The official Star wars thread

[vanguard333]

3 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Luke tries to help when people are suffering, but when he thinks he is responsible for it, he does so in a way that is recklessly dangerous, and massively irresponsible.

No, he's just reckless; it doesn't matter if he blames himself or not; he's just reckless when it comes to helping/protecting those he cares about.

 

3 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

But blaming himself is what makes him head off there alone...

No, it isn't; what makes him go there alone is the drive to save his aunt and uncle. The whole scene is him figuring out that if the Stormtroopers followed the droids to the Jawas then they probably followed them to the farm, and then he immediately races back and finds that he arrived too late. There is nothing saying or showing that he blames himself for it (all he is shown to blame himself for is arriving too late to save them, which is immediately followed by Obi-Wan telling Luke that there was nothing he could've done even if he had reached them in time).

 

3 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Literal quote from the movie

Obi Wan's Ghost "It is you and your abilities that the emperor wants. That is why your friends are made to suffer."

Luke Skywalker "That is why I have to go."

Luke believing he is responsible is a part of his decision to run head first into an obvious trap without anything even resembling a plan to get him (and his friends) out of that trap alive. Heck, when Luke gets to Cloud he doesn't free his friends from the Storm Troopers he sees guarding them, instead he gets lured away from helping them and into a fight with a waiting Vadar instead, leaving Lando to do all the actual helping.

That quote doesn't help your argument; in context, it helps mine. As I said, Obi-Wan is the one who has to point out that it's an obvious trap after Luke is already preparing to leave to save them, and Luke in that scene is basically saying that it being a trap is all the more reason he has to go. He was already going to go.

[GreatSaiyaman]

Uh... This turned out kinda long...

General

• Everything made by Disney and/or Filoni is complete and utter crap, it doesn't exist to me. That includes the 3D CGI 2008 Clone Wars show --- I don't care that George was involved with it or that Lucasfilm labeled it "canon" to the EU (it massively contradicted both the movies and the EU, the kiddy tone aside).
  • Speaking of animated series, the Samurai Jack Star Wars was overall pretty cool (despite bad fanfiction stuff like Durge) but I've always thought people on the internet took it way too seriously. In particular, Grievous' cartoon power level (this is the same show with Mace soloing a million droids etc) makes no in-universe sense (btw him fighting multiple Jedi at once is founded on the idea that they don't know how to flank or sense things they can't see etc even though fighting blindfolded is literally the first thing Luke learns). No, it isn't cool. No it's not the way he should've been in the movie. The character is just dumb period.
    • Just look at Revenge of the Sith. How many times would Greivous have died if Obi-Wan/Anakin had simply used the Force? Used their lightsabers (or those others in his cape) as buzzsaws when they took them back? Caused any of the battle droids to shoot him in the back of the head? Obi-Wan could've dropped that thing that he dropped onto the Magnaguards straight down onto Grievous without ever suicidally jumping down off the catwalk into a crowd of droids. Or just caused his heart to explode (if not for plot armor Mace Windu would've done this in the cartoon)? That kind of thing might not be cinematic but... you know...
  • Out of morbid curiosity I saw the first episode and a half or so of Kenobi (first Disneywars thing I'd bothered to see since RO on Netflix) but that show just proved me right about everything I'd thought it'd be (I'd argue it's worse than any of the sequel movies). Really, you are better off ignoring the new stuff.
• I hate how the original trilogy's portrayal of the Force is basically nonexistent almost everywhere else in the franchise. In the EU you consistently had writers making up stuff like Ysalamiri (Callista randomly losing her connection to the Force, the Vong, Force Wounds) to nullify the Force so that they wouldn't have to write around characters who have powers for just about every situation (the most egregious example of this was the ending of The New Rebellion, which before the ending was a great book). I think Roan Shryne is the only character ever besides Luke to have his powers affected by his mental state (like that X-Wing scene on Dagobah). It's also annoying how commonly Jedi are portrayed as forgetting that they have powers or only ever using the Force to swordfight, because lightsabers were the only solution ever used for anything in the PT.
  • Ysalamiri are a 100% stupid concept. Besides the fact that they just don't feel like they vibe with Yoda's explanation about the Force... ...Do you think the Jedi (all of them?) would let such a massive Kryptonite exist? Do you think Palpatine would've wanted those lizards around? All it would've taken was one Sith Lord at any point throughout the timeline glassing the planet from orbit and the problem would've been eliminated forever. ....Also, it's dumb that the Vong make their Voxyn from creatures on Myrkr but when the Jedi kill the Voxyn they don't do anything about Myrkr in order to stop them from just making more of them.
• The timeline is too static and stretched out. I know this goes back to ANH with Ben's line to Luke but George wasn't really thinking in terms of writing for a universe beyond his movie back then. If hyperspace travel existed for tens of thousands of years then how would there still be so many "uncharted settlements" or outright uninhabited planets like you see in ESB (much less an "Unknown Region") by the time of the movies? Especially considering people knew about the same planets back during KotOR as they do during the movies? When the status quo is basically identical for thousands upon thousands of years it limits the types of stories that can be told. At least do stuff like Knight Errant more often where people don't know how to get to the Republic because their navicomputers aren't programmed with the coordinates.
• The old EU explanation for lightsaber crystals was a billion times better. I also liked how in the stuff before AotC (when George said only blue/green/purple for good guys and red for bad) there were Jedi with red lightsabers and Sith / Inquisitors with non-red sabers.
• Battlefront 1 is better than Battlefront 2 (original Xbox)
• There should be more small scale character driven stories. Stuff taking place in a localized region with no (or at least minimal) space travel that does not involve the fate of the universe. Like the Kenobi novel.

Old Republic

• The events of Tales of the Jedi sound more interesting than they actually are in the comic. Redemption was good though.
• I have some nitpicks with KotOR 1's plot but they don't tend to matter to me too much when I'm actually playing the game. Chief amongst these is how one dimensional the Sith are. Also you should never play KotOR without mods (even if all you do is add movie sound effects, though there's lots you can do with modding).
• Chris Avellone is overrated. KotOR 2 had a lot of great stuff in it but Force Wounds and "The Sith Lords" were just bad fanfiction garbage. Avellone has outright stated in interviews that Kreia is his mouthpiece for what he doesn't like about the setting. https://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/nonfiction/feature-interview-chris-avellone-game-designer-fallout-new-vegas/
  • Kreia is a bitter, cynical, hypocritical, manipulative nihilist who's obvious Sithlike ideals are only accepted as "deep" by certain fans because KotOR II makes up lore to bend the setting and characters to fit Kreia's viewpoints which the game railroads the player into accepting. You are never given any ability to truly challenge her assertions in any meaningful way much less prove her wrong (even in the LS ending she gets what she wants). She's a Villain Sue any which way you slice it. She's ludicrously unstoppably overpowered throughout the entire game (even to the point of mind tricking Atris, who is supposedly a Jedi Master, from across the galaxy or that scene from the cut content where she takes on your party members, who are too stupid to attack simultaneously, all at once). Kreia is Palpatine's "good is a point of view" cranked up to 12 yet somehow with her a significant portion of the fanbase buys into it and takes her 100% completely dead seriously.
  • Revan was predominately a player created character and KotOR 2 ruins that by establishing a set in stone characterization that contradicts the lore of the first game. Truth be told if they were going to write Revan like Kreia it's a good thing that Obsidian's KotOR 3 never got made. And while we're on the subject Revan never needed some vague Unkown Regions excuse to get lost after the first game. After all, people still wanted Ulic Qel Droma dead.
  • The entire Mandalorian War was also ruined/retconned in K2. The whole point was that Revan and Malak were legitimately heroes at first before coming back as conquerors. And Canderous himself says that the Mandalorians were outnumbered and outmatched so just why were superweapons remotely necessary?
  • The "True Sith" suck as a concept and only exist for pointless sequel bait irregardless as to whether or not the story organically warrants it. It cheapens the story of both games to reduce everything to "those stooges didn't know what they were doing because they were manipulated" or "that dumbass Revan wanted to unite the galaxy against a Yuuzhan Vongish threat by... ...crushing the galaxy without ever bothering to attempt to talk about it therefor leaving everyone as easy pickings for the supposedly real threat".
    • Palpatine was really building Death Stars to fight the Vong!!! /s
• I have come to terms with KotOR 2's horrifically awful ending. The fact that it is so open ended makes it easier to write your own ending. I think they wanted a trilogy for the money and not because the story needed it. Both games should've had the same main character and I tend to just rewrite K2 as a more direct sequel to K1's LS ending.
• Basically everything about the MMO sucks. ...Even now, all these years later, those promotional trailers look better than any of the animated shows, though.

Movies

• Darth Jar-Jar is obviously true (or at least, was originally intended to be). It just fits, and it explains so much about why the prequels turned out the way they did.
• Attack of the Clones is more entertaining than The Phantom Menace. While neither film is great, TPM is just... ...so bad. Revenge of the Sith is the best prequel but in hindsight I have to say that's really not saying much. On paper, I do like a number of the ideas George was going for but the execution is just not there for most of it and at its core it kinda feels like Lucas was trying to do too many things at once. Odds are, you won't catch me watching any of them nowadays.
  • I'll never understand why the sand line is the poster child for the prequel trilogy's bad dialogue. Sure that scene is cringy but can you seriously tell me it's worse than the firelight scene or especially Revenge of the Sith's balcony scene? And no matter what you have to say about prequel Anakin being a loser or unromantic or whatever it doesn't change the fact that Padme was into serial killers etc.
  • I think one reason people hate the prequel romance so much is because they wanted it to be normal/relatable but George tried to make it some kind of tragic Shakespearan thing with inherently flawed characters. People just didn't want to see Romeo and Juliet written by a guy who sucked at dialogue who was probably(?) channeling his divorce issues into the Jedi's non attachment rules.
  • Padme is the worst character Lucas created until Ahsoka. She has zero character or personality and she actively drags the lore and the Skywalker family down. We would've been better off not knowing who Luke's mom was then be subjected to miss "lost the will to live". Anakin's turn to the Dark Side wouldn't have been so lame. Every single thing about her is stupid.
• Boba/Jango Fett and Darth Maul are unbeliEVABLY overrated. Especially in-universe, in Fett's case.
• Sometimes I go through phases where I'll be hyper critical of Return of the Jedi. But all things considered I think they took lemons and made lemonade with that movie. The plan with Jabba's Palace might not be all that logical, there might be too much exposition, the tone might not be perfect and the Leia reveal might not make sense but... ...it's still a great movie that could have been terrible. The original RotJ/sequel plans honestly sucked.

Post-RotJ

• You would think there would be way more areas like the Corporate Sector or the Hapes Cluster in Star Wars, that the people of the galaxy would want power divided to a point that it could never again reach the unquestioned heights that the Empire did. ...Instead they turn right back around and reinstate the same style of galactic scale government again (even though the empire was originally a republic and was an empire in all but name even before being officially instated as one etc...). I suppose this is one of those ways in which Star Wars' fantasy roots takes precedence though, as stuff like passports and border enforcement is a serious buzzkill to the allure of hopping on a spaceship and traveling out into the great unknown (anywhere you want!) and all of that.
• Tenel Ka is an awful character. Jacen should've gotten with Danni and Jaina with (pre Denning) Zekk.
• The New Jedi Order had a lot of great ideas and some great books but overall was a giant trainwreck of conflicting visions. And in the end it just feels like they broke the setting and any potential for future stories for a short term roller coaster ride. It's depressing that a galaxy decimating war happened so soon after they just got through with one, too. Even if it ultimately didn't work out for me I do greatly respect the ambition they had with this series though. ...Which is more than I can say for the later novel series (the "Denningverse": Dark Nest / Legacy of the Force / Fate of the Jedi), those just straight up sucked.
  • The NJO also had no reason to be as long as it was. Much of the length felt artificially manufactured by character stupidity (Centerpoint etc) and the series' strength of feeling epic due to including so many past characters was also one of its greatest weaknesses because it meant a lack of a more centralized focused narrative.

• The Legacy comic has one of the most interesting settings/concepts in Star Wars but it had the misfortune of being targeted towards edgy twelve year olds. It is truly staggering just how badly they managed to fumble almost literally everything in this comic even when they had a decent idea. There is no logical sense of cause and effect at all. The other comics in the Vector storyline didn't suck (most of Dark Horse's stuff was good actually) so I guess John Ostrander and Jan Duursema should just never be allowed to write anything ever. They definitely should've had better editors. Legacy Volume 2 sucks entirely and should just be forgotten.

Edited June 27, 2022 by GreatSaiyaman