Death Star Road of Trials

 In George Lucas's Star Wars: A New Hope, we follow the beginning steps of the hero's journey with Luke Skywalker, our protagonist. In this blog post, I will specifically be talking about step 6, the road of trials.

In A New Hope, the road of trials takes the form of the Death Star, Darth Vader's battleship. The Death Star scene is probably one of the longest and most memorable parts of the movie aside from the destruction of the Death Star. 

The Death Star road of trials allows for us to see how Luke rescues Leia from imprisonment and also see how well the crew of the Millennium Falcon can take on the forces of the Empire. Many obstacles are present in this scene. Such obstacles include masses of Storm Troopers, a garbage disposal filled with dangerous aliens and crushing walls, and Darth Vader himself.

Taking place after the Cantina scene, the belly of the whale moment, Luke, Obi Wan, Han Solo, Chewie, and the droids head off to Alderaan, getting intercepted and landing on the Death Star in the process. Once caught in the Death Star's tractor beam, the road of trials begins. The first trial presented to Luke and his allies encompasses all of the other trials, and that is escaping the Death Star. Almost immediately after landing, Storm Troopers flood the ship looking for the rebels aboard. In order to overcome the second trial, Han shows Luke how a floor tile can be hidden under. The crew uses this to their advantage and hides just in time. 

The trials continue as the crew works their way further into the Death Star. Donning Storm Trooper outfits and using false IDs, they descend to the lower levels of the ship and pose as Imperial guards taking Chewbacca to prison. Their plan backfires a bit when they are suspected as rebels, so they ditch the costumes and start blasting. From their, trial after trial appears until they are able to escape on the Millennium Falcon, losing Obi Wan and gaining Leia in the process.

This scene is important to the movie as it allows for meeting the goddess (Leia) and sets up for Obi Wan coming back during the final battle in the movie. The road also allows the viewers to see how well the protagonists fare against the antagonists. George Lucas uses the Death Star road of trials to really portray the strength (and luck) of his characters. The message is clear: to survive in this universe, you must have aid. There will be no victory in attempting the challenge alone. 

Comments

  1. Miriam ASeptember 29, 2022 at 4:01 PM

    I think the Road of Trials could even extend beyond just the scenes on the Death Star to be basically any challenge that Luke and his friends encounter during most of the film, but your characterization of this step in the Hero’s Journey as taking place in one location helps to make it a more concrete step. You did a nice job describing the multiple challenges that Luke encounters while onboard the Death Star and described them in enough detail to make your blog fun to read. Great post!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mason MiaoOctober 2, 2022 at 9:03 PM

    I like your observation that the Death Star is basically all of the road of trials, from entering to escaping the Death Star. I think that this is also the most important part of the movie, because the death of Obi-Wan is a catalyst for him turning from a farm boy into a pilot that takes out the death star. It is also crucial that he rescues Leia, which is a good observation.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ben DeMarcoOctober 6, 2022 at 10:38 AM

    I think you do a good job describing how the death star fits the road of trials and some of the individual trials in it. I'm not really sure whether Leia is supposed to be the goddess or temptation or both but I still think that she's in the road of trials as an ally for Luke. You also mention how the road of trials shows how the hero deals with their enemies and their current strength.

    ReplyDelete
  4. David ROctober 11, 2022 at 4:21 PM

    I really like your blog post Nathaniel. You do a great job going through the events in the story and making clear relations to the different parts of the Hero's Journey that they represent. This makes understanding the story through the lens of a Hero's Journey narrative much easier and more intuitive.

    ReplyDelete
  5. RoseOctober 16, 2022 at 11:47 PM

    STORM troopers?????????????????????????????⛈

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

[The Bundrens] do a little bit of [stumbling around]

Are the members of the Bundren family heroes? That's a question I asked myself many times over the course of the novel. It really didn't feel like they were. They just kinda stumbled around and did stupid things. They certainly weren't very heroic. Anse was selfish, Darl was crazy, Jewel had anger management issues, and the rest of the family had their own problems. To write this blog post, I decided to not only view the characters from my perspective, but from other characters' perspectives, starting with Cora Tull. I found it fitting to interview Cora first, which is fitting because she was the first non-Bundren to have a chapter in the novel. Cora has mixed opinions about the Bundren family. While she is a long time friend of Addie, she can't say she has the same feelings towards Addie's children and husband. When asked about how Anse and the kids will do without Addie, Cora responded, "I don't know what he'll do. I just don't know" (Fau...
Read more

Lego Movie

How well does The Lego Movie fit the Hero's Journey narrative? Emmet is told he is the Special (the Hero), but like Star Wars , The Lego Movie  is missing several of the final stages of the Hero's Journey such as 'freedom to live' or even 'crossing the return threshold.' As we saw in Star Wars , though, that apparently doesn't matter too much, so I won't worry about it here.  I think the first moment where it becomes obvious in The Lego Movie  that it is following the Hero's Journey is when Emmet touches the Piece of Resistance and is thrown into a completely new environment. He sort of experiences a Call when the Piece speaks to him, but the first clear stage is when Emmet crosses the first threshold and enters the world of master builders, characters from all over the Lego universe that don't use the instructions. It's a really distinct threshold, and the movie even shows Emmet breaking through what appears to be the sky to cross said thr...
Read more

Where can we draw the line?

Image
Where can the line be drawn to determine if a work follows the Hero's Journey? As we have seen in class, the key example of Star Wars: A New Hope did not not include several of the final stages of the Hero's Journey including master of two worlds or even crossing the return threshold. Siddhartha  appeared to have every stage, but some of them were a bit of a stretch, and the stages in Siddhartha did not all appear in the same order as they do in the Hero's Journey. If these both are still considered to follow the Hero's Journey, then what needs to happen (or not happen, as the case may be) to consider something to not  follow the Hero's Journey? I am going to look at another title, outlining steps of the Hero's Journey in it, and leave it up for the readers to decide whether or not it can be considered a Hero's Journey story. The Hollow Knight Hollow Knight is a video game, but considering that movies can follow the Hero's Journey, I do not see why vi...
Read more