No, Luke Didn’t Go Dark Side
As often with people attempting to take advantage of the rising waters that comes with a hype tidal wave, many blogs have been pushing ridiculous theories to trick people into giving them page views. Rob Conery at the Huffington Post/Medium (seen here) is just one of many offenders.
Conery promises a fan theory (his own) that “destroys everything” we know about Star Wars. The hyperbole alone should set off red flags.
Here is the meat of his claim: “Seeing these previews I think my theory might be correct: Luke gave in to the dark side to save his friends and defeat Vader and the emperor.”
He then double downs on the claim: “And Luke failed, according to Yoda. More than that — Yoda issued this warning which Luke completely ignored:
Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with the Force as his ally, will conquer Vader and his emperor. If you end your training now… if you choose the quick and easy path as Vader did… you will become an agent of evil.”
Really? Is that true?
No.
Luke did not defeat Vader. Luke did not defeat the Emperor. Anakin Skywalker, the fully trained Jedi Knight, defeated both.
In the climatic scene of the movie (spoilers!), Luke refuses to fight. He gets his butt handed to him by the Emperor. He looks pleadingly to Vader, to his father, and seeks help. The willing sacrifice of everything Luke is and could be inspires Anakin to return to the surface and cast out Vader. Anakin, not Luke, grabs the Emperor and defeats him.
Conery argues that the fight is proof that Luke has joined the Dark Side and is even a rival to the Emperor. Lets look at what happens: https://youtu.be/_RFYoZ7H67A
At the 2:30 mark, we see Luke’s temptation. His face is covered in shadows, which parallels the temptation in the cave at Dagobah. Emotions take over, and Luke becomes extremely aggressive in battle. The duel in Cloud City is reversed, and Vader is pushed towards the edge (literally) and loses a hand. Everything has reversed.
Or has it? The Emperor speaks — “Your hate has made you powerful.” Those are not the words of Yoda, Yoda is dead, but it is clear that his teaching still resonates. The look of confusion on Luke’s face is telling, and his eyes turn to Vader off-screen.
“Now fulfill your destiny, and take your father’s place by my side.” These words push Luke to the brink — Vader is down, Cloud City is repeated, a hand is taken for a hand, and Luke has become Vader at that moment, but for only that moment. The camera reinforces the relationship of the hands, of the loss. Luke, like his father before him, was just a pawn in the Emperor’s schemes of world domination.
“Never” — the word is uttered softly, meekly. This is not the grandiose “Nooooooo!” from Cloud City. Luke’s lightsaber is cast aside, an elegant yet useless weapon that Obi-Wan abandoned to obtain the truer victory. Realization has broken the dream, the nightmare, the shadow that cast itself (literally) across Luke.
This is where Conery makes his worst claim: “This, people, is a plot hole. It doesn’t make any sense in terms of the story and also Luke’s character. It doesn’t follow Luke’s motivation at all because he quite clearly doesn’t have any motivation to stay a good guy. He’s just seen what he could do with his dark powers (defeat the bad guys, save people).”
The Star Wars films were created in a time where the standards of Christian morality, of sin followed by redemption, still dominated the box office. Our taste for anti-heroes, with the celebration of the bad merely because they “kick ass,” would be anachronistic in Return of the Jedi.
Luke did not realize that he could save anyone. He realized only that he could lose everything. We know that the dark side has only empty promises, and Vader lost all he loved for no return. Luke can see how miserable Vader has become — lying weak and exposed on the floor, more robot than human, cast off without care. There is no power to be gotten from succumbing to temptation. There is only the living damnation.
“I am a Jedi, like my father before me.” Luke tries to redeem his father. Prone, weak, and destroyed, Vader does not deserve any support, yet Luke is willing to offer him a hand(!). Luke comes back from the brink, and, in terms of the Christian moral system, believes that Vader can still be redeemed. He is not even Vader but “my father.”
Luke calls out for Anakin before confronting the Emperor. Weaponless, he takes the brunt of the force lightning. He falls as Vader stands. Luke’s shirt opens, revealing a little white that was hidden beneath the whole time.
“You will pay the price for your lack of vision,” the Emperor claims, yet he is unable to see that Anakin, not Vader, is standing behind him.
“Father, please!” Those words resonate in what humanity is left. The music becomes dramatic, coming to the front, as the cold, black helmet of Vader pans between the two. The decision has been made, and Anakin wins out.
Let us take a step back for a moment. It is well-known among film theorists that Luke’s clothing progressively darkens through the trilogy, and the clothing represents his psychological state. Yes, Luke is darkening, and he has the chance to turn to the dark side of the force. He is tempted by the Emperor, and he is given the opportunity to destroy and replace Vader.
His clothing is black… or is it?
As I pointed out before, did you notice something change with Luke’s black outfit when you first watched the scene? Most people do not, and there is little discussion on it. There is a corner visible — it is white. Although Luke might appear to be “black” and “dark side,” inside he is white and light side. In the final scene, the celebration at Endor, the white is far more prominent and there for the three Jedi masters to witness. They know the true victory.
How did Conery miss this? Did Conery not watch the movie, or did he just not care? When it comes to clickbait, the latter is probably truer than the former.
Luke’s quest is one of the human spirit — cast adrift, cut off from our family, friends, and mentors, and having to fend for ourselves, we will be confronted with temptation to join the dark side of the force. However, there will always be a chance for redemption, and even someone as evil as Vader still has the chance to become Anakin in the end.
Afterall, the Jedi returned, and the Jedi was Anakin Skywalker.
Originally published at jmpeters.kinja.com.
