Obi-Wan: Anakin, Chancellor Palpatine is evil!
Anakin Skywalker: From my point of view, the Jedi are evil!
Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
Lucasfilm has announced that they have come to an agreement with the Dakota Ojibway Tribal Council and the University of Manitoba to release a dubbed Ojibway version of A New Hope, the original Star Wars movie. (If you happen to be a fluent speaker of Ojibway and have theatrical ambitions, now is your chance: you can apply at http://starwarsojibwe.com/)
The producers chose Ojibway because it is one of the most widely spoken indigenous languages, with approximately 320,000 speakers in North America. The Ojibway version of the film will see theatrical release across Canada, and will eventually be broadcast on Canada's Aboriginal Peoples Television Network.
It's interesting to imagine an indigenous re-write of the entire series, with the Empire recast in the model of a colonial power that has undertaken a program of ruthless conquest across the galaxy. In this version, Anakin Skywalker becomes a Lost Generation child, swept up in the equivalent of the 60s Scoop and stripped of his aboriginal identity. His romance with Amidala then becomes a double secret, not just due to the strictures of the Jedi code but because of prejudice and discrimination against his indigenous background.
But where do the Jedi fit in this retelling of the story? It's an easy out to have the Sith stand in for the Catholic Church, but a stark examination of the prequel trilogy makes it just as easy for the Jedi to be guilty of the same sins - let's face it, Qui-Gon Jinn essentially takes Anakin away from his mother and drops him into residential school at the Jedi Temple.
With the narrative changed to an indigenous perspective, Anakin turns out to be correct when he tells Obi-Wan that the Jedi are evil, and his conversations with the Supreme Chancellor about similarities between the Sith and the Jedi gain a new resonance. The good news is that in the aboriginal retelling, Anakin is no longer guilty of killing the younglings that he encounters at the Jedi Temple - instead, he rescues them. And after that, it's a whole new story...
- Sid
