\u201cBy accident, a great deal [of J.R.R. Tolkien\u2019s book series \u201cThe Lord of the Rings\u201d] can be read topically,\u201d Maj. Warren Lewis, brother to C.S. Lewis, wrote in possibly the first ever review of the novel in 1949. \u201cThe Shire standing for England, Rohan for France, Gondor the Germany of the future, Sauron for Stalin.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And while Tolkien later explicitly rejected the idea that his \u201cstory was an allegory of any historical event, most of all the recent war against Nazism \u2026 for all such protestations, Lewis had clearly been on to something back in 1949,\u201d historian Alan Allport wrote in his 2020 book about the social and military history of the U.K. during World War II, \u201cBritain at Bay.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Rather than singularly weaving a mythopoeic fantasy world, Allport contended, Tolkien\u2019s future audience \u201cwas going to see associations between events in Middle Earth and those in their own world.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tolkien, however, was not the first nor the last to draw inspiration from the cataclysmic bloodletting that was the Second World War.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Today, as fans celebrate May the Fourth (be with you), one does not have to stray far to glean that the galaxy of \u201cStar Wars\u201d is rife with WWII-based allegories \u2014 and its fanbase might equal, if not surpass, Tolkien\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cStar Wars\u201d creator George Lucas famously studied over 25 hours of footage from World War II dogfights<\/a> and jittery newsreel imagery while researching for the films \u2014 even using the footage as placeholders in the film before special effects were added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cSo one second you\u2019re with the Wookiee in the spaceship and the next you\u2019re in \u2018The Bridges at Toko-Ri.\u2019 It was like, \u2018George, what is going on?\u2019\u201d Willard Huyck, a screenwriter and personal friend of Lucas, stated in a 1997 interview<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though the b-roll was eventually edited out, the aerial tactics established in World War II remain visible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One such shot, according to National WWII Museum and Memorial curator Corey Graff<\/a>, \u201cshowed aircraft peeling out of formation and dropping from sight. The clip was used as a model for the memorable shot of Rebel craft diving to attack the Death Star. One at a time, the fictional spaceships elegantly \u2018aileron roll\u2019 across the screen, mimicking the movements of the 1940s aircraft almost exactly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Entire books have been devoted to such analogies, but we\u2019ve summed up a few of our favorites for some May the Fourth enjoyment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After studying hours of WWII footage, Lucas became particularly enamored with the cockpit of B-29s \u2014 the famous bomber known for dropping the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The result? The cockpit of Han Solo\u2019s beloved Millennium Falcon looks like it was lifted straight out of Boeing\u2019s blueprints, replete with the B-29\u2032s signature greenhouse-style cockpit. And, exactly like on the Superfortress, the\u202fFalcon <\/i>sports defensive gun turrets \u2014 which come in handy when battling a Death Star.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From stormtroopers to Imperial officers\u2019 uniforms and even Darth Vader\u2019s helmet, which resembles those worn by the Wehrmacht during WWII, the analogies between Nazi Germany and the Galactic Empire are not exactly subtle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The gradual rise of Hitler from German chancellor to Nazi dictator is further mirrored in the rise of Darth Sidious, or Sheev Palpatine, from chancellor to world\u2019s most in-need-of-facial-moisturizer emperor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once again Lucas turned to World War II aviation for inspiration to give his spaceships unique sounds. According to Ian D\u2019Costa for Tacairnet<\/a>, sounds couldn\u2019t easily be synthesized in the same way studios can create movie sound effects today. To get around that, Lucas sent out sound designer Ben Burtt to Reno Air Races in Nevada, where he was allowed to record the noise of P-51 Mustangs racing overhead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Burtt later recalled, \u201cI just said, \u2018I want to record some planes,\u2019 and they said \u2018Yeah? Then go on out there.\u2019 You could never do that nowadays. I was out at the pylons, and planes were passing 15 feet above my head. They were so fast that I could hardly see them go by; they were just a blur, though I could smell the oil and exhaust. … Almost all of the spaceships came out of those Mojave recordings, including the\u202fFalcon.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lucas further drew inspiration from the 1955 film \u201cThe Dam Busters,\u201d which chronicles the audacious British raid on Germany\u2019s strategic river dams in 1943. The dams were heavily defended by anti-aircraft fire, a recurring theme in \u201cStar Wars.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nThe Millennium Falcon\u2019s cockpit came from the Boeing B-29 Fortress<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The Empire\u2019s similarities to Nazi Germany<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Depictions of Star Wars spaceships were influenced by WWII fighters<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The Death Star trench run was inspired by the British Dambuster Raid<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n