[Tumblr crosspost] Luke and Leia

I responded to this picspam with:

Luke and Leia are visually paired in a lot of interesting ways, especially considered it wasn't conceived as a twin thing until ROTJ. I think Luke-Leia was always built on likeness.

Han and Leia definitely have commonalities, but ultimately it's a relationship about struggling to cross boundaries, and it's framed that way visually. Luke and Leia are framed as a natural pair. Neither ever stop to think of the oddity of princess-farmboy; they just fit. It works, and nobody needs to think about why.

I'm putting it strongly, but—that's part of the reason that the treatment of them as opposite counterparts is so ??????? They're framed together in opposition to Han, visually and dynamically, so often. They're given incredibly similar lines, sometimes simultaneously. I think it's also why ... people joke about the twin twist, but ultimately it works. You can look at these two tiny, unflinching idealists shouldering terrible trauma, and saying, tomorrow I'll grieve but today we carry on, and believe they've got the same blood in their veins.