Not so long ago, in a town one state away, my brothers and I grew up on Star Wars. It was one of the few things on which the three of us agreed as awesome. I was several versions of Leia for Halloween over the years (and R2D2 once when I was quite small). I remember the Christmas my older brother got the Millennium Falcon--his wonder and amazement at his new toy must have been like a a trip to Mecca or the Vatican for some. My mom would put the story records on at bed time and I'm pretty sure I always fell asleep before Vader captured Leia, but I think more of the story sunk into my dreaming brain.
Leia was the only princess I ever wanted to be. She was smart, pretty, and brave. She shot a gun, just like any other Rebel and I thought she was so cool for that. The girl with the big castle waiting for the prince to come save her or rescue her to his castle never resonated with me. Her special man friend, Han Solo, did resonate with me. Han was my first crush. He was so cute and well, different. He wasn't lock step with anyone, he did his own thing, which made much more sense in what my child's mind thought of as a good rebel. He said things like, "I take orders from just one person: me." He hung out with the bad guys, but he wasn't a bad guy. And there was something sort of fun about the way Leia and he acted like they hated each other, but we all knew they really liked each other. Han would have definitely pulled Leia's braids and teased her if they were in school together. But the other thing my child's brain latched on to was the idea that Han was sort of a lost guy who just needed Leia to save him. He needed to love her to make him see what was important. He needed Leia to save him from the life of smuggling and give him a reason to join the Rebellion and have purpose for himself.
As you're probably guessing, this storyline had a fairly profound effect on me. I call it my Han Solo Syndrome. It's slightly fueled by my Anne Frank quality, where I try to find something good in everyone (even Hitler LOVED his dog, Genghis Khan was tolerant of different religions), but I also think Leia being the rescuer instead of the rescued was huge. (Star Wars nerds--not interested in an argument about Obi Wan being her only hope and needing to be rescued from the Death Star. I'm going macro-level on IV-VI here.) Not a lot of strong women in the fairy tale-type stories, especially when a beloved was involved.
It was the perfect storm of the woman I wanted to be and the man I wanted to love.
It just isn't such a great blue print for today, in this galaxy.
The thing about our world is that our Hans don't get encased in carbonite. Our Hans get encased in far more sinister things like booze, powders, pills, gambling, and mental illness. Measured against the likes of those real-world issues, rounding up a group of friends to plan an escape from an obese, desert gangster sounds pretty feasible.
We can't save our Hans here. Maybe things just work out better in other galaxies far, far away.
