'Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - The Radio Drama' Episode Review: 'So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel'

(C) 1997 HighBridge Audio and Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL) 

So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel

Cast

• Luke Skywalker (Joshua Fardon) 
• Emperor Palpatine (Paul Hecht)
• Lord Darth Vader (Brock Peters)
• Han Solo (Perry King)
• See-Threepio (Anthony Daniels)
• Princess Leia Organa (Ann Sachs)
• Imperial Commander
• Imperial Scout #1
• Imperial Scout #2
• Major Derlin (Tom Virtue)
• Narrator: Ken Hiller

Sound / FX Roles

• Artoo-Detoo
• Chewbacca
• Ewoks
• Teebo
• Vine Ewok
• Logray
• Cub Ewok
• Wicket 
• Paploo

Reviewer's Note:

All quoted material is from the 1996 Del Rey book Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - The National Public Radio Dramatization.  This edition contains Brian Daley's complete radio play, which differs slightly from the version of the Radio Drama which aired on National Public Radio in 1996 and the original 1990s HighBridge Audio cassette and compact disc editions. The version in Daley's script was recorded, but as with the original 1981 Star Wars Radio Drama and its 1983 sequel, Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back – The Radio Drama, edits were made at the request of NPR due to the needs of the radio format. The longer version of this episode is available in HighBridge Audio's more expensive Limited Edition CD collection of Star Wars: The Complete Radio Drama Trilogy.

Announcer: OPENING CREDITS

Music: Opening theme.

Narrator: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away there came a time of revolution, when Rebels united to challenge a tyrannical Empire. After decades of conflict and war, the vast conflict is about to play itself to a conclusion on and around the idyllic forest moon of the planet Endor. The Rebels' makeshift armada is on its way to attack the Empire's new Death Star, but its success depends on a fearless expeditionary force far below on the forest moon, which is struggling to deactivate the defensive shield protecting the battle station. But their plans are not as secret as they would wish. The Rebels' every move has been foreseen by their greatest adversary, the Emperor Palpatine. Now, waiting in his throne room. he looks to the servant, and the conquest, that will gain him more power than any mere military victory could provide.

SCENE 5-1  EMPEROR'S THRONE ROOM ON DEATH STAR

Sound: A heavy, powered chamber door slides open.

Emperor: (TO OFF) Enter. Enter, my friend.

Sound: Vader's breathing apparatus and measured footsteps move on.

Emperor: It is always good to see my strong right arm.

Vader: Thank you, my master. I bow before you in obedience.

Emperor: Obedience, you say. Yet, I told you to remain aboard the command ship, to carry out my orders. 

Vader: A small Rebel infiltration force has penetrated our energy shields and landed on the Sanctuary Moon of Endor.

Emperor: I am aware of it.

Vader: My son is with them.

Emperor: Are you certain?

Vader: I have felt him, my master.

Emperor: Strange, that I have not. I wonder if your feelings in this matter are clear, Lord Vader.

Vader: They are clear, my master. But I sense that Skywalker has grown strong in the Force.

Emperor: That is of no significance to me. Go to the Sanctuary Moon and wait for him. When he comes, bring him here before me. 

Vader: As you wish, my master.

Emperor: Even so. And here, I shall either make Skywalker my own or I shall destroy him.

"Lord Vader, we've brought a Rebel who surrendered to us at the forest perimeter. He was armed only with this lightsaber."  Concept painting by Ralph McQuarrie. (C) 1983 Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL)

So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel is the fifth and penultimate chapter of Brian Daley's Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - The Radio Drama. Produced by HighBridge Audio for National Public Radio, this 1996 series is based on characters and situations created by George Lucas, and on the screenplay by Lucas and Lawrence Kasdan (Raiders of the Lost Ark, Star Wars - Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back).

So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel begins aboard the Empire's new Death Star with a conversation between Emperor Palpatine (Paul Hecht) and his most feared agent, Lord Darth Vader (Brock Peters). Vader has learned that a Rebel force has gotten past the Imperial defenses around the Sanctuary Moon and landed near the Imperial shield generator on its surface. Defying Palpatine's direct orders to remain aboard his Super Star Destroyer Executor, Vader informs his master that Luke Skywalker (Joshua Fardon) is one of the Rebel strike team's members. 

Palpatine is not surprised that the Rebels are attempting to destroy the shield generator; he has, as the excerpt from So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel shows, foreseen it. However, the greatest practitioner of the Dark Side of the Force in recent memory is troubled by the fact that he has not sensed Luke's presence, while Vader, the former Anakin Skywalker, can. 

Although Palpatine tries to act as though he has total control of the situation, the fact that he detects ambiguity in Vader's motives clearly unsettles him. Otherwise, why does he say this?

Strange, that I have not. I wonder if your feelings in this matter are clear, Lord Vader.

Meanwhile, back on the Sanctuary Moon, the object of Palpatine and Vader's attention, Luke Skywalker, and his Rebel companions have their own pressing concerns. Princess Leia Organa (Ann Sachs) is missing after a fiery confrontation with Imperial speeder bike scouts near the Empire's heavily guarded base. Now Luke, Han Solo (Perry King), Chewbacca, See-Threepio (Anthony Daniels), and Artoo-Detoo are in the same Endor glade where Leia met Wicket the Ewok in Pattern and Web. 

 SCENE 5-2  ENDOR FOREST

Sound: The same woodland clearing in which Leia fought for her life and met Wicket. Animal calls. "Bird" song, branches creaking in the breeze, and leaves rustling, etc. Sound of droids' servos, twigs cracking, and duff gritting underfoot, etc., as the Rebels search the area. 

Han: (TO OFF) Luke! Luke, get over here!

Luke: (MOVING ON) What is it, Han? Did you find Leia?

Threepio: Oh, Master Luke, if only we had.

Han: No, but her speeder's behind that tree, totaled.

Luke: There's two more wrecked speeders back there. And I found her helmet.

Han: Leia must still be alive. It's the only explanation. 

Threepio: I'm afraid that Artoo's sensors can find no trace of the princess in this vicinity. 

Artoo: PIPES SADLY.

Luke: What about Chewie? Can't he track her?

Chewbacca: VENTS HIS FRUSTRATION, OFF, TRYING TO PICK UP HER TRAIL.

Han: He says something else has been here. Something besides stormtroopers. Whatever it was, it left no tracks when it moved on, and Chewie thinks it covered Leia's, too.

Threepio; Oh, dear. You mean, something is stalking the princess?

Luke: That doesn't make sense. Why would [ - "a predator or a hunter bother to cover Leia's tracks?"]

Chewbacca: HALLOOS, OFF,  TO TELL THEM HE'S ON TO SOMETHING.

Han: (TO OFF) What? Chewie, what?

Luke: Let's go see.

Sound: The two men and the two droids moving through the undergrowth, etc., under next.

Han: (INDICATING MAKING HIS WAY THROUGH THE BUSH) He says he's picked up a scent. Over here.

Luke: (NEGOTIATING THROUGH BRACKEN) He's right, there's something over there.

Chewbacca: TRUMPETS HIS SUCCESS.

Luke: I think he's found it.

Han: (INDICATES HE'S EMERGED FROM THE SCRUB) What the - Hey. what's that thing? I don't get it.

Threepio: It appears to be an animal carcass hung from a wooden pole.

Artoo: HAZARDS A GUESS.

Threepio: Someone's lunch? If it is, it doesn't say much for their appreciation of the fine dining experience.

Chewbacca: SNUFFLES AT THE CARCASS, THEN VOICES A QUESTION TO HAN.

Han: Naw, I don't wanna taste it.

Luke: (SENSING SOMETHING'S WRONG) Chewbacca, step away from it. 

Chewbacca: GROWLS TRUCULENTLY.

Luke: No, don't touch it. Chewie, wait! Do-oon't! (REACTS TO THE TRAP BEING SPRUNG)

Sound: A crude wooden trigger mechanism is tripped, releasing ropes of twisted grass that whip through the air, then twang as they come under tension. The net trap concealed under the forest floor mulch is yanked up, catching them all. Heavier cable sings and saws against the limb above as the net's hauled into the air by a deadweight, under next. Smaller twigs and branches, either broken off or shaken loose from the snare, fall to the ground. Sequence ends with the "purse string" rope creaking and rubbing against the limb, as the net swings like a lazy pendulum.

Han: It's a trap! (REACTS TO BEING BAGGED AND HOISTED)

Threepio: (REACTS) Oh-hh!

Artoo: BEEPS IN DISTRESS.

Han: (INDICATES STRAIN OF HANGING IN THE BAG, PRESSED UP AGAINST THE OTHERS, UNABLE TO STRUGGLE MUCH, AND THAT, INEFFECTIVELY) Nice work, Chewie! You got us snared in a net trap!

Threepio: One would suppose a two-hundred-year-old Wookiee to have learned a measure of self-restraint. 

Chewbacca: BELATEDLY, ABJECTLY SORRY. 

Han: Great! Always thinking with your stomach! 

Production painting by Ralph McQuarrie. (C) 1983 Lucasfilm Ltd. (LFL)

As in the 1983 film directed by the late Richard Marquand, our quintet of Rebels (two human males, two droids, and a Wookiee) find themselves captives of the Ewoks, sentient teddy bear-like denizens of the Forest Moon who are fiercer than their cute appearance lets on. Unimpressed by Chewie's roars or Han's wisecracks, the Ewoks bow and chant reverently in the presence of See-Threepio, the golden protocol droid that they believe is one of their gods. 

In So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel, adapter Brian Daley, director John Madden, producer/post-production maven Tom Voegeli, and the Radio Drama's cast recreate these scenes from Return of the Jedi: 

• The trek through the Endor forest, with Luke, Han, Chewie, and Artoo treated as prisoners while Threepio is carried in a throne-like sedan carried by worshipful Ewoks
• Our heroes' narrow escape from being spit-roasted over open fires in a banquet to honor Threepio, and the reunion with Princess Leia
• Luke tells Leia the truth about their shared family history and of his belief that he can bring Darth Vader back from the grip of the Dark Side
• Luke's fateful conversation with Vader at the landing platform of the Imperial base on Endor
• The arrival of a captive Luke Skywalker aboard the unfinished second Death Star, and his first confrontation with the evil Emperor
• Han leads the first attack on the Imperial shield generator's bunker

 My Take

With a running time of just over three hours, Star Wars: Return of the Jedi is the briefest of the three Radio Dramas that aired on National Public Radio between 1981 and 1996. There are several reasons for this, including the fact that producer Tom Voegeli, director John Madden, and the production team  had a smaller budget to work  with to make the series. Originally, the Jedi radio adaptation was slated for production in late 1983 or early 1984, but Reagan era Congressional cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (which runs the Public Broadcasting System television network as well as National Public Radio) put those plans on hold...for 13 years! 

Chances are that if HighBridge Audio (which is now a division of Recorded Books), a Minnesota recording company which manufactured and sold tapes and compact discs of various NPR shows, including the first two Star Wars radio dramas, had not decided to fund the Jedi series, it would not have been produced 

Another reason, I think, for the brevity of Return of the Jedi in comparison to its two precursors was Brian Daley's poor health. In 1996, the 47-year-old novelist was ill; he had been fighting cancer for some time and the news from his doctors was not good; the disease was terminal. He turned in the six scripts in the nick of time; Brian Daley died on the same day that the actors completed the recording sessions at LA Theater Works in California. 

Even knowing that a second writer, John Whitman, was brought in to make some adjustments to add a few details from such Legends works as Steve Perry's Shadows of the Empire and Timothy Zahn's Heir to the Empire, it is not an exaggeration to say that So Turns a Galaxy, So Turns a Wheel shows what good storytelling and fine writing can accomplish. Daley cleverly found a way to take an already familiar tale told in another, more visual medium and still make it interesting and suspenseful.

Of course, Daley did not achieve this goal alone. Director Madden, who returned for a third Star Wars radio drama, got outstanding performances from Radio Drama veterans Ann Sachs, Brock Peters, Paul Hecht, Perry King, and, of course, Anthony Daniels, who reprised his iconic role of the always-nervous protocol droid See-Threepio from the Star Wars films.

In addition, Madden was able to get playwright/singer/actor Joshua Fardon to step into the role of Luke Skywalker as a replacement for Mark Hamill, who was unavailable for a third go-around as the Radio Dramas' Jedi hero. 

As in the previous NPR-produced Star Wars radio adaptations, Lucasfilm Ltd. collaborated in the creation of Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - The Radio Drama. The company not only granted the producers at HighBridge and Tom Voegeli Productions the license rights, but it provided Ben Burtt's library of sound effects and John Williams' 1983 score from Episode VI. This would mark the final appearance of Williams' original "Ewok Celebration and End Titles" track in a Lucasfilm-sanctioned work; in 1997, the Special Edition re-release of Return of the Jedi would feature a new track titled "Victory Celebration and End Titles" composed by Maestro Williams for the "definitive" version of the Classic Trilogy's final chapter. 

As HighBridge Audio's publicist writes in the booklet that comes with each Star Wars: Return of the Jedi - The Radio Drama CD set: 

Like its radio predecessors, Return of the Jedi is a remarkable fable for the mind's eye - a spellbinding story of heroes and villains, good and evil, temptation and redemption, all played out in a shimmering, almost palpable, universe of sound.