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The Prequel Feminism: Part 2 - Page 3

© Paul F. McDonald

The symbolism is already there with Padme, and the scene where she is manuevering between giant machines in the droid factory is a perfect representation of it. When she is trapped on a conveyor belt, this is about what Imperial thinking wants as a whole - to reduce biological beings to automatons on an assembly line. Of course, this also serves to show that Padme is a capable action hero, and as she runs the gauntlet, the machines are almost certainly metaphoric of the "clashing rocks" classical heroes must go through in Greek mythology. She does quite well in the massive arena battle too, and the fact that she picks her own lock before she is to be executed is the most prominent example of her status as a truly liberated woman.

The film ends with her marrying Anakin, with the droids C-3PO and R2-D2 standing in as witnesses. Some have questioned why she did not keep her pledge of love from him before they went out into the arena, particularly after his confession to her regarding his slaughter of the Tusken Raiders who killed his mother. The answer gets to what all this is about, for it brings us back to those traditional feminine virtues that are often lost, particularly in the feminism of today. Contrary to its origins, it seems to be strictly mimetic in quality now, concerned only with the world of economics and achievement.

It is very fitting that the young Anakin in The Phantom Menace innocently asks if Padme is an "angel." It seems she does play the role of saving angel for him after his confession, a role her son Luke Skywalker will assume in Return of the Jedi. The reason Padme is still able to love Anakin is because of compassion, a very important theme in the saga, though often difficult to understand. Anakin defines it as "unconditional love," and that is exactly what he himself receives.

Martin Luther, the driving force behind the Protestant Reformation, once had some interesting advice - "sin bravely." It might sound strange, but the reasoning behind it was that the more one sinned, the more humanity tapped into God's inexhaustible and ever-expanding grace. This is the real crux of the matter when it comes to Anakin. In the end, Padme's love for him can only be compared to the bodhisattva who is depicted as having an ambrosia of compassion that drips all the way from his fingertips to the depths of the underworld, or that moment when Dante realizes in "The Divine Comedy" that the very fires of hell are really misunderstood aspects of God's love.

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