My 8-Year-Old’s Reaction to the Big ‘Star Wars’ Twist

With The Rise of Starwalker coming out in just a couple of weeks, I have made it a mission to get my kid through the entire saga. She's already seen the new movies, Solo: A Star Wars Story, Rogue One, The Force Awakens, and The Last Jedi.

She's a big Star Wars fan, but I intentionally didn't get too into the story with her because she hadn't picked up on the big twist in Star Wars yet. SPOILER ALERT for a movie that is almost 40 years old, but Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker's father.

Well, we sat down to watch Empire Strikes Back and I prefaced the movie by telling my daughter "There's a big moment in this movie that shapes the whole Star Wars story." So of course, anything that my daughter deemed big was met with the "Is that the moment?" question. I think even Han Solo slicing up the Tauntaun was met with that question.

When the scene was about to come up, I did pause it to warn her that it was coming up. But I didn't do it right before the scene. I paused it when Luke first shows up to the Cloud City on Bespin, so there was a lot more action before it got to the big reveal.

But then the scene comes... (scroll down to the photo right after Vader reveals he's Luke's father and you can see her reaction)