Generally, nobody would expect a director who was given relative creative freedom to turn on their own work. So while some fans may have hoped Rian Johnson would take their criticisms of his Star Wars movie to heart, a new Empire magazine interview won’t deliver what they wanted. For those who did like the film, however, the director affirms that in many ways, it’s about them.
“I think it’s impossible for any of us to approach Star Wars without thinking about it as a myth that we were raised with, and how that myth, that story, baked itself into us and affected us,” Johnson says. “The ultimate intent was not to strip away – the intent was to get to the basic, fundamental power of myth. And ultimately I hope the film is an affirmation of the power of the myth of Star Wars in our lives.”
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Empire‘s only running a short excerpt of the interview online. So far, he makes no mention of the way Episode IX somewhat took back some of his story swerves. But after acknowledging, “When I was up at bat, I really swung at the ball,” Johnson disputed the criticism that The Last Jedi is too much of a deconstruction of Luke Skywalker.
“The final images of the movie, to me, are not deconstructing the myth of Luke Skywalker, they’re building it, and they’re him embracing it,” he says. “They’re him absolutely defying the notion of, ‘Throw away the past,’ and embracing what actually matters about his myth and what’s going to inspire the next generation.”
Johnsons’ s comments may well ignite debate all over again, but it’s only natural he’d stand by a film that was very clearly his vision of Star Wars. Let us know what you think in comments.
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