From: wplogan@ocf.berkeley.edu (William P. Logan)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.starwars
Subject: Re: Just how much of SW did Lucas make up as he went along??????
Date: 28 Jul 1992 22:17:52 GMT
Organization: U. C. Berkeley's Overloaded Computing Facility
NNTP-Posting-Host: bigbang.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Jul28.163425.4238@ericsson.se>
      etllnfr@babelfish.ericsson.se (Lyndon Fletcher) writes:

>I always saw the Vader/Luke relationship as being a little contrived,
>it always looked like an afterthought or something designed to shock an 
>audience. Concidering the carefull characterisation of the first film    
>it seems strange that Luke reacts so violently to the news. It's almost
>like Lucas is using that grief to distract the audience from what is a
>major plot twist. It's as if HE didn't believe it would stand up to close
>scutiny.

_I_ didn't think there was anything strange about Luke's initial reaction
in ESB (in Bespin, after Vader's severed Luke's hand).  Part of the 
"careful characterisation" of the first film was that Luke was an orphan,
whose father was killed by Vader.  Vader is the antithesis of all that
Luke, as a wanna-be Jedi, strives for.  Then Luke discovers that his
enemy, the enemy of his friends and of the Rebellion, a person who helped
to destroy a world is his own _father_ (or, Luke discovers he is Vader's
spawn).  Of course he's going to react violently!!!  He's put his heart into
destroying the man (Vader), only to learn he's trying to kill his father!!

>Strangely I accepted the Luke/Leia relationship more easily. Every writer
>puts a version of him/herself into their work. It was always obvious to  
>me that Lucas's character in Starwars was Han Solo, he got the best lines
>and the most interesting characterisation. Once you realised that it became
>obvious that he either had to die mega heroically, or he had to get the girl.
>For Han to get Leia, Luke would have to be out of the way (they had made too
>much of Han and Lukes rivalry in the first film), I had thought Luke would
>disappear off at the end of the movies to leave the field clear. Making
>Luke and Leia brother and sister solved this problem quite easily.

Actually, I didn't think they made very much of Luke and Leia's rivalry
(in SW), keeping it sorta below the surface (or at least not ultra-blatant).
IMHO Lucas's character in Star Wars (both the trilogy and the first movie)
was Luke.  Consider that Luke destroys the Death Star, saving the Rebellion.
Moreover, Luke bests Darth Vader, proving him (Vader) to have a spark of
humanity in him, like Luke said he did.  Also, more fundamentally, Luke
is the naive, backwater farm kid who perseveres and succeeds against all
expectations, much like Lucas and SW itself.  Meanwhile, at ESB, where is
Han Solo?  He's preparing to desert the righteous cause to save his neck
(he's gonna leave to pay off Jabba).

I would say that although Han Solo "might" be Lucas as Lucas would imagine
himself, Luke is Lucas as Lucas really is.

--Bill
-- 
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Internet: wplogan@ocf.berkeley.edu||"I am a constant soldier, a sometime poet
          William P. Logan        || and I will be king!"
                                  ||      --Prince Richard
                                  ||       _The Lion in Winter_
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