Jar Jar overreacts to everything,
constantly makes mistakes, never has a plan and has atrocious table manners.
He resembles nothing so much as an overgrown child. A fool, in the folkloric
sense.
Most fans think of him as
nothing more than bad comic relief, and George Lucas’s non-defense of the
Gungan as just another element of a kid-oriented movie doesn’t help.
Lucas may simply be playing
his cards close to his vest, however. The filmmaker has been studiously
close-mouthed about nearly every aspect of the prequel trilogy, and even
in The Phantom Menace there’s evidence that Jar Jar is more than
he appears to be.
"Just relax, the Force
will guide us"
Binks may be clumsy, but
he’s also amazingly lucky – something the sage Qui-Gon Jinn seems to recognize
early on.
When we first meet him, Jar
Jar is enjoying a perfectly ordinary breakfast, which just happens to be
in the path of a horde of Trade Federation war machines – and, the one
man who can save Jar Jar from them.
It's not just that Binks
is in the right place at the right time. The happy-go-lucky Gungan takes
action, grabbing Qui-Gon and setting into motion a sequence of events that
will inevitably lead to him accompanying the Jedi on his adventures.
Before long, Qui-Gon has
"clumsy" Jar Jar navigating a Gungan submarine, telling him, "Just relax,
the Force will guide us." It does, at least until Jar Jar faints upon encountering
the sea monsters – and even when he is unconscious, bigger fish just happen
to come along to consume the ones attacking his vessel.
"Why mesa always the one?"
Jar Jar’s fear seems to be
the weakness complicating his relationship with the Force. Anakin spots
it immediately, telling him that the reason Sebulba and others pick on
him is because he is always afraid.
Binks continues to be afraid
throughout The Phantom Menace, but by the climactic final battle,
it no longer paralyzes him. It’s in this battle that – seemingly despite
his failings – he begins to shine.
As we all know, he gets his
feet caught on a broken battle droid, and destroys half a dozen more trying
to shake it off. Trying to clamber on the back of a wagon of energy balls,
he destroys even more droids by clumsily upsetting the boomball cart.
Jar Jar Binks takes out droids
as fast as Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan do, and he’s not even trying.
Maybe that's his secret.
The message is clear and consistent. When Jar Jar Binks takes action –
even if it is only to run away – good things happen to him.
Is he just lucky? Or is he
unconsciously using the Force?
Is there a difference?
The hero with a thousand
faces and two buggy eyes
If mythic structure can be
trusted, Jar Jar is more than just the luckiest Gungan in the universe.
He’s following the path of one of George Lucas’s favorite obsessions: Joseph
Campbell’s "Hero’s Journey".
Whether we take the famous
literary critic turned mythic guru at face value or not, we know Lucas
is a longtime fan, and so Campbell's interpretation of folklore patterns
probably has quite a bit of relevance to the Star Wars saga.
Campbell suggested that most
of the important heroes in myth and literature undergo a common sequence
of experiences and changes. So far, Jar Jar’s adventures fit that sequence
perfectly.
We’re introduced to Jar Jar
in his Ordinary World of swimming and sucking clams. He hears the
Call
to Adventure in Qui-Gon’s request for guidance to the Gungan city,
and at first Refuses the Call.
Qui-Gon becomes a Mentor
leading
him into adventure, however, and he soon Crosses the First Threshold,
reluctantly entering a new world through the undersea journey to the Naboo
capital. Just like Luke Skywalker destroying the Death Star, he Passes
Tests in the climactic battle against the Trade Federation, becoming
a hero to his people.
In many ways, Jar Jar Binks
is the Luke of Episode I: he’s the annoying bumpkin, the farmboy who makes
good.
Anakin, the most obvious
candidate for that role, turns out to be something else.
Bring on that Grail
No other character in The
Phantom Menace follows the Campbellian pattern as clearly as Jar Jar.
Obi-wan and Anakin come close, but Obi-wan is already well-advanced down
his own path, and Anakin’s precocious eagerness to launch himself into
adventure hints that he will follow a more twisted path to villainy.
Of course, Jar Jar has only
taken a few steps in his journey – look for him to encounter innermost
caves, supreme ordeals and other Campbellian challenges in the next two
movies. Episode III may even end with his Return with the Elixir
– perhaps spiriting the infant Luke and Leia away from their father so
they can grow up in safety?
If this comes to pass, Jar
Jar’s ridiculous mannerisms may eventually serve to hide a powerful Force-sensitive
character in plain sight. George Lucas may have pulled the wool over the
eyes of an audience of millions.
Jar Jar Binks may never wear
a Jedi cape, of course, and his detractors can rest assured he's unlikely
to become the star of the Star Wars saga. But his comic role in The
Phantom Menace might just be the surface of the lake – and there's
always a bigger mythic fish lurking at Lucas' swimming hole.
What do you think? Send your
comments to the author or editor.
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