Freddie Prinze Jr. Says Toxic ‘Star Wars’ Fans Don’t Understand The Force: “You’re Just Mad The Franchise Isn’t Aging With You”
’90s heartthrob andStar Wars Rebelsvoice actorFreddie Prinze Jr. has heard the complaints about the franchise from certain corners of the fandom, and he’s sick of them. On a podcast appearance from earlier this year that’s now making the rounds online, Prinze absolutelygoes offon toxicStar Warsfans, dropping knowledge about the saga he learned directly fromDave Filoni, the protegeGeorge Lucasprotege andRebelscreator himself. Check out his F-bomb-laded rant below.
Freddie Prinze Jr. Star Wars Rant
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Prinze actually made this appearance onJeff Dye’s Friendship Podcastback in May of this year, but we’re just hearing about it now thanks to the folks atScreenRant, who noticed when the @allthingscomedy Instagram feed isolated theStar Wars-related clip from the larger conversation.
“Look dog, you’re just mad the franchise isn’t aging with you,” Prinze says, “but that ain’t how it works…you’re just pissed off that Han Solo gave the f***ing Millennium Falcon to a girl.” While that boiled-down assessment unquestionably applies to the most blatantly awful subset of the franchise’s fandom, there are plenty of fans who have what they view as legitimate grievances with the way the franchise has evolved over the past few years. But Prinze has some words for them, too, pointing at video games as the culprit:
“I know more about the Force than most people, because Dave Filoni taught me, and George Lucas taught him. And all these video games have f***ed people up on what the Force is. Luke’s skill doesn’t dictate whether he wins or loses,” Prinze says, indirectly addressing the “Mary Sue” complaints that surfaced in the wake ofStar Wars: The Force Awakens. “The Emperor doesn’t dictate whether he wins or loses. The Force dictates who wins or loses based on balance.”
Even putting extreme cases of obvious sexism aside, I think there are a lot of fans who still can’t come to grips with the idea that Daisy Ridley’s Rey is preternaturally gifted when it comes to the Force, and it’s such a huge issue for them that they seem to have drawn a line in the sand and can’t properly engage with the new movies because of it. I admittedly hadn’t really consideredStar Warsvideo games as a significant potential cause for that disconnect, but it makes sense: video games are all about incremental power gains, and if Rey doesn’t take a path that gamers view as “difficult enough” for her to warrant her access to higher control of the Force, then maybe that’s part of where this resentment about the franchise is coming from.
But as Prinze makes clear here, “you don’t get to level up in theStar Warsworld.” And while I don’t necessarily think he’s going to change anyone’s mind here – not sure if you’ve noticed, but people are pretty entrenched these days – it’s still amusing to hear someone closely associated with the franchise drop truth bombs (and F-bombs) for three straight minutes.
