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The year was 1980. The month, May, and a still quite young Clint was watching The Empire Strikes Back for the first time. Han Solo was my favorite, and he was proving his awesomeness with every moment — as opposed to that silly Luke who was doing all the boring stuff in the swamp with the muppet while Han dodged TIE fighters and asteroids and giant space worms.
And then, oh crap, Han got captured. And frozen in carbonite and handed over to Boba Fett. And that wasn’t the worst part. The worst part was Fett’s ship taking off (with frozen Han still aboard) before Leia and Chewie and company got there. Luke had a pretty bad day, too, but in the end at least he got rescued and was safe and (mostly) sound with the rebel fleet. As the credits rolled, I realized with dawning horror that I would have to wait three years to find out the fate of my wise-cracking smuggler hero.
At the time, it was a terrible betrayal. The good guys could get in trouble, sure, but were supposed to *win* by the end of the show. That’s what Saturday morning cartoons taught! What was this cliffhanger bullshit (ooh, bad words)?
Well, here I am many years later understanding that cliffhanger bullshit is part and parcel of a lot of entertainment, including the comic I’m writing now. I’m probably one of the only folk who still smiles seeing Boba Fett fall into the Sarlacc, since there’s a small angry child inside me that definitely wanted (and still wants) that smug sonofabitch to suffer for 10,000 years for what happened to Han and the three years of agonizing uncertainty it led to in the heart of my youth.
And really, if Star Wars is meant to be in part a hearkening back to the serials of yore like Flash Gordon, then Empire represents perhaps the purest example of a “What will our heroes do now?! TUNE IN NEXT TIME!” setup. It’s still self-contained in its way, but they had the luxury of knowing there would be at least one more film to wrap up the adventure. That’s something you didn’t really have the guarantee of back in the day.
Today? That’s a different story in the wake of the Lord of the Rings, the Harry Potters, and other film franchises. Studios and stars are committing to multiple movies and writers are aware well in advance, and its let to an interesting escalation in the idea that not every plot point has to be tied in a bow by the time the credits roll. Now we’re even getting the final movies of a series split into two parts, and there might very well be cliffhanger bullshit involved. In a sense it’s getting to where it’s like the days of going to see Flash Gordon and Tarzan matinee serials in the theater have returned. Katniss just woke up to learn District 12 has been purged! TUNE IN NEXT TIME…
Is that a bad thing where feature length films are concerned as opposed to shorter fare? I’m still not sure. The development cycle has shortened to where oftentimes the movies are being filmed without much break between, so you’re not necessarily waiting for three years for your fix, not to mention all the Internet leaks and such to whet your appetite in the meanwhile. The latest example of this is, of course, The Force Awakens, which is rife with dangling plot threads and unanswered questions. Will Episode VIII scratch those itches, or just make them worse? J.J. Abrams has always been better with possibilities and potentials than resolutions, but his hand’s off the tiller now. I guess we’ll see what the next episode brings…