That galaxy far, far away has a huge load of Narm... some of which is very tender and downright lovable.
Expect unmarked spoilers.
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The films:
Revenge of the Sith
- General Grievous' coughing is very Narm-y. The "charm" part? How awesome he is, despite being so over-the-top.Obi-Wan: Hello there!
Grievous: General Kenobi! - "I am the Senate!" In addition to Palpatine's beloved campiness, it highlights Palpatine's goal of engineering galactic crises as an excuse to gain vast amounts of political power and twist it into his personal empire.Mace Windu: In the name of the Galactic Senate of the Republic, you. Are. Under. Arrest, Chancellor.
Palpatine: Are you threatening me, master Jedi?
Mace Windu: The Senate will decide your fate!
Palpatine: I AM the Senate! - Many of Anakin's lines are spoken in a monotone voice. Many liked the "robotic" speech from him as a foreshadowing of Darth Vader's mostly-cyborg state and more formal speech patterns. It also serves to hint at a detachment; for example, when he's trying to sound affectionate to Padme and reciting Jedi beliefs, he can't quite manage it.
- Yoda's cheesy-yet-badass line:
Yoda: "Not if anything to say about it, I have!"
- Obi-Wan's "I have the high ground" was mocked by many for its weirdness, but others enjoy it and satirically quote it in their memes.
- Obi-Wan's "You were The Chosen One!" speech. Yeah, it's been quoted and memed to hell and back, but it's hard to laugh as he breaks down, having witnessed the fall of his apprentice and best friend, whom he even considered to be his brother, who he fought so hard with and gave in to the influence of Palpatine/Darth Sidious, not to mention the mass slaughter of the Jedi that Anakin, now Darth Vader, enabled.Obi-Wan: YOU WERE THE CHOSEN ONE!! It was said that you would destroy the Sith, not join them! Bring balance to the Force, not leave it in darkness!
- Anakin/Vader's final line to Obi-Wan can be pretty cheesy to some, but the way Hayden Christensen delivers it makes it clear that Anakin is incredibly furious toward not only Obi-Wan, his former best friend, but also the Jedi as a whole.Darth Vader: I HATE YOU!
- Vader's much Memed Big "NO!" may be cheesy, but the tragic context and James Earl Jones 's delivery make it work for some.
- John Williams' score is some of his most amazing and most overwrought work on the franchise. The music is essentially the orchestral version of Large Ham.
A New Hope
- Leia's inconsistent accent in this film, especially her quasi-British one, can be somewhat endearingly despite being simultaneously eye-rolling.
- Some of the costumes for the Mos Eisley bar patrons seem to be odd, including a literal devil costume for one. However, what makes this work in some fashion is that it shows that not all aliens have to look either like Rubber-Forehead Aliens or perfected creatures, and that some are truly alien!
The Empire Strikes Back
- The Reveal by Vader was so shocking at the time, people were willing to forgive the Big "NO!" from Luke.
- Luke's "I'll never join you!" He's so ragged-voiced note , shocked, and exceedingly The Woobie at that moment, it's up in the air whether this makes you laugh or want to comfort him.
Return of the Jedi
- The Ewoks were loved by children and loathed by critics at the time. But with the power of Original Trilogy nostalgia, audiences are pretty okay with them now.
The Force Awakens
- Hux and his speech is filled with Chewing the Scenery and is rather amusing, yet it works for a number of reasons. Hux doesn't start at eleven; he builds up to his outburst as if he is genuinely growing more and more incensed. Domhnall Gleeson drew upon real world dictators like Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, which is appropriate for a character that's A Nazi by Any Other Name. And of course, it looks ridiculous to us. It's not meant for us. Hitler looks silly in his speeches, but to those exposed to Nazi propaganda for years, it was memorable and powerful. The First Order is much the same way, way more visibly than the Galactic Empire. The overly dramatic speech precedes Starkiller Base destroying a whole star system, with the score by John Williams making the moment very beautiful and haunting. These elements make the whole scene come off as over-the-top and silly, but authentically fanatical and chilling, and it's hard not to get sucked in.
- Rey often acts like a little girl, especially when she fangirls over meeting Han Solo. In many ways, she never stopped being a child, daydreaming about joining the Rebellion against the Galactic Empire. These moments come off as endearing and sweet in context.
The Rise of Skywalker
- Much in the same vein as Return of the Jedi and Revenge of the Sith, Ian McDiarmid's delivery as Emperor Palpatine is full to the brim of Ham and Cheese, yet he still manages to make the character terrifying at the same time.
- The rank "Allegiant General" is a completely made-up rank and it's supposed to be an equivalent to Grand Marshal note . It sounds silly anytime a character mentions it, but the rank is held by Pryde, who is a genuinely intimidating Nazi-esque general. By definition, "allegiant" means "adhering firmly and devotedly", signifying Pryde's Undying Loyalty to Palpatine as well as the Sith Eternal's Cult of Personality nature.
- "Somehow, Palpatine returned" is often mocked and used to show everything wrong with the film, but it's gone straight to the point, usually edited without the full line or context ("We've decoded the intel from the First Order spy, and it confirms the worst: somehow, Palpatine returned."), continues the franchise's trend of memetically bad lines, and at this point in the story Poe really doesn't have an explanation for Palpatine's resurrection beyond "somehow" (granted, he is not Force-sensitive, and also, learning about the ways of the dark side is a big no-no since it can easily corrupt the learner into the dark side), plus what Palps is going to do and how to kill him again is the bigger concern right now. Oscar Isaac's performance when he says the line is also hilarious, with him sighing, shaking his head and pausing before he says it, as though even Poe knows what he's about to say will sound absurd.
- Similarly, "The Dead speak!" that the opening crawl begins with is derided as ridiculously cheesy. Per the filmmakers' own admission, this was the point, as Star Wars has always been derived from the cheesy film serials of the 1930s through 1950s, many of which opened on similarly bombastic statements to grab viewers' attention.
- The line, "I'm Rey Skywalker" is also used in the same manner as Poe's line. However, if you rewatch the scene where Rey says this, it would make complete sense. With the passings of Leia, then later Ben Solo, the Skywalker clan is now dead and gone. But Rey, who has slain Palpatine once and for all, is given the blessings of Luke and Leia (albeit now Force ghosts) to carry on the Skywalker family name and thus renew the clan once more. It's also the ultimate middle finger to her grandfather, who only saw the Skywalkers as pawns or enemies and wanted to wipe them and the Jedi out completely, yet now his own flesh and blood is ensuring that the Skywalker name and the Jedi Order will continue while the name of Palpatine becomes nothing but a bad memory. It also helps that the scene itself is a Call-Back to a moment earlier in the film where a young alien girl also asked Rey who her family name was, with the echo of that question by the old woman later on being seen as Rey finally knowing the answer.
The shows:
The Clone Wars
- Darth Maul shows up alive in The Clone Wars despite having been chopped in half by Obi-Wan and falling hundreds of feet down a pit in The Phantom Menace. His reason for surviving is that he used The Power of Hate to sustain himself for over a decade. As utterly ridiculous as this sounds and how much it cheapens the deaths of some other notable Star Wars characters note , you won't find many fans complaining about it because A) General consensus is that Maul was killed off too soon, and B) His story arcs in The Clone Wars series as well as Star Wars Rebels managed to make Maul a far more interesting character than he was in The Phantom Menace, where he was just a generic, uninteresting (albeit cool-looking and tough) villain.
Rebels
- While Maul's death can seem pretty shabby, some found that to be the point. He dies after very little effort, but that only illustrates his overconfidence.
The Mandalorian
- The Child may be an obvious animatronic puppet instead of CGI, but that just adds to his infantile charm.
- At the beginning of Chapter 5, the Mandalorian kills another bounty hunter by blowing up his fighter after delivering a Pre-Mortem One-Liner. The bounty hunter screams in an over-the-top manner as his ship explodes around him, with his screams echoing even after he should have been vaporized. It wouldn't be out of place in a cheesy 1980s action movie, but since The Mandalorian aesthetically feels like a 1980s film, it feels fitting.
- Chapter 10 features an antlike alien named Dr. Mandible. Any goofiness is offset by how amazing the puppet is, plus serving as a fun nod to director Peyton Reed's prior work.
- The froglike aliens from Chapters 10-11. Two adults going around in frog costumes may seem like something from a B-movie, but their sheer joy at being reunited just warms the heart.
- When Boba dons his armour again in Chapter 14, he clearly *ahem* fills it a bit more than he did when he was younger. However, this in no way diminishes the awesomeness of his massacre of the stormtroopers. In fact, it may enhance it to see him kicking so much arse at an older age and post-sarlacc pit.
- By Chapter 15, Boba has somehow perfectly cleaned up the armor so it looks fresh from the blacksmith. Even with the mystery of how he did it, and how popular the armor's well-used look was, many fans took to loving this look just as much.
- The Child's name turning out to be... Grogu, initially casted doubts on fans on catching on in favor of his memetically popular moniker, "Baby Yoda", but it did anyways since it was pointed out that the only two other members of his species are called the equally unserious Yoda and Yaddle, and the name Grogu had its own cute, shorter charm to it.
- In the Season 2 finale, the de-aging on Mark Hamill shows the franchise still has a ways to go before it can match the MCU in this technology. But you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone who cares that much, as it comes along with a Big Damn Heroes scene against a whole platoon of Dark Troopers like many were disappointed we didn't get in the Sequel Trilogy, plus the emotion of Din and Grogu's parting.
- Because of Din's decision to reveal his face to Grogu, the aforementioned parting amounts to the sight of a grown man tearing up as a puppet leaves him. Fortunately, Pedro Pascal's silently solemn performance — only the third time that The Mandalorian has let him show his face — and the heartbreaking music ensure the scene's dignity and pathos.
- Chapter 21 reveals that when the Children of the Watch hold meetings, only the one holding onto the Armorer's hammer can speak. It looks childish for adults in big, strong armor to pass around what viewers now call "the Talking Stick," but it also looks relieving for them to have some means of preventing internal fights.
- Chapter 22's intro features a Romeo and Juliet situation between a squid lady and fish man which is just ridiculous to look at. But if you know the recent bitter racial hatred between their species, it's still a touching moment.
Obi-Wan Kenobi
- Hayden Christensen's Role Reprise as Attack of the Clones-era Anakin in Part V clearly looks much older than he was when playing the role at age 19. Yet many viewers felt that it was worth him returning, especially given how well he plays the character and because Christensen himself still has a rather youthful face despite now being in his forties.
