Star Wars, Episode IX: Duel of the Fates: Chapter 11- The Ascension

**for previous chapters, please refer to the Table of Contents**

        The Mortis continued to shimmer and shift and change around them. Rey had long stopped trying to keep track of how much time, exactly, she'd spent here. Plus, as Luke and Yoda had assured her, she could sense that that was an unimportant question. Nonetheless, after the visions she had had and the encouragement the Masters had offered her, she slowly began to think on the battle that must be raging around Coruscant. Not that she didn't trust Poe, Finn, Rose, Lando, or Leia to handle themselves, but sooner or later Kyle Ren would appear (if he hadn't already), and she had to be the one to face him. No one else could do it.

        Yes. It was time she figured out a way back. She turned to Obi-Wan first. "Master Kenobi, when I first arrived here, you said that the Mortis would guide me back to where and when I need to be. Well...-" it felt awkward phrasing something this way to a Jedi Force ghost, but she couldn't think of any way to say it- "...how do I do that? If I'm to face Kylo Ren, then I need to return to Coruscant somehow."

        It was Yoda who spoke up. "Face him, yes. But where...not so sure, I am." He looked around slowly at the scenery around them, which at that moment was once more shifting from glaring sunlight to the dim gray of storm clouds. His face and voice took on a depth and gravity it hadn't had before. "Hm...wait much longer, you will not, I believe. A true storm...about to finally arrive, it is."

        "Indeed...." now it was Qui-Gon who spoke, his voice equally grim. "I can feel it too."

        It was at that moment that a series of sharp, cracking sounds began to build behind Rey, and a red glow starting to creep into her periphereal vision. Suddenly apprehensive at what was about to happen, she slowly turned around.

***

        A brilliant, flourescent sheen of lightning surrounds Kylo Ren. Stemming from the Holocron seated before him, wave after wave of every color imaginable streams over his body, concentrating in the center of his forehead where it sears its way into his being, unfiltered exposure to the dark side rending his mind, body, and soul. Whether the sensation was one of pain or ecstasy, he couldn't tell. He may have screamed- he knew his mouth was open- but he was beyond physical senses, hearing nothing, feeling nothing, seeing only the light.

        It was but a moment in time.

        It was a lifetime.

        It was generations.

        It was the birth, expansion, and heat death of the universe itself.

        It ended, suddenly and without warning, and Kylo Ren found his sense returned to him, gasping for breath on the cold, broken ground, his head bowed towards his heaving chest. The Holocron sat dark and silent for a moment, before the lines of energy formed once again and the figure of Palpatine re-appeared.

        You strength and fortitude is to be commended, Kylo Ren, the voice rumbled, that you could even survive exposure to such raw power is a further sign that you are indeed worthy of the mantle of the Sith. Now, Ben Solo truly is no more. Kylo Ren is no more. Rise now as... and here the voice paused for a moment in contemplation before continuing, Darth...Sidereas.

        The one now named Sidereas slowly contained his breath, feeling his body calm and muscles finally unclench. When he felt in control again, he found his legs beneath him and slowly pushed himself up off the ground. What pain he had been feeling was slowly fading, with the exception of his metal-filled scars, which continued to ache. Though slowly filling with a sense of true triumph, he was astonished at how calm he was able to remain. His inheritance was, at long last, in his hands.

        Before he could respond to Palpatine, however, a whisper in the Force suddenly reached out from behind him and touched his ear. He turned in the direction of the broken entryway and his ship, and a series of images began to flash soundlessly through his head; his ship's console flashing with messages; a great battle in space; riots and pitched street battles in Coruscant; Rey entering the Jedi Temple...

        The figure spoke again, having apparently sensed or seen the same things he had, the voice rising with a passion it had rarely expressed before, Yes, Lord Sidereas; the deciding hour is at hand. You are now the bearer of my legacy, of Vader's raw power! Go, achieve our final victory, and fulfill your destiny!

        For a moment, Sidereas didn't move, his eyes refocusing on the shattered and rotting temple walls around him. Then, he turned back to the Holocron and the image of Palpatine, the last ghost of the old order, darkness in his eyes.

        "You destiny....your legacy....nothing but ruins and ash." Again, he felt a detached wonder at how even his voice and his emotions remained, even as he felt the full might of the dark side swirling within. "I am beyond you. I am beyond Vader."

        The figure tried to speak, the voice now hissing with contempt and danger, How DARE you, you ungrateful...

        But Sidereas immediately cut him off, "I am a new Sith Lord, beholden to no one, especially not you. And I will create my OWN destiny." And without waiting a moment more, he struck, reaching his right hand out and sending out a shrieking blast of Force lightning. The shadow struck back, belatedly, desperately, but Sidereas was far beyond the strength of a memory now. His attack was held back for only a second before overwhelming the defenses of the Holocron.

        A terribly grating sound rang out and the last image of Darth Sidious, Emperor Palpatine, last Lord of the Old Sith, screamed an unholy sound of fury and terror before vanishing in a flash of fire. The Holocron itself then burst out, each one of its innumerable shards disintegrating further until nothing but a spread of burning dust remained where it had once stood. Silence descended once more within the wreckage of the ancient temple, where Darth Sidereas now stood alone.

        He allowed himself a moment to savor the sensation of ultimate triumph before turning back to the entrance to return to his ship. As he passed the threshold to the barren wastes, however, a strange shimmer suddenly passed across his vision, sending ripples of colors around him that washed out the sights of Exegal's landscape. Unsure of what sort of Force power he was encountering now, he paused, his lightsaber held at the ready in the grip of his right hand.

        After a few moments, the shimmer began to fade and his vision settled once again. Instead of the dry ground and red skies of Exegal, he found himself standing in a lush and absurdly green field that contrasted starkly with swirling gray clouds above him. Before he could even consider reaching out with his sense, a powerful sense of the Force, beyond anything he'd ever encountered, rushed into him; wherever he was now, it was a placed pulsing with deep, ancient, pure power.

        He started to wonder how he could determine where he was and how he got here when he heard a sharp intake of breath behind him. He turned.

        Rey had felt a deep apprehension the moment the eddies appeared in the air before her, knowing without needing to think that the final trial was now before her. She'd expected Ben- knew it could be no one else- but even then, she wasn't prepared for the battered visage that she now saw, the face of Ben Solo pockmarked and rimmed with deep red scars, burning as if something molten had been poured into his body. His clothes were bloody ruins, his body seeming almost emaciated. Yet there was nothing dimming the fierce power that burned in his eyes as they focused on her.

        Sidereas could no longer even feign surprise that the Force had drawn him to Rey once more, though her obvious disquiet at his...changed...appearance did give him a small measure of perverse pleasure. What did shock him, though, were the images of a host of Jedi around her; the one with the long, bound hair and short goatee was not familiar to him, but he immediately recognized Luke, Yoda, Obi-Wan, and even the pre-Vader visage of his own grandfather, Anakin Skywalker.

        For a moment, no one seemed able to speak. Sidereas found his voice first; "This isn't a vision this time, is it."

        Rey, still with that strange look in her eyes, shook her head. "No...we've both been brought to the Mortis."

        The name immediately rung a bell in Sidereas' head. He looked around, re-examining the ever-changing landscape around them with new interest. "The nexus of the Force...so it is real..." he then turned to the apparitions of the other Jedi. "I suppose it figures. That the last Jedi failures would flee here after death. Is that what you're here for? To try and join forces against me?"

        It was Luke who spoke, slowly shaking his head, "Our fights are long over, Ben. Whatever the future holds, it will be decided between you and Rey. And for what it's worth...I am sorry it's come to this."

        Sidereas snorted derisively. "Cowards to the end. Fine..." he raised his saber into the guard position, igniting all three blades with a snap of the wrist. "It had to happen anyway, so it might as well be here. Draw, Jedi."

        The look in Rey's eyes turned to one of sad pain. "Ben...please...it doesn't have to be this way..."

        "Enough," he sharply cut her off, "your sentimentality is sickening. Ben Solo is dead. Kylo Ren is dead. I am Darth Sidereas, the new Lord of the Sith. And once I've killed you, I will finish what the Emperor and my grandfather failed to do. I gave you your chance to join me, and you threw it away. Now you pay the price. Draw. Your. Blade."

        With a resigned air, Rey finally raised her blade and released its twin arcs of clear blue energy. "Very well then."

        The man who was once Ben Solo lunched, and the swirling skies forked with sparks of light both white and black.

Review: The Suicide Squad

The Suicide Squad (2021): Written and directed by James Gunn. Starring: Idris Elba, Margot Robbie, John Cena, Joel Kinnaman, Sylvester Stallone, Viola Davis, David Dastmalchian, Daniela Melchior, Alice Braga, and Peter Capaldi. Running Time: 132 minutes. Based on the comic series by DC Comics.

Rating: 3/4

        As soon as the word dropped that James Gunn (at that time, still sitting under a cloud kicked up by alt-right ratshits) would be heading the attempted resuscitation of the Suicide Squad franchise, my immediate reaction was to get all the hype. The first film had a note-perfect trailer that promised so much, but the film itself delivered so little and is now considered one of the biggest failures in a DC movie universe filled with them. The lone exception, of course, was Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn, which is so far and away the best creative decision to come out of current DC franchises that it's practically in its own universe. At any rate, the very concept of the Suicide Squad remained so promising and Gunn's specific skill sets such an ideal fit that I couldn't be anything other than excited.

        And now it's here, and boys, they did it. The Suicide Squad immediately papers over (and in one case, literally kills off) the shortcomings of its predecessors to deliver the hard-R, black-humor-filled joyride this year had been lacking. With all due apologies to Will Smith, who just didn't have anything to work with, Idris Elba steps in wonderfully as Bloodsport, the more-or-less lead character/team leader and a MacGyver-esque weapons expert. In conjunction with a second suicide squad of secondary characters- which gets slaughtered in the funniest ways in a banger of an opening sequence- he and returning "regular" soldier Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) head a new lineup (new aside from Quinn, that is) consisting of John Cena as Peacemaker, Daniela Melchior as Ratcatcher 2, David Dastmalchian in a quietly-brilliant turn as Polka-Dot Man, and a not-so-quietly brilliant turn by Sylvester Stallone as the voice of Nanaue, aka "King Shark," a literal giant shark that eats everything in sight and seems nigh indestructable.

        Returning as well is, of course, Viola Davis in pure Ice Queen form as Amanda Waller, the utterly ruthless head of the secretive government agency that organizes the Suicide Squad missions in the name of "protecting US interests." Using every means of emotional blackmail available, she strong-arms Bloodsport into leading an expedition to the fictional, Caribbean Island nation of Corto Maltese, which recently saw its dictatorial ruling family executed in a military coup. Their goal is to kidnap a British scientist called The Thinker (Peter Capaldi) and force him to lead them into a secretive research facility used for something known only as Project Starfish, which Wallace believes the hostile new regime will use in an attack on the United States. Once there, they are to inflict as much chaos as possible and destroy all evidence of the project. I will not spoil any details regarding Starfish here, because believe me, it's worth the wait.

        Now, if the notion of a covert unit of superkillers sent by the US to infiltrate and possibly destabilize a small, non-white nation suffering from crushing poverty and brutal autocracy evokes some, ah, uncomfortable feelings, that is very much the point. Gunn is not afraid to get political and maybe even a little anti-imperialist, a decision which, given the leanings of those who tried to wreck his career, I wholeheartedly favor. And it certainly isn't superficial; one of the standout sequences of the entire film is a dick-measuring contest between Bloodsport and Peacemaker to see who can kill the most people in a camp without alerting anyone. It starts as just another darkly comic, "Hoho, look how gruesomely we can kill people while being blithe about it," bit like any other in the film, only to be completely turned on its head in seconds by a revelation that they were actually slaughtering freedom fighters seeking to overthrow the country's military dictators. In other words, the good guys.

        Granted, James Gunn is a White, American male, so it's not like he's going to be the one to drop the most thorough deconstruction of US foreign policy into mainstream laps. And while the movie does follow through with the liberation subplot- Alice Braga really shines despite relatively little screentime as the leader of the freedom fighters- it's only a small part of the whole, never allowed to distract too much from the wacky kill-times. That this storyline is as prominent as it is and is clearly resolved without any direct influence by the main characters or their superiors is a feather in the film's cap to be sure, but this is not anywhere close to the sociopolitical level of, say, Black Panther.

        Nonetheless, where the film unhinges itself the most is when it shines the brightest. We were promised James Gunn Unleashed, and we got it. From everything surrounding King Shark to the hilariously twisted, psychosexual backstory of Polka Dot Man (and the absolutely nuts payoff it builds to, which, again, not spoiling), there is a lot of insanity to revel in. The highlight for me (and, I suspect, for most viewers) is the caper Harley ends up getting into on her own that actually allows a window into the long-running emotional development Robbie has been able to work into the character. It even involved a call back to the first Suicide Squad movie that actually felt rather empowering for Quinn, which, given how much of a mess that film was, should have been impossible.

        True, it comes at the cost of the film's momentum and any sense of narrative cohesion. However, as I said before, Robbie's Quinn is practically in her own dimension, so whatever Robbie decides the character needs in a given project, the rest of the production crew should just shut up and listen. And the narrative getting choppy or sluggish at times are among the bigger criticisms of the film that people are likely to have; the film easily clears two hours and that length very much is noticeable. However, for the most part it's such a good time, I will not be the one to complain.

        All in all, this is definitely one of the most fun times we've gotten from the movies so far. The DC film universe stumbled in spectacular fashion out of the gate, but with Wonder Woman, Shazam, Birds of Prey, and now this, they just might have found something of an approach that works.

-Noah Franc

Review: The Green Knight

The Green Knight (2021): Written and directed by David Lowery. Starring: Dev Patel, Alicia Vikander, Joel Edgerton, Sarita Choudry, Sean Harris, and Ralph Ineson. Running Time: 130 minutes. Based on the anonymous tale of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

Rating: 3.5/4

        There's always something to be said for films that stick to their guns and get strange, and friends, David Lowery's latest- Dev-Patel-starring adaption of one of the most famous King Arthur legends- is strange, and makes no apologies for it. Given that this is the same mind that brought us A Ghost Story, one of the best and most unique films of the 2010's, this is hardly surprising. Still, there was no guarantee that a grungy, balls-out adaptation of Arthurian myth would actually stick the landing, and while this is most definitely not a film for everyone, it's free to land on my runway anyday.

        The premise, for the unitiated, is that one Christmas day, a mysterious "Green Knight" appears at the court of Camelot and issues a challenge. Any knight may take a free blow at him, even try to cut off his head, but in exactly one year's time, at an appointed place, he will be permitted to strike the exact same blow in return. The only one who rises to take the bait is Gawain, a younger man, untested, and very much eager to take his place amongst the other members of the court, who he himself views as "legends." He promptly strikes off the knight's head, but in true Arthurian fashion, there is some strange magic at work, and the body merely shrugs it off and picks up the head, which reminds Gawain of his promise to meet him again in a year's time, presumably to have his own head lopped off. The adventures that follow track Gawain as he struggles to meet this challenge, experiencing the usual litany of magical adventures along the way that test his character, virtue, and resolve, especially when faced with what seems like certain death.

        Though the original story is considered a classic of chivalrous romance, the movie makes it very clear from the beginning that this will not be a straightlaced adaptation. Camelot, classically meant to represent a "Golden Age" of chivalry, appears cloudy, wet, dark, and all-around dirty and unpleasant. Arthur (Sean Harris) is a tired old man, immediately owning up to the fact that he himself doesn't have the strength to fight the knight when he appears. The Green Knight himself is a literal green giant who looks like a close relative of Treebeard and is voiced by the wondrous Ralph Ineson. There is also a love interest for Gawain, a commoner played by Alicia Vikander, who also pulls double duty later as a strange lady in a countryside manor who later provides the sharpest temptation to Gawain during his quest.

        What I most appreciated about this version is how it goes all in in embracing wildest stuff out of these myths. For all the polish and gloss that musicals like Camelot and other classical depictions of Arthur and the Round Table tend to get, when you really boil down these stories thereis a host of truly insane stuff going on, often out of nowhere and with no more reason than "something weird must happen so a knight can do Knight Things." Magical animals, hosts of giants rising out of fog, ghosts, and much more come and go with nary a hello. The movie embraces the randomness and the oddity of it all from the word go- the film literally starts with a crowned head bursting into flame- and is all the better for it.

        Every scene and sequence is positively dripping with atmosphere, more often than not designed to keep the audience in a state of constant unease. A standout sequence involving the ghost of a dead saint and a task to find a missing head near an abandoned cottage effectively works as a short horror film. I found it particularly effective, probably in no small part because it evoked some, ah, uncomfortable memories of watching Hereditary. The color green, especially in regards to nature and plant life, is a recurring motif, and the vast woods and wildernesses Gawain travels through are often spotted with the wrecks and ruins of houses and churches, as if to say, "Here, too, Man tried to conquer and failed." The soundtrack by Daniel Hart, currently the best I've heard this year, deserves mention as well, perfectly matching the visuals by refusing to let the ear feel at ease.

        All that said, the anchor of it all is obviously Dev Patel, and he delivers career work. He's given a lot of moments, especially during a dynamite sequence towards the end, to use just his face and body language to convey the emotional and mental development of Gawain, and he takes full advantage of them. Once again, though, given that this same director was able to evoke a similar effect using a fucking BEDSHEET, this should not surprise anyone. Alicia Vikander is as enchanting as ever, in every sense of the word, and though her scenes are relatively few, she makes sure they stand out.

        Out of all the ideas on the film's mind, probably the most interesting one is how it comments on the nature of narratives and legends as a whole, and their ability to take shape and meaning far beyond any connection to what may have actually happened. Every so often we cut to a literal puppet show depicting the coming conflict between Gawain and the Green Knight, which seems to be spreading his tale to the common folk around the kingdom. He is hailed as the "hero" who "killed" the knight in taverns before he's even had the chance to ride out and begin his journey, and afterwards as well he encounters people who have already heard a version of his story. It becomes immediately obvious that the tales being spread bear almost no resemblance to the truth, and Gawain knows this, but he always seems far too uneasy or uncertain of himself to ever try and set the record straight.

        And would it even matter if he did try? It has always been a key part of legends that they shift and change in meaning and even content with the retelling, each iteration bringing something new to the forefront while letting other details recede into the background. It's part of what makes storytelling such a vibrant and fascinating and fun aspect of human existance. No tale-spinner has ever let the facts get in the way of a good story. This makes the film less of a deconstruction of mythmaking and more of a meditation on how stories shift and change over time, meaning different things to different people.

        More than anything else, I am grateful that we finally have a new take on the tales of Arthur to breath new life into its world, one that I think was getting rather stale in modern culture. It has been some time since we've had a really interesting, new, and meaningful story from this particular universe. This movie reminded me that Arthurian tales have endured for a reason, and that the world of English-speaking storytelling is better off when these stories continue to be revisited. This is one of the strangest and best films of the year, and I suspect it will find a long shelf life indeed.

-Noah Franc