One of Lego Star Wars’ Silliest Gags Reminded Me Not to Take Star Wars So Seriously

I’m not very far into taking part in by way of all 9 Star Wars motion pictures on this week’s Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, however I’m already satisfied it’s one of many definitive takes on the franchise for a single purpose: Padmé Amidala’s finest decoy being a man in a beard.

Playing by way of the sport’s adaptation of The Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones this week, I typically discovered myself stifling a snort or two at Skywalker Saga’s gag-a-minute strategy to Star Wars. But one repeating gag within the first two prequels stored making me guffaw gleefully: Amidala’s well-known “reveal” scene on the climax of The Phantom Menace, the place she proclaims that the Padmé carrying courtly apparel for chunk of the film is definitely considered one of her decoy Handmaidens. Of course, it’s a lot the identical in Lego Star Wars… by means of Spartacus:

It’s an excellent little gag, however the random bearded Lego dude in Padmé’s beautiful purple gown simply is totally delighted. Especially as Skywalker Saga retains committing to the bit past this second. He’s the decoy that reveals up within the palace to distract Nute Gunray through the climactic battle of the film, and even funnier, when Padmé’s ship lands on Coruscant in Attack of the Clone’s opening, he’s the decoy who will get blasted through the bombing (he’s high-quality, after all—folks don’t visibly die in Lego Star Wars cutscenes, it’s a sport for the youngest followers of the galaxy far, far-off).

That’s his contribution to all the sport, possibly a handful of minutes at most, but it surely was the one constant factor that simply stored me chuckling like a toddler every time I used to be taking part in. Lego Star Wars has at all times leaned on the sillier facet of issues, and many absurd visible gags. And little doubt the remainder of The Skywalker Saga goes to have working bits simply as humorous as this one. But it was the one factor that stored reminding me that, as lovingly devoted to what Star Wars is as one thing like Skywalker Saga is—and really lovingly devoted to Star Wars as a totality—that Star Wars actually at its finest when it is aware of simply how a lot to take the piss out of itself generally.

We generally tend, as Star Wars followers (and actually, nerds generally), to get defensive if somebody pokes enjoyable at a factor we love. Or, heavens forbid, somebody doesn’t take this world of area ships and magic hippies with laser swords significantly sufficient. After all, Star Wars means a lot to us—this epic, sweeping, multi-generational story of rise up and resistance, the perpetual battle for good and evil—that we’re inclined to take it as deathly severe to show that it’s value our funding, as if Star Wars isn’t already taken fairly significantly sufficient as one of many largest and most beloved pop cultural behemoths of the trendy age already. Even if we meme it and mock it ourselves, anybody else doing so is disrespecting that deathly-grave worldview we’ve constructed round this factor we love.

Lego Star Wars ignores all that. Sure, put a bearded man in Padmé’s handmaidens! Have Obi-Wan surprise why his lightsaber doesn’t have two blades when he first encounters Darth Maul! Hell, have him punt the Sith apprentice’s still-living head by way of a basketball internet earlier than it plummets into Naboo’s reactor! It loves Star Wars a lot that it can not assist however joke and jibe at each accessible alternative. Star Wars is often absurd, in good methods and unhealthy. It’s often fairly humorous, even when generally we don’t wish to admit that ourselves. Lego Star Wars doesn’t attempt to conceal that a part of all of it, even when it’s portraying the moments of this story we maintain excessive as deep and significant, influential and highly effective. If something, it’s in these moments that it goes the silliest, as if to drag us down from haughty highs and remind us to take the joke. Star Wars, in any case, is enjoyable, whilst we like it at its most collection, particularly even once we need higher from it.

Sure, make Padmé’s most constant bodyguard a Santa-bearded dude who loves to decorate like his beloved elected monarch. Why not? That’s as Star Wars as all of the lightsabers, X-Wings, bounty hunters, and Empires on the earth, particularly if it makes you giggle.

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