A classic Hero’s journey: our intrepid young protagonist meets with an old mentor who sets him or her on a quest of great importance. There are trials along the way, and a crew of motley others. This is the place-setting for this little movie called Star Wars that happened once — and a hundred trillion other stories out there. However, as I’m watching Revolution, the NBC series created by Supernatural man Eric Kripke, more than a few plot points began to nibble at my brain. “This is familiar, self,” I said to myself, triggering the opening of a word document, and the list that you see before you now. Kripke, an admitted Star Wars fan, has hidden not just a few plotlines from the classic trilogy within his TV piece Revolution. We’ll compare using this handy shot-next-to-shot technique.
1. We start with our distraught Hero, spending a moment alone covered in angst and wanderlust after having been denied the ability to travel and feeling trapped at home, with a broken family lacking in certain parent role-models. Note the handy “Return of the Jedi” lunchbox that stores all of Charlie’s happy memories. That’s when tragedy strikes while the hero is away, thereby killing the reason for staying home in the first place. Convenient!
2. Here we see the main hero being told that he/she is similar or shares traits with a supposedly dead family member. For Luke, it is a genetic leaning towards telepathic badassery, while for Charlie, it is that she is “strong”. You may judge for yourselves who won the family lottery on this one. There’ll be more on this later on.
3. This militia lapdog who has complicated personal feelings about his own family while seeming to blindly serve his purpose likes to throttle people who question his faith.
4. Our hero goes to a shady bar in a new shady city in order to find a no-morals, scrappy Rogue who will be able to help to take him/her where he/she needs to go.
5. This woman yells at the disorganized man who rescues her in a manner to which she is either unaccustomed or wholly against.
6. They then continue to get along smashingly.
7. The Rogue doesn’t want to help, but a heavy dose of hero idealism ends up changing the tide.
8. A giant piece of technology is a symbol of power for the villains.
9. The Brit dies.
10. The Rogue goes to an Old Friend for assistance, and the Old Friend pretends at first to be angry with the Rogue.
11. They are then betrayed by the Old Friend. This betrayal eventually leads to the main girl needing to dress up like a hooker and infiltrate enemy territory.
12. The Rogue is captured by a Bounty Hunter.
13. A sexy villain reveals that a previously beloved family member is actually a figure of power within the enemy’s hierarchy. Once again, the family lottery: Luke’s father (omg spoiler u guys) is the right-hand man of the most evil thing that ever Emperor’d an Empire, while Charlie’s uncle is the reformed former co-creator of a militia (that might be an actual spoiler). Vader just has slightly more movie to go before he’s sort of there. We’re also treated to the fact that:
14. A supposedly dead family member is not actually dead and is, in fact, living with the enemy and giving them assistance. This assistance’s nature manages to change thanks to the interference of family members — a brother and a sister.
15. They seek to blow up the symbol of power, but are afraid that an ally is onboard. Bonus points if this ally is the blond brother of a main character.
Bonus: Once again, folks: shining idealism is the answer to all your problems.
What do you think, geeklets? Am I making this all up in my head out of a desperate need for a TV show about Rogue Squadron, or is there something to the parallels? Sound out below!
Revolution returns Wednesday, September 25 at 8/7c on NBC for its sophomore season. Find out how the dialogue between Star Wars and Revolution changes now that the power has come back on.