Thought about going to one like that, but going to just a regular AMC.
Sooo - you’re off the internet for a few weeks? Are you one of those who likes to be teased forever before finally getting what they want?
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The only real cinema in my town is reserved seats only and has got (crappy) beer all the time. It’s also IMAX with laser projection rolled out just for Star Wars.
Saw it last night and went to buy seven more tickets today to go see it two more times with some buddies.
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Isn’t he? The only part of that particular statement he actually takes issue with is that he is “scruffy-looking”.
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Of course the Jedi Order were a religious order. They were all about traditions and moral instructions and proper beliefs in their “followers” which had to be adhered to as a matter of faith because every piece of evidence pointed to them being bogus. The only “real” thing in their religion was the force itself, and that was something they claimed exclusive ownership while inaccurately mythologizing.
Worse, the Jedi were a particularly hypocritical and nefarious religious order, and it’s good they were all destroyed and the Order-that-was is dead forever. (I haven’t seen the new movies yet, but if it has “Jedi” I’m going to assume they are going to be a reformed splinter sect based on the anti-Jedi lessons Luke learned that doesn’t adhere to the tenants of the original religion, since a constantly repeated point in both original series AND the prequels was that the Jedi religion was wrong and stupid and following it was a bad idea)
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I think a key distinguishing factor is that the force doesn’t prescribe behavior or morality, and certainly not from the perspective of an judgmental anthropomorphic supernatural figure. “Fear leads to anger,” etc… is more technique and understanding of observed patterns of behavior than prescription. The force itself is agnostic to purpose, and the light and dark side are groovin’ on the same force. The dark side is suggested to disfigure the emperor (if the prequels are to be believed, rather quickly, if not, then it could be that the emporer is super duper old, and the force is the only thing keeping him alive). It’s possible though, that this is merely a result of the level of exertion or the specific powers that dark-siders gravitate toward, rather than a moralistic karmic feedback mechanism.
It does seem to suggest an afterlife, but the afterlife is observable and tangible. There’s nothing particularly supernatural about our vision of the afterlife. The only thing that makes it supernatural is that one must take it on faith, because it supposedly lays outside of laws that we can comprehend. Within the Star Wars universe, existing as a blue-colorized hologram is just business as usual, like caterpillar into butterfly.
But they never describe the significance of their traditions as being the will of the force itself. Their beliefs and practices fit better into a new-agey humanistic mode than religion, in that they seem to have developed a way of living that they believe leads to peace and tranquility. There was actually an incredibly thin layer of myth on top of a very real, very natural force.
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Religions don’t require an external rule-bringer though - buddhism and confucianism shinto are all religions in the manner you describe, sets of rules built on and about interacting with some natural thing that is not in and of itself the religion.
Arguably somewhere between religion and militant philosophical cult I suppose.
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I agree, but I think that fact problematizes the utility of the word “religion” to describe both god/supernatural-centered religions and the kind you describe. To avoid a semantic argument (and the possibility of it being misconstrued as an argument about the legitimacy of either) I bring it back to the OP. The lack of a paternalistic god-figure and inexplicable afterlife certainly makes the Jedi order appreciably distinct from radical Islam and violent jihad.
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Those other religions have their radicals and jihadist equivalents as well, though (except confucianism, I guess, tied as it is to complete subservience to whomever is currently in power)
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I guess we’d have to know what they meant by “nerfs” a long time ago in yada yada yada. We don’t see him herding anything on screen, unless Chewbacca is a nerf.
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I understand that the EU is even less canon now, but in the EU, they seem roughly analogous to cattle, making the term “nerf herder” basically mean “cowboy.”
I believe it was Obama who said, “If you want your canon, you can keep your canon.”
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I don’t know. The prequels shit all over the EU, but the EU survived it. But now…
I don’t know that I want to watch the new Star Wars movie. I know what happened after Episode VI, but Disney says that that’s all gone now.
I met wonderful people there, people who lived and loved and died, except none of that apparently ever happened.
If I watch that movie, it’ll be putting the last nail in the coffins of Mara Jade and Talon Karrde and Booster Terrik, of Jacen and Jaina and Anakin Solo, of Daala and Fey’lya and Thrawn. Perhaps I won’t be sad to know the Vong never existed, that there’s no Anti-Force, that Chewie doesn’t get crushed by a moon, but I don’t think I can ever accept that Wedge never climbed into a cockpit dressed as an Ewok, or that Leia never came to terms with her parentage by adopting the Noghri race as her bodyguards.
I honestly don’t know if I can do that.
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So is Scientology, just sayin’
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