“If there’s a bright center to Britain, Number Four Privet Drive is the street that it’s farthest from.” I recently got a new TV, and proceeded to break it in by watching the nerdiest movies I could find, which naturally included Star Wars: A New Hope and the first Harry Potter film. As I watched these two movies back to back, I was struck by how similar the two main characters were, a connection I’d not made before, though it’s quite obvious in retrospect. Both were delivered by bearded men to be raised by unsupportive uncles, where they would grow up after much hardship to find that they were really wizards (though one was called “Jedi”), receiving rare magical items that belonged to their fathers which would help them to defeat a Dark Lord. Anime is fun to de-construct, too, breaking down memes into their component parts and seeing what inspirations came from where — a Hollywood movie here, a reference to an old TV show there.
Harry and Luke, heroes of a thousand faces.
