Why Darth Vader Is Really the Hero

Darth Vader is the archetypal villain; even his theme song is enough to denote evil.  After all, he kills his own men and destroys innocent planets for fun.  Yet, I believe that he’s the hero of the Star Wars series.  (I’m only counting the films.  I don’t care what the extended universe says happened on Stavromula Beta or whatever, we don’t mention that here.)

Seriously, screw this.

Let’s look at the facts.  Anakin Skywalker was prophesied to restore balance to the force, but turned to the dark side and had all the Jedi except for Obi-Wan and Yoda killed.  Both of whom exiled themselves to desolate lands.  When you first meet Obi-Wan and Yoda (in the original trilogy) they seem like wizened hermits devoted to spiritualism.  It’s easy to forget that the Jedi used to have a skyscraper and an army of clones.

They take a vow of poverty, like the pope.

The Jedi were extremely powerful and, for a group that’s supposed to be operating for the sake of the light side of the force, did extremely well financially.  With their new army, is it that hard to believe that they’d convince themselves that it was okay to do bad things for good reasons and vice-versa?   Imagine if the Empire were run by a council of Jedi, instead of two Sith lords.

While most people point to Vader saving Luke as proof of his inherent goodness, that was the worst thing he could have done.  The force has the power to corrupt even the best of men, and if Vader, Palpatine, and Skywalker had died on the Death Star II, everyone who knew how to use the force would be dead.  Anakin Skywalker was supposed to bring balance to the force by killing everyone that could use it for their own means.  The same human weakness that made this drastic action necessary is what prevented him from letting his son die.

So don’t forget, Vader eliminated the Sith, and prevented Jedi control of the universe.

Truly, he was the hero the galaxy deserved.

The Dark Truth About "Back To The Future"

Analyses of the dark implications of Back to the Future have been done to death.  But this is the internet, and if I see a dead horse, then I’m sure as hell going to beat it.  But I want to do something more.  Most of the aforementioned analyses only refer to the first movie, but I’m going to look at the trilogy as a whole.  If we pick up immediately after Doc Brown flies off in his time-travelling train, we find the epilogue is quite…unfortunate. 

But a word about the train first.  If it’s been a while since you’ve seen the movie, you probably remember that a train smashed the Delorean, then Doc Brown showed up on a flying, time-travelling train, with his wife and kids in tow.  You might have forgotten that right after the Delorean is destroyed, Marty says, “Well, Doc.  It’s destroyed.  Just like you wanted.”  The dangers of time travel and messing with the past was a constant theme in the trilogy, and Doc Brown realized the havoc his creation could cause if it ended up in the wrong hands.  So when he comes back in a new time machine, the best case scenario is that he is a huge hypocrite. 

But let’s put that aside.  Doc Brown flies off into the sunset, and Marty goes back home.  Until he is taken away be the government.  You remember the terrorists from the first movie?  Yeah, that storyline never really got wrapped up.  In fact, their van crashes into a film development booth, which probably wouldn’t kill them.  So the police get there and arrest the terrorists.  In exchange for leniency (this was pre-9/11) they give up the name of the guy who got stole the nuclear material: Dr. Emmet Brown.  They also mention that there was a kid with him.  It wouldn’t be hard to connect Marty with Doc Brown, as even the high school principal is aware of the friendship. 

So Marty is brought in for questioning.  And he can’t adequately answer any questions about his own past, because he didn’t grow up in this timeline.  He grew up in a world where his family was timid and unsuccessful.  The events and people that populated that life occurred differently in his current reality.  If he tried to answer their questions, he’d come across as delusional.  Even if he told them about the time machine, they wouldn’t believe him.  Except…

The only reason no one knew about the Delorean is because it was kept quiet.  Between 1885, 1955, 1985, and 2015, only one person found out about it that they didn’t want to.  Because a car, even a flying one, could be easy to hide.  But a train?  It’s impossible that no one would notice a flying train.  Which, might I add, was built only with parts that existed in the late 19^th century. 

So Marty would become a valuable asset to a government that now has to worry about a madman hurtling through time and space with his family in a flying locomotive.  Because Marty is the only person who has any experience with time travel at all (and is guilty of aiding and abetting Doc Brown), he would be held indefinitely and used to help capture his friend.

Outdated Movie Review: Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002)

Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is a South Korean film, and the first part of Park Chan-wook’s “Revenge Trilogy” (it’s a trilogy in terms of theme, the stories don’t connect).  While Old Boy (2003) is unquestionably more famous, I believe that Sympathy is the superior film.

It is very rare for me to see a film, and be left speechless.  Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance is as much a tragedy as it is a revenge story, maybe even more so.  While I’ll admit, I’m not a very good judge of acting unless it’s very good or very bad, none of the actors were bad.  Song Kang-ho (who played Park), in my opinion, particularly stood out.

The violence is over the top sometimes, but it is by no means obtrusive nor is it detrimental to the movie as a whole.

The movie stands out due to its story.  In almost every revenge story, from Hamlet to a Liam Neeson action flick, there is an obvious bad guy.  This villain will often be given some sympathetic aspect, but in the end the audience knows who to root for.  Not so in Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance.  This is a revenge story about good people who make bad decisions, and the damage those decisions cause to themselves and the people they care about.