When have you Rooted For the Empire?

"the original trilogy falls flat in that regard, with Darth Vader's single act of redemption earning him a place in Force Ghost Heaven, disregarding twenty years' worth of atrocities; the prequels starting off with mass child slaughter was just a cherry on top.

Well in the EU leia tells han that "20 minutes of redemtion dosen erase years of sufering"

But disney say no EU so....we are right in square one...again

and thing is, in ficcion many times morality is tied out with empathy and simpathy, if a chararter is charming they would pass many evil thing not matter what, while the fandom will request to kill a chararter because is annoying(for them)

yeah...morality in ficcion is weird to say the least

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Well, with Vader, there are two things I could say that kind of justifies it. One is that I see Force Ghost Heaven as more of a symbol of the understanding he's reached at the point when he died, rather than any kind of summary of what he'd accomplished in his life. The other is that Luke personally forgave him, and forgiveness isn't something that needs to be earned. It just needs to be given. And since the story takes his point of view... But just because something is forgiven doesn't mean it's justified, or that other people will also forgive the same thing, which is where the dissonance lies.

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I'd say the problem lies not so much with fictional morality, as with motivation. No matter how saintly the heroes are, or how satanic the villains get, if we are not shown believable personal reasons for them to be at each other's throat, the story becomes ripe for alternate character interpretations.

One of my favorite aversions is the Samurai Jack cartoon, where for one, the outright card carrying villainy of the antagonist doesn't bother me in the slightest, due to the aforementioned sheer inhumanity that he represents - the guy's basically a natural disaster given tangible form; anyone would be against him. And yet, the story doesn't hinge on that. Instead, it still sets up a very moving, if unoriginal motivation for the lone Samurai to keep at his quest. Rather than using cheap tricks to ensure the audience opposes the villain, the story simply focuses on why the hero does it, and I'd say turns out all the better for it.

edited 28th Jul '14 3:04:21 PM by indiana404

The Forge Ghost thing isn't some heavely reward for goodness, its Ascending to a Higher Plane of Existence. One just needs to know how. Presumably, one of the others taught Anakin before he went evil.

but that happen because the public dosent see the evil, it dosent matter to much the motivation is the public can connect with them

and the fact that we barely see aku anyway, they guy is pretty much a card carring villian who do evil every single time, we them to focus in jack who is wander around, so we tend to care about him more

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

It could work the other way around, though. Any conceptual flaws the heroes have will be exacerbated by the extra focus, while villains get to remain enigmas for people to project onto. The Star Wars prequels utterly disenchanted the romanticized image of both the old Republic and the Jedi, while if the sequel rumors are true, there is no new Republic even thirty years post-Endor. Demolishing decades of established canon aside, this development makes the Rebellion itself seem not just poorly planned, but also with no clear goal whatsoever. Compared to that, the Empire's fairly standard galactic domination plot is at least consistent.

Taken allegorically, when you consider how there's no genuine "good" government in the movies proper, coupled with the less-than-subtle jabs at the Nixon and/or Bush administration and the occasional corporation, then the whole story comes off less like an epic tale of good versus evil, but rather a generic anti-establishment power fantasy. The Empire itself becomes a stand-in not for the Nazi or the Commies, but for government in general, and American government in particular. And it wouldn't be Lucas's first dystopia either.

Which brings me back to the point that people will frequently root for fictional villains, as representations of groups and organizations that they'd support in real life. It's like Marines singing to the chopper scene in Apocalypse Now - they don't cheer for the "good" side or the "bad" side, but for their side. Thus, I find no irony whatsoever in how the predominant Star Wars imagery and cosplay material revolves around Imperial Stormtroopers and Bounty Hunters. Maybe it's a subconscious thing, maybe it's not, but when people start putting plush toys of your villains in their kids' cribs, you know you've failed in making them villainous in the first place.

edited 5th Aug '14 6:41:30 AM by indiana404

I wouldn't call that an example of how you're failing to create villains. Just because someone's a villain in a story doesn't mean that character absolutely has to be hated. There are lots of stories where rooting for the villains is to some degree intentional, or at least allowed for. The purpose of a story is to make people enjoy it, not to root for any particular side. Soapboxes aside.

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I think that's more a matter of the difference between "villain" and "antagonist". The latter can be genuinely noble without it negatively affecting the story; frequently, that's even the point. However, when a film's opening crawl officially labels one side as an evil empire, the intended moral compass of the story is hardly left ambiguous.

In hindsight, given the political climate the movies were initially written in, it could be said the story did try to bring its own soapbox - vaguely in the original trilogy, not so much in the prequels - only for fans to prove utterly immune to it, or even knowingly embrace the imagery of the villains. I tell you, I don't think it's pure coincidence the most hated race in the franchise are the Viet Cong-inspired Ewoks.

that is why it divied the chararter in two: the ones i root and the ones i enjoy, enjoying a villian dosent meant i root for them, is just meant i want to see the history focus more in his plans or actions.

in fact, i have the theory that people use draco in latter pants because some Moral Dissonance , people like the villian because their are cool,cute,handosome or a least interesting, but they dont like the fact that they are...villian, so they change canon to suit them, so its less "he is so cool, of course he is a good guy" and more "i like the chararter, so i will make him/her a good guy"

its a way to have your cake and eat it too

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

It also comes up as a sort of backlash whenever the story is played as black and white while the events portrayed really aren't. It's like how InGen were supposed to come off as a bunch of corrupt corporate executives meddling with things they couldn't control, while literally every single death in the movie is caused by the protagonists' recklessness and acts of outright eco-terrorism. Had this gem made it in, and I guarantee you Pete Postlewaite's great white hunter would've warranted his own spin-off, where he stalks raptors, kills a T-Rex with his bare hands, and finally shoots Vince Vaughn's head clean off.

In general, characters who are badass easily come off as heroes in their own right. Fitting, really, as the very word "hero" originally meant exactly that, often with some divine heritage involved. Ancient mores were funny like that.

edited 6th Aug '14 3:20:18 AM by indiana404

Some people always see political allegory in any work. Especially were none was intended.

I think Star Wars villains are just an embodiment of Evil Is Cool. They get most of the cool starships and the most visually intersting outfits. The heroes are...normal.

I don't think Star Wars in any way fails at making the Empire villainous. They may have actually blown up "only" one planet full of innocent civilians, but the fact is the Death Stars were built for the classic "hold the world hostage with Doomsday Device" -plot.

If people start to root for the villains just because Evil Is Cool or related reasons, I don't think it's at all detrimental to the work. Those fans are just taking a different opinion of the work than (probably) intended, but like it nonetheless. Works particularly well for a Villain-Based Franchise, for obvious reasons.

If it's because the villains fail to be villanous enough, or because the heroes are too flawed, then people are far more likely to complain about the work, which naturally can be detrimental (but not necessarily).

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badassery is a sure way to have a hero no matter what, fans are really forgiving of badass heros for that reason, and they can be really vocal about a not action guy or a shy protagonist

let see a example: vegeta of dragon ball, the guy destroy a planet, its the main reason the namek arc start in the first place, help the bad guys for his own petty reasons...twice(and the second time was after many years living in earth)

what i want to say is that many people root for the empire in a draco latter pants way, because the villians are more cool,handsome of intersting than the protgonist

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Badassery is debatable, but generally how much a hero is admirable is by how much they do to earn a victory. A problem many stories have is that they are unsubtle about the fact The Good Guys Always Win. They don't even bother with formalities anymore, everything just skews in their favor in an Ass Pull fashion. You almost feel more for the bad guys in this manner because they are actually working against the odds, while often a good guy is automatically designated to win 'because the rules say so', even when they've barely done anything to imply they deserve it.

John Krisfalusi once stated Bugs Bunny became unlikable in the fifties largely for becoming "an aristocrat who deserves to win because he's the star character". You look in many of his later shorts and they are mostly just Daffy, Sam, etc performing their heart out while Bugs stands there barely needing to do anything to win. Tweety became similar (as was Road Runner, but that case was deliberate). It's sort of during a point the writers know their character is already loved so get lazy, not bothering to put personality and sympathy onto them anymore.

edited 6th Aug '14 9:03:22 PM by Psi001

I thought the Star Wars prequels were pretty obviously based on the Roman Republic/Roman Empire, not anything in American politics.

I dunno - engineering wars in order to gain internal power was something of an American cliche back when the prequels came around, though that itself was a case of pop-cultural resonance with the Nixon era. Still, Lucas has confirmed Roman inspirations for the plot... for all that's worth nowadays.

Taken at face value, the overall plot is fairly simple - a weak and corrupt government sparks internal dissent and secessionism, gradually turns into a tyranny in order to suppress it, and is toppled by another wave of rebellion led by disenfranchised former regime personnel. Top brass notwithstanding, neither side seems particularly good or bad, while as I mentioned, the ultimate victors in the final battle shown onscreen are yet to establish any solid government thirty years since. Given how similar events go in reality, it's not much of a stretch to imagine things got worse, with warlordism and infighting all across the map, potentially much deadlier than organized oppression. So, on the political level, it's anyone's guess as to who is in the right.

On the personal level, well... hardly anyone but Han Solo and the Skywalkers offers personal motivations for what they do, instead proclaiming loyalty to various concepts. That worked for the space opera that was the original trilogy, but not so well for the political lines in the prequels. If anything, the entire plot really is just Palpatine's ballgame, apart from the utterly contrived coincidence that a bunch of teddybears would take the Rebels' robot for a god and assist them, instead of eating them for dinner. If anything, such developments really take the initiative away from characters as a whole, which brings us back to rooting for whoever has the coolest hat... so, Cad Bane, more or less.

edited 16th Aug '14 2:06:44 PM by indiana404

The Empire works for order and security, and the well-being of their citizens. The Rebel Alliance is a terrorist group, trying to force the Empire into anarchy in order to impose their ill-conceived ideas. And yes, the Empire blew up Alderaan to pieces, but that planet was helping the terrorists.

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Underworld is one of my few cases of rooting for the Empire. The egregious thing here is Viktor, the Big Bad of the first movie, is a dick because he is adamant that a Lycan-Vampire hybrid is too dangerous to be let live (well that and plain Fantastic Racism against Lycans), so he tries to kill him. This is bad because the hybrid is our protagonist's love interest.

What's the plot of the second movie you might ask? A Lycan-Vampire hybrid bringing about the downfall of the entire vampire and immortal civilization over the course of a single night.

In the second movie it's also revealed he locked up William, a dangerous, rampaging werewolf to the ground and double-crossed Marcus, a God-complex-having vampire who later became the aforementioned hybrid.

Granted he did it all not out of the kindness of his heart, but due power thirst, greed and sadism, but the problem is judging by the way things work out, it seems Viktor is the only person in the franchise who can put two and two together ("Maybe, just maybe, creating a fusion between two superpowered creatures of the dark may have some troublesome consequences?").

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

of course it becomes hollow when you see that victor only care about himselfs and rulling the everything

and about the empire, well this is a cambelling history, so the empire is as evil as they need it to be, is the prequels who fill the background about how i came to be

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Yeah, I'm not saying Viktor is a kind, benevolent ruler, indeed he's a cruel, sadistic tyrant who did everything for the worst reasons, but the problem is he's always right. His Pragmatic Villainy, judging by the proggression of the movies, was actually a lot more benign and effective than the protagonist's righteousness (which ends up single-handedly destroying all immortal races by the fourth movie).

It's choosing between a sadistic tyrant who'll actually improve society or righteous heroic people who'll doom society.

"All you Fascists bound to lose."

yeah but is method to stop that set the whole thing, murder her daughter send the whole lycan rebelion and then trying to murder the hybrid, the point of pragmatic villians is thata there is a point that their pragmatic solutions send their downfall

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

Well, this is what you get when you try and cast the government as unambiguous villains. Because, on the conceptual level, that's what the Empire really is - just a government. They're not professional terrorists like Cobra, or brutal invaders like the Orcs, or even internal extremists like the Decepticons. Consequently, the only way to make them seem villainous is to have every Imperial act like a pooch-punching punk, while the vast majority of expanded universe stories merely rehash the "evil forceuser" and/or "evil superweapon" plots of the original trilogy, with occasional pointless enslavement or genocide thrown in for good measure - because any Imperial even hinted as being a remotely reasonable authority figure would steal the rebels' thunder faster than you can say "Mitth'raw'nuruodo". Or simply "Fel", if you want it even easier.

edited 2nd Oct '14 3:17:44 AM by indiana404

I'm not buying it. We have ample evidence in the real world of how it's possible to have a government that brutally oppresses its people. If a rebellion against such a government can gain the support of other world powers as a force for positive change, then so can a fictional rebellion against a fictional tyrannical government.

While it is certainly true that Star Wars goes out of its way to give the Empire Kick the Dog moments, it is hardly necessary to turn to fiction for examples of real life governments doing similar things: supplanting democratic institutions, torturing dissidents, committing genocide, using weapons of mass destruction, institutionalizing racism, etc.

edited 2nd Oct '14 6:32:14 AM by Fighteer

"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"

And yes, the Empire blew up Alderaan to pieces, but that planet was helping the terrorists.

It was a planet. I doubt everyone on it was a sworn, unrepentant enemy of the Empire. I mean, shit, the CIA World Factbook says that 27% of the world's population is fifteen or younger. Assuming similar proportions (and taking into account Alderaan's population of two billion), that means Tarkin killed 540,000,000 kids in a matter of seconds.

What's precedent ever done for us?

And in how many of these cases does the rebellion turn out even worse that the oppressors they sought to overthrow?

Note that here, the administration was not only popularly elected, but had ruled for well over a decade before its rechristening as an Empire. If anything, the Republic's use of unaccountable psychic janissaries as its main executive arm, overseeing an army of genetically handicapped clone conscripts no less, puts it barely better, if not actually worse than its successor. This is where the pooch-pounding gets tacked on, because we're talking about virtually the same government under a different name. The only thing that has changed is the relative position of the Jedi and their supporters... from whose point of view we see the events. Interestingly enough, in the course of both trilogies, both sides proclaim moral relativism as their favored philosophy, but it's denigrated as a delusion coming from the villains, yet implicitly accepted when the hero's mentor - the same guy who denigrated it in the first place - does it himself.

As for Alderaan, even the title crawl puts its destruction in the context of an ongoing civil war, with the rebels already striking first. Since such conflicts tend to forego the niceties of established rules of engagement, it's difficult to present this as any less justifiable than, say, the nuking of Hiroshima. Don't start none, won't be none.

The main problem, I think, was not that the Empire wasn't "evil", but that with the finalization of the prequels, there wasn't a faction that could truly be considered "good". The vaunted old Republic used means that were just as autocratic, yet opposition to it in the face of the CIS was just as ham-fistedly vilified. The Jedi themselves functioned with no oversight, disregarded civil authority to the last, and as the Clone Wars showed, were prone to switching sides with barely any prompting. And the rebels themselves are not, mind you, independent freedom fighters, but merely the same assortment of aristocrats and alien industrialists as the CIS, only trying to reinstate the failed administration that once favored them.

In a way, the story as told looks less like an actual good-vs-evil conflict, but more like a considerably murky set of events, only seen through a nearly fanatically biased point of view... which, when you think about it, really does fit the profile of the robe-clad mystics the story follows, and even they ultimately admit as much themselves.

edited 2nd Oct '14 8:02:45 AM by indiana404