Revenge of the Sith: Why didn't Padme have an abortion?
Of course there are obvious narrative reasons why she didn't. And there are even plausible narrative reasons why she and Anakin didn't think of it.
But earlier this week I saw Revenge of the Sith, and within twelve hours of seeing the movie read the opening pages of Randy Alcorn's book Why Pro-Life. And then it struck me: at the close of George Lucas's final film, the source of hope for the galaxy is the product of an unplanned and inconvenient pregnancy. And that seemed an unusual public statement (albeit very subtle, and perhaps unintentional) about the importance of unborn human life.
What do you think?
But earlier this week I saw Revenge of the Sith, and within twelve hours of seeing the movie read the opening pages of Randy Alcorn's book Why Pro-Life. And then it struck me: at the close of George Lucas's final film, the source of hope for the galaxy is the product of an unplanned and inconvenient pregnancy. And that seemed an unusual public statement (albeit very subtle, and perhaps unintentional) about the importance of unborn human life.
What do you think?
4 Comments:
That's a very good observation. I hadn't thought of it like that. It's especially applicable considering how the twins were inconvenient, destroyed both their parents' careers, and endangered the mother's life.
Yes, if Luke and Leia were in our world, they would probably never have been born.
How sad.
That occured to me too, Sarah... but my conclusion was that it made a sort of sense because the twins WERE convenient--convenient to the story and George Lucas, that is. And that's enough for them to be called "babies" instead of "fetusues," and have their mother's life sacrificed for them rather than being sacrificed for her. If it's all about convenience...
Counter-thoughts?
That's an interesting way of looking at it. I agree that the twins are convenient FOR the story, but they're not convenient INSIDE the story. So, inside the story (which I think is the best way to analyze it), I don't think it's all about convenience.
But I'm open to other arguments...
firinteinne: Lucas is ignoring the books. The Emperor is supposed to be a xenophobe; he's not in Episode III. Further, he is ignoring some elements of his own movie... Wasn't Leia supposed to remember something about her mother? And what about the dark cave on Dagobah? Yoda goes into exile because he "failed?" Ya, right!
But the pro-life question... I have come to the conclusion that Lucas has included quite a lot of truth in his movies, but he may not know how or why. The original trilogy spoke to people. It spoke to me. These were heroes - great people, real people, tossed into difficult circumstances and dealing with them the way they ought. I still get chills every time I watch Episode IV and see the young, naive Luke standing on a sand dune and staring at the horizon in the first few scenes. He has no idea about the greatness and trials ahead of him, just as we young people don't have a clue what God has planned for the our lives and the next several decades of the world. Episodes I-III just go through the motions. They complete the story elements that are needed, but they don't have any zing. That's because any true story is about the people and their stories, not about a galaxy. We don't care about Padme, Obi-Wan, or Anakin. It's like their destinies are fated, and they don't try to struggle against them. They just are washed along by the current.
So. Right. The pro-life elements. I think they were just inserted on the way past. When Anakin says, "This baby is a blessing," it is just to establish his humanity so that we will be more manipulated into feeling sorry for him later. If the babies were really so special, Lucas would have written a Padme who couldn't give up when Anakin fell. She would have wanted to live to take care of her children. Those comments are nice, but they don't redeem an ambivalent movie.
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