Breaking the Cycle: How Star Wars: The Force Unleashed Imagines a New Masculinity for Force Users

Star Wars, as a series, has always had a fraught relationship with masculinity. It’s apparent just in the basic fact that most of the notable characters are men. Both organizations associated with the Force, the Jedi and the Sith, largely push men to the forefront and adhere to two different traditional masculinities. The Jedi are emotionless and logical, while the Sith are brutal and consumed by rage. The way the Force is perceived by these orders ultimately reveals the toxicity of both, as seen in both the CGI Clone Wars series, and The Force Unleashed. Clone Wars sets up the dichotomy between the Light and Dark sides of the Force as being equally toxic through the lens of Anakin Skywalker’s demise, while The Force Unleashed uses his secret apprentice, Starkiller, to prove that moving away from the both the Jedi and the Sith is the way to achieve a masculinity that can love and aspires to restoration, even if it doesn’t quite succeed. 

The Light side of the Force and the Dark side each clearly represent the two kinds of masculinity that are generally accepted as the norm in Western culture. The Dark side is violent, fueled by anger, and only sees emotions that can be used to cause harm as valuable. The Light side, meanwhile is the masculinity that many have come to see as ideal- the one that values logic above all else, that will turn a blind eye to suffering to not stir the boat and will deny any and all emotion until it kills them. 

Clone Wars gives us direct insight into this by means of Anakin Skywalker’s time leading up to his fall. The prequel trilogy leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to his characterization and eventual pivot to child murdering fascist, and the show does its best to make the most of that timeframe while still having to tie back into the OG films. Anakin is an intensely emotional person, who forms deep attachments to the people he cares about- the exact opposite of what he’s supposed to do as a Jedi. As a man of the Light side, he is supposed to be detached, and make his decisions based on logic and reason. Anakin is the perfect example of why that sort of thinking is dangerous. 

Because he is never taught how to actually deal with his emotions in a healthy way, Anakin ends up spiraling into the worst parts of himself, cementing his status as a violent militarist who lacks empathy or desire for anything other than power. Now to be clear, Anakin was always a violent militarist. He sees the world in black and white, which is what made his training in the Jedi Order even riskier. Because his perception is in absolutes, and he never learned to process emotions or even acknowledge them publicly, Anakin is unable to accept that the person he wants so desperately to be inherently does not fit with the man he is expected to become. A husband, a father, a friend… these are all roles Anakin wants for himself, but the ideal he was raised to uphold expressly forbids them. The Jedi reject attachment, which is an inherent rejection of human connection broadly, but particularly of connection with women. This high-minded masculinity rejects the femininity of being emotive, and pushes away Anakin’s opportunities to be influenced by the women around him. Each is instead taken from him, one by one, and the masculinity he idealizes tells him over and over that this pain and loss is for the best. 

When the differences between what Anakin wants, and what is expected of him finally become irreconcilable, of course the result is explosive in the worst possible way. Anakin only sees in absolutes, so for his desires to be so out of line with what he was taught to emulate, that can only mean that he himself must be bad. That, or the Jedi Order must be completely wrong. With no outlet for his repressed feelings, Anakin’s turn to the Dark side is unsurprising. One form of toxicity mutates into another. Anakin replicates Palpatine’s behavior because what else would he do? He was never given a chance to unlearn his authoritarian sensibilities, and the only feelings he knows how to cope with in any way are rage and pain. It’s because of this though, that his no-longer-canon apprentice, Starkiller, is given the chance to form a masculinity all his own. 

At the start of The Force Unleashed, Starkiller is firmly planted in the Dark side’s view of what a man should be- he is strong, stark, and violent,ready to prove himself deadly enough to help his master strike the Emperor down once and for all. This remains the case until the game’s twist, where Palpatine reveals his knowledge of Starkiller’s existence and orders Vader to end it. Starkiller dies, is resurrected by Vader, and sent out to stir up a rebellion against the empire to keep Palpatine distracted. 

By tossing Starkiller away, Vader unwittingly opened the path to a new form of manhood for him. Feeling betrayed by the Dark side, the only person Starkiller has that he cares for and trusts is his pilot, Juno. Through their time hunting Jedi together, they’ve developed a bond that is of course romantic because this is a game from 2008. While the trope of a woman being the key to a man’s emotional growth is tired and ridiculous, I do think it has an interesting reading when it comes to The Force Unleashed. 

At the game’s end, Starkiller has been seemingly killed. At his funeral, General Kota⁠—the first Jedi Starkiller hunted who later became his new teacher⁠—reveals to Juno that the reason he helped them despite knowing who Starkiller was the whole time was because he could always sense a light in him, despite being surrounded by such darkness. The light was his love for Juno. 

Now, on the surface this is a weak, sexist take, I’m not denying that, but it caught my attention in the context of this world. Before the final mission, Starkiller calls himself a Jedi, implying that he is one because he’s never not been a Sith before, and he equates not-Sith with Jedi. But in reality, he’s not. Kota has taken him under his wing, but the former General’s connection to the Force was severed, and the Order he once served was obliterated⁠—in part by the very man he’s taken on as a student. Despite being portrayed as someone who remained loyal to the Order, it becomes apparent that Kota’s experiences have softened his commitment to the Jedi Code. 

Attachments were not allowed, let alone encouraged, during the prequel-era Jedi days. Kota would be fully aware of that, and yet he reveals that such an attachment was the only thing anchoring Starkiller towards the Light. Instead of asking his new student to bury those feelings away, they’re encouraged. Starkiller caring about Juno is a good thing because it proves he’s still capable of caring about someone other than himself. And beyond that, his feelings of betrayal at the hands of his master, and guilt over what he’s done up to this point are useful as well. It’s okay for him to be angry at Vader for all the abuse and manipulation, and it’s okay for him to be angry at himself, because he has a positive outlet for it. 

This is a Star Wars property, so of course, Starkiller’s redemption arc has little to no textual nuance to it. He gets the chance to lead a rebellion with bad intentions, then pivots and helps the Rebel Alliance we see in the OG trilogy form. But more broadly, this is suggesting that there is room for a new kind of masculinity in this world, one that can have a violent past but that is given room to embrace emotions and attachments instead of pushing them away. It’s a pitch for restorative justice, an opportunity to accept mistakes and harm from your past and do work to try and fix things as best you can. 

It’s not given enough time or depth to really hit the message home hard, but after watching Clone Wars start to finish, the idea of Anakin falling into the trap of his own toxicity but opening a way for the boy he trained to become a different kind of man was compelling. By being freed of both the Sith and the Jedi, Starkiller can be the kind of man it seemed Anakin always wanted to be: a partner, a friend, a leader. This is cut short, because of course Starkiller has to pay the ultimate price for what he’s done, but the importance of his freedom from the battle between the restrictive manhood of the Jedi and the violent and rage fueled masculinity of the Sith remains clear even in death. Canon is only as important as you let it be, but it is disappointing that this breaking of the cycle has been removed from the Star Wars universe. The franchise can use all the diverse looks at masculinity it can get.