Plot
Luke Skywalker initiates a plan to rescue the frozen in carbonite Han Solo from the crime lord Jabba the Hutt with the
help of Princess Leia, Lando Calrissian,Chewbacca, C-3PO and R2-D2. Leia infiltrates Jabba's palace on Tatooine disguised as a bounty hunter and releases Han, but Leia is captured and
enslaved and Han is detained. Luke arrives a week later and allows himself to
be captured. After surviving an attempted feeding to the Rancor,
Jabba sentences Luke and Han to be executed by the monstrous Sarlacc. Luke breaks free, retrieving his newly-constructed lightsaber from R2-D2 and a large battle erupts; in the ensuing chaos, Leia
strangles Jabba to death, Han inadvertently knocks Boba Fett into the gaping maw of the Sarlacc and Luke, escaping with his allies,
destroys Jabba's sail barge. While Han and Leia meet with the other Rebels,
Luke returns to Dagobah, only to find that Yoda is dying.
With his last breaths, Yoda confirms thatDarth Vader is Luke's father and that Luke must confront him again to become a true
Jedi Knight; he also mentions "another Skywalker". The spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi reveals that the "other Skywalker" Yoda spoke of is Luke's
twin sister, who Luke discovers is Leia. Obi-Wan then tells Luke that he must confront
Vader once more to defeat the Galactic Empire after
confirming that Vader was originally Anakin Skywalker.
The Rebel Alliance learns that the Empire has been constructing a new Death Star. In a plan to destroy the new weapon, Han leads a
strike team to destroy the battle station's shield generator on the moon Endor,
allowing a squadron of starfighters to enter the incomplete superstructure and
destroy the station from within. Returning from Dagobah, Luke joins the strike
team along with Leia and the others. The strike team travels to Endor in an
Imperial shuttle; Vader senses Luke's presence on the shuttle, but lets them
through so that they will be ambushed by the Imperial forces lying in wait on
Endor. Sensing Vader's presence, Luke fears he is endangering the mission by
his presence.
On Endor,
Luke and his companions encounter a tribe of Ewoks and form a
partnership with them. Later, Luke confesses to Leia that she is his sister,
that Vader is their father and that he is leaving to confront him, thinking
that there is still good in him. Luke surrenders to Imperial troops, so that
they will bring him to Vader. He unsuccessfully tries to convince Vader to turn
from the dark side, but Vader takes Luke to the Death Star to meet Emperor Palpatine (Ian McDiarmid), his Sith master and
leader of the Empire.
Luke learns
that the Death Star is fully operational and set to destroy the Rebellion once
and for all. On Endor, the Rebels are captured by Imperial forces, but a
surprise counterattack by the Ewoks allows the Rebels to launch an attack.
Meanwhile, Lando leads the Rebel fleet in the Millennium Falcon to the Death Star, only to find the station's shield is still up and
the Imperial fleet waiting for them. Palpatine tempts Luke to give
in to his anger and join the dark side of the Force.
Luke and Vader engage in a lightsaber duel. Vader discovers that Luke has a
sister, and is about to suggest something terrible will happen to Leia such as
turning to the Dark Side or being killed when Luke snaps, interrupting Vader's
sentence. He severs Vader's right hand in a rage, disarming him. Realizing that
he is beginning to share his father's fate, Luke refuses Palpatine, declaring
himself a Jedi. Palpatine attacks him with Force lightning. Unable to
watch his son suffer, Anakin reemerges from within Vader and throws Palpatine
down a reactor shaft to his death, but is mortally wounded by Palpatine's
lightning. The redeemed Anakin Skywalker (Sebastian Shaw/Hayden Christensen) asks
Luke to remove his mask and tell Leia that there was good in him after all; he
then dies, finally at peace.
On Endor,
the strike team, with the help of the Ewoks, defeats the Imperial forces and
destroys the shield generator, allowing the Rebel fleet to launch a final
assault on the Death Star. Lando leads the remaining ships deep into the
station's core and destroys the main reactor. Luke escapes on Palpatine's
Imperial shuttle with his father's body before the Death Star explodes, while
Lando escapes in the Falcon. On Endor, Han tells Leia that he
knows she loves Luke and offers to step aside; she tells him that Luke is her
brother and kisses him. That evening, Luke returns to Endor and cremates his
father's body and armor on a funeral pyre. As the Rebels celebrate the end of the Empire,
Luke sees the spirits of Obi-Wan Kenobi, Yoda and a redeemed Anakin Skywalker
proudly watching over them.
Cast
§ Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker: In the
year since his encounter with Darth Vader in Cloud City, Luke has nearly completed his Jedi training.
§ Harrison Ford as Han Solo: Frozen in carbonite by Darth Vader in Cloud City, and taken to Jabba the Hutt, Han is freed by
Princess Leia, only to be sentenced to death by Jabba the Hutt. He escapes with
the group after Luke arrives at Jabba's palace.
§ Carrie Fisher as Princess Leia Organa: A
princess from Alderaan, Leia has been aiding Luke in his search for Han. It
is later revealed that she is actually Luke's twin sister.
§ Billy Dee Williams as Lando Calrissian: After Cloud City was taken over by the
Empire, Lando joined the Rebel Alliance, and aided Luke in his search for Han
Solo. He would later use the Millennium Falcon, Han Solo's ship, to lead an
attack on the Death Star.
§ Anthony Daniels as C-3PO:
Luke Skywalker's protocol droid for human-cyborg relations, 3PO is instrumental
in establishing friendly relations between the Rebels and the Ewoks on Endor,
who mistakenly believe him to be a god.
§ Peter Mayhew as Chewbacca: Han Solo's Wookiee co-pilot and best friend, introduced in Revenge of
the Sith.
§ Sebastian Shaw as Anakin Skywalker: Luke's father, Anakin, was a Jedi Knight
before being seduced by the dark side of the Force and becoming Darth Vader.
Shaw was partly replaced by Hayden Christensen in the 2004
DVD release of the film.
