OK, I was unclear. Then let it be known that I never meant or thought that Luke was “macking on”.
Interesting sidetrack to the thread. I’ve read it all with great interest.
I am not sure that I can contribute anything to the positions. I think that caligulathegod’s theory is rather interesting. I suppose what it comes down to in my view is how you would define love triangle. If there is one it is rather weak. There certainly are the beginnings of a competition between Han and Luke in Star Wars.
The material that was cut from Empire seems to imply that Lucas decided to tone that part down. Maybe we as an audience has read a bit more into it based on our expectations of the hero getting the girl.
This is where Casablanca is actually one of the best comparisons. The only real romantic interaction IS between Rick and Ilsa, correct. However, the storyline is that after she met Rick and fell in love, then she found out Victor, her husband, was still alive and she left Rick and went back to him (so it affects the plot). Later, when they meet at Rick’s Cafe, she and Rick kind of rekindle their romance. Rick lets her go back to Victor at the end because Victor is a “hero of the resistance” (or so we’re told, it is an assumption we must accept) and he needs his wife to stay strong personally and for the cause. Societal and story telling expectations DO inform the plot in this one. She is married to Victor, and that is a strong bond (in the 40s, and with the production code, anyway) that forms a triangle even if the characters don’t quite (although, Victor makes it clear he does love Ilsa). Star Wars really doesn’t have this. Luke and Leia really don’t have any formal or informal tie. All we have is that Luke found her in the detention block. Other than his adolescent crush in the first one, he never really addresses it again. The one bit he did in Empire was cut out, reactions, lines, and all. It’s not there in Jedi at all, since he knows before he sees Leia that she’s his sister (and he’s not hitting on her at Jabba’s. They are there to rescue her actual boyfriend so he’s all business). Then of course, there’s Leia, who never shows any interest in Luke and outside of the Kiss, which is off the table, there’s never been any argument for her and Luke. This leaves Han. I showed how his lines were cut from the excerpts:
He actually acknowledges a competition there that’s gone from the final film. And he never brings up Luke again, except to comment that’s he’s probably waiting for them at the rendezvous point. This leaves Jedi. We have 2 of the three points in the triangle firmly established as not interested. Han’s brief confusion (for purposes of discussion we will completely ignore my earlier explanations for it as pure conjecture and take them at face value) falls to the level of a Three’s Company confusion, except that Three’s Company confusions usually affected their plots. This doesn’t affect anything until the last line in the movie when Han offers to step off. That doesn’t affect the plot like Ilsa’s marriage (and in 40s morality, as her "rightful place) with Victor. If there is even a “weak triangle” it is like a xerox of a xerox of a xerox (out of toner). In the final analysis, there’s really not much triangle to make it even worth mentioning. It’s just one of those things that “everyone knows is true” until the guys on Mythbusters show that perhaps it isn’t, after all.
Plus, people seem to forget that the hero DOES get the girl. Han is also one of the heroes. In Star Wars, we get two for the price of one. But thanks. This is the reaction I always expect, but never get.
Ok, but you’ve brought that up 4 or 5 times in the thread as some kind of example of Luke and Leia getting intimate (I just re-read the entire thread-explaining the break between this and the last post), and I’ve expressed my disgust at the implication each time. Luke just got his ASS KICKED. Leia was comforting him as much as he was comforting Leia. None of this implies anything more than friendship. “If you think that a closing image of Leia resting against the shoulder of Luke doesn’t mean anything at all and doesn’t lend itself to any interpretations whatsoever, then fine, not more I can say about that.” God, I hope so.
That was confrontational. I humbly apologize for that.
If Luke wasn’t a romantic rival to Han WRT Leia, the kiss in the Hoth infirmary would not have made much of an impact.
The triangle was set up in A New Hope with this:
There you have Luke trying to connect with Leia’s heart, then reacting with obvious jealousy to Han’s talk about her. Yeah, it’s kinda weak: there aren’t any romance scenes with Luke and Leia*, but there are definitely two men wanting one woman.
After Luke splits off after the Hoth evacuation, the triangle is, indeed, completely dumped in favor of a conventional Han/Leia, opposites attract romantic entanglement. The triangle doesn’t come up again until Endor, when Leia reveals to Han that Luke is her brother. However, to say it never existed in the first place is to be blind.
*: After seeing, in Ep. II, how Lucas does “romance” without a better writer to help him, I’m glad he left love out of Star Wars.
What impact does it make? My premise has been that people THINK there is an impact, but when you watch it closely, there is nothing to it, or we’ve been mislead by our own expectations. It’s the audience making up their own meaning. I don’t care what the audience THINKS is there, I’m talking about what is ACTUALLY there.
And I’ve said from my first post that Star Wars A New Hope set up a potential triangle, but it is dropped in Empire Strikes Back since it didn’t fit into the story they wanted to tell. When we get to Jedi, there’s no actual triangle. The only thing we have is a misunderstanding by Han. Of course when you actually watch the film, there’s no underlying threat or concern that Leia might leave him for Luke, like in Casablanca where we know Ilsa is married and has already left Rick once and might do so again. So it’s a love triangle so weak that it’s virtually inconsequential. It’s a love triangle because we WANT it to be rather than what’s actually there.
Here’s what amazes me. Everyone is acting like I have committed some sacrilege by even suggesting this. When I brought up children earlier, I wasn’t being condescending. When a child watches Star Wars, he tends to relate to Luke. Luke is an orphan who wants to go off to school and find adventure. For a child, Star Wars is a wish fulfillment fantasy, not unlike Harry Potter. It’s not enough that Luke becomes a Jedi and saves the galaxy, he has to get the girl, too. The mere suggestion that perhaps he isn’t meant to get the girl is tantamount to fighting words. How dare I suggest the Luke doesn’t get the girl. Well, he doesn’t get the girl. BUT HE COULD HAVE, DAMN IT! HE COULD HAVE! Like this somehow emasculates Luke, and by extension, the viewer who identifies with Luke.
I’m not sure I can stand for all I’ve posted in this thread, I’ve certainly revised my opinion to some degree, with all of the different aspects of this topic that have surfaced, as I’m sure that you have to some degree. But as for that quote, I don’t think you quite get what I’m trying to say, and it’s probably my being unclear. I think that the mere image of Leia and Luke supporting and comforting each other can be seen as a “they are right for each other” moment, especially if you see the movies for the first time and still keep an open mind to the Hero Gets Girl scenario.* Not that it is definite proof of Luke and Leia “getting it on” or such. Friendship or no, it is a scene which shows of compassion.
Apology accepted.
- I’ve acknowledged your reasoning of both Luke and Han as heroes, but in my view, Luke is still the Main Hero of Star Wars, possibly due to the importance of the Hero Of Thousand Faces trope.
No, you’re tilting at windmills. You are using an absurdly narrow definition of what a love triangle is. That’s what people are objecting to.
Or are you possibly using an absurdly *broad *definition? If knowing that they are brothers and sisters is enough to make a story aspect silly(as per the original post that prompted this hijack), then that story aspect needs to be more than a slight misunderstanding by a character at the end of the last movie to render it silly, don’t you think? If we have the two characters in question, namely the brother and sister, not actually showing any interest in each other for the second two of the three movies (and the sister for the brother in none of the films) and even though it IS acknowledged in the first movie, it’s still not actually pursued (as it was meant to take place in the next movie-but didn’t), then it’s so weak that it barely even registers as a love triangle. It’s kind of like calling a menstruation cycle a baby. It was never fertilized, so even though it’s a *potential *baby, it’s kind of excessive to actually call it a baby. Lucas didn’t have to cut it out of Empire, but he did. If he made such an effort to remove every trace from the second film, and in the third film the only remnant is an awkward conversation filled with little more than exposition between Leia and Han, then the Love Triangle aspect was the last thing on Lucas’ mind. Plus, Jedi don’t get the chicks anyway. All things considered, what’s there is so unimportant that it doesn’t affect the plot or the motivations of any of the characters, it’s not *unreasonable *to conclude that even if there is the weakest of Love Triangles, it is such a non-issue as to be essentially absent.
Not really. I just think you’re wrong. Because over the three movies, there is just a little bit more going on in the romantic area then just “Han gets Leia”.
Of course it’s unimportant. It would have been totally lame while the V romance is much more vivid and fun. So it’s there and it’s absent? Hmm, that’s just your opinion, and a pretty isolated one at that.
And you still haven’t given us your definition.
Anyway you have finally admitted in one post that there are pieces of triangle in IV and VI. OK, there aren’t many of them, but you just refuse to connect the dots!
Have you considered that george didn’t do more of triangle because he wanted it removed, but because of other reasons? You know, timing, other storylines, the fact that the triangle is lame anyway. How do YOU know what’s in his head?
I’ll give you my definition if you give me yours.
Outside Luke lusting after the hologram and the one comment with Han after the rescue, what is there? And don’t say the fucking Kiss.
Of course it’s unimportant. It would have been totally lame while the V romance is much more vivid and fun. So it’s there and it’s absent? Hmm, that’s just your opinion, and a pretty isolated one at that.
And you still haven’t given us your definition.
Anyway you have finally admitted in one post that there are pieces of triangle in IV and VI. OK, there aren’t many of them, but you just refuse to connect the dots!
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Where did I admit anything? I’ve said from post one that they set up a potential Love Triangle in the first movie only to drop it. And what’s in Jedi, if it’s there at all (and the best one can say is even if one granted the Han-Leia conversation is that is gives the *appearance *of one rather than there actually being one). A misunderstanding that doesn’t affect the plot or motivations, just a throwaway line at the end to invoke some exposition does not make a triangle. Appearances aren’t necessarily proof that there IS one. It’s just illusory. The dots don’t lead to one another.
Exact-a-mundo! That’s why it’s gone. That’s not the story he wanted to tell. Luke is to become a Jedi and doesn’t need to get the girl. Plus, since Han was going to get the girl, then Luke looks like a loser. Cut the Triangle and Luke is no longer a loser.
I have several times. Star Wars the trilogy doesn’t have it. Han and Leia are together. Leia never shows any interest in Luke. Luke showed interest in Leia in the first movie, but before he pursued it they dropped that storyline.
You’ve actually brought up children since this thread started? I didn’t realise we had been talking for so long! How time flies when you are having fun. Or talking to a very strange person. What is that last bit supposed to mean? You just wrote exactly why a triangle is to be expected. If you were trying to get some other message accross, it did not deliver.
Your second post upwards from here. Even though you still omit some stuff that doesn’t suit you, you finally confirm that a triangle would be possible after IV and is mentioned in VI. (That’s TWICE actually, not once.)
<innocently> Oh, and why is that? </innocently>
Surely not because both heroes are potential suitors? Could it be… a potential three sided shape??
So, let me get this straight mr. movie expert. Return of the jedi inadvertedly gives the impression that there is a triangular relationship at work, by characters actually talking about it, while in fact there isn’t? It’s the appearance, but not the real thing.
Are we to believe that it sounds like a triangle, and looks like a triangle, but instead it’s… something else? It was considered, and to be expected, but in reality it’s a mirage or maybe just a continuity error? That is really what you are saying??
Can you cite ANY source for this - no, copypasting dialogue does NOT count - any source except your telepathic link to george and your own stubborn refusal to connect the dots?
Let me just predict your reply: “No, no, there are not dots to connect, because IV leaves open only the possibility for a triangle but it doesn’t actually start, so nothing to be connected there, the scene in V doesn’t count because that was to spite Han, and in VI it’s an error and that’s a fact because I know it better than the people who made these movies. So there are no dots to connect, therefore no triangle. I’ve just explained them all away. Oh, my brain hurts because I know everything.”
Made of hate.
Well, when you bring that up…
And I thought I was Star Wars obcessed…
That could work, putting THaHB right after TLtWatW, but if you want to read them in the order they were previously, it’s 2-4-5-6-3-1-7.
And really, maybe you should read 7 in the middle, get it out of the way, so you close on a nice one. Or not read it at all until you’ve read the others at least once, even better.