Still There

The Force Awakens trailer dropped in December and people acted like the world had just been saved. I watched it the next morning and felt that old pull—half genuine excitement, half the bone-deep certainty that this couldn’t possibly matter the way the original trilogy did.

Star Wars has this weird gravity now. The original films showed up at the right moment and felt like discovering something instead of consuming something. Everything attached to that name carries weight it shouldn’t. The prequels made that crystal clear, but here we are again, franchise machinery in full effect, everyone frantically tweeting about lightsabers.

The trailer is well-made. The new characters seem interesting. I sat there and felt something watching it, which is exactly what a trailer is supposed to do. But the feeling that kept following me was simpler: we already got the thing we loved, and it’s still there. Rewatching it won’t change it, and watching something new won’t recapture it. The moment those films hit is gone. Everything since then has been the industry trying to bottle something that only worked because it was real the first time.

I’ll watch The Force Awakens when it comes out. Probably like parts of it. But I’m already resigned to it feeling like a really good copy of the thing that felt like discovery. Nothing can fix that particular problem.