(Pilot Porter.Staff Writer)

I write this now being a little over 4 days from my completion of a movie, which I have been anticipating for my entire life. That is not a dramatic sentiment meant to define the gravitas of my eagerness, I was born in 1984 and Return of the Jedi was premiered in 1982, so the math adds up. Growing up a Star Wars fan I had always heard of the possibility of a final trilogy, but once the prequels were put on the docket I among many others started believing that our anticipated final trilogy was no more, left to the annals of the Extended Universe. But then on October 30^th, 2012 a shirtless little mouse announced, his owners will make our final trilogy.

They will do it fast, and they will throw a bunch of other stuff in as well, just because we asked nicely. Never let it be said that Walt Disney pictures would not make the most profitable drug dealers in the world, if they turned their attention to organized crime. Most of you reading this have probably been following The Wars for quite some time, so I will spare you the boring history lesson. If you would like to discuss Star Wars history, by all means tweet me, @thedougporter!! Since history discussions will be saved for later, I wanted to write about what The Force Awakens has done for me as a…..it pains me to say this….a lapsed Star Wars fan.

Yes, over the last few years my interest in the fandom of Star Wars has been on a slow, slow, slow, sloth like journey to dormancy. That isn’t to say that the Galaxy far far away had been any less important to me, I have it tattooed on my body…TWICE! I just found myself getting less excited with the “day to day” of the Star Wars fandom. But this movie has AWOKEN (PUN) the fan that waited 5 days outside a theatre for Attack of the Clones.

I think it is fair to say at this point if you’re a fan of Star Wars you have seen this movie at least once, but if you haven’t PLEASE COME BACK AFTER YOU’VE SEEN IT, cause there will be rosebud type spoilers aplenty. I will give you a minute to get out of eye sight before I continue….

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Well I think burying the lead at this point is futile so, WTF HAN IS GONE!?!?!?!?!?! I am still in mourning from this scene. I have cried multiple times in my life, but I have wept 4 times in my life. Han’s death was the latest. Now before you judge me for being a copy of cryingfwife.com I would like you to understand something. I spent quite a lot of time growing up by myself watching movies, because as we all know the outside sucks! I would on average watch one of the original trilogy a day. I consistently ran the marathon once I had gotten a TV in my room, so the characters became my pseudo family. Always there when I needed them, never leaving, never making fun of me, always encouraging. Han Solo was the epitome of the man I was hoping to become in my adult life. Now as an adult, I have realized that Han’s death was meant to affect us on an ever deeper level than just losing a familiar figure head, losing Han was the symbol of losing our childhood. The story of Star Wars has always followed Joseph Campbell’s The Hero’s Journey and one of the key turning points is The Death of the Mentor. This is the moment that the hero’s innocent, childlike life, is forever changed and puts said hero on the final part of the journey towards heroism.

Han was our mentor, he was the non-believer who we could relate to while watching Luke takes these steps into the force. Now, JJ Abrams wants us to take our own journey with Rey, how do we do that? Remove our mentor. By removing our mentor we have to take this journey with her, we have no one else to look to, we alone are the deciders of our destiny. Plus, added bonus Kylo Ren has become just more evil than Darth Vader in the eyes of the fandom. Which will make his inevitable fight with Luke that much sweeter….unless JJ wants to completely tie up all loose ends and kill him too. Wouldn’t that be something, eh?