What the Hell Is It About ‘Star Wars’ That Makes Us All Crazy?

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“Star Wars” is a strange phenomenon that turns everyone into toxic nerds with an unhealthy obsession.

“Star Wars” occupies a fairly unique place in our culture: it may be the only thing in pop culture that almost all of us generally like.

While it’s impossible for anything to be truly universal — there’s always going to be the odd person who has never seen any of the movies — “Star Wars” I think serves as the collective cultural touchstone for us. It’s the one thing that kinda gives us all a good feeling when we think about it. That phenomenon crosses pretty much every boundary — age, political affiliation, other general interests don’t matter. We all are pretty much just into “Star Wars.” It’s like some kind of safe space for us as a society. “Star Wars” is home. It’s a part of us and it will never let us down even while it’s constantly doing just that. It also makes us crazy.

I think maybe at this point liking “Star Wars” is such a subconsciously exhausting endeavor that we’ve simply given up on worrying about whether these movies are actually good. Things may be improving somewhat — even though last year’s “Rogue One” got very positive reviews, people seemed more willing to complain about it or outright dislike it. The standard unbridled enthusiasm wasn’t there, and neither was the general reflexive compulsion to defend it when it would be criticized. I don’t think we have a capacity for apathy toward “Star Wars,” though. If we ever stop feeling incredibly generous toward the franchise it’ll be because we all decide to hate the thing. It’ll be a complete heel turn, not a gradual change.

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