A jaded hero in ‘Last Jedi’
It took eight episodes, but finally, in “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” (2017), the franchise produced a great performance. Mark Hamill played a jaded, 60something Luke Skywalker, who is sick of having had to fight for decades. He expresses the weariness that we all feel when we realize that battles are never really won.
The Berlin Wall comes down, so the Cold War is over, right? And then there’s Putin. Obama is elected, so racism is over, right? But then there’s Charlottesville. The Capitol rioters are turned back on Jan. 6, so that dark chapter is over, isn’t it? No, it’s already launched a comeback. Such is life on Earth and perhaps throughout the galaxy. There’s no winning.
You blow up the Death Star, and before you put down your celebratory glass of Champagne, there’s another Death Star. And on and on it goes. When you’re as old as Luke Skywalker in “The Last Jedi,” you know this never really ends.