Everybody knows what comes next when you see “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” in all caps on screen. Since its debut in 1977, Star Wars has become a worldwide phenomenon: with subsequent films and TV series of the franchise regarded as staple events in geek culture. Its ever-growing fan base continues to span across the entire world. With 11 movies and 5 televisions made thus far, it is a vast Space Opera with incredible world-building. There is still much more left to discover with every location, ship, character, or era we are introduced to.
There are countless memorable scenes, entries, and characters introduced in the franchise that serve as inspiration for a lot of filmmakers and storytellers today. The Empire Strikes Back is still considered one of the best sequels ever made; Darth Vader is one of the most iconic villains to date; Grogu (a.k.a. Baby Yoda) is everyone’s favorite character from the current Disney Plus Star Wars properties. The list goes on. However, a big franchise, no matter how successful, cannot please everybody.
Due to the passion and dedication of its fanbase, Star Wars is prone to their backlash, especially when it involves characters or storylines they do not particularly enjoy. For example, most of this backlash started out with intolerance of CGI characters, and then later with racism and death threats towards the inclusion of diversity in the franchise. There were even times when Lucasfilm (the company behind Star Wars) tried so hard to please fans that it backfired, ruining certain inspirational character arcs and causing even more backlash in the process.
The most recent backlash the franchise has faced is through the Obi-Wan Kenobi mini-series. Actress Moses Ingram, a person of color who plays The Third Sister of Darth Vader’s Inquisitors (also known as Reva), was harassed on Twitter through anti-Black and misogynist messages.
“There’s nothing anybody can do to stop this hate, and so I question what my purpose is in even being here in front of you saying that this is happening,” Ingram publicly stated on Instagram Live. “I think the thing that bothers me is that like sort of this feeling that I’ve had inside of myself—which no one has told me—but this feeling of like ‘I’ve just got to shut up and take it,’ you know?”
The Disney administration, along with her co-stars Hayden Christensen and Ewan McGregor, showed their support while she faced backlash and criticism.
They had first-hand experience, especially Hayden Christensen whose performance in the prequels was criticized for being whiny and unnecessarily broody. In a recent interview, Christensen reflected on how his portrayal was received and mentioned how the fans have this sense of ownership of the characters and were able to live with the fact that despite the awkward dialogue and criticism towards his performance, fans just “didn’t get” Anakin. Christensen was not the only Anakin Skywalker to suffer from backlash, however.
The most brutal criticism from this era was the treatment of Jake Lloyd, who portrayed a much younger version of Anakin before Christensen landed the role in Attack of the Clones. After the reception of Phantom Menace, the then young actor was harassed and bullied for this portrayal which led him to give up acting altogether. Quote:
“Other children were really mean to me,” Lloyd said in an old interview. “They would make the sound of the lightsaber every time they saw me. It was totally mad… I’ve learned to hate it when the cameras are pointed at me.”
It did not stop with real-life humans. The CGI character Jar Jar Binks is considered one of the most hated characters in the entirety of Star Wars. Although beloved by younger viewers for his goofy manner, adult fans viewed the character as annoying, and would never miss the chance to voice their outrage. And because animated characters cannot necessarily process outside criticism themselves, fans instead targeted the actor who voiced the character, Ahmed Best. According to an article in the Hollywood Reporter, the actor opened up about how he was harassed to the point where he considered taking his own life.
While a lot of criticism pointed towards the prequel era, the sequels had their own worries as well. Anticipation was high for a whole new rendition of Star Wars which not only brought back familiar characters, but also introduced new personalities like Rey, Finn, and Poe to the already large and established world. The sequels, however, were not exempt from fan criticism either. . John Boyega, known for his role as Finn, a Stormtrooper turned rebel, was attacked by racist fans who made it very clear that Black people had no right to hold a lead role in the franchise.
“Nobody else had the uproar and death threats sent to their Instagram DMs and social media, saying, ‘Black this and Black that and you shouldn’t be a Stormtrooper,'” Boyega later told GQ.
But the racism did not stop there. When the sequel to The Force Awakens was released, fans were unhappy with many of the narrative choices made, but nothing about The Last Jedi was criticized more than Kelly Marie Tran. Marie Tran is the first actor of Southeast Asian descent to be featured in Star Wars, and like Boyega, she suffered racism from fans online which led the actress to quit social media in 2018.
Actors of the franchise are not the only aspects that get a lot of ‘flack’ (A word a friend of mine used when mentioning unnecessary Star Wars backlash towards the prequel era). Amongst all 9 movies set within the Skywalker saga, the prequel trilogy is by far the most criticized. Apart from specific character details, fans would also argue that the trilogy spent too much time in council meetings, with a “cringy” romance plot and slow build-ups. However, as time passed, most existing fans grew to appreciate the prequels alongside new fans who fell in love with the franchise through the prequels.
That was the main goal of the Star Wars prequel era, if not the main purpose of prequel installments in general: it was meant to bring in new audiences while also providing an origin story to Anakin’s fall to the dark side, the end of the Jedi Knights, and the transition from the Republic to the Galactic Empire. The same can be said with the sequel trilogy, but that had way more issues than the prequels ever could make up for.
Everyone was ecstatic to hear Star Wars was coming back to the big screen in 2015, which led to The Force Awakens becoming the highest-grossing movie that year with more than 2 billion U.S. dollars in box office revenue. From the new storylines and surprises that came with it, Star Wars was opening itself to a whole new generation of audiences. But alas, there were the follow-up movies. With The Last Jedi, writer and director Rian Johnson decided to stray away from familiar Star Wars territory. The fans, however, were not happy with the direction it was heading which led to Lucasfilm initiating a series of shifts in production and rewriting to ultimately mitigate backlash and please fans. This ultimately ended up backfiring.
The final installment, The Rise of Skywalker, promoted as a conclusion to the Skywalker saga, was nothing short of a disaster. Despite making more than a billion dollars at the box office in 2019, the sequel throws out established plotlines, destroys character development, and unfortunately, sidelines non-white characters, including Boyega’s Finn and Marie Tran’s Rose. On top of encouraging racism the franchise encountered in previous years, the film romanticized a relationship born from abuse, appeasing nostalgia as opposed to creating something new and better.
For all the setbacks that befell the sequel, news surfaced that there was another script officially made before the uproar against The Rise of Skywalker, a film alternately called Duel of the Fates, calling back to the score made by John Williams for The Phantom Menace. A draft of the script was leaked on Reddit almost a month after the movie was released and uproar against the sequel nce again occurred, fans considering it the better alternative as opposed to the final product that they had gotten. This led to some hardcore fans taking matters into their own hands in some shape and form. For example, a dedicated fan drew a comic strip of 7 issues that he released online for all to read based on the alternate script.
The Star Wars fandom has never been one to please easily due to their passionate, often overbearing love for the original trilogy. Even with tons of reasons for fans to debate, it is still one of the longest-running franchises with a number of shows and movies airing or in development by Disney to expand on. There are viewers who do not expect or demand as much by just enjoying what they have; they may have their opinions, but that does not mean it needs to be ruined for everyone else. Everyone has their own perspective on what Star Wars is and should be, including the people working at Lucasfilm itself. Just like our fellow fandom members, I think it is about time we respect the people who can expand more on narratives within this fictional world, as opposed to inexperienced, biased, or bigoted fans who are unable to do so.
References
Star Wars actress receives racist backlash from Internet trolls but Disney has her back – Marca
May the Force Be Over – The Village Voice
Why did Star Wars fans hate Hayden Christensen, and why have they forgiven him now? – Quora
Star Wars’ Hayden Christensen Thought Fans Didn’t ‘Get’ Anakin Skywalker – CBR
Star Wars’ Young Anakin Quit Acting For This Reason – TheThing
Jar Jar Binks Actor Says He Considered Suicide After ‘Star Wars’ Backlash – The Hollywood Reporter
The Star Wars fandom’s racism problem – The Week
Everyone Likes the ‘Star Wars’ Prequels Now – Thrillist
The Year Star Wars Fans Finally Ruined Star Wars – Esquire
Why ‘The Rise of Skywalker’ was hated – Sportskeeda
The Full Original Star Wars 9 Script Has Supposedly Leaked. And It Gives Fans the Ending They Deserved – Esquire
‘Star Wars’ fan creates comic based on ‘Duel of the Fates’ leaked script – Deseret News