Just let that force-kick be canon

We’ve all seen the GIF (and the movie it came from). We all know the moment. The year was 1983. The movie was Return of the Jedi. The moment? Luke Skywalker kicks an opponent away — except the man seems to react despite the fact that Luke’s foot doesn’t come anywhere near the person’s body.

Because it’s Twitter, someone asked Luke Skywalker himself Mark Hamill if this “movie mistake” bothers him. Surely it does! Surely he hasn’t been asked this question a thousand times despite having played many, MANY roles that aren’t Luke Skywalker since 1983.

The actor responded to the question, also on Twitter: “How could anyone possibly be bothered by my widely celebrated, perfectly executed Force-Kick?!”

That’s it. The discourse is settled. No one on the internet will ever bring it up again, surely.

At some point in your fandom, you have to reach a stage where you just accept that the original Star Wars movies were never perfect — and that’s what makes them fun. Right?

Online, it’s hard to tell if people are actually bothered by movie moments like this. It’s fun to point them out and wonder how they made it to the final cut of the movie. There are lists of these “mistakes” all over. We’ve all read them.

Hamill’s reaction is a good reminder regardless that sometimes, fun is the whole point.

In my head, the Force-kick is canon, and that’s all that matters. Thanks to the internet pointing it out to me over and over again for some reason, I now smile every time that moment comes up in an ROTJ rewatch. It’s the kick. It’s Boba Fett zooming by in the background. It’s entertaining. Isn’t that all Star Wars is for sometimes — to entertain us?

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