It started simply enough. A coworker, a father of two grown-up children and an accomplished journalist pulled off his headphones and announced he’d watched the new Star Wars trailer. And he teared up.
Within seconds a friend posted to Facebook: “I actually cried.”
Then another friend tagged me on Facebook. “I dare you not to tear up. ‘We’re home’ indeed.”
, I planned on watching it on my lunch break, but my coworkers were having none of that.
“Let’s do this,” I said. I sat down and watched it as one of them filmed my reaction. I got through it, saw and . I chuckled, but shed no tears. My emotional response was a dud.
I decamped to the lunchroom and decided to watch it again, alone and away from the glare of potential social media.
The trailer opens with the familiar Lucasfilm logo before giving way to a lone rider on a speederbike across a barren desert landscape. What follows provides more questions than answers — as a good trailer should: a wrecked Star Destroyer, lightsabers, new heroes, villains and stormtrooperish looking figures. talks to some unknown character about how strong The Force is in his family. And here comes the Millennium Falcon, outracing TIE fighters. .
The screen goes dark.
A familiar voice announces “Chewie, we’re home.”
It’s Han Solo and Chewbacca, in the flesh and fur, for the first time in over 30 years. Alive as you and me.
And I teared up.
It was Han and Chewie that did it. But mostly it was Chewie.
. The interstellar Sasquatch never awarded a medal at the end of “A New Hope.” Even that beacon of fairness and justice, , calls him a “walking carpet.”
Ouch.
Chewbacca, though, is more than than the crossbow-toting loyal sidekick who would crush your larynx for betraying his best friend.
“The Wookie Storybook” examines how interstellar Sasquatch Chewbacca juggles battling the Empire and raising a son.
Chewie’s a working dad, light years from his home and family on Kashyyyk, fighting the good fight against the Galactic Empire.
I never fully appreciated this until I became a dad myself. You work longer hours than you’d like, you do your best and just as your career comes into focus you miss milestones. You don’t miss all the milestones, but even one is too many. Suddenly the swashbuckling space pirate Han Solo or the coolly detached Obi Wan Kenobi are not so cool, but Chewbacca, yeah, he gets it.
Chewie and I could share some beers and swap some tales. (No, I am not equating myself to the mighty Chewbacca.)
As wonderful as the latest trailer is, as fantastic as Han is, what mattered to me was knowing that my Joe Sixpack, 200-and-something-year-old, 8-foot-tall Wookiee remained steadfast in building a better galaxy, well, it touched me. Working dad to working dad.
That brings me to the other reason I teared up: My dad.
According to family lore my first movie in a theater was Star Wars. (Back then it didn’t need to be qualified as “A New Hope.”) I wasn’t quite three and I have only the vaguest memories; the title crawl, Leia asking “Aren’t you a little short for a stormtrooper?” and spinning wildly into space after Chewbacca (and Han Solo) blasted him out of Luke Skywalker’s way.
I’m a dad now. Every time I watch a Star Wars movie with my kids, a part of me is back in that theater sitting in an impossibly large seat with a bucket of popcorn next to my dad and sister watching Star Wars for the very first time. My mom waiting at home. It’s visceral.
Whatever’s happened in the resulting years, good or bad, I have that. I have my dad and my sister and me in a dark theater. I have Star Wars.
And so do countless people all over the world.
May the Force be with all of you.
This image released by Lucasfilm shows character Chewbacca, left, and Harrison Ford in a scene from “StarWars: The Force Awakens,” the highly anticipated film by J.J. Abrams that hits theaters Dec. 18. (Lucasfilm via Associated Press)
