The resounding narrative of the Star Wars saga is the age-old fight of good and evil. Throughout the movies, the Rebellion is painted as the epitome of morality and justice while the Empire is the representation of corruption and oppression. However, careful mediation of the movies veils the reality of the Rebel Alliance’s ruthlessness and purposely frames their actions in stark contrast against those of the Empire to make the Rebels’ actions seem morally good. My aim is not to condemn the Rebellion for fighting against an oppressive authoritarian government, but rather to complicate the strict binary of good and evil in the midst of a civil war. Though the Rebellion has become synonymous with the image of good in modern culture, it actually commits violence that is equivalent to, if not more gruesome than, the violence of the Empire, subverting the primary good against evil narrative of the Star Wars enterprise and exposing how the mediation of the movies has made this false belief possible.

     Philosopher Albert Camus questions the necessity of violence in creating a successful rebellion. In his essay, “The Rebel,” Camus analyzes the theoretical and philosophical motivations behind a rebellion and ultimately suggests that acts of murder and rebellion are inherently contradictory. He also implies that rebels can get carried away by the crimes they commit and that this leads them astray from their original intentions for resistance. Camus rejects the use of violence to stage a successful uprising; the Star Wars saga leads the audience to believe the opposite, that destruction is a key component to winning a rebellion. Both the Empire and Rebel Alliance resort to brutal maneuvers in their fight for power. The Empire uses torture, commits mass genocide, and indoctrinates Stormtroopers to be totally obedient to the Emperor while the Rebels send several squadrons on suicide missions for information and also kill mass amounts of people; their collective body count is in the billions. The original Star Wars trilogy ends with the Empire in ruins and an opportunity for the Rebel Alliance to assume power (which it does), yet its plans to reform the galaxy are unknown, leaving room for more violence in its galactic dominance.

     The Rebel Alliance is presented as a symbol of pure good for Star Wars viewers. However, upon closer inspection, the Rebellion is comparable to the Empire in terms of brutality and is just as guilty of killing millions of innocents caught in the middle of the war. Analyzing this shifted perspective changes the Rebellion from a pillar of good to a morally ambiguous and ruthless movement. Therefore, many major events throughout the Star Wars movies need to be reconsidered. While the Empire is depicted as heartless and brutal when it destroys Alderaan, the Rebellion is seen as victorious when it destroys both Death Stars. Additionally, the deaths of Stormtroopers are nothing more than insignificant background action since they are portrayed as faceless pawns who the audience has no sympathy for. Finally, the Rogue One squadron sent to Scarif to retrieve the Death Star plans consists wholly of Rebellion members who have morally corrupt pasts, calling into question the underlying moral purity of the Rebellion.

     While the Rebellion is fighting against an authoritarian government to restore a republican government in which the citizens of the galaxy would live with more rights and representation, the mediation of the movies creates a scenario that places the Rebellion and Empire as complete moral opposites, which they are not. The Rebel Alliance is just as guilty as the Empire for crimes it commits onscreen that are mistaken as heroic victories. The Rebellion murders thousands upon thousands throughout the Star Wars saga without remorse and veils the measures it takes to further its goals, even though the crimes of the Rebellion and Empire are quite similar. Through analysis of the Rebellion’s destruction of both Death Stars, killings of Stormtroopers, and the individual actions of its members for the cause, the Rebellion is much more corrupt than how it is portrayed. The mediation of this film series compels the audience to undoubtedly believe in the goodness of the Rebellion and provides a skewed image of how a rebellion occurs. It implies that rebellions have clean-cut “good” and “bad” sides and that rebellion is adventurous and even appealing. A closer examination of the films changes the portrayal of the Rebellion from a symbol of good into a realistic, ruthless group of revolutionaries.