Welcome to the first of our nine days of covering Star Wars: Visions! Some notes up front: we’re not going to be talking much about the studios that created these short films, both because of my general ignorance of the various producers involved, and also because I want to attempt to take these stories at as close to face value as possible. Fire up your lighsaber umbrella and let’s go.
1. Instantly recognizable
What’s always tough about mixing two unconnected ideas or properties is attempting to stay true to both, while creating something new. About three minutes into “The Duel,” it becomes very clear that this is handled extremely well. The unnamed Ronin is clearly cut from a classic archetype, but there is no shortage of Star Wars here, either. There are a number of familiar races present, like Trandoshians and Mon Calamari, but there are also touches for us true blue fans, like a Tuscan Raider doing the exact series of movements that we see in A New Hope.
There were a few moments where you could almost forget one aspect or the other. This episode was so well handled that it feels absolutely true to both masters. I can’t imagine that all nine episodes will walk this tightrope, but it happens here, and it’s very impressive.
2. Liberation
It’s amazing to see just how wide-ranging Star Wars can be when you’re not trying to fit it into the Skywalker Saga, or even in the period of time we’ve seen the majority of stories set. I was watching this with my daughter, who is 9, and she was asking some questions that were perfectly logical for someone who doesn’t have a super concrete understanding of canon and non-canon and artistic expression versus presenting a unified creative vision. But once we established that “this is Star Wars, but it’s not going to be like any other Star Wars you’ve ever seen,” she got totally into it.
And look, that’s not to say that I don’t care about the characters that already exist, but if Disney wants Star Wars to continue to grow and adapt, they need to do more things like this. Having a novel spin out of this world is really smart, and will allow this setting to be something that Lucasfilm can return to without ever having to make it ‘fit.’ That is a liberating idea.
3. Designs
Like I said in point one, it’s a lot of fun to see how the worlds of classic samurai stories and Star Wars mesh together, and what the Kamikaze Douga folks came up with. There’s this weird lightsaber umbrella that is part General Grevious and part Mary Poppins, and the design seems like an instant fit into the comic convention commissions and cosplay world. That’s the most unique visual we get in the episode, but it isn’t the only fun aspect.
The hilts of the lightsabers, the droids, and the weaponry all lean a little more samurai than Star Wars on first sight, but over time, all of these designs reveal surprising facets and, again, the two worlds merge a little bit.
4. So…he’s a Sith?
The alignment of the Ronin was my daughter’s biggest question throughout. “Is he a good Sith?” I love that the show doesn’t give us any real answers for this, and instead presents a few potential answers. Maybe he’s an evil Sith, but is pragmatic and wants his village to survive. Is he a Sith with a vendetta against the other Sith we meet? He claims he’s not a Jedi, but he never uses the “s” word – is he some sort of ‘grey’ Jedi, a Force user who doesn’t’ align with the light or the dark? Is he a lapsed Jedi, and is carrying a red lightsaber for intimidation?
Ultimately, none of that matters in “The Duel,” and it is all the better for it. Again, we’ve got to wipe our minds of the trappings of ‘normal’ Star Wars. When you do that, you can take in the episode cleanly, which is how we should all be approaching this.
5. The music
The most recognizably Star Wars part of this episode was the music. There were teases of “Duel of the Fates” a number of times, but even without a familiar theme, the Keiji Inai score flirted with Willams-esque touches. But, thankfully, there was a lot of traditional Asian instrumentation and a hint of electronic music as well mixed in. The score is the perfect descriptor for the episode in general, as it both felt like Star Wars and like something else entirely.
See ya tomorrow.
