Dear Alexis,
Star Wars saga is full of many religious conceptions and traditions. All the episodes are worth to analyze them in many levels. Related to your commentary of "Looks like Zong Rimpoche's trying to raise his X-wing from the swamp!", I have always seen master Yoda as a Buddhist master or guru. I remember when Yoda says to Anakin: "The fear of lost (attachement) is the path to the dark side", "Fear is the path to the dark side, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to sufrfering"... "Attachement leads to jelousy...death is a natural part of life...train yourself in everything you fear to lose".