On May 25th, 2027, Star Wars will be celebrating 50 years. I wanted to do something to mark the occasion, but I also wanted to feel like I was creating something positive and worthwhile to commemorate this important moment that’s approaching.
Jakku Journal was born to commemorate Star Wars’ historic milestone, as well as explore the following two questions regarding to my relationship to the franchise:
- What do I love about Star Wars?
- What would I say about Star Wars if I wasn’t limited to Twitter formatting restrictions?
I’ve had multiple instances within the past few years where I’ve had friends ask me “why do you love Star Wars?” and I’ve genuinely not been able to give them a simple answer beyond “it makes me happy”. I’m hoping to use this blog as a way to explore what specific reasons Star Wars has continued to keep me hooked for over half my life and further explore those ideas to form a more well rounded answer to that question.
When I initially came up with the idea that eventually became Jakku Journal, I wanted to take a bit of inspiration from Kevin Napzok’s Why We Love Star Wars – a book where he explores 100 reasons why he (and fans holistically) still love Star Wars after all these years. While his book is an inspiration and I highly recommend buying a copy if you haven’t already read it, I’ve made the deliberate choice to not read the book in the past year in order to remove any possibility of accidental plagiarism. That being said, there may be some similar topics we both talk about – there’s some heavy hitting moments you just can’t miss when you’re talking about Star Wars.
Second, I wanted to explore a longer format of sharing my thoughts on Star Wars and specific details I love. I’m no stranger to a Twitter thread, but it takes a bit of whittling down to say what you’re thinking in a concise 280 characters (or splitting it up into multiple 280 character tweets). A blog, while not as accessible as a thread, will allow me to write as much or as little as I feel fit for each topic I’ve chosen.
I’ve also missed my time in college where I had specific reasons to seek out new knowledge and apply that knowledge to topics I found interesting. My film analysis, philosophy, anthropology, and art history classes hopefully set me up well.
I also would like to establish that this project is primarily for myself – though hopefully a few people will enjoy it as well. I’m not attempting to position myself as an expert or authority on anything I choose to write about, Star Wars included. These writings will primarily be reflecting my personal opinions & interpretations and I will cite sources as needed. All thoughts are my own, and you’re more than welcome to disagree (respectfully of course).
Some posts will be good. Some will be bad. Some I will wish I had more time to explore. But either way, I’m excited to go on this journey, counting down to 50 years of stories from a galaxy far, far away….
Jakku Journal 