Something monumental has happened in my life.  Spouse, an avowed anti-Star Wars individual, accompanied me last Saturday evening to the opening of Rogue One, which I enjoyed very much.  I asked him what he thought afterward.

“It was okay,” he said.  “As a movie, it was awesome.  As a Star Wars thing…meh.”

My response was probably something along the lines of “MEH?”

I will spare the finer details (largely because I have mostly forgotten them at this time), but suffice to say that Jay had no problem telling me that he thought the entire Star Wars franchise was dumb, the special effects were stupid, and it was doubtlessly overrated.  I didn’t get offended, exactly, but I was a little annoyed.  This is probably because I was fairly sure that Jay hadn’t seen any other SW films.  I was half correct.  He has seen Phantom Menace, but he only remembered it because of the pod racing sequence and Jar-Jar.

Cut to this evening.  We typically spend our Thursdays playing board games with our friends Bill and Lissa.  This evening, sadly, Lissa had to work.  So we made alternate plans.  We would hold movie night at Bill’s, so that I could finally see The Force Awakens (yes, I am fairly sure that I am one of the last members of High Nerd society to have not watched it – last year was a bad year for us).  Instead, upon discovering that Jay hadn’t seen, or didn’t remember seeing, Episodes IV-VI, we ended up watching A New Hope.  (This was a plan leftover from last Thursday, but Jay came down with a migraine.)

Here’s the amazing part: Jay liked it.  I think part of him learning to appreciate it came from me leaning over, looking him in the eye and saying “Malcolm Reynolds would never have existed without Han Solo.  Also Chewie is basically a smarter Jayne with a better conscience.”  He has now agreed to watch the other films.  He even said that he would, and I am quoting directly here, “Enjoy that a lot.”  I have proposed having schnapps on hand if we decide to add Episodes I-III to the mix.  Bill seemed amicable to that plan, so who knows.  Drunk Attack of the Clones?  Why not.