May 5, 2023 • 53 mins
A not so long time ago, in a galaxy not far, far away, two podcasters came together to discuss the feminism of the original badass princess icon, Leia Organa from the Star Wars universe. Because Anney has been dreaming of this day for so long, it's a two-parter. In this one, we focus on our own experiences with Star Wars, the cultural impact of the original series, and the basics of Leia's character in 'A New Hope' and 'The Empire Strikes Back'. Listen, or listen. There is no listen not. It's not a trap!
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm welcome to Steph whan never told you a production
of iHeartRadio, And welcome to our one of many Star
Wars classics are going to run this month, beginning with
(00:28):
our two partner and Princess Leah. To everyone who's listened,
you know, I adore her. Carrie Fisher got her honorary
Star today because today is May the fourth, as we
record it, And you know, I could have It's a
joke that I make several times in this, but I
could have just talked about her on and on and on,
(00:48):
and I have had new thoughts since this, So it's
one of those things where I just it makes me
very happy. It brings a smile to my face when
I think about it. There is this on Princess Leiah
in our upcoming book, which you can pre order it
stuff you should read books dot com. But I just
adore her. I love her so much. I don't know,
(01:11):
I'm filled with joy, but so much joy. I hope
this classic brings you joy as well, so please please
enjoy this classic episode. Hey, this is Annie and Smitha
and welcome to stephf Mom've never told you a production
of iHeartRadio. I am so excited right now. Yes, my
(01:44):
heart is racing. Yes, I couldn't sleep last night.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
I like this anticipation of what's happening.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Yes, because we're finally talking about a hero of mine,
Princess Leiah and feminist them.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
And at this point this is where like Canaan's and
like sparks should be going off, all the sound effects.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
I was like, my brain is like the death Star exploding.
That's what's happening.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
There you go there.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, yeah, this is the longest outline I've ever written,
so long, it's twenty one pages.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
I will say partially, I'm going to say it was
my fault because I told you to have ad it.
This is your project, this is your baby, and do
it so I and I think you held back.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
I definitely held back. I definitely was like, at some point,
you're gonna have to stop or you might just die
here research.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
I think I told you. I like, I'm going to
need you to wrap it up now.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Yeah. Last night I sent Samantha text and I just
had circled like how long it was and how many
tabs I had left, and she was.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Like, oh god, that that was literally the only response
I could.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Give was oh God, yeah, oh, and I would.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
I would go in to look at the outline while
I'm working to one thing to see where we were,
and I know, like day three was page nine and
I was like, oh, it's gonna be a long one.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
It definitely is, which means it's a two parter. So
in this one, we're gonna focus on the basics of
Star Wars and Princess Leah threw a new hope and
Empire strikes back. Yeah, we're pretty much sticking to the
original trilogy and then no be a Kuldar Finger and
you'll have to wait to figure out what we think
(03:32):
about the metal bikini in Return of the Jedi, and
then the feminism of Leah and my own a personal
ani original on my thoughts of around Luke Skywalker's feminism
and the feminism of the Force.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
So right, and before we start, just to let you know,
we did actually do a viewing social distance viewing of
the trilogy, the originals, the Originals, because I, to many
people's chagrin, have never actually watched a full Star Wars movie.
(04:08):
And I will say, if you know anything about the house,
stuff works, family Slash, iHeartMedia family. There are some diehards
in here, I mean true, true diehards. Holly Fry was very,
very disappointed in the fact that I had never seen
one of these. She was very forgiving, yeah, but disappointed.
I made sure that I let her know, yes, guess
(04:30):
what we're watching it. I feel like she was pretty
excited for us. But yes, I have never actually seen
a full Star Wars movie. I've been around it quite
a while. You know, it's been out there on random
TVs at bars and restaurants because it is played a lot.
And of course I've seen it while flitting past while
channel surfing, but never fully committed to watch any of these.
(04:52):
I will say it was never part of my childhood.
It was never a part of anybody in my family's childhood.
I'm gonna blame the orphanage that I was in for
a while. We didn't watch movies come on and and
again I'm a little older, so I would have been
right outside of when it was popular. I think right
before right after, you know what I mean, Because it
came out in the seventies. The popularity hit it in
(05:13):
the nineties, seventies, eighties, so it was kind of all
that time and I will say after months months.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Begging, yeah, I don't love it.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Well actual studio. Yes, by the way, all she did
this whole really sweet video, but how much she cared
about me with an ending that said please watch Star
Wars essentially was what went down, and even some bartering,
like I almost got some free luggage out of this.
I had to step back. I was like, that's corol,
that'n't mean but did She's like, I'll watch whatever you want.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I will.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
I haven't decided whether that's gonna be yet though. By
the way, that we finally finally committed to a day
of marathon ing in the midst of the pandemic, I mean,
what else am I going to do? Right? And so
with that I decided to go ahead and write. So
this is what I wrote before she started the actual outline, y'all,
the twenty one page outline of my views of what
(06:11):
I knew of the movie before I watched the actual movies.
So I know Harrison Ford and he was involved with
this obviously, and the iconic Carrie Fisher, who was an
amazing woman, and of course Mark Hamill, your crush with
that I know, Luke, I am your father Chebacca and
(06:32):
the dark side. Of course, I remember the weird giant
slime thing that for some reason in prisons and grossly
sexualizes Leah, and that there's a gold robot R two
D two. I know those letters. Oh no, but I
know those letters. And of course space in the future
with lots of laser guns, which apparently I found out
later they don't know how to aim. They don't know
(06:54):
how to do it, doesn't know and of course laser swords.
And I'm not gonna lie. I mixed some of the
scenes up with Spaceballs because I had a roommate who
loved that movie, and also we would watch that together.
And of course I mean John Candy. He should have
been in Star Wars, right, that was a missed opportunity.
(07:15):
Who doesn't love John Candy? Didn't this? I know. I
did go in thinking this may make or break my
relationship with Aie, but I will be here to tell
you that it didn't. Except there was There was one
of those moments when the holiday special came on. I
was like, what in the hell is this? And why?
(07:37):
I did question a lot of things.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Well, that is fair. One of my favorite tweets from
fellow podcasters stuff. You should know. They did a whole
episode on the Holiday special and it was something like
no one could explain what happened that night in nineteen seventy.
It's infamously awful. Yeah, yeah, I yes, we're still friends.
(08:02):
We made it through, and I do love how this
kept happening. When we were watching it too. We kept
saying it's in the future, but it's actually a long
time ago in a galaxy far far away. And you
did the thing, you got the line.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Drug it's true. I did. I know it's actually no,
I am your father. I got it now. I got
it now. But yes, as many as we know, as
many have gotten that wrong, Luke, I am her Father's no,
I am your father. But hey, I got it. I've
got that in my mind.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
Now that's a whole it's a whole thing. There's been
YouTube videos about why we do that, so it's all good.
And I also had to get pretty good at translating
Samantha Star Wars speak like gold. I don't think you
ever got c threepo. It was always like gold Robot
or gold Man or gold gold dude. And then there's
like baby Jet, which was the why we was a
(08:55):
baby jet, so I had to get good at that.
I will say, for me, asking you to watch Star
Wars is like a proposal. If it's my love language.
It's like sharing a piece of my soul. I was
really nervous about it. Honestly, I was really nervous about
doing this, even though I've had the outline for like
eight months. I'm embarrassed by how important it is to me,
(09:18):
and then angry that I'm embarrassed about it.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, and I don't think you need to be embarrassed
at all, because, first of all, as a good friend,
you shared a part of yourself with me that you
love and I love that. Secondly, you're really good at
translating my Star Wars speaker. You did better than the
partner who watched it with me, and he was also
excited that I was finally watching it. And again, you
are the one that convinced me to watch it, not him.
(09:44):
Just as a reminder, but yeah, I definitely may have
called the smaller jets baby jets. I may have called
a few robuts baby robots, baby Goldman robots, robot man dick.
I called him a dick a couple of thousand, like dude,
that guy's a dick. It just keeps running away. What's
wrong with Well, yes, I had to create nicknames shorthands
(10:05):
in order for me to figure out who was what
and why and just again just why. To be fair,
that may have been more with the holiday special of
like what is happening and why? Oh well, but yeah,
I digress.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
That is totally fair. I actually like I saved my
text message change because I only watched that for the
first time like a year ago, and I saved my
text message change with my friend and I love it.
It is so funny because I also have a similar
reaction because people can prepare you, but they can't really
prepare you. It is that mad.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
It is so bad.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Anyway, A brief rundown of my experience with Star Wars
fandom because I I actually don't remember a time having
not seen them. I saw the original trilogy when I
was four years old, and I love them, even if
even at four I was like, oh, I don't buy
this force thing. I don't think that's real. They are
(11:02):
super nostalgic for me. Even watching them now. I remember
Obi Wan always. My dad always quoted obi Wan, and
I can't hear Obi Wan's voice without thinking about my
dad doing Yoda and Darth Vader voices with my brothers.
I fell in love with my first cush, Luke Skywalker.
I would pause the frame and kiss his cheek.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Oh and yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and put this
out there for anyone who may have a connection with
Mark Hamill. Her goal, y'all, her goal has been to
get a tweet from Mark Hamill or reaction. So we've
got to make this happen. We we're gotta make this
dream come true.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
I think I might Actually I wouldn't die, but it
would be a close call. Like I I think.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
You would fall out. I think you would fall out
for sure.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
It's really funny because I keep talking about like this scheme,
and my scheme is literally like tweet at him. But
I do have this plan where I'm gonna recreate the
original trilogy from memory, which I've I've got that down.
I think, wait.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Didn't you already start doing that? Then you say you
started it?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I have been practicing perhaps.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Okay, Okay, I feel like I heard that story.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Oh yeah, it's a work in progress, and I'm gonna
I have costumes and praps and It's gonna be really
silly and hopefully fun, and I'm going to release just
chunks of it every day on Instagram because otherwise it
would be ridiculous. But maybe then Mark Hamill will notice
me and my life will be complete, meaning just.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
And just By the way, as she talks about costumes,
she's actually weaving.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
I do now. I'm in the Rebel X Being fight
suit flight suit.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And we will have pictures of those for sure. Also,
I talked to her an hour before we started recording,
and she was in another costume. She did a wardrobe
change before we started.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
I did it all for you, Samantha.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
And you know what, I appreciate it. I appreciate the
commitment and the love. And I know you're going to
say it's cosplay, but I think this is just your life,
and I enjoyed that even more.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
You know, I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I have
spent more than one night wondering what it means that
my first crush was Luke Skywalker and I'm dressing as
my first crush.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
I mean, enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I got to take care of my mental ill. Somehow
I got this whole evolution of Luke Skywalker cosplay. I'm
probably just one of my goals is every week to
wear costume at work. And this is the second time
I've done it this week because I was the Winter
Soldier earlier. So nailing it. You're right.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
And if you didn't see our stories. She did do
the podcast with Movie Crush, you should check it out,
and she is in full costume that she put on.
It wasn't a flashback she put on for that specific episode.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yes, I think check thought I might have lost my
mind in Quarantine, but uh yeah, more about that later.
So yeah, I had like all the toys and the
books and the games. We had the original VHS's and
they I couldn't watch the last thirty minutes of any
of them because they were overworn.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
I don't think that you would tell us this is
the part that my video starts.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
I know, And it was always like right at that
epic climax Like this is for younger viewers, who viewers
listeners who might not know. This was a thing where
if you watched a VHS so much, the tape would
get worn and you just couldn't watch the rest. And
I oh, I had this board game that I love
where you played along with the VHS. It was like
(14:39):
my favorite. And then my good friend Katie, who is
my neighbor. She and I used to recreate Jedi lightsaber
battles with the lights off and the music playing. We
had a Jedi training course. I created a fictional Star
Wars character when I was eight named Tara Polaris.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Which, by the way, great name, Thank.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
You, thank you, and I would go dressed as her Halloween.
People would be like, oh Obi wan Kenoby, and I'd
be like, uh uh, Tara Polaris, thank you.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Wait is she and your fan fiction?
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Uh No, she's not my current fan fiction, which by
the way, is one hundred and eighty page pages along
you guys, but she. I did write the Adventures of
Tara Polaris as an eight year old, and unfortunately, I
think they've been lost in the Great Purge of high
school where I burned everything that I'd ever written.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Oh no, I know.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
I would love to read about Tara Polaris.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
That's such a good name. I feel like that she
would be a character.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
Maybe I'll introduce her into my fan fiction. Yes, please, Actually,
what I wanted to do because I was going to
read a bit of my Star Wars fan fiction, but
it's all really depressing. I think the angst in it
could kill a person. So I was thinking that I
could put out the offer of listeners sending in prompts
(16:01):
and I will try to write something and maybe we
can read it.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Is it gonna be like I choose your own adventure?
Speaker 2 (16:06):
No, I mean that it could be. But in fan
fiction usually like there'll be one shot prompts like what
if the twin swap is a big thing in fan fation.
What if Luke and Lea were swapped? What what happened
in this scene? So just putting that out there everybody,
and I had like all the posters and the stars.
(16:29):
I had three thousand of those sticky stars in my ceiling.
I probably right now I'm on a bit of a
Star Wars bench. And I think it does have to
do with the anxiety around quarantine and pandemic, because it
started right around then, and it is something that I
find really nostalgic and comforting. So once a week I
(16:50):
watched something Star Wars related.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Peane, that's not a bad thing. And I just tweeted,
actually in my own personal account, about how there's a
research about during times of trauma during people with anxiety
will rewatch a lot of things, which is absolutely me.
But I do want to call you out on one thing.
So during our adventures and watching these movies or marathoning
(17:13):
these movies, they did turn on the Holiday Special, which,
by the way, apparently the version we had is double.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
It was way longer than the version I have.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Right, so I think you had like fifty minutes and
our version was an hour and forty five minutes and
it was torture. So I was like, look halfway through.
U stopped. It was like I can't, I can't do this.
I'll be back when you know, when you're fitted for whatever.
I leave, I come back and they have restarted from
the freaking beginning of the trilogies these movies, and I
was like, what is happening? We just watched seven and
(17:47):
a half hours of this. What is going on?
Speaker 2 (17:49):
It's really funny too, because when you came in, I
didn't realize you re fined us at first, and you
said something, what are you doing? And I turned around
like a child had been caught doing something wrong. I said,
She called I was watching them again?
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Was everybody was like what.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
It was quite embarrassing.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Yess, it would not have been embarrassing, but I was
just more in shock of like, are you freaking kidding me?
You guys, I don't know if as much as I
love things, I've never loved something this much.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, I've been thinking about this for this episode, the
level of love I have for it, which I'm trying
to going through some of it right now. One of
the last things Samantha and I did before Quarantine was
we went to Disneyland and we rode the new ride
Rise at the Resistance, and it's a huge ordeal and
(18:40):
I almost cried when I found out we were going
to get.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
To write day. Okay, so I'm gonna go ahead and
interrupt you because I need to talk about the overall
process as well as the level and the drama that ensued. So,
first of all, we were in LA to do a conference,
and of course while we were in La must go
to Disneyland. While we were in Florida, we went to
(19:04):
disney World, so it only made sense in preparation of
going to Florida. Of course, Annie had to talk to
our experts, Holly Fry, who, by the way, if you're
not following her Twitter, account. You should because she has
daily updates of her love for Star Wars as well,
including all the mini dresses that she has made, in
(19:26):
clothing she has made, and dedication to Star Wars. It
is hardcore and amazing, right awesome, Yes, yes, so all
of these things. So Annie decided to get the best
strategic way on getting this ride. And if you don't
know about this ride, you can't just get on it.
(19:46):
You have to reserve, and you have to reserve way
to advance or you were not going to ride that ride.
And not only did we get to the park two
hours before it opened and very cold, l it was
so cold that we also walked in before the actual
park open. You get to go into the entrance and
(20:06):
just pretty much stand there and wait. You could see
a crowd of people, not only us, holding their phones
out and getting ready for whatever this reservation system was.
So as it opens, immediately Annie's like, Okay, you gotta
do this, this and this. All three of us, because
there's three of us got ready and did the thing
now as they did the thing. I know that was
(20:28):
very flippant, but it was a whole thing. By the way,
you have to download the app, get to this ride,
reserve on this ride as a crew whatever whatnot. Annie
is watching and as we sit there and one of
us finally shouts, we got it. Not only does any
and the entirety of the Disney crowd let out this
whoa in the middle of nothing like You're like, what
(20:51):
is happening? But Annie turns around away from us in
silence and turns back around and she's like, oh my god,
I can't believe. I just can't believe. Oh my god.
And I see tears in her eyes and I'm going,
oh my god, Annie, are you are you? Are you crying?
And you were like, no, yes, It's just so good.
(21:11):
It's just gonna be so good. And in anticipation of
the fact that we were actually going to ride the ride,
and I will say, it is a really good ride.
Xt my own Donald wasn't it And I didn't know
he was a bad guy in the New York movies.
I still love him. It's fine, I'm a fan, but
it was, Oh cuss, I forgot. I also got yelled
at but one of the Stormtrooper dudes because I couldn't
(21:34):
figure out how to follow the line.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
It was.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I'm traumatized by that. Moment, I'm not gonna lie. I
feel like, huh, those guys are coming to get me.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
He blamed you. The rebellion was losing the resistance.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Yeah, but yeah, the reaction on your face, the reaction
on the crowd in the crowd was so big. I
was actually taking aback.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Yeah, it was wild. It was wild because it was
like total silence for thirty seconds and then screaming.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
The shouts, the shouts of celebration was unreal.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
And the level I've reached is I now fantasize, like
legitimately fantasize about getting to see these movies without knowing
the ending of Return of the Jedi. I like, I've
read old speculation articles about how people thought it was
going in what did it mean? Luke was wearing all black?
He's gonna turn evil? And I interview my older friends
about it, tell me what was like, what did you
(22:32):
think was gonna happen? And I want it so badly.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yeah, And even as a person who never actually watched
or cared about these movies previously, I still knew how
it ended. So yeah, that's definitely a thing. As iconic
as these movies are, it's inevitable you kind of know
what's going to happen.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yeah, and we're gonna and we're gonna talk about that
for a minute, just the cultural impact these movies have
had and why it's important that we're talking about it.
I didn't want to throw in there because yes, I
was recently on movie crush for The Winter Soldier. I'm
going to be on there next for The Empire Strikes Back.
That I have been annoying Samantha with my new belief
that they're in many ways the same movie, just been
(23:13):
texting her like evidence I find. I recently discovered the
Sebastian san mar Cammel viral.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Thing, which I'm really surprised by because I even I
saw that.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
I don't know how I missed it, and a new hope.
The first one slashed. The fourth one came out on
May twenty fifth, which is the same day The Winter
Soldiers true identity as Bucky was revealed in the comics,
and the day my parents got married, so special day
and also Holly Holly's birthday.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, super fan experts. She's not superfan, she's a like
Star Wars expert.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Oh god. Yeah, we were joking that we need to
make a chart of like the level of Star Wars fandom,
she's the top.
Speaker 1 (23:51):
Yes, you're the middle. Yeah, and even like I think
of my partner who also loves it, I was like, no,
you don't meet Annie. You're a little lower than her.
And then myself, I was like, I'm at the bottom,
and I like, well, I can't say I'm at bottom anymore.
I finally watched it. So now I'm a novice.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yes, yes, a novious sub Jedi patawe as they say,
which I still don't know of them. That's okay, I'll
do not it is no try so yeah, yeah, that's
that's kind of where we are on our levels of fandom.
And today I'm so excited to talk about Lea raghana Ak,
Princess Leah. We are mostly going to focus on the
(24:28):
original trilogy, because we talked about Leah in the new
trilogy Slash the Sequels and our feminism of Star Wars episode,
which I think came out two years ago on May
the fourth, of course, but we'll touch on that for sure,
because there are a lot of interesting things and conversations
we had and as a kid, I totally loved her,
which was a big deal because I'm kind of ashamed
(24:49):
to admit this, but usually, like I was fine with
female characters, but they were never my favorite or I
didn't even necessarily like them, really, And I think that
might be because female characters aren't written as well off.
But I loved her and I thought she was so
funny and smart and brave. And I did love her hair.
I thought it was awesome she had good hair. She did.
(25:10):
And I asked my friend Katie, who I've mentioned she
was like my Star Wars partner in crime, and I
asked her what she could remember of Princess Leiah as
a kid, and she wrote me back. I thought that
she was beautiful. I loved her white dress. I thought
she was badass in Return of the Jedi. I loved
when she was the bounty Hunter. I did think it
was too mean for her. I remember liking her voice
and how precise she was when she said her words.
(25:32):
I hated the needle scene. A needle scene was very scary. Yes,
and we have talked before about the importance of costuming
in our feminism of Star Wars episode, and I do
think there's something to be said for the fact that
most of her costumes are functional, but also feminine. Don't worry. Yes,
we're going to talk about the metal of bikini. Oh
my god. And I also forgot to mention that in
(25:56):
the original ending of Return of the Jedi, Hondaes becomes
starth Vader and ordered the destruction of all the rebellion
and listeners.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Just so you know. She did tell me this during
the movie viewing.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Oh god, I only recently found that out, and I
blew my mind.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Yeah. I think there were so many things that you
were talking about, including the transition for loose outerwear.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
I think this is the best way to say white
to great black. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. So there
was a lot of conversation that was had between my
partner and Annie, and there are so many things that
I'm like, I don't know what is happening, but this
nerd out is amazing from Afar and also annoying. I
don't know what to do right now. I'm both impressed
and annoyed.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
We're endearing but annoying. It was so endearing.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
I was like, Oh, I love that they have each
other to talk about this, but what is happening?
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Well, that's probably all the rest of this episode will go.
So politics in advance. I did want to talk about
the cultural impact of Star Wars because this is something
that's been on my mind since we read Whiskey and
Ribbons for our book club and there were all these
Star Wars references in it, and it got me to
thinking what it must be like to be a part
(27:05):
of something that big, where you could just be reading
something I never would have imagined there would be multiple
Star Wars references in that book, where a character you
played or story you're part of is just kind of ubiquitous.
And so I actually started making a graph keeping count
of all the Star Wars references I encounter every day
where I'm not like, not expecting to find them or
(27:28):
hear them. And it's between five and ten. Uh, I'm
going to make a chart and I'm going to post
it is great.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
So I got asked, it is three point thirty today.
We've been recording since too. How many references thus far
before the six Wow?
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's amazing. It really is stunning. How many
It just pops up and I'm like, oh, hey, there
you go. I think it was dead eye, dead eye
mind trick. Uh, and is the last one I heard today?
So in case you somehow don't know. Star Wars is
(28:03):
a science fantasy space opera franchise created by George Lucas
of currently eleven movies, TV shows, books, comics, toys, video games,
theme parks, dedicated conventions, radio dramas, music parodies, musical parities,
all Lale, weird out, and documentaries. It's been involved in
science politics, pretty much everything that you can imagine, and
(28:24):
inspired a massive fan community. The memes, the memes, art, cosplay,
fan fiction experts have written about Star Wars as an
American mythology, inspiring people to create their own thing. It's
now owned by Disney and has an estimated net worth
of seventy billion dollars and holds the Guinness World Record
(28:47):
for most successful film merchandising franchise. When the original trilogy
came out, beginning with a New Hope in nineteen seventy
seven and followed by The Empire Strikes Back in nineteen
eighty and Returned the Jedi nineteen eighty three, it changed Hollywood.
It revolutionized special effects. I annoyed Samantha with the paper
I wrote in fifth grade all about the special effects
(29:08):
of Star Wars and the Nike shoe that they for
some reason took out a Return of the Jedi.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
She did mention when it was and where it was.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
I was like it was back there, And things like
industrial light and magic still around today came out of
this and sound effect systems that we still use and
for better our worse, because you will find people that
really think this was the end of cinema, the understanding
that you could make more form of merchandising than the
films themselves. It also introduced the idea of toy sets
(29:40):
and collectibles. It was the first blockbuster series. It started
the whole trend of having summer blockbuster releases. It modeled
the trilogy story structure and was the first to contain
many genres in one movie. The plot twist and the
Empire Strikes Back as one of the most influential plot
twists in history, and a New Hope was the first
(30:01):
to surpass the three hundred million dollar mark adjusted for inflation.
It's still one of the highest grossing movies of all time,
and it revitalized interest in space based entertainment, making way
for the Star Trek motion picture series. And one of
my other faves that Samantha was also very patient with
me about alien among so many other things. Some comic
(30:22):
experts say the popularity of the Star Wars comic single
handedly saved Marvel. It goes beyond that too. Harry Potter
was influenced by Star Wars so many things. They came
out during a time when there was all these feelings
of hopelessness, and the stories of the time reflected that,
the stories that people were watching in movie theaters, but
(30:42):
not Star Wars right.
Speaker 1 (30:44):
So again, by the way, these are all Annis research things,
and I just wanted to be in here for a
voice because her love for it. There's no way I
could ever imagine so from findango dot com. In it's
forty years of existence as an entertainment property, it has
also become a cultural entity unlike any other, a phenomenon
(31:04):
that has probably influenced pop culture more than anything else
in our time. Contributing editor at Wired, Daniel Night Griffiths
wrote in maybe one of a million universes does George
Luca's combination of narrative structure of a fairy tale with
model making an aesthetic of a downbeat, broken future sci
fi movies of the seventies even get made In one
(31:26):
out of ability, it turns out to be the most
successful independent creative enterprises of all time.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I think of that a lot because I know we
all have heard the stories of the actors coming on
set and seeing like a walking trash can and thinking out,
my career is ruined.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
But you told us about Harrison Ford trying to leave
several times and then coming back.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
Well, and it totally influenced the pot of the movies.
That's why the Carbonat scene exists. I can see it
like just all of these things had to turn out correctly,
and amazingly they did, or else it could have been
a very ridiculous lip like flop. Right.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
And by the way, during the movie, the entirety of
the time, while Annie was talking about this is what
was happening, this could have been what happened. My partner
was like, this is where they put through gi At
backwards and they didn't need to do this, and they
made this.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
So it was a really interesting context from a parson
who's never seen it. Yeah, for them to tell tell
me how it changed.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Yeah, And it's so. We were watching the Disney Plus
version and for people in the no like Star Wars
has been changed so many times, and I actually really,
really want to see the original cuts without all of
the changes so badly, and I think maybe it'll happen
for me. Sirin very excited. Former Wired dot Co UK
writer Michael Rundle wrote, I'm fascinated by Star Wars because
(32:40):
of what a world without Star Wars would look like.
No Star Wars means no lucasfilms are Lucas arts? Would
there still be a goal in age of video games
without Monkey Island, Full Thottle or Sam and Max. One
of the many incredible things about Star Wars is that
every time you think you've mapped out every aspect of
how different a world without Star Wars would be, you
think of something else. Fan or not, Star Wars is
a part of you, and you are a part of it.
(33:02):
Like the travels of Odysseus, the ravages of our ancient
meddlesome Gods, the trials of Superman, and the heroic journeys
of Mario, you can't avoid it, right.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
The original trilogy told the classic tale of good versus
evil hero's journey, following Luke, Skywalker, Leah Orghana, and Han
Solo as they fight the Evil Empire. They won numerous awards,
including Oscars and regularly rank among the top ten movies
of all time across multiple publications and market surveys. Darth
Vader is one of the most memorable villains of all time.
(33:35):
I think it also has something to do with James
Earld Jones, oh, absolutely for sure. And Luke Skywalker is
so iconic that he's often used to teach the hero's
journey in school and is used in child's psychotherapy to
make things understandable between both child and therapists, framing the
Force as self healing and the child as Luke and
themselves as obi Wan, which is a really big assumption.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
It's supposed to you like, one day you won't need
me anymore, right, and you'll be able to do this
with the Force on your own.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
I'm that's true. Okay, Well, we have a lot more
to go over, oh my gosh, but first we're gonna
pause for a quick break for word from our sponsor,
(34:30):
and we're back, Thank you, sponsor. So just a broad
overview of some culture things you've got when it comes
to Star Wars, You've got sayings known worldwide, even if
people don't know where they'd come from, like Jedi mind trick,
You're my only hope. May the Force be with you.
I am y'all follow the evil Empire and then you've
got the holidays. May the Fourth be with you. In
Revenge of the Fifth, which.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
By the way, we watched four May the.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Fourth, Yes we did. It's a celebration.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
It was a celebration for some. And in two thousand
and one UK survey all almost four hundred thousand people
wrote in Jedi as their religion, making it the fourth
largest religion. Oh wow, there's a church of Jediism. And
in Texas there's a registered Church of Jediism, which, by
the way, are you part of that?
Speaker 2 (35:16):
No, I don't know if there's like a test second,
just check it, Samantha. And then songs I always think
of for me Run the Jewels, Skywalker talk because I'm
the real Darth Vader. I think that's from Banana Clipper,
Banana Clip, Mu Tan Klan, Kanye West, BC Boys, quin
A Two, Justin Bieber, the Nerve Herders, which is a
band named after the Star Wars Insult and they played
(35:38):
the theme song for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So you
got all these like musical references too, and the music
itself from the movie is amazing and iconic. Many view
it as one of the best movie scores of all time.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
I think we try to plot away to get that
Darth Vader slash uh death stars somehow. That's like, like,
you know this is going to happen. Someone's going to
die soon. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
I'm actually a member of the John Williams Span Club
and I have been since fifth grade.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That makes sense, Yeah, it does, I know so. It
obviously also influenced art. Banksy has used Star Wars energy
in his own art. Other movies have it replicated Star
Wars posters like National Lampoon's Vacation and European Vacation.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
And in sports, Major League Baseball gets in on May
the Four celebrations, encouraging costumes and themed to giveaways. I've
definitely been to those. The Yankees are known as the
Evil Empire during this and they play the Imperial March
at their home games.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
And then as you say that, I can hear the
song in my head even though I've not watched the movie.
Speaker 2 (36:36):
But once it's catchup.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
Also in politics, so the same year, Return of the
Jedi came out in nineteen eighty three, Star Wars got
wrapped up in Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, which was a
system of ground in space based lasers and missiles meant
to protect against a nuclear attack. Critics called it Star Wars,
which Reagan, of course leaned into. Reagan also called the
(36:58):
USSR the Evil Empire, and at one point the US
military had an idea to create a First Earth battalion
made up of folks who could walk through walls, be invisible,
see the future, and kill goats with a look, and
they were called Jedi Warriors. I definitely couldn't let go
of the fact that every single bad guy had an
(37:20):
odd Russian accent.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yeah, well, it's funny too, because I love that Carrie
Fisher was able to joke about this herself later. But
Leah has kind of a strange English accent in a
New Hope that goes Away. And yeah, even a few
weeks ago this happened when Trump's campaign manager compared Trump's
campaign to the Dead Stars, seemingly not realizing that one,
(37:45):
the Death Star is bad and it's for the bad guys,
and two it always gets destroyed. He got a very
big Star Wars schooling from the Internet for that, and
a New Hope and the Empire Strikes Backup been added
to the Nash Film Registry by the Library of Congress
for being quote culturally historically, are esthetically significant right just
(38:06):
their own.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Like beginning montage with the writing the script uh huh,
you know what that is?
Speaker 2 (38:16):
And science. Star Wars has played a role in actual science.
For instance, when Will I Am and Correspondence appeared on
CNN as holograms, one of the correspondents said, it feels
like I follow in the tradition of Princess Leia. Bionic
arms like those sported by Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader.
Some of them are named after Luke Skywalker. A company
out of Hong Kong made a pretty spot on lightsaber
(38:37):
the military is working on at eight like machines, which
are the big snow creature things that they knock over
with their harpoons.
Speaker 1 (38:45):
Those are yeah, I just call them the monster things.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I got you, I Got you, Samantha. And then there's
a death star bug zapper.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
Right in the popular Smithsony. In nineteen ninety nine, Star
Wars exhibit star Wars The Magic of Myth lives online
and the Millennium Falcon was the inspiration by the name
of Elon Musk's Falcon series launch vehicles, which yes, you
could absolutely see that in Oh yeah, and several organisms
have been named after Star Wars terms and characters.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
So okay, it's a big deal, is what we're trying
to say, mostly me and Samantha supporting me. It's not
without its faults, obviously, there's hardly any people of color
La It's pretty much the only woman in the regionals
and that isn't much better in the prequels sexualization. There's
definitely toxic fandom. I think it might be one of
(39:35):
the most toxic fandoms, and we've talked about that before
specifically now and a lot of mostly men, feel that
the new ones are made by social justice warriors with
the social justice warrior agenda. Some cinophiles do feel like
it ruined cinema forever because we pivoted away from what
in their mind is artistic films to movies that make
(39:55):
a lot of money for children. But in a lot
of ways it connected with so so many of us
and for a lot of girls and women. Princess Leah
specifically was a feminist icon, and we'll get into that
after your quick break for word from our sponsor, and
(40:24):
we're back. Thank you, sponsor. So let's finally arrive at
Princess Leah, and thank you for letting me indulge in
my Star Wars fandom and continue. Because just like you
can't separate out the influence of Star Wars from our culture,
you really cannot separate the enormous influence of Princess Leah
(40:45):
on our culture and the influence she had on countless
other fictional characters, from Ellen Ripley to Hermione Granger to
catmus Everdeen, so many so general sketch of her. Leah
Organa is the princess of the planet all Ron, a
member of the Imperial Senate, and the leader of the
Rebel Alliance. This is all by the time she's nineteen.
(41:06):
Just fyi. According to George Lucas, she also has the
Star Wars equivalent of a PhD uh huh. Through the series,
we learned that she is a twin sister of Luke
Skywalker and daughter of Darth Vader. She was raised by
Senator Bail Organa and Queen Braha Organa. She goes on
in the new trilogy to found the Resistance as a
(41:27):
general against the first order, she was played by Carrie Fisher,
and the character has appeared in many books, comics, television shows, games,
and she has gone on to become iconic the Cinmon
bun hair style, which George Lucas attributes to a hairstyle
of female Mexican revolutionaries of the metal bikini, and has
(41:49):
been adopted by many as a feminist icon. She's been parodied, celebrated,
and appeared on stamps in the US and the UK,
and she's appeared on all sorts of merchandise in all
sorts of merchandizing. After Disney acquired Star Wars, they had
to backtrack a statement that there were no plans for
Princess Leah merchandise after it caused so much backlash, so
(42:10):
much backlash, there's still not as much as there should be.
But Carrie Fisher allegedly was told she had to lose
ten pounds for the role, which is gross and totally
still happens. For the new series, she was reportedly pressured
to lose thirty five pounds. I've been told something like
this more than once, so this is still absolutely a thing.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Oh, absolutely ageism and then of course weight in all
of those things and race, and Fisher has spoke openly
about how she regrets signing away her likeness, which wasn't
really a thing at the time. She told the Daily
Base there's no merchandising tied to movies. No one could
have known the extent of the franchise. Not that I
don't think I'm cute or anything, but when I look
(42:51):
in the mirror, I didn't think I was signing away
anything of value. Lately, I feel like I mini mouth.
The identity of Princess Leah so eclipsed any other identity
that I've ever had.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
Yes, I could see that.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
Yeah, that sounds like she lost a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
Oh yeah. She even said like she's kind of very
I don't know if good natured, but you know, she's
got her classic funny view on it. But she said,
she said, if she found out that Dadley Portman was
making merchandising, she'd be really mad. For Queen Amidala. Lea's
part diplomat, spy, soldier leader. She's passionate, She's caring, brash, loud, strong, defiant, assertive, angry, snarky,
(43:32):
not afraid to speak her mind and fight for what's right.
She first appeared as Yeah, a nineteen year old in
a New Hope in a virginal floor length dress that's
accent of cleavage, although Fisher recounted George Lucas telling her
not to wear a bra with it because quote, there
is no underwear in space, because your body expands, but
(43:53):
your bra does not, and it would strangle you. So
Fisher used to joke she wanted it reported that. However,
she died, it should be reported I drowned in moonlight,
strangled by my own brawl, and that was a very
popular tweet after she did die. It's immediately established that
Princess Leah is not going to shy away from a blaster,
and later we find out that her actions at the
(44:15):
beginning of the movie saved the entire rebellion. This the
only force that was opposing the empire. She is captured
by the intimidating Darth Vader, but stands up to him
and withstands. His torture doesn't reveal anything, so she is damseled,
but she's still fighting, and she's still making these snarky comments,
and when she is rescued, she pretty quickly takes charge.
(44:36):
She literally takes the blaster from Luke's hands and comes
up with a plan to get them out, jumping into
a smelly, disgusting garbage disposal, which is hardly a traditional
princess decision. She also immediately sees through Luke and the
Stormtrooper get up. When he says he's here to rescue you,
She's like, Nah, is very unimpressed with him, and they're
(44:59):
poorly thought escape plan. And I do love thinking about
like Luke, who's bringing is full of adventures, envisions himself
as the hero coming to save the beautiful princess. He
says he's here to rescue her, and she's like, excuse me,
you're who now, kind of immediately shutting him down. And
I also love that her leadership in general isn't questioned
(45:19):
as a woman. Like it's never like, oh, we shouldn't
listen to her because she's a woman. It's more Han
being like, I don't listen to anybody, right.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
I do like the back and forth with Han and
the Han being like, what's happening? Who are you? What's happening?
So before that happens, her planet is destroyed by the
death Star to make a statement, and I was like,
oh my god, they blew up a planet. What just happened?
And in an instant she loses her family, her friends,
her stuff, her home and this could have destroyed her,
(45:48):
but it didn't.
Speaker 2 (45:50):
Alyssa Rosenberg at The Washington Post wrote about her, Leah's
nerves as a revolutionary are clear from the moment she
arrives on the screen. She takes shots at the stormtroopers
boarding her shit, gets stunned with a blaster in her hand,
then has the audacity to try to make Darth Vader
feel ashamed of himself. She has enough energy left over
after a nasty session of torture to insult Grandmoth Tarkin.
(46:11):
And while she grieves when her home planet Aldorant is
destroyed by the Death Star, Lea's not paralyzed when her
unexpected rescuers show up. She's ready to go and to
gripe about their operational sloppiness, and then she went on
to right. Leiah wasn't just the first great heroine of
science fiction and fantasy to capture my imagination. She was
one of the first characters I encountered whose power came
(46:32):
from her political conviction and acumen. So when Han, Cherry
and Luke do arrive to rescue her. She pretty much
instantly asserts her authority, and this leads to conflict between
her and Han Solo, who isn't used to having someone
tell him what to do. He calls her sweetheart, but
Lea's totally impervious to his attempts to take control. She
(46:52):
also proves she's got more savvy and less bravado than
Han after they escape, and she surmises they're being tracked
by the Empire, who let them go. Hans like, no,
not this ship. Never, he's too cocky to admit it.
She's right, he's wrong. Despite the tragedy she's gone through,
she assumes leadership in rebellion. And also, look, Luke is mccrush.
(47:15):
I know he's had a rough time. Leah comforts him
after obi Wan dies, but Lea just lost her whole
planet and she knew obi Wan too, by the way,
and we never get to see her grieve. And Okay,
I know people like to fight about this because I
said it on another show, and man that she grieved
off screen. And Luke did lose his guardians, which was
(47:36):
very sad and traumatic. I agree, but it.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
Was also very quickly passed by. Yeah, wait, that was it?
Speaker 2 (47:42):
Yeah. He kind of just is like, well, I'm leaving now,
and I don't judge people for how they grieve. That's
totally cool. I'm just saying, uh, you know, we don't
get to see her grieve because I guess it's not
technically her story. It's explored some of the in the
Extended Universe legends.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
I will say about the movie, she takes everything.
Speaker 2 (48:06):
With like okay and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:09):
Let me keep going like that was like very much
like that. Seems like she should be a pause of
some sort.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Well, we'll talk about that more in a minute. Well, now,
we'll talk about that more in part two. Because a
lot of people gripe about the return of the Jedi reveal.
I see her as someone who takes things in stride right,
But anyway, also of the character's lay perhaps has the
least of an arc, and a part of that is
she is the most sure of in herself and her
calling when we're introduced to her. Her biggest thing is
(48:38):
learning to accept that she has needs and wants on
a personal level and embracing those things. Han and Luke
have a lot of growing up to do, and Leah
is instrumental in that. For both of them. Even at
the heart of it, she influences Luke and Han to
become a part of the rebellion. She's already a hero
when we meet her, and she influences them to become
heroes too. She does often serve as a support to
(48:59):
luke story into Han's story, and in the first two
is the potential romantic interest for both of them. She's
more developed and interesting a character than perhaps her traditional
love interest, but there is still an element of that.
All right, So New Hope Ends, Big Explosion, Death Star, Happy,
(49:21):
pure are your metals. Then we move on to The
Empire Strikes Back, in which Leah is a prominent leader
of the rebellion who stays behind to the very last
second to make sure everyone is safely evacuated off of
the snow planet hof. We see her relationship with Han,
and in today's context, it's a little cringey, just because
(49:41):
he's so pushy and doesn't take no for an answer.
I definitely want to return to the whole nice men
scoundrel trope that plays out here, and it is kind
of funny that she's trying to manage all of the
stafffull of this evacuation and Han is just trying to
her to admit that she cares about him, and I
(50:02):
know the stakes are high because he's basically trying to
get her to admit he wants him to say, or
he's gonna leave. But anyway, there's a definite unthawed the
ice queen vibe too, and Lando is pretty flirty with her.
Although Orlando is the typho flirts with everyone. My friend
and I have an ongoing argument about whether or not
(50:24):
he had sex with the Millennium Falcon. Weigh in on
that if you would like or don't, I'm.
Speaker 1 (50:29):
Just gonna say that's the first thing she saw said
when he arrived, and I was like, I don't know
what's happening, but what.
Speaker 2 (50:35):
We had like an hour fluslong argument about it. Oh,
and Lando's also trying to make sure they don't get
win that Vader's there, so he's trying to endear himself
to them. But we do see another instance of a
woman sensing that something is wrong and being dismissed when
Leah voices her concerns about Lando's trustworthiness. Han Lean and
(50:56):
Chewey are captured and tortured by Darth Vader. That you
only really see Han's torture and I guess tobacco with
the loud sound thing.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
Wait in the gold dude, oh gold Man.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Gold Man gets blasted apart.
Speaker 1 (51:08):
Yeah, I was like, what did no one notice that
Chewbacca did? He did? He did, he came, and Lea
did too.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
Han was the one that was like, ah, and then
we have the famous I love you, I know exchange.
So there are so many ways to interpret this, but
one is that in the face of Hans's death, she
admits something she knew she'd made him doubt, that she
loves him, and he acknowledges his understanding of her fear
of intimacy and accepts it as a kid. I always
(51:38):
saw it as Hans Solo's too afraid to say it
in front of all these soldiers and Darth Vader. But
you know, multiple ways to interpret those those lines. Some
people take issue with the fact that Han asked Chewie
to take care of her when clearly she can do
it herself, while others see those words is meant to
comfort Chewy, to give him something to you, to calm
(52:01):
him down. When Lando frees them, Leah takes charge of
the ultimately failed attempt to save Han and does save
Luke after sensing his call for help, and we do
you get to see Pilot the Millennium falcking, which is cool.
Speaker 1 (52:16):
Yeah, yeah, it was very cool. I think I'm not
gonna lie. I was very confused about what was happening,
and you made sure to let me know that. This
is where Harrison for said I'm not coming back. Yeah,
so they had to have a possibility of just ending
him or allowing him to come back.
Speaker 2 (52:32):
Well, the only reason he came back to return the
Jedi was he was supposed to be killed off and
then they didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
There you go. Yeah, yeah, so I'm going to heard
it here with the end of part one. Yes, our heroes,
your heroes, the heroes, how about that are battered and
separated in part two? Yes, y'all after an hour of
this lengthy discussion, there is a part too, and it's
about the return of the Jedi and the infamous metal bikini,
(53:02):
which is the one scene that I know, and the
feminism of Princess Leiah and of the Fourth in general.
Speaker 2 (53:07):
Yes, so we'll leave you on a cliffhanger, just like
those lucky viewers that got to see Empire shikes. Back
and didn't know what happened. Then Return of the Jedi,
so look out for that episode in the meantime. If
you want to email as you can, Our email is
Stuff Media Moms Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com. You can
also find us on Instagram at Stuff I Never Told
(53:29):
You or on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast. Thanks as
always to our super producer Andrew Howard, and thanks to
you for listening. Steffan Never Told You is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Hey, this is Annie and Samantha.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm welcome to Steph whan never told you a production
of iHeartRadio, And welcome to our one of many Star
Wars classics are going to run this month, beginning with
(00:28):
our two partner and Princess Leah. To everyone who's listened,
you know, I adore her. Carrie Fisher got her honorary
Star today because today is May the fourth, as we
record it, And you know, I could have It's a
joke that I make several times in this, but I
could have just talked about her on and on and on,
(00:48):
and I have had new thoughts since this, So it's
one of those things where I just it makes me
very happy. It brings a smile to my face when
I think about it. There is this on Princess Leiah
in our upcoming book, which you can pre order it
stuff you should read books dot com. But I just
adore her. I love her so much. I don't know,
(01:11):
I'm filled with joy, but so much joy. I hope
this classic brings you joy as well, so please please
enjoy this classic episode. Hey, this is Annie and Smitha
and welcome to stephf Mom've never told you a production
of iHeartRadio. I am so excited right now. Yes, my
(01:44):
heart is racing. Yes, I couldn't sleep last night.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
I like this anticipation of what's happening.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
Yes, because we're finally talking about a hero of mine,
Princess Leiah and feminist them.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
And at this point this is where like Canaan's and
like sparks should be going off, all the sound effects.
Speaker 2 (02:05):
I was like, my brain is like the death Star exploding.
That's what's happening.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
There you go there.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, yeah, this is the longest outline I've ever written,
so long, it's twenty one pages.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
I will say partially, I'm going to say it was
my fault because I told you to have ad it.
This is your project, this is your baby, and do
it so I and I think you held back.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
I definitely held back. I definitely was like, at some point,
you're gonna have to stop or you might just die
here research.
Speaker 1 (02:40):
I think I told you. I like, I'm going to
need you to wrap it up now.
Speaker 2 (02:43):
Yeah. Last night I sent Samantha text and I just
had circled like how long it was and how many
tabs I had left, and she was.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
Like, oh god, that that was literally the only response
I could.
Speaker 2 (02:54):
Give was oh God, yeah, oh, and I would.
Speaker 1 (02:57):
I would go in to look at the outline while
I'm working to one thing to see where we were,
and I know, like day three was page nine and
I was like, oh, it's gonna be a long one.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
It definitely is, which means it's a two parter. So
in this one, we're gonna focus on the basics of
Star Wars and Princess Leah threw a new hope and
Empire strikes back. Yeah, we're pretty much sticking to the
original trilogy and then no be a Kuldar Finger and
you'll have to wait to figure out what we think
(03:32):
about the metal bikini in Return of the Jedi, and
then the feminism of Leah and my own a personal
ani original on my thoughts of around Luke Skywalker's feminism
and the feminism of the Force.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
So right, and before we start, just to let you know,
we did actually do a viewing social distance viewing of
the trilogy, the originals, the Originals, because I, to many
people's chagrin, have never actually watched a full Star Wars movie.
(04:08):
And I will say, if you know anything about the house,
stuff works, family Slash, iHeartMedia family. There are some diehards
in here, I mean true, true diehards. Holly Fry was very,
very disappointed in the fact that I had never seen
one of these. She was very forgiving, yeah, but disappointed.
I made sure that I let her know, yes, guess
(04:30):
what we're watching it. I feel like she was pretty
excited for us. But yes, I have never actually seen
a full Star Wars movie. I've been around it quite
a while. You know, it's been out there on random
TVs at bars and restaurants because it is played a lot.
And of course I've seen it while flitting past while
channel surfing, but never fully committed to watch any of these.
(04:52):
I will say it was never part of my childhood.
It was never a part of anybody in my family's childhood.
I'm gonna blame the orphanage that I was in for
a while. We didn't watch movies come on and and
again I'm a little older, so I would have been
right outside of when it was popular. I think right
before right after, you know what I mean, Because it
came out in the seventies. The popularity hit it in
(05:13):
the nineties, seventies, eighties, so it was kind of all
that time and I will say after months months.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Begging, yeah, I don't love it.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
Well actual studio. Yes, by the way, all she did
this whole really sweet video, but how much she cared
about me with an ending that said please watch Star
Wars essentially was what went down, and even some bartering,
like I almost got some free luggage out of this.
I had to step back. I was like, that's corol,
that'n't mean but did She's like, I'll watch whatever you want.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I will.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
I haven't decided whether that's gonna be yet though. By
the way, that we finally finally committed to a day
of marathon ing in the midst of the pandemic, I mean,
what else am I going to do? Right? And so
with that I decided to go ahead and write. So
this is what I wrote before she started the actual outline, y'all,
the twenty one page outline of my views of what
(06:11):
I knew of the movie before I watched the actual movies.
So I know Harrison Ford and he was involved with
this obviously, and the iconic Carrie Fisher, who was an
amazing woman, and of course Mark Hamill, your crush with
that I know, Luke, I am your father Chebacca and
(06:32):
the dark side. Of course, I remember the weird giant
slime thing that for some reason in prisons and grossly
sexualizes Leah, and that there's a gold robot R two
D two. I know those letters. Oh no, but I
know those letters. And of course space in the future
with lots of laser guns, which apparently I found out
later they don't know how to aim. They don't know
(06:54):
how to do it, doesn't know and of course laser swords.
And I'm not gonna lie. I mixed some of the
scenes up with Spaceballs because I had a roommate who
loved that movie, and also we would watch that together.
And of course I mean John Candy. He should have
been in Star Wars, right, that was a missed opportunity.
(07:15):
Who doesn't love John Candy? Didn't this? I know. I
did go in thinking this may make or break my
relationship with Aie, but I will be here to tell
you that it didn't. Except there was There was one
of those moments when the holiday special came on. I
was like, what in the hell is this? And why?
(07:37):
I did question a lot of things.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Well, that is fair. One of my favorite tweets from
fellow podcasters stuff. You should know. They did a whole
episode on the Holiday special and it was something like
no one could explain what happened that night in nineteen seventy.
It's infamously awful. Yeah, yeah, I yes, we're still friends.
(08:02):
We made it through, and I do love how this
kept happening. When we were watching it too. We kept
saying it's in the future, but it's actually a long
time ago in a galaxy far far away. And you
did the thing, you got the line.
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Drug it's true. I did. I know it's actually no,
I am your father. I got it now. I got
it now. But yes, as many as we know, as
many have gotten that wrong, Luke, I am her Father's no,
I am your father. But hey, I got it. I've
got that in my mind.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
Now that's a whole it's a whole thing. There's been
YouTube videos about why we do that, so it's all good.
And I also had to get pretty good at translating
Samantha Star Wars speak like gold. I don't think you
ever got c threepo. It was always like gold Robot
or gold Man or gold gold dude. And then there's
like baby Jet, which was the why we was a
(08:55):
baby jet, so I had to get good at that.
I will say, for me, asking you to watch Star
Wars is like a proposal. If it's my love language.
It's like sharing a piece of my soul. I was
really nervous about it. Honestly, I was really nervous about
doing this, even though I've had the outline for like
eight months. I'm embarrassed by how important it is to me,
(09:18):
and then angry that I'm embarrassed about it.
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Yeah, and I don't think you need to be embarrassed
at all, because, first of all, as a good friend,
you shared a part of yourself with me that you
love and I love that. Secondly, you're really good at
translating my Star Wars speaker. You did better than the
partner who watched it with me, and he was also
excited that I was finally watching it. And again, you
are the one that convinced me to watch it, not him.
(09:44):
Just as a reminder, but yeah, I definitely may have
called the smaller jets baby jets. I may have called
a few robuts baby robots, baby Goldman robots, robot man dick.
I called him a dick a couple of thousand, like dude,
that guy's a dick. It just keeps running away. What's
wrong with Well, yes, I had to create nicknames shorthands
(10:05):
in order for me to figure out who was what
and why and just again just why. To be fair,
that may have been more with the holiday special of
like what is happening and why? Oh well, but yeah,
I digress.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
That is totally fair. I actually like I saved my
text message change because I only watched that for the
first time like a year ago, and I saved my
text message change with my friend and I love it.
It is so funny because I also have a similar
reaction because people can prepare you, but they can't really
prepare you. It is that mad.
Speaker 1 (10:37):
It is so bad.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Anyway, A brief rundown of my experience with Star Wars
fandom because I I actually don't remember a time having
not seen them. I saw the original trilogy when I
was four years old, and I love them, even if
even at four I was like, oh, I don't buy
this force thing. I don't think that's real. They are
(11:02):
super nostalgic for me. Even watching them now. I remember
Obi Wan always. My dad always quoted obi Wan, and
I can't hear Obi Wan's voice without thinking about my
dad doing Yoda and Darth Vader voices with my brothers.
I fell in love with my first cush, Luke Skywalker.
I would pause the frame and kiss his cheek.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Oh and yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and put this
out there for anyone who may have a connection with
Mark Hamill. Her goal, y'all, her goal has been to
get a tweet from Mark Hamill or reaction. So we've
got to make this happen. We we're gotta make this
dream come true.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
I think I might Actually I wouldn't die, but it
would be a close call. Like I I think.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
You would fall out. I think you would fall out
for sure.
Speaker 2 (11:47):
It's really funny because I keep talking about like this scheme,
and my scheme is literally like tweet at him. But
I do have this plan where I'm gonna recreate the
original trilogy from memory, which I've I've got that down.
I think, wait.
Speaker 1 (12:01):
Didn't you already start doing that? Then you say you
started it?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
I have been practicing perhaps.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Okay, Okay, I feel like I heard that story.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Oh yeah, it's a work in progress, and I'm gonna
I have costumes and praps and It's gonna be really
silly and hopefully fun, and I'm going to release just
chunks of it every day on Instagram because otherwise it
would be ridiculous. But maybe then Mark Hamill will notice
me and my life will be complete, meaning just.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
And just By the way, as she talks about costumes,
she's actually weaving.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
I do now. I'm in the Rebel X Being fight
suit flight suit.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And we will have pictures of those for sure. Also,
I talked to her an hour before we started recording,
and she was in another costume. She did a wardrobe
change before we started.
Speaker 2 (12:47):
I did it all for you, Samantha.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
And you know what, I appreciate it. I appreciate the
commitment and the love. And I know you're going to
say it's cosplay, but I think this is just your life,
and I enjoyed that even more.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
You know, I'm embarrassed to admit this, but I have
spent more than one night wondering what it means that
my first crush was Luke Skywalker and I'm dressing as
my first crush.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
I mean, enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
I got to take care of my mental ill. Somehow
I got this whole evolution of Luke Skywalker cosplay. I'm
probably just one of my goals is every week to
wear costume at work. And this is the second time
I've done it this week because I was the Winter
Soldier earlier. So nailing it. You're right.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
And if you didn't see our stories. She did do
the podcast with Movie Crush, you should check it out,
and she is in full costume that she put on.
It wasn't a flashback she put on for that specific episode.
Speaker 2 (13:53):
Yes, I think check thought I might have lost my
mind in Quarantine, but uh yeah, more about that later.
So yeah, I had like all the toys and the
books and the games. We had the original VHS's and
they I couldn't watch the last thirty minutes of any
of them because they were overworn.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
I don't think that you would tell us this is
the part that my video starts.
Speaker 2 (14:16):
I know, And it was always like right at that
epic climax Like this is for younger viewers, who viewers
listeners who might not know. This was a thing where
if you watched a VHS so much, the tape would
get worn and you just couldn't watch the rest. And
I oh, I had this board game that I love
where you played along with the VHS. It was like
(14:39):
my favorite. And then my good friend Katie, who is
my neighbor. She and I used to recreate Jedi lightsaber
battles with the lights off and the music playing. We
had a Jedi training course. I created a fictional Star
Wars character when I was eight named Tara Polaris.
Speaker 1 (14:59):
Which, by the way, great name, Thank.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
You, thank you, and I would go dressed as her Halloween.
People would be like, oh Obi wan Kenoby, and I'd
be like, uh uh, Tara Polaris, thank you.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
Wait is she and your fan fiction?
Speaker 2 (15:16):
Uh No, she's not my current fan fiction, which by
the way, is one hundred and eighty page pages along
you guys, but she. I did write the Adventures of
Tara Polaris as an eight year old, and unfortunately, I
think they've been lost in the Great Purge of high
school where I burned everything that I'd ever written.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
Oh no, I know.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
I would love to read about Tara Polaris.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
That's such a good name. I feel like that she
would be a character.
Speaker 2 (15:40):
Maybe I'll introduce her into my fan fiction. Yes, please, Actually,
what I wanted to do because I was going to
read a bit of my Star Wars fan fiction, but
it's all really depressing. I think the angst in it
could kill a person. So I was thinking that I
could put out the offer of listeners sending in prompts
(16:01):
and I will try to write something and maybe we
can read it.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Is it gonna be like I choose your own adventure?
Speaker 2 (16:06):
No, I mean that it could be. But in fan
fiction usually like there'll be one shot prompts like what
if the twin swap is a big thing in fan fation.
What if Luke and Lea were swapped? What what happened
in this scene? So just putting that out there everybody,
and I had like all the posters and the stars.
(16:29):
I had three thousand of those sticky stars in my ceiling.
I probably right now I'm on a bit of a
Star Wars bench. And I think it does have to
do with the anxiety around quarantine and pandemic, because it
started right around then, and it is something that I
find really nostalgic and comforting. So once a week I
(16:50):
watched something Star Wars related.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Peane, that's not a bad thing. And I just tweeted,
actually in my own personal account, about how there's a
research about during times of trauma during people with anxiety
will rewatch a lot of things, which is absolutely me.
But I do want to call you out on one thing.
So during our adventures and watching these movies or marathoning
(17:13):
these movies, they did turn on the Holiday Special, which,
by the way, apparently the version we had is double.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
It was way longer than the version I have.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Right, so I think you had like fifty minutes and
our version was an hour and forty five minutes and
it was torture. So I was like, look halfway through.
U stopped. It was like I can't, I can't do this.
I'll be back when you know, when you're fitted for whatever.
I leave, I come back and they have restarted from
the freaking beginning of the trilogies these movies, and I
was like, what is happening? We just watched seven and
(17:47):
a half hours of this. What is going on?
Speaker 2 (17:49):
It's really funny too, because when you came in, I
didn't realize you re fined us at first, and you
said something, what are you doing? And I turned around
like a child had been caught doing something wrong. I said,
She called I was watching them again?
Speaker 1 (18:02):
Was everybody was like what.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
It was quite embarrassing.
Speaker 1 (18:08):
Yess, it would not have been embarrassing, but I was
just more in shock of like, are you freaking kidding me?
You guys, I don't know if as much as I
love things, I've never loved something this much.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, I've been thinking about this for this episode, the
level of love I have for it, which I'm trying
to going through some of it right now. One of
the last things Samantha and I did before Quarantine was
we went to Disneyland and we rode the new ride
Rise at the Resistance, and it's a huge ordeal and
(18:40):
I almost cried when I found out we were going
to get.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
To write day. Okay, so I'm gonna go ahead and
interrupt you because I need to talk about the overall
process as well as the level and the drama that ensued. So,
first of all, we were in LA to do a conference,
and of course while we were in La must go
to Disneyland. While we were in Florida, we went to
(19:04):
disney World, so it only made sense in preparation of
going to Florida. Of course, Annie had to talk to
our experts, Holly Fry, who, by the way, if you're
not following her Twitter, account. You should because she has
daily updates of her love for Star Wars as well,
including all the mini dresses that she has made, in
(19:26):
clothing she has made, and dedication to Star Wars. It
is hardcore and amazing, right awesome, Yes, yes, so all
of these things. So Annie decided to get the best
strategic way on getting this ride. And if you don't
know about this ride, you can't just get on it.
(19:46):
You have to reserve, and you have to reserve way
to advance or you were not going to ride that ride.
And not only did we get to the park two
hours before it opened and very cold, l it was
so cold that we also walked in before the actual
park open. You get to go into the entrance and
(20:06):
just pretty much stand there and wait. You could see
a crowd of people, not only us, holding their phones
out and getting ready for whatever this reservation system was.
So as it opens, immediately Annie's like, Okay, you gotta
do this, this and this. All three of us, because
there's three of us got ready and did the thing
now as they did the thing. I know that was
(20:28):
very flippant, but it was a whole thing. By the way,
you have to download the app, get to this ride,
reserve on this ride as a crew whatever whatnot. Annie
is watching and as we sit there and one of
us finally shouts, we got it. Not only does any
and the entirety of the Disney crowd let out this
whoa in the middle of nothing like You're like, what
(20:51):
is happening? But Annie turns around away from us in
silence and turns back around and she's like, oh my god,
I can't believe. I just can't believe. Oh my god.
And I see tears in her eyes and I'm going,
oh my god, Annie, are you are you? Are you crying?
And you were like, no, yes, It's just so good.
(21:11):
It's just gonna be so good. And in anticipation of
the fact that we were actually going to ride the ride,
and I will say, it is a really good ride.
Xt my own Donald wasn't it And I didn't know
he was a bad guy in the New York movies.
I still love him. It's fine, I'm a fan, but
it was, Oh cuss, I forgot. I also got yelled
at but one of the Stormtrooper dudes because I couldn't
(21:34):
figure out how to follow the line.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
It was.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
I'm traumatized by that. Moment, I'm not gonna lie. I
feel like, huh, those guys are coming to get me.
Speaker 2 (21:43):
He blamed you. The rebellion was losing the resistance.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Yeah, but yeah, the reaction on your face, the reaction
on the crowd in the crowd was so big. I
was actually taking aback.
Speaker 2 (21:58):
Yeah, it was wild. It was wild because it was
like total silence for thirty seconds and then screaming.
Speaker 1 (22:05):
The shouts, the shouts of celebration was unreal.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
And the level I've reached is I now fantasize, like
legitimately fantasize about getting to see these movies without knowing
the ending of Return of the Jedi. I like, I've
read old speculation articles about how people thought it was
going in what did it mean? Luke was wearing all black?
He's gonna turn evil? And I interview my older friends
about it, tell me what was like, what did you
(22:32):
think was gonna happen? And I want it so badly.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yeah, And even as a person who never actually watched
or cared about these movies previously, I still knew how
it ended. So yeah, that's definitely a thing. As iconic
as these movies are, it's inevitable you kind of know
what's going to happen.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yeah, and we're gonna and we're gonna talk about that
for a minute, just the cultural impact these movies have
had and why it's important that we're talking about it.
I didn't want to throw in there because yes, I
was recently on movie crush for The Winter Soldier. I'm
going to be on there next for The Empire Strikes Back.
That I have been annoying Samantha with my new belief
that they're in many ways the same movie, just been
(23:13):
texting her like evidence I find. I recently discovered the
Sebastian san mar Cammel viral.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Thing, which I'm really surprised by because I even I
saw that.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
I don't know how I missed it, and a new hope.
The first one slashed. The fourth one came out on
May twenty fifth, which is the same day The Winter
Soldiers true identity as Bucky was revealed in the comics,
and the day my parents got married, so special day
and also Holly Holly's birthday.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Yeah, super fan experts. She's not superfan, she's a like
Star Wars expert.
Speaker 2 (23:45):
Oh god. Yeah, we were joking that we need to
make a chart of like the level of Star Wars fandom,
she's the top.
Speaker 1 (23:51):
Yes, you're the middle. Yeah, and even like I think
of my partner who also loves it, I was like, no,
you don't meet Annie. You're a little lower than her.
And then myself, I was like, I'm at the bottom,
and I like, well, I can't say I'm at bottom anymore.
I finally watched it. So now I'm a novice.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yes, yes, a novious sub Jedi patawe as they say,
which I still don't know of them. That's okay, I'll
do not it is no try so yeah, yeah, that's
that's kind of where we are on our levels of fandom.
And today I'm so excited to talk about Lea raghana Ak,
Princess Leah. We are mostly going to focus on the
(24:28):
original trilogy, because we talked about Leah in the new
trilogy Slash the Sequels and our feminism of Star Wars episode,
which I think came out two years ago on May
the fourth, of course, but we'll touch on that for sure,
because there are a lot of interesting things and conversations
we had and as a kid, I totally loved her,
which was a big deal because I'm kind of ashamed
(24:49):
to admit this, but usually, like I was fine with
female characters, but they were never my favorite or I
didn't even necessarily like them, really, And I think that
might be because female characters aren't written as well off.
But I loved her and I thought she was so
funny and smart and brave. And I did love her hair.
I thought it was awesome she had good hair. She did.
(25:10):
And I asked my friend Katie, who I've mentioned she
was like my Star Wars partner in crime, and I
asked her what she could remember of Princess Leiah as
a kid, and she wrote me back. I thought that
she was beautiful. I loved her white dress. I thought
she was badass in Return of the Jedi. I loved
when she was the bounty Hunter. I did think it
was too mean for her. I remember liking her voice
and how precise she was when she said her words.
(25:32):
I hated the needle scene. A needle scene was very scary. Yes,
and we have talked before about the importance of costuming
in our feminism of Star Wars episode, and I do
think there's something to be said for the fact that
most of her costumes are functional, but also feminine. Don't worry. Yes,
we're going to talk about the metal of bikini. Oh
my god. And I also forgot to mention that in
(25:56):
the original ending of Return of the Jedi, Hondaes becomes
starth Vader and ordered the destruction of all the rebellion
and listeners.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Just so you know. She did tell me this during
the movie viewing.
Speaker 2 (26:07):
Oh god, I only recently found that out, and I
blew my mind.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Yeah. I think there were so many things that you
were talking about, including the transition for loose outerwear.
Speaker 2 (26:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
I think this is the best way to say white
to great black. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. So there
was a lot of conversation that was had between my
partner and Annie, and there are so many things that
I'm like, I don't know what is happening, but this
nerd out is amazing from Afar and also annoying. I
don't know what to do right now. I'm both impressed
and annoyed.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
We're endearing but annoying. It was so endearing.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
I was like, Oh, I love that they have each
other to talk about this, but what is happening?
Speaker 2 (26:45):
Well, that's probably all the rest of this episode will go.
So politics in advance. I did want to talk about
the cultural impact of Star Wars because this is something
that's been on my mind since we read Whiskey and
Ribbons for our book club and there were all these
Star Wars references in it, and it got me to
thinking what it must be like to be a part
(27:05):
of something that big, where you could just be reading
something I never would have imagined there would be multiple
Star Wars references in that book, where a character you
played or story you're part of is just kind of ubiquitous.
And so I actually started making a graph keeping count
of all the Star Wars references I encounter every day
where I'm not like, not expecting to find them or
(27:28):
hear them. And it's between five and ten. Uh, I'm
going to make a chart and I'm going to post
it is great.
Speaker 1 (27:35):
So I got asked, it is three point thirty today.
We've been recording since too. How many references thus far
before the six Wow?
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's amazing. It really is stunning. How many
It just pops up and I'm like, oh, hey, there
you go. I think it was dead eye, dead eye
mind trick. Uh, and is the last one I heard today?
So in case you somehow don't know. Star Wars is
(28:03):
a science fantasy space opera franchise created by George Lucas
of currently eleven movies, TV shows, books, comics, toys, video games,
theme parks, dedicated conventions, radio dramas, music parodies, musical parities,
all Lale, weird out, and documentaries. It's been involved in
science politics, pretty much everything that you can imagine, and
(28:24):
inspired a massive fan community. The memes, the memes, art, cosplay,
fan fiction experts have written about Star Wars as an
American mythology, inspiring people to create their own thing. It's
now owned by Disney and has an estimated net worth
of seventy billion dollars and holds the Guinness World Record
(28:47):
for most successful film merchandising franchise. When the original trilogy
came out, beginning with a New Hope in nineteen seventy
seven and followed by The Empire Strikes Back in nineteen
eighty and Returned the Jedi nineteen eighty three, it changed Hollywood.
It revolutionized special effects. I annoyed Samantha with the paper
I wrote in fifth grade all about the special effects
(29:08):
of Star Wars and the Nike shoe that they for
some reason took out a Return of the Jedi.
Speaker 1 (29:14):
She did mention when it was and where it was.
Speaker 2 (29:16):
I was like it was back there, And things like
industrial light and magic still around today came out of
this and sound effect systems that we still use and
for better our worse, because you will find people that
really think this was the end of cinema, the understanding
that you could make more form of merchandising than the
films themselves. It also introduced the idea of toy sets
(29:40):
and collectibles. It was the first blockbuster series. It started
the whole trend of having summer blockbuster releases. It modeled
the trilogy story structure and was the first to contain
many genres in one movie. The plot twist and the
Empire Strikes Back as one of the most influential plot
twists in history, and a New Hope was the first
(30:01):
to surpass the three hundred million dollar mark adjusted for inflation.
It's still one of the highest grossing movies of all time,
and it revitalized interest in space based entertainment, making way
for the Star Trek motion picture series. And one of
my other faves that Samantha was also very patient with
me about alien among so many other things. Some comic
(30:22):
experts say the popularity of the Star Wars comic single
handedly saved Marvel. It goes beyond that too. Harry Potter
was influenced by Star Wars so many things. They came
out during a time when there was all these feelings
of hopelessness, and the stories of the time reflected that,
the stories that people were watching in movie theaters, but
(30:42):
not Star Wars right.
Speaker 1 (30:44):
So again, by the way, these are all Annis research things,
and I just wanted to be in here for a
voice because her love for it. There's no way I
could ever imagine so from findango dot com. In it's
forty years of existence as an entertainment property, it has
also become a cultural entity unlike any other, a phenomenon
(31:04):
that has probably influenced pop culture more than anything else
in our time. Contributing editor at Wired, Daniel Night Griffiths
wrote in maybe one of a million universes does George
Luca's combination of narrative structure of a fairy tale with
model making an aesthetic of a downbeat, broken future sci
fi movies of the seventies even get made In one
(31:26):
out of ability, it turns out to be the most
successful independent creative enterprises of all time.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
I think of that a lot because I know we
all have heard the stories of the actors coming on
set and seeing like a walking trash can and thinking out,
my career is ruined.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
But you told us about Harrison Ford trying to leave
several times and then coming back.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
Well, and it totally influenced the pot of the movies.
That's why the Carbonat scene exists. I can see it
like just all of these things had to turn out correctly,
and amazingly they did, or else it could have been
a very ridiculous lip like flop. Right.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
And by the way, during the movie, the entirety of
the time, while Annie was talking about this is what
was happening, this could have been what happened. My partner
was like, this is where they put through gi At
backwards and they didn't need to do this, and they
made this.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
So it was a really interesting context from a parson
who's never seen it. Yeah, for them to tell tell
me how it changed.
Speaker 2 (32:19):
Yeah, And it's so. We were watching the Disney Plus
version and for people in the no like Star Wars
has been changed so many times, and I actually really,
really want to see the original cuts without all of
the changes so badly, and I think maybe it'll happen
for me. Sirin very excited. Former Wired dot Co UK
writer Michael Rundle wrote, I'm fascinated by Star Wars because
(32:40):
of what a world without Star Wars would look like.
No Star Wars means no lucasfilms are Lucas arts? Would
there still be a goal in age of video games
without Monkey Island, Full Thottle or Sam and Max. One
of the many incredible things about Star Wars is that
every time you think you've mapped out every aspect of
how different a world without Star Wars would be, you
think of something else. Fan or not, Star Wars is
a part of you, and you are a part of it.
(33:02):
Like the travels of Odysseus, the ravages of our ancient
meddlesome Gods, the trials of Superman, and the heroic journeys
of Mario, you can't avoid it, right.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
The original trilogy told the classic tale of good versus
evil hero's journey, following Luke, Skywalker, Leah Orghana, and Han
Solo as they fight the Evil Empire. They won numerous awards,
including Oscars and regularly rank among the top ten movies
of all time across multiple publications and market surveys. Darth
Vader is one of the most memorable villains of all time.
(33:35):
I think it also has something to do with James
Earld Jones, oh, absolutely for sure. And Luke Skywalker is
so iconic that he's often used to teach the hero's
journey in school and is used in child's psychotherapy to
make things understandable between both child and therapists, framing the
Force as self healing and the child as Luke and
themselves as obi Wan, which is a really big assumption.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
It's supposed to you like, one day you won't need
me anymore, right, and you'll be able to do this
with the Force on your own.
Speaker 1 (34:06):
I don't.
Speaker 2 (34:07):
I'm that's true. Okay, Well, we have a lot more
to go over, oh my gosh, but first we're gonna
pause for a quick break for word from our sponsor,
(34:30):
and we're back, Thank you, sponsor. So just a broad
overview of some culture things you've got when it comes
to Star Wars, You've got sayings known worldwide, even if
people don't know where they'd come from, like Jedi mind trick,
You're my only hope. May the Force be with you.
I am y'all follow the evil Empire and then you've
got the holidays. May the Fourth be with you. In
Revenge of the Fifth, which.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
By the way, we watched four May the.
Speaker 2 (34:52):
Fourth, Yes we did. It's a celebration.
Speaker 1 (34:55):
It was a celebration for some. And in two thousand
and one UK survey all almost four hundred thousand people
wrote in Jedi as their religion, making it the fourth
largest religion. Oh wow, there's a church of Jediism. And
in Texas there's a registered Church of Jediism, which, by
the way, are you part of that?
Speaker 2 (35:16):
No, I don't know if there's like a test second,
just check it, Samantha. And then songs I always think
of for me Run the Jewels, Skywalker talk because I'm
the real Darth Vader. I think that's from Banana Clipper,
Banana Clip, Mu Tan Klan, Kanye West, BC Boys, quin
A Two, Justin Bieber, the Nerve Herders, which is a
band named after the Star Wars Insult and they played
(35:38):
the theme song for Buffy the Vampire Slayer. So you
got all these like musical references too, and the music
itself from the movie is amazing and iconic. Many view
it as one of the best movie scores of all time.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
I think we try to plot away to get that
Darth Vader slash uh death stars somehow. That's like, like,
you know this is going to happen. Someone's going to
die soon. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:02):
I'm actually a member of the John Williams Span Club
and I have been since fifth grade.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That makes sense, Yeah, it does, I know so. It
obviously also influenced art. Banksy has used Star Wars energy
in his own art. Other movies have it replicated Star
Wars posters like National Lampoon's Vacation and European Vacation.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
And in sports, Major League Baseball gets in on May
the Four celebrations, encouraging costumes and themed to giveaways. I've
definitely been to those. The Yankees are known as the
Evil Empire during this and they play the Imperial March
at their home games.
Speaker 1 (36:31):
And then as you say that, I can hear the
song in my head even though I've not watched the movie.
Speaker 2 (36:36):
But once it's catchup.
Speaker 1 (36:37):
Also in politics, so the same year, Return of the
Jedi came out in nineteen eighty three, Star Wars got
wrapped up in Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, which was a
system of ground in space based lasers and missiles meant
to protect against a nuclear attack. Critics called it Star Wars,
which Reagan, of course leaned into. Reagan also called the
(36:58):
USSR the Evil Empire, and at one point the US
military had an idea to create a First Earth battalion
made up of folks who could walk through walls, be invisible,
see the future, and kill goats with a look, and
they were called Jedi Warriors. I definitely couldn't let go
of the fact that every single bad guy had an
(37:20):
odd Russian accent.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Yeah, well, it's funny too, because I love that Carrie
Fisher was able to joke about this herself later. But
Leah has kind of a strange English accent in a
New Hope that goes Away. And yeah, even a few
weeks ago this happened when Trump's campaign manager compared Trump's
campaign to the Dead Stars, seemingly not realizing that one,
(37:45):
the Death Star is bad and it's for the bad guys,
and two it always gets destroyed. He got a very
big Star Wars schooling from the Internet for that, and
a New Hope and the Empire Strikes Backup been added
to the Nash Film Registry by the Library of Congress
for being quote culturally historically, are esthetically significant right just
(38:06):
their own.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
Like beginning montage with the writing the script uh huh,
you know what that is?
Speaker 2 (38:16):
And science. Star Wars has played a role in actual science.
For instance, when Will I Am and Correspondence appeared on
CNN as holograms, one of the correspondents said, it feels
like I follow in the tradition of Princess Leia. Bionic
arms like those sported by Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader.
Some of them are named after Luke Skywalker. A company
out of Hong Kong made a pretty spot on lightsaber
(38:37):
the military is working on at eight like machines, which
are the big snow creature things that they knock over
with their harpoons.
Speaker 1 (38:45):
Those are yeah, I just call them the monster things.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
I got you, I Got you, Samantha. And then there's
a death star bug zapper.
Speaker 1 (38:55):
Right in the popular Smithsony. In nineteen ninety nine, Star
Wars exhibit star Wars The Magic of Myth lives online
and the Millennium Falcon was the inspiration by the name
of Elon Musk's Falcon series launch vehicles, which yes, you
could absolutely see that in Oh yeah, and several organisms
have been named after Star Wars terms and characters.
Speaker 2 (39:15):
So okay, it's a big deal, is what we're trying
to say, mostly me and Samantha supporting me. It's not
without its faults, obviously, there's hardly any people of color
La It's pretty much the only woman in the regionals
and that isn't much better in the prequels sexualization. There's
definitely toxic fandom. I think it might be one of
(39:35):
the most toxic fandoms, and we've talked about that before
specifically now and a lot of mostly men, feel that
the new ones are made by social justice warriors with
the social justice warrior agenda. Some cinophiles do feel like
it ruined cinema forever because we pivoted away from what
in their mind is artistic films to movies that make
(39:55):
a lot of money for children. But in a lot
of ways it connected with so so many of us
and for a lot of girls and women. Princess Leah
specifically was a feminist icon, and we'll get into that
after your quick break for word from our sponsor, and
(40:24):
we're back. Thank you, sponsor. So let's finally arrive at
Princess Leah, and thank you for letting me indulge in
my Star Wars fandom and continue. Because just like you
can't separate out the influence of Star Wars from our culture,
you really cannot separate the enormous influence of Princess Leah
(40:45):
on our culture and the influence she had on countless
other fictional characters, from Ellen Ripley to Hermione Granger to
catmus Everdeen, so many so general sketch of her. Leah
Organa is the princess of the planet all Ron, a
member of the Imperial Senate, and the leader of the
Rebel Alliance. This is all by the time she's nineteen.
(41:06):
Just fyi. According to George Lucas, she also has the
Star Wars equivalent of a PhD uh huh. Through the series,
we learned that she is a twin sister of Luke
Skywalker and daughter of Darth Vader. She was raised by
Senator Bail Organa and Queen Braha Organa. She goes on
in the new trilogy to found the Resistance as a
(41:27):
general against the first order, she was played by Carrie Fisher,
and the character has appeared in many books, comics, television shows, games,
and she has gone on to become iconic the Cinmon
bun hair style, which George Lucas attributes to a hairstyle
of female Mexican revolutionaries of the metal bikini, and has
(41:49):
been adopted by many as a feminist icon. She's been parodied, celebrated,
and appeared on stamps in the US and the UK,
and she's appeared on all sorts of merchandise in all
sorts of merchandizing. After Disney acquired Star Wars, they had
to backtrack a statement that there were no plans for
Princess Leah merchandise after it caused so much backlash, so
(42:10):
much backlash, there's still not as much as there should be.
But Carrie Fisher allegedly was told she had to lose
ten pounds for the role, which is gross and totally
still happens. For the new series, she was reportedly pressured
to lose thirty five pounds. I've been told something like
this more than once, so this is still absolutely a thing.
Speaker 1 (42:30):
Oh, absolutely ageism and then of course weight in all
of those things and race, and Fisher has spoke openly
about how she regrets signing away her likeness, which wasn't
really a thing at the time. She told the Daily
Base there's no merchandising tied to movies. No one could
have known the extent of the franchise. Not that I
don't think I'm cute or anything, but when I look
(42:51):
in the mirror, I didn't think I was signing away
anything of value. Lately, I feel like I mini mouth.
The identity of Princess Leah so eclipsed any other identity
that I've ever had.
Speaker 2 (43:02):
Yes, I could see that.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
Yeah, that sounds like she lost a lot of money.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
Oh yeah. She even said like she's kind of very
I don't know if good natured, but you know, she's
got her classic funny view on it. But she said,
she said, if she found out that Dadley Portman was
making merchandising, she'd be really mad. For Queen Amidala. Lea's
part diplomat, spy, soldier leader. She's passionate, She's caring, brash, loud, strong, defiant, assertive, angry, snarky,
(43:32):
not afraid to speak her mind and fight for what's right.
She first appeared as Yeah, a nineteen year old in
a New Hope in a virginal floor length dress that's
accent of cleavage, although Fisher recounted George Lucas telling her
not to wear a bra with it because quote, there
is no underwear in space, because your body expands, but
(43:53):
your bra does not, and it would strangle you. So
Fisher used to joke she wanted it reported that. However,
she died, it should be reported I drowned in moonlight,
strangled by my own brawl, and that was a very
popular tweet after she did die. It's immediately established that
Princess Leah is not going to shy away from a blaster,
and later we find out that her actions at the
(44:15):
beginning of the movie saved the entire rebellion. This the
only force that was opposing the empire. She is captured
by the intimidating Darth Vader, but stands up to him
and withstands. His torture doesn't reveal anything, so she is damseled,
but she's still fighting, and she's still making these snarky comments,
and when she is rescued, she pretty quickly takes charge.
(44:36):
She literally takes the blaster from Luke's hands and comes
up with a plan to get them out, jumping into
a smelly, disgusting garbage disposal, which is hardly a traditional
princess decision. She also immediately sees through Luke and the
Stormtrooper get up. When he says he's here to rescue you,
She's like, Nah, is very unimpressed with him, and they're
(44:59):
poorly thought escape plan. And I do love thinking about
like Luke, who's bringing is full of adventures, envisions himself
as the hero coming to save the beautiful princess. He
says he's here to rescue her, and she's like, excuse me,
you're who now, kind of immediately shutting him down. And
I also love that her leadership in general isn't questioned
(45:19):
as a woman. Like it's never like, oh, we shouldn't
listen to her because she's a woman. It's more Han
being like, I don't listen to anybody, right.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
I do like the back and forth with Han and
the Han being like, what's happening? Who are you? What's happening?
So before that happens, her planet is destroyed by the
death Star to make a statement, and I was like,
oh my god, they blew up a planet. What just happened?
And in an instant she loses her family, her friends,
her stuff, her home and this could have destroyed her,
(45:48):
but it didn't.
Speaker 2 (45:50):
Alyssa Rosenberg at The Washington Post wrote about her, Leah's
nerves as a revolutionary are clear from the moment she
arrives on the screen. She takes shots at the stormtroopers
boarding her shit, gets stunned with a blaster in her hand,
then has the audacity to try to make Darth Vader
feel ashamed of himself. She has enough energy left over
after a nasty session of torture to insult Grandmoth Tarkin.
(46:11):
And while she grieves when her home planet Aldorant is
destroyed by the Death Star, Lea's not paralyzed when her
unexpected rescuers show up. She's ready to go and to
gripe about their operational sloppiness, and then she went on
to right. Leiah wasn't just the first great heroine of
science fiction and fantasy to capture my imagination. She was
one of the first characters I encountered whose power came
(46:32):
from her political conviction and acumen. So when Han, Cherry
and Luke do arrive to rescue her. She pretty much
instantly asserts her authority, and this leads to conflict between
her and Han Solo, who isn't used to having someone
tell him what to do. He calls her sweetheart, but
Lea's totally impervious to his attempts to take control. She
(46:52):
also proves she's got more savvy and less bravado than
Han after they escape, and she surmises they're being tracked
by the Empire, who let them go. Hans like, no,
not this ship. Never, he's too cocky to admit it.
She's right, he's wrong. Despite the tragedy she's gone through,
she assumes leadership in rebellion. And also, look, Luke is mccrush.
(47:15):
I know he's had a rough time. Leah comforts him
after obi Wan dies, but Lea just lost her whole
planet and she knew obi Wan too, by the way,
and we never get to see her grieve. And Okay,
I know people like to fight about this because I
said it on another show, and man that she grieved
off screen. And Luke did lose his guardians, which was
(47:36):
very sad and traumatic. I agree, but it.
Speaker 1 (47:38):
Was also very quickly passed by. Yeah, wait, that was it?
Speaker 2 (47:42):
Yeah. He kind of just is like, well, I'm leaving now,
and I don't judge people for how they grieve. That's
totally cool. I'm just saying, uh, you know, we don't
get to see her grieve because I guess it's not
technically her story. It's explored some of the in the
Extended Universe legends.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
I will say about the movie, she takes everything.
Speaker 2 (48:06):
With like okay and yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (48:09):
Let me keep going like that was like very much
like that. Seems like she should be a pause of
some sort.
Speaker 2 (48:15):
Well, we'll talk about that more in a minute. Well, now,
we'll talk about that more in part two. Because a
lot of people gripe about the return of the Jedi reveal.
I see her as someone who takes things in stride right,
But anyway, also of the character's lay perhaps has the
least of an arc, and a part of that is
she is the most sure of in herself and her
calling when we're introduced to her. Her biggest thing is
(48:38):
learning to accept that she has needs and wants on
a personal level and embracing those things. Han and Luke
have a lot of growing up to do, and Leah
is instrumental in that. For both of them. Even at
the heart of it, she influences Luke and Han to
become a part of the rebellion. She's already a hero
when we meet her, and she influences them to become
heroes too. She does often serve as a support to
(48:59):
luke story into Han's story, and in the first two
is the potential romantic interest for both of them. She's
more developed and interesting a character than perhaps her traditional
love interest, but there is still an element of that.
All right, So New Hope Ends, Big Explosion, Death Star, Happy,
(49:21):
pure are your metals. Then we move on to The
Empire Strikes Back, in which Leah is a prominent leader
of the rebellion who stays behind to the very last
second to make sure everyone is safely evacuated off of
the snow planet hof. We see her relationship with Han,
and in today's context, it's a little cringey, just because
(49:41):
he's so pushy and doesn't take no for an answer.
I definitely want to return to the whole nice men
scoundrel trope that plays out here, and it is kind
of funny that she's trying to manage all of the
stafffull of this evacuation and Han is just trying to
her to admit that she cares about him, and I
(50:02):
know the stakes are high because he's basically trying to
get her to admit he wants him to say, or
he's gonna leave. But anyway, there's a definite unthawed the
ice queen vibe too, and Lando is pretty flirty with her.
Although Orlando is the typho flirts with everyone. My friend
and I have an ongoing argument about whether or not
(50:24):
he had sex with the Millennium Falcon. Weigh in on
that if you would like or don't, I'm.
Speaker 1 (50:29):
Just gonna say that's the first thing she saw said
when he arrived, and I was like, I don't know
what's happening, but what.
Speaker 2 (50:35):
We had like an hour fluslong argument about it. Oh,
and Lando's also trying to make sure they don't get
win that Vader's there, so he's trying to endear himself
to them. But we do see another instance of a
woman sensing that something is wrong and being dismissed when
Leah voices her concerns about Lando's trustworthiness. Han Lean and
(50:56):
Chewey are captured and tortured by Darth Vader. That you
only really see Han's torture and I guess tobacco with
the loud sound thing.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
Wait in the gold dude, oh gold Man.
Speaker 2 (51:06):
Gold Man gets blasted apart.
Speaker 1 (51:08):
Yeah, I was like, what did no one notice that
Chewbacca did? He did? He did, he came, and Lea
did too.
Speaker 2 (51:16):
Han was the one that was like, ah, and then
we have the famous I love you, I know exchange.
So there are so many ways to interpret this, but
one is that in the face of Hans's death, she
admits something she knew she'd made him doubt, that she
loves him, and he acknowledges his understanding of her fear
of intimacy and accepts it as a kid. I always
(51:38):
saw it as Hans Solo's too afraid to say it
in front of all these soldiers and Darth Vader. But
you know, multiple ways to interpret those those lines. Some
people take issue with the fact that Han asked Chewie
to take care of her when clearly she can do
it herself, while others see those words is meant to
comfort Chewy, to give him something to you, to calm
(52:01):
him down. When Lando frees them, Leah takes charge of
the ultimately failed attempt to save Han and does save
Luke after sensing his call for help, and we do
you get to see Pilot the Millennium falcking, which is cool.
Speaker 1 (52:16):
Yeah, yeah, it was very cool. I think I'm not
gonna lie. I was very confused about what was happening,
and you made sure to let me know that. This
is where Harrison for said I'm not coming back. Yeah,
so they had to have a possibility of just ending
him or allowing him to come back.
Speaker 2 (52:32):
Well, the only reason he came back to return the
Jedi was he was supposed to be killed off and
then they didn't do it.
Speaker 1 (52:38):
There you go. Yeah, yeah, so I'm going to heard
it here with the end of part one. Yes, our heroes,
your heroes, the heroes, how about that are battered and
separated in part two? Yes, y'all after an hour of
this lengthy discussion, there is a part too, and it's
about the return of the Jedi and the infamous metal bikini,
(53:02):
which is the one scene that I know, and the
feminism of Princess Leiah and of the Fourth in general.
Speaker 2 (53:07):
Yes, so we'll leave you on a cliffhanger, just like
those lucky viewers that got to see Empire shikes. Back
and didn't know what happened. Then Return of the Jedi,
so look out for that episode in the meantime. If
you want to email as you can, Our email is
Stuff Media Moms Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com. You can
also find us on Instagram at Stuff I Never Told
(53:29):
You or on Twitter at mom Stuff Podcast. Thanks as
always to our super producer Andrew Howard, and thanks to
you for listening. Steffan Never Told You is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Stuff Mom Never Told You News
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Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.