It's no secret that I'm a massive Luke Skywalker fan and now I've had some time to process The Last Jedi's incredible teaser trailer (and re-watch it like 10 times) I can't help but speculate on where they might be going with the character in both The Last Jedi and the sequel trilogy in general.
My first thoughts on watching it (besides the typical OMG that was amazing) were this reminds me so much of The New Jedi Order. But more on that in a moment. It also reminded me of speculation I had for Luke following EW's preview article on The Force Awaken's back in 2015. And Daisy Ridley's comment at the panel about being careful of meeting your heroes also reminded me of that.
"Who is Luke Skywalker?" That was the question that ultimately convinced J.J. Abrams to do The Force Awakens. EW wrote;
"After all these years, we thought we knew him, but what if there was more to that Tatooine farmboy? Or… what if there was less?"
Just like this new teaser has fans speculating what the end of the Jedi could mean, that question, "what if there was less?", really got inside my head. Back then I wrote this;
"Our only image of him is alone with only his faithful droid by his side. In those circumstances, has Luke become less than what we expected him to after Return of the Jedi? Is then Luke's story in this trilogy a different form of redemption story? Redemption not from his own dark side but from his inaction allowing darkness to rise and spread in the galaxy? An arc that will see him leave his apparent isolation to finally fulfil Yoda's instruction, passing on what he has learned and bringing back the Jedi."
It was speculation based on a single image in the teaser trailer but nothing in the film really changed it. If anything Luke was more alone because he didn't even have Artoo with him.
"It's time for the Jedi to end."
Is this Luke at his lowest? In isolation. Defeated. Unwilling to try again after Ben's betrayal and the massacre of his fledgling Jedi Order. Twice now a promising Jedi has fallen and all Luke's done is repeat the mistakes of the past.
At its simplest this could be a story of Rey bringing Luke out of his isolation and back to the Jedi, convincing him the Order is worth reviving (basically the arc I speculated back before The Force Awakens). But I'm no longer sure that's the case. One line in the teaser changed my views on Luke's arc for this film and the Sequel Trilogy;
"It's so much bigger."
Like I said at the start, if there's one thing this teaser made me think of it was The New Jedi Order novel series and Jacen Solo. In that series, before subsequent the retcons and Legacy of the Force debacle, Jacen reached a deeper understanding of the Force, a Unifying Force that encompassed both light and dark that he was able to balance within himself as he momentarily achieved oneness with the Force at the climax of the series. That's really oversimplifying it but he also realised that this was not a discovery but a rediscovery of old knowledge that had been lost.
Luke asks Rey what she feels. She speaks of the light, the dark and the balance. "It's so much bigger."
We're told in The Force Awakens that after the massacre Luke sought the First Jedi Temple. Could it be that here he made the same rediscovery that Jacen did in the old Legends series? That light and dark are only partial truths and the Force is so much more?
From the beginning of the Saga we're told that the Force is out of balance. The death of both the Sith and the old Jedi order in Return of the Jedi restored the balance (at least for a time) leaving Luke as the start of something new. Could it be that in trying to rebuild the Jedi Luke unintentionally upset the balance that he helped restore? Is that how Luke sees the fall of Ben and the rise of the First Order?
But his isolation had consequences to as the New Republic fell and Han died at his son's hand.
"Pass on what you have learned."
I always assumed this meant rebuild the Jedi Order. But what if it didn't? The old Jedi Order was far from perfect and it was only in rejecting Yoda and Obi-Wan's instruction to confront/kill Vader that Luke redeemed his father and succeeded where they failed.
"It's time for the Jedi to end."
Luke may be the last Jedi, but with new (or old) knowledge of the Force he may also be the first of something new. Something potentially great, more unifying. Something that's so much bigger.
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