ST I think that Return of the Jedi's ending is still happy

Some people seem to be arguing that things went bad immediately after ROTJ, and the movie doesn't really bear that out. It seems like they did get quite a few years of relative peace and happiness (Han even tells Leia that "there weren't all bad times, some were actually kind of good" with a smirk on his face). Han and Leia had enough time to get married and have a child, Luke had time to start his new Jedi school and recruit students. They managed to establish a New Republic, and the Empire was reduced to a much smaller and weaker group of die hard fanatics Also the Sith were defeated, Sheev was dead, Anakin dies redeemed, etc.

But, in life, times aren't always good and they're not always bad either. It goes in cycles, and there will always be new trials and tribulations, and there will always be new threats and evils to battle.

So yes, I agree that ROTJ still has a happy ending. It just wasn't destine to last forever.

 

Going from the grand victory celebration in ROTJ to "Luke Skywalker has vanished. In his absence, the sinister First Order has risen from the ashes of the Empire and will not rest until Skywalker, the last Jedi, has been destroyed etc" strengthens that good old serial feel, IMO. The ending of ROTJ is really happy (How could it not be? They've brought down the freakin' Empire!), but as we move on to the next episode, it's like they're saying "Alright; Time for the next adventure!" and to me, that just feels right.
Sure, there's a whole lot of drama inbetween the two episodes, so it is quite a leap, but at the same time, the backstory that we're given has so many similarities with what happened when Palpatine rose to power and Anakin went bad that we're more or less told "So we're at it again". History has repeated itself and going forward, we'll - hopefully - see a different turn of events from last time.

So basically, I feel that ROTJ's ending is as happy as ever. It's still the end of the first story arc. 15 years afterwards, stuff happens that lays the groundwork for the next story arc, but that really is another story for another time - even though it has many links to the past.

 

Grand comments!

 

If they all "lived happily ever after" at the end of ROTJ, there wouldn't have been a need for sequels.

 

Return of the Jedi makes no sense as a title now btw. Luke came back as the first new in the new Jedi order only for it to be taken away in less then thirty years. Should left the Skywalker saga buried in 1983.

They honestly could done the EXACT SAME story and had it all about the new characters. Searching for the last Jedi (not Luke who been dead for hundreds of years), fall of the new Republic, fallen Jedi etc. Would left the Skywalker saga intact and gave us more time to develop the new story.

Darth Derringer

Untrue! They could easily made the story as Mark said taking places hundreds of years later. The opening scrawl could said something "after decades of peace and prosperity, the galaxy is at a dark time..." and went from there. The only reason to really have the legacy characters in it was to get people excited for Star Wars ASAP! If The Force Awakens was only about the new characters, it would sold a lot less tickets. It's also would left the foundation much better going forward.