So, the rebels just trashed the Death Star, and now they've setup shop on a remote ice planet (Hoth). They seem happy (as they freeze their butts off). Then (while doing a patrol) Han and Chewbacca see a scout droid from the Empire and take it out. Unfortunately, the scout got a chance to phone home before they turfed it, and now they know to expect company.
Translation: The students from Leia's old lab have decided to take the big plunge... Startup time! They're going to chase the dream
w/o finishing grad school
(good for you guys). The cold/desolate nature of Hoth represents the unforgiving environment of doing a startup with a shoestring budget
and invasive VC's. As this is happening, Vader's lab is trying to attach intellectual property (IP) to their idea! Dammit, Vader
is a sore loser.
Luke is being a tool, as always, and decides to go hoping off on his tantan (sp?). While out, he gets jumped by an abominable snowman (Wompa). The creature drags Luke off to his cave where he almost gets eaten. Luke manages to get away and starts to hallucinate. Just before passing out in the snow, he sees the ghost of Ben (Obi-Wan) who tells him to go finish his training with Yoda. Just then, Han shows up and saves Luke from freezing to death and then they get rescued.
Translation: Luke is obviously just farting around with a hacky-sack, or phreaking on a telephone or whatever grad students did in
the late 70's (today it would be surfing the Web, or IM'ing with friends, or writing this). While doing this, he's not
doing his work, and is falling behind. It looks like he was playing Dungeons and Drag-Queens (D&D), or playing a
Multi-User Dungeon (MUD) (today it would be World of Warcraft),
and the abominable snowman was probably an actual character from the game!
Luke must have gotten a letter from Ben that said something like, "What are you doing at a startup? We talked about grad school and
you were down with that! You should go chat w/ this crazy well-connected professor from my own committee (Yoda). He'll take you on."
Han obviously showed up before Luke's deadline and did his work for him. Good ole' Han.
So, the Empire showed up and trashed the rebel's base. They all jammed outta there in different directions as fast as they could. Vader kicked their butts. Luke decided to follow Ben's advice and go look for Yoda on some planet in the middle of nowhere. Leia, Han, and Chewbacca all set out for a place called Cloud City where his buddy, Lando Calrissian (Billy Dee Williams, "oh yeah") runs the show.
Translation: Looks like the IP claims were too strong and Leia's new startup got busted up. All the former grad students had to go find
real jobs. Luke took this opportunity to go find Yoda, who is apparently teaching at some bush-league college in the boonies. Meanwhile,
Han decided to take Leia on at M. Falcon Corp and see if they could bid on a joint contract with a buddy of his (who owns another company
called Cloud City Corp).
Vader commissions a bunch of bounty hunters to go find Luke and his buddies. No one likes, "their scum," but Vader wants what he wants.
Translation: Vader is really cheesed off, and he gets in touch with some of his old contacts (old grad school buddies, business associates, etc.)
and asks if they can keep an eye out for Luke, Han, and Leia to see where they get employed next so that he can stalk them! It is a small
world after all.
Luke crashes his ship into Yoda's planet and then stumbles around looking for him. Luke (as usual) thinks he's got everything all figured out, but Yoda isn't buying it. After a while, Luke is begging Yoda to take him on, and Yoda is about to say no when Ben makes a plea on his behalf. Finally Yoda agrees and Luke is in for it now.
Translation: Luke shows up on campus and acts like a big shot. Yoda sizes him up right away and decides he's not interested in
having him in the lab,
but Ben's letter of recommendation (remember, Ben was one of Yoda's students) convinces him to let Luke stay. The admission process is
obviously a joke in the boonies here, so Luke is in. Of course, we all know that this means he's just stepped into the grad school
frying pan, and that he won't notice how hellacious it is for 1-3 years.
Meanwhile, Leia, Han, and Chewie get to Cloud City and everything seems hunky-dory with Lando. They all relax, but Leia thinks something is up. Then they suddenly find out that Vader has been rollin' around the halls here since before they got there. It turns out Boba Fett followed them to Could City and arranged for Vader to get there first and twist Lando's arm into conspiring against them. Vader's plan? Simple, get Luke to meet-up with everyone in Cloud City and then punk Luke into joining the dark side.
Translation: At first, the joint work between M. Falcon and C. City is going well. Then they find out that Vader's outfit has
a majority share of C. City and basically owns Lando. *OH SNAP*! Basically, Vader's grad school buddy (Boba Fett) was a consultant at C. City
and
ratted Han out. Vader's here to settle some scores, but Luke is missing. So, Vader tells them to get Luke a summer internship at C. City
so that he can be his boss and give him a hard time. I guess he wants Luke to join his research group.
After a VERY brief encounter with Vader, Han gets punked. It looks like Vader's going to use him as bait to get Luke over to Cloud City. Han tries blasting Vader, but Vader just gives him the hand, "Puuuulllleeeeaaaaaseee... I'm a dark lord, biotch!" OK that part was in my head. Han can't stop Vader at all, so Vader has Han's ass frozen in carbonite. In there he'll be, "very well preserved, if he survived the freezing process..."
Han finds out that people who fund small companies (the investors) really resonate to a Ph.D. in the room. Vader was able to gank Lando
by pandering to his investors, and Han is basically in the same spot. So, being a young guy, and plenty pissed at Vader for swooping
in and eating his company's lunch, it seems like Han is going to have to figure out how to make himself resilient against people
like Vader... Foreshadowing anyone?
While all of this Cloud City carp is going on, Luke is training hard w/ Yoda. Luke gets really diesel workouts and doesn't seem to appreciate the training... wus... Yoda's filling him w/ good cardio and Force-related ideas. Then, he gets this telepathic image of his friends getting their butts kicked on Cloud City. He tells Yoda that he's gotta jam to help. Yoda tells him not to go, then Ben tells him not to go, then he goes... Douche.
Translation: Luke is getting his hands into some really juicy research, and based on some of Luke's early conversations with Ben,
they seem to have found Luke a thesis topic. He may not be enjoying
it as much as he could, but he's at least trying (we all know how much grad school sux).
Then, Luke gets a letter from Leia and Han asking if he would do a summer internship at M. Falcon. Luke's advisor doesn't think it would
be good for Luke to get some money, or a bit of rest, or enjoy himself even a little bit. Luke asks Ben, and Ben also thinks he should
stay in Yoda's salt-mines and toil over
the summer. Luke makes a locally optimal decision and decides it would be good to rest up and make some money. While this seems, at the
surface, to be a really heads-up call, it's really a retarded idea. Luke has just added about a year onto his grad school life (3 months
delay in his thesis + ~9 months of punitive work from his advisor). Anyway, Puke heads off to enjoy his summer (and make a little $$$) and
delays graduation. ;)
When Luke arrives at Cloud City, the trap is set. He sees them wheeling Han's carbonited butt around and chases them. Then he falls right into Vader's trap. He duels with Vader for a bit, and it's clearly not going Luke's way. Then Vader lops off Luke's hand and the fight is over. As Luke is standing there w/o a thumb to stick in his own butt, Vader lays some serious science on him: "...I am your father!" Luke is a bit beside himself, and he jumps/falls to his supposed death.
Translation: This is tricky, when Luke gets to his summer internship, he finds out that he's supposed to be working w/ Vader.
He's a bit despondent.
Moreover, Han isn't even there (this is some foreshadowing that I'll have to get to later). Luke actually bites, and stays for the internship.
While there, he and Vader spar incessantly until Vader basically says that Luke's research topic is a polished up version of Vader's topic (from
long ago). Luke is (again) a bit despondent and quits his internship on the spot.
As Luke falls through a series of conduits in Cloud City and is about to fall out into the atmosphere, the Millennium Falcon comes out of no where and catches his ass. Then they fly off to a fleet of rebel ships and give Luke a fake hand. Han is long gone, but they know where he got taken (Jabba the Hut's palace).
Translation: Luke is literally walking the streets trying to decide his next move when Leia drives by and tells him that the old crew
from her lab,
and Lando are going out for happy hour and he HAS to come! So, Leia (being an ABD grad student herself) basically
tells Luke that grad school is just a series of miserable disappointments and that the real lesson is learning to live w/o money, w/o
self-esteem, and w/o more than just a shred of hope. Basically, Leia and her former lab mates all tell Luke that this is just how
it goes and they all get drunk... We find out what happened to Han in Return of the Jedi!
