**Warning: this post contains material that may constitute a spoiler for a film that is currently in theatres. Read at your own risk.**
One of the most interesting aspects in trilogies (or any anthology series, for that matter) stems from the psychology of the love story aspect. Typically, it’s built in to get audiences fired up – you’re supposed to care about two people being together, and half of the fun is watching the couple struggle to get to the point of union. The Star Wars series is no exception, and for years, fans have built Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and Leia Organa (Carrie Fisher)’s pairing up as the be-all, end-all of romance. It’s been idealized, turned into punch lines and generated everything from greeting cards and costumes to ring inscriptions. So when Star Wars: The Force Awakens came along, the audience received a shock. We got to see a sweeping epic turn out as so many other marriages and relationships have: separation and hurt, despite a valiant effort. And the inclusion of that quality not only makes them more real, but serves to reassure the audience that our own stories are just as epic as theirs.
When we meet the current version of Han and Leia, the usual banter is there between them, but there’s a strain and sense of damage which draws us to them. When we first see Han Solo in this episode, he hasn’t seen Leia in quite some time. In fact, there’s a fear on Ford’s face that the audience feels acutely when she steps off a ship and spots him: will she still be angry with him, and what did he do wrong this time, as past experience has taught the audience? We have a history with them, but we knew that they really did love each other and overcame everything to realize that they were important to each other. This historical aspect throws us for a loop for a few reasons: 1.) We’ve seen this before, and Leia doesn’t take Han’s shit, and 2.) We’re sad and concerned because we don’t know what went wrong; we don’t have immediate access to the events that made them this way. Combine the two factors, and you have an audience that is both surprised and left slightly adrift. After all, our cinematic couples are supposed to be together forever. For a while, they were happy: we know that they had a child together, and in our minds, we’re picturing the happy times. We’re picturing Han taking a little boy out somewhere for a ride in a ship (most likely to some bar he’s not supposed to bring the kid), and we’re thinking about how Leia would have been as a mother: gentle, reassuring, yet tough. The sun set; they were supposed to live happily ever after. This isn’t the way it was supposed to turn out.
The reason for this turn of events is heartbreaking and all too real for some families. Leia and Han have a son that has turned to the Dark Side, which mimics several points of crisis for a family with a troubled child. If you think about it, “turned to the Dark Side” could easily be substituted with another issue that’s been known to place a strain on families. Kylo could easily have suffered a mental disorder that caused conflicting views on treatment; he could have been addicted to drugs or alcohol; he could have chosen to be a career criminal; he could have contracted an illness and died. Either way, both parents behave in a fashion that is typical to a family in crisis: each parent throws him or herself into work or other passion projects in order to deal with the fact that the child has undergone a change that the parent cannot control. Leia places blame upon herself for Kylo’s turning because she didn’t send him to Luke for appropriate training, and Han chalks it up to the presence of Vader’s DNA in their son. It’s a classic pattern: “It’s all my fault!” “No, it’s not your fault. It’s the way he’s wired.” Both are looking for ways to make sense of something that has rocked the foundation of the life they built together, something so integral to who they are that they feel a deep sense of loss. If this hasn’t happened to you, you know someone that this has happened to. It’s common. We don’t have to like it; it’s a simple fact of life, and our hearts are broken for it. Families hit rough spots, and the members of said family find mechanisms in order to cope with the changes.
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| Not where you thought this was going to wind up for their kid. |
It’s this aspect that makes the love story of Han Solo and Leia Organa that much more real, and therefore, that much more enduring than the standard fare. Too often in film and literature, we’re sold a fairytale: a couple meets, bickers, realizes that they’re in love, and gets married by the end of the third act, regardless of personality quirks and long-term compatibility. We got to see much of this formula in Episodes Four through Six, and honestly, many of us expected them to still be together, with a reformed Han and a still-feisty Leia heading their family together. Deep down, we really wanted that because we liked them together. They were that couple that we pulled for, despite that we knew deep down that it wasn’t going to be all hunky dory. Instead, we got a couple that had split due to the strain of their troubled child, coping with their pain through old personality habits. Suddenly, it wasn’t fairytale anymore. They fought and had been angry with each other. They had their good times overshadowed by the painful reality of circumstances they couldn’t change. They tried, and like so many of us, they failed; they were human. And we loved them even more for this. Suddenly, Leia is your mother, your aunt, your best friend. Han is that nice guy that works two cubicles over. These aren’t untouchable legends; they’re people we know. That makes them both relatable and even more deserving of our love, because we want them to be happy again, just as we want those we personally know and care for to have that same happiness.
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| Sometimes, the best stories are the ones around us. |
This dose of reality does not work to sink their entire love story; if anything, it gets more respect because it dared to be realistic. It would have been cloying and obnoxious to believe that Han Solo could have changed who he was and had given up being a smuggler, just as Leia could not set aside her ability to be a leader in order to bake cookies and arrange a floral centerpiece. That they managed to retain feelings for each other while raising a family and then dealing with that family’s fracture… that’s the real magic right there. It’s not in the sweeping gestures. It’s not in the melodramatic moments. The meat of the story, sometimes, is the way that the real world impacts the love story. It’s the flawed couple; it’s the hurt and the pain that can tear apart and put back together. It’s imperfect. It’s us.
