General Star Wars Thread

Am I the only one who's wondering why The Force, as a Sentient Cosmic Force that oftentimes comes across as a largely but not-quite-wholly impersonal Power That Is, doesn't have it's own character sheet profile in Characters.Star Wars?

edited 19th May '15 8:55:19 AM by MarqFJA

The Clone Wars kinda-sorta covered that with "The Ones"

They are embodiments of aspects of the Force — and apparently were originally mortal beings before undergoing a much stronger version of the Ascension To A Higher Plane Of Existence that Obi-Wan and other Jedi masters went through upon their deaths. They're not the Force itself, and I suspect that the Force is more than just the sum of those three.

edited 19th May '15 9:05:02 AM by MarqFJA

We don't know anything about them that wasn't said in the episodes, and the end of the arc indicates the entire thing was a "Dumbledore in Harry's head" ordeal, and as such those three would be the Force's attempt to manifest itself. For now, they are the most "character" the Force has.

edited 19th May '15 9:14:10 AM by TheAirman

The Force shouldn't have physical embodiments.

They aren't, and that isn't our call to make. As it stands, The Ones are simply The Force's attempt to communicate directly with Anakin about his role as The Chosen One. And as with all things concerning Anakin, it backfired horribly.

Sorry, my mistake.

edited 19th May '15 11:06:47 AM by TheAirman

I watched Clone Wars. I know who they are. I was replying to the person suggesting that the Force should become a character.

OK, so... Besides Sentient Cosmic Force, what tropes directly apply to the Force itself, or are so intimately related to it that they may as well be directly applying to it (e.g. midi-chlorians being the source of or the physical conduit to Force sensitivity and powers in living beings)?

The Powers That Be maybe? I can't think of much else.

In Mysterious Ways definitely. It's a running theme for the Jedi to be unclear with what exactly is "the will of the Force"

In the old EU at least The Ones were eventually revealed to be surviving Celestials, the resident long-gone, stupid-powerful Precursor race.

Oh yeah, the infamous Fate of Jedi series...I remember I got exited when I heard that Apocalypse included the Ones, but being the ever-sceptic about the EU, I decided to play safe, and asked help from Hondo. You can't imagine how glad I was when I finished, that I didn't pay for that novel! The whole stuff with the Ones was just so beyond any synonym and superlative of "stupid" and "ridiculous", and it was shoved down my throat word-for-word twice! I'm not kidding! Literally he had, word-for-word, the exact same infodump written down, twice! Then there was that whole bunch of Sith getting crunched to paste by exiting the gravelevator-tubes too fast, Luke organising a series of highly public assasinations and of course Luke teaming-up with the villain of the second most disgusting entry of EU to beat Abeloth...Oh and something about Force-sensitive giant termites being the histographers of the Galaxy...Okay, that one's actually not that bad an idea. First and last Star Wars novel I've ever read from that utter hack Denning. Stuff like this is why I'm glad for the reboot.

Come to think of it, I think Filoni straight said in an interview or behind the scenes thing that Mortis was a metaphor-vision.

Can somebody put me in carbonite until July 7th? I need Dark Disciple now, dammit.

edited 20th May '15 6:13:59 PM by TheAirman

What's Dark Disciple?

The book featuring Ventress and Quinlan Vos based on unaired Clone Wars material.

A novel about Asaaj Ventress based on unfinished episodes of the Clone Wars.

edited 20th May '15 7:47:45 PM by Kostya

Meh. Give me a Grievous novel.

Oh yes. I find Ventress boring and I know pretty much nothing about Quinlan Vos.

Hell, give me a good novel about Mandalorians.

Nah, Mandalorians are unnecessary.

So Sentient Cosmic Force, The Powers That Be, and In Mysterious Ways... Anything else, e.g. something that could apply to the connection between The Force and midi-chlorians?

Background Magic Field, The Dark Side, Place of Power, Mind over Matter, The Dark Side Will Make You Forget, Passion Is Evil, The Chooser of the One...

edited 21st May '15 10:49:09 AM by Antiteilchen

Vos was one of the most well written, dynamic, interesting Jedi in the old EU. In fact, Dark Horse's work on the Clone Wars and Legacy are two of the best bits of the later period of it. If you can find any of his old comics, I highly recommend them, even if you're not really a comic reader.

I still maintain that the Force doesn't have light and dark sides beyond how it reflects the hearts and minds of those that use it. Mostly because Matt Stover wrote some awesome stuff, but also because the idea of this evil, corrupting metaphysical power that we can blame people doing bad things on rather than their own flaws doesn't quite sit well with me.

I feel a certain quote from one Van Hohenheim does an adequate job of explaining my views of the The Dark Side and balance:

edited 25th May '15 9:47:30 PM by TheAirman

But the Jedi way isn't about getting rid of those emotions. It's about controlling them so that they don't get in the way of you thinking clearly.