April 13th, 2008 posted by Bender Rodríguez
from Salon's Heather Havrilesky and her column "I Like to Watch".
When my sister and I were kids, we made our Star Wars action figures go on dates with each other. First we'd take turns picking our favorite action figures, then we'd set up "apartments" for each of them. (We knew from "Three's Company" that single people always lived in apartments.) Next, Luke would knock on Leia's door, but she'd usually say she was busy or had to wash her hair, because she secretly wanted to go out with Mark (that was the hunkier "Empire Strikes Back" version of Luke) or Harrison (the hunky "Empire Strikes Back" Han Solo). Finally, once everyone went on dates and kissed good night and went on dates again without any broken hearts or unexpected pregnancies, we needed to mix things up a little. So Mark would dump Leia for Bespin Leia (the fancy "Empire Strikes Back" Leia who Lando said truly belonged with them "among the clouds" of Bespin City), and Bespin Leia would cheat on Mark with Harrison, or Luke would start stalking Carrie ("Empire Strikes Back" Leia in "Hoth" garb). But even with so much drama and intrigue in the air, the second we started to mix and match the couples, we'd quickly begin to lose interest in the game. Who cared if Bespin Leia dated Mark then Luke then Harrison then Luke again, really? After a while, the relationships felt arbitrary, and sometimes Leia would elope with Chewbacca just to piss everyone off.
I think about our hormonally charged action figures, knocking on doors as we put the finishing touches on their apartments: That
was the best part of the game. The heart-pounding anticipation of love,
waiting to see if the devil-may-care smuggler pilot liked you, too, and
hoping against hope that he'd take you out for a ride in the fastest
hunk of junk in the galaxy.
"The workers battle-cry must be: the permanent revolution."
Karl Marx