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Star Wars (etc) X Black Swan Green

Strangely enough, I seem to have drawn a connection between Jason’s dad and Jason himself. This connection, which I briefly mentioned in class, is almost like a Star Wars father/son relationship. We first get a glimpse of something Star Wars like with the dad’s chair, “Dad’s swivelly chair’s a lot like the Millennium Falcon’s laser tower.” (page 4). From just that line, something clicked in me to equate Jason’s dad and Jason with Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker. The first line of connection I drew between the two father/son relationships was the way Jason defies his father by going into his office to sit on the Millennium Falcon chair. The Millennium Falcon is a sign in Star Wars of the good side. For Jason to defy his dad (Darth Vader) almost seems like Jason is defying his dad to become part of the good side (Millenium Falcon) whereas his dad (Darth Vader) is on the Sith/bad side. Another way Jason’s dad reminds me of Darth Vader is the authoritative style of Jason’s dad. Jason’s dad seems to have a lot of authority and say his solution to a problem is the only way to fix the problem. In Star Wars, Darth Vader carries a lot of authority and threatens all of his people/subordinates to come up with a solution that fixes everything. So in my mind, Jason’s dad is the slightly less extreme version of Darth Vader minus the costume and weird breathy voice thing. Also between Jason and Luke Skywalker, Jason has a sister while Luke has a girl twin!! Although Leia (girl twin) and Jason’s sister are vastly different in their age scheme, I feel like they too can be compared to one another. Jason’s sister Julia can apparently get away with a lot of crap she pulls with her parents by being speaking her mind and honestly, being a strong woman. Leia is the same. In Star Wars, Leia always speaks her mind and comes across as being very independent, hella strong, and badass woman. So once again, Julia is the slightly less extreme version of Princess Leia. This connection makes sense in my head and I hope I wrote the majority of the whole Star Wars connection in this post.

Besides the Star Wars connection that I fabricated in my head and tried to convey, there are other themes of fantasy/science fiction type movies/books that can be also connected to BlackSwanGreen. One connection that stood out to me a lot was the appearance of Cerberus. Someone said in my class that the trio of Doberman dogs reminded her of the greek mythology pet of Hades, the god of death and afterlife. Being someone who especially enjoys greek mythology, this connection seemed the perfect fit. The Doberman dog's owner had the evil taking of Hades, someone who is not afraid of being evil and enjoys being feared of. I think the connection seemed absolutely perfect in that the owner wanted to seem feared with his trio of dogs by setting them loose on Jason, something Hades would very much do. Also the fact that the owner has three dogs correctly resembles Cerberus, the three headed dog.

Another connection between BlackSwanGreen and the mythical/fantasy theme appeared during Jason's home alone day. During this home alone day, there seemed to be many rites of passage. Mr. Mitchell said something about the rites of passage and the friendship with Dean resembling Middle Earth in J.R.R. Tolkien's legendarium. It's amusing because the Middle Earth concept can also be connected to Norse mythology, which is often compared to Greek mythology for having some of the same type of gods. Overall, I find the connections to the book and mythologies and the connections between the mythologies to be amusing and hilarious.

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