The Lars Homestead
The Lars homestead on the planet Tatooine appears in four of the nine films of the Skywalker Saga. The first three times, its appearance coincides with a loss of home and the deepening disintegration of a family. The fourth time, its appearance coincides with homecoming and the reunification of a family.
In Attack of the Clones, Anakin Skywalker goes to the Lars homestead in search of his mother, Shmi Skywalker. After the Jedi took Anakin away from her in The Phantom Menace, Shmi was freed from slavery by Cliegg Lars, who then married her. But by the time Anakin meets his stepfather, Shmi is missing, captured by Tusken Raiders. Anakin finds her, but only to bring her body back to be buried.
In Revenge of the Sith, Obi-Wan Kenobi brings the newborn Luke Skywalker, Anakin’s son, to the Lars homestead to be raised by Owen Lars, Cliegg’s son, and his wife Beru. But in A New Hope, the homestead is destroyed by the Empire and Owen and Beru are slaughtered. This leads to Obi-Wan taking Luke away from Tatooine. As Luke says, “There’s nothing for me here.”
Across three consecutive films, then, the Lars homestead is a family home that ironically emphasizes a character’s homelessness and lack of family. For Anakin, it is the home that his mother had without him, and it represents his separation from her, first by distance, then by death. For Luke, it is the home he can’t return to, and it represents his separation, not only from the family he knew, but also from the family he should have known: from his father, who turned to the Dark Side; from his mother Padmé Amidala, who died; and from his twin sister Leia, who was taken to another planet to be raised in another home.
But when the Lars homestead reappears in the final scene of the Skywalker Saga, it is to emphasize that a character has found home, and the members of a broken family have been restored to each other. In The Rise of Skywalker, Rey goes to the Lars homestead to deposit Luke and Leia’s lightsabers. She bundles their lightsabers in one cloth, symbolizing a reversal of how the infant Luke and Leia were bundled in separate cloths when they were separated. And she buries their lightsabers in the same ground in which their grandmother is buried, symbolizing a reversal of the separation of mother and child that was the family’s first tragedy. After this the ghosts of Luke and Leia appear and smile approvingly as Rey claims the name of Skywalker as her own. They receive her into their family just as the Lars family once received Shmi and then Luke.
EXPLORE FURTHER…
Characters: Anakin Skywalker / Beru Lars / Cliegg Lars / Leia Organa / Luke Skywalker / Owen Lars / Rey / Shmi Skywalker
Films: Episode II: Attack of the Clones / Episode III: Revenge of the Sith / Episode IV: A New Hope / Episode IX: The Rise of Skywalker
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