(yes this is a show not a movie but my roommates' been making me watch it and I need to complain to somebody.)

so yeah, SW:TCW really is astonishingly bad. Most of the time it's dull-eyed and dimwitted, forgetting half the lines it was supposed to memorize, but still preening for applause at the appropriate moments. Sometimes, though -- sometimes it will push to the edge, just to the very edge of no longer being fascist propaganda.

Then it will stop and sheepishly turn back. Because it is, after all, astonishingly awful. (Ironically, this quality of absorbing small amounts of non-fascist reality makes it only more potent as fascist propaganda. Like padding, like antibodies attaching to an invading amoeba, the society seeds its content with small markers of dialectic thinking, to as to more readily identify and neutralize it.)

In S04E09[I think??] of SW:TCW, some of the clones in the Republic Clone Army -- enslaved child soldiers, by the by -- begin to have doubts about the priorities of their current owner. The owner, a Jedi, sends them into danger again and again, seemingly uncaring of casualties. The clones begin muttering among themselves. "Hey, maybe that guy doesn't have our best interests at heart!"

A promising start, right? These characters are normally so straight-faced that the only characterization they get is "likes guns" or "is a bit of a geek". Straightforward imperial dreck, devoid of anything gay like "emotions" (beyond "just hanging out with your bros"). But now the world they inhabit has become grayer. Different ones make different choices -- is it right, to rebel for the sake of your loved ones, even if it goes against your country? -- They engage in socratic dialogues, go on adventures of their own free will, experience reality for the first time--

But, it's dashed. The exciting mutiny that follows, all that carefully-crafted moral ambiguity... it completely falls apart, only a few minutes after it comes to fruition.

Once the full battalion has come to open rebellion, the clones corner their Jedi captain. They lock him in the brig, and ask him why he gave them such dangerous orders -- he's supposed to be a Jedi!

...And he laughs and says, "Your mistake, thinking I was a weak-willed Jedi."

...blah blah blah, he was a Sith all along and wanted to get them killed because he thought it would make Count Dooku his friend. Because it was just so delightfully evil. No no, he was no Jedi. Not anymore!!

The Clone captain is aiming a pistol at the back of the Jedi's head. Sadly, he cannot bring himself to fire. He's afraid of soiling his soul with killing, or something. Never mind he's been shooting sentients in the face his entire 10-year life... never mind, never mind. The point's moot, because at this point the last clasp on the coffin claps shut. A particular clone -- named Rulebook or something, I forget -- who has up to this point been a rat, constantly reporting the mutineers because he believes in Law and Order -- this saint-clone, this morally upstanding character, becomes overcome with emotion. Suddenly, he shoots the Sith imposter in the back. Because he cannot handle being betrayed.

Did you catch the card trick? How these kernels of reality are ground into feed?

The story stamps out any possibility of Empire not having your best interests at heart. The evil general was not simply lazy, or cruel, or racist, or stupid. No, those things could imply bad things about our actual rulers. So instead, the general was simply a traitor. Remember, if your instincts ever tell you not to trust your boss, listen to them! They may be able to lead to to traitors, who you can turn in for a pat on the head.

Ugh.

All of Star Wars has this problem. The fact that the overarching structure of the story is anti-imperialist doesn't help. One, because the heroes are American aircraft fighter pilots, which really puts the brakes on any potential application of the word "Maoism". Secondly, because the invading tentacles of capital have reached into the work and corrupted the ends of this narrative, so that it becomes eternal and reactionary. Sure, the "democratic" oligarchy falls and becomes an empire, but it's only because there were evil Sith corrupting it from the inside, despite the valiant White senator Amidala proudly Doing Her Part For Democracy. The show really has all sorts of faith in the system, and can only sternly shake its head at those cruel individuals who try to subvert it. Which they do surely because they are evil and bad, of course.

(Now, laugh at these charming ethnics! We call them "droids". We love to mock them, disembowel them, and then have them tearfully swear loyalty to their naturally superior Aryan-coded masters.)