It's Ahch-To-Ber!

The most wonderful time of the year

This month is a busy time for Pam, as her podcast is back for Season Six, the veil is thinning, and Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups are shaped like pumpkins.

While we’re in a celebratory mood around here, I’ve decided to embrace the sheer power of rhyme and declare this Ahch-To-Ber! on Ahch-To Baby.

This month I plan on celebrating all things Ahch-To, from the movies that introduced it, to the dramatic moments it hosts, to the themes it illustrates.

Skellig Michael provided Star Wars with a setting evocative of the mysteries of the Force itself. It’s a location that would not feel out of place in the mistiness of John Boorman’s Excalibur. It’s a location that symbolizes how Star Wars has evolved since it first debuted in 1977.

When I watched The Force Awakens for the first time, the final scene made me cry. The John Williams music, the unexplained structures, the scale, the young knight holding out the old master’s sword, the cliffhanger…I levitated out of the theater.

Ahch-To is Star Wars in the mode of high fantasy. Sure, Star Wars has often been described as space-fantasy or space-opera instead of hard science-fiction, but Ahch-To is the planet that made that subtext into unmistakable text.

I look forward to staring into the mirror cave with all of you, of discussing the sacred Jedi texts, and sharing a green milk from a Thala-siren. We’ll talk about what it means that Ahch-To doesn’t have a name on screen, and talk about the Caretakers, and we’ll be definitely talking about why I love Old Luke Skywalker and The Last Jedi, too.

The only thing I will not write about is lifting rocks.

It’s not about lifting rocks.

(Disclaimer: I might write about lifting rocks.)