When Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) had to disguise himself as an alien, he donned a yellow radiation suit and pretended to be “Darth Vader,” an “extraterrestrial from the planet Vulcan.” In Back to the Future—which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year—this joke about Star Wars and Star Trek was always a quick gag, and a knowing nod to the kinds of sci-fi stories that inspired Marty’s father (Crispin Glover), even if both those fictional worlds existed after 1955. And now, in a roundabout tribute, the Star Wars franchise has inserted the visage of Marty McFly in the yellow suit and helmet into an actual part of the Star Wars saga.
In the newly released third season of the animated series Star Wars: Visions, the sixth episode, “The Lost Ones,” begins with a very familiar sight. Is that Marty McFly as Darth Vader? Not quite.
Star Wars: Visions References Back to the Future
In the opening scene of “The Lost Ones,” a figure clad in a yellow suit is extracting material from a mining planet. The background of this episode focuses on a planet that has been beset by leaking carbon freeze leak, which results in people randomly being frozen in carbonite, rather than intentionally, like in The Empire Strikes Back.
But the first scene depicts a worker, in their yellow suit, holding a small device, which isn’t a Walkman, but is certainly meant to look like one. In short, this is clearly an homage to Back to the Future’s 1985 homage to Star Wars. Only this time, this image isn’t meant to be a spoof, but, instead, exists in what is otherwise a very serious story.
Visions Pushes the Boundaries of Star Wars
Launched in 2021, the anthology series Visions employs various different animation studios to create different radical takes on the Star Wars saga. “The Lost Ones,” directed by Hitoshi Haga and created by the Anime studio Kinema Citrus, is actually a sequel to a 2021 short called “The Village Bride.” While the Back to the Future shot is great, the rest of the story is all about a Jedi Padawan on the run, trying to help a group of people in deep trouble.
For those who have perhaps been a bit overwhelmed by the amount of homework some new Star Wars instalments seem to demand, Visions is a good antidote to that feeling. Each installment might not be for everyone, but there is something in these nine episodes that will appeal to nearly every kind of fan.
