Star Wars Culture Clash

One of the joys of Star Wars (A New Hope for anyone born after 1990 or so) is that it is such a simple morality play. I've developed a new way to chart culture clashes and examining the relationship between Luke and Han will help to introduce it.

The most useful breakdown of possible moral alignments I've come across is (sadly) from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. In this system there are three possible takes on morality (Good, Neutral, Evil) and three positions on legality (Lawful, Balanced, Chaotic). By creating a 3X3 grid, like the one below, all possible combinations are shown. There are actually several different ways to arrange this map of moral alignments. The lawful/chaotic or good/evil axis could have been flipped. The axes could have been rotated 90 degrees either way. I'll call this particular orientation Luke Skywalker's world view.

At the beginning of Star Wars Luke is living with his aunt and uncle on an isolated water farm on Tatooine. He's led a fairly sheltered, boring life and isn't really sure what to do with himself. There are three options he's considering: submitting his application to go to the Imperial Academy (Lawful Neutral), staying and helping his uncle with the farm work (Lawful Good), and hanging out at Toshi Station with his friends (Balanced Good or Balanced Neutral). He's been exposed to the Sand People who are Chaotic Evil and the Jawas who are Chaotic Neutral.

When C-3PO tells him about his recent participation in Rebel activities (Chaotic Good), Luke gets excited and wants to find out more. After leaving the farm to chase after R2-D2, he enters the wasteland and runs into a crazy old wizard (who Uncle Owen thinks is Chaotic Neutral) named Obi-Wan Kenobi. While recovering from an encounter with some Sand People Luke finds out that Obi-Wan was a (Balanced Neutral) Jedi as was Luke's own father. Obi-Wan encourages Luke to join up with the Rebels, but Luke isn't willing to commit to such a big step.

When Luke sees the destroyed Jawa transport and then the devastation at his uncle's farm, he's forced to reclassify the Empire from Lawful Neutral to Lawful Evil. This leaves no real options open to him other than joining Obi-Wan in the quest to return the droids to the Rebel Alliance. To that end, Obi-Wan takes them to the (Chaotic Evil) “wretched hive of scum and villainy” that is Mos Eisley Spaceport. There they run into a (Chaotic Evil to Luke) smuggler named Han Solo. This characterization is underscored by the casual way Han kills the bounty hunter Guido (in the original version of the film).

So, to summarize, Luke had his Lawful Good family destroyed by the Lawful Evil Empire and has fallen in with a Balanced Neutral Jedi guide and a Chaotic Evil smuggler to go join up with the Chaotic Good Rebels.

As Obi-Wan would no doubt confirm, the world can be seen from multiple points of view. For example, Han Solo does not see himself as Chaotic Evil. He just lives in a different moral framework than Luke. The only laws that Han respects are the thieves' code: might makes right, follow through on your obligations, watch your back. His moral world-view is below.

From Han's perspective Obi-Wan and Luke are drawing him in to some serious trouble. If they weren't offering him enough cash to get out of his own problems with Jabba the Hutt he wouldn't have taken on the risk. He, too, sees the Empire as Lawful Evil and wants no part of the conflict if he can avoid it. The rugged independence of the privateer is Han's idea of the good life. Han is skeptical of Obi-Wan's Jedi philosophy and is only willing to help the Rebels because it helps him meet his contractual obligations.

The rescue of Princess Leia (Chaotic Good to Luke and Han, but Lawful Good in her own world view) starts to get Han personally vested in the fight against the Empire. Obi-Wan's death at the hands of Darth Vader (Lawful Evil) leaves Luke without a guide. The bonding from shared combat leads to friendship between Luke and Han. The three world-view cells they have in common (Chaotic Good, Balanced Neutral, and Lawful Evil) form the basis for their initial cooperation. Their friendship leads both to question their own world view as they internalize some of the others' judgments into their decision making process. Their composite world-view is a more nuanced and conflicted understanding of the moral universe.

As soon as they reach the Rebel base Luke officially joins the Rebellion. The upheaval in his life make it the only real choice he could have made. Han takes his reward money, but gets some grief from (Balanced Good) Chewbacca for cutting and running. While the hopeless position of the Rebellion would have made this an easy decision for the Han that killed Guido, the friendship with Luke makes it a tough call. In the end, loyalty and friendship keep him hanging around. When Luke gets in trouble with Darth Vader, Han jumps in to save him, and the Rebellion, from certain destruction.

By their actions, the Rebel Alliance judges both Luke and Han to be Lawful Good warriors and holds an award ceremony to honor them.

Why does this matter? Here's a diagram of the narrative structure created by the composite world-view of Luke and Han.

This is a map of the heroic epic. A hero starts out in a sheltered environment where true evil and chaos are unknown. After leaving this home or having it disrupted by outside forces, the hero discovers that a powerful evil force is threatening some vulnerable and virtuous people. By teaming up with a seemingly incompatible ally (or allies) under the tutelage of a wise, balance-seeking guide the hero works to protect the underdogs and vanquish the forces of evil. Along the way some allies drop off or flame out. Encounters with randomly helpful or destructive third parties distract or assist the hero with the quest. The villain's underlings are duty-bound to follow the dictates of their leader, but some see the evil and may even assist the hero. Eventually the band of adventurers is successful in restoring the known world to something closer to its proper balance.

These elements are as old as storytelling itself. That they are created by simply overlaying two different world views shows the usefulness of this method of mapping the moral universe. Storytelling is about broadening horizons, challenging assumptions and reconciling real differences between characters and cultures. The reason the heroic narrative is universal is because no two cultures (and no two people) have identical world views. Creating and sharing these narratives allows people to discover and reinforce commonalities that facilitate collective action (for good or evil) and/or peaceful coexistence.