Word: jedi
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Luke, meantime, has been visited by the holographic presence of Obi-Won Kenobi, or Ben Kenobi (Alec Guinness), who was translated to incorporeal planes by Vader in Star Wars. With the power of the Force behind them, old Jedi Knights never die, it seems; they just fade in and out. Ben Kenobi tells Luke to seek out someone named Yoda on the Planet Dagobah. Ben did not say that the place is all jungles and swamps, and Luke soon finds himself knee deep in muck...
Luke tries to shoo him away but discovers that this is his Jedi master...
Yoda, a 26-in.-tall Muppet operated by Frank Oz, the man in charge of Miss Piggy, is one of Lucas' great fantastics. Part elf and part wizard, he is Dagobah's answer to the High Lama of Shangrila. He has been training Jedi Knights for 800 years. At first he hardly wants to talk to Luke. "No good," he says to Ben Kenobi, who has hovered into view once again. "I cannot instruct him. The boy has no patience. Much anger in him, like his father. All his life has he looked away-to the horizon...
Eventually, of course, Yoda relents and instructs Luke in the ways of the Jedi and the uses of the Force, that strange, mystical power that all Jedis possess. "Life creates it and makes it grow," the little gnome explains. "Its energy surrounds us and binds us. Luminous beings are we . . . Feel the flow. Feel the Force around you." Luke does, to a degree. By an exertion of will he can move rocks and other small objects-like a wildly beeping and protesting Artoo Detoo. Yet when he tries to raise his ship, which is mired in the swamp, Luke fails...
...Force is neutral, and it can be used for good or evil, by Yoda and Ben Kenobi or by Darth Vader. As Luke leaves Yoda to do combat with Vader, both of those old Jedi masters fear that he may be seduced by the dark side of the Force, just as Vader was. The issue is not resolved when the film ends. "The Force has two sides," explains Lucas. "It is not a malevolent or a benevolent thing. It has a bad side to it, involving hate and fear, and it has a good side, involving love, charity, fairness...