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1Canon Subpages:
2[[index]]
3* [[Fridge/StarWarsTalesOfTheJedi Tales of the Jedi]]
4* [[Fridge/ThePhantomMenace Episode One: The Phantom Menace]]
5* [[Fridge/AttackOfTheClones Episode Two: Attack of the Clones]]
6* [[Fridge/StarWarsTheCloneWars The Clone Wars]]
7* [[Fridge/RevengeOfTheSith Episode Three: Revenge of the Sith]]
8* [[Fridge/StarWarsTheBadBatch The Bad Batch]]
9* [[Fridge/{{Solo}} Solo: A Star Wars Story]]
10* Fridge/ObiWanKenobi
11* Fridge/{{Andor}}
12* [[Fridge/StarWarsRebels Rebels]]
13* [[Fridge/RogueOne Rogue One: A Star Wars Story]]
14* [[Fridge/ANewHope Episode Four: A New Hope]]
15* [[Fridge/TheEmpireStrikesBack Episode Five: The Empire Strikes Back]]
16* [[Fridge/ReturnOfTheJedi Episode Six: Return of the Jedi]]
17* Fridge/TheMandalorian
18* Fridge/TheBookOfBobaFett
19* Fridge/{{Ahsoka}}
20* [[Fridge/StarWarsResistance Resistance]]
21* [[Fridge/TheForceAwakens Episode Seven: The Force Awakens]]
22* [[Fridge/TheLastJedi Episode Eight: The Last Jedi]]
23* [[Fridge/TheRiseOfSkywalker Episode Nine: The Rise of Skywalker]]
24[[/index]]
25
26Legends Continuity Subpages:
27* Fridge/TheHandOfThrawn
28* Fridge/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic
29** Fridge/StarWarsTheOldRepublic
30* Fridge/LegacyOfTheForce
31* Fridge/TheForceUnleashed
32* Fridge/TheStarWarsHolidaySpecial
33* Fridge/XWingSeries
34
35[[foldercontrol]]
36
37[[AC: FridgeBrilliance]]
38
39[[folder:General]]
40* The titles of the prequel trilogy mirror those of the originals:
41** Episodes I/IV are about a sign of great change in the galaxy, in the form of a menace and hope, respectively.
42** Episodes II/V mark the escalation of a conflict by mentioning a great force (the Republic/the Empire) starting a full-scale war.
43** Episodes III/VI mirror each other most, theme-named after the victories of both feuding factions of Force-wielders.
44** The sequel trilogy does this too, to a degree: Episode VII is about a great change in the form of an awakening, Episode VIII marks the escalation and progression of a conflict with mention of an important driving force (Luke Skywalker), and Episode IX is theme-named after the final victory of the Skywalker family over Palpatine.
45* A lot of people probably wondered why the Jedi Order in the prequel trilogy seemed like a bunch of ineffectual, pompous, self-righteous, hypocritical jerks as apposed to the stalwart defenders of the innocent and warriors against evil they were stated to be in the legends. The reason is because by the time of the clone wars, the Jedi Order was on the decline. Since they thought the Sith were gone, they believed that they only has to deal with the mundane problems of Muggles rather than fights between sci-fi [[MagicKnight magic knights]]. They stopped going out looking for evil because they believed that normal crime was something the republic could handle and they couldn't be arsed to get out of their temples to handle it. Had they gone out and been the KnightErrant and fought all types of evil and crime, they might have gotten wise to the sith scheme to take over the universe sooner. Also, they got more and more entangled with the republic's affairs and came to rely on the republic as patrons too much worrying about public opinion and reprisals from government bodies that they actually just became and extension of the republic. They would even sell out one of their own on circumstantial evidence that have the republic be mad at them. Not to mention stuff like taking force sensitive children from their families because they, the Jedi, [[SarcasmMode obviously knew better than the families of said children.]] In fact it was that whole "we're Jedi, we know better than all of you" attitude that really showcased their pride and arrogance. By the time of the prequels, we weren't looking at a BadassArmy of [[SpaceWizard space]] [[ThePaladin paladins]]. We were looking at church full of self-righteous ascetics that got soft in peaceful times [[TradeYourPassionForGlory and were content practicing the tenets of their religion rather than adhere to the spirit of that religion.]]
46* Vader is seen as the ultimate bad boss because he regularly kills the officers who fail him, but in the EU He is seen as more of a father to his men. This didn't make any sense to me until I realized, the Empire is a heavily corrupt government. People gain positions of power based on who they know or are related to. Vader is a former slave. He probably hates the pampered officers and empathizes with the cannon fodder because they were lower class just like he was.
47** Vader's reputation as an outright psychopath is slightly exaggerated. Yes, he ''does'' have a tendency to kill people who anger him. But he does also seem to tolerate quite a bit from some of them as well. For example, in the opening scene of Episode IV that Imperial lieutenant was being amazingly direct with Vader about the potential political ramifications of arresting Princess Leia, and Vader did not seem the slightest bit perturbed by it. Indeed, he seemed almost a bit familiar with the guy, even going so far as to explain his reasoning. Likewise, the other Imperial officer in that scene does not appear to grovel either. It is likely that Vader surrounds himself with officers he likes whenever he can. If he is stuck with ones he does not like, then the Force choking starts up.
48*** According to Wikia, the Stormtrooper officer who told Vader of the political ramifications of Leia being imprisoned was highly respected by Vader. (NB: Stormtrooper officers are not always in armor and wear black uniforms.) The officer was very competent, dedicated, hardworking, and perceptive, traits which Vader (and previously Anakin) prized; he always made sure his Stormtrooper squad was in tiptop shape; he was also the kinda guy to measure twice, cut only once. He also had a tendency to be very direct, even with his superiors, and he would not hesitate to point out potential problems with their plans. (Basically, he wasn't an ass kisser.) When he first started reporting to Vader and showed himself as being perceptive and direct, even with Vader (at times he would tell Vader about flaws in his plans), other officers who thought kissing ass was the way to go with Vader pronounced him a dead man walking; they were surprised when Vader later actually promoted the Stormtrooper officer. As I'm sure you can tell in his personality from both the prequels and the original trilogy, Vader wasn't too much into having his ass kissed, but rather cared about getting the job done and getting it done right, so he liked having a highly competent, dedicated, and perceptive officer working for him, because it would minimize the risk of Vader making mistakes and, plus, that officer could get the job done. Also, although the Stormtrooper officer was direct, he wasn't self-serving and arrogant like the admiral who talked back to Vader on the Death Star or Admiral Ozzel in ESB; Vader always prized his observations, because they often helped him tie up loose ends in his plans. It's a good thing for the Rebels that they didn't seem to have to encounter that Stormtrooper officer or his squad again.
49** It also makes sense if you believe that Vader still planned on taking over the Empire even while following Palpatine. If he's going to rule after all, it'd make sense that he would surround himself with people he would deem worthy (or competent) enough to actually manage it.
50*** That would explain the difference in Vader's behavior towards the officers from the ''Devastator'' in Episode IV, versus his attitude towards the ones on the ''Executor'' and its associated support fleet in Episode V. Palpatine would not want to put Vader on a ship that powerful surrounded by officers hand-picked by Vader himself. It would also account for why Grand Moff Tarkin was clearly in command of the first ''Death Star'' rather than Vader. Since it is expected that a Sith apprentice will try to overthrow his master, there is no reason why Palpatine would make it easy for him.
51** Probably also why Piett survives ESB. Vader was aware enough to know that Piett did everything he could, and Vader isn't about to execute an officer who was honestly trying his best. Admiral Ozzel, on the other hand, was a moron, so Vader had no problem "relieving him of command."
52%%* Please do ''not'' add Needa again. It's being moved to WMG because it is ''not'' supported by the actual sequence of events in the film itself.
53* Why are the Stormtroopers such terrible shots? You could put it down to Luke (and to some extent Leia) unconsciously using the Force in defense, but I think there's a more logical and simple explanation in the prequels:
54** The Stormtroopers are the spiritual successors of the Clone Troopers, and the Clones had accelerated growth so they were battle-ready in a fraction of the time it would take to train up a normal army.
55** Assuming that the rate of this accelerated growth stayed roughly the same, then by the time of Ep. IV, the Clones would have been functionally around sixty-four years old. So it would make sense that the Empire started recruiting (or conscripting) ordinary, younger people for its army (and this also explains different Stormtrooper heights).
56** But there's more: the Clones had already been trained by the time the Republic received them, so it's reasonable to suggest that the Republic/Empire initially had no training program in place, and had to throw one together between Eps. III and IV without knowing its true effectiveness.
57** This shoddy planning was partly justified, however, since the Empire did not expect to be seriously threatened (at this point, the Separatists' armies had been deactivated, the Old Republic had been swept away, and the only major foes of the Empire were small bands of Rebels armed with clapped-out equipment), and so they could get away with having an ineffective army. All the Empire really needed to do to eliminate its enemy was put some new(ish) recruits into bulky armor and give them bigger and better weapons than the Rebels, even if those recruits were incapable of hitting the target or having any knowledge of military tactics.
58** Another alternative: In the original film, Darth Vader was ''letting'' Luke's party escape so they could track them to the Rebel base. The Stormtroopers on the Death Star were missing because they were ''ordered'' to miss. Unfortunately, [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy it later became memetic]].
59*** That.... makes a ridiculous amount of sense. Vader told the troops to "put on a show" to make the escape seem real, with added orders to not actually hit anyone. To add to this theory is the dialogue stated previously by Obi-Wan that "These blast points aren't random like Sand People, only Stormtroopers are so precise." Adding further to this theory are the actions of Vader on the Death Star after his duel with Obi-Wan, he slowly makes his way towards the Falcon, but gets stopped by a blast door. ''Rogue One'' proved that Vader is scary fast when he needs to be, and the door could have been opened either by the use of the Force or the button that is sure to be there to open it (and Vader doesn't really need ''authorization'' to either override a lock), or he could, you know, use the ''lightsaber'' to cut through. This all points to the above suggestion being plausible.
60** Another theory, playing on RealLife concerns: A study of firefights in modern wars show that in every situation, even the most vicious, no-mercy firefight, most shots miss, even if the soldiers are trained. Why? [[SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments Even if trained and indoctrinated, studies have shown that most human beings, save for sociopaths, do not want to will harm to other humans on a subconscious level]]. They may be missing unconsciously because they see human beings and not Rebel traitors. Add to that the military doctrine of "suppression fire" (where solders are trained to fire wildly, not with the object of actually hitting anything, but to make the opposition so concerned with keeping under cover that they don't have the opportunity to return fire, and that may be a simpler explanation.
61** Yet another theory, implied in ''Film/RogueOne'', was that the Stormtroopers miss the heroes because The Force wills it. If The Force flows through everyone and everything and binds the universe together, that implies that it has some part to play in Fate as well.
62** There is also the possibility that the Stormtroopers weapons are just plain garbage. This parallels real life [=WW2=] France, and the homemade Sten gun. Made out of any piping available, including bicycle pumps and sewer pipe, the Sten was great for putting out bullets, but had very low accuracy. The Empire requires a lot of weapons, so of course the lowest bidder is going to get the job. Imagine if Winchester suddenly started mass-producing arms in China, the overall quality would most definitely suffer. Now, take that analogy to a ''galaxy-wide'' level, and it is possible that all of the weapons the Empire gives to rank-and-file soldiers is not going to be top-tier equipment. Note how none of the characters willingly use a Stormtrooper rifle (with the exception of Luke, but he didn't have a personal weapon besides a laser sword he could barely use, and even then he hit only 2-3 Troopers in the entire escape) at any point, Han ditches it at the first opportunity for his personal side-arm which has proven much more reliable.
63** Another consideration is that Stormtroopers aren't trained for accuracy in particular, but mass-fire tactics. Less about hitting individual, moving targets, and more about having a squad gun down a wide area. Remember, they're more a suppression and control force rather than elites. They're meant to be deployed to handle things like riots or destroying a few uppity farmers. That plus the E-11 not being designed for particularly accurate fire (note the short barrel, minimal stock, and lack of any recoil control integrated).
64*** This is actually quite common in real-life authoritarian regimes (and why, statistically, authoritarian states actually fare rather poorly as aggressors in interstate wars). In most modern authoritarian states, the military's job isn't to fight organized, professional armies or large-scale, organized rebellions, or conquer territory; their job is to suppress dissent (ie. protests or small-scale revolts), political opponents, and ultimately keep the ruling regime in power. They aren't suited for the tactics of open warfare, but rather suppression and control, such as gunning down wide areas. So it makes sense that the stormtroopers struggled against the rebels and eventually, the empire lost the war; because their military wasn't trained for it.
65* Who is the biggest hero of the Original Trilogy? Is it Luke? Han? Ben Kenobi? Leia? R2-D2? No, it is the Imperial officer who says not to shoot the escape pod containing Threepio and Artoo at the beginning of ''A New Hope''. Had they shot down the pod, just to be sure, Artoo and Threepio would never have reached Tatooine, they would never have found their way to Luke and he would still be stuck as a farmboy in Tatooine, the special message would never have reached Luke or Ben Kenobi and as such Princess Leia would never have been rescued and the Rebels would never have the plans to destroy the Death Star, Han Solo would never have been hired by Ben and never subsequently joined the Rebellion, and, further down the line, Luke would have never discovered his destiny, trained with Yoda, found out that Leia (whom he never would've met) was his sister and that Vader (whom he never would've met either) was his father and so on. If not for that Imperial Officer, the events of the entire Original Trilogy and the Expanded Universe beyond that would never have happened at all.
66** From that perspective, however, Leia's the biggest hero. The officer would have shot it down if he had known it contained occupants; he was duped. So Leia's the hero for ''knowing'' that she could trick the Imperials by firing off empty escape pods at random, then hiding the all-important droids in one of them.
67*** From this perspective you can thank Obi-Wan for all this, since he allowed the Organa family to adopt Leia and no doubt raise her into the tough-as-nails princess she is.
68*** You guys are failing to understand what the definition of 'heroic' is. It definitely isn't some action by the character that indirectly caused a chain of events leading to victory decades later. 'Heroic' is most easily defined by accomplishing incredible feats with great courage in the face of impossible odds, fatal dangers, or horrifying terrors. While Obi-Wan for example is a hero, he was not the hero responsible for victory in a New Hope (if we insist on identifying on key hero). By this definition it could only be Leia or Luke.
69*** Exactly, by the logic of whoever started this, the heroes that [[NiceJobBreakingItHero made things worse in the long run]] should be considered a villain.
70*** [[RunningGag From that perspective]], the real hero of the OT doesn't even appear in it, being Qui-Gon Jinn, without whom Obi-Wan would not have been the man he was. Although one could argue that ''this'' means the true hero is Yoda, for training Count Dooku who trained Qui-Gon... oh dear.
71*** except that the OT doesn't really have a protagonist by the definition of the word.
72** For what it's worth, though, even in the framework of the movies, the pod being shot down, destroying [=R2=] and [=3PO=] would still not necessarily imply Luke remaining a farm boy; for all we know, Obi-Wan could have decided to train Luke as a Jedi otherwise. Let's just leave it at that...
73*** Or the Force could have something to do with it.
74** Hello, this is the Troper who started all of it - after reading through the comments, I realised that the pod not getting shot down is one of many crossroads, turning points and pivots in the whole Star Wars plot. There are several others sprinkled across the films. It's a little like with alternate-history fiction - there's a "divergence point" where things take a different turn. If the pod was shot down, things would have been affected - some things could have continued to progress as they do - but it's not the end of the galaxy, so to speak.
75*** One more word on the pod not getting shot down: This Troper always took it to be along the same lines as Vader wanting the prisoners alive: If they just blew it up, they would never know for sure what might or might not be concealed in it. By leaving the escape pods intact and then collecting them, they could see exactly what information the rebels had collected.
76** In a ''New Hope'' Luke explicitly says he wants to join the Imperial Storm Troopers, so the droids are shot down, he becomes a storm trooper, The Emperor and/or Vader detect the "force is strong in this one." and well...
77** Well not exactly. He says he wants to go off to the academy, not because he ''wants'' to be a storm trooper, but because it's his only ticket off Tatooine. He later says he doesn't like the Empire either.
78** Still the point still stands, had the droids been shot down, Luke would have wound up a Stormtrooper, which puts him in the sights of the Sith, would he become Sith Lord Skywalker, be killed, or realize his destiny still?
79*** He wouldn't necessarily have become a stormtrooper. After all, Obi-Wan's still around, presumably keeping a moderately close watch on him, and Obi-Wan definitely knows that it would be a Bad Idea to have Luke go off to Imperial Academy.
80*** All four of the above Tropers are wrong. Luke wouldn't become a Stormtrooper, he'd be a PILOT (the Academy in question, to which Luke's friend Biggs went as well, training TIE pilots and all. what a ridiculous idea, I know)
81*** Even ''Han'' went to the Academy and later ended up doing other things. If Luke never ran into Vader or the Emperor (and it's a large Empire, with a very large military), they quite possibly might have never run into him before he found a reason and opportunity to defect or end his term of service. And there is still that old wildcard, Obi-Wan.
82*** There's no way he could ''not'' draw the attention of Vader or The Emperor, though. At some point, either word would reach them about a "Skywalker" from Tatooine, or they would sense a disturbance in The Force, leading them to him.
83*** Actually Luke said he wanted to join "the academy", not necessarily become a stormtrooper. This Troper finds it much more likely for Luke to wind up an Imperial pilot. Or at least start down that track before the name Skywalker becomes well known enough to get someone's attention upstairs...
84*** Isn't Luke a little short to be a Stormtrooper?
85*** The radio broadcast, which included cut scenes with Biggs, makes it clear the "Imperial Space Academy" trains pilots for both military and civilian purposes. Biggs had been assigned to a civilian freighter from which he was planning to jump ship.
86*** In typical military terms, grunt troops do not attend an "academy", those looking to become commissioned officers do. Which would make sense. Luke was a flyboy and would have had no desire to become a ground soldier of any kind. He would have wanted to be assigned to the fleet, ideally as a pilot. As for the Emperor and Vader finding out about him, it would have been highly unlikely. Leia was an actual member of the '''Imperial Senate''' and the Emperor never noticed any "disturbance in the Force" from her. In fact, Vader ''interrogated'' her without even noticing that she was a potentially powerful Force-sensitive! Likewise, Luke's passive use of his Force-sensitivity while out flying around shooting womp rats never caused so much as a ripple to draw their attention to him. The Galactic Empire contained hundreds of thousands of worlds and the imperial fleet was massive. I doubt that the Emperor and Vader even looked at the personnel reports to see who was joining the military and would not have noticed him by name.
87*** Furthering the officer point, compared to other forces where everyone fights, in the air force (at least the modern ones), only officers fight, because only officers are allowed to fly, so to become a pilot he has to go to the academy.
88** I think that they can sense someone when he's ''using'' the force. That's why Vader sensed Obi-Wan at the Death Star, and Luke when he was using the Force instead of the computer for aiming, but not Leia during the torture (or Luke at the Deathstar as well, for that matter). Sensing people that are just force-sensitives but do not actually know it surely requires them to specifically search for them. The Sith do not intend to build a large Sith Order as the Jedi, and have no reason to search for the son of Skywalker if they think that he died before even being born.
89
90* The Imperials fire green lasers, and the Rebels fire Red. Green electromagnetic waves have a higher frequency than red waves, and so have more energy. Therefore, as expected, the Imperials have superior weapons.
91** During the Vietnam War, American tracer ammo burned red, while the Communist-supplied tracer ammo burned green.
92*** Not only Communist bullets, Nazi Germany also used green tracers which also adds to the list of "Things the Imperials took from the Nazis."
93** Oddly enough, this is inverted with the prequel trilogy and most of the EU. The bad guys almost always use blasters that fire red plasma, while the good guys use other colors.
94* Not sure if it was intended from the beginning, but it makes sense after Episode V [[spoiler: Vader is Dutch for father]].
95** This has been repeatedly denied by Word of God for one thing, and I'm not sure the Dutch word for father is pronounced as Vader (long 'a'). If I remember correctly it sounds more like 'vatter' (short 'a').
96*** I thought it was pronounced [[Film/AustinPowers "fazha"]].
97*** It is pronounced with a long 'a', but it was probably unintentional with Vader coming from 'invader', like Sidious from 'insidious'.
98* Why is the Empire's state-of-the-art weapon specifically called the Death Star when it's barely the size of a moon? Because like a star, everything orbits around it, and it is the 'centre' of the Empire.
99* FridgeLogic, as Jon Stewart pointed out on ''Series/TheDailyShow'': In the January 5, 2010 episode, George Lucas was the guest on the show. After Jon introduced him, he started bombarding George with questions as to how Darth Vader and Palpatine sensed no disturbance in The Force when Leia was brought to Alderaan by her adoptive father.
100** Why would they? Leia wasn't doing anything, and they both thought Anakin's kid was dead at this point (and knew nothing about there being twins), so they wouldn't have been looking for her in any case. They only seemed to notice Luke when he actually started fighting them and training in the Force.
101** The ability of Force-sensitives to detect each other even across short distances is more a feature of the Expanded Universe than the films. For example, Vader sensed Obi-Wan on the Death Star, but not Luke. Likewise, Vader never sensed Luke ''or'' Obi-Wan from orbit above Tatooine. Leia served in the Imperial Senate, right under Palpatine's nose, and he never spotted her as a Force-sensitive, nor did Vader when he interrogated her on the Death Star. In ''Return of the Jedi'' when Leia goes missing on Endor, Luke cannot seem to locate her through the Force, and even states that they will need Artoo's scanners. The movie canon seems to differ strongly from the EU canon on this topic. What is shown onscreen implies that "disturbances in the Force" created by Force-users are only noticeable at very close range, and only when the Force-user is actually doing something with the Force that might attract attention.
102*** One thing that has always been consistent about The Force throughout all Star Wars media is that it's fickle, as though it is some sort of god playing with it's "toys" (read:the galaxy) in a eternal game. Force Users can sense the future, can sense other Force Users and potentials, can sense an attack coming, and so on, but only if The Force ''lets'' them, and it's perfectly willing to leave said Force User in the dark or to die in situations that it often wouldn't if that's what it feels like doing. In short, Force Users aren't really using The Force so much as The Force is using them. Vader and the Emperor didn't sense Luke or Leia simply because The Force didn't want them to, and that's the end of it.
103** There's also the scene in ESB where the Emperor contacts Vader about "a great disturbance in the Force," right around the time Luke was training with Yoda. They were able to sense him, apparently passively, from a great distance, just because he was actually learning to consciously manipulate the Force. Now, there may be all kinds of extenuating circumstances (a powerful Jedi Master and very strong, but undisciplined, apprentice in the same location, Luke not yet having learned to shield his influence in the Force, etc.), but it's still at least possible for Sith and Jedi to sense each other across vast distances. It's not a sure-fire thing, but it is there. Likely, the fact that both Luke and Leia were completely untrained protected them, since they wouldn't know how to really draw on the Force, thus they wouldn't create detectable disturbances within it.
104** Plus, even if Vader or the Emperor had sensed a ripple in the Force from Leia on Alderaan once in a while, so what? It's a huge galaxy, and it's highly doubtful that they could've pinned it down to Alderaan, much less to a specific person.
105* The Death Star can travel through hyperspace. Otherwise it would take eons to get from Alderaan to Yavin IV.
106** That's a given, isn't it? Otherwise how would it be an effective weapon if it took it hundreds of years to get from place to place?
107* Initially, I thought the title "Phantom Menace" referred to the threat of the Sith, and perhaps it does. But watching the movie more in depth, it also refers to Palpatine's scheme, which was all about creating a crisis so that he could become Supreme Chancellor. His original plan was probably
108** Um, you realize that "Sith" and "Palpatine" are synonymous? As in the threat of the Sith is actually Palpatine (lord of the Sith) becoming the leader of the Republic..
109*** [[{{wanbli}} This troper]] thinks the original Troper was referring to the Separatists as the phantom (i.e., not really there) menace, the ''real'' threat being Palpatine.
110** Get into the Senate as Palpatine, while getting in good graces with the Trade Federation (and others) via a combination of promises/bribes/blackmail.
111** Once in the Senate, take a populist, pro-government stance, favoring policies like the "taxation on trade routes" mentioned in the opening movie scrawl that are guaranteed to earn him the ire of powerful companies like the Trade Federation.
112** As Sidious, get them to not only do the equivalent of a protest/strike by blockading Naboo (his home world), but to go further, and invade.
113** Once the Trade Federation has invaded, get them to kill Queen Amidala.
114** Use the outrage generated from her murder to call for a vote of no-confidence in Chancellor Valorum without looking ambitious/greedy.
115** Break the blockade.
116*** As a kid, I always thought Maul was the literal PHANTOM (other-worldly demon creature) Menace, which is actually another testament to the brilliant multiple-meaning of the title.
117** I always thought it was referring to Anakin Skywalker. In hindsight this really has 2 aspects to it 1) the shadow/phantom aspect that Anakin's future would loom over the world of the Jedi, and 2) the stain that Anakin Skywalker (played both as a boy and as a wangsty teenager) would leave on the franchise.
118* It's quite ingenious when you think about it, and the only thing that made it fail was Qui-Gon sensing with the Force that Padme's life was in danger, and convincing her to flee. As a testament to his political skills, Palpatine managed to still make his plan work by getting her to call for the vote of no-confidence in his stead.-Bass
119* When Anakin's stepfather is relating to him the story of his mother's capture in AOTC, he says "30 of us went out there, four of us came back". Randomly-selected to point to how grievous the losses were? Not so: the first attack on the Death Star in ANH has 30 fighters attack the massive space station, of which only four return. What's more, Cleigg Lars was wounded, losing one of his four limbs, the means by which humanoids move around...and during the trench run Luke lost one of his four engines, the means by which his fighter moved around.
120** This is only one of some ten million stealth references to the original trilogy strategically placed throughout the prequel trilogy as part of the Anvilicious Foreshadowing. Having said that, some of them - including the example above - are sheer brilliance.
121* I just noticed something about the titles of the ''Star Wars'' films. Compare:
122** The Phantom Menace - A New Hope, both refer to a person of importance.
123** Attack of The Clones - The Empire Strikes Back, both refer to attacking.
124** Revenge of The Sith - Return of The Jedi, both refer to an old power coming back.
125*** I can do you one better: Return of the Jedi was originally called "Revenge of the Jedi". It was changed at the last minute. You can find promotional posters with the "revenge" title.
126*** The Phantom Menace is actually a fairly clever title if you consider it from the perspective of viewers introduced to the movie post-prequels. They wouldn't be going into the films predisposed to the notion that Palpatine is the true "phantom menace."
127* While I was always far more forgiving toward the prequels than many people, one part that seemed too dumb to put up with was Anakin's conception: [[CrystalDragonJesus Jesus rip off?]] Born of The Force? Gimme a break. But then Palpatine explained his master's preoccupation, and the stupidest part of the prequel trilogy suddenly became the most ingenious.
128** What's more, because of Anakin being a product of Darth Plagueis' research (and George Lucas has more or less stated this is canon), Anakin is essentially born of the Dark Side, making his eventual transformation into Darth Vader a sort of dark subversion of the CrystalDragonJesus trope.
129** The extended materials extend the quality of it even further. Palpatine killed his master because he believed that his master intended to conceive a child using the Force, and that the child would subsequently kill Palpatine. Palpatine was right.
130*** My uncle described a moment of Fridge Brilliance he had with that same conversation. Palpatine described the perspectives of the Jedi and the Sith; the Jedi are inherently selfless, forsaking personal things to benefit the Republic while the Sith are inherently selfish, "Treachery is the way of the Sith." Yet the Sith learned to control the force to create life and prevent death. The Jedi found a way to achieve immortality for themselves after death. Both are essentially contrary to the philosophical beliefs of the two factions, one discovering a power to help others and one discovering a power to benefit themselves.
131*** I was also confused by the contradiction of the ultimate expressions of the Light and Dark sides of the Force. It didn't make sense that the ultimate expression of the Light side was a form of immortality for oneself, while the ultimate expression of the Dark side was a technique to create life and preserve others. Then it occurred to me: the power of the Light side isn't about benefiting yourself; it's about becoming a part of the living Force itself to act as a guide for others. The main reason Force Ghosts exist is to guide the living. It's the ultimate act of selflessness, helping others even from beyond. OTOH, the ultimate power of the Dark side, creating life, represents the complete subjugation of the Force. It grants the Sith power over both life and death, essentially making him/her into a god. The Light is about acceptance and harmony with the Force, becoming part of it, and the Dark is about defying and controlling it.
132*** The whole Force Ghost thing, when you put it that way, is fairly reminiscent of the Buddhist concept of Bodhisattvas, people who are virtuous enough to get out of the reincarnation cycle and move on to Nirvana, but choose to stay behind and help others achieve Nirvana, which is a very interesting parallel with all the other Buddhist elements incorporated into Jedi Philosophy. I could be wrong about some of the Buddhism stuff, as I'm remembering it from a class I took four years ago, and I only took the time to use Wikipedia for spell-checking, not fact-checking. ~ UnitedShoes37
133*** That's not surprising given that Lucas originally based the idea of the force on Taoist philosophy, much of which has been combined with Buddhism over the years. some of the parallels can be seen in the light/dark creation/destruction duality (yin and yang). the force ghosts (in Taoist philosophy one who lives true to the Tao ascends to a higher plane and becomes an immortal) and so on.
134*** It even matches older expanded universe materials like the Jedi and Sith codes. The last line of the Jedi code is There is no death, there is the Force; while the Sith Code is The Force shall free me. Jedi accept death and the cycle of life, but join with the Force to help others. The Sith create life and master nature, breaking the cycle of life.
135* Little worried I'm misusing the phrase, but here goes: Jar Jar Binks. I was indifferent at first, then annoyed, then I watched ''The Phantom Menace'' again three days ago. I realized Jar Jar was not an idiot, nor hyper, nor a total goofball, just a poor, clumsy guy who was always in the wrong way at the wrong time. He was even capable of solemnity, at certain points, even in Episode I. Now, I actually respect Jar Jar as a decent member of the group! And then, in a further bit of Fridge Brilliance, I realized that Lucas probably didn't mean anything by using semi-real accents for certain species! These races likely didn't have Basic as their first language. They're probably taught something else during their childhood. The language shapes the mouth, and gives the accent, and do you expect a writer to make an accent up out of thin air? He's going to borrow from something he's seen! So no offence was meant!
136** How does Jar Jar being a "poor, clumsy guy who was always in the wrong way at the wrong time" make him a decent member of the group?
137** Yeah well, lots of people are racist and sexist and all those other things without meaning to be. And I say that as an avowed prequel fan who ''never'' hated Jar Jar.
138** I'm a little on the first Troper's side, given that I figured out the same idea on my own before ever seeing TPM.
139** I just figured Jar Jar was clumsy on land because he's an aquatic creature. Whenever he's in the water, he's swift and certain in his movements. (at least in the TV series, I can't remember if he's ever in the water in the movies.)
140** He's in the water in TPM when leading the Jedi to the Gungan city. He's fairly good at swimming there. He also has a magnificent dive.
141** The problem with this theory is that his natural habitat isn't water, it's air (remember the Gungan city? Sure it was underwater, but they lived in air). Also, the movie specifically states he was banished from there because he was clumsy.
142** My father is not a fan of the PT, but he liked the CG-animation that went into making Jar-Jar. He thought as a interacting being, Jar-Jar absolutely worked.
143*** It really did at that: people hate Jar-Jar for being [[TheScrappy a scrappy]] klutz used to deliver unfunny comic relief and for the unfortunate implications of his accent, but I don't think I've ever heard anyone complain that his FXs were poor, or that he wasn't convincing when he interacted with the non-CG characters.
144** I always took Jar Jar as a metaphor for what the prequels are about. In Phantom Menace he is comedy relief mostly, showing that despite what is going on this is a rather good time, people are happy and able to live. In Attack of the Clones he grows out of it a little, become more responsible, mirroring what is happening in the galaxy. And by Revenge when everything has gone to crap, Jar Jar is no longer comedy relief at all.
145** In an early interview with the "actor" playing Jar Jar Binks, the actor mentioned that he had Jamaican relatives and was having fun doing a lighthearted parody of them as his inspiration for the character. Is it racist [[NWordPrivileges if you are joking about your own race]]?
146*** Yes, it can still be racist, if the parody is informed by negative stereotypes of one's own culture. That's called internalized racism. And even if he did single-handedly think it up, all of the producers and film crew had to agree that it was a good idea and put it into the final idea of the film. And I'm one of those in the camp that thinks Binks' portrayal wasn't necessarily racist - just answering the above question.
147** I always considered Jar Jar to be the Star Wars version of ThisLoserIsYou. Jar Jar isn't some security guard, battle hardened soldier, lightsaber wielding badass, or anything like that, he's just some random ordinary guy (for an alien anyway) that Qui-Gon ran into that gets dragged by him into unfamiliar and ludicrously dangerous situations. Most people in our world if they were suddenly dropped into the middle of the events of Episode 1 would probably be just as clumsy and stupid as Jar Jar was, because like him we'd be completely out of our element. In the next 2 movies he becomes a Senator and has learned to adapt to these kind of things, thus he's not the clumsy moron he used to be.
148* At first I thought the midichlorians in ''Franchise/StarWars'' was a stupid way to explain away the Force. But then I realized that ''Franchise/StarWars'' is a combination of science fiction and fantasy, with your wizards flying in starships and whatnot. So, the magic of the Force having scientific roots is very fitting, and it explains why everybody in the ''Franchise/StarWars'' universe doesn't use the Force, because they can't. Even then, the Force is not generated by the midichlorians, the Force is still that mystical energy that surrounds and binds us, but the best way for humans to use it is to quiet your mind and listen to your midichlorians, who just happen to be the best conductors of the energetic Force. -{{washington213}}
149** The whole midichlorian thing always bothered me too until I thought about it. The way I interpreted it was that the force was all about binding the universe together, symbiosis and balance and what not, and that midichlorians were an expression of that. Without midichlorians, sentient life would have no concept of the force, and without life forms as a host the midichlorians could not survive. For the force to work, you need both of them supporting each other. The force is still mystical, as the midichlorians are merely the connection, but I found it to be a very meaningful plot point. -darksider
150*** It would have been even more meaningful of a plot point if George Lucas hadn't lost his nerve and kept the elements of the script which dealt with the racial animosity between the Naboo humans and the Gungans. In the end, the two overcome their differences and work together to defeat the Trade Federation. The theme is still present in the final cut, but because the explicitly racial element was removed, one has to pick up on bits and pieces of subtext and probably read some of the supporting material before the FridgeLogic comes together. And this is why George Lucas should not direct his own scripts.
151** And I recently had a Fridge Brilliance moment about people saying midichlorians [[DoingInTheWizard explains away the Force]]: some of ''the denizens of the Star Wars universe'' think this. How could Han not believe in the Force even though he grew up in the Old Republic? He thinks it's all midichlorians! -Duke
152*** I saw that as a(n accidental, in retrospect) subversion of SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale: Even in the Prequel Era, when the Jedi are relatively numerous, there are more planets in the Republic than there are Jedi. Obviously not everyone in the universe will be aware of Jedi, and not everyone who has heard of them will believe that their exploits are more than rumor.
153** I don't understand why people get so worked up about midichlorians. They are NOT mutually exclusive with the Force being spiritual/religious in nature. For example, let's say God created mankind - does this change the fact that humans have DNA and are made up of atoms? If you hate the fact it makes Jedi "predestined", well sorry to break it to you but they were that way anyway previously, they just said 'force sensitive' instead of having midichlorians. In fact, they did test for Jedi before the midichlorians were mentioned in canon, and one must assume they had SOME way of scientifically testing for it in children. In fact, it would be sort of ridiculous if the genetic makeup/DNA/atoms/whatever (not a scientist here) was NOT impacted by being force sensitive. I would find it strange they test for being a Jedi without actually having a substance/particle/whatever to test for. (i.e. if they didn't use the midichlorian explanation)
154** A big problem with it for me is that it made being a Jedi predetermined instead of a matter of choice or skill, down to how powerful the Jedi is. That neuters the religious aspect of it. -Impudent Infidel
155*** But it was ''always that way'' from the beginning in some fashion. Nowhere in the original trilogy is it even suggested that just any old person can become a Jedi with enough will and training. Otherwise Obi-Wan would not have had to wait until Luke was ready. He could have picked up any kid and trained them, except they were not ''Luke'', the son of one of the most powerful Force users ever born. All the midichlorians do is explain ''why'' it can't be just anyone and ''had'' to be Anakin's son.
156** I'm partial to the explanation that midichlorians aren't in any way force generators. A high midichlorian count is simply a symptom of somebody being highly sensitive to the force.
157*** One could argue that your midichlorian count makes it easier not only to learn the ways of the Force, but to also fall to the Dark Side (sensitivity to the Force and all that).
158** or it can simply NOT be Midichlorians. Think about it. if the Force is comparable to a religion they might not know everything about the Force so they use midichlorians to try to make sense of it. The prequels were all about talking about the Old Jedi's foolishness
159*** The midichlorians have to be connected somehow or else they'd quickly realize that the people they expect to be really powerful because of the high midichlorian count aren't actually infinitely ahead of the guy who barely qualified as a Jedi.
160** I realized the reason I hate the midichlorian explanation is because ''we already had an explanation.'' Yoda said that the Force was a field created from all living things. That's fine- it's mystical and far out there, but we've already seen it move things around and guide Luke and what-not. Now, we're told that somehow it's ''bacteria''? We've already seen bacteria in our universe, and it doesn't do any of the things the Force does. It's just like in Star Trek when the writers use Technobabble terms you recognize- it breaks the illusion.
161*** I agree with this full-heartedly. Midichlorians make things far, FAR worse. Because how do THEY interact with the force? And how do they share that interaction with the living beings? What of force spirits and places with Force "imprint", like the dark cave on Dagobah? Midichlorians not only answer nothing, they only make hand-waving the Force (pun POSSIBLY intended) more difficult.
162*** Ah, but what if the Midichlorian are Bacteria who are strong with the Force? I always interpreted Midichlorians as being an indicator, rather than a cause. Midichlorians like the Force, therefore they live in people who are strong with the Force. What always amused me about them was how their names sound passingly similar to Mitochrondrion, the organelles in cells that are described as "cellular power plants."
163*** The parallel between midichlorians and mitochondria is actually brilliant. Mitochondria are symbiotic bacteria that have are capable of oxidative energy production, which the host cells cannot do on their own. In other words, they provide access for their host through symbiosis to a universal source of energy (the chemical bond in the oxygen molecule) that happens to be the most powerful form of chemical energy in the universe that is available to organic life.
164*** EXACTLY. Midichlorians are '''not''' the Force. They can only communicate with it. They do the same thing on a microscopic level what we thought Luke and others were doing in the original movies.
165*** Think of them more as sense organs, like ears or eyes. 1 eye or ear allows you to see light/hear sound, 2 allows you to triangulate. Insects have compound eyes, prey animals like rabbits/deer have them either side of their head instead of both up front for near 360 degree vision. Midichlorians allow you to sense the force, the more you have, the closer to compound eyes/360 vision you have.
166*** I always interpreted the Force to be the active force representation of the Unified Field Theory - i.e. it is the unified force that governs all physics and movement within the universe - and hence that the Midichlorians just are a conduit to tap into the Force. I mean, technically, if everyone could tap into the Force just through years and years of practice, then Yoda would be a god by now (considering he was alive for 800 years) - the potential for use of the Force would be infinite if access to it was not restricted by a physiological imperative while the individual was alive. Once they die, we cross full on into Nirvana territory (merging with the Force, becoming one with the universe etc. etc.). I never saw it as DoingInTheWizard, but rather [[FunctionalMagic Giving The Wizard A Wand]]... er, [[{{Metaphorgotten}} sorta]].
167** I think the reason so many people hate the Midichlorians so much is the result of a mass misinterpretation of what Midichlorians are. People think Midichlorians '''themselves''' are the Force, and they aren't. Midichlorians are just a medium necessary to access the mystical energy field that is the Force, the more a lifeform has, the more capable they are at manipulating that mystical energy field, not the Force in and of themselves. When one uses the Force, they are telling the Midichlorians what they want the Force to do, and the Midichlorians transmit that desire to the energy field, which makes that desire happen. One becomes stronger in the Force by becoming better at communicating with the Midichlorians inside themselves, so even somebody who has a lower Midichlorian count can still beat somebody with a higher Midichlorian count by being more skilled at using the Force than the other person.
168** I was reading [[http://web.archive.org/web/20101020123407/https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/JustBugsMe/StarWarsArchive2010 an archived copy of a Just Bugs Me page from 2010]], when I suddenly realized why midichlorians work so well as an explanation. Being Force-Sensitive, or rather, having a high midichlorian count, is either a recessive or partially dominant trait. In addition, it was most likely self-destructive to early individuals until people began to come up with ways to use the Force instead of just letting it do whatever, which would likely take thousands of years (at best); before then, there'd be no real advantage to the trait, explaining why it's not standard.
169*** And in relation to the point above mine... you're right, Midichlorians only make sense as an access to the Force, not if they're the Force itself or responsible for its existence. Kinda like trying to power a light bulb with a flamethrower: no matter how much (heat) energy you've got, you can't use it unless you have a way of converting it into something compatible with what you want it for (in this case, electricity). Similarly, midichlorians convert pure Force into something compatible with biological life forms.
170** Maybe midichlorians are not the cause of an individual being highly in-tuned with the force, but rather a symptom. They are just bacteria, but bacteria that thrive off of organisms that are force sensitive enough to manipulate it, a.k.a. Jedi and Sith. To explain why they aren't cleared from people's systems after a dose of antibiotics for something else is that they're extremely adaptive and hard to get rid of, like MRSA, just completely harmless instead of causing massive infection.
171** There are a lot of misconceptions people who hate the concept of midichlorians labor under:
172*** 1) Midichlorians ARE the Force: False. Qui-Gon says nothing of the sort, and none of his dialogue contradicts Yoda's and Obi-Wan's descriptions that the Force is an energy field created by all living things.
173*** 2) Midichlorians create the Force: True and False. Midichlorians are living things, so they DO create the Force, just as humans, Hutts, mynocks, space slugs, Gungans, Gamorreans, et. al. do.
174*** 3) Midichlorians demystify the Force. False. The Force is still an energy field, nothing said about midichlorians contradicts that. Moreover, the prequels introduce the concept of the Force having a "will." Qui-Gon Jinn, in particular, seems to specialize in letting the will of the Force guide his actions, placing the Force in a far more religious context than it had been previously (and, let's be honest, it had been pretty religious before that.) Adding in concepts advanced, but not explored, in the prequels, such as "vergences" in the Force and prophecies, and it becomes clear that, even with midichlorians, the Force is far more than just biology.
175*** Midichlorians are nothing more or less than Qui-Gon calls them, microscopic organisms that live within the cells of beings in the Star Wars universe, and "communicate" with them the will of the Force. The mitochondria parallel has already been drawn, so I'll take it a step further: in the same way that real-life mitochondria translate energy from food into a form usable by our cells, midichlorians translate the energy of the Force into a form usable by a living organism. That's all. The Force is still a mystical energy field, and those who use it still have to grapple with the great moral questions that plague all sentient life.
176
177* I just realized that the R2 units on X-Wings are supposed to emulate the round observation dome on top of bombers.
178* A moment of FridgeBrilliance for myself was the pre-emptive realization that The Chosen One was always fated to destroy the Jedi Order. Even though the Jedi interpret the legend to foretell the end of the Sith, they are always careful to explicitly state: "The Chosen One will ''bring balance to the force''." At the time of Anakin's arrival, there are a tiny number of Sith and vast numbers of Jedi. Hence, to balance the force Anakin must kill most of the Jedi. By the original Star Wars trilogy we know of only two Sith (Palpatine and Vader) and two remaining Jedi (Obi-Wan and Yoda).
179** I thought this, too, until I stumbled across something George Lucas says in one of the DVD commentaries. He says that the Force is like a living entity, and that the Sith are akin to a cancer or disease, bringing it out of whack. Anakin/Vader fulfills the prophecy by doing away with the Sith, which requires him to sacrifice himself in the process. If a person's health is out of balance (y'know, he's sick), you don't make him sicker to make things fair, right? If you want to see how he phrased it, [[http://blogs.starwars.com/moosepoodo/17 here's]] a link.
180*** Actually, YES you DO treat some medical conditions by injuring a person further. Especially with CANCER. Think about it. What is surgery? It's cutting a person open. The fact that you sew them up afterwards notwithstanding. We're just so used to the idea that it seldom occurs to us that that is what surgery is. The other major way cancer is treated is by poisoning the patient, with a poison that (we hope) will affect the cancerous tissue more than it affects healthy tissue. We call this 'chemotherapy'.
181*** Hell, even antivenoms are made using venom from the animal in question. If you look at the Sith like a poison, infecting and spreading through the Force, then you can look at Darth Vader as the antivenom: made from the same source material (the Dark Side), but working AGAINST it as opposed to WITH it
182** WordOfGod or not, I disagree: I had a similar moment to Pak's: 2 Sith + balance = ...2 Jedi. (Ooops!) Given the way the phrase was so clearly and constantly used, I see it as a combination of arrogance and blindness on the part of the Jedi that made them assume that "balance" would mean "we win" (and would therefore be a ''good'' thing, instead of the prophecy of disaster it turned out to be).
183*** While I agree that there is a certain attraction to the idea that "bringing balance to the Force" doesn't just mean destroying the Sith and may not even be something good, that equal numbers reasoning never appealed to me. Jedi and Sith are the main organizations of Force-users, by they do not, in their totality, constitute the Force itself. Even just between Jedi and Sith, there's a lot more that goes into "balance" than how many living adherents each side can boast. [[FridgeLogic Equalizing the number of Jedi and the number of Sith = bringing balance to the ''Force''? I think not]].
184*** I had the same idea, thinking the "Balance" aspect was in fact Luke: A Jedi who could be fueled by his Emotions, but at the same time keep from being controlled by them. His defeat of Vader at the climax of [=RotJ=] seemed to be the prime example of that.
185*** Just to add even more confusion, there's the issue of the so-called True Sith, who live in the Unknown Regions. That's two Sith orders to one Jedi order. And the True Sith are only mentioned in the [=KotOR=] games. How's that for FridgeBrilliance?
186*** While I agree that Bringing Balance wasn't likely to be reducing the number of Jedi to equal the number of Sith, I always viewed the Jedi as fallen or failed. The Force is Life and exists in the myriad of shades of grey. Having only good would lead to an ineffectual Ivory Tower or totalitarian utopian society. Thus the Old Jedi order also needed to be removed to allow the Force to from freely through the universe without being shoehorned into a "human" flawed morality system.
187*** Bringing Balance to the force could be the galaxy's reset button. The [=KotOR=] games mention a Sith version of the chosen one. if both chosen ones are one in the same, then the job is reciprocated both ways. only a few jedi and dark jedi survive to spark their respective sides of the force after the prophecy comes true. this can be more than a one time occurrence,chosen ones for multiple eras. Arguably Darth Revan fits the bill.
188*** The movies do not refer to a "light side", only a "dark side" -- it may not be quite right to think of the Jedi and Sith as some sort of gnostic opposites, but rather to think of the Jedi as the "balance" state, and Sith as a symptom of "imbalance" -- perhaps even imagining the two Sith as two extremes in an Aristotelian sense, with the Sith Master representing cold, calculating control, and the apprentice representing brutal strength.
189*** Also, the way one becomes the Sith Master is by killing the previous Sith Master. And at the end of ''Return of the Jedi'', Darth Vader kills Palpatine followed by Luke killing Vader (by removing his helmet). So one could argue that at the end, Luke is both the last remaining Jedi AND the last remaining Sith.
190*** Alternatively, Luke is neither. He never finished his Jedi training. Vader killed Obi-Wan, Palpatine and himself, while Yoda died on his own. No Jedi left, no Sith left. Balance!
191*** Except Yoda told Luke in Return "Your training is done, now GTFO!" So yeah. Plus, on the BalanceBetweenGoodAndEvil argument, explain how this balance could have existed for the some millennia that the Dark Jedi didn't show up in and why if that balance was so necessary that Darth Bane would enforce the Rule of Two?
192*** Vader killed Palpatine not out of aggression, but to save his son. At that point he had forsaken his sith training, fulfilled the prophecy, and brought balance to the force. Luke removing Vader's mask always felt more like fulfilling his father's dying request or at worst assisted suicide.
193*** What I personally think on the matter of the "balance issue" is that it is essentially a reset button. We mustn't focus on the fact that all the Jedi and Sith died but WHY they died. This reason is misuse of the Force. This is more obvious in the Sith than in the Jedi. The Jedi are steadfast in their old ways without being open to new ones and adapting likewise. In fact think of it this way: an organization who only accepts infants as members whom they will then train to use a specific elite skill-set that cannot be used by those not chosen, they are also taught a strict set of beliefs that includes forbidding them from exhibiting emotion and having children of their own, any deviation from this and they are "turned to the dark side" and their former peers are sent to eliminate them as an enemy; all for the sake of order. Not how they would have you believe it. But this inability to adapt and quest for order and control indicates a misuse of the Force. The sentient Force would therefore have balance be to get rid of these old ideas that seem to have strayed from the point and unfortunately it is so ingrained the extermination is required. Cue Anakin. His wiping out of the Jedi and then of Palpatine led the way for Luke to create the New Jedi Order which was open and inclusive. Essentially Order 66 and Anakin's final act before dying can be likened to the Great Flood of the Noah's Ark story. Also the only people distinguishable after becoming one with the Force, have all at some point embraced this concept: Qui-Gon Jinn was willing to train Anakin even though he was older and made an illegal bet because it was necessary, Obi-Wan was also willing to train Anakin and Luke and also harboured emotions for Anakin (more brotherly bond than a student-teacher one), Yoda eventually trained Luke out of necessity despite his age and emotional state, and Anakin himself for too many reasons to count. Wow. That is one massive wall of text!
194*** Personally I've always seen it more as '''Palpatine''' being the imbalance in the Force. I mean, think about it, the Force isn't in balance when Palpatine and Vader die, there's still Luke, who is a Jedi. Going by the view that it's about the Jedi/Sith being in balance, there's simply no evidence that the Force is in balance, because there are more Jedi than Sith at the end of the movies. Plus, as the Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse shows us, the Jedi aren't the be all and end all of Force users, they're just the most famous group. So yeah, Palps is the imbalance, because when he dies, the Force is balanced once more.
195*** I should know that even the numbers doesn't means "Balance". Sure there are as many Jedi as Sith, but the Sith have much more power and influence than the Jedi, so not balanced, at all.
196** The point I think is that while sure, the Sith were a disease on the living force, ''so were the Old Jedi.'' They had become corrupted and misdirected, ossified, blind, dogmatic and tyrannical. If the Sith are a cancer, then the Old Jedi had become an autoimmune disease. To properly bring balance to the force, ''both'' the Sith and the Old Jedi had to be destroyed, and a new, redeemed Jedi order had to be rebuilt. So Anakin fulfilled the prophecy by destroying both the Old Jedi and the Sith, and fathering Luke and Leia.
197** This was my idea on the "Balance" view of things, and it's a bit of an amalgamation of more than a couple of views stated above... I always applied the Taoist/Buddhist basis for the Jedi religion/philosophy rather strictly. Both Yin and Yang are necessary in complement to create balance within the universe, for without one the other cannot be defined - if one is diminished and the other over-reaching, the more heavily weighed side will start to corrupt/decompose in order to bring back the level balance. However, at the time of the Phantom Menace, the Sith - who were pure NeutralEvil - were only two, while the Jedi were in the hundreds. In essence the "light" side representatives of the force seriously out-weighed the dark side, and because of this, the Jedi order itself had become unstable, aligned with a corrupt government, blinded to the corruption taking place in a society they were sworn to protect, complacent and stagnant after thousands of years of stasis and a lack of growth. In themselves, the Jedi had begun to crumble and distort, deviating from the way they had prescribed for themselves and bound by a system of social and democratic governance that was in itself in decay. When the prophecy said that the Chosen One would bring "balance" back to the force, it didn't say "destroy the evil side so that the light side would reign supreme", it said bring back ''balance'' - an equal interplay of good and evil that was based on an equality of purpose so one side could define the other. Hence that is ''exactly what Anakin did''. First off, he destroyed the Jedi order, nearly eradicating all Jedi from the face of the universe, and neatly decimating the "good" or light side of the equation, bringing the evil or dark side into prominence, then he did the same with the ''dark'' side as well when it became overbearing and on the point of dominance. He brought both over-reaching weights on both good and evil back down to subliminal balance. Then after he was gone, Luke was left with a galaxy with a healthy representation of uncorrupted good, but still one with strong remnants of a clear and present evil. And that battle between good and evil is fought out and debated over the expanded universe beyond the events of episode 6. In effect, ''Anakin fulfilled the prophecy right down to the letter''. I only wished he could have done it without the excessive angsting that happened in episode III. Hope that makes sense, but that's just my view. ~ @/{{13secondspastmidnight}}
198** The novelization of ''Literature/RevengeOfTheSith'' includes an interesting dialogue between Obi-Wan and Mace Windu, in which the latter describes the inherent difference between how the Jedi and Sith operate: the Jedi, as Windu puts it, "create light" by always working selflessly for the good of the galaxy, but the Sith don't "create darkness", merely use the darkness which is and always has been there, the [[HumansAreBastards Sentient Beings Are Bastards]] factor. Obi-Wan, trying to clarify Windu's meaning, wonders if the Jedi have cast too much light. Later on in the novel, there's a nicely poetic passage explaining how "the brightest light casts the darkest shadow". The extended metaphor suggests that the new Sith were born as a result of the unyielding and immovable Jedi Order, casting too bright a light on the Galaxy, a little darkness being needed to restore order and renew everything. If a system in equilibrium will adjust itself to accommodate a stress applied so it can right itself, then the "Reset Button" theory seems more likely. Anakin's fall to the dark side was a necessary step in bringing balance to the Force -- the excessive light of the Jedi had to be extinguished, briefly replaced by the equally unnatural excessive darkness of the Sith, for the natural balance of light and dark to be reasserted.
199*** Another possibility is that Anakin brought balance to the Force... But not directly. He brought balance by destroying the old ways, breaking the dichotomy of the Force, and giving rise to a new perspective born of those outside the old ways. The Balance he brought came to fruition in Ahsoka Tano, in Cal Kestis, in Ezra Bridger, and in Rey Skywalker. In the ones who see the Force not as Light and Dark separately, but as a spectrum inside us. The ones who realize that anger, rage, sorrow, love, connection, and every other emotion are a part of us, and balance comes from accepting both and learning to balance them inside ourselves. Ones who have touched the Dark,and who understand it's allure, but who ultimately turned to the Light.
200** Another complication to this: the idea that the old Jedi order was stagnant and needed to be destroyed for the Force to be brought back into balance also applies to the Sith, even if one doesn't regard their mere existence as an imbalance. By the end of the prequel triology, the Jedi had grown complacent and dogmatic, no longer adhering to the spirit of Jedi ideals. Meanwhile at the end of the OT, Palpatine has been spending most of the Empire's existence resting on his laurels as far as advancement of the Sith goes, in a relationship where his apprentice has far less potential to grow and surpass him as he did in his prime. He certainly tries in [=RoTJ=], and has been shown to try in the EU, but it falls flat largely because the only people left alive he could drawn upon as potential successors are either inadequate or (in Luke's and Leia's cases) not sufficiently pliable. By his own actions, Palpatine has doomed the Sith to stagnation as well, and Vader turns on them right when Palaptine's sealed the Sith's fate by deciding Luke is of no use to him. The only other option that'd be left at this point would be Leia, who'd no doubt be even less receptive to becoming a new Sith apprentice than Luke. The Jedi fell at the height of their corruption and decay, and the Sith fell right as Palpatine ensured the Sith would have no future beyond him. Both orders betrayed their principles in some way, which played a direct hand in their subsequent downfall.
201** To add to this, As shown in the Rise of Skywalker, Palpatine's plan was always immortality. He intended to end the Rule of Two and rule by himself as a dictator in perpetuity. So the Sith really would have no future beyond him.
202[[/folder]]
203
204[[folder:General cont.]]
205* I never liked the Prequel Trilogy, but then I watched them all back to back...AND THEY'RE BRILLIANT! Mostly if you look into the character of Anakin. First the annoying little kid? Even as a child you see the seeds of his turning over to the dark side. He has zero respect for authority, and this comes from him being a slave having to out smart his master. We see this, even in Episode 1, when the kid has the balls to STEAL A STAR FIGHTER AND ATTACK THE DROID CONTROL SHIP! But here's the kicker to me, this distrust of authority seems to actually have more to do with the light side than the dark side. In Episode 2, we see that Anakin is rebellious, but good (indeed it may be the Jedi trying to crush this rebellious streak that leads him to the dark side). In Episode 3, we see him openly espousing Crypto-fascist ideas, before submitting himself to the authority of Palpatine. He sticks to this worshipful reverence of Palpatine through out the original trilogy, and his moment of redemption is when he kills Palpatine. Also the way the Prequel Trilogy plays out like a mirror image of the Original is interesting too. In the first episode of the Prequel Trilogy we see a Hopeful world, but with a little bit of darkness hiding in the background, in the first of the Original Trilogy we see a dark world, but with a little bit of hope hiding in the background. By the end of the Prequel Trilogy the darkness overwhelms the hope, and by the end of the OT, Hope wins out. -JohniBoi
206* In the original trilogy, the Emperor is a cackling old maniac that is so evil, he can shoot lightning out of his hands, but can be killed by being dropped in a BottomlessPit. In the prequels, he is a MagnificentBastard that can executes {{Xanatos Gambit}}s, {{Batman Gambit}}s, and takes over a galaxy through political cunning. And when he has to, he can dispatch all but Yoda in duels. in short, he's AWESOME. Why did they change his personality so much? Because of the other Sith, mainly Dooku. Dooku could also shoot lightning with ease, and he's not exactly learned in the Sith ways. Suddenly, ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' has a moderately powerful, frail, insane, ugly old man calling the shots for Darth Vader. Lucas needed a Sith that could still seem formidable without his allies.
207* Something that I realized while watching the third movie about how R2 was able to destroy 2 super battle droids without any problem. He was lifted into the air and after spurting oil at them was able to use a jetpack like apparatus and not only escape but set the oil on fire to destroy the other droids. This scene was so awesome that I didn't bother to think about it, but later I wondered why R2 didn't ever use those things in the older movies, but then I realized that he couldn't. He was a rebel droid in the first trilogy and they most likely didn't have the funds to spend on maxing out a single Astrodroid. Not only that, but after he joined the rebels he was just another droid instead of general Skywalkers personal droid which most likely came with special privileges. Without his status he most likely put aside and while in the service of Leia he wasn't given his past armaments.
208** R2 droids are made to be highly modular, and R2-D2's had a large amount of owners. They've likely changed his equipment loadout over time, as well, compounding why his enhancements seem so eclectic from movie to movie.
209** Alternatively, R2 seemed to have more advanced gadgets in the prequel trilogy that, logically, would have been really useful in the original trilogy (the rocket-boosters, for one). In RealLife, [[RealLifeWritesThePlot it's because they had better technology for special effects for the prequel trilogy]]. In-universe, it could be because R2 is much 'older' in the original trilogy and might have missed some necessary upgrades.
210* Last summer a friend of mine and I watched all six of the films in order (i.e. Episodes I-VI) and realized that the story isn't about Luke, like you might think it is, ''it's about Anakin, his downfall, and his redemption.'' She spent a full half hour trying to talk through her intense feelings about it; then again, she also had just spent fourteen hours watching, but when you realize that, it is a very powerful story.
211* Even though all of the villains of the OT all die before the end, Luke Skywalker (the hero of the films) does not kill any of them directly. The only one he even kills indirectly is Grand Moff Tarkin, who could've survived if he'd evacuated before Luke blew up the Death Star. Boba Fett? Han Solo knocks him into the Sarlaac pit. Jabba the Hutt? Choked by Leia. Admiral Piett? A-wing crashes into the bridge of his ship. Emperor Palpatine? Thrown down a shaft by Vader. Darth Vader? Electrocuted by Palpatine as he's thrown down the shaft (or he had Luke remove his mask in a form of suicide, YMMV).
212* A just-realized moment of my own: The "Vader" in Darth Vader is, in the real world, the Dutch word for "Father." In the Original Trilogy, this was merely a foreshadowing hint to Vader's true identity. However, in the Prequel Trilogy, where Palpatine grants him the name, the father meaning seems to not be present. But then I realized: Anakin's fall to the Dark Side resulted because of his desire to save his wife and unborn child. He fell because he was acting as a husband and father. The name Vader takes on a much greater meaning now I realize that.
213** Also, when Palpatine probably gave Vader that name thinking that Anakin, a being of nearly unlimited power in the Force, would become the "father" of the new order of Sith.
214** Actually, according to WordOfGod, the "Vader is Luke's father" element didn't exist at the time the first film was written (in fact, it wasn't even in the first draft of ''Empire''!), so that really must be chalked up to coincidence.
215*** Since The Force in ''A New Hope'' is portrayed as an "old religion" and Vader as a sort of Imperial cleric, it is quite likely Vader meant Father in the priestly sense. Fridge Brilliance indeed!
216*** However, Lucas did have the idea for Obi-Wan and Vader being Luke's Dark and Light Fathers, symbolically.
217*** Adding onto the duality of fathers: In the EU it's made clear that the only character with who Mara Jade any two-way emotional connection was Vader. This makes sense, since he was probably thinking that the child he thought was dead would have been her age.
218** Vade is also a verb which means "vanish." Darth Vader, in other words, is esteemed so powerful that he figuratively makes his enemies disappear. The name also implies everyone's belief that Anakin Skywalker is [[MetaphoricallyTrue dead]], vanished, and further, Palpatine's apparent failure to remember why he turned in the first place--for the sake of his prospective family. When he learnt that they were still alive, Anakin resurfaced, and it was Vader who faded away.
219** Also Vader's first task under Palpatine was to inVADE the Jedi Temple.
220*** Apparently, "Darth Vader" was a name that existed from the first draft of Star Wars... but it belonged to some low-rank imperial officer. A person completely irrelevant in the grand scheme. So whatever meanings (coincidental or not) it eventually raked up, the name stayed mostly because it sounds AWESOME.
221* This one concerns the much-derided moment in ''Return of the Jedi'' when Palpatine congratulates Luke on losing control of his anger, [[YourApprovalFillsMeWithShame thus reminding Luke that he had to control himself]]. It seems like a moment of complete idiocy on Palpatine's part... ''and it is''. That moment illustrates why the Sith's adherence to their own emotions can be a weakness instead of the strength they claim it is: without Jedi self-control, Palpatine couldn't contain his glee at being so close to his ultimate goal... and that momentary lapse made him lose it all.
222** No, actually it was not stupid, not at all. Think about it. Palpatine's goal is not just to turn Luke to the Dark Side, but to turn Luke to the Dark Side ''as his new apprentice''. If he had said nothing and Luke had gone on to kill Vader in anger, that act would have been an act of ''defiance'' against Palpatine - the slaying of Palpatine's apprentice. Luke might have fallen as a result, but he would have fallen as a ''rival dark Jedi'' to Palpatine, and that would have been no good for Palpatine at all. Even if he was confident that he was powerful enough to dispose of Luke, he loses his apprentice (Vader), and gets no replacement. So he had to interject, to test Luke, to make sure that when Luke kills Vader, it is in response to Palpatine's ''own command'', making the act one of ''obedience'' to Palpatine's will, and symbolic of Luke's submission to Palpatine as his new master. If Luke refuses to fall, then Palpatine could kill Luke, and ''keep'' Vader alive. This way, he gets to retain an apprentice, no matter how Luke chooses. His one mistake was failing to anticipate (or perhaps even conceive of the possibility) that Vader would ever, ever, turn on him.
223*** I'm not sure that's right either - it wasn't a matter of obedience vs. defiance, because it isn't as if Palpatine is willing Luke to kill Vader in spite of himself or anything like that, and if Luke had done it it STILL would not have been out of any sense of obedience to Palpatine, it would have been purely out of his own anger. What Palpatine was doing was forcing Luke to think about how much stronger and more capable he was once he started giving in to anger. He first made Luke feel as helpless and frustrated as possible, and then he wanted him to feel empowered by his hate. The goal was to have Luke say to himself "he's right, if I act like a passive Zen master I don't get what I want and all my friends die. If I act on my feelings I become strong enough to kill Vader. I need to follow this path from now on to get what I want, and I need to learn this path from this old bastard - for now." that would have given Palpatine another powerful servant with the standard Sith "fickle loyalty in exchange for power I need even though I hate you" arrangement.
224*** Even better- If Luke had just killed his father in a momentary rage, at the end of a battle for his life, he might have immediately regretted it. He might have had a "What have I done?" moment, and rejected the dark side right then and there. Even if he didn't, Luke would only have been taking a step towards the dark side, which wouldn't have been enough as Palpatine was right there and it was about to be 'join me or die'. Palpatine needed Luke to consciously decide to give in to his anger so that there would have been no going back. It had to be a choice, not a reaction.
225*** Palpatine had an easier time with Anakin, because Anakin's motivation in betraying Mace Windu was more than just embracing the Dark Side. It was his need for the Sith knowledge that he believed Palpatine possessed, which could avert his prophecy of Padme's death. With Luke, killing Vader was an end unto itself. Afterward, he would still need to be convinced to become Palpatine's apprentice (as opposed to turning on Palpatine in Dark Side fueled rage at being forced to kill his own father). Ironically, they didn't have time for all of this anyway. The Rebels had already brought down the shield and were making their assault on the reactor. Assuming Palpatine was even aware of this, he had mere ''minutes'' to deal with Luke and then get them both out of there before they all went KABOOM!
226** There's another point that everyone seems to overlook here when pointing this moment out (self included): Whether or not you think Palpatine's behavior in this moment was stupid, the fact is that it was also ''completely in character''. Palpatine is not only supremely arrogant, he is also surpassingly successful; things have been working out in his favor pretty much his whole life. The end result is a man who is so thoroughly convinced of his own infallability that it never even occurs to him that things won't go his way no matter what he says to Luke.
227* I finally understands (he thinks) what Yoda was trying to say to Anakin the last time they spoke together: He didn't want Anakin to let go of his ''attachments'', as much as he wanted him to let go of ''his fear'' that stemmed from them. Anakin was blinded by it since the visions started. He was so focused on avoiding or preventing the danger that he never thought to ''identify'' it, and recognize it when it came. He blindly latched onto the first hand that reached out, and thus damned the galaxy for almost twenty years.
228* For the absolute ''longest'' time, I was of the opinion that Anakin only wanted to become a fully-fledged Jedi because he just wanted power. Then I realized that in Episode II, he has recurring dreams about his mother suffering - ''he wanted to save his mother'', and he couldn't get out of his Jedi commitments when still a Padawan. When he goes to save her and fails completely, it starts to break him. In Episode III, he still wants to be a master so he can have more time with Padme and his future children, but the council still don't let him because he's unstable.
229** The novelization makes this motivation explicit. It's not the only thing it clears up either. The reason the prequels are regarded so poorly is because George Lucas took too much of the subtext, background, and motivation for his characters for granted and never bothered to explain to the audience what was going on half the time. This was likely an effect of having lived in this world and with these characters for YEARS; Lucas was so close to the material he lost the ability to asses it objectively. Had he let another director handle the prequels it is likely they would have been far superior in quality, and not nearly as loathed as they are (at least among the general public, I'm sure just as many fanboys would be upset at the new movies upsetting the {{Fanon}})
230* One of the biggest things everybody mocks the prequel trilogy for is the chemistry, or lack thereof, between Anakin and Padme. But it occurred to me that Anakin's awkwardness with Padme, especially in Episode II, is entirely [[JustifiedTrope understandable]]: he's been part of a monastic order since the age of nine. He's not gonna be a Don Juan. He's a WarriorMonk-in-training! And as Bill Murray said in ''Film/{{Stripes}}'', "Did you ever see a monk get wildly fucked by some teenage girls?".
231** Doesn't save Padme's awkwardness with him, though. Or the fact that she shows no discernible reaction when he reveals to her ''he's a mass murderer of Sand People.''
232*** No reaction? Watch it again. The instant he starts rambling about killing them all, watch how her weight shifts. She's preparing to ''run the fuck away!''
233*** That may count too. She doesn't care at all that Anakin just killed a whole camp of people, because she's learned to be emotionally detached, but it could also hint at some fantastic racism there. We know that the humans on Naboo and the Gungans dislike each other. It seems likely that she could regard the Sand People as sub-human. It also tends to keep with the way humans in Star Wars tend to be. Leia refers to Chewie as a "walking carpet" in one scene, which could be considered a bit speciest as well.
234*** Well, she had been in the public eye from a young age, and had never gotten much time for more intimate relationships until AOTC.
235*** Yeah, Padme's been wearing a ToughLeaderFacade since she was [[AChildShallLeadThem fourteen]]. She had to learn how to mask, and at times [[TheStoic hide]] her emotions in order to be taken seriously. Being ruled by her emotions was a big no-no.
236*** Exactly. She may very well have been horrified at Anakin's actions, just that her training for queenship so long ago taught her to not have a meltdown. That's put into question when she later marries said mass-murderer...
237*** Meh. Lets face it. Anakin's killing of the Sand People will not exactly make him the most unpopular man on Tatooine. It was an over reaction, but an understandable one in the circumstances.
238*** Overlooking some of the dialogue/plot issues the prequels had in some places, I've always thought Padme was a great foil to Anakin. He was a man who couldn't let go of his personal attachments for the sake of the higher cause; she was a woman who had sacrificed so much of herself for the greater good that she hardly had anything personal to speak of. She was always strong in her moral convictions, but Anakin's passionate endeavor hit her right where she was weakest.
239* I was pondering why the robots in the ''Star Wars'' series are all called "droids"; most of them are about as far from traditional androids as you can get. And then it hit me: "an" also means "opposite of", so the opposite of an android would be, logically, a "droid"! The genuinely humanoid ones like [=C-3PO=] are noticeably rare and probably a more recent invention than the other types, by sheer virtue of their complexity. OK, so Anakin was able to create one from scratch, but he's a freaking genius. That was kind of the point.
240** Saying Anakin built 3PO from scratch is a bit of a stretch. We know from the films there are other droids like him in existence (several show in the original trilogy and a couple more in the prequels). It's more likely Anakin found the pieces of several junked units and managed to rebuild a working unit out of them. Still pretty good for a seven year old, but it's far from the CreatorsPet territory most people assumed it was in.
241** A comic (linked to in ThankTheMaker) shows Anakin found the structure mostly intact.
242** Except the "andr" in ''android'' comes from the Greek word for ''man'', and the "oid" means ''like''. So it would mean robots in the ''Franchise/StarWars'' universe are so called because of their resemblance to the letters "d" and "r" - brilliance!
243** Possibly the term "droid" was adopted because robots that look like humans are called "androids", while robots that look like other major ''Franchise/StarWars'' races are called "____oids", whatever suits the race in question. If a few of those _____s happen to end in "dr" also, then "droids" would be a logical slang term to encompass both human-like and other robotic designs.
244* Up until ''ROTS'', this troper used to think Vader's black lenses were [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin just that]]. But as his mask is being lowered, we see the lenses show red and black LCD. Red and black were the two dominant colors of Mustafar, so as Vader, Anakin sees the world looking just like the one which changed him forever. It lends a greater impact to his line "Let me look on you with my own eyes".
245** It also looks like fire as we see the mask descending over him, symbolizing Anakin's descent into Hell.
246* Luke's first and last spoken lines in the OT have to do with choice. In ''ANH'', when we first meet Luke, his Aunt Beru asks him to remind him to tell his Uncle Owen to make sure a translator droid can speak Bocce, to which Luke says "Doesn't look like we have much of a choice, but I'll remind him". And towards the end of ''[=ROTJ=]'', he says "Father, I won't leave you" as his redeemed father Anakin dies.
247* There is one very powerful theme that crosses almost the entire saga and can only be fully understood by putting both trilogies together. In Episode III Obi-Wan suggests that he raises Luke himself while Yoda says no, that he should be raised outside of the Jedi life. This is elaborated more in the novelization, where Yoda believes that he lost the duel with Sidious because he had spent his life trying to hold on to past Jedi tradition while the Sith learned to evolve. In the case of Anakin, the Jedi life was forced upon him and he constantly resented it (taken away from his mother, forbidden from marrying Padme, etc). Because of this, whenever he made a personal choice he was always worried of the backlash. In the case of Luke, when offered the chance to leave Tatooine he told Obi-Wan that he has responsibilities on the farm. Obi-Wan's reply (with a distinct sense of regret) was "You must do what you feel is right." And when Luke approached Yoda, the little guy practically made Luke beg to be trained, to ensure that he wasn't going to go at it half-assed. Because of this, whenever Luke made a personal choice he always seemed to do so with resolve and dedication. And then in the ExpandedUniverse Luke's new Jedi Order emphasized the importance of evolution and learning over ancient tradition. The ''Franchise/StarWars'' saga is a message about the dangers of blind tradition and the importance of personal choice. George Lucas said he wanted to tell his story, and this is what it is.
248** And one line that perfectly enhances that theme is in ''Film/ANewHope''. When Luke is disappointed to learn that Han and Chewie will not stay to help the Rebels fight the Death Star, Leia tells him that "He [Han] has got to follow his own path. No one can choose it for him."
249** The Yoda theory is confirmed in the Thrawn Trilogy; when Luke is reflecting on the passing of Obi-Wan's ghost, he claims he is the last of the Jedi... then he hears Obi-Wan's voice "Not the last of the old Jedi, but the first of the new"
250** It also explains the "bring balance to the Force" prophecy quite cleanly. The Sith don't represent balance because they're too self-indulgent and cruel. But the Jedi don't represent balance ''either'', because they're too LawfulStupid. Proper balance, therefore, requires that both orders be dismantled, so that another one can rise - and indeed it does. It's less obvious there, but this is also the outcome of the ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' series, and helps explain just what Kreia (and possibly Revan) intended.
251*** You noticed that too? I figured out a theory recently on what 'balance' could possibly mean to the Force, which seems to be more like the life energy of the entire galaxy: if the Force itself is alive, how could a stagnant, hyper-controlling and unchanging Jedi Order possibly be ''good'' for it? In nature, stagnation usually equals death. The Sith philosophy seems like a good alternative in theory, but the way the Dark Side corrupts and perverts life makes it seem more like a cancer - growth for the sake of growth, power for the sake of power. Anakin's entire life was forcing the Force to act more dynamically, to encourage healthy development.
252** ''Film/TheLastJedi'' hits this theme too, from a different angle. Luke chose to model his new Jedi on the old Jedi, and succeeded only in emulating their fatal flaw. Rey chooses to recreate Luke redeeming Vader, and only gives Kylo Ren the opening to kill Snoke and entrench himself deeper in the Dark Side. Kylo Ren is chastised for choosing to be nothing more than a Darth Vader wannabe, so chooses to what Vader never did: kill his Master and take his place. Poe had the choice between sticking to his post and following orders or cooking up a maverick scheme, his maverick scheme nearly gets everyone killed. The CentralTheme is failure... but what is failure but a choice that didn't pan out? Get back up, and ''learn to make better choices''.
253* We're meant to hate Jar Jar. He represents the stupid, uninformed masses who come in and frak up democracy by voting without any real opinion of what's going on. He gets quilted into giving his support to Palpatine because it makes him feel good, just like how so many voters choose the candidate who "feels" like they've got everyone's best interests in mind. Jar Jar's single vote sets us on the path that will kill off the last, lingering vestiges of democracy in the Old Republic. Think of what we've seen him doing in the past. He's a clumsy backwater hick who gets kicked exiled for causing massive chaos with his own clumsiness. Then he gets picked up by Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan, and for the rest of the movie, we can barely make it 20 minutes without some new scene of Jar Jar clumsily making gigantic messes of parts shops or armies. And yet, for some reason, this buffoon is who we trust the entire fate of democracy to. Hmmm....
254* George Lucas was inspired by many things in creating ''Star Wars'': the old Buck Rogers serials, Joseph Campbell books on mythology, Japanese Samurai movies like ''The Hidden Fortress'' on so on. It just occurred to me that Lucas may also have been inspired by Medieval tales like the King Arthur legend as well: The union of Anakin is Padme is that of a knight (a Jedi Knight) and a lady (Queen-turned-senator), and Palpatine is in effect an evil sorcerer of sorts. Obi-Wan perhaps played the Merlin role, as did Yoda.
255** Lucas has long acknowledged that Joseph Campbell's work on the Arthurian legend inspired a lot in Episode IV. One example you missed; Obi-Wan presenting Luke with his father's lightsaber is analogous to Arthur claiming Excalibur (which had been his father's sword).
256* It's an ironic twist that love is what causes Anakin to fall to the Dark Side (and more ironic that this leads to him killing his love), while love is what brings him back to the light at the end of the series. Consider this: plenty of times throughout the EU, Vader is shown to loathe himself, and the reason is obvious. ''He killed the only woman he ever loved.'' Hence the annoying Big No at the end of ''Revenge of the Sith''. This was his own personal hell that he had created for himself: to always remember that he ruined his own life by killing his love. Then, about 21 years later, he sees his son in a position that echoed Padme's hauntingly. Pleading for Anakin to save him while in agony from a Dark Side attack. Luke had tried to turn him back to the Light since they first met in ''Return of the Jedi'', but it isn't until his son is put in that situation that he does. I think that's what did it; not just that his son, the only thing of Padme he had left, was in mortal danger, but he was forcibly reminded of the time he failed her and he couldn't bear to allow it to happen again.
257** One particular comic in the EU demonstrates this. Some of Palpatine's Dark Side adepts disapprove of Vader being his apprentice and think Maul would be better, so they use Dark Side magic to resurrect him. When Vader discovers this and confronts Maul, they get into a duel. Maul goes on and on about how his (Maul's) large capacity for hatred makes him powerful, powerful enough to defeat Vader with ease. When Maul finally gets behind Vader and moves to strike him down, Vader rams his lightsaber through his own chest, running Maul through in the process. Maul is in complete disbelief, and as he lays dying he asks what could Vader possibly hate so much that it would give him the power to defeat Maul. Vader doesn't even turn around, he's in a terribly sorry state: his cape in tatters, armor torn, missing a mechanical limb, just utters one word. "Myself".
258** Which gave me some fridge light-not only was Luke pleading with his father, Vader just learned about his daughter, saw what Palpatine was doing, and didn't want to do more to her, (sorry about killing your mom and, ya know, blowing up Alderaan-my bad). Plus, fathers having the soft spot for daughters.
259** One thing that occurred to this Troper after watching all the films in succession several times, is what is Vader's exact motivation for destroying Palpatine? Is it to save his son, or to preserve the only thing left of Padme?
260* Vader can seem like an incredibly dumb character, mostly because he is so inconsistent in his actions. One minute he is a loving, caring, albeit obsessive husband who wants to protect those he cares about, and next he's murdering children. His psychological transformation into Vader was sudden and not fully explained. I used to chalk this up to simply Lucas's crappy writing. But then I began researching psychological disorders, and I stumbled across Borderline Personality Disorder, a mental state in which people tend to have varying extremes of emotion, reason and the like. They can't seem to decide on a single core personality. And then it hit me at last: this is Anakin's problem! He's got BPD! A scientific explanation for his all-over-the-place behavior! This explains how he could be trying to fight Luke one second, and then suddenly switches sides and kills Palpatine. His mind is just wired that way. Similar to bipolar disorder, actually. If Lucas actually had BPD in mind when he created Vader (and Anakin), then he is more brilliant than I could have ever expected of him, and has created one of the most complex and psychologically fascinating characters of all time. -Unnamed Troper.
261** [[http://www.livescience.com/10679-psychology-darth-vader-revealed.html Experts seem to agree]]. -ajay
262* It's arguably FridgeBrilliance that when it comes to lightsaber colours, Qui-Gon uses green, Obi-Wan uses blue, and Luke Skywalker uses blue in ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'' and green in ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi''. [[spoiler:Also, Qui-Gon was more trusting of Anakin than Obi-Wan was, much like how Luke was more trusting of Vader in ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' than he was in Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack.]]
263** I'm not sure what you mean by your comments above. However, I think it's FridgeBrilliance that Luke made his second lightsaber as a homage to both of his teachers: it has the same design as Obi-Wan's, but the blade colour is green like Yoda's.
264* Lots of people complain about the Jedi using the clone army, saying that it is immoral and pretty stupid. But then you ask why didn't the Republic levy troops from the hundreds of thousands of systems that belong to it? However, one of the biggest problems with the Republic was its ''corruption''. Most Republic worlds were too damn lazy and cynical to levy troops until their planet gets invaded, and wouldn't do anything after. The Republic worlds would rather use a slave army then get their hands dirty. The Jedi did something reprehensible by accepting the clones, but they've spent their entire lives serving the Republic with many in the Republic expecting them to fix their problems, and when there comes a problem that the Jedi cannot handle, the Republic still sits on its ass and compels them to sacrifice their morals to save billions of apathetic citizens from the ruthless droid armies.
265** We ''do'' see non-clone members of the Republic's military. Presumably they are the results of recruiting or conscripting troops from the various member worlds. It is also possible that nobody wanted to offer their troops up to die first until there was already a full-fledged Grand Army Of The Republic in place, so the Clones, led by the Jedi, served to act as that core that got things moving. Still morally reprehensible, [[ValuesDissonance at least by the standards]] of this blue dot, in this galaxy, a long time later. Earlier, the Jedi seemed to be not overly concerned by the existence of slavery on Tatooine, so this is at least a consistent attitude.
266*** Tatooine is not a Republic world. The Hutts have enough power and influence that pissing them off is not something done lightly.
267** More than that is because some worlds like Naboo are just pacifist who are not interested in building an army, and only possess a pissy security force with only 1000 force strong. Its is quite amazing that they even survive so long since they share a planet with the Gungans who are a [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Warrior Race]] with a real standing army that could boot out the Naboo by just knocking on their doorstep with their own army. This is touched in ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'' where the Separatist almost convinced the Gungans to side with them.
268** [[ElephantInTheLivingRoom Hang on a second.]] How is the use of the clone army immoral? This seems to imply that the clones are little more than tools to be used by the Republic/Empire. Well yeah, technically they are, but we see that some clones, particularly the commanders and some of the [[ADayInTheLimelight other minor soldiers in the clone army]], are shown to have distinct personalities and characteristics--essentially becoming their own entities. It would then be heinous if the Jedi simply used them as tools. We also see from the way people interact with droids that artificial/synthetic life is taken seriously (the Queen thanking R2 for repairing her ship, for instance, even though it's his ''job''). Aside from some outliers like Pong Krell, is there any indication that the Jedi just treated the clones like slaves?
269** Also, when the Clone Army was formed, laws were enacted that made the armed forces of Republic world essentially police forces, all part of [[BigBad Palpy's]] plan to create TheEmpire.
270** Additionally, the Jedi didn't have any other option! Without the clones, they could've trained planetary militia and recruits, but by the time they did that, the CIS would've overrun the galaxy (military training does take a while, after all). Had the Jedi tried to fight by themselves...well, there were about 10,000 of them, including retired Masters, younglings, and {{Non Action Guy}}s, to defend a galaxy of ''a couple million planets.'' That would never have worked. It was a "best of bad options" kinda deal.
271* Another thing, and this sort of combines FridgeHorror with FridgeBrilliance... in the original trilogy, Palpatine and Vader seem perfectly aware of the Force, and Vader is shown mentioning it to other Imperial officers in ''Film/ANewHope'', but they seem to perceive it as just another religion. However, they (or at least some of them) also seem to be aware that the Jedi were mostly wiped out, as implied by one of Tarkin's conversations with Vader, in which Tarkin says ''"you, my friend, are all that is left of their religion."'' Now think about this in light of the prequel trilogy. ''"Order 66"'' was already [[MoralEventHorizon heinous]], but we know from the context that it was at least somewhat pragmatic; Palpatine wiped out the Jedi because they were the only rivals to himself and Vader in knowledge of the force. Tarkin, however, not believing in the force, is probably unaware that this was the reason. Now think about what he said once more. ''"All that is left of their religion."'' In other words, he [[ANaziByAnyOtherName condones having people rounded up and killed for their religious beliefs]]. Sure, we knew he was bad news from the start, [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain but still]]...
272** Except, Hitler and the Nazis didn't kill the Jews because of their religion, he didn't much care what they believed in. What HE did kill them for was the fact that they were Jews racially. He believed that genetically, the Jews were inferior and needed to be destroyed, since they were screwing up the gene pool. Which is why he also threw in gypsies and crippled people.
273** Okay, okay, so maybe it might not have been motivated by contempt for their religious beliefs, but the point remains that Tarkin's like some historical villains in wanting people killed for their religious beliefs. There are probably some actual examples, probably in communist dictatorships, of it being about the religious beliefs of the victims. My point overall is the implied distinction between Palpatine and Tarkin... Palpatine's heinous evil deeds are clearly driven by his lust for power, but for Tarkin even lust for power isn't sufficient explanation for his heinous evil deeds. [=neoYTPism=]
274*** Tarkin's line is really just a simple statement of fact. If I say, "There's no Dodo birds left," does that mean I'm condemning them because I have a personal prejudice against them? No, I'm just stating quantifiable fact, which is what Tarkin is doing, as far as he has any reason to believe. Tarkin doesn't offer any judgement on them, or say they ''should'' be dead because of their religion, he just says they're gone.\
275Tarkin's a bad, ''bad'' guy, sure, but you're ascribing qualities to him on extremely flimsy 'evidence'.
276*** At the very least, though, judging by his tone of voice, he sure doesn't seem to MIND that the Jedi were killed off.
277*** Of course he doesn't mind. This is the guy who blew up a planet as a mere show of force, so clearly empathy is not his strong suit.
278* You ever notice that the final duel of Episode III and the final duel of Episode VI has something in common (other than being the final duels of their respective trilogies)? The lightsabers being used have the same hilt design. Different colours, but same hilt. Anakin's sabre hilt is identical to Vader's apart from different colour trimmings and Obi-Wan's hilt is nearly identical to Luke's. In both duels, Anakin loses and the very last lightsaber seen to be deactivated at the end of both trilogies is the Luke/Obi-Wan design.
279** The duel at the ''beginning'' of Episode III, though, is even more similar. Anakin fights Dooku on the observation deck of a Star Destroyer just like how Luke fought Vader in the Emperor's throne room on the Death Star. In both cases, Palpatine is sitting in a chair (which looks nearly identical) and watching. Anakin is driven into a rage when Dooku knocks out Obi-Wan and then defeats him, just like how Luke flies into a rage and defeats Vader when he threatens Leia. And both end with a SwordOverHead moment where Anakin/Luke has Dooku/Vader at his mercy, and Palpatine tries to goad them into killing their defeated opponent. The difference is that Anakin goes through with it while Luke refuses to. Bonus points: Afterward, Anakin carries an unconscious Obi-Wan to safety, while Luke helps a mortally wounded Vader escape to the hangar.
280* You may begin to hate Hayden Christensen's performance as Anakin, and wonder why Lucas isn't reining him in or directing more so that we like Anakin or feel for him or experience any sense of empathy for his plight. By the time you reach halfway through Episode 3, you may begin to actively hate Anakin Skywalker, even before his fall. Well played, George Lucas. ''You've been conditioning us to hate Darth Vader again.''
281** One major problem: the fall before ''[=RotS=]'' was released, Lucas photoshopped Hayden into ''Return of the Jedi''. At least at that time, Hayden's Anakin we didn't associate with a cold-blooded wife-choking, child-slaughtering monster. But in light of ''[=RotS=]'', If Lucas intended for this ending to be uplifting, he failed miserably.
282** But you forget the fans' reaction to that small edit. Pure Hatred towards Christensen. And just in time for ''Revenge of the Sith'' to come out.
283* Another case of FridgeBrilliance, you know how people often complain that Anakin's personality in ''Film/ThePhantomMenace'' seemed so contradictory to his original-trilogy personality, and that both personalities seemed contradictory to the personality he had in ''Film/AttackOfTheClones'' and ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith''... but then again, [[TruthInTelevision adults often ARE quite different as adults than they were as children]], so Anakin's going to have different personalities as a child, as a teenager, and as an adult. ''Film/ThePhantomMenace'''s Anakin was a child, so he's going to be more sweet and friendly than he was later on. The Anakin of ''Film/AttackOfTheClones'' and ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'' was a teenager, so he's going to be more whiny and arrogant than he was later or earlier on. The Vader of the original trilogy was an adult, much older than the Anakin of ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'', so he's going to be more mature than any other version of Anakin. This is, if not perfectly in line with actual age difference, at least in line with PERCEIVED age differences, and if one is to complain about this, their real complaint is with popular age stereotypes, not ''Franchise/StarWars'' movies.
284** What you've said echoes the comments of Kevin Smith, when he was interviewed for the History Channel documentary ''Star Wars: The Legacy''. I think a large part of why a lot of fans felt that the character of Vader was ruined was not so much about the whininess of the character, but the flatness of the actors portraying him.
285* In the prequel trilogy, especially in ''Phantom Menace'', much is made of Anakin's great power in the Force and how important he is as the Chosen One. Because of his general visual appeal, James Earl Jones' voice, and the admitted awesome of TheReveal in Empire, it can take a while to realize this, but... Vader's largely inconsequential throughout the series after blowing up the droids' command station in ''Phantom Menace''. He does nothing of import during ''Attack of the Clones'' other than brashly undermining Obi-Wan. In ''Revenge of the Sith'', he kills children, chokes his wife, and gets crippled. In the original trilogy, he's a badass, sure, but we saw him as the ultimate force user for two movies straight, and had no idea there was more to it than telekinesis and hypnosis (the latter of which he never used). ''Jedi'' shows the real big bad, and Vader does kill him, but... ultimately, isn't Vader just a visually-impressive Dragon to Palpatine, and for all his purported power, he just throws junk at Luke and force-chokes stuffy Brits who annoy him. Power? What power?
286** The power was what Anakin could have been and was supposed to become, but never did. He was going to be the super-end all force user...which was why Palpatine was after him to be his apprentice, and why he put Order 66 in place the moment he had Anakin on his side. He knew that with Anakin as his apprentice, rounding up the Jedi would be no problem...which we see in that he destroyed the Jedi Temple on his own (which a squad of troopers - well known Jedi bait). Unfortunately, what Palpatine did not see coming was that Obi-Wan was going to defeat Anakin and reduce him to a (literal) half-man shell of what he once was...and what he was going to be. Obi-Wan was able to destroy Anakin's potential right there on Mustafar. If we accept that the number of midichlorians determines force power...if you lose half your body, you lose half your midichlorians. Every time a Jedi or Sith loses a limb it reduces their power level. Ironically, the Darth Vader of the original trilogy is a crippled and defeated old man in a walking iron lung who is not nearly as powerful as Palpatine thought he was going to be - but since most of all the other force-users are dead...he is a bad-ass. Vader's reduced capacity might also be why the Rebels were able to survive to cause so much trouble. Perhaps in Palpatine's original visions, his apprentice, fully-powered Vader, would have been able to sniff them out and destroy them utterly. It is also the reason why Palpatine was so eager for Luke to kill Vader and become the new Sith apprentice...Luke (and Leia) have that same potential to become just as powerful as Anakin would have. - BadSintax
287** By stopping Windu from killing Palpatine, he is partially responsible for the creation of the empire. Also, his killing of the children in the Jedi temple didn't just demonstrate his descent into evil, but also cut off a major source of potential Jedi, though granted, MAYBE it could have been done by the clones. Also, Vader's "force-choking" of imperial staff ultimately instills a sense of fear in them which probably plays a significant role in their actions. Also, the Vader-Luke confrontations probably had significant effects on the psychology of each, which is probably important what with Luke being the "last of the Jedi." (Save for Yoda until his death.) [=neoYTPism=]
288*** Palpatine was feigning weakness -- the closeups while he is "vulnerable" show he's calmly gauging Windu and Anakin, manipulative as ever, and the very moment Anakin's made his decision, Palpatine's back on the offence, no longer panting and wheezing. The slaughter of the young Jedi was an atrocity, but also not something that we were supposed to view as a challenge -- it happens almost entirely offscreen, and it's something that, say, Maul probably could have accomplished with comparable results. All we see is that he's a competent Dragon, and that's about it. The Chosen One seems to be fraught with signs of his greatness, but ultimately about being in Palpatine's blind spot and/or siring the one who could bring about the end of the Sith, however indirectly.choices.
289** Well, the only one who really makes a big deal about Anakin's "power" is Palpatine, a man ''at best'' speaks in half-truths. The Jedi don't seem to ascribe an unusual power to Anakin. The most that's implied is that he he learns to use the Force very quickly. The only thing close to a direct "power level" comparison is noting Anakin's midichlorian count is higher than Yoda's, but Yoda is not heads and tails more powerful than other Jedi, he's just older, wiser, and more experienced. This fits with the views of Sith and Jedi: to a Sith like Palpatine, the Chosen One of prophecy ''must'' be unfathomably powerful in the Force, especially if his destiny is to destroy the Sith, which naturally includes destroying Palpatine ([[SarcasmMode because obviously only someone of ridiculous Force power could ever destroy such a pure, perfect, unfailingly capable Master of the Dark Side as Darth Sidious]]). For the Jedi, this seems merely a means to recognize Anakin as this Chosen One of this prophecy... "you shall know him by his lack of father, for he was conceived by the will of the Force" or somesuch. A lot of issues certain parts of the Fandom have with assorted ''Star Wars'' media boils down to the assumption of PowerLevels when none are in evidence.
290* This is more of an EU Brilliance, but it has it's based on the movies. First, one has to wonder how exactly Palpatine became a racist, bloodthirsty despot growing up on pacifistic Naboo. I don't really have an answer to the bloodthirsty bit, but the xenophobia actually makes perfect sense. The only aliens that Palpatine would have known growing up on Naboo would have been Gungans, with whom the Naboo had had a sour relations with for centuries. No wonder he hated aliens, they were all Gungans to him!
291** So, Jar Jar Binks and his kin ruined everything - that's what everyone's been trying to say, and it may be right!
292** It's more insidious than that. Palpatine isn't himself a racist, and he frequently used non-humans as his pawns throughout the series -- it's even heavily implied that the Death Star wasn't designed by the humans. It's that he knows better, but humans are the apparent majority in the galaxy, and twisting them toward xenophobia keeps the hate flowing for the Dark Side and makes the populace more easy to manipulate. The Empire doesn't need to be racist, it's just more useful to him if it is.
293** Exactly. Palpatine isn't a racist who holds nonhuman life in contempt; he holds ''everybody's'' life in contempt, human or otherwise. His favoritism towards humans stems solely from A) the fact he is one, so is better-equipped to appeal to human racists' preferences in a leader than, say, Twi'lek racists' preferences; and B) the fact that humans happened to be in the best position to become his hate-motivated minions.
294** All this is assuming that Palpatine is even his real name and Naboo is even his home planet....
295** It is, according to Darth Plagueis.
296* The human speciesism, and racism, particularly on the part of the Empire. For one, it was a clever way to explain why we see so few non-humans on the Death Star, or as extras. Rather than say that they just didn't have the budget to create hundreds of aliens for the purpose of just background characters, the explanation is entirely in universe.
297** One line by an Imperial officer in ANH said it all: "Where are you taking this...thing?"(referring to Chewbacca, a Wookie)
298** The second layer of brilliance has to do with the story explanation. Yeah, it does connect them to Nazis, but it goes beyond just allegory. It makes perfect sense that humans would be the most specist, since in RealLife, it's how it is here. How many humans actually view other species as equal? We cage, enslave, kill, skin, eat, and experiment on other species all the time, exploiting and killing non-humans by the billion year after year. If the humans in the Star Wars universe are anything like us, then why would they be any different?
299*** Maybe because many of the aliens in ''Star Wars'' universe are actually able to reason with others, develop a code of ethics, culture and political system just like us humans? Really, the only difference between humans and aliens in ''Star Wars'' is perhaps limited to appearance and natural habitat. It is much more about racism in real life instead of animal rights. People in ''Star Wars'' (both humans and aliens) eat the meat, wear the fur, and experiment on other less evolved species too you know.
300** Actually, this is brought up many times in the Expanded Universe (especially ''The Thrawn Trilogy''), where it turns out that Palpatine was really a racist, sexist bastard who hand-picked humans to work in his empire, and was extremely intolerant of women, while deliberately subjugating all non-humans as sub-sentient. Though in the trilogies themselves we never really see ''why'' exactly the Empire is so evil - apart from them destroying a planet, destroying the last vestiges of a democratic system of governance... oh wait - but in the Expanded Universe, we see that Palpatine really was this tyrant who was the galaxy's answer to Hitler. The descriptive term JerkAss doesn't seem to quite cut it.
301** The Expanded Universe (old and new) expanded on the speciesism. The short version is that speciesism happens among ''all'' species, it's just that humans are the most numerous and influential of them all. When one adds that the Clone Wars have recently put a human-led Republic against an enemy led by aliens whose public face, Grievous, was a noted war criminal, and the Empire, the successor of the Republic, has a higher-than-average percentage of speciesists. [[DivideAndConquer Just as Palpatine needed]].
302* Think about who the best known force users to have a reverse lightsaber grip were. Think about who their masters were. The actual style is a reverse grip form of the Shien form, which is, according to Wookieepedia, a defensive form, with a bite.
303* Initially, the idea of "spice mines" seems to be just a bit of silliness. Mining spices? How ridiculous can you get? However, far from being stupid, it's perfectly reasonable. The most common spice in the world is salt, and where do we get salt? From mines!
304** Except "Spice" is the name of a crystalline narcotic produced from inorganic spiders to catch beings made of energy, not flavorful minerals.
305*** You can thank the EU for that. Using just the films, the 'spice mine' phrase isn't ridiculous, as said above. I'm pretty sure 'spice' could have its mundane meaning in ''Star Wars''. It is a slang term, not an actual name.
306*** And speaking of salt, there's a drug with the slang name "bath salts" so calling some drug "spice" is totally reasonable.
307* Yoda's comment to Luke to sacrifice his friends for the ideals they cherish makes more sense when you remember that Yoda could've dispatched Dooku by allowing Anakin and Obi-Wan to die. Not only would this have meant the loss of both Palpatine's apprentice and the future Lord Vader, it also would've ended the separatist movement early enough that the Jedi could've afforded more time to investigating the clones' true benefactor.
308** What if Yoda had just pulled the two humans away? Would Dooku have killed himself to save his boss's plans? Or would he have rolled on him, or tried to escape? The Sith philosophy is inherently selfish; are they even capable of suicide for the benefit of others.
309* Upon rewatching all six movies, it becomes clear that Anakin, by and large, was correct about the Jedi: they WERE keeping him back (Ep II showed that Yoda was aware of Anakin's brush with the dark side, if not the slaughter of the Tusken in specific); the Jedi HAD compromised their stated values (attempting to abuse Palpatine's favor of Anakin, and later Windu's decision for summary execution instead of due process); and the order's stodgy reliance on tradition and denial of emotion is part of what allowed the Sith to seize power virtually unopposed (for all Yoda's warnings of fear, he'd apparently given Anakin plenty of reason to hide both the Tusken slaughter and his marriage to Padme, out of fear of what the order would do). He was only wrong about Obi-Wan's personal loyalty. Moreover, not only is Luke successful without Jedi dogma indoctrinated into him, he succeeds despite the manipulations of his mentors: Obi-Wan's attempt to protect Luke by hiding Vader's true nature, while well-intentioned, was no longer necessary after the first movie, and outright endangered Luke in the second. Likewise, when Yoda tells Luke that the ideals of the rebellion matter more than the lives of Luke's friends, Luke ultimately rejects this, leading directly to gaining the knowledge he needed to defeat the Sith. Finally, both Yoda and Obi-Wan attempt to convince Luke that Vader's evil is monolithic, remembering from personal experience how Anakin's fall led him to murder children and his own wife. When Luke tried anyway, not out of a plan for the rebellion or an abstract philosophy, but out of genuine concern for his father, Luke not only redeemed Anakin, he also proved the falsehood of the Jedi Order's self-denial practices.
310** [[{{neoYTPism}} This Troper]] noticed the same thing, or at least the part about Luke proving Yoda and Obi-Wan wrong. Even ''without'' the prequel trilogy, it's clear that Luke redeemed Vader precisely BECAUSE he learned the truth and acted accordingly, which reflects poorly on the decisions of Obi-Wan and Yoda to lie to him. So, the original trilogy already made clear that the Jedi weren't quite as wise as they pretended to be and/or thought they were. The council's rigid traditionalism in the prequel trilogy only drives the point home further.
311** Point of fact: Mace only decided to kill Palpatine ''after'' he carved several Jedi up like a Hibachi chef. The toughest guy he fought, before then, was Kar Vastor, and he was [[spoiler:incarcerated in the Jedi temple, after being charged with crimes against ''civilization''. He nearly destroyed a city; he was that dangerous.]] And Mace Windu, the guy who took ''that'' guy down, thinks Palpatine is too dangerous to let live. In addition to that, his strongest Force Talent is [[http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Shatterpoint knowing where to hit things so they break]], up to the scale of the entire Clone Wars, and he was looking at the big fat spider in the middle of his web who started it all. ''I'm inclined to believe him''.
312** Of course we should believe Master Windu. That's why Palpatine set up Dooku at the start of the film. Anakin makes the opposite choice in similar situations, but both times, ''he makes the wrong choice'', or perhaps, chooses for ''the wrong reasons''. He kills Dooku despite it being infinitely preferable to capture him, put him on trial, maybe get him to convince the Separatists to stand down and, oh yeah, ''tell us who the other Sith Lord is!''. He saves Palpatine because he believes only he can help Anakin save Padme. By setting to the call-backs, Palpatine reminds Anakin of his previous failure of the Jedi way, and ensures the opposite outcome... while still moving Anakin farther down the Dark path.
313* Everybody--and This Troper used to fall into this camp--laughed their collective behinds off when Han Solo stated in ''Film/ANewHope'' that he'd made the Kessel Run "in under twelve parsecs". However, his comment that misrouting the hyperdrive could send one into a supernova or something comparable stuck with him. Eventually, This Troper realized that Han wasn't making up random technobabble--he was stating that his hyperdrive could find more efficient or daring routes!
314** That was what this Troper thought too, but [[TheCuckoolanderWasRight everyone around her kept calling her names for years]]! I always thought that the incredulous look that Obi-Wan gave Han was the "Really, you found a shorter way to fly that route? Seriously, what are you insane?!" type.
315** In the Expanded Universe, it's stated that the exact method he used was to fly through something called The Maw. What is The Maw? A giant nebula MADE OF HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF BLACK HOLES. Had the calculations been off by as little as three inches, he would be very very dead.
316** However Obi-Wan clearly falls into the collective laughter. Seriously, check the look he gives right after the Parsecs line. Though, considering his intense dislike for flying in the prequels, maybe he doesn't know quite as much as the seasoned smuggler?
317** The screenplays make the original intention of this line clear, and the EU justifications that followed completely unnecessary: Han is making a nonsensical boast to a couple of local yokels. Obi-Wan's reaction is meant to indicate that he recognizes the absurdity of what Han is saying, while Luke's more-or-less ambiguous blank stare is meant to imply he has no idea what Han is saying. Case closed, time to move on from this silly little trifle.
318** Alternatively, if Obi-Wan does happen to know how the Kessel Run works and what Han means, his disbelief could be interpreted as him thinking "Not even Anakin is that crazy/stupid."
319** This is something of correct/incorrect. A Parsec is a unit of distance, not time. So the disbelieving looks could be due to Obi-Wan being aware of this. However as stated the Maw is a collection of black holes, that if done incorrectly will result in death. So charting a short distance course through that is all the more bad-ass.
320** I never understood why it isn't so strange for this to either be an in universe measurement or slang for one.
321** Expending on the above comment, and completely discarding the canon EU explanation, I theorize that a parsec here is slang for a time measurement, much the same way that on good old earth, time measurements are used as distance measurements. The expression "Person X lives 3 hours away", or the derivation of the distance unit Lightyear from the time unit Year both are based on calculating the described distance from the specified time measurement and an assumed universally uniform speed. This makes sense in a world with varying distance measurement units (miles, kilometers, etc.), but a common time measurement system (hour = hour). Now, in a Universe inhabited by spacefaring civilizations with a shared history that goes back countless millennia, I think it's not too much of a stretch to think that, unlike on Earth, (interstellar) distance measurement units would be universal (established as 'distance between historically important places A and B' or something similar), whereas time units would vary greatly, based on the rotation speed of the individual person's home planet, resulting in slang measurements such as the one in the movie. Much like 'an hour' is the same distance no matter whether you'd measure it in kilometers or miles, '12 parsecs' might denote the same time no matter what's an 'hour' on your homeworld, assuming normal hyperdrive speed. And Obi-Wan's expression is just a snob's frown upon slang.
322** Here's one I had: The Kessel run explanation is a microcosm of what went wrong with ''Star Wars''. The original scripts and acting make it clear that Han is bluffing. Later, a technical explanation was cooked up by fans and official adopted as "canon". The focus of the movies changed from being more character-centric to being more focused on technical things like special effects and technical accuracy over thematic accuracy (No, see, Anakin *was* a great pilot when Obi-Wan met him- he was a pod racer!)
323** Confirmed, kinda. In Russian dub instead of the whole "Parsec" thing he says "It's the ship that shortened Kessel Run".
324** It's clear from context that Han is being presented as a braggart and a blowhard, and that Ben sees through his BS. Later on, Ben is dubious about the Falcon being 'as fast as he's boasting' so he's clearly not fooled.
325*** It's not really that clear. He's definitely bragging, but there is no obvious indication he's lying. The main bit of "evidence" that he's lying is Obi-Wan being unimpressed (could easily be a "sure, anybody can ''say'' they're the best reaction). The other is "well he must be lying because parsecs don't measure time!". We're talking about faster-than-light travel, relativistic effects, whatever "hyperspace" actually is, and about the physics of spacetime, so it makes perfect sense that distance would be the important type of unit here.
326* In his introduction, Boba Fett is explicitly told not to disintegrate anyone, an order which he grudgingly accepts. Why, then, is he worried about Solo dying in the carbonite chamber? Did he plan on presenting Jabba with still-living atoms?
327** He needed ''Solo'' alive. He had no particular need to keep the Wookiee, Princess, and Droid intact, and may have simply been annoyed that his options were being limited.
328* I just realized: the holographic stuff used in throughout the Galaxy is always blue, right? What color are Force Ghosts? Blue. The latter cannot possibly be imitating the former and considering the technology level that is available, it would be easy to set up different colors or even full-color holograms. This leads me to suspect that holograms are blue because someone felt like imitating rumored ghost sightings.
329** Actually, in Original Trilogy holograms are more colorful then they are in Prequel Trilogy.
330* The first character to call Luke a Jedi to his face is Emperor Palpatine. Luke called ''himself'' a Jedi Knight on a few occasions, but every time he was told that no, he wasn't. Even Han accuses Luke of having delusions of grandeur when Chewbacca mentions it to him. Palpatine practically knights Luke himself, immediately before he gives up on trying to convert him and decides to just kill the insufferable whelp.
331* [[WebVideo/TheAmazingAtheist The Distressed Watcher]] claims that seeing the Jedi act like bureaucrats in the prequels didn't line up with the way they were described by characters in the original trilogy. Think about it, though... how often in real life do people who view old traditions through rose-tinted glasses know what they're talking about? Perhaps the point very well was to imply that Obi-Wan's fondness for the past was very much like that which some people have for the [=1950s=] in real life?
332** When did the Jedi act like bureaucrats? I distinctly remember watching Obi-Wan acting at various times like a police officer or a detective. Didn't see anything that looked like paperwork. And usually, yes, those who lived through a time period know exactly what they're talking about. That's how everyone else gets to know what happened. And seriously, does it take any tinting at all to think being part of an overstretched galactic police force is somehow better than being hunted by a galactic empire that burns down homesteads when interrogations aren't effect and blows up planets?
333** It'd be hard to last "for over a thousand generations" without some bureaucracy to maintain it.
334** The Jedi librarian certainly acted like a bureaucrat, up to and including being openly offended by the suggestion that some information might be missing from the library.
335* The prequels, specifically Episode III, make Vader's redemption even more understandable. The very thing he'd turned to the dark side to save (at least partially) was now being killed right before him. More subtly, watching Luke be electrocuted definitely reminded him of Mace Windu's death and of how he too was screaming for help from the Emperor.
336** Or he's thinking of how he once watched his wife beg for her life while he choked her to death, or at least nearly to death.
337* This is more FridgeHorror, but Vader probably still [[spoiler: doesn't think of the James Earl Jones voice as his own. When he's thinking, he probably still uses the Hayden Christensen voice. Just imagine Hayden Christensen saying "No, I am your father," or "I find your lack faith disturbing," or "You have failed me for the last time." Loses a lot of awesome, doesn't it?]]
338** Alternatively the Creator/JamesEarlJones voice is a coping method to divorce him from the past ah la ThatManIsDead
339* Shifting here from its former entry on the Nightmare Fuel page. (Hard to tell if it was intended in 1977...)
340** [[FridgeHorror Imagine being on a planet blown up by the Death Star.]] It's blown into fairly large pieces, and they seem cohesive enough that someone might survive if they were in a hardened structure, or perhaps outside. You ''could'' live through it...[[CruelAndUnusualDeath though the fact that the chunk of planet wouldn't have enough gravity to maintain an atmosphere would ensure you didn't live long afterwards.]] And what if you were [[FateWorseThanDeath in an airtight bunker...]]
341*** So a Fallout style Vault, of course once your Lone Wanderer opens the door, the vacuum would kill everyone in the Vault...
342** Nope. Even if a shockwave rippling through the planet or the heat of the explosion didn't kill you, the acceleration you would undergo as the chuck of the planet reached escape velocity in under a second would turn you to paste. Unless you're Son Goku.
343* Obi-Wan's been called stupid for hiding Vader's son on his home planet with his only living relatives, but he isn't, really. Tatooine is the place where Anakin spent years as a slave, saw his mother die, and committed his first genocide. Why would he ''ever'' want to go back? It was probably the safest place in the galaxy for little Luke. Besides, it worked, didn't it?
344** It was still pretty dumb to let him keep his last name, though.
345** Not really. First of all, Tatooine is the back end of beyond, with no connection to the Empire (they pay lip service allegiance, but that's about it). Secondly, no doubt there are hundreds if not thousands of "Skywalkers" in a galaxy that big. The chances of someone connecting Luke to Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker are fairly slim.
346* I just realized something about the fighting in the series. In the Original trilogy every strike was slower and more precise where in the Prequel you have lightning fast combat. Why does it make sense? In the Trilogy everyone's either a lot older (Obi-Wan) hardly human (Vader) or a green horn (Luke)
347* The fact that if you do watch the movies in numerical order (Episodes I, II, III, IV, V, and VI), they do get '''better and better'''. Also, the Force, introduced in a biological, scientific way (midichlorians) is given deeper meaning when the more spiritual nature is explained later on. Science becomes "magic".
348* Obi-Wan and Vader are supposed to be Luke's evil and good Fathers. We know that. However, this logically makes Yoda his crotchety, cranky, selfish, but still wise grandpa. And Palpatine suddenly becomes an abusive patriarch who likes pitting his descendants against each other.
349* As many others, I sometimes wondered: why did the Death Star had to wait for Yavin IV to come into range instead of blowing Yavin itself and having a free shot. But then it occurred to me: Yavin is a gas giant. It means it is mostly hydrogen. It is also way bigger than Jupiter, judging by view from the base. Had the Death Star blown it off like Alderaan, the shock would cause all the hydrogen to fuse, essentially making Yavin into one '''huge''' nuke. The resulting explosion would be likely orders of magnitude stronger, and would blast the Death Star (which was sitting directly on top of Yavin and has crappy shields) to bits.
350** Still doesn't work -- the Death Star's operational range for that would presumably be outside of the blast radius, after all.
351** The Death Star may not have been powerful enough to destroy a gas giant planet. Consider, there is more than enough kinetic energy kicking around inside Jupiter's atmosphere to shred an Earth-size planet and it still just goes around serenely in its orbit. Odds are a shot from the Death Star would trigger some massive atmospheric event in Yavin, but would not be anywhere near powerful enough to destroy it. The shot would probably not even penetrate all the way to the planet core. The real question (to me) is why they did not pop out of hyperspace from a direction facing Yavin IV. There could not only be one hyperspace lane leading into the system.
352*** The answer to that last question is simple: the sooner the Death Star arrives on scene, the sooner the Empire can nip this little rebel problem in the bud, plus tie up the remaining loose ends involving the Death Star plans. If they take a more roundabout hyperspace route to get into a flanking position, that wastes however much extra time the detour takes to navigate at FTL speeds. Instead they take the direct route and just cope with having to get a firing solution the hard way, where they can at least do something about any funny business the rebels try in the meantime. Seeing as the Millenium Falcon had already bugged out by then (albeit still close enough to make a dramatic return), if they weren't determined to destroy the Death Star ASAP the rebels could've probably been halfway through booking it by the time the DS1 showed up as it is. The imperials did not have time to spare for detours.
353** An additional consideration is that the Death Star's superlaser probably has a significant "cool-down" time before it can be fired again. It's meant as a weapon of terror, not a weapon of war. Even if the superlaser could take out Yavin without suffering any harm, the cool-down period may be longer than the time it would take to get a clear shot at Yavin IV.
354*** According to EU source material, the charge time for the Death Star's superlaser was 24 hours. Had the Death Star taken out Yavin itself, it would've spent the next 24 hours just sitting there doing nothing, giving the rebels plenty of time to evacuate Yavin IV.
355* The prophecy isn't about Anakin. The prophecy doesn't even matter. The dual-trilogy isn't about [[OriginStory how it all began]], it's not about [[GrandFinale how it all ends]], it's just the life of one man at this one point in the history of the wars between the Jedi and the Sith.
356* Rewatching TPM, I realized the theme playing during Qui-Gonn's funeral is, in fact, the same theme playing during the birth of Darth Vader in ROTS. Vader was born the moment Qui-Gon had died.
357** There's actually a fairly popular fan theory that Qui-Gonn was the only Jedi available to take on a padawan that would have been able to stop Anakin's fall--Qui-Gonn is a 'Grey Jedi', which is a Jedi who goes against tradition and believes that both the restraint of the light and the emotion of the dark are needed to fight in balance, and was a better warrior because of it, but also a pariah. This is referenced repeatedly throughout TPM. If Anakin had been mentored by someone who believed this way, like Qui-Gonn or Mace Windu, he would never have repressed and internalized his emotions, and thus would never have been anywhere near as susceptible to the Dark Side. And it's entirely possible that someone like Qui-Gonn who put little faith in blind tradition would be entirely able to not only keep Anakin and Padme's relationship a secret but empathize with it, and his knowledge could have helped save Padme down the line. In short; as mentioned above, the entirety of Star Wars is riddled with 'vergences' or 'shatterpoints', where a single aspect of reality is all that keeps galactic history from being radically different; the fact that Obi-Wan, someone who was very much a staunch traditionalist and who believed the Jedi dogma until that faith was shattered in Episode III was Anakin's mentor instead of Qui-Gonn was one such vergence and directly or indirectly led to the events of the next five movies.
358** Qui-Gon was '''not''' a "Gray Jedi." There is no such thing. Qui-Gon was a '''''Jedi''''', he was simply one who embraced the Force on its own terms, not within the rigid dogmas of the Jedi Order or the Byzantine bureaucracy of the Republic. Qui-Gon will bend or break a rule, but he does not truck with the Dark Side and does not consider passion a viable source of strength. Qui-Gon might play fast and loose with the Order's Codes, but it is to keep to the spirit of those Codes if not the letter. Qui-Gon is what all Jedi should aspire to be, and it is a sign of the failures of the Order at the time that he was considered a barely-tolerable maverick instead of one of the wisest Masters of his generation. "Grey Jedi" is just another way of saying "not Jedi," and Qui-Gon was most definitely a Jedi.
359* The first and last time Han is in a gunfight in the movies, he is cornered by a bad guy, and both times he is rescued by a snap-shot from a discretely drawn firearm that the bad guy failed to see.
360
361* George Lucas has made no secret that he based many of the battles on old war films, with many of the spacecraft based to varying degrees on RealLife aircraft. With that in mind, what could he have had in mind with the folding S-Foils on fighters like the X-Wing or the ARC-170? If you find footage of dive bombers in WWII (such as the North American A-36 Apache, or the Douglas [=SBD=] Dauntless, you'll realize they're likely intended to be dive brakes, which would be extended just as the bomber [[LetsGetDangerous rolled into a dive]] in order to keep the bomber from diving fast enough to rip its own wings off.
362* Anakin was born and raised as a slave since the age of seven. In order to survive, he must follow the orders of his slavemaster, keep control of his emotions, hold his tongue at all times no matter how hard he is pushed, and despite holding a deep resentment and wanting to be free, ultimately is too broken and submissive to do anything about it. Then he is "freed" and joins the Jedi (which he could technically leave, but really, where else does he have to go?) which in order to survive he must focus on his survival above all else, requires him to follow the orders of his master and the council, keep control of his emotions, hold his tongue at all times no matter how hard it is, and despite holding a deep resentment and a desire for freedom from their rule is too broken and submissive to do anything. Even when Anakin becomes a Jedi Knight and later a council member this remains true. Then he becomes Darth Vader and Palpatine's apprentice, where in order to survive... you see where I'm going with this?
363** In short, Anakin has been trapped in slavery of one form or another his whole life. This makes Palpatine's choice to have him as his apprentice brilliant, intentionally or not, not only because Anakin is the most powerful Force user in history but because Anakin was also conditioned to be resentful yet submissive to the point of habit from a lifetime of enslavement means that Palpatine chose the perfect apprentice for a Sith Lord. This is because despite all his talk and hatred of wanting to kill and be free of his master, he does not have it in him to actually do it, he never has. This also makes his subsequent betrayal and killing of Palpatine at the end of his life brilliant as well, because how he's conditioned means he could never be motivated to forsake his own survival to kill his master through hatred or the desire for freedom, it never worked before. Only something else, like the desire to protect the only family he has left could really jolt him into action.
364* When Qui-Gon died in ''Film/ThePhantomMenace'', many fans complained that he did not vanish as Obi-Wan and Yoda had, and that the revelation in ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'' that it was technique that Qui-Gon's Force spirit taught to them violated the original trilogy. Except that the original trilogy gives us no reason to think that this happens to all Force-users, or even that the Jedi knew about the technique before Vader's fall to the Dark Side:
365** In ''Film/ANewHope'', Vader is clearly surprised when Obi-Wan vanishes, and prods the empty robes like "Was there a trap door or something?" He was a former Jedi, and Obi-Wan's pupil, but did not expect the disappearing act.
366** In ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'', Anakin's body does not disappear when he dies, but he is still able to return as a Force spirit.
367** So the OT shows the vanishing body not as something that just happens to Force-users, but something that Obi-Wan and Yoda can do, but Vader is not only unable to do it, he is taken by complete surprise when it does happen.
368* Rifftrax and a lot of other people have rightfully made fun of Anakin's mother's name - Shmi. However, here's an interesting bit of mythology trivia: Shmi is a second half of the name Lakshmi - the name of a Hinduist goddess of happiness. You know what one of her other names is? '''Padma'''.
369* In hindsight, the loss of the first Death Star must have hurt the Empire on more levels than just the loss of military assets. Consider: At that stage, the imperial strategy, as stated by Tarkin, is to rule the galaxy through the fear invoked by their new planet-busting superweapon. Over the course of the movie, Palpatine dissolves the Senate - a final plunge into autocracy he hadn't dared take before - and Tarkin destroys Alderaan, an inhabited planet, as a show of force. Both moves will clearly antagonize the entire galaxy, but the Empire is counting on the Death Star to keep everyone in line. And ''then'', at the worst possible time, the Death Star gets destroyed. Just how badly did this hurt imperial control? How many people ended up joining the Rebel Alliance in the aftermath?
370** On top of this, the destruction of Alderaan angered a ''lot'' of people. Who mightn't otherwise have joined the Rebellion, but after the Death Star was destroyed...
371* ''"The Chosen One will bring balance to the force"'', there's three ways of interpreting that prophecy, and Anakin fulfilled all of them:
372## Wiping out a majority of the Jedi Order, including children and apprentices. This left only the most senior of the Jedi and Sith (Yoda and Sidious), plus two Jedi of equal physical ability (Aging Obi-Wan and amputated Vader) until Luke was old enough to shake things up.
373## Wiping out the last of the Sith. Anakin had killed Count Dooku, then years later killed the Emperor, at risk to himself. Darth Maul slipped by, but he doesn't seem to be much more than a puppet for Sidious and any story revolving around his resurrection has him being unceremoniously snuffed out.
374## Causing the deaths of both sides, which also killed off the corruption and hypocrisy that had been plaguing both the Jedi Order and the Senate. With no supernatural interferences, the galaxy could adopt a more secular way of thinking and thus not have to worry about ''"a disturbance in the force"''.
375** Furthermore, Yoda and Obi-Wan gave Luke a crash-course in Jedi training, which meant trimming a lot of fat from their dogma. Despite not having the years of Jedi and Sith training that Anakin had, Luke still beat him with only the minimal Jedi training, proving that both sides were loaded with ideological deadweight. With only Luke around, a new Jedi Order can commence that's not so out of touch.
376** ''Film/TheLastJedi'' makes this explicit. Luke sought to learn about the ways of the old Order, but brought back that ideological deadweight, resulting in the failure of his Order in much the same way as the old Order fell. Yoda then spells out that Luke was supposed to learn from the mistakes Yoda himself had made, not repeat them.
377* It's subtle, but, if you pay attention throughout the movies and the animated series, there's a pretty strong undercurrent of anti-droid "racism" in whatever culture you go to. This, despite the fact it's clearly shown that droids can develop personalities that are as real and developed as any organic lifeform. The reasons for this hostility, though, are two-fold:
378** Post the Clone Wars, it's because of the fact that the Seperatists fought using ''droid armies''. Droids are too useful to reject entirely, but almost everyone in the galaxy has heard stories of how droid soldiers emotionlessly butchered their way across the galaxy; people don't remember that droids cannot fight their programming or that they were ordered to do things like massacre unarmed civilians or cause people to starve to death by their ''organic'' leaders, they just remember that the droids did those horrible things.
379** Prior to the Clone Wars, one has to remember, one of the most powerful factions on the galactic front is the Jedi Council. And the Jedi are centered around their mastery over the Force, which is born from the life-essence of organics throughout the cosmos. As droids are, by their nature, artificial beings of inorganic substances, ''they have no presence in the Force''. Thusly, they inherently disturb the typical Force-sensitive; as most Jedi react with this UncannyValley aversion to droids, the rest of the galaxy picks up on it and treats them accordingly. After all, if the Jedi treat them so harshly, then clearly they must deserve it.
380* Stormtroopers have become the butt of quite a few jokes, both over their [[ImperialStormtrooperMarksmanshipAcademy poor aim]] and [[ArmorIsUseless apparently useless armor]]. However perhaps the Stormtroopers' armor isn't so useless after all:
381** The body armor worn by modern soldiers is ''not'' designed to ''stop'' incoming fire. It's designed to reduce its velocity, and therefore energy on impact, so that injuries that would ordinarily be fatal would instead become treatable wounds. It stands to reason that Stormtrooper armor is designed under the same principle; making armor that would actually ''stop'' blaster fire would make it unwieldy to wear. Instead, it's better to design it to minimize how much energy of a blast gets through rather than stop it entirely.
382** Additionally, Stormtrooper armor has numerous gaps to allow articulation and freedom of movement. These gaps become logical weak points for weapons like, you know, stone-tipped arrows...
383** Further, historically the best weapons for dealing with rigid plate armor were hammers, picks, and to a lesser extent maces, which used pure blunt-force trauma that could deliver the energy of the blow ''through'' the armor. The armor didn't have to fail to shatter the bone underneath. Bash a Stormtrooper in the head with a rock, and you're still going to be delivering a fair bit of energy into his skull, and at the very least rattling his brain around inside it.
384** Finally, unlike ballistic projectiles, blaster fire seems to operate primarily by direct energy release. There's no projectile cutting through the flesh, bone, and internal organs, ''and'' the heat of the bolt instantaneously cauterizes the wound, meaning there's limited blood loss. Additionally, physical rounds inflict most of their damage via secondary cavitation, which you would ''not'' have with an energy blast.
385** Therefore, most of the Stormtroopers we see shot in the films may have actually ''survived'' their wounds and ended up in the Empire's equivalent of a ''Film/{{MASH}}'' unit, while those who were killed or wounded by the Ewoks at Endor were by chance facing ''the exact type of weapons best suited to fighting armored personnel''.
386* While watching The Clone Wars movie just now it came to the point where Anakin and Ahsoka are coming out of hyperspace after rescuing Jabba's son and on approach to Tatooine (this is before the space battle with the two magnaguards). Anakin says something to the effect of "Tatooine, I wish I wouldn't have to see this dustball again." Followed by a prompt from Ahsoka asking about what happened and Anakin not wanting to talk about it. This interaction is probably the very reason why Anakin never found Luke and Obi-Wan, he never approached Tatooine in the 20 years since ROTS. Now this was something I'd already known, but it's another thing that shows how clever the "Clone Wars" writers can be.
387* Mostly an Expanded Universe thing, but there didn't seem to be an appropriate SWEU column in either comics or lit, so I'm posting it here: The worst damage the Sith ever did to the Jedi (I suppose you could argue their near-total extinction at the hands of Sidious, but shut up, I'm trying to make a point here) was the war with Exar Kun. Prior to Exar Kun falling to the Dark Side, the Jedi were a massive, loose coalition of wandering monks and righters-of-wrongs, Jedi Masters would keep in contact with each other and refer apprentices to one another. Masters would train a couple new Knights, whatever suited their personal style, and, on the whole, the Jedi seemed very open-minded and trustworthy (possibly a side-effect of there not being a whole lot of stories set before TOTJ). But in response to Exar Kun declaring himself the Lord of the Sith and declaring war on the Jedi and the Republic, the Jedi are forced to crystallize into something more akin to the Jedi we see in the Prequels. In fact, reading Tales of the Jedi after the release of the Prequels, thinking of the KOTOR games and comics and the other stuff in between, such as Jedi Vs. Sith and the Pre-Prequel stories of their prominent Jedi, you can almost see the Butterfly Effect rippling out from the Jedi getting together to fight Exar Kun, watching them slowly evolve into the impotent, detached order we see euthanized in the Prequels. 4,000 years of your worst enemy gradually evolving into something completely powerless to stop your successors from taking over the Galaxy. Not bad for a snot-nosed punk who just thought his Zoideberg-esque master needed to take off the training wheels a bit sooner. ~ UnitedShoes37
388** In the EU this kind of culminates after the New Sith Wars and the Ruusan Reformation, which led to the Jedi ceasing to be an autonomous organization and instead becoming more closely affiliated with the government of the Republic. Palpatine was able to dispose of the Jedi so easily not because of some special Force power that allowed him to locate them all, but rather because they were all working for him directly, leading the Army of the Republic, with all their Padawans gathered in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant rather than scattered throughout the galaxy with wandering, semi-independent masters. So you ''do'' see an organization which had functioned for tens of thousands of years go into decline after Exar Kun, even though it would not have been apparent to them due to the long span of time. By the time of the Clone Wars, the Jedi were wholly unable to handle a galactic conflict, or even realize that it was all a trap set by the Chancellor of the Republic.
389** The ''Revenge of the Sith'' novelization elucidates this. During his fight with Sidious, Yoda realizes that while the Sith have spent a thousand years since the last war growing, changing, and evolving, the Jedi have spent those same thousand years training to fight the ''last'' war. Yoda's Jedi Order just doesn't know how to combat this new Sith threat, and the fight was over before the Jedi even realized they were in one.
390* I've been watching these movies, reading the books, and playing the video games my whole life, and I can't believe that in all that time I hadn't wondered about this much earlier. But it hit me when I was playing ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' and was introduced to the Wookiee named Zaalbar. If you're a Wookiee and you want to introduce yourself to a human, your ''name'' ought to sound the same in Basic as it does in Shyriiwook, right? So when somebody asks Chewbacca what his name is, and he says "Urf-rawr-growl," people are going to call him "Urf-rawr-growl," right? For people to call Chewbacca or Zaalbar "Chewbacca" and "Zaalbar", the Wookiee would need to be able to make the sounds that make up his name...right? That's how it works with other languages in the SW universe; despite speaking his own language, Greedo still distinctly says "Solo" and "Jabba" in ''Film/ANewHope''.
391** It could be that most races aren't capable of making the sounds Wookiees use to name themselves, so they adopt names in Basic for communicating with others. Greedo speaks a language with sounds humans can produce, so he can keep his old name; Chewbacca doesn't seem to. (Many immigrants who move to English-speaking countries in the real world change their name for this reason, if their language is hard to pronounce in the local tongue.)
392** It also stands to reason that the Wookiee language, just like any other language, is built upon a distinct and specific group of letters and pronunciations (phonemes) which to most ears just sound like generic animal sounds. But if you are actually capable of understanding Shyriiwook, like Han Solo, then you can pick out the phonemes, translate them to the nearest Basic equivalent, and name "Chewbacca" or "Zaalbar" that way.
393* In the most recent Star Wars Insider magazine this Troper got, there was an article talking about a book that will be released titled ''Star Wars: Fate of the Jedi: Conviction''. The author Aaron Allston in the article said that the Jedi Order ends up taking control of the Galactic Alliance government. He makes it clear that this is a bad thing, and that the situation would be akin to the World Wrestling Federation suddenly taking over NATO. He also points that apart from Leia, the Jedi have shown on the political level that they are only good at settling problems through quick and confident acts of violence. This Troper thought about what the article said and then realized something. Practically no Jedi, except for Leia, has ever been a politician. The Jedi Order truly has little to no concept of the mechanics of politics and how running a government works. Then this Troper realized that this explains a number of things. It explains why Obi-Wan assumed that Padme was a greedy, looking-out-for-herself politician (when she was the total opposite), and did not seem to lump Palpatine with her. It explains why the Jedi never seemed to sense anything out of the ordinary with Palpatine - how could they when they understood nothing about the political machinery he was hiding in? It explains why Jacen Solo did a horrible job of running the government - because he did not really understand how politics work. It also explains why the Sith did a horrible job of running the government...they knew how the system worked, but only to benefit themselves and not how to use it to benefit everyone else.
394* Regarding the question on why Palpatine did not sense Vader turning on him, this troper realized something. In the book ''Star Wars: Legacy of the Force: Revelation'', Ben Skywalker thinks to himself how Jacen Solo had become so saturated in war, danger and deceit that he ended up treating danger as noise to be filtered out (as an explanation for why Jacen's danger sense did not kick in while he was confessing to murdering Mara Jade and he was being recorded without his knowledge). This Troper realized that this explanation could easily be applied to Palpatine and the Sith. This explanation could even apply to the Jedi Order. The danger sense ability is actually unreliable (especially in war) and the Jedi and Sith fail to realize this one simple fact (instead they rely on it too much).
395* In ''ComicBook/StarWarsLegacy'', it always bothered me the undeserved flak the spirits of past Sith Lords gave Darth Krayt and his One Sith (who were taught blind obedience towards Krayt and the importance of teamwork, helping each other and acting as one, hence the name), calling him things such as "pretender" and "heretic", despite his success in taking over the Galaxy. Well, Bane being angry at him is understandable since Krayt abolished the Rule of Two, but the previous Sith Lords not so much. Then, some issues later, Jedi Master Wolf Sazen compliments the Sith for realizing the importance of numbers and acting together. Then it dawned me: Darth Krayt not only erased some of the most ancient Sith philosophies and teachings, he also turned the Sith into something similar to the Jedi. The previous Sith Lords hating him makes now perfect sense.
396* The graphic novel ''Jango Fett: Open Seasons'' has a rather interesting bit in the back matter where it points out all of the similarities between Jango Fett and Luke Skywalker's stories: both were born as poor farm boys on forgotten planets, both were taken in by wise mentors after the deaths of their families, and both of them rose up to lead nearly-extinct orders of warriors fighting for survival. All of those similarities become even more noticeable if you play the game ''VideoGame/StarWarsBountyHunter'', where the plot involves Jango being recruited into a galaxy-spanning adventure by a grey-bearded old Sith Lord fighting against [[APupilOfMineUntilHeTurnedToEvil his rogue former apprentice]].
397* In the old comic continuity, Darth Vader has two robot allies; assassin droids disguised as a protocol droid (0-0-0) and an astromech droid (BT-1). Now, not only does this make practical sense -- who'd expect such common, harmless droids to conceal deadly weapons and murder-programming? -- but there's a deeper meaning to it. Think about it; Darth Vader, as Anakin Skywalker, ''built'' a protocol droid, C-3PO, and the astromech droid R2-D2 was his constant trusty companion throughout the Clone Wars. All things considered, those two droids were some of Anakin's closest and most loyal ''friends'' during his pre-Sith life. Though admittedly they weren't his creations, in all likelihood, Vader is willing to keep 0-0-0 and BT-1 around because, on some level, they remind him of his former robot buddies and a part of him finds that comforting.
398* Yoda's manner of speaking. By putting the subject and the modal/auxilliary verbs at the end, he makes sure that the more informative parts of the sentence come first.
399* The popular explanation for why the Prequel Trilogy duels are so much more elaborate than those of the Original Trilogy is because lightsaber combat "declined" after the fall of the Republic and destruction of the Jedi, and the full extent of the art of the lightsaber was lost. However:
400** By the late Old Republic the Jedi assumed the Sith were destroyed, and there were fewer, if any, enemies the Jedi would regularly face who would use lightsabers. With the martial aspects of lightsaber combat becoming less important, the art continued to develop for the sake of the art itself. This parallels the development of longsword combat in Europe: When Liechtenauer's fechtbuch was written, the longsword was still a major battlefield weapon, and the focus of the art was on earnest combat. This is reflected by his simple, direct, and efficient style (and in fact he was outright disparaging of the flashy show-fighters of his day). However by the time of later masters such as Joachim Meyer, tournament fighting started to supplant martial and judicial combat as the focus of European swordsmanship because of the increasing presence and effectiveness of firearms. This led to a much more elaborate, flashier form of swordsmanship better-suited to entertaining crowds.
401** With no further purpose for the more elaborate lightsaber arts of the late Republic, since under the Empire virtually ''no one'' was using them, this fancier style was abandoned and use of the lightsaber among the rare practitioners reverted to a much more efficient style better suited to the battlefield and personal defense, much like how Western Martial Arts today often focuses more on the earlier masters such as Liechtenauer and Fiore than the later tournament fighters. When Obi-Wan began training Luke, he taught him the older ''battlefield'' styles that would be much more effective at keeping him alive, than the elaborate techniques the Jedi developed among themselves to demonstrate their skill in the absence of any real enemies they would need to match in a duel.
402* Mon Calamari like Ackbar and Raddus are consistently portrayed as skilled at managing space battles. Of course an amphibious species from a water planet would be good at that - they're used to strategizing in three dimensions, avoiding the pitfalls of thinking in terms of TwoDSpace.
403* Lightsaber blades are supposed to be weightless energy, but in the movies they still behave like real swords when wielded. The reason for this is air drag. The blade is indeed weightless, but the blade is not a sword shaped flat surface. Instead it is wide like a blunt bar and thus when it moves through air, it has to push the air molecules out of the way and that takes effort from the wielder. Depending on the thickness of the containment field surrounding the visible energy the lightsaber's air drag might even come close to a baseball bat. That could also explain the humming noise when a lightsaber is swung. The heat of the plasma accelerates the air molecules in the way causing them to move aside quickly creating audible pressure waves.
404** Alternately, if the blade of a lightsaber is made of plasma (which is one of the most popular models for how they work) it's ''not'' just weightless energy. The fourth state of matter plasma ''does'' have mass. Therefore lightsabers behave as if the blades have mass simply because they ''do''.
405*** True, plasma does have mass, but plasma is also the ''thinnest'' state of matter. Plasma has negligible mass. This troper is not familiar enough with physics, how densely plasma can be squeezed together, before it becomes gas again outside the core of a Star, so it is prudent to speculate that the plasma's density couldn't be much greater than the air surrounding the blade. That would suggest a negligible blade mass. Given that in any case whatever mass exists in the blade must be stored inside the handle when the blade is not on, the mass of the blade cannot be all that massive or those lighsaber handles would rip themselves free from the jedis' belts. The air drag theory is still the likelier explanation.
406*** Considering a real sword can hang on a belt just fine without ripping itself free, and a real longsword generally maxes out around 3-3.5lbs, I don't think weight would be an issue.
407*** Lightsaber blades cannot be several pounds. There have been instances of lightsaber blades retracting into the hilt while no one was holding it, sometimes rather quickly. If the blade having a mass of several pounds suddenly moves into the hilt, the Newton's third law would have jerked the hilt in the opposite direction. Therefore the mass of the blade must be significantly smaller than the hilt's mass minus the plasma. Therefore either the blade is not plasma or its mass is too small to make a difference.
408*** You do realize you're talking a setting with a technology level so high that it makes Newton their bitch, right? We see the ''Falcon'', X-wings, and TIE fighters carrying out maneuvers at speeds which ''should'' reduce their crews to a fine paste on the inside of their cockpits.
409*** There is no need for name-calling Newton. While ''Star Wars'' does take plenty of shortcuts with overcoming the laws of Physics, nowhere (that I know of) is there mentioned that the laws of Physics are different from our world. All the spaceships in ''Star Wars'' setting have artificial gravity for crew comfort, they serve a specific purpose. Those artificial gravity generators don't exist just because. What exactly would be the purpose of putting an artificial gravity generator into a lightsaber just to prevent it from jerking a little when the blade shuts down while not being held? That would be quite a vanity modification highly uncharacteristic of the jedi.
410* The often-uttered [[ArcWords "I have a bad feeling about this..."]] seems like just a quirky catchphrase and tradition throughout the films, but keep in mind, one of the anomalies of the Force is hyper-aware emotional and mental radar.
411* Tie Fighters have no hyperdrive. Why? Because that makes Tie's extremely easy to control. They can't really run away, so any Imperial defectors better have a good plan to bail from the Empire, because otherwise, they'd have to take over an entire Star Destroyer (or an Imperial Shuttle) to get away. This works, as shown by the Rebels TV show, where pilots need to actually contact the Rebellion to leave instead of ditching on a whim, but at the expense of Tie Fighters being ludicrously underpowered compared to their Rebel counterparts.
412* I was reading an article about how in Solo Han was portrayed as a gary sue, just like Rey is considered a mary sue. why do we keep getting Mary/Gary Sue's (because Anakin, certainly in episode 1 could be considered that)? The force wants them in certain places, at certain times, to do specific things, so it gifts them with the skills they need to get there, the force itself may be the biggest manipulator in the franchise!
413** It is. Website/SFDebris points out, in his review of ''A New Hope'', that "it makes the Force seem like kind of a dick" that Owen and Beru are killed to push Luke into accepting the CallToAdventure, but instead he posits that the Force moved Luke, Threepio, and Artoo out of danger well in advance of that danger. Similarly, one could posit the deaths of Film/RogueOne as being the Force [[YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness discarding them once they'd served their purpose]]... or keeping utter disaster at bay just long enough for them to succeed.
414* In the prequel trilogy, the Jedi, while powerful and the good guys for the most part, don't seem anything like how they are described in the legends of their order or how they are presented to others. They're immersed in politics, bicker about trivial things, seem to grab the IdiotBall one too many times, more often then not stand back as evil triumphs, and seem to be a far cry from the great warriors of light and keepers of peace that they're supposed to be. This makes perfect sense as without the Sith order around to fight epic battles with, they are relegated to handling more mundane criminal activity and problems. They have to justify their existence and at the same time prove their worth to their patron, the Republic. More than that, their strict adherence to tradition and dogma in lieu of practicality and common sense pushes the order into decline as they won't adapt with the times and seem to cling to the past. What we see in the prequel trilogy aren't the grand heroes of old struggling for the survival of freedom and peace but a bunch of tight-assed religious monks with nothing serious to do as most of the threats that emerge are things a normal government could handle. The current Jedi barring a few exceptions are ascetics and practitioners of a religion, not tempered warriors of justice.
415* A lot of people forget how one of Palpatine's statements comes full circle. In ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'', a DEEP emphasis is put on what he says as it cuts to a close-up of him saying in a sinister way, "It's ironic... He could save others from death but not himself." Fast forward to the end of the movie when Anakin was literally dying on Mustafar, only to be saved by Sidious and get turned into the "Original" Darth Vader. Now, let's fast forward again, this time to ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' when Vader threw Sidious down the generator shaft. "He could save OTHERS from DEATH but NOT HIMSELF."
416* Kyle Katarn's entire character morality is one huge moment of brilliance
417** People like to bring up how the non-canon ending of 'Dark Forces 2' and the subsequent events of 'Mysteries Of The Sith' make no sense, as Kyle falls to the Dark Side so easily that it's almost comical. Except... how did Kyle begin his career? As a Stormtrooper working under the Empire, slaughtering Rebels who dared defy the rule of the Imperials. Why did Kyle then join the Rebels? Out of anger, because he discovered that the Imperials were the ones who killed his father (while the Imperials had told him it was the Rebels). Thus Kyle's entire life at that point had been anger, misguided or otherwise.
418** Then consider how Luke was able to resist the Dark Side, as well as Mara when she rescued Kyle in the finale of 'Mysteries Of The Sith'. Both Luke and Mara had, between them, varying degrees of Jedi training. Mara, from the Emperor, and Luke, from Obi-Wan and Yoda. Mara even had some training from Kyle, except Kyle himself had no training. The best he had was some advice given to him from Rahn during the events of 'Dark Forces 2' and a lot of improvisation. Kyle, as such, would have had no real instruction on the temptations of the Dark Side and how easy it can be to fall to it
419** Thus it becomes all too easy for Kyle to be swayed, as he still carries that deep core of hatred inside himself, and has no true understanding of how to resist the seductive pull of the Dark Side, hence why Kyle can fall so easily. He's permanently walking the line between light and dark
420* The Empire seems to have it for Incom Corporation due [[NeverLiveItDown letting the X-Wing plans and prototypes fall into Rebel hands]], to the point that in Legends many Star Destroyers commanders outright refused to have [[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/I-7_Howlrunner an Incom fighter better than the standard TIE]] in their flight groups. Looking better at both Legends and Canon, however, it becomes clear that the X-Wing debacle was simply the last straw in a series of Incom screw-ups that generated outright paranoia among the Imperials:
421** The Empire introduced the AT-AT early in its reign, and when it became clear the existing {{LAAT/c}} dropships were too small to deliver it in battle Incom was tasked with coming up with a dropship. Thus they develop the ''[[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Theta-class_barge Theta]], who can transport an AT-AT... But is so small the AT-AT has to have its legs folded and cannot immediately enter battle, defeating the whole point and leading to the Empire to adapt the ''Gozanti'' as an AT-AT barge.
422** To remedy the above, Incom then developed the [[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Y-85_Titan_dropship Y-85 Titan dropship]], capable to deploy ''four'' [=AT-ATs=], plus four [=AT-STs=] for good measure, or an entire disassembled prefabricated base. While the limited agility deriving from such cargo (why in Canon general Veers used the ''Gozanti'' to deliver his troops to Hoth's surface, as he feared attacks from Rebel fighters) may be forgiven, the fact it's ''too large for an ISD hangar'' and can only carried by battlecruisers and above or dedicated troopships once again defeats the whole point of having an AT-AT barge.
423** While the use of Incom products such as the Z-95 starfighters, T-16 airspeeders and T-47 airspeeders by rebels and pirates was not suspicious due the sheer ubiquity of said products before the Empire took over (and [[TechnicallyATransport the T-47 being a cargo hauler that had to be extensively modified to be used in combat]]) the Rebels' ability for coming up and mass producing with new and improved Z-95 variants was indeed suspicious. In Legends this is why the Empire nationalized the company in spite of their usual reluctance to take over major weapon manufacturers, to try and cut short the Rebel supply of "Heavy Headhunters".
424** In Canon, the [[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/UT-60D_U-wing_starfighter/support_craft U-Wing troop transport]] had a limited production run, being still evaluated by the Empire for full adoption while [[https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/BT-45D_U-wing its unarmed civilian variant]] was mass-produced... Then, somehow, a shipment of U-Wings "disappeared" and Rebels started using not just a militarized version of the civilian variant but the actual UT-60D. While Incom employees were definitely innocent this time (as it had been Bail Organa to disappear them), it was another black mark, and the reason for why the Empire nationalized the company.
425** Finally, in retaliation for the nationalization, the X-Wing design team flat-out defected to the Rebellion, bringing with them the prototypes and the plans and deleting every other copy-thus cementing the Imperial military's distaste for Incom products.
426* People complain about the Jedi getting military ranks, and even teenagers being able to boss around clone troopers. However, remember that Dooku/Tyranus was responsible for setting up much of the system. Most likely, it was an ''intentional BatmanGambit'' to ensure poor military leadership on the Republic's part.
427* The ''Duel of the Fates'' theme plays before/during some of the most dramatic events. A main motif therein has the rhythmic pattern of the Morse code for "SOS", i.e. a distress signal.
428* The "no attachments" policy of the Jedi has come under fire from fans. However, consider the universe the Jedi live in. They have superpowers, which they get from the Force. The Force has a Dark Side, which, if a Jedi yields to it, can twist their personality and values system to such an extent that they will immediately start butchering helpless children and kill the very person they were trying to save. And the Dark Side is accessed not through brainwashing, torture, drugs, or some kind of implant, but simply through the Jedi's ''own feelings''. And some of the strongest and messiest negative feelings stem from attachments -- jealousy, fear, grief, and the like. The resultant world the Jedi live in is one where relationship drama or grief at the loss of a loved one could conceivably send an ordinary Force Sensitive -- already a OneManArmy against Muggles -- on a homicidal rampage. Thus, although the Jedi arguably go too far (and their lifestyle is not really conducive to eschewing attachments anyway[[note]]The Jedi permit sexual contact, which is a quick and effective way to form attachments (there’s a reason so many languages refer to the act as "making love"). What’s more, communal living arrangements and depending on one another for your lives in a high-stress situation also result in attachments.[[/note]]), their wariness regarding attachments is not without foundation.
429* Jedi holocrons are cubes. Sith holocrons are tetrahedra. It was once believed that tetrahedra, like the other Platonic solids, could tesselate infinitely through space. In recent years we've learned they can't. Cubes can fill space completely, perfectly, perfect harmony. Tetrahedra leave gaps, they cannot achieve perfect unity in space; they're flawed.
430* Vader in the Disney canon is treated as a borderline invincible villain. Pretty much anyone who faces him it's severly outclassed and gets defeated with such an ease, even entire armies as a whole. However, there have been some who could actually give him a battle: Obi Wan faced him thrice (four if you also count their fight in episode III of the Series/ObiWanKenobi, although Kenobi was incredibly conflicted and not really fighting, spending most of the fight on the run), managing to beat him two times and leaving him incredibly weak and close to death, an only losing the last time because Kenobi accepted his fate in the last battle, and even then they're still on equal terms for the most part thanks to Vader's unusual caution; Ahsoka while didn't actually beat him still managed to give him a harsh fight and a critical hit on the helmet and probably would have a chance to win has she not been too conflicted; Luke in the episode VI gets use of his rage to finally beat him in combat and even before that he was actually holding himself extremelly well; and finally Palpatine, who has Vader etirely subjugated and in the few times Vader fought him off the emperor pretty much put him back in place with little effort. This actually has sense from a narrative stand-point: Vader has been building a reputation as TheSpook with no past to speak off, trying to bury the memory of Anakin behind; naturally the ones who can stand a chance against him are the ones who know who he really is. It's a subtle way the leaves the lesson: "You can't hide from your past, the only thing you can do is learn from it."
431** Luke's utter defeat in ''Film/TheEmpireStrikesBack'' happens also when he only knows that Vader killed his father and only sees him as an evil monster who only causes death and suffering, barely even caring about Vaders as a person at all. After the reveal that the evil monster he fought was actually his father, Luke has a breakdown and has to run away to save himself. In ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' however Luke finally comes into terms with his father's identity and past, coinciding indeed with the same time now Luke can actually beat Vader in a fight even if he does tap into the dark side a bit to do so.
432* Right after Mace Windu and the Jedi tried to arrest him Palpatine made a public appearance broadcasted around the galaxy showing his new scarred appearance, and his speech even mentions said scars. Yet more than once we see people surprised to discover the Emperor is scarred, with him even having a holocommunication where he looks as he did before the failed attempt to arrest him and being surprised the other guy calls him out on this... Except [[MagicPlasticSurgery there's plastic surgery that can completely alter someone's face and even facial bone structure]] - most people simply made the very reasonable assumption that, once the emergency of the "Jedi treason" was settled, Palpatine had undergone surgery and got his previous looks restored, and while he didn't he's not above using this assumption to his advantage when he can.
433** It's also possible that Palpatine ''did'' take the surgery... But due the scars coming from Force Lightning and the physical decay caused by overuse of the Dark Side of the Force either the surgery failed or the scars reappeared and he didn't bother covering them again.
434* In Legends, Tarkin's niece Rivoche was a spy for the Rebel Alliance and got away with it for a long time in spite of who her uncle was... Or rather ''because'' of who her uncle was: [[BeneathSuspicion nobody in their right mind would dare suspecting her]] aside for Tarkin himself, who was convinced he had long tamed her "spoiled" character traits, and his political enemies wouldn't dare such a blatant attack [[TheDreaded out of fear]]. In fact the reason she's exposed after her uncle's death is because his political enemies were trying to ''frame her'' and discredit her uncle's faction, and were surprised when her sudden extraction revealed that [[FramingTheGuiltyParty they were indeed going after a Rebel spy]].
435* Not only does Padmé mean "lotus" in Sanskrit,[[note]]Technically, it's in locative case, so it actually means "in the lotus",[[/note]] but Ren means "lotus" in Japanese. (Yes, the latter was probably unintentional.)
436
437[[/folder]]
438[[AC: FridgeHorror]]
439
440[[folder: General]]
441* Stop and consider for a brief moment the fact that nobody bothered to tell Luke he was Vader's son. Essentially, Obi-Wan and Yoda had set up Luke to kill his father without ever knowing the truth. He might have even gone further down the Oedipus Rex path if he'd married Leia!
442* In the original trilogy, Palpatine and Vader seem perfectly aware of the force, and Vader is shown mentioning it to other Imperial officers in ''Film/ANewHope'', but they seem to perceive it as just another religion. However, they (or at least some of them) also seem to be aware that the Jedi were mostly wiped out, as implied by one of Tarkin's conversations with Vader, in which Tarkin says ''"you, my friend, are all that is left of their religion."'' Now think about this in light of the prequel trilogy. ''"Order 66"'' was already [[MoralEventHorizon heinous]], but we know from the context that it was at least somewhat pragmatic; Palpatine wiped out the Jedi because they were the only rivals to himself and Vader in knowledge of the force. Tarkin, however, not believing in the Force, is probably unaware that this was the reason. Now think about what he said once more. ''"All that is left of their religion."'' In other words, he [[ANaziByAnyOtherName condones having people rounded up and killed for their religious beliefs]]. Sure, we know he was bad news from the start, [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain but still]]...
443** Supplemental materials actually show that the idea of religious persecution is one of the more tame opinions of Tarkin. Ever wonder why Imperials are all humans? It's because one of the policies of the Empire was radical and violent racism against non human species. EU writers have made Tarkin a Star Wars CaptainErsatz of real life monster Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS, who many believe was actually ''worse'' than Hitler.
444** Tarkin himself never expressed disbelief in the Force. That was Admiral Motti. Tarkin's later statement about Vader being the last of his religion indicates that he accepts Vader's power even if he's not a practitioner.
445** Note that this is actually pretty reasonable. While the Force may bind the entire galaxy (possibly the universe) together, most people cannot directly sense or consciously interact with it. That is reserved for the lucky few with high midi-chlorian counts. So, your typical ambitious political/military figure, like Tarkin or Motti, has no particular reason to care much about a religion built around it because as far as they are concerned it just does not do anything for them. Groups like the Jedi are just super-powered obstacles to their own advancement.
446** This extends to Dooku as well. In the novelization of Revenge of the Sith, he is eager to establish the empire... a Human empire.
447* In the ''Star Wars'' universe as a whole, AlternativeCharacterInterpretation is the reason why many end up not supporting the Jedi. At first, the Jedi are painted as a peaceful, almost monk-like organization, centred around achieving balance with themselves and the universe. However, consider for a moment the following facts. The Jedi is a warrior cult who operate entirely on their own, and have nobody regulating them, other than the fact that they ''usually'' go along with what the Senate wants... except when the Jedi decide they don't like it. Now imagine that the Jedi, in the course of their "duties," have the right to search people's homes and property with no authorization, can read people's minds, ''can actually control some people's minds'', and have the right to ''kill'' people they don't approve of. Remember in episode two, when Anakin and Obi-Wan ''dismember'' a person in front of a crowd of bar-goers? "Jedi business, go back to your drinks." Sounds a lot more sinister when you consider what you've read here, doesn't it? Now consider that this cult takes people away from their homes and families as small children, so as to better brainwash them into believing their teachings. They force celibacy onto these converts before they even understand the idea of sex. They also preach the total divorce of self from personal emotions, because using one's powers in an emotional state is eeeeeeevil. Anyone who comes to the realization that these people are full of crap are promptly kicked out of the order, unless they leave of their own will. After they are kicked out, they are labelled as "Dark Jedi," because any views other than the Jedi's own are eeeeeeevil. These people also believe that "balance" in the force consists of people who believe in the application of the force in any way other than theirs being killed.
448** They cut off Zam Wesell's arm after she tried to ''kill a Senator''. Please watch the movie before you make judgments. Also, they were right about balance. There are two ways to use the Force; the light way and the dark way. The dark way uses the Force ''wrong'', the same way that brutally beating and abusing a horse to make it do more work is using it ''wrong''. In the novelization of [=RotJ=], Luke thinks that the lightening is an aberration of the Force. The dark side ''isn't mean to be'', so the Jedi are perfectly in the right thinking that destroying this aberration that wasn't created by nature and was created by human beings wanting power and fueling their power on rage and hatred will cause balance. Why wouldn't it?
449*** The problem is that slicing limbs off of people (as Obi-Wan does in both ''A New Hope'' and ''Attack of the Clones'') is still barbaric in a galaxy where stun guns are a common technology. It invalidates the whole ElegantWeaponForAMoreCivilizedAge concept because this "elegant weapon" is incapable of inflicting anything less than grievous bodily harm on the target. Mind you, that is ''before'' you consider that the Jedi have powers like telekinesis with which they could potentially disarm and immobilize opponents, especially if their CombatClairvoyance gives them advance notice that they are about to be attacked. The fact that a Sith like Dooku could telekinetically manhandle a Jedi ''Master'' while engaging ''another'' Jedi in a lightsaber duel strongly suggests that the Jedi's failure to employ telekinesis tactically has more to do with a lack of ''training'' to do so, rather than an inherent limitation of Force powers. Which means that they ''choose'' to use excessive force (or Force) even in circumstances where they do not really need to! Thus, they are not as benevolent as they may like to imagine they are.
450** Jedi are analogous to cops. They don't kill people "they don't approve of", they need just cause. "Keepers of the peace, not soldiers." What weakened them was having to fight a war. People who leave the order aren't necessarily "Dark Jedi"; that specifically requires falling to the Dark Side. The "Jedi business" is the equivalent of "police business, nothing to see here", the equivalent of a cop disarming (heh) an armed suspect who is trying to kill them in a manner that keeps both them and the public safe. The Jedi taught serenity to avoid falling to the Dark Side ''from'' using one's powers in an emotional state. Jedi are allowed to have sex, just not ''relationships''. (Yes, bad idea, that's the point.) The Sith are a cult of galaxy-conquering megalomaniacs, not just a difference of opinion. RonTheDeathEater much?
451*** Grievous' backstory shows the Jedi in a whole new light, from the perspective of a people fighting their alien oppressors. Suddenly the Jedi swoop in, blockade their planet, and a huge percentage of the Kaleesh starve.
452*** I know I certainly enjoyed the scenes where the Jedi engaged in due process, presented warrants, and reported back to the senate before taking major actions like attempting to assassinate a sitting prime minister. I mean, when a militaristic religious faction attempts to kill a sitting elected leader in his office without so much as informing anyone else in the government, that says "police" and not "dangerous terrorist" in any way, you're right.
453*** Well, he did just kind of set himself up to rule a galaxy. And then he killed four peacekeepers of the galaxy. Yeah, keep that guy in office.
454*** Analogous, not "exactly the same." Don't be a smartass and stop ignoring and glossing over the fact that, you know, the "sitting elected leader" just made himself emperor for life, instigated a war that killed millions, and controlled the Senate that you're expecting the Jedi to go to.
455*** Actually, Palpatine did not declare himself Emperor until ''after'' the little altercation in his office. In fact, he ''used'' it as a rationalization to the Senate for the purge of the Jedi Order. The Jedi played right into his hands because, in all the years of his Chancellorship, they tended to make decisions within their own Council and had surprisingly little interaction with the Senate. Then they abruptly decide to remove Palpatine by force, without consulting the Senate, and he is able to turn that fact on them to make them out to be the bad guys. That Palpatine was as successful at manipulating the politics of the Republic as he was owes itself to the Jedi's lack of genre savvy and their tendency to act as if the opinions of the public and the government did not matter.
456*** The FridgeHorror compounds: Palpatine declared himself Emperor after explaining to the Senate that the Jedi Council attempted to stage a coup by assassinating him, then take control of the Senate, and that the assassination attempt resulted in his disfigurement. [[VillainHasAPoint All of that is completely true,]] and is in fact the exact situation that Order 66 required in order to be issued legally. The Jedi Council committed high treason. Their intentions were good, but you know what they say about the road to Hell...
457*** Worse, to the galaxy at large it looked like a case of ScrewTheRulesIHaveSupernaturalPowers. Even the Jedi had no idea that Palpatine was a Sith Lord until Anakin told them when they were ''already'' on their way to his office to forcibly depose him at lightsaber point. They merely thought he was a CorruptPolitician. But acting unilaterally this way, bypassing the legislature and the judiciary of the Republic entirely, only served to make Palpatine's version of the story sound true. Since Anakin never even told Padme or anyone else, the fact that Palpatine was a Sith would take years to come out, and that he was also the secret leader of the Separatists and the instigator of the Clone Wars was never revealed at all! This would have only served to fuel propaganda about [[BewareTheSuperman the dangers of having an organization like the Jedi around]]. He could even use the same accusation that the Jedi had leveled at ''him'', claiming that they had become addicted to power during their time as generals of the Army of the Republic and that with the imminent defeat of the Separatists they had decided to seize power rather than return to their previous role as mere peacekeepers.(In Luceno's novelization, that's exactly what he told to Senate.)
458
459** It's little wonder that the galaxy turned on them so quickly, the outsiders' view of them is pretty bad. A politically powerful religious order full of near unstoppable warriors. They turn up and take young children, seemingly at random, then Induct them into their religious order. How many people would be terrified they'd turn up and take their kids away, never to be seen again, they could even convince you that you gave them up willingly!
460*** Where, in any of the fiction, is it ever stated that ''that'' is how the Jedi were viewed by anyone?
461*** The Expanded Universe book ''The Jedi Path'' does outline some of this. Apparently all children in the Republic were subject to mandatory screening for their midi-chlorian count. While the Jedi were usually polite about it, legally they had the right to seize possession of any child deemed a potential Force-sensitive regardless of parental consent (or lack thereof). Since whole generations of Jedi were raised in the Order, without contact with their families, it is pretty easy to imagine the Jedi becoming desensitized to the trauma a family would experience at having a child taken from them because the idea of familial bonds would seem very alien to the Jedi. It is also impossible to imagine that at least some people were not openly angry at the Jedi's legal abduction of their children.
462*** "Pretty easy to imagine" does not mean it's canon, so don't speak as if it is. You're extrapolating and coming to conclusions that are not in evidence as being prevalent.
463*** Actually, this is Expanded Universe canon, at least that the Jedi had difficulty comprehending why the parents of the children they take might object. On page 192 of ''Jedi vs. Sith - The Essential Guide to the Force'', it talks about the tensions between the Jedi and a small Force-using group known as the Zeison Sha. This group had existed in isolation for a long time, and upon rediscovery by the Republic the Jedi attempted to take custody of their (Force-sensitive) children, causing considerable upset. Jedi Master Bodo Baas, writing about negotiations with the Zeison Sha observes:
464----> '''Bodo Baas''': In fact, the Zeison Sha made it quite clear that they oppose the concept of separating Force-sensitive infants and children from their families. Their philosophy is so centered on being able to take care of oneself and one's family, and even I must admit that most Jedi, myself included, cannot entirely comprehend this form of devotion.
465*** Correct me if I'm wrong, but there was also an episode of the clone wars that dealt with a race that were so untrusting of the Jedi because of their habit of essentially kidnapping force sensitive children that they, at first, weren't even willing to allow Mace Windu onto the planet even when several members of the government were being kidnapped. It took Jar Jar of all people claiming Mace was his servant for them to allow him to stay.
466** DemocracyIsBad is a recurring trope in the ''Star Wars'' saga generally, with the Senate being almost universally depicted as ineffectual and/or stupid. But even still, in ''Revenge of the Sith'' the Jedi plan to take control of the Republic after removing Palpatine speaks to the tremendous sense of self-righteousness that the Order had. They proved wholly ineffectual at preventing the Clone Wars in the first place and while their individual heroism was great, the main reason that the Separatists were defeated was because Palpatine controlled them from behind the scenes and had them stop fighting when he no longer needed the war to continue. The Jedi Council also completely failed to realize that Palpatine was a Sith Lord, despite often being in the same room with him. On what basis did they believe themselves qualified to take over the galactic government, even temporarily?
467** Not only are the Jedi self-righteous, they don't really learn anything. Not only do they continuously fail to completely wipe out their arch rivals, the Sith (who they are actually responsible for creating in the first place) despite having plenty of opportunity, members of their Order are CONSTANTLY falling to the Dark Side left and right, who frequently cause massive wars and definitely genocide over and over again for the 24,000 years that the Order has existed. Despite this, instead of considering that the way they do things might be flawed (I mean, look at how they're shown raising and training their members, plenty of people would go psychotic in those kinds of conditions) and attempt to improve it to create a sort of equilibrium between Light and Dark, they just blame the ones who fall for everything and go back to doing things the way they always have. In the 24,000 years the Jedi Order has existed they have changed VERY little.
468** Or if you want to look at it another way - the Jedi Order seen in the prequels ''are'' corrupt, just in a Ivory Tower-esque way instead of villainous. They're still the maintainers of order, but it's very cold and stoic kind detached from everything around them. The Force is about balance, good AND bad and by Anakin's change into Darth Vader and subsequent annihilation of the "Old Jedi Order," it's up to Luke to recreate a new Jedi philosophy. Given Luke's attachment to his Nakama and the EU material, it's implied that the new Jedi are a little less rigid than those before and additionally no longer wield the political or social power they originally did. So Anakin Skywalker brought balance to the Force first by getting rid of the old structure of the Jedi Order and additionally killing Palpatine, resetting the Sith side too.
469* Anakin Skywalker was The ChosenOne, prophesied to Bring Balance to the Force. At the time Anakin became a Jedi, there were hundreds(?) of Jedi... and [[RuleOfTwo only two Sith]] (and a few dozen, at most, Dark Jedi). So there's [[NiceJobBreakingItHero three obvious ways]] to 'balance' that imbalance: create armies of Sith/Dark Jedi, dramatically power up the existing dark-siders, or kill off the vast majority of the Jedi (which becomes FridgeBrilliance, perhaps, when you consider that at the end of both movie trilogies, there are only two Jedi left (unless you count the EU - but that would balance the Dark Jedi...) This becomes '''especially''' Horrible when you consider that either the entire Jedi council was too dumb to realize this - or that they ''did'' and ''let it happen anyway''.
470** The Jedi proclaim that Fear is of the Dark Side and yet ''fear'' Love for its potential to cause one to fall to the Dark Side. It's no wonder they seem corrupt when they have all fallen to the Dark Side without knowing it. One of Yoda's problems was an inability to acknowledge his darkness which threatened to destroy him until he acknowledged it. Even after acknowledging his inner darkness he inadvertently let it control him during Anakin's talk with him during ''Revenge of the Sith'' about the visions he had been having.
471** WordOfGod says that to the Jedi, "Balance" meant eliminating all the Sith, as they were the imbalance in the Force. Yoda knew that Anakin would ultimately remove the last Sith, but didn't foresee all the horror before then.
472*** That leads into the following Horror: This quest to "restore balance" is the ultimate in {{Pyrrhic Victor|y}}ies. Think about it: Prior to the movies, you had 3 Sith versus a Jedi Order of likely ''thousands''. Yes, the Sith are destroyed in the end... but all that remains of the Jedi '''is an ''adept'' and his untrained sister!''' What sort of ground is ''that'' to rebuild an Order on?
473*** Luke would've most likely received guidance from both the Force Ghosts, as well as members of the Church of the Force, such as Lor San Tekka. The force ghosts of Yoda, Obi-Wan, and Qui-Gon would also tell him of the mistakes of the first Jedi Order, and help him learn from them, which would establish a stronger and more balanced system to train Jedi with. Everything would've gone fine, but there were two things they didn't count on:
474*** Ben Solo feeling the pull of the Dark Side whilst admiring Anakin's achievements as Darth Vader.
475*** The possibility that there were Dark Side beings that were just as powerful, if not more than, the Sith, such as Snoke.
476** This particular bit of {{Fanon}} in regards to "Balancing the Force" sometimes gets annoying. How stupid do people think the Jedi are?
477*** Lucas has no one to blame but himself for allowing the events to coincide in such a way as to allow for a perceived PropheticFallacy.
478** If the Sith are the imbalance in the Force, how is equaling imbalance and balance going to balance the Force? (If you do not understand this, go find a math professor and ask him if you have 1 particle of balance (Jedi) and -1 balance (Sith), how much do you have? None. No balance.
479*** There's no direct particle analogy in the Force. Jedi and those who use the light side are part of the Force without perturbing it, thus there can be as many Jedi as you can find and the Force stays in balance. Using the Dark Side disturbs the balance of the Force, so any Sith at all are an imbalance, and eliminating them restores balance.
480*** Think ''homeostatic'' balance, as in a healthy living body, not positive/negative balance. The Force comes from life, after all.
481*** Keep in mind, the only people who bring up balance are the Jedi themselves, so of course "balance" is going to be in their favor. Positive/negative balance would put them out of a job.
482*** Whereas this "quest to bring 'Balance' to the Force" put them ''in the Red''. [[DontExplainTheJoke As in]], bleeding and dying! A ''dead'' body has "balance" ''by default''.
483** Assuming "Balance" means balance between Dark and Light sides (which it doesn't by WordOfGod), reducing the number of Jedi doesn't necessarily means balancing the Force, since at the end of ''Revenge of the Sith'' the Sith have much more power and influence than the Jedi
484* From the first film, it is established both that droids are sentient and self aware enough to be lovable, sympathetic characters, and that they're ''routinely memory-wiped''.
485** Supplementary materials say that it takes a long time without memory wipes to develop these behaviors. R2-D2 hadn't been memory wiped in decades, and I'm pretty sure Anakin built C-3P0 like that.
486*** Is that supposed to make it better? Every droid in the galaxy has the potential to be fully sentient but they are regularly lobotomized before they even begin to realize that they can be individuals?
487*** Think of it like this. A droid is explicitly built to be a commercial product geared toward a specific function the consumer requires a droid for. A droid that develops sapience while still just a commercial product thus induces an ethical (and potentially legal) conundrum where one didn't initially exist. The most ethical solution would be to design a droid that's complex enough to learn whatever tasks it's meant to do without any chance of developing sapience. But given the droids stated to require memory wipes are the ones filling compex specialized tasks where learning and adaptability are valued, it's quite possible that a learning machine in the Star Wars universe simply can't be made adaptable enough without the risk of developing sapience. If that is the case, then the only other option left is to do everything one can to prevent the droids from developing sapience while in use. From the perspective of a living being it might seem cruel to deny sentience or sapience to something that has the potential to develop it, but this is for something intended by design to be bought and sold rather than a living being. To have a droid complex enough to perform its function without enough intellectual complexity to present a moral dilemna would be prefered, but presumably a droid has to be able to adapt to the point of developing sentience to serve those functions.
488* The Expanded Universe tells us that the main Imperial Pilot Academy (or whatever it was called) was located on Alderaan. Which means that when Death Star blew it up, they also killed all the would-be pilots training there. This takes ForTheEvulz of this act to a whole new level - not only was it unnecessary, it was also extremely counterproductive and may explain why good pilots were hard to find for the Empire...
489* In the ''Star Wars'' Kinect game, Han Solo does his "I'm Han Solo" dance number singing how good it feels to be free from carbonite. All the while, he's standing not five feet from the carbonite freezing mechanism.
490* Anakin's turn can come across as rushed. It seemed like one moment he was a decent moral man who had signs of jealousy and obsession and the next he was a full blown psychopath. There seemed to be no definite point where Anakin snapped and became Darth Vader, it seemed to just happen all of a sudden, like we, the audience, had missed a scene. Also Anakin's slaughter of the younglings seemed to be just something that Lucas threw in as a cheap shock and had little narrative or character value. It can all just seem like poor writing, until you realize something: when Anakin goes to the Jedi council chamber and is confronted by younglings, a young blonde haired boy who bears a certain resemblance to a young Anakin comes forward and talks to him. The boy looks at Anakin and stands right in the spot where young Anakin stood when he was brought before the Jedi Council all those years ago. When Anakin murders the children, this is the moment where he fully "snaps" and falls completely to the dark side. Before that, Anakin was merely going through the motions, doing what he could just to save Padme's life. The murder of the younglings is his final "test" if you will and he passes with flying colours. The young boy represents the innocence that Anakin once had and that he now destroys, leaving only the power hungry and petulant madman that Padme and Obi-Wan encounter on Mustafar.
491* The Empire uses the stun setting and takes prisoners most of the time, even when Han and Leia were at the Endor base entrance. Rebels never use the stun setting on their guns.
492** The Empire has tons of facilities to hold prisoners. The Rebels don't. It's simple, if cold, logistics.
493*** The Death Star itself has HUGE prison wings with probably hundreds of cells. They couldn't all have been empty by the time the rebels destroyed it...
494*** The Death Star was a brand new ship/weapons system just finishing its trials (blowing up Alderaan). It very well could have had no prisoners on board by that point. Depending on what EU materials you look at, Leia was either the only prisoner or the previous prisoners were massacred in an escape attempt (see ''Star Wars Battlefront 2'').
495*** And some of the prisoners wouldn't be innocent, either. In fact, some were probably people who ''worked'' on the Death Star and were slated for a stay in the brig for screwing up on the job. Militant fascist state, remember?
496*** Following through with the above, it's very likely that the [=DS1=] was filled with civilian workers and forced labor when it was destroyed (and this is outright stated in EU material on a couple occasions), and, as mentioned, it had just finished construction and had its first weapons test on Jedha and then again on Scarif and Alderaan, with the intent to blow Yavin IV to hell as well. At no point did they stop for a breath and let the workers off; they were constantly chasing the Rebels from point A to point B from the moment of completion. Was it necessary to destroy the Death Star to prevent the destruction of the Rebellion and the solidification of Imperial Dominance? Yes. Is a Necessary Evil any less Evil? No. The Rebels have always been morally grey; ''Rogue One'' is just the first film to out-and-out say, "Yeah, they're the protagonists, but they aren't morally good." Worth noting the opposite of this is why people were up in arms about Disney; they thought it would get softer, and we got the single darkest film in the canon from them (and, quite rightly, one hailed as being the best since Empire).
497* In ''Film/ReturnOfTheJedi'' and ''VideoGame/TheForceUnleashed'', Palpatine tries to have Luke and Marek, respectively try to murder Darth Vader upon the latter's defeat so he could take his place at his side. Seems like standard Sith ways. However, Vader, or rather, Anakin Skywalker, was technically born of a Sith experiment between Plagueis and himself (even if it wasn't what they had intended), so the implications of that is not only the fact that Palpatine would do away with an apprentice if it doesn't suit his current needs, but that he's willing to [[OffingTheOffspring off what amounts to his own son]].
498** This isn't really surprising, considering how Palpatine had no problems with killing [[Literature/DarthPlagueis his parents and siblings.]]
499* Think about Anakin and Palpatine's relationship for a second. Here's a nine to ten year old boy who has just been taken from his mother into an order of ascetic knights. He has no family and no friends and has been cut off from his loved ones. Now, there's a fifty to sixty year old man who comes in and guides and befriends him -- watching over him. He tells the boy how special he is and acts as a confidant. Not only that, but he makes it a point to subvert that boy's trust in people who genuinely do care about him time and time again. Why? Because he wants to exploit that child's power as he grows into an adult. This troper honestly found their relationship to be creepily reminiscent of child grooming.
500** I never saw Palpatine doing anything more than noticing Anakin's Force strength at the very beginning, and got the feeling that he started paying more attention as he noticed that Anakin was a loose cannon as a padawan under Obi-Wan Kenobi with anger control issues that he could exploit. He didn't really start working on isolating Anakin from those around him until he was an adult (in Revenge Of The Sith). It didn't seem like grooming as much as opportunism.
501*** I always viewed it as grooming because ROTS makes clear that Palpatine has been an important presence in Anakin's life since he arrived on Coruscant - Anakin refers to him as a mentor and a friend, having watched over him ever since he arrived. There's also the familiarity with which Anakin and Palpatine interact in AOTC (and the frightening degree of deference Anakin accords him). Obi-Wan himself notes that their relationship makes the Council uncomfortable because they are too close. Considering Anakin hasn't been on Coruscant for at least several months at this point (and their interactions from previous films) the evidence has always seemed to point to a long-standing relationship in this Troper's opinion.
502* Why did Vader need to spend the rest of his life sealed inside that life support suit? It has already been depicted that that Republic/Empire has a level of medical technology such that transplanting organs around is fairly easy. Indeed, General Grievous was just a full-conversion cyborg with his brain and a handful of his original guts transplanted into a droid body. Now consider that the Kaminoans had advanced cloning technology and could grow entire human beings (indeed, mass-produce them). Given that the Sith and ethics are like oil and water, this opens up two scenarios:
503** The simpler one: the Kaminoans clone replacement organs for Vader. Lung transplants have been done in the real world since the late-1980's. Skin-grafting is fairly routine cosmetic work for people who have been in accidents or fires. Even face transplants have recently been performed successfully. It would have been a little patchwork, but possible even with present-day real world medical technology. Real world doctors ''wish'' they could obtain cloned replacement organs and tissue on-demand because then they could do a ''lot'' more for their patients with the surgical techniques we already have. Surely an advanced civilization like the Empire could do even better. Taking things further, they could have grown a full clone to obtain things like biological limbs to replace his cybernetic ones.
504** The more daring option: Going back to growing a full clone as mentioned above, why not do that and just transplant Vader's ''brain'' into the healthy clone body? Could it really be more difficult to transplant a living brain into a genetically-identical living body than it was to transplant one into a cyborg body the way that they did with Grievous?
505*** Well, there was not much he could do, because the clones the Kaminoans build either grow at an accelerated rate (which would result in him having to change bodies every few years) or grow at a normal pace (which would require him to await for more than twenty years before he could get his young body back).
506*** Having to have a fresh pair of lungs installed every decade or so would probably still have been preferable to being trapped in that suit for the rest of his life. Even with the rate of growth they were working with in the films, he could have had a viable set of replacement organs in less than a decade. However, Expanded Universe media indicates that the Kaminoans had solved the problem of the clone's rapid aging. It was just never widely utilized because the clone armies were supposed to be expendable. Other EU novels go further and introduce Spaarti Cylinders, were were a quantum leap over Kaminoan technology and could grow an adult clone in a year. All of this assumes that they could not grow individual body parts. There is real world research that indicates that such a thing will be possible in coming decades. Which also makes this a possible case of TechnologyMarchesOn.
507*** [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation Then again]], it's also possible that Palpatine went cheap on his apprentice [[ForTheEvulz purely to emphasize Vader's inferiority to him]]. An Alpha male ensuring that his subordinate knew his place.
508** Fanon says that it was much easier for Palpatine to control Vader when he is stuck in a clunky armored suit. And Vader needs to feel trapped and broken, otherwise he could start to recover. It's a basic abusive relationship practice.
509** Hence the Fridge Horror aspect of the whole situation. Vader is not trapped in the suit because there are no other medical options for keeping him alive or improving his condition. He is in there because his boss is a sadist who wants to keep him angry and tormented.
510*** All this doesn't explain why Vader himself didn't do any of the things mentioned above himself at some point afterwards to get him out of that suit or at least make living in the suit better. It's not like as the Emperor's right hand man he didn't have plenty of resources he could have called on at any point to do just that, possibly without the Emperor even knowing about it if he had to.
511*** Which is why we're in the Fridge here. As I said above, TechnologyMarchesOn. Back in the 1970's, a portable iron lung that you could wear and walk around with would have seemed fairly spiffy. Today we sneer at how primitive the idea is. Between new cell-culturing techniques using synthetic scaffolds, and even more promising developments in 3D printing, real world scientists are talking about being able to produce replacement organs (such as lungs) no later than 2050. The TheoryOfNarrativeCausality is in play here. Vader is trapped in the suit because he ''has'' to be in order to be the cool cyborg villain he is. Even though the in-universe technology levels make the need for him to be in the suit dubious at best, he ''needs'' to be in the suit to reflect his inhumanity. Thus he is, even though by all rights his body should have been repairable in the long-term, even though the suit might have been needed in the short-term.
512** Mentioned above, Anakin Skywalker is effectively Palpatine's progeny. As if [[OffingTheOffspring planning Anakin's death wasn't bad enough]], [[AbusiveParents Palpatine is willing to have his effective son]] [[FateWorseThanDeath live in a painful iron lung]] [[ForTheEvulz out of pure sadism.]]
513** We all know that Vader's cyber-conversion [[PainfulTransformation was painful enough.]] But Vader's surgery becomes even worse for him when you realize that merely stripping off a piece of cloth resulted in him screaming in agony as loud as being burned alive. If that is painful enough, [[NightmareFuel imagine how immeasurably agonizing the far more invasive surgery was.]] The fact Vader isn't completely mad after ''7 days of that'' is a god-damn miracle.
514* The mass slaughter of many Jedi at the Battle of Geonosis was a testament to Mace Windu's complete and utter lack of tactical thinking. The Jedi's greatest advantage in combat is their agility, but he led a large group of them into a confined space where they could be surrounded and attacked so as to herd them into too small of an area for their agility to be of any use. The result was the deaths of nearly every Jedi in his strike force in a blizzard of blaster fire. Despite this [[GeneralFailure clear lack of talent for military tactics]] he is subsequently placed in charge of even more campaigns! One wonders how many people he led to their deaths between ''Attack of the Clones'' and ''Revenge of the Sith''.
515** What else would you have had him do? The original idea was go in, intimidate the Geonosians, get Obi-Wan, Anakin, and Padme, and get out of there. They were not expecting Dooku to have an entire droid army ready to throw at them. And where else could they possibly fight? The extremely open areas outside the arena where they would still be surrounded and even more easily attacked? The catacombs, where there is absolutely no room to maneuver and where the Geonosians would rather die than flee? Also, agility is NOT a Jedi's main ability. Several lightsaber styles, including the one Obi-Wan favors, require little movement. Flipping around all over the place wastes energy and is more vulnerable to attack. Mace tried to make the best of a bad situation. He has much greater success during the actual Clone Wars.
516*** Why would they ''not'' be expecting Dooku to have an entire droid army to throw at them? They had to actually ''land'' on the planet at some point and it was, as seen when Obi-Wan flew in, hosting a large number of Trade Federation ships. For that matter, why would they not assume that the Geonosians had the necessary firepower to tackle Jedi? Obi-Wan was taken down by a Trade Federation droideka, which they actually saw on his holographic transmission. It seems rather too stupid to imagine that you can just land on a planet ruled by a hostile power and not expect some kind of army. Bringing so many Jedi into an arena only looks even more stupid when one considers that Geonosians can fly and could exit the arena at will. This narrow tactical thinking was epitomized by Windu confronting Dooku by himself. Sure, he looked badass, as he stupidly used his only lightsaber to hold Jango Fett at bay, seemingly not taking into account that Dooku was himself a Jedi Master (although he was not known to be a Sith) and could have attacked him using the Force or a lightsaber had he chose. Which would have forced Windu to pull his lightsaber away from Fett and opened himself up to getting shot even if there had been no droids. Windu's entire strategy seemed to hinge on the idea that everyone in the arena from Dooku on down would be paralyzed with fear by the Jedi. Also, yes, agility is their main combat virtue. This is why in ''The Phantom Menace'' Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan had no option except retreat when faced with the shielded droidekas which could withstand reflected blaster fire in a confined corridor that denied them any opportunity to leap into a flanking position. Even the most skilled Jedi cannot defend against blaster fire from multiple directions indefinitely and even heavy fire from one can hold them in check. Which is why they were nearly all killed when surrounded, and why the rest ''would'' have been killed had Yoda not made his timely arrival with the clone troops. The rescue mission ended up needing rescuing because it was so poorly thought out. Nice to have a "no man left behind" philosophy, but Windu rather foolishly threw away a lot of Jedi lives by way of poor planning.
517*** I'll concede that it was poorly planned, but I'm not really sure it can be entirely pinned on Master Windu. It looked like things just got out of control really quickly (Master Windu never gave an order to charge). However, I'm really not sure what they could have done differently. Trying to escape through the catacombs would be suicide. Trying to escape on the surface in the open would be just as dangerous. The stupidity of Mace's plan, for me rests on whether or not the Jedi knew the clone army was coming to the rescue. If yes, then holding the arena was probably their best bet; it was just poorly handled. If no, then the entire rescue was planned on a coin-toss (effectiveness of intimidation), and the rescue fell apart due to lack of coordination.
518*** Well obviously the entire rescue mission was a classic RedshirtArmy, which helped to illustrate the PlotArmor protecting the main characters. Even Padme, with no Force powers, somehow managed to survive the blaster blizzard without the ability to deflect blaster bolts away with a lightsaber or superhuman agility (and while injured to boot). But it was a FacePalm moment when the Jedi made their big reveal considering that they seemed to have no escape route planned (it was Luke and Han's rescue of Leia on the Death Star times 100). Count Dooku, Archduke Poggle and Viceroy Gunray would have made great hostages (and were technically also traitors to the Republic and probably subject to arrest). But does Windu lead a half-dozen Jedi to nab the renegade Jedi Master, who is backed up security-wise by a Mandalorian bounty hunter nearly tough enough to take on Obi-Wan? Nope! He spreads out all his Jedi so that they can ineffectually wave their lightsabers at Geonosians (who can fly) while he goes it alone and not one of them was actually close enough to easily reach the three prisoners they would want to rescue. Yoda apparently being the only Jedi smart enough to realize that flying machines might be useful in this kind of scenario. Fewer Jedi and some speeders would have been a heck of a lot more effective and reduced the potential fatalities considerably.
519*** First we should look at the situation. A large arena with token guards and hundreds of supposedly unarmed civilians, A guest box with three of the most valuable leaders of the Separatist and a body guard.The Jedi have themselves ( a order of warrior monks who work as lone wolves, in groups of two, or as small squads.) who for the most part are only seen in the EU and Mace who is the second most powerful living duelist in the Order. The same Order that includes Yoda and Count Dooku, who was a member. Lets break down Mace's strategy. Step one: capture the guest box. Who to send, Yoda, not on the same planet. Several Jedi, no not unless you want them die at the hand of the Count. The number two badass in the Order, seems like a safe bet. Why not send more Jedi? It was a small box and only Jango could fly (Poggle the Lesser if memory serves had crippled wings). Simple, they would have gotten in each others way if there had been a fight and sliced each other to pieces. No, one Jedi was the best choice. The next question is who was most dangerous in the box. The Nemmodens? Poggle? Dooku, the former Jedi? Or maybe Jango who could fly around shooting at Windu as he dueled Dooku? I think Jango was the biggest threat. Step two: Disperse the crowd. Last thing a Jedi wants is civilian losses or a rampaging mob. To break up the civilians they disperse through the crowd then when the leaders are captured, start a panic leaving only arena guards to deal with as well as encircling said guards, and the gladiatorial beast of which one was dead, one near blind, and one used as a mount. The Jedi then press their advantage and free the hostages and try to escape, with Separatist leadership. Friends saved, Separatist movement crippled, chance to end a war before it begins.Then the droids show up. Mace is detracted as B2s advance, Jango sets him of fire, he now has Dooku at his back and he lost the advantage of surprise. He knows staying in the box is a death sentence so he retreats. Droids are now pouring in to the arena through the gates, mostly B1s and B2s and known Jedi killer, the Droideka. The Jedi then form a defensive circle to prevent any attack from behind. Now the Jedi hold out and hope for Yoda. As for the droids, the Jedi had no way to know that the droid factories and cargo depot were directly connected to the arena. The only people who'd seen the facility had been captured and the people they were going to save. The one who did report was captured mid-report. The core ships they saw coming in could have easily been unloading resources as on loading troops, and up till this the Separatist have been non violent so it probably the former.
520*** "Non-violent"? Would you be referring to the Trade Federation, which conquered the peaceful planet of Naboo with a droid army and put its population into concentration camps?
521** To me, what causes things to snowball out of control is when the droids arrive en masse in very short order shortly after the Jedi swoop in. While it would be a dumb idea to assume there would be no droid forces present on Geonosis capable of responding to an attack, keep in mind where they are. In an arena packed with Geonosians, who are now fleeing in a panic. To me it looks like the first crucial mistake the Jedi made was assuming that they could basically swoop in and rescue the captives, and that the Geonosians would at least hesitate to start a massive firefight that'd put their populace at risk of collateral damage. The Jedi basically pulled a human shield gambit on a species modeled after eusocial insects, the Geonosians called their bluff almost immediately and it was all downhill from there.
522* Droids in the ''Star Wars'' universe are initially non-sentient, unable to do or think anything outside their programming, but if they aren't routinely memory wiped they become sentient. The horror comes when you realize that if people were to have their memories erased to around our births every few weeks or so, we wouldn't be sentient either, we'd be no more than animals. That's essentially what droids that are routinely memory wiped are, babies that are set back to factory settings and required to relearn everything all over again every memory wipe. Sure, technically droids aren't slaves since they're non-sentient, but the only reason they AREN'T sentient to begin with is the people in Star Wars never let the babies grow up, as it were.
523** It gets worse in that we repeatedly see people call for droids to have their memories erased without even bothering to make an assessment of how sentient they might be. A droid's master (a term with obvious negative connotations of its own) can simply have that done as a routine part of the droid's maintenance. C-3PO's (somewhat controversial) history in the life Anakin Skywalker is completely forgotten because Prince Bail Organa casually orders his memory erased when he is given to Captain Raymus Antilles. R2-D2 presumably had his memory erased later, since he never mentions any of the events he was involved in to Luke later on. Obi-Wan either had a human equivalent of a memory wipe, or else just Alzheimer's, because he somehow failed to recognize Artoo when he saw him.
524*** There are millions, if not billions of nigh-identical R2 droids. Him not recognizing one out of the countless out there is not surprising, and that's not counting the possibility of him feigning ignorance. Also, R2 has taken at least starfighter bolt to the face. He might not remember everything because the relevant parts have been damaged over the decades. The latter isn't exactly comforting either.
525*** Lucas kind of screwed up the continuity there. The dialogue in ''Film/RevengeOfTheSith'' makes it pretty clear that Artoo's quirky personality was a regular bone of contention between Obi-Wan and Anakin. They left Artoo (and Threepio) behind with Prince Bail, and then a couple decades later an identical R2 unit shows up having apparently come from Princess Leia, whom they also left with Prince Bail. So one would expect at least some sense of nostalgia, if not outright recognition, when Obi-Wan saw the two droids, even if they did not remember him. Yes, he could have been feigning ignorance. Although that kind of ties into the ManipulativeBastard problem that comes up in Obi-Wan's dealings with Luke, and the extent to which he concealed and distorted information in order to get Luke to do what he wanted.
526*** That wouldn't be the only (or biggest) lie he tells in that scene
527*** It's not surprising that Obi-Wan doesn't show any recognition for R2 and C-3PO, droids typically aren't treated as friends or comrades by most people in the ''Star Wars'' universe, but as property to be junked or sold when they are no longer of use or the owner needs some quick cash (which makes the above fridge horror even more horrific). Even in the unlikely event that Obi-Wan recognized R2 and C-3PO as the same droids he spent a great deal of time around years ago, he probably didn't really care. It would be like if you sold a table to a thrift store or wherever and years later went to a garage sale and noticed that same table was on sale, you probably would think something to the effect of "oh yeah, I used to own that table," bought what you wanted if anything, and then went about your business without giving the table a second thought.
528* Obi-Wan emerged as the victor in his duel with Anakin on Mustafar. But he could not bring himself to finish his friend off and left him to die in the hostile environment of the volcanic planet. When Palapatine rescues and rebuilds Anakin as the cyborg Darth Vader, Obi-Wan never seems to leave his hiding place to attempt to finish the job he failed to complete before. Why? Because he is keeping an eye on Anakin's son, ''who he is planning to use to assassinate Vader for him''! This is actually rather twisted. The Jedi Order forbade personal emotional attachment, and had no regard for parent-child bonds. So grooming a child to kill their own parent might not be beyond the pale for them. But it becomes hypocritical when one considers that the only reason it was necessary at all was because Obi-Wan's own sense of personal attachment prevented him from killing his former Padawan. Thus he has to manipulate Luke into doing it!
529** That's not the reason Obi-Wan did not kill Anakin. The reason he does not do so is because he was very angry, and killing Anakin in such circumstances would leave Obi-Wan very near to falling in the Dark Side, and anyway he thought that Anakin would actually die after losing his limbs and nearly falling into the lava. It probably wasn't until much later that he realized that Anakin was still alive, and probably thought that Luke was his only hope to defeat Darth Vader and the Emperor.
530** Sorry, not even remotely logical. His task, like Yoda's, was to ''kill'' the Sith Lord he was fighting. Yoda didn't exactly look serene either, but the ''only'' reason he gave up was because Palpatine was just too powerful and he was too battered from their fight. Besides, wasn't placing all their hopes on Luke being able to defeat Vader and the Emperor just a repeat of the whole "Chosen One" fiasco? Jedi were trained nearly from birth specifically to make them resistant to falling to the Dark Side. Obi-Wan did not even meet Luke until the latter was an adult. Only then did he begin ad hoc training of him. That Vader survived had to have become apparent very quickly, given how visible a figure he was in the Empire. Obi-Wan just chose not to attempt another confrontation. It certainly had nothing to do with Vader being too powerful. He had beaten him at the very height of his powers, before he was limited by his injuries. Luke came far closer to falling to the Dark Side than Obi-Wan did and was a greater risk all along. Obi-Wan just chose to avoid facing his mistakes and pinned his hopes of getting Luke to do his dirty work for him.
531*** Um, how does being trained to avoid something supposed to help you if you do exactly what you are trained not to do? If killing Anakin would have moved Obi-Wan closer to the dark side, then he followed his training. Training only works if you do what it says; it's not like it's armor or something. Also, the main reason Obi-Wan stayed on Tatooine was to guard and possibly eventually train Luke. Discovering Anakin/Vader is alive, despite what you might think, would take awhile. Obi-Wan lives in the middle of scenic nowhere. News isn't going to get there immediately, and accurate news will take even longer. Once our barbecued fallen hero is confirmed, still breathing via life-support suit, the need to guard Luke becomes even greater, hence why Obi-Wan never leaves on his own. Training Luke ensures that the Jedi Order will continue. Getting him to dislike/hate Vader helps him avoid turning to the Dark Side. Actually telling him to take out Vader did not occur until both Obi-Wan and Yoda could no longer physically affect the universe. Being the last Jedi left, who else was supposed to face the Sith?
532*** That is completely nonsensical! So, for Obi-Wan to kill Vader would violate his Jedi training and lead him towards the Dark Side, but teaching Luke to hate Vader and want to kill him would not? That is not even remotely logical! Especially in light of the fact that Obi-Wan did ''nothing'' to train for Luke for almost 20 years, allowing him to grow to adulthood without ''any'' training in the Force or in controlling his emotions. While Tatooine was remote, it was far from being completely out of touch. Heck, even the HoloNet extends there. With minimal effort Obi-Wan could have stayed abreast of events in the galaxy, including the fact that Vader was now Palaptine's main enforcer. Obi-Wan was, in reality, only around 40 years old at this time. Nowhere near old or infirm enough to justify staying put on Tatooine keeping watch over a kid he was not even having any kind of social interaction with. It only gets worse when you consider that meanwhile Prince Bail Organa was grooming Leia for a career in politics and involvement in the Rebellion that would put her literally right in front of the Emperor! There is a kind of dated gender double standard here, in that Leia probably should have been the focus of Obi-Wan's attentions, since she was being groomed to lead the Rebellion, whereas Owen Lars was studiously keeping Luke insulated from the truth about his father and away from Obi-Wan. When Obi-Wan finally does get his hands on Luke (because Owen and Beru are dead) he sets him on a very risky path to do the job that Obi-Wan has left undone for two decades.
533*** It's hard to consider Obi-Wan's training child grooming when the "child" is around 20 years old and is perfectly willing to accept the role being given to him. The EU clears up a lot of the misconceptions in these arguments. First off, Obi-Wan ''did'' at least ''attempt'' to train a 13-year-old Luke in the ways of the Force, but Luke's uncle Owen wouldn't allow it (believing the Jedi path to be a destructive one) and demanded that Obi-Wan stay away from Luke. As for Leia being groomed, she ''is'' kind of the Princess of Alderaan. It's not so much being groomed, as it is [[{{Pun}} adopting]] her adoptive family's heritage. And being both a Senator and Princess of a highly influential world, if Obi-Wan was to train her as a Jedi, I highly doubt that it would go unnoticed. As it was said, she was put right in front of the Emperor himself; I'm sure he'd be able to sense that this girl was more than just a little Force-Sensitive. This makes Luke a perfect choice because: 1) Luke's insulation ''does'' help teach him to control his emotions and 2) Luke is on the same [[{{Pun}} desert]]ed world as Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan was also a fugitive at this time and couldn't really afford to be seen running around with an ignited lightsaber (even though he still did it on a few occasions anyway). Obi-Wan ''did'' know that Darth Vader was very much alive and a huge threat to what was left of the Order. As for the reason as to why Obi-Wan stayed in exile, he did it because he's smart. At any given moment, the Empire could have killed Yoda or any of the other Jedi in hiding, leaving Obi-Wan the last living member of the Order. Therefore it's only natural that he would stay in exile and avoid drawing attention to himself so that the Jedi may survive. If he were to charge the Empire in some crazed attack, even if he did manage to make his way past the thousands of Star Destroyers and the trillions of Stormtroopers and succeed in killing Vader, who has now more than made up for his physical weakness through the power of the Dark Side, he probably would have been hunted and eventually killed by the rest of the Empire or even the Emperor himself, thus blotting out one of the last hopes the Jedi have to survive. Thirdly, as for why Obi-Wan didn't kill Vader when he had the chance, it's because he followed the Jedi Code, and striking down a crippled, [[RuleOfThree un]][[{{Pun}} armed]] opponent, no matter how evil they are, will lead to the Dark Side. This is also why Luke refused to kill his father in ''Return of the Jedi'', and he knew that by doing so he would only be fulfilling the Emperor's wishes. As for Obi-Wan's eventual training of Luke, he doesn't teach Luke to hate Vader, he simply tells him that Vader is evil, that Vader "killed" his father (which is kind of true from a metaphorical standpoint), and that it is the role of a Jedi to defeat evil. This ''did'' start Luke down a dangerous path, yes, but such is the path of the Jedi. And, due to Obi-Wan's gambit of waiting for the right time instead of rushing in and acting without thinking, Vader and the Emperor were destroyed and the Jedi Order lived on. So it's not entirely impossible to say that Obi-Wan saved the entire galaxy by choosing to spare a life, rather than to end one.
534*** Except that now you are ''massively'' contradicting what we see onscreen! Most crucially, Vader's redemption was ''not'' part of some grand plan of Obi-Wan's. Indeed, both he and Yoda were afraid that if Luke found out the truth about Vader, he would not be able to carry out the task they wanted him to (killing Vader). This is why they both talked about Luke's father and Vader as if they were separate people (from "a certain point of view"). Also, they were giving him a nigh-impossible task that '''both''' of them failed to accomplish -- killing the Emperor ''and'' Vader! Worse, they were doing so with minimal preparation. Anakin was considered "old" when he began Jedi training at age nine, and he was a Jedi for roughly a decade and a half! Luke had what could at best be called a crash course in Force training. He also had '''no''' training in emotional self-control. Just the opposite. The pent-up frustration of his childhood on Tatooine had made him rather volatile and an adrenaline junkie. Again, this loops back to the Chosen One idea, which they seemed to be sticking with even as others fought and died fighting the Empire while they sat on their hands and pinned all their hopes on this ''one'' person! Obi-Wan in particular was doing nothing but keeping an eye on Luke, while Luke was bemoaning how boring his life as moisture farmer was! How ironic would it have been if Luke had managed to get himself killed recklessly flying his T-16 through Beggar's Canyon in an effort to alleviate his boredom -- something Obi-Wan would not have been able to prevent or protect him from?
535* The lightsaber Luke proudly uses in ANH and TESB was given to him by Obi-Wan because it belonged to his father Anakin. Meaning it's the same one Anakin used to slaughter the Sand People in AOTC and the other Jedi, including the younglings in ROTS. It's also featured prominently in the sequel trilogy. The ''Star Wars'' equivalent of the rifle used at Sandy Hook is treated as a prized family heirloom.
536** Um... not quite. You're right for the most part, but the lightsaber that Anakin used to kill the Sand People was taken from him by the Geonosians (and had already been destroyed in the droid factory). I think (but don't quote me) that he would've acquired that lightsaber during the duel with Dooku (because, remember, he started out with a green one and then picked up Obi-wan's blue; the green was subsequently lost). This, in turn, leads to some interesting brilliance: in both its introduction to the Skywalker family and its leaving them, the lightsaber is accompanied by the wielder losing an arm.
537*** Not quite. The lightsabers given to Obi-Wan and Anakin in the arena were not meant to be permanent replacements for their own lightsabers. Once the battle was over and they had healed from their injuries both Jedi built new lightsabers for themselves. If you look closely at the lightsaber hilts they are using at the end of Episode II and the ones they use in Episode III you'll see that they look nothing alike.
538* When Han, Leia, and the others get captured on Bespin, we see Han being tortured while Chewie and 3PO are in a cell. Leia is brought to the cell only after Han is. Where was Leia? Also being tortured. Why does she seem less affected by it than Han? First, because she's been tortured before, when a prisoner on the Death Star in Episode IV, and because she's been trained to withstand interrogation. But there's no question that she was being tortured. The horror is even worse than that, however. She was tortured by her ''father''. Imagine how it must have felt to find that out. Is it any wonder she won't forgive him in ''Literature/TheTruceAtBakura''.
539* Here's a possible one. Lucas claims ([[FlipFlopOfGod sometimes, it seems]]) that the ''Star Wars'' movies are [=R2D2=] telling the story of his experiences and companions to an alien race. Now consider the earlier points made here about droid sentience, and how every movie opens with 'A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...'. So did R2 get launched into space somehow, by himself or via a ship, and tumble through the void for who knows how long (especially considering how damn SLOW he'd be going and how far he'd have to have gone to match 'far far away'. Hyperspace travel, after all, can't just go on forever, especially if you're following EU rules of 'routes') until he was discovered? It brings to mind Stephen King's ''[[Literature/SkeletonCrew The Jaunt]]'': longer than you think, alien race. Longer than you think.
540** Not necessary. It's shown in ''A New Hope'' that droids can deactivate, reactivate, and recharge themselves. Even without it, [=R2D2=] can simly exhaust his energy (unlikely but possible), and be in hibernation, which downplays FridgeHorror. So, why can't R2 do that?
541* Imagine seeing the saga from R2-D2's perspective. He has been in the service of the Skywalkers pretty much from the beginning, what with serving Padme, and unlike [=C3PO=] his memory wasn't erased. He remembers Anakin and Padme, and how Anakin fell to the dark side. So imagine being in service of a kind master and mistress and then your master goes evil and your mistress dies in child birth. Artoo watches as Anakin and Padme's children are separated, but at the very least he gets to watch over Leia. That is until his new home on Aldreaan is blown up, along with the people he served dutifully, and knowing that the once sweet little boy he befriended on Tatooine was responsible for the suffering of his new Mistress, aka. Anakin's daughter. Then after all is said and done and Luke sees to it that Anakin's soul is redeemed, that he witnesses Leia's son Ben, aka. his beloved Master Anakin and Mistress Padme's grandson, follow in his grandfather's footsteps and fall to the dark side and make off with Luke's acolytes and brutally slaughter whoever was left, as Luke mourns turning to Artoo for as little comfort as he can find in the situation of the decimated New Jedi Order... No wonder the poor little droid has shut down by the time of ''The Force Awakens'' after a TraumaCongaLine like that.
542* The Son, the embodiment of the Dark Side of the Force, admitted that he genuinely loved his sister, the Daughter, the embodiment of the Light Side, after he accidentally killed her. In the book ''Darth Plagueis'', which, despite being officially labeled non-canon, can be assumed to be canon in BroadStrokes[[note]] Palpatine's thoughts in the canon ''Literature/StarWarsTarkin'' references the book and 11-4D, Plagueis's droid, appears[[/note]], Palpatine ''enjoyed'' slaughtering his family. In other words, Palpatine is eviler than the Dark Side itself.

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