Thought of the Day: Plot for Star Wars 7 should basically be hide & seek

The announcement that Star Wars Episodes 7, 8 and 9 made earlier this year was met with excitement and nervousness by Star Wars fans everywhere.  And by Star Wars fans, I mean people who had to wait until they were in or past (or well past) their teenage years until they got to experience Episodes 1, 2 and 3 and Jar Jar Binks and Hayden Whatshisname from "Jumper".

I wasn't the only one that was disappointed that he didn't actually jump. Or get arrested by the Egyptian authorities.

The fact that Disney were producing the films was far from reassuring for most fans, given....well... the series' past inclusions of Jar Jar and Ewoks.  Don't get me wrong, there is nothing ostensibly wrong with Ewoks, its just more than a little far (far away) fetched that an army of teddy bears could knock out a clone army of Maori bounty hunters.  That Lucas et al were prepared to include the Ewoks was more of a tip of a hat to merchandise sales than actual story development.

That being said, it was also soon announced that JJ Abrams would be in charge of the productions, leading to a sigh of relief from Star Wars fans who were familiar with the excellent work he has brought to the Star Trek franchise.

Including the important "cast Brits as bad guys" rule.

But what of the story line?  It was relatively easy to develop a story for the prequels to Star Wars as everyone knew that Anakin Skywalker would become Darth Vadar, there was something called the Clone Wars and The Republic, and lots of Jedi's - plenty of material to build a story around there.

Yet there have been no hints as to what may lay in the future for episodes 7, 8 and 9...sort of.  Given that R2D2 and C-3PO are droids, they could well be still around and serving drinks, performing translations for giant slugs and assisting with mass-murder.

Of the other characters, Han and Leia all went through significant character developments in the episodes 4-6 while Chewbacca seemed pretty level throughout.  Lando was a bit of a special guest star, while old Obi Wan and Yoda are now ghosts that seem to turn up to barbecues uninvited.

They didn't even bring a salad.

Which brings us to Luke.  As I've discussed earlier, Luke is a bit of a bad-ass, but there is a very good reason for this and this should be the key to the next episodes: Everyone close to Luke dies.

Think about it.  His mother died giving birth to him so he went to live with his Aunt and Uncle.  They died horrifically.  Obi-Wan then took him under his wing and he let himself be killed within about 60 minutes. 

In Episode 5, Luke is seen riding a Ton-Ton.  It gets friggin eaten. Then he goes to visit Yoda under the instructions of the now-dead Obi-Wan.  While it doesn't happen straight away, Yoda dies.  This has particular significance in that Yoda had been alive for over 800 years training Jedi, but a bit of exposure to old Luke Skywalker and he's off to the big barbecue in the sky.

Luke seems to cotton-on to what is going on by Episode 6 and is much more aloof and reserved than previously.  He even wears a lot more black so people won't notice him. 

The bright green lightsaber is a bit of a give-away though

Luke goes to see Jabba about freeing his friend and, due to Luke's evil scheming, Jabba and seemingly all of his friends die - some of them terribly (being digested by not just any Zarlac, but the almighty one).

Once his friends are liberated from the now-dead Jabba, Luke goes off to see Yoda (who now dies) rather than spend time with them.  Perhaps this is his kind side coming through, he is only killing one friend, rather than three.

At the end of 6, Luke finally reunites with his father after he takes him to visit the Emperor (who dies).  Then his father dies.

I'm sure even Luke was getting the idea by this stage & feeling pretty bad about this whole "friends" business.  So, transport the storyline 30 years and I'm pretty sure Luke will have moved himself to a Galaxy far, far away where there is no-one for him to befriend.  Or perhaps just no-one left to befriend.

To make it interesting, Leia and Han should try and bring him back to help with some smuggling or something, while Luke does his darnedest to avoid them.  Should make for some good chase scenes at least.