By Ciera Terry
When I first sat down and started “Star Wars” on Dec 22, 2024, I had no idea what I was in for. The thing is every couple of months I sit down for a very long and excruciating time to install my braids.
To pass the time, I often put on some movies or binge a series just for some background noise. I usually want something casual that doesn’t really grab my attention.
I had already watched a movie when I saw “Star Wars” on Disney +. I just raised my eyebrow and tilted my head a bit. The movie was long, and it was about to take me a couple more hours to finish my hair so I thought, what’s the harm?
When the movie started, I felt out of place. This was a whole other world I was stepping into – at the time I didn’t understand excellence just yet – “Star Wars” had played for about five minutes before I slowly paused it. I just sat in silence for a second and quietly looked around my room thinking “Am I really gonna watch this?”
Unfortunately, I did not start it again because I was overwhelmed with anticipation; truthfully I only started again because it was my partner’s favorite. I hesitated even texting them because I didn’t want to get their hopes up. The thing is I had nothing against “Star Wars,” I just simply had no interest in it.
The most I knew about it at the time was the iconic “Luke I am your father” scene, but ironically, the only reason why I knew it existed was because of “Toy Story.” I admit for a long time I was uncultured.
But with the courage of love and devoted loyalty. I continued the movie.
For the next 72 hours of my life nothing mattered but the TV and my remote. “Star Wars” was my air. It was my water, I lived it and breathed it.
I’m not sure I can explain the feelings that took over me but I’m sure anyone that’s a fan is aware of it. I was truly in shock and lowkey felt like I was possessed. I had to remind myself to go eat food because I was so determined to finish it all in one go and that was just for the original series…I hadn’t started the prequels yet.
I began Anakin Skywalker’s journey.
There were tears, laughter, unimaginable horrors – There was a lot of that last one.
When I started the last movie, “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith,” my friends from Norman ended up face-timed in the midst of it. I desperately wanted to decline and explain I had other businesses to attend to but ultimately I didn’t have the heart to do so.
After the call ended, I simply just restated the whole movie and watched it again!
When I finally finished, I was in a pit of wonder and utter confusion on why I had never watched it before. I began this journey during Christmas break so when I went home, I told my uncle Daren (a “Star Wars” fanatic) that I had watched it, I don’t think I had ever shocked this man more in my whole lifetime.
He probably stared at me in disbelief for like 10 whole minutes. He kept asking “did you really watch all of them?” By the end of the night he had asked me that five times in total. I don’t think he believed he had successfully spread the Star Wars agenda throughout the family.
Even though I had only been a fan for a couple of days, when I heard my aunt and mother had only watched the first one, I was in disbelief. I had the heart of someone who had been a fan for years at this point and no one could tell me differently.
This showed up in many ways. I visited my friend in Norman and immediately sat her down and told her we were watching “Star Wars.” I didn’t have to do much convincing myself, she had already planned to watch it a couple times but never got to it.. So there I began the journey of spreading the agenda myself, it was an honor to fulfill my duties.
My other duty as a newly established “Star Wars” fan was to correct my family on the whole “Baby Yoda” business.
Me and my aunt were in the party section in Walmart when my aunt inaccurately named Grogu as Baby Yoda. The smile I wore dropped so fast, I just shook my head at her and sighed in disappointment.
When I pressed play on that fateful day, I didn’t realize how serious watching the “Star Wars” franchise was going to become to me and I wouldn’t change it for the world.