Luke Skywalker was despairing for longer than we may admit
it starts with Owen and Beru’s deaths, then Obi-Wan’s, then Biggs’s death. he’s nineteen when he signs up for a suicide mission readily, instinctively, without thinking twice. it just feels like what he’s meant to do.
in Empire Luke nearly gets himself killed and needs Han to risk his own life to save him. and then he manages to slow the Empire but can’t keep them from overrunning the Hoth base.
he tries to train his skills and his patience but neither progress very far. he has visions of becoming his most dreadful, most evil enemy. then he finds out his friends are in danger and runs off to save them, but it turns out to be a trap and he ends up maimed and confronted with a horrible, unbelievable truth
and he literally tries to kill himself. lets go and falls.
in RotJ he turns himself over to Vader and the Emperor out of fear that his friends will be in danger otherwise
he starts the movie watching Leia get captured and debased; Palp and Vader catch on that he’s got a sister and threaten to corrupt Leia as well and he absolutely loses it and nearly goes Dark before he realizes he’s trying to hack his own father to pieces with a saber.
once again, all Luke can do is make peace with his own end, and try not to lose his soul. he is helpless. the war is won as he’s screaming and twitching on the floor in horrendous agony. when he recovers, he finds his father - the father he thought he lost before he ever knew - back from some kind of death, and already dying a second time. there’s so much fatigue and pain layered into the victory. the movie doesn’t even end with the heroes returning to be honored by the galaxy. it’s just a celebration with a little group of allies on a remote planet, watched over by ghosts.
Luke was always going to need to face the fear that his very existence brought suffering and harm and death to everyone he loved. he was never a triumphant, confident champion. he was a young man growing up too fast from relentless loss. when it looked like his worst fears were coming true, he panicked. when his moment of panic brought those fears to fruition, and he crawled out of the wreckage surrounded by dead children he must have loved as if they were his own, he chose, as he did over and over, to surrender his will to live
it takes meeting a strange girl who believes in Luke the way Luke believed in Anakin — a myth, a source of strength and bravery — to tip the scales. he thinks, I’ll lose her the way I lost everyone else. I’m too dangerous. I hurt people I love. just like my father did. and this girl tells him, I believe in what you did for your father. I believe you brought him back, I believe he was saved, I believe anyone can be saved, or deserved to be given a chance.
even the man who hurts the people he loves
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