Q&As About Star Wars: Who messed up Jake Lloyd's life? George Lucas? Jake Lloyd? The Media?

Jake Lloyd as Anakin Skywalker. Photo Credit: Lucasfilm Ltd. via Daily Mail

On Quora, "Anonymous" Asks: 

Did George Lucas ever feel guilty for messing up Jake Lloyd’s life or is Jake himself to blame for screwing up himself? Or is the general media the main reason that Jake’s childhood was ruined?

My Reply

This question, by far, wins the prize for Disingenuous Query of the Month.

George Lucas is a producer, screenwriter, director, and entrepreneur who used to own one of the most famous production companies in the industry, Lucasfilm Limited. I know people who have met him in person, and by all accounts, he’s a smart, talented, generous, and warm-hearted man. He has several kids that he raised, for the most part, on his own. So the last thing in the world that George Lucas would do is “mess up” any actor’s life, much less a juvenile actor such as Jake Lloyd.

The only “sin” Lucas committed was to write and direct the three films of the Prequel Trilogy that failed to meet many fans’ expectations. In my opinion, The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith are lesser films than the Original Trilogy, but they aren’t so bad that no one will like them. And it was sheer bad luck that Jake Lloyd was caught in the merciless bashing handed so casually online by fans who were pissed that Lucas had not made the Prequels to their liking.

Jake Lloyd was already a professional child actor when he signed on - with his parents and agent at his side - to play Anakin Skywalker as a nine-year-old slave on Tatooine. George Lucas didn’t mistreat Jake in any way on set; the kids in the film had a teacher on location and at the studio in London, plus they had parents or guardians around to make sure they got the proper care they needed while working on the movie.

If anything caused Jake Lloyd to crash and burn as an actor it was the bullying he received from kids his own age who may have resented him for being in Star Wars, as well as the ugly, demeaning, and mean-spirited “criticism” from angry fanboys. Those self-appointed gatekeepers of the Star Wars franchise called Lloyd’s character “Mannequin Skywalker” and teased the young boy so relentlessly that he turned his back on acting.

Not only was Jake Lloyd bullied, but he was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia, a serious but treatable mental disorder.

As for blaming the “general media” (whatever that may be), that’s another copout. Sure, many film critics were highly critical of The Phantom Menace in general and of Lloyd’s acting specifically. The film has flaws, and even forgiving viewers like me have to admit that The Phantom Menace is not as good as, say, A New Hope. But actors, like filmmakers, have to live with the reality that although they can please all of the people some of the time and please some of the people all of the time, they can’t please all of the people all of the time, including viewers and critics. Bad reviews. good reviews, mixed reviews…these will all cross your path if you choose moviemaking or acting as your career.

The media isn’t the “message.” It’s the “messenger.” And since the 1990s and early 2000s, the main medium for the delivery of mean, hateful, and soul-killing messages is the Internet.

So if you want to blame anyone for Jake Lloyd’s career tanking, don’t blame George Lucas, or the former actor, or the media. Instead, blame everyone who jumped on the Bash the Prequels bandwagon.