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starwarsgirl198 · 2 years ago

Text

TWO

Star Wars the Clone Wars

TWO

CHANCELLOR PALPATINE'S OFFICE, CORUSCANT

"I never thought I'd heard Lord Jabba say that," Palpatine murmured as the holomessage repeated in a shimmering blue loop. TC-70, Jabba's droid, delivered the appeal for help to find Rotta while his master looked on, blinking and swaying slightly, clearly agitated. "He must be in enormous distress to ask for outside help."

The Chancellor looked around at the Jedi assembled in his office to gauge their reaction. He could feel it, but it was always interesting to watch their little physical tells--the frowns, the twitches, the slight lifts of the shoulders--that hinted at the anxieties within.

The only being that kept her anxieties hidden under a perfect mask of composure and serenity was the Regnant Empress of the Faberian Empire, Kalene Vernius. It was hard to see her physically and in the Force, she had obviously been trained since childhood to keep her true emotions shielded, to not allow them to be shown.

Only those close to her could see her with the mask off.

Mace Windu stroked his chin, grim and unmoved. The man never looked so much as even slightly satisfied with his life. The others--Plo Koon, Luminara Unduli, Bolla Ropal--seemed to be leaving it to him to say what was on all their minds. Nobody was rushing to Jabba's aid. Palpatine was sure that if Master Kizira Vernius was here, she would be wanting to help Jabba find his missing Huttlet. The Faberian Jedi may act like a Jedi but there were times when you could see the Faberian side reveal itself. From her aggressive tendencies to her maternal instincts that only showed up when she was around Anakin.

It was no secret that she had adopted him, none of the other Jedi had said anything against it. Probably not wanting to do anything to anger their new yet old allies. Especially when it came to light that she was married to both Qui-Gon Jinn and Count Dooku.

It had been quite a surprise to learn about an old treaty between the Republic and Faberian Empire, the Vernius had the only copy of the treaty left since the one that the Republic owned had been destroyed when the Jedi Temple had been destroyed in the Sacking of Coruscant.

Palpatine nudged gently for a reaction. "A suitable job for the Jedi. Nothing can be hidden from you for long, after all." Except for me, of course. Even now, after all these years of delicately careful planning, he had moments when the ease with which he moved undetected among them as a Sith Lord made him pause and marvel. You don't deserve to be the guardians of the galaxy, do you? "Come along, Master Windu, what's the problem?"

Windu leaned back in his seat. "It'll be a sorry day for the Republic when we divert resources to helping criminal scum."

"Harsh words, my friend. But I'm sure he speaks highly of you, too..."

"Chancellor, Jabba probably knows who's done this--no doubt some other gangster he's crossed." Windu's tone wasn't exactly serene. "He's never shied from kidnapping as a tactic himself. Why would he ask us? And why should we divert Jedi to a basic police task when there's a war to fight?"

"Because it's right, Master Windu." Palpatine had no real need to leap to the moral high ground, but it amused him to do it and labor the point. Such blind spots, Jedi. This is how I shall remember you when you're long gone--unable to see what was right before your eyes, from me to your own duty. "A child is missing. If it were a human child, would we be having this conversation? Does the parents' lifestyle have any bearing on the child's plight? Or do Hutt parents not feel the same grief that we do?"

"Would we be having this conversation," Windu said, not rising to the bait. "If the human child's father was the head of Black Sun?"

"We would, if he could deliver this." Palpatine sat down and activated a holochart. It hovered above his desk, a complex web of lines and clusters of light representing the major points of the known galaxy. He tapped the control to remove layers of detail, and entire star systems and planets winked out of existence--so easily done, so very easy--to leave a few snaking threads of colored light that ended in the Outer Rim. "A hologram, as they say, is worth a thousand words."

The threads were hyperspace routes. And they were all by the Hutts.

Windu looked like a granite monument of disapproval. Eventually, he tilted his head slightly to one side. "I still feel uneasy. There'll be more to this than a simple ransom demand or a settling of scores. I sense it."

Palpatine allowed himself a sad smile, with just the right blend of I-share-your-concern and you-know-I'm-right. "You might not like doing deals with the Hutt, Master Windu, but these are trying times, and we can't be too exacting in our qualification requirements of allies. As long as they help more than they hinder, that has to be good enough for us. This Hutt has control of the hyperspace access we need to move troops and materiel to the Outer Rim, and we have the expertise to find the unfindable. Mutual advantage."

"I still say there's more going on here than a simple kidnapping. It's a sting of some kind, knowing Jabba."

"I didn't realize you were that well acquainted."

"Based on his track record..."

"Then you need to put as many Jedi on this case as you can...based on his track record."

"Chancellor, that's impossible. We're overstretched. I have no Jedi to spare."

"And our troops will be spread even more thinly if we can't reach the Outer Rim and keep a resupply chain functioning."

"I'm inclined to agree with the Chancellor," said Unduli. She'd been totally silent until then. "Regardless of the reasons for this kidnapping, we have to negotiate with Jabba, and this would give us an excellent bargaining position."

"A win-win, as you might call it," Palpatine said quietly, in almost a whisper. "Save a child, and save our army."

Windu was silent again for a few moments, then spread his hands in reluctant concession. "Kenobi, Vernius and Skywalker have just taken Christophsis. The planet's largely secured, so if anyone can be redeployed, it's them."

"Very well, send them," said Palpatine. "I'll contact Lord Jabba and reassure him." He didn't need to ask which Vernius was with Kenobi and Skywalker on that planet, it was obvious that it was Kalene. Where there was Skywalker then she would surely be there at his side, it had been that way since they had met on Tatooine when they were children and then on Coruscant. Anakin was always visiting the Faberian Palace and she'd visit the Jedi Temple.

The Council never once refused her entry, it was no secret that the Faberians didn't like the Jedi and would take any refusal from the sect as an insult.

Palpatine did enjoy trying to drive an even bigger wedge between the two, key word being try since he had to be careful with his manipulation of any of the Vernius. They are all quite stubborn and willful, any sign of being manipulated will cause an aggressive reaction to the surface.

The Jedi stood and bowed their heads politely, almost synchronized. Palpatine returned the nod and watched them file out of his office. In a few moments, he'd open a comlink to Jabba and set the wheels in motion.

Lord Jabba, you have our sympathies. You must be beside yourself with worry.

Windu had a point, even if he didn't know it. Why would Jabba expose his weakness like that so conveniently? Dooku would have to exercise appropriate caution.

We'll put our best people on it, Lord Jabba...

Jabba's plea saved time in the plan to take one more potential ally away from the Jedi, once they were suitably incriminated, of course. In the longer run, it was also one of the finely balanced thrusts and counter thrusts that would keep the war in an uneasy balance until everything was in position, until the Jedi were in just the right state of vulnerability, and Palpatine could choose to end the war--and with it the Jedi Order itself.

Fascinating, how they didn't jump into action when they heard the child was missing. He really is: Dooku's made sure of it. Jabba might be corrupt, but the child...he's still innocent. Fascinating...how the social acceptability of the parent affects the willingness to aid the child.

They were very selective, these Jedi, about where they focused their legendary compassion.

Palpatine hoped nothing went wrong and that the Huttlet was returned unharmed when he'd served his purpose. Rotta was, after all, another very long-term potential ally in his plan.

But if anything happened to the poor thing--ah, here he was, falling into the platitude trap of being a politician, lies repeated so often that they eventually persuaded even the speaker that he meant what he said, and had done no wrong.

There were always innocent casualties of war, but war still had to be fought. And Jabba would be even more firmly in the anti-Republic camp if anything happened to his son.

Fascinating and...yes, still strange occasionally to play both sides of this game as if I want each to win.

Palpatine opened the comlink on his desk. "I want to speak to Lord Jabba," he said. "This is the Chancellor of the Republic."

FORWARD AID STATION, CRYSTAL CITY, CHRISTOPHSIS

"Steady with polish, sir," said the squad sergeant, checking the fluid level on a hemostatic hypospray. "If you shine it up any more, we'll have to put a camo net over you."

Clone Captain Rex paused in mid sweep, razor held between thumb and forefinger as he shaved his mirror-smooth scalp, and ran his palm over his head to test for missed stubble. Hair was just annoying under a helmet. And regrowth itched. Shaving was now both a necessity and a diversion in quieter moments, a comforting ritual.

Rex went on dragging the razor across his head in precise, slightly overlapping strips, one boot resting on his helmet as it lay on the ground. "Use me for signaling. Should be able to see me from orbit."

"You missed a patch, sir. Going for the tufted look?"

"Maybe a topknot." Rex allowed himself a smile, then pocketed the razor. "Or a fancy braid like those Weequay pirates."

It was the first chance he'd had to sit back and take a breather for days, and his head buzzed with fatigue. The armies of Separatist droids here had been reduced to scrap and a few pockets of resistance; Christophsis had finally fallen to the Republic. In the shelter of a colonnaded doorway that was doubling as a first-aid station, he took out his datapad to check the casualty reports coming in, conscious of an injured trooper sitting on an upturned crate while the sergeant--Coric--tended to the man's shrapnel injury. Plastoid armor was said to be the best credits could buy; Rex staked his life on it. But it had to have joints, gaps, and seals--and they were always vulnerable. The trooper had taken a spray of jagged fragments as razor-sharp and as lethal as flechettes. Some had penetrated the gap between back plate and shoulder.

"How are you doing, Ged?" Rex asked.

"Grateful it's just my shoulder, sir," said the trooper, not looking around. "At least I can still sit down."

Yes, it wasn't a bad kit. Could have been better, like the fancy ARC trooper rig he'd seen, but it did the job. The relatively short list of named and ID numbers on his 'pad was testament to that.

Light casualties for a battle. Doesn't feel like that, though.

"Running low on bacta, sir," Coric said. There was a metallic tinkle as he dropped bloodstained fragments into a plastoid container. "Okay on analgesics for the time being."

Rex did a quick mental calculation of how long it would take the cruiser Hunter to reach the supply base, load up, and return. "They've sent the ship for replenishment. It'll be back in---"

Whoomp--whoomp. A massive explosion shook the ground, then another.

"Incoming!" a voice yelled over the clatter of raining debris.

Yeah, we noticed. Thanks.

Rex grabbed his rifle and sprinted for the street. He didn't look back at Coric or the injured trooper. The two Jedi generals, Jedi commander--Kenobi and Skywalker--and the Empress Regnant Kalene Vernius were already in the open, dodging blasterfire. When Rex got level with them, he could see a wall of droids, rank upon rank, marching toward them in that weird synchrony. It wasn't the same as a well-drilled army of human beings. The precision was cold, unthinking, inexorable, as if the tinnies would keep marching right over you and crush everything in their path. It was SBDs, the super battle droids, that really got him.

He sighted up and aimed.

It was the way they ran with their firing arms extended. And they had no visible heads. Any tinny could kill you, but at least the regular droids looked vaguely human.

Do they think? Do they feel? Do I care?

No.

Us or them.

Rex squeezed off a few rounds, smashing into the front rank. It wouldn't do more than slow them down. It never did. The game was all about numbers, and the droids had them. Clone troopers, roused from brief sleep or caught while gulping down dry rations, took up defensive positions.

Clone Commander Cody sprinted to Kenobi's side. "Where the stang did they come from?"

General Kenobi didn't seem too pleased with his young general. "I told you they caved in too fast," he said, swinging his lightsaber in an arc to deflect a volley of blaster bolts. It was hard to hear him over the blasterfire. "Some victory, Anakin..."

"I wasn't the one who decided to send the ships for supplies..." Skywalker stood his ground, lightsaber grasped two-handed. "Master."

"Neither of us is perfect, then, and that be our lesson--second wave incoming, men. Stand to."

Kalene snorted and Kenobi turned that look on her, which she ignored as she fired at the droids. Rex liked Kalene, she was a soldier even though she was a ruler. She made it look easy slipping into the role of a soldier and out of her role of a ruler. Maybe it was easy for her because Faberians were a military culture and war was in their blood.

Anakin swung around. "Platoon, on me!" he barked, tapping the top of his head in the signal to form up. Skywalker even sounded like a soldier. He was an easy general to follow. "Rex, see that building? The energy sphere? Best position, I think."

Rex flicked the macrobinocular setting on his helmet to get a close-up view. "You want to go around behind."

"It's risky, but we can make it."

"Okay, let's go for it, sir."

"I'm coming with you, Ani," Kalene said, putting her twin hand blasters in their holsters, dangling from her belt was a black hilted lightsaber that Rex knew had a maroon colored blade. He knew that the color of her lightsaber made the Jedi uneasy and he knew that the Faberians didn't believe in either dark or light side, to them it was just the Force. Rex had overheard Kalene and Kenobi talk about it, he also knew that the general got off easy since he had seen how Grand Admiral Vernius cuts into Jedi when they go all 'anger leads to the dark side' on her. "Someone needs to watch your back and pull you out of trouble."

"That's why I have Rex, Kal."

"Fine, I'll come to watch both of your backs and to pull the both of you out of trouble."

Kalene was loyal to those she deems as her friends, something that Faberians were well known for. Faberians would take a blaster bolt for a friend, something that Kalene had done a few times for Skywalker and his men.

Chunk-chunk-chunk. The battle droids marched like a single machine. Rex hated that noise. It just would not stop.

Droids relied on numbers and keeping coming, and coming, and coming. Rapid reaction wasn't their strong suit. They also preferred a nice level battlefield and wide open spaces. Rex signaled to the platoon, indicating that they should melt back into the deserted streets and alleyways of Crystal City, then transmitted the coordinates of the objective via his helmet comlink. A chart of the streets leading to the energy sphere appeared in the head-up display in every trooper's helmet. Rex didn't really need to use hand signals with that level of communications tech, but it was an instinctive thing to do--and if the HUD systems went down, they all had to fall back on good old-fashioned, non-digital soldiering.

Coric grabbed his medical field kit. The FAS moved with the front line.

General Skywalker and Kalene darted for the entrance to a deserted office block, Rex at their heels, to pick through the rubble and passages of the city and make their way back behind the droid lines. The route ran parallel to the main street. Kenobi, Cody, and a company of troopers returned the heavy fire raining down on them from the advancing droids; Rex couldn't see it, but he could hear it, and feel the shocks under his boots. Plumes of gray smoke bloomed into the air.

Keep'em occupied, Cody...

Rex scrambled over a shattered fountain that was still gushing water from a broken conduit. This must have been a nice place to live, once; Rex tried to cast his mind back to just a few days earlier, when Crystal City had been a landscape that seemed carved out of glittering gems. The civilian population had already fled by the time ground troops had landed.

It felt like a lifetime ago, and he'd still not seen a living Christophsian. Plenty of dead ones, though. Plenty of them. His night-vision filter kicked in as he ran down a sloping passage into darkness and shapes resolved in the green-lit images, a chaos of shattered transparisteel, permacrete, and cables.

A light winked on a console torn from the wall; he hadn't realized there was still a functioning power supply in this complex. Not a booby trap. No HUD sensor warning. Just a light. Rex ran on. Skywalker's robes flapped, blotting out the faint lights beyond like a black cloud.

It was hard to make out Kalene because she wore all black though the faint lights shined off her black armor when she moved by it. Rex didn't know where Jax was but he had no doubt that the Jha'dur was following them, keeping silent and keeping up.

Rex had seen the canid sneak up on a platoon of droids undetected before lunging at one of them from the shadows.

It was an unnerving sight but he was happy that he was on their side and that could be said about the Faberian Empire as well, he had seen the aftermath of a fight against them and it looks entirely one sided. The captain didn't know what the Faberians had been fighting back in the Unknown Regions but whatever it was, it had made them into a great military power that shouldn't be taken lightly.

Rex glanced at the HUD icons set to one side of the main display to check for stragglers, counting the transponder blips and ID numbers of the platoon. Sergeant Coric was right behind him--and the injured trooper. He must have been tanked up on painkillers. The trooper's bodysuit had lost some integrity, too. Rex hoped he didn't get into a situation where he needed it to be airtight.

"You could sit this one out, Ged." Rex said.

"I get lonely, sir."

"We'll keep you company, then..."

It took maybe ten minutes to skirt around the droid lines, staying close to the canyon-like walls and covering as much ground as possible under cover to avoid aerial detection.

Skywalker and Kalene leaped ahead--it would have been very handy to bound clear over obstacles like that, Rex thought--and was already on the roof of the energy sphere building by the time Rex pushed through the doors.

They edged to the parapet around the sphere. Troopers positioned themselves and sighted up, snapping anti-armor attachments onto their rifles. On the ground floor, the rest of the platoon hid in the lobby, ready to give the droids a street-level surprise from the rear.

Skywalker and Kalene seemed to be sizing up for a jump. Two stories beneath them, three octuptarra droids marched forward in that three-legged staccato gait, each one a sphere supported by thin arching legs, spitting a stream of cannon fire.

"What's the plan, then, sir?" Ged asked, as if he didn't know. There was one surefire way to take a droid like that. But their narrow profile and relatively small spherical bodies made them a hard target to hit.

The general seemed to be focused on one of the droids. "Follow me."

"Right you are, sir..."

Rex secured his rappel line on the edge of the roof and signaled to the men behind. Skywalker and Kalene didn't need anything fancy like that.

They just jumped.

STREET LEVEL, CRYSTAL CITY

Anakin landed on the back of the octuptarra droid just hard enough to balance on the flat section on top of its spherical body without tipping both of them over, he sensed and heard Kalene land on the second one.

And the droid couldn't do a thing about it.

It spun and flailed as he rammed his lightsaber deep into its top panel. One of its comrades swiveled its cannon and fired, the one that Kalene wasn't one and unleashing a barrage of blaster bolts into its top panel. Anakin batted the bolts away with his lightsaber as Rex and the rest of the clone troopers opened fire and took down the remaining octuptarras, running over the wreckage to engage the rear rank of battle droids, which had now realized they were facing a rearguard action as well.

Anakin sensed Jax arrived at that scene, he had no idea where the canid had been but he did know that he had been following them. He didn't have to worry about Jax, he had seen the Jha'dur in action enough to know that he was quite capable of holding his own against the droids.

Jha'durs' jaws were stronger than they appear and he had seen Jax crush the skull of a battle droid with his teeth and jaw pressure.

Anakin knew he wasn't actually thinking at this point. An odd moment of mental separation left him able to run on some buried instinct at the same time as part of him took a step back and observed it all, both fascinated and appalled. His body had bypassed his higher brain functions, moving him around the battlefield without his consent. He was aware of the position of every droid, every clone trooper, of Kalene and Jax, but not consciously; he could see Kenobi's blue lightsaber blade, flashing intermittently through a smoky forest of battle droids. The noise was deafening--screaming, ripping metal, explosions so loud that they felt like a punch high in the chest--but he wasn't sure he was hearing or even listening. It was...a kind of blindness where he could still somehow see.

Images flared and vanished in front of him like flash-frames. He was swinging his lightsaber into a group of Tusken Raiders. You killed my mother. Now it's your turn. It was a memory; he'd done exactly that. For a split second, he wasn't sure if he was looking at droids or Sand People. He simply spun around the droid lines, swinging and slashing, buoyed up on a wave of reflexes. Metal fragments flashed past his face. Some veered away at angles, deflected not by his lightsaber but an instinctive and unthinking Force push. One moment he was rising explosively from a squat into the looming shadow of an SBD, thrusting his lightsaber through its chest, the next he was leaping onto the back of a battle droid and ripping off its head with a Force-assisted stranglehold.

And he could still glimpse Tuskens he didn't want to see, solid ghosts, running for cover in the forest of falling droids as white armored troopers charged, fired, and even vibrobladed them. He sprinted after one; but Rex now stood right in front of them, smashing the butt of his DC-15 rifle hard down on a battle droid's fragile neck as it lay struggling to get up. Rex was almost casual. The clone hammered the droid right-handed as he reached into his belt pouch with his left hand to grab a reload. He barely paused as he snapped the new energy pack into its housing and started firing again. Another droid turned on him--perhaps to aid its fallen comrade, perhaps not--and got a faceful of blasterfire.

Anakin struggled to shut out the memory of the Tusken Raiders. They vanished. But in the melee he saw a tall gold figure with long black claws; a Blood Carver called Ke Daiv. He'd killed him, too, years ago.

It's not darkness.

I'm not dark.

This isn't anger--

It was okay; they'd always told him so. He was fighting to save his men, and if he did terrible things out of compassion, out of love, then he wasn't turning to the dark side. That was the Jedi way.

For my mother. For my men. For Padme. For Kalene.

His body carried on anyway. He swung his blade through metal bodies as easily as if he were cutting grass. Rex and the clone troopers fought as hard as he did, as pumped with adrenaline as he was, too desperate to feel their own natural fear--and yet at that moment they felt unlike him in the Force, devoid only of that singular crazed frenzy, that throat-closing...rage.

I'm not turning dark.

This has to be done.

Don't stop to think; it'll get you killed.

Anakin shook off the doubt, but it scared him more than death. He charged past Rex into the next rank of droids, almost choking on smoke and flying dust. The thing within swept him along the way it had when he wiped out the Tusken village for his mother's murder, a strangely cold frenzy, equally consuming, equally animal in its intensity.

He went on killing. Somehow it didn't matter that those who fell before his lightsaber this time were droids. It was all the same to him. He leaped from octuptarra to octuptarra, driving his blade deep into each droid's sphere as he went. He felt that he could keep going for eternity, never running out of this--

Not rage. Not rage.

Whatever it was, he had to let it out.

The droids were crushed against one another, unable to maneuver. Clones pressed in on them, firing point-blank into their weak points. Shrapnel flew, peppering noisily against clone armor.

"Anakin!" Obi-Wan yelled. He whirled his lightsaber around his head and took out two battle droids in one sweep, cut in half at the waist joint. At his side was his padawan, slicing and hacking battle droids with her dual lightsabers. "Come on!"

Anakin suddenly ran out of droids. The cacophony of battle noise stopped. He was now face-to-face with Kenobi, and they were standing on a carpet of dismembered and shattered droids. A sudden silence descended on the battlefield, the kind that left Anakin's ears ringing.

"Are you okay, Anakin?" Kenobi was staring into his face as if he'd seen something.

Kalene was standing next to Anakin suddenly, he had sensed her approach so it didn't surprise him. Then he felt a comforting weight against him and knew without looking that it was Jax. Sensing the soothing aura she was putting out, she knew about the Tusken Raiders, his mother and Blood Carvers and didn't lecture or judge him.

Faberians didn't understand why Jedi tried to put a lid on their emotions, emotions helped fuel their connection to the Force. Anakin had seen it first hand and knew that Kalene was right but it wasn't his way, the Jedi way.

Anakin took a deep, steadying breath. For a moment, Tuskens, Blood Carvers, and enemy droids were all gone. "Yes, Master." He turned to check how many of his men were wounded, Kalene and Jax were fine but they did have cuts and scrapes on them though Kalene's were mostly found on her face since it was the only thing uncovered. Droids tended to aim for that but Kalene was always able to dodge them. "Rex? Let's evac as many as we can while we--"

But it was just a lull in the storm. The sound carried from farther up the road, that chunk-chunk-chunk again.

Another wave of droids.

Kalene groaned as she put her blasters back in their holsters and unclipped her lightsaber, activating it with a snap-hiss and the maroon colored blade sprang forth. Kenobi pressed his lips together in a thin line but kept what he was going to say to himself while Kalene was the most patient out of her siblings, she did have a limit to it.

And remarks about the color of her lightsaber would make the patience disappear faster than you can blink.

"We're going to need reinforcements, fast." Anakin said.

Kenobi looked up as if he expected a ship to appear on demand. "I still can't get a comlink signal through to the Admiral. Must be atmospheric conditions."

Kalene paused for a second, debating if she should go meet those droids but then turned off her lightsaber, clipping it back on her belt before saying, "None of my forces are close enough to lend aid so I can't contact them." She didn't mean comms, she meant using the Force. It was way more reliable than comms and they didn't have to worry about interference or any enemy forces listening in.

"Let's get these guys out, anyway," Rex said wearily. A trooper was calling for a medic; two men picked their way through the droid debris to a fallen man Anakin could see only as a tangle of limbs. There were at least a dozen troopers down. "Come on--I said, let's get these guys clear! Move it!"

The clones had been heavily outnumbered, but they were human--agile, motivated, and smart. The droids were just machines. They fell victim to their sheer numbers and inflexibility in every sense. Stick them in a tight spot, and they couldn't avoid one another's arc of fire, or even move. They had no room to fight the way they were programmed to. They couldn't use a rifle as a club like Rex would, or drop a grenade into a hatch and jump clear like Sergeant Coric, or pull off a combo like Kalene and him, or care enough about their brothers' lives to fight like crazy men, or even think. They were machines. Just dumb machines.

I just destroyed machines. I didn't kill.

Anakin felt as if he were sobering up after a drinking spree, but he'd never been drunk. The moment left him disoriented and embarrassed in a way he didn't understand. He shook himself out of it. More droids were coming, and there were wounded men to evacuate. He rushed to check the casualties with Kenobi, Zephyra, Kalene and Rex, helping those he could, moving those he couldn't.

Chunk-chunk-chunk.

"Patience, clankers," Rex muttered, hauling a trooper by his shoulders into the shelter of a doorway. Anakin took the man's legs. "I'll get back to you soon."

And then the metallic marching stopped. Anakin strained to listen; the close explosions must have affected his hearing. But he wasn't imagining it. He could see them now, a line of metal statues seeming to wait for orders.

The droid advance had ground to a halt.

Jax's large ears perked up in response while Kalene paused in her action of helping a wounded trooper to shelter.

"Let's hope that doesn't mean they're moving long-range artillery into position," Kenobi said. He wiped the back of his glove across his mouth, smearing dust and droid oil across his beard. The wretched things scattered debris and fluids for meters when hit. "We can't take much more of this."

Jax lets out a chirping bark before he stands on his hind legs, tucking his front legs against his chest. He was now looking up, Kalene looked up in response. Anakin and the clones had long learned to always pay attention to Jax, he was their early warning system. If Jax was alert then it best to stop and see what had earned his attention.

It was something that Anakin had learned back when they were children.

Anakin heard it even before he felt it. It was a very distinctive sound, pure music. He looked up at the same moment Rex did, and what he saw was possibly even more wonderful than it sounded. It was so arresting that he almost missed the droids up ahead doing a sudden, crisp about-turn and marching away again.

An armed Republic shuttle banked above the street and veered off toward the plaza.

"That's more like it," Rex said. His shoulders sagged slightly, a blend of relief and fatigue. "They don't like the odds now."

Kalene let out a gleeful cheer, throwing her arms up with a large smile on her face while Jax spun in a circle, dropping his upper half so that all four paws could be on the ground.

Anakin turned to Kenobi, trying to look unmoved. He wanted to cheer like Kalene. But it wasn't a very Jedi thing to do. "They're pulling back, Master. Looks like reinforcements have made them see sense. Come on, Rex, let's give them a proper welcome."

"Where's the cruiser?" Rex asked, tapping his finger against the side of his helmet as if having comm problems. "I'm not picking up anything within landing range."

"It'll be here," Kenobi said, exuding energy. As always, he seemed--felt--invigorated by a fight. Anakin wondered if he had those frenzied killing moments too, he knew Kalene did and even Kizira who was a Jedi Knight, and a second mother to him. He and Kizira shared a common secret: they were both married though Kizira had been married to Qui-Gon Jinn, and he had died on Naboo. Killed by a Sith before Kizira killed him in an action that was considered normal for a Faberian. Kenobi hooked his lightsaber to his belt and jogged toward the plaza, where they set up a landing area. "Time for reinforcements and supplies." He looked at Anakin. "You should ask Master Yoda for your own Padawan, Anakin. You have a lot to teach. I really think you should." Obi-Wan looked away to fix his gaze on his padawan, Anakin won't lie but he thought she'd be a liability because this wasn't a time or place to train one but she had proven herself time and again.

"No, thanks." Anakin glanced at Rex and Kalene and raised an eyebrow to Kenobi's back. The captain shrugged while Kalene looked amused by the whole idea of Anakin being a teacher, he knew that she had her doubts. The council knew that Anakin had issues with attachments, something that she had overheard them tell him many times. "I'll teach when I think I've got experience worth passing on. And a learner would slow me down. We don't have the luxury of time at the moment."

Anakin could have sworn Rex was amused. He couldn't see his face behind that T-shaped visor, but he noticed a slight dip of the chin and felt his mood in the Force. Then the man gave him a discreet thumbs-up.

Kalene smirked in response and shook her head.

Anakin winked. Thanks, Rex, Kal.

The gunship touched down between two cannon emplacements, and the ramp went down. But no fresh clone troopers disembarked, or even supply droids steering fully-laden repulsors and ammunition crates.

A little female Togruta stepped onto the plaza instead. A tiny girl. A child.

Kalene blinked owlishly while Zephyra did a double take before the dark skinned padawan moved to stand next to her master, her eyes on the Togruta before them.

Kenobi stood transfixed. "What's that youngling doing here? Where's the ship? Where's Hunter?"

The little Togruta drew herself up to her full height--which wasn't saying much--and craned her neck to look up at Kenobi, doing her best to ignore the steady staring that Zendaya was giving her. It would have been impressive in a different situation and not the one they are currently in. "Master Yoda was worried that you hadn't reported in, and he couldn't reach you, so he sent me with a message."

"Sent you?" Kenobi said. "So where's the cruiser? Where are our reinforcements? Our support?"

"The ship dropped me off. Master Yoda wants you to return to the Temple right away. There's an emergency."

Kalene raised an eyebrow before she looked at Anakin, having picked up on his emotions as soon as she felt them rise up to the surface. They had formed a Force Bond, it had begun to form when they had first met on Tatooine and now it was such a deep bond that they can easily pick up on each other's mood before anyone else can.

"Funny, we've got one of those too, in case you hadn't noticed." Anakin gestured over his shoulder at the palls of smoke still rising into the air. He didn't dare look at Rex in case the dismay rising in his throat was contagious, Kalene wasn't doing anything to calm him down. She understood how he felt because she was feeling the same way. After the blissful relief of the droid retreat, the realization that they were still under siege slapped him back hard. There was no end in sight, no resupply, no comm to Padme to let her know he was fine. "Are you telling me they never got our signals asking for help?"

"I don't think they did. Perhaps we can relay a message via the cruiser that brought me."

"And who are you?"

"I'm Padawan Ahsoka Tano," she said.

"And why are you here, Padawan? Other than to deliver us a message," Kalene asked with a kind and patient smile as she stepped in front of Anakin as if it would calm him down. Maybe it would and while she understood how he felt, it wasn't the child's fault that they didn't get their signals. And there was more to this padawan than being a mere messenger, she could sense it. "Obi-Wan already has a new padawan." She motioned to the silently watching teen that was standing next to her Master who kept her eyes on the Togruta. "So whose padawan are you?"

Ahsoka looked a little uncomfortable for a moment, then smiled as if she'd nailed it on with a grim determination just to keep their spirits up.

"I'm Master Skywalker's padawan." She turned to Anakin and bowed.

Kalene and Anakin then looked at each other in unison, both surprised and shocked.

What was the Council playing at?

#Star Wars OC #Clone Wars #Anakin Skywalker #Obi-Wan Kenobi #Ahsoka Tano #Vernius Family

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padme-amitabha · 4 years ago

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Is Anakin and Vader the same person?

I think I have talked about this before but I’ll reiterate the main points.

Of course they are the same person at different points in life. I don’t choose to follow Disney’s interpretation of anything about Star Wars. They hire writers and pay them to write their own fanfiction and interpretation and it’s far from George’s vision so I don’t see any reason to. Only 1-6 movies are canon to me with few exceptions such as 2003 Clone Wars and a few legends material but I’ll always put more emphasis on the movies.

Now from Revenge of the Sith movie we see Anakin become Vader (and by that I mean undergoing a surgery and being put into the suit). While the mask is being lowered we can see the fear in his eyes and his face is still recognizable. Fast forward 23 years and there’s no reason to believe he’s a different person. The only time he talks about his name is when Luke brings it up and he says “that name no longer has any meaning for me” not “I destroyed Anakin” or something similar to that. He is completely right because obviously it doesn’t hold any meaning for him - everyone who called him and knew him by that name (Shmi, Obi-Wan and Padmé) were all dead and his master called him Vader. And he had gotten used to the name in over two decades. Also, Palpatine probably preferred that he distance himself from his past hence referring to Luke as “the offspring of Anakin Skywalker.” Vader wasn’t a personality; it was just a new name he went by and since the mention of his real name brought back unpleasant memories he tried not to think of himself as the same person as a coping mechanism. This is why Vader tells Luke it’s too late for him to redeem himself - because he knows he commited some terrible deeds and hurt his loved ones and he can’t ever take that back. If he wasn’t Anakin, he wouldn’t feel that guilt or remorse for Anakin’s wife and mentor.

It’s the same as Padmé in TPM really - we see Padmé first as Queen Amidala who is a regal authoritative figure and then we see her true self when she’s in disguise.

Anakin winced, then quickly picked up another holograph, this one showing Padmé a couple of years later, wearing official robes and standing between two older and similarly robed Legislators. He looked back at the first holo, then to this one, noting that Padmé’s expression seemed much more severe here. “My first day as an Apprentice Legislator,” Padmé explained.

Then, as if she was reading his mind, she added, “See the difference?” Anakin studied the holograph a moment longer, then looked up and laughed, seeing Padmé wearing that same long and stern expression. She laughed as well, then squeezed his shoulder and went back to her packing.

Anakin put the holographs down side by side and looked at them for a long, long time. Two sides of the woman he loved.

This is from the AOTC novelization and this can be applied to Anakin as well. (More about similarities between Darth Vader and Queen Amidala in this post.) Just like Queen Amidala is really Padmé Naberrie, in the same way Darth Vader is really just Anakin Skywalker.

The reason why he has a different demeanor in OT is mostly due to his age and because he had years to adapt to his new persona. Vader in ROTS didn’t immediately become all stoic and impassive - he got very emotional on hearing Padmé’s death just like he would as Anakin. Vader isn’t some kind of demon possessing Anakin - Vader is Anakin after he has lost everything and he isn’t holding back as he did as a Jedi. It sounds very poetic to state both Anakin and Padmé died on the same day but Anakin truly didn’t though. Anakin lived on for years and died a redeemed man on the death star. The ROTS novelization supports this and it was approved by Lucas so it’s authentic to me.

And there is one blazing moment in which you finally understand that there was no dragon. That there was no Vader. That there was only you. Only Anakin Skywalker.

That it was all you. Is you.

Only you.

You did it.

You killed her.

You killed her because, finally, when you could have saved her, when you could have gone away with her, when you could have been thinking about her, you were thinking about yourself …

I do think it was Anakin who choked Padmé on Mustafar even though some people like to blame it on “Vader”. Anakin was unhinged on Mustafar but even in the beginning of ROTS, he was beginning to show some aggression. Though people complain the first part of ROTS is slow and too much happens in the latter half and he falls too suddenly, that’s not the case. This moment has been building up from the very first movie to the first half of ROTS. The fall isn’t just that one action of attacking Mace Windu, he was gradually falling to the dark side for years starting from his mother’s death and he only made the actual decision in the rumination scene. That’s when he finally sheds a tear and makes the conscious decision to join the dark side.

For the record, I think conflict has always been a part of Anakin Skywalker. The prequels portray him in a negative light, particularly in the last two films. Anakin in the movies is a very, very flawed individual and even meant to be unlikable at times. He struggles with his emotions, he struggles to communicate with others and he struggle to fit in the order. I wouldn’t say he was mentally stable either - he could be unpredictable and his actions depend on his mood. But the movies also show the good aspects of him, especially about people he cared about. He even starts off as a kid with a good heart. The conflict and his flaws cause him to fall to the dark side and his good qualities (like selflessness and loyalty when it comes to family) ultimately redeem him.

So I don’t think “Anakin” was the good side of him and “Vader” was the dark side. Vader is Anakin after he has lost everything he cared about and since he is not a Jedi anymore he is no longer required to hold back on anything. Ambition and desire to rule the galaxy is often associated with “Vader” but I think people forget Anakin was just as ambitious and in ROTS being denied the rank of Master deeply upsets him and increases his resentment towards the Jedi. He admitted that he wanted more in ROTS even though he knows he shouldn’t. He also told Padmé in AOTC that he would prefer dictatorship over democracy so it’s not like his ideals changed either. Vader until he discovered he had a son had no interest in ruling the galaxy. Later on he essentially offered Luke the same choice he gave Padmé on Mustafar. From the conversation in AOTC, it seems he’s more dissatisfied with the system and being from a lawless and harsh world he sees dictatorship as the solution. While he doesn’t want to actively take part in it, he wants to enforce the system which is exactly what he does later on (and perhaps he preferred leaving the actual ruling bit to Padmé or Luke). I don’t see Vader as “evil” - I mean the only times he killed people were for failure and he did keep Admiral Piett alive since he proved to be competent. Vader in OT (when Luke isn’t concerned) is just doing his job and punishing inefficient people who aren’t letting him do his job. He only serves the emperor and does his bidding. After Luke rejects his offer, Vader still plans to seek him out but in ROTJ his resolve definitely grew weaker and it’s more like he’s imploring him to reconsider than being forceful.

Anakin as we have seen in AOTC is very much capable of mass murder (and confessed that he felt they deserved it) so should he really be defined as the good side? You could even argue as Vader he killed people for legitimate reasons whereas Anakin killed defenseless people when he was blinded by rage. And even in ROTS he kills Dooku as revenge. I’m not saying Anakin is evil (that would be grossly oversimplying things); I am saying he was a complex character. The reason why he turned out the way he is has already been explored in the prequels but I also believe it’s a combination of nature and nurture. Anakin as a child has a good heart, wants to help others and free the slaves but in TPM script/novelization he lashes out at a Rodian who claims he won the race by cheating, meaning he didn’t handle accusation very well. It might be dismissed as a childish reaction but we see he struggled to control his temper in later years as well. A person has both good and bad qualities and that’s the case with Anakin here, though his negative traits were expressed more. But the prequels are all about exploring his downfall so it was necessary to highlight them.

Anakin to me was never a “hero” who fell to the dark side due to circumstances; he was a complex character who made some hard choices. If the roles were reversed and Padmé was the Jedi with Anakin’s life at risk, I don’t think she would go that far to commit murder. Sure Palpatine is very manipulative but at the same time he understood that it was in Anakin’s nature to be manipulated very easily. You need to have some form of fear, insecurity and resentment in you for someone to utilize them.

I blame TCW, Rebels and the fanboyish Marvel comics for dissociating Anakin from Vader. “Anakin Skywalker was weak, I destroyed him” again makes him very one-dimensional than accepting the fact that people can be morally complex. Not to mention the Marvel comics’ tendency to make him react violently and unnecessarily ruthless to prove he isn’t Anakin drastically reduces his character depth for me. It may also have to do with the fact that movie Anakin was not well-received so they are trying to distance him from Darth Vader, whom fanboys worship. Anakin’s story is incomplete without Vader - he made a choice to embrace the dark side and sacrifice his morality so like the tragic hero he is, he has to suffer and face the consequences for his actions. Similarly, Vader’s story is incomplete without Anakin - without Anakin he is a faceless man. Sure he’s mysterious but without his past we would not know what a complex character he was or sympathise with him.

If Vader wasn’t really Anakin, he wouldn’t have felt remorse for his actions or believe it was too late for him. If he wasn’t Anakin he wouldn’t refer to Luke as his son and if he was so desperate to erase any trace of Anakin, he would have definitely killed Luke as he was a reminder of his past. It was Vader who saved Luke in the end and while it is fine to figuratively say “Anakin was back”, taking it literally undermines his sacrifice. It takes a lot to come back from the dark side, face your demons and after being that way for decades, attempt to redeem yourself when you believe you’re far too gone. He redeemed himself as an old man after a long life full of sorrow and regrets, which also sounds much better than saying “he was evil no longer” and that “Anakin was back”. It makes everything seem black and white and the prequels were essentially all about exploring the gray area. Luke didn’t even know “Anakin” and really where was Anakin when “Vader” cut off his hand? Or fought him? Vader’s inner struggle was between accepting he was far too gone and going on as he did for years, and accepting change, letting it go and forgiving himself for his son’s sake - not a struggle between two personalities fighting to take control. If they were different personalities, Anakin wouldn’t have almost all of Vader’s qualities; he wouldn’t be morally conflicted both as Anakin and Vader. George said the reason why he later replaced his force ghost as a younger version was because he stopped being Anakin after he fell to the dark side and I have to say that’s the only time I disagree with George because Anakin in prequels still had dark tendencies so I do believe Vader never stopped being Anakin hence the original version with the old force ghost made more sense to me and the new version does rob some of the depth from his character. I’m sure George has his reasons - he might have wished to preserve the black and white simplicity of the OT but after the complexity of the prequels, it seems more appropriate for the saga to have a more imperfect, realistic ending. In retrospect, it seems to me they are very much the same person when you study his personality and consider his whole life, which was full of ups and downs.

#ask #my thoughts #anakin skywalker #darth vader

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ariainstars · 5 years ago

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Star Wars vs. Pride and Prejudice

Mr Darcy’s famous proposal scene from Pride and Prejudice, here taking place in the rain for further emphasis of his desperate love for her.

“In vain have I struggled. It will not do. My feelings will not be repressed. You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”

Ever since Kylo’s clumsy attempt to convince Rey to stay with him, in the infamous Throne Room scene, I must have stumbled at least a hundred times across the above-mentioned quotation with the assumption of both scenes being parallel to one another, leading to the conclusion that Kylo and Rey also will be together.

How many times, to you think, was I confronted the parallel scene - the one where Elizabeth has to confess that she was prejudiced against Darcy, that she knew too little to judge him, that she felt superior to him although she had no actual justification?

…

That’s right. Not once.

“Did Luke tell you what happened that night?”

“I know everything I need to know about you.”

To me the revelation of Dark Rey in the second TROS trailer was not in the least surprising. The moment I heard Palpatine’s laugh at the end of the first trailer I guessed he was after her. (My husband’s comment was: “Of course Palpatine wants her, not Kylo. What is he supposed to do with that daydreamer?” 😊)

Honestly: I would have been surprised, even affronted, if Rey had never been tempted by the Dark Side. Every Force user is tempted to misuse his powers, in one way or another. And despite the many claims I have read and heard to this issue, though there were a few clues that might have justified calling Rey a Mary Sue, there were at least twice as much already indicating that she, like her equal in the Force, is fragile and immature.

But for some reason - naivety? Wrongly understood feminism? - for years it was widely assumed, in particular among female Reylo fans, that Rey would be the one the save Kylo (alias Ben Solo); that she is good and pure and flawless and that her love would redeem him, or at least push him to redemption due to his desire to be with her. Few seemed to consider that Rey has her own weaknesses to overcome, too.

Personally, I see nothing “romantic” in the idea of a woman redeeming a guy. I don’t know why a girl is naturally assumed to be better than a man and that it is her task to save or inspire him, morally. Nor do I believe that it is a case of “true love” if the man ends up doing everything the woman wants him to do. It would make her his pet, not an equal partner. I know, it is a mistake that women often make, believing they must “help” the man they love: but no one can be saved from himself.

I do wish Ben and Rey to have a future, and of course they cannot be together if they are on the opposite sides of a war: but that must not necessarily mean, as a matter of fact, that Ben just has to see the righteousness of Rey’s and her friend’s cause and switch sides for everything to be wrapped up. The Force needs balance, which meaning that both sides, each in its own way, have a right and a point to exist. The greatest weakness of people who believe to be - and are universally believed to be - “good” usually have a tendency to be in denial. Rey lived in denial almost all of her life, since her parents left her. When Ben confronted her with what she already knew, i.e. that they would never come back, it was very painful for her, but he immediately added that her being “nobody” did nothing to change the fact that to him, she is much.

Even the fans who called Reylo Reverse Anidala often did not want to see that Padmé had believed she could save Anakin with her love, and failed. Of course she failed: because for a balanced relationship, both have to learn from one another. They must influence one another and grow together. The relationship between Anakin and Padmé always was unbalanced because she was not aware of his inner turmoil, and he always felt inferior to her - an ex slave who had married a former queen. And in a dramatic context as the Skywalker family saga, people have to save one another. The team that was glued together in the classic trilogy always did so, that’s why things worked out.

Ever since The Force Awakens we have often been confronted with Rey’s aggressiveness and judgmental attitude. And she ends her last Force connection in The Last Jedi literally looking down on Ben.

There is no reason at all, except wishful thinking, to assume that Rey has nothing dark inside her, or not enough to make her evil. (Yes, in The Last Jedi she kills a few Praetorian Guards, but in self-defense.)

Even most of the fans who kept stubbornly pretending that Rey is secretly Luke’s daughter did not come to this conclusion. But Luke was never 100 % good and pure himself.

When he met Vader for the first time face-to-face on Bespine, he was welcomed with the sentence “The Force is with you, young Skywalker. But you are not a Jedi yet.” Luke immediately proved him right by igniting his light saber first, although Yoda had repeatedly taught him that a Jedi fights only in defense and that violence is not a solution.

Luke paid a high price for his conceit and sense of entitlement: on Bespine all hell broke loose. He came away barely alive, crippled and severely traumatized. But that terrible experience on the long run had done him good: he was much more calm and collected in Return of the Jedi. Luke had learned his lesson. Rey hasn’t, as of yet.

Now I am not saying that Rey is a bad person, and I am not trying to justify Ben’s atrocious deeds. But he was isolated, manipulated and terrified since childhood and then let down by the one person in the galaxy he would never have expected it from - his uncle, whose all-encompassing love for his father, forgiveness and pacifism had made him a legend before his nephew was even born.

Rey was in no position to understand the depth of pain and despair that made Ben kill Han, in an insane attempt to overcome the inner conflict that was tearing him apart. As they say, don’t judge someone unless you’ve been in his shoes.

Snoke, a powerful Force user, knew its mechanics very well: “Darkness rises and Light to meet it.” As Rey had “risen” from Jakku while Kylo did more and more evil, so it was to be expected that since he has freed some of the light that still was in him, she will now go down the opposite path.

I am positive that Rey will not remain in the darkness, that in some way or another she will find out again. But the plunge into the Dark Side is extremely important for her because she must understand that she has no right to judge the man who is her equal in the Force.

Ben and Rey have an important task: they have to bring Balance to the Force and thus lasting peace to the galaxy. But they can’t cooperate if they don’t have a common ground, and they will never have a common ground as long as one of them believes he has the right to make choices for the other. Both are convinced of doing right; which is why the darkness is all the more tempting to them. They have not yet matured the sense of responsibility a Force user needs in order to employ his powers the right way.

Though it contains many tropes, this is not Pride and Prejudice or Romeo and Juliet or Cinderella or Beauty and the Beast. It’s Star Wars. Like a royal family in former times, the fate of the Skywalker saga always echoes through the galaxy. They must find peace at last, and for good, for the sake of everybody. The saga won’t be done by Ben and Rey kissing and making up.

And apart from that: it was about time that the saga got its own female villain. I’m all for female empowerment - it must not necessarily be through virtue. *cough* 😉

#star wars #dark side #the force #rey #kylo ren #ben solo #redemption #palpatine #snoke #episode IX #pride and prejudice #beauty and the beast #The Last Jedi #The Rise of Skywalker #reylo

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unexpectedreylo · 5 years ago

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Time For More Speculation!

The sizzle reel is out and EVERYBODY is talking about it. Of course that means there are many interesting theories and many more painfully dumb ones. (Sigh.)

Mark my words. TPM turned trailers into events. TROS has just hatched a new phenomenon, the sizzle reel that’s not a trailer but still is. Look for every blockbuster movie from now on to do one.

Let’s get to our top story: Dark!Rey

Who knew that a popular fan trope would actually become canon? I didn’t expect it at all but I have to say, regardless of context (and there are MANY possible contexts), thank God they had the cojones to explore that part of Rey. It’s easy to think of her as the eternal Rey of Sunshine but the movies have hinted at something not quite so pure.

After I saw TFA, I had a hard time figuring out what was Rey’s harmatia, the Achilles heel where if this was a tragedy it would be her downfall or at least in a comedy (in the old sense, not funny ha ha) the one thing that would test her. It wasn’t obvious, whereas in the prequels you could keep score on everything that was going to add up to Anakin’s downfall.

Then after TLJ the picture became clearer. Her loneliness, her aggression, and repressed rage manifested through her defiance, her recklessness, and her tendency to clobber anyone who makes her mad. Luke was freaked out not only at her power but also the casual way she went “right to the dark.” You think that wouldn’t have made the Jedi Council of the PT era a wee bit concerned?

So yes I can now see how Rey could possibly turn to the Dark Side. Remember Kylo’s vision? Maybe it’s what he saw. It would be Alanis Morrissette-level ironic that our two space wizards pine for the other to turn only for them to turn in opposite directions at the same time. Especially since I strongly believe the resolution of this story depends on Kylo/Ben and Rey finally ending up on the same page, balanced within themselves, and destroying Sidious together.

A thought had occurred to me. Chances are if you’re reading this you’re big into Bendemption like I am. I know that in order to do this, Ben must commit a selfless act. What if that act is confronting Dark!Rey to turn her back to the light? What if it’s a replay of Han’s confrontation with Kylo in TFA? Imagine, Ben walking out onto one of those bridges over a bottomless chasm to meet Rey. Imagine he leaves his weapons behind in his first Jedi-like act in years. It’s just him. He knows this story because he lived it before, only he was the one someone tried to save with love. He knows full well his chances of surviving are not good. But he’s the only one who could stop Rey from taking this path and plunging the galaxy into permanent chaos. And then when he’s standing there pleading with Rey, it’s his second proposal to her. He holds out his hand, this time a bare hand, for her to take. He knows Rey could just hack off his hand and then his head faster than she can say “Eff you.” But it’s all he can do and he is in that moment accepting the will of the Force.

It would be Poetic Cinema (TM).

What I think he could offer her? Letting her know again she isn’t alone. She will always have him and his love. And this time it’ll work.

Now Palpatine could try to stop this from happening and kill Ben. But I think if this occurs, Rey will return him to life. Then they go take out the trash.

I may be right or I may have cooked up a good AU canonverse fan fic.

Of course if Abrams is willing to toss us this crumb now, who knows what’s still in the mystery box. Many think there’s more to what we saw and I agree. It could be a vision. It could be a dream. I don’t think it’s anything bizarre or complicated like a clone or a long lost twin sister (that would be a Steven From The Room problem). Many have noticed she wears a ring on her forefinger and either it’s cool jewelry or it is influencing her behavior. Notice also that her red beams are like Kylo’s. Hmm.

Perhaps the whole point, regardless of what this is, is to show that Rey has her own dark side and she is not in any position to think of herself as better than Kylo/Ben. Let’s face it, sometimes she regards him with a touch of self-righteousness mixed in with her anger. I think it might actually sell his redemption better if we understand their differences are by degrees and the grace of the Force. And it gives Rey, who’s got thicker plot armor than a Sherman tank, some peril.

Okay, on to the rest of it.

The beginning of the sizzle reel highlights the previous eight films. I found it very interesting that it highlighted Anidala from AOTC as well as Han and Leia from TESB and TFA, and it included the Magic Hand Touch (TM) from TLJ. It’s the only romantic gesture from any of the sequels. HMMM.

Shot of the gang...I think the first act of this movie is going to be The Goonies or Stranger Things but with adults. I think they’re looking out at the city shown a shot later. Oh look, there’s Leia.

When Rey tossed that lightsaber though the trees, I noticed a couple of things. First off, she looks angry. She appears to be training (there’s a remote in the woods) but it wouldn’t surprise me if Kylo decided to dial her up again and she’s like, “Sod off!” The second thing is the red strip of fabric around her hand. Many Reylos have pointed out this is the red thread of fate. Hmm.

Red-eyed Threepio! I think that since the Resistance is desperate, it needs everyone to be a warrior, even protocol droids. My guess is Threepio is reprogrammed to fight and this is a nod to the Terminator movies.

Judging by how that space battle is shaping up, this is Abrams’s “hold my beer” to the space battle in ROTJ. Geez, that’s like every flying thing in the galaxy!

Kylo Ren’s strut...hoo boy. *Fans self.* Bonus points for the lightning strikes.

I’m calling it now...the rematch between Kylo and Rey is probably the end of the first act and the turning point in their relationship. Again, he appears to be defending himself while she’s attacking and just as in TFA, he uses his stature and body size to press her further and further back. Wouldn’t it be interesting if this time he defeats her (but of course doesn’t kill her)? Or maybe it doesn’t end with someone winning over the other but with a kiss...there’s a lot of um, energy and tension there!

(As a quick aside about the interviews, both previous ones and this new wave of interviews, if you can’t see Reylo coming like a Mack truck 100 miles away at 100 mph, I can’t help you. Now it’s SO OBVIOUS. I think the real reason they conveniently scheduled Adam to shoot another movie during D23 is to make sure he’s not around to spoil it because he can’t help but start laughing in a guilty manner whenever it’s brought up. But we’re not going to see any kissing until the movie’s out.)

Finally, after we see Dark!Rey, notice the ominous tone Rey’s Theme takes at the end. It’s opposite of the triumphant ending of Kylo’s Theme at the end of the first trailer. HMMMMMMM.

#reylo #tros #dark rey #rey #kylo ren #ben solo #bendemption

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holocron-inthe-restrictedsection · 5 years ago

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Okay it's a lot but: 1, 2, 11, 12, 13, and 19 for Lethaa and Naras? (Feel free to substitute/add any questions you'd like to answer!) 🌺💕

Yesssssss I was so excited to get this! Thanks, Mercedes! 💛

So, this got reeaaaally long and rambly. My bad. I just have a lot of thoughts about these two, and I’m excited to share. Click “keep reading” to see my response!

(also, sorry if it formats weirdly - I copy-pasted from a word doc, and tumblr mobile doesn’t like that for some reason)

Ask me questions about creating my OCs!

1. What was the first element of your OC that you remember considering (name, appearance, backstory, etc.)?

For Lethaa, it was her name and position. For Naras, it was the descriptor “the Togruta senator’s wife”

They popped into my head at about the same time. I created them to be throwaway characters in a short story I wrote called “Shall We Dance” (I may someday go back to it and add a few chapters. No promises). There was some dialogue between Anakin and Obi-Wan about different controversial viewpoints in the Senate, and I just needed a senator or two to mention in passing. –

“But these are some of the most outspoken public figures in the Republic. Take Senator Lethaa Daal.” [Obi-Wan] flashed a smile in the direction of the Togruta senator and her wife as they passed. The women returned the smile and made their way arm-in-arm into the grand hall. “She has been very scornful regarding the Senate’s tendency to dedicate resources to systems that are strategic to military movements, as opposed to who needs it most.”

It might have ended there, but I received feedback from a few different readers saying how they appreciated the mention of Senator Daal’s wife. There seemed to be an interest, so I sat on the idea of them for a while.

2. Did you design them with any other characters/OCs from their universe in mind?

Since Lethaa was fully fleshed out first, I made Naras with Lethaa in mind. I knew I wanted her to have her own objectives and life – she couldn’t continue to just be “Lethaa’s wife”. So I tried to give her a profession that was critical in its own way, which is why I went with healing, so that their “importance” (for lack of a better word) was equal to each other.

I guess Lethaa was partially created in response the frustrating politics of the galactic senators. They all make their alliances, play the game to get the upper hand, all while gaining very little ground. I wanted to make a character that found the subtly of politics maddening, and wasn’t afraid to get in someone’s face and tell them exactly why their policies or views were dumb or harmful. I wanted to make someone who could be aggressive without calling into question their moral alignment.

And while it’s not a character, I really really wanted to design or add to a culture that doesn’t get explored much in the Star Wars universe. I took what elements I could find about Togruta culture from Wookipedia, but it was rather lacking, so I made up the rest. I already loved Togruta designs, and wanted characters that could interact within their own culture.

3. How did you choose their name? (Added this because it was Relevant)

If my memory is right, Lethaa Daal’s name came from combining a few names I found on the Togruta name generator (which I HIGHLY recommend btw). I decided to keep it after I finished her design because the first name reminded me of “lethal”, and by that point I knew that was a good descriptor of her. ‘Daal’ came about because I tend to put way too many A’s in my togruta names, and I was for some reason thinking about Roald Dahl at that time, but I also found that I liked how it could be mispronounced as “doll”. I was highly amused by the idea of a “lethal doll” – woe unto anyone who looked at Lethaa and only acknowledged her for her beauty.

Naras Tyn came about because lots of my female ocs tend to have names that end in A or E (IE/I/Y, etc), and I didn’t want to do it again. I wanted a short last name, and I just liked how “Tyn” sounded – it was concise and melodic. ‘Naras’ I think also came from the name generator. I remember being bummed when I realized it sounded so similar to Barriss and Maris (already existing characters), but by that time I was attached. Her first name just sounds calming, and it just sounded right imagining Lethaa calling for her.

11. Did you know what the OC’s sexuality would be at the time of their creation?

Heck yes I did. There really wasn’t any hesitation. The thought process went: Senator –> Togruta Senator –> female Togruta Senator –> has a spouse –> a wife, cuz why not. And that was that.

12. What have you found to be most difficult about creating art for your OC (any form of art: writing, drawing, edits, etc.)?

Everything.

Lol, jk. I mean, as much fun as I have with all the colors and markings of the two, my own drawing ability is kinda limited in terms of body positions. So some things I’d love to draw (Lethaa vs. the rancor, Naras on a medical mercy mission during the Clone Wars, etc.) are taking a long time for me to sketch out. It can be frustrating, but it’s a work in progress.

And writing is hard too. The story ideas in my head play out as nice little movies. Getting it all down on paper while conveying emotion without overloading, describing setting, and making it engaging – that’s all trickier.

But overall, the most difficult thing is trying to figure out what exactly I’m going to do! I have other OCs I want content for, and canon characters I want to explore – and then I have to decide between drawing and writing. There’s not enough hours in the day for me to draw and write everything I want, so I have to pick and choose.

13. How far past the canon events that take place in their world have you extended their story, if at all?

Still a work in progress. I jump from one event to the next without writing it in chronological order. I’ve started their story before the start of the Clone Wars, sometime between episodes I and II. Might write some earlier snippets about their childhoods (though they didn’t meet until they were adults).

I’ve got some ideas for what they do during the Empire era (some of which was influenced by one of the Star Wars D&D games I play), but I haven’t written any of that out yet. I do know they live to see the fall of the Empire, and the emergence of the New Republic. They pass away peacefully of old age on Shili.

19. What is your favorite fact a fun fact about your OC?

I had to change this from “favorite” to “fun” because I like everything about them and I’m still developing them. So I thought I might drop a little trivia that I haven’t managed to work into any stories or art yet.

Lethaa was on a hunting trip with her father – Barin – and a few others in her twenties. After her cousin killed their prey, Barin asked her to prepare the meat for dinner. She did her best with it but waaaaaaay overcooked it, and when Barin asked about it, she said, “I… never actually learned how to cook meat.”

Bewildered, Barin said, “But we’ve been on dozens of hunting trips! How could I have never taught you??”

And Lethaa’s just like, “I was the one to kill the prey on most of those trips.”

And Barin and the others can’t help but laugh, because according to tradition, the one who kills the prey while hunting in a group is served the first piece, but never is the one to prepare it. So it makes complete sense that she never had to cook it, because she was always served the first dish. Her cousin actually liked his meat overdone, though, so he was perfectly fine with his meal.

Also, I just came up with this so I have no idea of the context, but there is a 100% chance that there was an instance or two where Lethaa – tall Amazonian though she is – couldn’t reach something. Unable to climb to retrieve it and without a stepstool, muttering darkly, she would disconnected her prosthetic arm and used it as an extender to pull it towards her.

Naras can fall asleep anywhere. Even before she became a physician/healer, she had the uncanny ability to close her eyes and be asleep within minutes. Lying down, standing while braced against something, sitting, lounging between skyfaring silks (she’d gotten bored waiting for her Gatalentian friend to come back from the holocall he’d had to take). No nap is too short – she wakes feeling rested even if it’s only been five minutes. She wakes easily, fully alert.

Naras sings and hums to her plants and patients. It’s not uncommon to walk into her clinic and hear her singing a folk song or a current hit. She definitely encourages sing-alongs anytime nervous children are brought in, and at night broadcasts spiritual songs important to Togruta culture over the PA system – at a very quiet volume, of course. Naras has a garden at home – a singfruit tree surrounded by flowers and bushes, some of which are not native to Shili – and the plants routinely get hummed and sung at as she tends to them. Lethaa loves waking up in the morning to hear her wife’s singing voice drifting in from an open window.

Thank you again so much for the ask!! This was a lot of fun!Also, I really do appreciate your interest in my OCs (especially these two). It means a lot to me 🌺🌷

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throwingideasatthewall · 4 years ago

Text

Clone wars Lightsaber Lost

(Season 2 Episode 11)

Oh, so it’s gonna be a minor episode?

Neat

That’s Cool

Alright; Quote: (Haven’t covered one of these fully in a while)

“Easy isn’t always simple,”

True;

Take a look at the way Un-accountables Screw over the world And you need a flow chart to follow . But it always comes down to screwing over the world for our self- destructive tendencies)

Evil for fun- -zies!

Any- way; So we jump right in.. ]

No!

(Never mi -nd... it’s just the recap..)

This doesn’t have to be a train wreck...

Hey is that Ventress?

[no it’s not I’m a bad noodle-]

[A very hopeful bad noodle]

Er-

Is anyone going to weigh about that pink smoke about to encompass everything?

Just Me?

Okay?

Also white one does have any battles episode title for the episode where he actually lost his lightsaber?

Seriously we’ve gone from switching plot and characterization to switching title names.

“Arms Dealer,”

Okay,

It’s not as bad as dragging the child soldier to war

More Approp.

Kinda

Also please no more mercenaries

please no more mercenaries

My head still coming down from the last nonsensical filler arc We Had

With Honda? Was It?

The excessives are damn strong

And this narrative doesn’t know how to use it accountably

“Black market,”

The worst crime that can be comm-

HAHAHA

[But to be fair this is the kind of power I’d expect the Jedi Council to give Anakin as Boomer Bait]

Enemies-

The national healthcare of this fecking-

Either that or pollution

Could be both

[Sign that something is wrong]

No Help..

Great damn peacekeepers

“Ironically”

Also, that’s kind of the reaction I was hoping from Ahsoka

Kinda awkward

And forced-

Needs less emo

Did they drag children into this?

[I mean even more than this]

Arms Dealer-

That’s kind of the reaction, Eyes Down, Scan -ning Emot Ion Less Ly ...

Whose he selling them to?

Never mind

[There’s that tonal rift]

Also who do you think??

It’s either the Sep ar Tists

Or that other guy we don’t talk about

Joint

Not going to skulk out the place or check for any other entrances or exits

Also yet leave the child Padawan alone

With people who will very likely be okay with killing her

👍

Good job

Like if you’re going to be a. authority assumer at least be a less deadly one,

Like...

Nope,

Master Windu!

There’s was an example

Be more like him

Or not

[Assuming authority is bad]

That’s almost the look !

blank faced “yes, order,”

Never mind

Very never mind!

What does she do to screw it up?

Alright, Whelp

She’s Possibly Dead-

Also are you tell me Hondo literally picked, A bodyguard Outside a random club For his party? Weak

(I’m talking about the gangster in case I get his name wrong)

The robot detective one)

Any way...

(Also yes she has the biggest Indicator of Jedi..

(A braid)

On the back of her head...

[Look I don’t care how much respect people have for the police (over here) she would be gone by now,]

[I’m not getting into further details]

Whelp,

Dude he wasn’t even threatening you

Also, Oh yeah they give the child a gun -

Like that’s an adult - A child touching a gun isn’t threatening

Their reactions are too slow due to having no energy or initiative..

[But this is Ahsoka the abomination isn’t it?]

I can’t think of one episode..

They got the tone right

And didn’t put for a whole as much more mature for her age. *Too

Which is kinda of disgusting

And narratively screwy,

Also why did I just hear a lightsaber go off?

[What did she do?]

Her master

Really?

Aight

...

Whelp

Seriously if your adult in just assert your ground

[And preferably don’t make an entertainment sector so.. Screwy,]

My lightsaber

Time for some Looney Tunes esk charades

(Don’t put that much focus on it)

Also, he just stole a cop in training’s gun

Also THIS IS THE ISSUE with going into slums without any disguise

Hey,

You were just following him!

Master going to kill me..

No..

[Child would Be In Tears [Neg ative aff ila tion + “Com Fort-] [Poss-ibly]

What triggers it

Not exact science

But definitely not that reaction.

Nor.

[my mind’s already going blank with anger,]

This is not how a child would react

And I know it’s going to end up with Anakin giving the moral; That’s it not her fault

Or that am object isn’t worth risking her life

Or honesty

But; again,

Screaming at a baby is all I get

The message is un-applicable And Use- Less-

So is the episode...

[And it gives me that disgusting feeling...

Like there’s anything to be learned from this

Children Can’t Lie (Un-less instructed to)

Please Stop

Pro-

Anyway we’re already pretty far into the episode and my brain is going numb-

So Expect-

A lot Of “Uh-huh” s

The holocron episode, At least had the decency to keep her in the background

And even that felt mildly disgusting- when it came to that scene.

[Damn it]

Anyway the general gist of it;

‘A child has lost some thing and has to reclaim it before their abusive over involved parent to find out,’ (well it has been done slightly better not good, with slightly more realistic children, who didn’t have personalities) was dead upon arrival [Stale]

How to make it better?

Have it be Obi-Wan and Anakin

Obi-Wan already shown to be a bit of a control freak and overly scrutinizing of Anakin‘s actions

Causing Anakin to have such an over emotional reaction [obi-Wan still around]

Or (And the story can still work with Ahsoka]

Have Anakin show those tendencies;

Possibly replicating Obi-Wan‘s behavior

just being a dick

And at some point has given us so got a ‘never lose your light saber’ order paired (possibly) with a, ‘find the thing that you lost,’

Leading to Ahsoka emotionlessly searching for the light saber

The tension coming from the audience’s knowledge of what can happen to her

[not the character

That’s cheating]

[oh and now plot stuff is happening]

[Tumblr refresh recap ending [Damn it- Here-]

[Additional details missing]

Any way...

[Light saber-]

Uhm,

That’s nice

So anyway

That doesn’t mean she can’t cry

That does happen

But it has to be done correctly

And Precise ly

[Oh stuff, The door got kicked down]

The Face must remain taunt

Emotion-less

Still-

The Tears Come Only From The Eyes [Literally] [ Not metaphorically] No emotion -

Ahsoka isn’t a person yet she’s a combination of orders,

22:38 minutes Left

In 8:07 (I’m not doing the math)

[It’s too long]

[His eyes are weird]

Dude is 100% lying

He literally just pulled out name out of thin air

You can literally see the look on dude’s face..

Dude

‘His body language’ said liar

I’m not sure you can read that...

But it sounded like lies..

Any way...

Also who said he was a killer?

And ‘exactly’

STRIKE

No I know I didn’t record my exact thoughts on why this deserved a strike

It is so aggressively authority

And basically shouts;

Respect your Elders at every possible moment

To which I respond No!

Not to mention the gull.

You know how I feel about playing happy music over terrible morals, the inclusion of child soldiers, and of generational overstep particularly

It is no surprise this episode earned a strike

[Also it tries to paint profiling And police brutality As a good thing,

Ack!

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andrewuttaro · 5 years ago

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2020 State of Star Wars

The State of Star Wars in 2020 is counterintuitive. After perhaps the most anticipated movie of this relatively young century in “The Force Awakens” released in 2015 the following installments in the mainline series were divisive at best and roundly reviled at worst. With that backdrop, non-traditional Star Wars content has become shockingly good comparatively. Save for a botched video game launch everything beyond the movies has met a level of quality tantamount to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in my opinion.

From comic books and visual dictionaries to TV shows and background narratives, the State of Star Wars is actually incredibly good beyond the films. The consumption of entertainment media is always a subjective art, but one doesn’t need to look to hard to see a consensus cultural opinion in the Post-Sequel trilogy Star Wars world: disappointed interest. Our world at large is polarized as ever right now so of course every declarative statement on anything is a big fight but on this 2020 Star Wars Day I thought I’d take a whack at the big picture.

I’ll get my opinions out of the way right now. The “Last Jedi” (2017) was intentionally difficult. It grew on me in its own right (and got me interested in Rian Johnson’s filmography) but the impact it had on the whole continuity was damaging at best. I should have seen it coming but there was really no coming back from it for a Director like JJ Abrams. I found “Rise of Skywalker” (2019) borderline unwatchable. The first two acts were cringy fan festivals followed by a conclusion I found insulting to science fiction fans the world over to be honest with you. Repeat viewing did not help. I’m one of those nerds who salivated at the Duel of Fates synopsis. With that out of the way I want to take a stab at the 2020 State of Star Wars in a way that at least attempts to be objective.

Star Wars for All

Star Wars was always supposed to be the Superman of space operas: a story for everyone. Forgive the platitude but we live in a time of increasingly segmented media. Memes are big deal for us because they’re the rare shared piece of culture almost everyone enjoys sharing in. Star Wars had uphill battle with the mainline movies trying to be for everyone in this world today where nothing if for everyone except death and taxes. Perhaps this is one reason we were heading for sequel trilogy disappointment even if Disney had a cohesive plan for it.

“Force Awakens” accomplished close to universal appeal by redoing “A New Hope”. Box Office returns at the very least shows they did a good job. Leaving the more toxic elements of the Star Wars fanbase out of the equation the “Last Jedi” aggressively threw out the sacred elements of the universe for the sake of subversiveness that ultimately did accomplish something I applaud as the Democratization of Star Wars. That is to say the force is for everyone now. In spite of all its flaws that movie did something Star Wars has always been about at a basic level.

That said, the way that was executed fundamentally damaged the continuity going into the trilogy, and Skywalker Saga, finale. I liked the Colin Trevorrow script because it picked up on some loose ends of “Force Awakens” while also not ignoring “Last Jedi”. I realize that’s just a script though and it probably would’ve had a certain level of disappointment as well. Whoever directed the final installment was going to struggle no matter what. There is an irony here in that the finale of “Rise of Skywalker” is this giant fleet of essentially everyone coming to save the day in the ultimate Star-Wars-for-everyone moment.

Nobody is at fault for liking any Star Wars film or any piece of Star Wars content. I understand a certain segment of the fanbase was overjoyed to see Rey and Kylo have what was later called a kiss of gratitude. The film wasn’t even made well enough to fully satisfy that segment. In attempting so hard to be for everyone JJ Abrams made a Star Wars finale that was for almost nobody. The level of narrative shorthand it takes to write “All the jedi now reside in you” as a central plot conceit is unbelievable if it didn’t precede a Dragonball Z style energy fight. Star Wars isn’t dead, it’s alive and well. But I’d argue a solid 70% of people who consider themselves Star Wars fans would say that is in spite of the Sequel Trilogy and not to its credit.

As for the anthology films we might have two ends of the spectrum in “Rogue One” and “Solo”. “Rogue One” was a great movie that had an unnecessary premise while “Solo” was a mediocre movie with an interesting premise. “Solo” may have done better and been viewed differently had it not followed “Last Jedi”. The sad reality of it’s box office returns is Disney may not be interested in more movies about the Star Wars Universe’s criminal underworld. That’s a shame. “Rogue One” on the other hand should be proof positive of something most Star Wars fans have been clamoring for: more story in this universe separate from the Skywalkers. What made that movie great was compelling, efficient character development. If announced projects are any true indication it looks like we may have a good chance of getting that.

The Future of Star Wars

I follow this twitter account called “Star Wars Stuff”. I’m a visual learner so the tendency toward photos and concept art is fun for me. The account often posts screen grabs with captions like “The Best Story ever told” and “Reylo is Canon now”. I don’t think there is any inherent opinion of this poster other than… well… “Star Wars Stuff”. I think this is an interesting way to look at the future of Star Wars. If the Skywalker Saga is truly over than everything from here on out is just Stuff. As I said before that’s a good thing, but it poses some interesting questions about what we think of this fabulous fictious universe.

Is Star Wars truly for everyone? Yes. The toxic minority of the fanbase was turned off by the “Last Jedi” and unsuccessfully pandered to in “Rise of Skywalker”. Announcements of more diversity oriented projects like this “female-centered” series in the works signals to them that nerd culture is truly pop culture now. If you can’t handle diversity in your content then Star Wars is not for you anymore. You can’t be included in everyone if you don’t think everyone is deserving of being in Star Wars. I’ll be honest, Oscar Isaac and Daisey Ridley expressing no desire to be involved in Star Wars again gives me pause but I think the property as a whole is still intact enough to attract diverse enough talent.

What is the central organizing plot of Star Wars if the Skywalkers aren’t it anymore? I think I’ve looked at the prequel trilogy with a fresh set of eyes after these recent movies. In spite of all their camp they were compelling in the way they built up to what we knew was already coming: the Fall of Anakin Skywalker. I don’t have the answer to this question, but I think the details of the projects that have been announced offer some anecdotal thoughts: Star Wars will continue to be the socio-political opera of our modern society. Every integral piece of content in this universe, especially since the Disney purchase, has provided commentary on everything from twentieth century politics and the War on Terror to family structure and what love truly means. I believe Disney is capable of continuing to execute on this fundamental premise of Star Wars media.

What does it mean to escape to a Long Time ago in a Galaxy far, far away? When the scope and design of media from Video Games to Streaming is evermore self-aware and intentional in the worlds and narratives they create Star Wars really does offer something unique. I’m a sucker for good science fiction like James S.A. Corey’s “The Expanse” and I love to escape to that world. However very few fictional universes have roots in the 1970s. Yes, books and concepts being made into newer media forms have roots in content as old as Greek mythology. But very few science fiction properties, perhaps only Star Trek in a disjointed way, have two-three generations of cultural commentary built in. Star Wars, as long as new content comes, will be the broadest share science fiction universe out there.

Thanks for reading.

#star wars

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