When should a Jedi act?

The fourth episode of Visions was created by studio Kinema Citrus. The story is quite sweet – featuring a village terrorised by bandits and old fashioned droid robots last seen in the Clone Wars.

A visiting, and in hiding, Jedi together with her companion attend a wedding feast laced with poignancy because the bride is to become a captive of the bandits in the morning – her status as hostage to ensure the village don’t try to fight back.

Not everyone is taking it laying down though and the village plots their resistance even while the Jedi and her companion discuss why she refuses to help.

It’s a complex and subtle story, hinting at much more going on beneath the surface –a lost master, a lost home, fear of discovery and compassion for those in need.

All of these themes are bound up in the sensation of memory, which comes and weighs on all the decisions the characters make, as if Proust was hovering in the background when they wrote the script.

The ending here is not one of surprises – the Jedi is moved to help and the village is freed from their tormentors, yet it feels like the real triumph here is the freedom the Jedi feels after she acts. She arrived wearing a mask but by the end the mask is gone and her face is once more set forward, presented to the world for all to see.

Our Jedi remembers that despite the risks, the terror which could await her for daring to be herself, in being herself she lifts others up and gives them hope. As a coming out story it is a lovely little allegory for the courage required to be who we are when being true to ourselves is likely to come with pain and suffering.

Rating? 7 exploding helmets out of 10.

Stewart Hotston