Star Wars‘ next movies have to return to one of the franchise’s core themes if the franchise is going to succeed. Star Wars has always been political; Lucas was partly inspired by the Vietnam War (and yes, that means the Viet Cong inspired the Rebel Alliance – while the Empire was based on the U.S.).

Lucas doubled down on the politics in the prequel trilogy, and he wasn’t subtle about it; the prequels literally begin with discussion about taxation and trade routes. But, for all there’s a political edge in Lucas’ movies, he was careful to always try to add one important theme into the mix – one that Star Wars needs to emphasize.

One Word Defines George Lucas’ Star Wars Franchise

Lucas Understood How Important It Was

Every franchise has an irreducible core, an idea that runs through it and that is key to its success. Is Star Wars fundamentally about family, redemption, or spiritualism? All these things are important, but I believe the heart of Star Wars is simply hope. There’s a reason George Lucas reтιтled the first Star Wars movie “A New Hope” – signifying that theme’s importance.

Hope. The first Star Wars movie offered reᴀssurance that the military might of empires can be defeated by a mere farmboy, The Empire Strikes Back showed a found family still coming together in the darkest night, and Return of the Jedi offered the hope of redemptive love.

The prequels may have been darker, but hope is still there; it’s why Padmé dies with words of redemptive hope on her lips. Anakin Skywalker may have been destined to fall, but viewers know he is also destined to be redeemed, and the movie ends with the birth of a new generation – one who will become the galaxy’s hope.

The Star Wars Sequel Trilogy Inadvertently Set Up A Challenge

The Theme Of Hope Is Harder To Hold On To

The problem, though, is that the Star Wars sequel trilogy subtly changes everything. It reframes the Rebellion’s victory into a temporary event, with the Empire resurgent a generation later, in large part because of the heroes’ mistakes. The New Republic becomes as flawed as the Old, Luke’s Jedi Order repeats the mistakes of the past, and the redeemed once again die for their sins.

Star Wars has always tended to hop around the timeline with impunity, but now there is a simple challenge; can the franchise rediscover the theme of hope? Andor season 2 strikes a careful balance, showing the Dark Times of the Empire’s reign and the cost of rebellion, but also ending with the same generational note of hope. Can the movies find their own balance of darkness and light?

Star Wars’ Next Two Movies Are The Ultimate Test

They Will Prove Whether Star Wars Can Rediscover Its Irreducible Core

Next year, Star Wars finally returns to the big screen with The Mandalorian and Grogu. Set roughly five years after Return of the Jedi, this will continue the story told in The Mandalorian seasons 1-3. It would be so tempting for Star Wars to start doubling down on the Empire’s inevitable return – an idea begun with season 3’s Imperial Shadow Council – but I think that would be a mistake. Where’s the hope in that?

If Star Wars focuses on setting up the Imperial resurgence, then it will simply underscore the weakness and failure of the New Republic, compromising the theme of hope. We’ll be left with something so very bleak, an entire era defined by failure. There needs to be so much more to the post-Return of the Jedi era than that.

The Mandalorian and Grogu will be followed by Shawn Levy’s Star Wars: Starfighter, a movie that’s due to begin filming in September. This will finally reveal the aftermath of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, taking us to a period five years after the sequels. Again, it will be so tempting for the franchise to focus on the scars, but it fundamentally needs to offer hope – light in the darkness.

Personally, I think there are signs Lucasfilm understand this. The logo of Starfighter is deliberately reminiscent of the classic A New Hope image – a lightsaber as a shining star in the darkness, its brightness held aloft, a radiant light of optimism. That’s the Star Wars I so desperately want to see right now, especially in the current political context.

Lucas made Star Wars at a time of political instability, at the height of the Vietnam War. The franchise’s hope and optimism was a deliberate political statement, a call to look beyond the present moment and to believe in the redemptive power of an everyman hero. That is the message Star Wars needs to return to, reᴀssuring us once again that however dark the galaxy may get, the light is always brighter.