On Looking Forward To The Prospect Of Being Disappointed in Star Wars All Over Again

I grew up with the Star Wars trilogy and I count myself among the millions of people who have disavowed the prequel trilogy, accused George Lucas of childhood rape (LEGITIMATE CHILDHOOD RAPE), and cursed Lucasfilm for cunningly blending the original trilogy and prequel characters together in virtually all Star Wars children’s merchandise. I couldn’t keep my children from those fucking Jar Jar movies if I tried. BECAUSE GEORGE LUCAS IS A BEARDED SHIT DEMON WHO WILL DO ANYTHING FOR MONEY.

And now this. I don’t think I’m alone in dreading the idea of paying another goddamn red cent for a Star Wars movie ticket after Lucas made three terrible movies and went back to monkeyfart with the older, better ones, ruining them in the process (They are no longer magic now that the yub yub song is gone! I demand they be as awe-inspiring as when I saw them at four years old!).

But deep down, I already know I’m gonna see every shitty, horrible Star Wars movie that Disney pumps out. It’s like rooting for a sports team that never wins anything (or more accurately, a sports team that won three titles thirty years ago and hasn’t won a game since). The fact that the franchise is under new ownership doesn’t change my blind, stupid loyalty. You always come crawling back, and you hate yourself for it every time. I hate the fact that Lucas got to cash out to the tune of $4 billion after supposedly guarding his precious Star Wars storyline so closely. I hate that he sold it to a company that has already scheduled a new movie without even bothering to work on things like, I dunno, a plot. And I REALLY fucking hate the idea of someone not named Harrison Ford playing Han Solo. Some asshole at Disney is gonna greenlight Taylor Lautner as Han and then the Internet will die. There are so many things that can go wrong with this coming trilogy that it’s hard to imagine it not being completely fucked, just another horrible dilution of a once beloved pop culture artifact, like the past ten seasons of “The Simpsons.”

And yet, I’m going to sit here like a rube for the next three years and privately hope that somehow—despite all evidence to the contrary and despite the fact that no movie can ever equal the milestone movie moments of your childhood—this thing turns out to be awesome. After all, Lucas’ grubby little fingers won’t be on this new edition of Star Wars. The brilliance of the original trilogy is that Lucas ceded screenwriting and directorial control to other people for the final two thirds of it. Nerdy Internet nerds were praying he’d do the same for the prequels, only to watch as he micromanaged them into a pile of half-animated dogshit.

Now the series is finally free from Lucas’ ambling, simplistic vision. The names “Abrams” and “Whedon” have and will be tossed out five billion times in the next year or so, with the idea that there’s someone out there who adores the original trilogy and has the creative force to bring the new movies up to that impossible standard. But then again, who the fuck wants that job? Money aside, who wants to sit there for three years working feverishly on a movie that they know everyone will see just so they can shit all over it? It would probably be easier for Disney to hire some random asshole and base the new trilogy off of one of those Star Wars novels that are beloved only by strange, horrible people. The whole idea of Luke Skywalker running some Jedi Academy makes my asshole itch.

But still, I’m gonna be there. I’m gonna be there on opening night with all the aggressive nerds wearing costumes and anticipating this seventh Star Wars with balled fists, praying for the best but ready to be outraged that we got something far less. I feel like such a jackass for getting sucked into all this again. But it’ll happen. We can’t help it. That’s why George Lucas just walked off with four billion to spend on sail barges and Slave Leia hookers. Fucking Lucas.