Today, I thought about the Star Wars prequel trilogy … twice!
First, I was wondering why didn’t they have Anakin as a young adult in the first place instead of being a toddler? Why not have Episode I be about new Jedi recruit Anakin falling in love with Padme? Have it end happy and be self-contained and all — like a WWII love story.
Then Episode II could be about the simultaneous development of Padme’s feelings for Obi-Wan — Anakin’s slightly older, more emotionally-stable mentor — and Anakin’s personal and professional jealousy of him. Throw in a backdrop of political instability between the Republic and the grassroots-but-fascist proto-Empire and have Anakin suffer a humongous emotional wound in the end.
Alternately, you could have Padme be Obi-Wan’s stately wife from the very beginning. But she secretly finds Obi-Wan cold because of his devotion to Jedi ethics and she responds to his unstable pupil’s inherent passion. Then, at the end of Episode II, in a moment that recalls Empire, have Padme reveal to Luke and Leia’s presumptive-daddy Obi-Wan that “No, Anakin is their father.”
My point is … there are a lot of better ways they could have gone with it.
Anyway, the second time I thought about the prequel trilogy, I was on the balcony of my friend’s apartment talking to her boyfriend.
He was telling me about his first car — a ’91 Ford Taurus — which he’d saved long and hard for but which turned out to be a disappointment.
“Can you imagine what that’s like?” he asked me.
“Yeah,” I said. “I know.”