I think it's worth pointing out that, especially in the original 3, Lucas relied heavily on Joseph Campbell's work on Mythology. So, more than fantasy or Sci-Fi, it functions, IMO, primarily as (an attempt at) mythology, so, yes, the story can easily be transposed elsewhere, largely because it is a transposition of existing Story(ies). The same, IMO, can be said of the second and third Matrixes, which felt less like extrapolations of the "What if" to me than "And now that we have set the stage, here are the steps hero stories are supposed to go through".

Lucas relied heavily on Joseph Campbell's work on Mythology.

For the sake of clarity I'll note I was talking about John Campbell, not Joe.

Oh, and this is useful too:

*************

Isaac Asimov divided the history of modern science fiction, i.e., works written after 1926, into four types of stories:

1926-38--adventure dominant
1938-50--science dominant
1950-65--sociology dominant
1966-present--style dominant

Hee, Hec. I was working on my post when you posted yours, so I didn't see that.

More useful stuff from that site. From the Gernsback Continuum:

Contemporaries of Gernsback include:

E.E. "Doc" Smith "Doc" Smith (1890-1965) was the father of the space opera--cops and robbers or cowboys and Indians in space.

Firefly and Star Wars are both squarely in this science fiction tradition, which precedes John Campbell's more narrow and hard-science defined genre. Notably, the phrase "science fiction" was created to describe these space operas originally.

Isaac Asimov divided the history of modern science fiction

That's actually not a bad set of dividing lines on the evolution of SF in terms of narrative emphasis, though I might quibble about the dates involved. I'm not sure how it works for writers who straddled the dates (or the narrative tropes, for that matter).

Firefly and Star Wars are both squarely in this science fiction tradition, which precedes John Campbell's more narrow and hard-science defined genre.

Hmm... I've never really considered SW to be Space Op, but now that I think of it, it strikes me that it's a very divided 'verse, with Han, Chewie, the Falcon, the Cantina scene, bounty hunters, and all the stuff I love about the originals firmly on the Space Opera side of the force. The feudalism in space stuff (and oh, how I love that phrase) feels much more sword-and-sorcery romantic quest, and I think that's what pings people as "not SF" about it. (It's also about the only damn thing in the new trilogy, but I could just be bitter -- still -- about the grievous lack of Solo.)

1966-present--style dominant

Do you know, offhand, what was the "present" he was speaking of? Do we think that we are still in a "style-dominant" mode?

the grievous lack of Solo

He would have been, like, 12. And it would have been far too much to ask to have had his father (or mother) involved in it. Besides, I doubt Han even knows who his parents are.

Supposedly they wanted a young Han Solo in RotS, but then they decided that no 12-year-old would be able to pull off Han Solo.

Besides, I doubt Han even knows who his parents are.

Does this mean he was born somewhere in the Ford Galaxy?