I was ten years old when The Empire Strikes Back came out. This
time, there was no missing it, no excuses about not being plugged in. Everyone
knew about this movie. The tag line on the television ads was, “The Star Wars
saga continues...” and really, that’s all anyone had to say to make us lose our
collective minds.
A lot had changed in three years. My parents were now in the
midst of a divorce, with all the attendant drama that goes with it. To their
credit, they both tried to keep me out of the fight as much as possible, but
there was inevitable bleed-through in the form of snarky comments, weird
behavior, and strident, whispered conversations with other people, or over the
phone.
I was living with my mother. I was given no choice in the
matter, and then, as now, I was grateful for not being made to choose. It still
sucked, though. My mom’s decision to leave my father was as mundane as it was
spectacular, seen from my limited viewpoint, and a lot was asked of me that I
now know is just par for the course in any divorce.
Case
in point: my mother’s new boyfriend. Paul was a
divorcee himself, with two very young children. I have vague memories of
him
talking to my father on several occasions prior to the split-up. He
briefly taught guitar to my mother. He talked photography with my dad.
In fact, one of my favorite pictures of Mom and Paul was taken, by my
father, during one of their guitar lessons. How's that for nutty? His
kids were
both enrolled at my mom’s day care center. And they were little, too; 3
and 5.
I was, like, twice as old as them, so, you know, they were, like,
babies, to
me. Pfft. Whatever.
Now,
mom and Paul are seeing each other at least twice a
week. Sometimes, more. And now I’m trying to figure out how to get along
with
these two kids. Hillary was five, and a girl, so right away, I was
dealing with
a Martian. She liked Barbies. I liked G.I. Joes. This was never going to
work. Joshua,
the three year old, was, at least, a boy. And very prone to suggestion,
which is a great trait for a little brother to possess. Hillary
worked him like a sheep herding dog, keeping him on task, on track, and
more or
less corralled at all times. He was quite good at fetching things, as I
recall.
I was expected to get along with them. I did this, initially, by staying
out of the way.
It was Paul who made the effort. He was, after all, the
adult in the relationship. I read a lot, and so did he. We had some
common interests, in science fiction and fantasy, and most especially, in
movies. When The Empire Strikes Back
came out, we went as a “family outing.” I think this was actually our first movie we
watched as a family.
I should say, right up front, that I was glad Han Solo wasn’t
killed in the film, and initially very pissed at Super Duper Darth Vader for
lying to me. “Ohhhh,” I thought, “yeah, he’s the villain. Maybe he lied on
purpose.” Then I realized, as the movie just ended in the middle of the action,
no less, that maybe Vader got it wrong, and Han was going to die in the next
movie. Son of a bitch! He pulled a bait and switch on me! I scanned the
newspaper for a full year in the hopes that Vader would return to the Super
Duper, but he never did. Perhaps he suspected he would be called on the carpet
for his deliberate untruths.
The Empire Strikes
Back. What a mean-sounding title. And everything, from the music, to the
tone, was a meaner, more dark, journey into the Star Wars universe. I was a little ball of negative energy at the
time, and so I absorbed this like a cynical sponge. Decades later, I found out
that even if your parents weren’t in the middle of a divorce, the movie was
good shit.
The banter, the raised stakes, the improved special effects,
and oh my God! Luke! Vader! The hand! Boba Fett! Boba Fett! Are you kidding me?
The emotions that movie still drags up in me, to this day, are amazing. I was
rooting for Han and Leia from the start, all right? And then to yank them apart
on the Cloud City Platform with Chewie howling in frustration, and that music
playing in the background...
Look: The Empire
Strikes Back is still the best Star
Wars movie, ever. Period. This is not in dispute. It’s just not. You may
think I’m wrong, but I’m not. You’re wrong, and we’ll never agree. And if you
tell me it’s not your favorite, I will forever second-guess any movie review or
recommendation you give me for the rest of our association. I’m just telling
you this up front.
Some of the more layered and nuanced scenes zipped by me. At
the age of ten, I was more fascinated by the monsters, the space ships, etc.
And for my monster-addled, special-effects-obsessed brain, it didn’t get much
better than the ice planet Hoth. By this time, I was a devotee of Ray
Harryhausen, and so it should come as no surprise to anyone that I was out of
my mind about the tauntauns. Also, the Imperial Walkers, but mostly those
furry, bipedal mounts that were obviously and beautifully stop-motion animated
for those few, key scenes.
See, back in 1980, that was the apex of movie monster
making. If you wanted something to interact with people onscreen, you had to
stop motion that that monster. I knew it was expensive, and that’s why so many
other movies didn’t use it. But now, here it was in this new Star Wars movie. I
was thrilled.
Luke? Way more interesting. Han? Still a rogue. Lando? Also
a rogue. Boba Fett? My new favorite villain. Best space ship in the film? The snowspeeders,
no question about it. Yoda? Best Muppet ever.
I was awash in emotions and energy. But as we left the
theater, Paul asked me, “What did you think?” We started talking about the
movie. He liked some of the stuff that I liked. He pointed out some things I
missed. We kept up an animated discussion all the way back to Mom’s Day Care
Center. As we got out of
the car, I asked Josh and Hillary what they thought of the movie. Joshua was
bouncing all over the place. I scooped him up on my back and told him I was a
tauntaun, and he was Luke Skywalker, and ran around the playground with him on
my back and me making noises like the MacDonald’s Hamburglar. He was cool with
that.
That was our first shared experience. Paul and I first
connected over Star Wars.
