It's Not Greed, it's Hunger

Hey brother Do you still believe in one another? Hey sister Do you still believe in love I wonder? Oh, if the sky comes falling down, for you There’s nothing in this world I wouldn’t do

(more star wars angst hours in lyric comic form, thanks for tuning in) 

(It was a home, a school, and a place of worship)

anakin skywalker appreciation week | favorite platonic relationship

ANAKIN SKYWALKER APPRECIATION WEEK JULY 18: FAVOURITE MOVIE/SHOW APPEARANCE ▸ REVENGE OF THE SITH (2005)

There is something that really grinds my gears and drives me nuts about how Gorge Lucas described Anakin’s fatal flaw of “greed”.

It boggles my mind how he reduced Anakin’s problem with toxic attachment to just that: simple greed, with NO acknowledgment of his trauma and mental illness.

Anakin’s original problem wasn’t “greed”.

It was HUNGER.

He had a chronic fear of loss and a chronic emptiness that made him constantly crave to have more and more and more yet still felt constantly unable to fill that void inside his soul.

I’m reminded of another character that had the exact same problem (one that was played by James Earl Jones, ironically enough!):

Troy Maxson

Here’s how James Earl Jones described him:

Here you see how Troy’s “hunger” was acknowledged as a tragic symptom of the trauma of living under slavery. It ONLY becomes a moral flaw when Troy didn’t take responsibility for his own spiritual growth and allowed this hunger to turn into selfish greed that ruined his life (he refused to let go of his mistress because she made him feel good, despite his love for his wife and his need to stay married to her).

Anakin - who lived under slavery - didn’t get any of that from Gorge Lucas. No sympathetic acknowledgment and understanding of the traumatic origin of his spiritual hunger.

His natural trauma response was immediately judged as a moral flaw, even BEFORE it turned into selfish greed and toxic attachment.

I guess this is what happens when a privileged white man writes about slavery in a superficial and ignorant way.

Troy’s character was treated with understanding and sympathy but without ever excusing his shitty actions. Why? because his writer was a black man who fully understood the sort of gaping wounds that slavery inflicts on the human soul.