker 1: be and all. So, I'm like surprisingly nervous about this
1:01
Speaker 1: one because it's like, really, it's so near and dear
1:04
Speaker 1: to me. I know it's a matter of interpretation a
1:07
Speaker 1: lot of what I'm going to talk about, but it
1:09
Speaker 1: is how I interpret these movies, especially as I've grown
1:13
Speaker 1: older and become more aware of feminism. So I've been
1:18
Speaker 1: kind of putting it off and then we have like
1:19
Speaker 1: major technical difficulties. So if this episode sounds kind of strange, apologies,
1:25
Speaker 1: that's just what birthday is as an adult. During Bantomic podcast,
1:34
Speaker 1: I did want to start with a quick note about
1:38
Speaker 1: our recent Mary Sue episode. So as I often say,
1:43
Speaker 1: like when people call Ray and Mary Sue, which was
1:46
Speaker 1: a big thing, um, like why don't we ask whether
1:49
Speaker 1: or not Kyle and Maren is just bad? Because it
1:51
Speaker 1: seems like he's just bad. But I don't wanted to
1:54
Speaker 1: tract from how good Ray is either when I say that,
1:57
Speaker 1: I think both are true at once, because she was
2:00
Speaker 1: thinking about it. This is what I lie awake and
2:01
Speaker 1: think about at night. Uh. She is a scavenger. She
2:06
Speaker 1: grew up in harsh conditions, tough conditions. She knows how
2:11
Speaker 1: to use her staff really well, um, which is kind
2:15
Speaker 1: of similar to a lightsaber. She's got the fours, She's
2:18
Speaker 1: got all these things. So I just don't want to
2:19
Speaker 1: make it sound like I don't think she's she's really good.
2:24
Speaker 1: I also think Kyler Wine is bad, but that's just me.
2:27
Speaker 1: And so yeah, because it is my birthday, I have
2:29
Speaker 1: been watching a lot of Star Wars stuff, and right
2:33
Speaker 1: before this Samantha knows. I had to. I had to
2:36
Speaker 1: put it off before because I was watching two Star
2:40
Speaker 1: Wars documentaries at once. I was watching the one on
2:43
Speaker 1: Disney plus Light and Magic, which is about how industrial
2:47
Speaker 1: light and Magic got created, and it's not specifically Star Wars,
2:52
Speaker 1: but like the first four episodes are mostly Star Wars
2:56
Speaker 1: based because they sort of had to make this. The
2:58
Speaker 1: special effects and exist, so they sorted had to make it.
3:01
Speaker 1: And then I was also watching Empire Dreams, which is
3:04
Speaker 1: like two hours and thirty minutes. So I feel like
3:08
Speaker 1: my brain, I feel like I've been plugged into something
3:10
Speaker 1: and I've just absorbed a lot of information before this.
3:14
Speaker 1: But it was interesting because the contexts they gave around
3:19
Speaker 1: when these movies were coming out, just like n seven
3:23
Speaker 1: and you know, we had the Vietnam War, we had Nixon.
3:25
Speaker 1: People really disillusioned with what was going on. Um. This
3:31
Speaker 1: is when second wave feminism was happening, and there was
3:35
Speaker 1: a lot of hope for change. There was a lot
3:37
Speaker 1: of turmoil around around change, UM, and so a lot
3:42
Speaker 1: of movies at the time, especially science fiction movies, were
3:45
Speaker 1: kind of downers, and so Star Wars in a lot
3:50
Speaker 1: of ways, when a new Hope came out in ninety seven.
3:53
Speaker 1: It broke a lot of conventions at the time of
3:56
Speaker 1: movie making. It had it was hopeful, it was kind
4:01
Speaker 1: of lighter um it had a big symphony soundtrack, which
4:06
Speaker 1: I guess was not hip at the time. It's it
4:11
Speaker 1: cast a bunch of unknown actors. It was basically asking
4:16
Speaker 1: to create things that didn't exist, Like people had no
4:18
Speaker 1: idea how to shoot it. And so when I was
4:21
Speaker 1: watching and I was like, how did this get made?
4:24
Speaker 1: So many things had to go right for this to
4:25
Speaker 1: get made, and I didn't know this, but George Lucas
4:30
Speaker 1: and his team kind of had a hand in creating Pixar.
4:34
Speaker 1: They sold it to Steve Jobs and Apple, but I
4:37
Speaker 1: had no idea. And they did create a special effects
4:41
Speaker 1: field that didn't exist before. They created sound that didn't
4:45
Speaker 1: exist before. And then this was also when it's kind
4:49
Speaker 1: of ironic now. But George Lucas really didn't want to
4:53
Speaker 1: be beholden to studios. He didn't want them to be
4:56
Speaker 1: able to come in and say, no, you have to
4:58
Speaker 1: do this, or you have to teach this, you have
4:59
Speaker 1: to do this. Um. So so I was kind of
5:02
Speaker 1: independent films actually, which is yes ironic because Disney ended
5:06
Speaker 1: up buying the rights to them, but that kind of
5:10
Speaker 1: felt sort of feminist in nature. I don't know, like
5:13
Speaker 1: I'm not saying he's but like that idea. And then
5:16
Speaker 1: there was a funny scene where everything was like, this
5:19
Speaker 1: is mostly white men working on this. And there was
5:22
Speaker 1: a funny scene where everything was all schedule, nothing was
5:24
Speaker 1: getting done, and they brought in a woman's secretary and
5:28
Speaker 1: she basically like got them to to to shaping up,
5:33
Speaker 1: to to be on the schedule and to actually get
5:36
Speaker 1: things done. And then like, I really recommend watching them
5:39
Speaker 1: because they was like you could see how they did
5:42
Speaker 1: the special effects, it was so cool. And then you
5:44
Speaker 1: could see like the Matt paintings they did for the backgrounds,
5:48
Speaker 1: and they were so cool. It was just neat to
5:50
Speaker 1: see it happen. Uh. And then I didn't know this either.
5:55
Speaker 1: I knew Star Wars gets a lot of flak, a
5:57
Speaker 1: lot for in some people's minds ruining move. It definitely
6:01
Speaker 1: changed Hollywood and it changed the landscape of entertainment. But
6:05
Speaker 1: one of the things that people bring up a lot
6:07
Speaker 1: is merchandizing, and Star Wars and George Lucas were like
6:11
Speaker 1: the forefront of this of toys movies being made around toys,
6:16
Speaker 1: which is kind of what happens sometimes now, But back
6:19
Speaker 1: then it wasn't about that. He just wanted to own
6:22
Speaker 1: something outside of the studio that he could have and
6:25
Speaker 1: make money off of, and studios like at the time,
6:28
Speaker 1: movies didn't make money that way. That wasn't how it
6:32
Speaker 1: was done. Um, But he had an idea that, Okay,
6:37
Speaker 1: I think I can at least control this and get
6:40
Speaker 1: money from this outside of the studios. And boy was
6:43
Speaker 1: he right, because I recently went home to visit my
6:48
Speaker 1: mom for my birthday and she had found me all
6:52
Speaker 1: of these like old toys from a friend of hers grandfather,
6:59
Speaker 1: like they were thing is him into a new place,
7:02
Speaker 1: and in his garage he had all these old Star
7:04
Speaker 1: Wars toys and one of them is from If I
7:07
Speaker 1: had the box and if it was in better condition,
7:09
Speaker 1: the Internet tells me he would be worth a four
7:12
Speaker 1: team thousand. But I am keeping it. I'm keeping it.
7:17
Speaker 1: It is mine, UM, never gonna sell it. Please don't
7:21
Speaker 1: come after me for my toys. I'm very very excited
7:24
Speaker 1: about it. And I also didn't know I learned from
7:27
Speaker 1: watching this documentary that Kinner, who made the company that
7:32
Speaker 1: made a lot of the early Star Wars toys. They
7:36
Speaker 1: they didn't expect the popularity of it. A lot of
7:41
Speaker 1: companies didn't want to even do it, so they turned
7:44
Speaker 1: down the contracting down, but Kinner did and then it
7:46
Speaker 1: was so popular that people kids on Christmas would get
7:49
Speaker 1: like this voucher for a year from now, you'll be
7:53
Speaker 1: able to get this toy. We don't have it right now,
7:55
Speaker 1: but in a year you can get it. So that
8:01
Speaker 1: is a lot of preamble before I've even gotten into
8:05
Speaker 1: into the bulk of this, which again is going to
8:09
Speaker 1: be shorter, very self indulgent, mostly me. So yeah, I
8:15
Speaker 1: just when I've been watching them. I've been watching them
8:17
Speaker 1: a lot, as you know, the original trilogy, and I
8:21
Speaker 1: feel like the Force itself is pretty feminist in nature
8:26
Speaker 1: because it implies that you're you're in touch with your feelings,
8:31
Speaker 1: you're being empathetic. A lot of these sort of more
8:35
Speaker 1: emotional end quotes being in touch with your emotions that
8:39
Speaker 1: I think has been traditionally put on women, um, kind
8:44
Speaker 1: of a more associated with women trait. So you've got
8:48
Speaker 1: that throughout the movies and these messages of you know,
8:56
Speaker 1: being in touch with your emotions, but also being able
8:58
Speaker 1: to control and go your emotion and not let them
9:01
Speaker 1: control you. But if you think about the dark side, Um,
9:05
Speaker 1: the dark side, I would argue, is kind of toxic masculinity.
9:13
Speaker 1: A lot of people when they describe the dark side,
9:17
Speaker 1: it's kind of difficult to describe it, but a lot
9:19
Speaker 1: of people describe it as a drug. And if we
9:22
Speaker 1: think about, you know, toxic masculinity being this thing that's
9:25
Speaker 1: being pumped into our society from the moment we're born,
9:30
Speaker 1: that we're just kind of immersed with it and not
9:33
Speaker 1: know it. Are like the patriarchy perhaps, um, then I
9:38
Speaker 1: can see the dark side being representative of of that.
9:44
Speaker 1: And it's this promise of power and yeah, a promise
9:51
Speaker 1: of power and kind of a promise that you won't
9:55
Speaker 1: It's a very possessive thing. So I know, we talked
9:57
Speaker 1: about this briefly in one of our past happy hours
10:00
Speaker 1: about the whole uproar around like attachment and Jedi possessive
10:06
Speaker 1: love is a key is a testament of the dark side.
10:10
Speaker 1: It's the love you're so afraid to lose that you
10:13
Speaker 1: would do anything to keep it, even if it means
10:16
Speaker 1: killing all of these young things which is what Anakin
10:19
Speaker 1: did to try to save his family and in doing
10:22
Speaker 1: so actually ripped his family apart and potentially led to
10:26
Speaker 1: the death of pat Me, his wife. Like it always
10:30
Speaker 1: makes me sigh when I have to talk, when I
10:33
Speaker 1: have to talk, when I talk about I want to
10:35
Speaker 1: talk about it. But the so the thing with attachment
10:39
Speaker 1: as it was originally intended, and I think it has
10:41
Speaker 1: shifted around as other creators have come in and done things,
10:45
Speaker 1: uh and put their own mark on the story. Originally
10:48
Speaker 1: it was meant to be attachment. It's not the problem.
10:51
Speaker 1: It's like possessive attachment. You have to be able to
10:54
Speaker 1: let go of the attachment, and the dark side is
10:57
Speaker 1: you can't let go usually because you're too afraid to. So,
11:16
Speaker 1: you know, I got to talk about Luke because I
11:18
Speaker 1: love him, um. And again we've already done two episodes
11:21
Speaker 1: on my so please check those out, and we are
11:23
Speaker 1: going to mention her because I can't not mention her. Um.
11:25
Speaker 1: But I do think it's interesting how Luke in particular
11:28
Speaker 1: interacts with the Force because you've got Obi Wan and
11:33
Speaker 1: Yoda telling him he has to confront his father, Darth
11:36
Speaker 1: Vader to become a Jedi, to become this thing that
11:39
Speaker 1: he wants to be, and I would say mostly wants
11:42
Speaker 1: to be because of his father, and Luke saying that
11:46
Speaker 1: he can't do it um because he is so strongly
11:49
Speaker 1: in the belief that he can feel I feel that
11:53
Speaker 1: there is still good in Darth Vader, which again I
11:56
Speaker 1: just think is such a how many times I've women
11:59
Speaker 1: been this smissed because of feelings or because of emotions,
12:04
Speaker 1: were being emotional, but this was a really for me.
12:08
Speaker 1: It was a powerful thing for him to say, like, no,
12:10
Speaker 1: I can feel this, and I'm not going to to
12:14
Speaker 1: betray that feeling or like go with that feeling. And
12:16
Speaker 1: that's you know, when pad May died, that was the
12:18
Speaker 1: last thing she said, like there's still good in him.
12:20
Speaker 1: I can feel it. And so after Luke turns himself
12:24
Speaker 1: over to Vader, who then turns him over to the Emperor,
12:27
Speaker 1: which is, by the way, one of my favorite lines
12:29
Speaker 1: is when Luke says, come with me, I love that um. Anyway,
12:33
Speaker 1: the Emperor is urging Luke to embrace his anger given
12:38
Speaker 1: to his aggression and kill his father and take his
12:43
Speaker 1: father's place, and violence and anger are stereotypically masculine traits
12:50
Speaker 1: are more masculine associated and so when Luke does that,
12:54
Speaker 1: when he does give into that, he almost loses himself
12:58
Speaker 1: to the dark side and continues this cycle of violence.
13:02
Speaker 1: Cuts off his father's hand where his father had cut
13:05
Speaker 1: off his hand before him, And in my opinion, his
13:08
Speaker 1: act of heroism is throwing away his weapon, which is
13:12
Speaker 1: a very phallic weapon, by the way, and refusing to fight,
13:16
Speaker 1: to let not to let those things control him um
13:20
Speaker 1: and embracing those more feminine coded traits. And this act
13:26
Speaker 1: that he does brings out the empathy and love and
13:28
Speaker 1: Darth Vader and breaks the cycle. Luke also rejects the
13:32
Speaker 1: old Jedi order as well as the Empire, much like
13:36
Speaker 1: feminism demands systemic change. And I don't we're not talking
13:39
Speaker 1: about sequel because it's my birthday. They don't want to.
13:41
Speaker 1: But in the in the original trilogy, if we kind
13:44
Speaker 1: of have that ending, and I'd like to believe that
13:46
Speaker 1: that's when it was. But yeah, just rejecting that offer
13:53
Speaker 1: of power, of feeling like you can protect, that you
13:57
Speaker 1: can control things that are ultimately out of your control
14:01
Speaker 1: because you're so powerful. Throwing away the lightsaber, throwing away
14:05
Speaker 1: the weapon, UM. I've just always felt was sort of
14:10
Speaker 1: a tacit rejection of the patriarchy, toxic masculinity. Again, I
14:17
Speaker 1: could be reading into these where it's not meant to
14:18
Speaker 1: be written to, but I'm going to do it because
14:20
Speaker 1: I love it. And then there is the aspect of
14:24
Speaker 1: forgiveness and family, which uh certainly at the heart of
14:30
Speaker 1: this original trilogy, and I think does have some aspects
14:35
Speaker 1: that I feel anyway are are more leaning towards women,
14:44
Speaker 1: um are being a like feminine coded trait, because as
14:47
Speaker 1: we've discussed, forgiveness is tricky. Um it's often associated with women.
14:53
Speaker 1: Women are more expected to forgive. And so when you
14:57
Speaker 1: have O. B One saying like, oh he has already
15:00
Speaker 1: one after Luke says he can't kill his own father,
15:04
Speaker 1: it kind of reads differently when you know what we
15:09
Speaker 1: wanted to anakin as do a lot of things. Once
15:11
Speaker 1: the prequels come out, of the sequels come out, um,
15:14
Speaker 1: it can change your your interpretation for sure, But it
15:19
Speaker 1: does kind of feel manipulative. And I think a lot
15:21
Speaker 1: of ways that some of us have felt manipulated into
15:25
Speaker 1: these interactions of how things are supposed to be. And
15:29
Speaker 1: I also think like the whole story of Luke wanting
15:35
Speaker 1: always looking towards the horizon and thinking about his father
15:39
Speaker 1: and wanting to be like his father, and then meets
15:43
Speaker 1: finds out the truth, meets him and it's like the
15:46
Speaker 1: ultimate disappointment, I mean the ultimate disappointment, um, which kind
15:51
Speaker 1: of threatens like a part of who he thinks, who
15:53
Speaker 1: Luke thinks he is, and what he could be. Uh.
15:57
Speaker 1: And then you get Darth Vader threatening Leah, who is
16:04
Speaker 1: Luke's last remaining family, and that's what sets him off
16:07
Speaker 1: into almost giving into the dark side. It's that kind
16:10
Speaker 1: of similar fear around around the people you care about.
16:15
Speaker 1: It's also really sad, Like this is probably a different podcast,
16:19
Speaker 1: but Vader's story is quite tragic. I know he did
16:23
Speaker 1: a terrible things. I'm not forgetting that, but he like
16:26
Speaker 1: it is kind of sad that the Emperor was like, yeah,
16:29
Speaker 1: just kill that guy who's been my right hand since
16:32
Speaker 1: forever and you will replace him. When all Vader wanted
16:39
Speaker 1: was his family. That's what started this whole thing. He
16:40
Speaker 1: just wanted his family, UM. And I mean there's a
16:44
Speaker 1: bunch of other things. There's like trauma for sure, UM
16:48
Speaker 1: and grooming, and he just really needed he needed some help. Um.
16:57
Speaker 1: But he really wanted family. Uh, and he'll never I'll
17:02
Speaker 1: never see his son's smile or hear him laugh or
17:05
Speaker 1: know him saying with Leah, his daughter, Um, and their
17:09
Speaker 1: relationship is characterized by fear and pain and sadness and loss.
17:14
Speaker 1: But at the end it's hope. I mean, there's still hope.
17:18
Speaker 1: And I know, like probably a lot of you saw this,
17:20
Speaker 1: but recently this picture did the rounds where Um, it
17:24
Speaker 1: was after the Canoe Show came out and Hayden Christensen
17:28
Speaker 1: was with the actors. He's like hugging the actors who
17:31
Speaker 1: play Luke and Little Luke and Leah and the show,
17:34
Speaker 1: and everybody was like, Oh, that's the only time he's
17:36
Speaker 1: gonna it was so oh, it was so sad um.
17:48
Speaker 1: And then this this again might be my own interpretation,
17:53
Speaker 1: but even as a kid, I always kind of felt
17:57
Speaker 1: like Luke's change and demeanor from Empire strikes back to
18:01
Speaker 1: Return of the Jedi. It always made me sad because
18:04
Speaker 1: it feels like Luke's trying to be something he's not,
18:07
Speaker 1: Like he's trying to force himself to be this certain
18:10
Speaker 1: way to play this role, which is also something I
18:14
Speaker 1: think a lot of women feel. Um. But like he
18:18
Speaker 1: can't show emotion all of these things. He feels like
18:22
Speaker 1: he can't do that. I thought made him special when
18:26
Speaker 1: I was younger, because I would like watch it and
18:28
Speaker 1: I the things I loved about him, or you know,
18:30
Speaker 1: he was so genuine, He wore as hard on his sleeve.
18:33
Speaker 1: He was so kind and gentle, and he's still those things.
18:36
Speaker 1: But like it just felt um, like he was trying
18:41
Speaker 1: so hard, Like he was so scared of Darth Vader
18:44
Speaker 1: and becoming Darth Vader. He was grieving the loss of
18:49
Speaker 1: his father figure that he'd wanted his whole life. Um,
18:53
Speaker 1: And he finds out, you know, this person stands against
18:55
Speaker 1: everything that does, has committed truly attrocious crimes um, some
18:58
Speaker 1: against his closest friends. They're on opposite sides of the war.
19:02
Speaker 1: Um and cut off his hand. You know that that
19:06
Speaker 1: fear of what he could be, of what Darth Vader is,
19:11
Speaker 1: led him into really cutting off his emotions and becoming
19:14
Speaker 1: closed off of being this Jedi he believes he needs
19:17
Speaker 1: to be, which I would argue he was at the
19:21
Speaker 1: end perfect, Like he was someone who was compassionate and
19:26
Speaker 1: caring and all of these things. Um. But there's also
19:32
Speaker 1: a morning element too, you know, you got all the
19:34
Speaker 1: black clothes, which are of course reminiscent of Vader. But
19:37
Speaker 1: also yeah, so so that's suggestive of you know, Okay,
19:41
Speaker 1: this could happen to Luke. It was definitely meant to
19:43
Speaker 1: make you think, oh, he could become like Darth Vader
19:45
Speaker 1: when it first came out, but also this loss of
19:48
Speaker 1: you know, who he thought his father was, of this
19:50
Speaker 1: innocence that he had had, and of course, you know,
19:53
Speaker 1: it's also coming of age story and in a way
19:56
Speaker 1: this control that he's exhibiting, and which in The Jedi,
20:00
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure it was meant to be interpreted as like,
20:04
Speaker 1: oh um, he grew up. He's not so whiny anymore.
20:11
Speaker 1: I think, you know, that's what it was meant to be.
20:13
Speaker 1: But when I was watching it as a kid, it
20:14
Speaker 1: always made me feel sad because he had he had
20:17
Speaker 1: this sort of brightness to him, and then it was
20:20
Speaker 1: like he felt he had to hide it. But yeah,
20:22
Speaker 1: I guess in some ways there's always something sad about
20:24
Speaker 1: letting go of childhood and becoming an adult. But yeah,
20:30
Speaker 1: that's in the end. I've always loved the ending he
20:33
Speaker 1: returned the Jedi because in the end, Darth Vader and
20:36
Speaker 1: Luke choose each other. Um. And when Luke does this,
20:41
Speaker 1: throws away his weapon his father. He chooses his father
20:46
Speaker 1: and family over power, over this temptation of the dark side.
20:51
Speaker 1: It's something that the Emperor cannot understand, so he is
20:54
Speaker 1: surprised when Vader returns the selfless Act, the selfless Act
20:58
Speaker 1: and saves Luke. Uh. And just that like having faith,
21:02
Speaker 1: having faith in each other. So yeah, I mean, clearly
21:06
Speaker 1: I've been talking about it already, but I do think
21:11
Speaker 1: that lucas a nontraditional hero, and that was one of
21:14
Speaker 1: the things I loved about him, still love about him.
21:16
Speaker 1: I think he was a really good balance of traditionally
21:19
Speaker 1: like typically masculine coded traits and feminine coded traits in
21:23
Speaker 1: a way that doesn't feel I would almost say like
21:26
Speaker 1: we're allotting the the more feminine coded traits over the
21:30
Speaker 1: masculine ones, because he's sort of like reckless and hot
21:34
Speaker 1: headed and all this stuff that I would say is
21:36
Speaker 1: typically more masculine, not always though not always. Um, But
21:40
Speaker 1: the things that I at least was always like, oh
21:43
Speaker 1: my gosh, this is so great is that he does have.
21:47
Speaker 1: It's kind of really empathetic kindness, about him. This is
21:53
Speaker 1: sounding so like man can't be that. They can obviously,
21:57
Speaker 1: but but it's just I feel like in our media,
22:01
Speaker 1: the way those things play out is like that, Um,
22:04
Speaker 1: he's got you know, he does wear his heart on
22:06
Speaker 1: his sleeve. A lot of people have made connections between Physically,
22:14
Speaker 1: he's not your traditional hero or at least in our
22:17
Speaker 1: more modern times. Like he's pretty, He's on the smaller side.
22:20
Speaker 1: He is kind of pretty. He's got a bit of
22:23
Speaker 1: ire voice. Um, I'm always struck by how small he
22:28
Speaker 1: is compared to to Darth Vader at the end. Um
22:32
Speaker 1: and then his fashion, Oh my gosh, I found this
22:35
Speaker 1: whole corner of the internet was like Luke Skywalker gay
22:38
Speaker 1: fashion icon and it's the best and I highly recommenzed.
22:41
Speaker 1: It's a lot of good memes. The channel boots, Shutel, yes,
22:46
Speaker 1: I know you've shown me. You've shown me a few times,
22:50
Speaker 1: as well as yelling to the screen the Chanel boots
22:54
Speaker 1: and I'm not even putting that justice. There's no other
22:57
Speaker 1: reference but the Chanel boots. But as much as I
23:01
Speaker 1: love that, there is the question of you know, clearly
23:04
Speaker 1: they intended Luke, and in my opinion, it clearly intended
23:08
Speaker 1: Luke and Lead to end up together before they knew,
23:11
Speaker 1: before the story changed and they became brother and sister.
23:13
Speaker 1: So that's why we get kind of some of those
23:15
Speaker 1: more awkward moments of between them and the earlier ones.
23:19
Speaker 1: But for me, they always just had it. They had
23:21
Speaker 1: a chemistry that was like run their and sister. That
23:23
Speaker 1: could also be because I don't know a time before
23:26
Speaker 1: I've seen it, so I just never I was always like, no,
23:29
Speaker 1: their brother and sister. Um. And it does make sense
23:32
Speaker 1: to me you would feel through the force a connection
23:36
Speaker 1: to someone immediately if they were your long astwin uh,
23:41
Speaker 1: and you might not know what that is and you
23:42
Speaker 1: might misinterpret that as attraction. But also, you know, I
23:47
Speaker 1: think in a New Hope, Luke was definitely trying to
23:50
Speaker 1: play the role of hero and failing pretty good. So
23:56
Speaker 1: he thought that was like the things the hero goes
23:58
Speaker 1: and rescues the damsel distress, and it turns out, Leia,
24:02
Speaker 1: it doesn't really need him, and in fact, it's going
24:04
Speaker 1: to take control of this whole situation for you, which
24:07
Speaker 1: I love, which I love, but um, it has brought
24:11
Speaker 1: up that, like you know, I personally always loved that
24:15
Speaker 1: there was not a really big romance for for Luke
24:19
Speaker 1: in these movies, and even like Han and Leiah is there,
24:23
Speaker 1: but it's not too much. Um. But the way people
24:26
Speaker 1: have interpreted it can sometimes be problematic because it's like
24:29
Speaker 1: automatically he's coded as gay or even a lot of
24:33
Speaker 1: people a sexual, which again is fine, Like I don't
24:37
Speaker 1: think there's necessarily anything wrong with that, but it's almost
24:42
Speaker 1: I just wonder if there's some element of he can't
24:46
Speaker 1: possibly be the romantic interests leading man because he does
24:50
Speaker 1: have these qualities that are more associated perhaps with women. UM,
24:54
Speaker 1: but that could just be me. Also, interestingly, I was
24:58
Speaker 1: just talking about this with somebody that a day. I
25:01
Speaker 1: do think the character of Han solo the way people
25:06
Speaker 1: received him changed how they wrote him, if that makes sense,
25:11
Speaker 1: because I think, um, you know, he was sort of
25:14
Speaker 1: the bad boy, doesn't like to care, it's not cool
25:17
Speaker 1: to care, which seemed to really resonate with um A
25:22
Speaker 1: lot of men who want to be him, but also
25:24
Speaker 1: a lot of women, um who want to date him.
25:28
Speaker 1: You know, it doesn't hurt that he was handsome, but
25:31
Speaker 1: but like that whole bad boy aspect, I would love
25:33
Speaker 1: to come back, come back to that, but that's one
25:35
Speaker 1: of the reasons. I think that scene you know who
25:37
Speaker 1: shot first greeno Han who shot only has changed so much.
25:42
Speaker 1: And also yea, as our friend Holly Fry has said
25:46
Speaker 1: to me before, she thinks like Han solo might have
25:50
Speaker 1: ruined the whole generation. And then I know, I said,
25:55
Speaker 1: I wasn't going to talk about those equals because it's
25:57
Speaker 1: my birthday, but I did want to briefly mention like
25:59
Speaker 1: you Grumpy Luke and the sequels. I think you could
26:03
Speaker 1: read it as like the ultimate burnout one but too
26:08
Speaker 1: kind of being tired in the feminist movement, fighting the
26:11
Speaker 1: fight and then seeing all this stuff happen and giving
26:15
Speaker 1: up or hiding away, and then Ray coming in and
26:17
Speaker 1: being like the next wave of feminism. Um, And I know,
26:23
Speaker 1: I mean, I have to mention it. We did a
26:26
Speaker 1: whole two party episode on Leiah, but it is worth
26:28
Speaker 1: mentioning her again because she is amazing and I love her.
26:30
Speaker 1: I love her. I know there was a lot of
26:33
Speaker 1: stuff around filming with her that wasn't great, and we
26:37
Speaker 1: talked about that in those two part episodes. I go
26:39
Speaker 1: check those out, But I like, as a kid, I
26:41
Speaker 1: didn't have there weren't that any characters like her, and
26:44
Speaker 1: I just remember respecting her immediately, like she is in charge.
26:49
Speaker 1: I loved her. I think she changed my life. I
26:52
Speaker 1: don't know if I hadn't had her, I don't know.
26:56
Speaker 1: I don't know, so just she fills me with morength
27:00
Speaker 1: and gratitude. To be honest, I do love the dichotomy
27:04
Speaker 1: of Luke and Leia. I know a lot of people
27:06
Speaker 1: don't like that they turned out to be twins, and
27:08
Speaker 1: I will say that probably I don't think everyone had
27:14
Speaker 1: to follow their lead. But the whole idea of like, well,
27:16
Speaker 1: now everybody has to be connected to somebody related to
27:18
Speaker 1: somebody has seeped into so much of our entertainment and
27:21
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be that way, and in fact,
27:23
Speaker 1: it can be very annoying, but in this case, I
27:25
Speaker 1: did like, I do love the dichotomy of their experiences. Uh.
27:31
Speaker 1: In fan fiction, they're known as the Chaos Twins, and
27:36
Speaker 1: Luke is often kind of described as like he looks
27:38
Speaker 1: like Anakin is but it's more like pad May and demeanor,
27:41
Speaker 1: whereas Leia it looks like pad May but is more
27:45
Speaker 1: like Anakin in demeanor. And they're both they're both like
27:48
Speaker 1: both with their parents, and I know alas the diplomat Um,
27:53
Speaker 1: but she's definitely in fan fiction she's called like the
27:55
Speaker 1: Firecracker and should be so annoyed to know she's more
27:57
Speaker 1: like Anakin than pad May. But this is all also
28:01
Speaker 1: up for interpretation because Luke has often depicted as like,
28:04
Speaker 1: oh look, leta look at this flower, and she's like,
28:06
Speaker 1: IM gonna go to wire. Couldn't don't bother me? But
28:09
Speaker 1: I didn't write that. I really enjoy and uh yeah,
28:13
Speaker 1: I think that's my saddest. I love reading stories and
28:17
Speaker 1: fan fiction where one their twin swapped. So Luke goes
28:22
Speaker 1: to alter On becomes Prince of alter On, and she
28:25
Speaker 1: Lea goes to Tattooed becomes a Jedi. But I also
28:27
Speaker 1: just love That's the thing that is sad to me
28:30
Speaker 1: is that we never got to see them kind of
28:32
Speaker 1: discovering their sibling relationship and how that plays out. And
28:37
Speaker 1: so that's one of my absolute favorite pantictions to read
28:41
Speaker 1: is them. Okay, well, thank you so much for letting
28:45
Speaker 1: me have this ranch on my birthday. And I'm sure
28:50
Speaker 1: I have so much stuff that there might be a
28:52
Speaker 1: bit of a mess or that I'll have I will
28:55
Speaker 1: I'll want to add later I'll be lying awake tonight
28:57
Speaker 1: thinking about it because I don't worry. I didn't write
28:59
Speaker 1: this one out as much as I normally do. I'm
29:02
Speaker 1: sure I will come back in the future, but I
29:06
Speaker 1: hope it was enjoyable with my gushing fangirl gushing and
29:10
Speaker 1: I love it. The one thing I did request after
29:13
Speaker 1: knowing that we were doing this, I was like, Okay,
29:15
Speaker 1: have we truly done? And like a quiz because we
29:18
Speaker 1: love to do our little quizzes on things about what
29:22
Speaker 1: woman character from the Star Wars world we would do
29:27
Speaker 1: would be be So I need you to take this
29:29
Speaker 1: quiz if you haven't already, and then tell me who
29:32
Speaker 1: you are, and then I'll tell you who I am.
29:35
Speaker 1: Let's take this quiz. This is gonna happen in real
29:37
Speaker 1: time because I haven't taken it yet, so I don't know.
29:40
Speaker 1: But if I get someone I really don't like, it's
29:43
Speaker 1: mostly the deudes I don't like it. Here we go go.
30:00
Speaker 1: So if listeners you want to take the quiz with us,
30:02
Speaker 1: we did the Star Wars dot com uh International Women's
30:06
Speaker 1: Day Quiz, so it is specifically from Star Wars. Whether
30:11
Speaker 1: you think that's good or not. But I was trying
30:13
Speaker 1: to be a little more legitimate in our quizzes. Who
30:19
Speaker 1: are you? What did it say? Oh? I got um Oh,
30:24
Speaker 1: I'm not even sure. I don't pronounce this. I got
30:26
Speaker 1: infas nest. Who is that? So she's in Um, she's
30:31
Speaker 1: in Solo, which is the only movie we haven't done,
30:33
Speaker 1: and we'll have to come back and do it because
30:34
Speaker 1: I know you like that one. She's the at the
30:37
Speaker 1: end with the wild red hair who kind of takes control,
30:41
Speaker 1: um of the whole situation. Yeah. So it says you
30:44
Speaker 1: keep your true self hidden beneath a mask, but in
30:46
Speaker 1: time of those who tries to get to know who
30:48
Speaker 1: you really are, a person who is trying to help
30:50
Speaker 1: those in need. Oh dang better they went real deep. Um,
30:55
Speaker 1: well I was said that I'm ray all right. Yeah,
31:01
Speaker 1: you don't need anyone to hold your hand with or
31:03
Speaker 1: without the force as your ally. You are truly a
31:06
Speaker 1: force to be reckoned with. Very interesting answers. What is
31:10
Speaker 1: your reaction? Are you disappointed or not? Layah? This is
31:13
Speaker 1: going to sound kind of silly, but I'm like, I
31:15
Speaker 1: don't know if I'm cool enough to be like Okay, Well,
31:22
Speaker 1: thank you so much again for going on this journey
31:24
Speaker 1: with me. Well, happy birthday. I'm glad we need to
31:27
Speaker 1: talk about it, and sorry for any technical difficulties that
31:31
Speaker 1: have come up. Hopefully it's all good and I rest assured.
31:35
Speaker 1: I'm sure we'll revisit some of these things later. Are
31:38
Speaker 1: are be terrified? I'm not sure which? Uh? In the meantime,
31:41
Speaker 1: if you would like to email us that you can
31:43
Speaker 1: or email Stuff Media mom Stuff at i heeart media
31:45
Speaker 1: dot com. You can find us on Twitter at mom
31:47
Speaker 1: stff podcast or Instagram at stuff I Never Told You.
31:49
Speaker 1: Thanks as always to our super producer Christina. Thank you, Christina,
31:53
Speaker 1: and thanks to you for listening Stuff and Never Told
31:55
Speaker 1: his production of I Heart Radio. For more podcast from
31:57
Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, you can visit me a Heart Radio app,
31:58
Speaker 1: Apple podcast, or revery list into your favorite shows