It’s hard to make sense of the politics of Star Wars (a Senate whose electees include senators that represent government agencies; an elected princess who calls a no-confidence vote, etc), but the more you think about Luke’s “hero’s journey,” the more it starts to resemble the “radicalization” process that we’re supposed to be watching out for to keep us all safe from ISIS.
After Luke’s uncle and aunt are collateral damages in a drone attack, he is guided by an elderly fanatical warrior-priest to isolate himself from his former life and flee to a militia base. En route, Luke is trained in covert military tactics and brainwashed by the old priest, who lies to him and tells him that the Empire killed his father. They escape with a drug-runner.
They stage a suicide-run on a forward operating base, and the old priest martyrs himself while uttering religious dogma. Luke rejoins his terrorist cell and attacks the FOB, destroying it while repeating religious slogans the old priest taught him.
That’s just the first movie. After that, things get really radicalized:
Yoda accepts Luke into his religious “school,” teaching Luke Jedi fundamentalism and guerilla warfare. Like many extremist mullahs, Yoda demands total adherence to his strict interpretation of the Force and seeks to strip Luke of independent thinking. Yoda’s push to radicalize Luke, rob him of an identity, and instill obedience are apparent when at various points he instructs Luke to “Clear your mind of questions,” “Unlearn what you have learned” and, most grimly, “Do, or do not, there is no try.” The Jedi know it is imperative to force mindless devotion in warriors they recruit for their holy war. Armed with new combat training and cloaked in a hardline religious fervor, Luke leaves Dagobah, impatient to put his terror training to use.
In Return of the Jedi, we see a darker, hardened Luke, fittingly dressed in black and eager to use violence as a tool to enforce the twisted “judge, jury, executioner” value system of the Jedi. During a rescue mission, Luke exhibits their extremist binary worldview of “if you aren’t with us, you’re a viable military target” when he blows up Jabba’s barge, killing every man, woman, and child on board. Excited by so much bloodshed and mayhem, young Skywalker seeks to assassinate the Emperor and even his own father (!) if they won’t convert to Luke’s extremist interpretation of the Force. Luke enters the Death Star, hoping to gain martyrdom if he is killed. As Luke’s insurgent friends successfully bomb their target, Luke succeeds in killing the Emperor and, eventually, his own father. Luke’s path to radicalization is complete, his bloodlust sated … for now.
THE RADICALIZATION OF LUKE SKYWALKER: A JEDI’S PATH TO JIHAD [Comfortably Smug/The Decider]