‘I’ve been seeing her in my dreams… vivid dreams… scary dreams’
- the Mother

The Mother, as we have seen, is also significant and also complex. The ambivalence towards her experienced in the heroic quest is apparent not least in the fact that actual mothers tend, in Star Wars, to come to sticky ends, a tendency that reaches apotheosis in Episode III. The oscillation between attachment to and separation from the Mother as well as the vigorous presence of the Mother in her darker and more universal aspects (the Death Stars, caves, empty space, Hoth, Tatooine, Geonosis, Mustafar, the sanctuary moon of Endor, Naboo and Alderaan) are patterns that underlie the entirety of the narrative and indicate this same ambivalence. It finds its direct articulation in Anakin’s adoration of his pregnant wife, his fantasies of her death and his ultimate brutality towards her. The Mother provides sanctuary and inspiration; she also threatens reabsorption and/or punishment by withdrawal.