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Post #1295806

Author
DrDre
Parent topic
Episode VIII : The Last Jedi - Discussion * SPOILER THREAD *
Link to post in topic
https://originaltrilogy.com/post/id/1295806/action/topic#1295806
Date created
8-Sep-2019, 1:06 PM

OutboundFlight said:

I don’t quite think so. I think it sounds like postmodernism. Both Luke and Kylo act with postmodernism in mind. Rey, however, is still modernism. And Luke changes his opinion once he meets Yoda, returning to modernism. He claims “I will not be the last jedi”, before sacrificing himself in the most heroic way possible. That’s why the final shot is random kids honoring this legend. By the end of the film, Kylo is the only character supporting postmodernism- and he’s the villain. Basic storytelling tells us almost always the hero is right and the villain is wrong.

Postmodernism does not reject the notion of heroism, it just views it through a different lense, and so Luke in TLJ does not literally end up facing the whole FO with his lasersword, but symbolically. Luke doesn’t again become a legend, he just gives the galaxy at large a symbol to believe in, as the story simultaneously tells us we shouldn’t look for a Chosen One, or someone from a special lineage to deliver us from evil, but to ordinary people saving what they love. In the classic mythology the hero strives to become the ideal, the legend. In postmodernism the legend represents an ideal, that the hero can never attain. Luke the legend, and Luke the person are separate entities. This is made all the more clear in the way TLJ frames Luke near the end. Luke the aging broken, flawed human being through illusion perpetuates the legend of a more youthful invincible Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master, before dying not in a blaze of glory, but of overexertion at peace with his own fallibility. And so, the old ways die as lines between good and evil blur. Postmodernism claims that villains are created by the expectations of society, and are therefore, an essential part of the heroes they work against. By the end of TLJ Rey and Ben have become essential parts of each other, two sides of the same coin, holding a delicate balance.