Stop the Hyperdrive, I Want to Get Off: Losing Faith in Star Wars TV

It doesn’t stop there. Boba Fett also wants to remind you of Ray Harryhausen monsters, Lawrence of Arabia, and great train robberies, with the second episode giving us the third convoy fight in four years. More than just referencing other stories, the series seeks to use all their emotional payoffs without engaging with what provoked those emotions in the first place; we’re supposed to feel a great power shift when Boba helps the tech-equipped Tuskens take back a convoy from oppressors they don’t understand the significance of, rendering a potentially seismic moment relatively toothless. What’s more, the emotional satisfaction we get from other stories of cross-cultural connection is softened because it’s not happening with rich characters we can dive into—the investment we have in the ensemble is all assumed.

“It’s what Star Wars was always meant to be,” a cousin told me when The Mandalorian first premiered. “A western.” I knew I disagreed, but couldn’t quite articulate why. On reflection, I see it raises an important question: what exactly do people think Star Wars was meant to be? There are plenty of clear influences with samurais, serials, and yes, the occasional cowboy; but listing any of these as an answer misses the point. Star Wars was always supposed to be Star Wars, because Star Wars meant something new. It was a flashy updating of all of its inspirations into something that was, crucially, more than the sum of its parts. It doesn’t matter what Star Wars’ influences are, as long as it transforms them, rather than using them as a crutch.

The emptiness and transparency of this new series’ inspirations can’t fully be blamed on its creators. Favreau and Robert Rodriguez (an executive producer and director on Boba Fett) are from the generation of filmmakers after George Lucas, and will, like him, bring with them a menagerie of influences to whatever project they develop. Rather, it’s the shadow of Disney that looms above it all, with their trademark vampiric way of looking at film history; they’re prepared to exhume any stories they see as suitable for their hollow projects. With the original Star Wars, you weren’t supposed to point out all its constituent elements, you were meant to be bowled over by how fresh it all felt in its contemporary climate. This doesn’t mean we should demand new, flashy things every week, but there’s the growing feeling the franchise isn’t capable of developing anything that feels like we haven’t, in some way, seen before.

It could be argued that, because Star Wars takes place in foreign, alien worlds, the way we navigate through them is with recognizable plot and character dynamics. Calling the settings of Star Wars totally alien, however, would be disingenuous; we don’t need to be guided through a simple, unchanging biome, with a clearly coded society that is only interesting because of how it affected the adventures of our characters. Tatooine is a planet Luke doesn’t want to spend his whole life in; its ability to seize our interest with a complex underworld is limited, especially as the development of the gritty streets extends to a punk cyborg biker gang. In addition, thanks to the deluge of Star Wars stories we’ve recently seen, anything that made the planet unique has now been replicated on countless other backwater worlds. There is little that’s interesting about these alien settings on their own, there must be innovative stories taking place there.

I don’t want to see Star Wars do The Godfather, just as I got tired of seeing them riff on Seven Samurai, monster movies, and prison breaks. I want something other than the dull, numb familiarity I’m handed every week. Every time you show me Star Wars through the prism of a story I know, you are further limiting the boundaries of an unlimited universe.

Boba Fett is not without its graces; sometimes it’s more rewarding than tedious watching Temuera Morrison bring life to an otherwise blank-slate of a character, and it continues The Mandalorian’s hot streak of exceptional casting. But television was meant to promise Star Wars freedom to do everything the films were too big to accomplish. So far, they’ve given the barest justification that these stories are worth telling, while claiming to have more scope than they are actually capable of. There is no exploration, no outward movement. There is only down, a look within that’s devoid of introspection, a descent into a dark Sarlacc pit of what we already know. Forgive me if I drop out of lightspeed here.

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