Or so Andrey Summers writes in this excellent essay from JIVEmagazine.com, entitled The Complete and Terrifying Reality of Star Wars fandom:
My girlfriend doesn’t understand what I see in Star Wars. We’ve hadseveral soul-crushing arguments about what exactly makes this series soimportant to me, and every time I have found it more and more difficultto argue my case. As the maddening years have wound on, I think Ifinally understand the reason for this crippling handicap.
There is a diabolical twist to Star Wars fandom, you see, that defiescomprehension, and yet is the life-blood of all Star Wars fans. It isthis:
Star Wars fans hate Star Wars.
If you run into somebody who tells you they thought the franchise wasquite enjoyable, and they very-much liked the originals as well as theprequels, and even own everything on DVD, and a few of the books, theseimposters are not Star Wars Fans.
What's to hate? Naturally, he elaborates:
Star Wars fans also hate the original Star Wars trilogy. We think MarkHamill’s acting was whiny, the pacing was flawed, and Empire was betterthan Jedi, making the end of the series a let-down. We hate the wayBoba Fett died, and we hate the cantankerous, arthritic duel betweenVader and Obi-wan. We don’t understand why the storm-troopers can’tshoot worth a damn, and we don’t get why “an entire legion of [theEmperor’s] best troops”(ROTJ,Palpatine) can be overpowered by a tribal society of midget teddy-bearsarmed largely with rocks and twigs. Star Wars fans hate omnipotentwar-machines that get their legs tangled in strings, or slip on logs.They hate Darth Vader’s face and that stupid harmonica thing he wasplaying. Star Wars fans hate the original Star Wars trilogy.
I should probably be embarrassed by how much I connect with this essay, but I'm not. As a true Star Wars fan, I, too, hate Star Wars in the same way.
Thank you, Bill.
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