Nobody outside the carefully policed world of the film's production knows much about the coming next
Star Wars trilogy, other than the fact that the cast of the original trilogy has returned to their original (if considerably elder) roles, and that
Harrison Ford was on the receiving end of a brutal foot injury when a
Millennium Falcon fell on him. But today
we do know one more detail: the
title of the first new film:
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Star Wars: The Force Awakens
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Wow. Now that is interesting. This may turn out to be purely an exercise in focus-group-tested marketing, but I'd like to hope that it signifies something about the trajectory of the franchise. Two of the titles previous to now --
Revenge of the Sith and
Return of the Jedi -- have invoked the two major practitioners of manipulation of
The Force, but none has been about The Force itself, as a thing proper. I have contended before that
the metaphysical operations of the Star Wars mythology are well-consistent with
Pandeism as an underlying theological model, though they might as readily be
pantheistic as pandeistic. But the current title is one which most strongly suggests that The Force is itself in some sense a
sentience, a thinking thing capable of experiencing long unawakened states, and undoubtedly awestriking wakefulness.
Naturally, another
interpretation is that the title continues to refer to the practitioners of Force-manipulation, and some awakening of the power of The Force which uniquely appears for the first time in this new installment. But either possibility is intriguing, if the implication is that what we have seen of The Force in all of the past installments will seem to be a sleeping thing compared to what we will see of it beginning in this new film. At the very least, this ought to have the effect of increasing the numbers of real-life people who religiously identify as
Jedi, and try to live according to Jedi principles in their conduct, costumery, and occasional efforts to lift rocks with their minds.
Postscript: A detailed analysis of the film itself may or may not be added here in the course of time.
Postpostscript: It seems detailed analysis of the film itself will be added by other noders.