#the jedi purge was not a genocide

[underwaterspiderbird]

order 66 was NOT a genocide. you can only genocide people & cultures, you can’t genocide a systemically deified super-religion that wants everyone in existence to either agree with them & exist their way or burn in hell for eternity. any decent ppl who went down with the purge forfeit their lives down the drain along with their family, home & very sense of self. they. had. it. fucking. coming.

from an indigenous person, fuck y’all for even comparing order 66 to genocide & talking all over survivors of real genocides to save face for your evangelical faith & the people you think are good guys. you are not about to disrespect the continent-sized OCEANS of blood that make up our ancestors & loved ones who were lost to real genocide. fuck off.

[istillbelieveinmagic142]

Perfect post.

I can’t remember which post it was off the top of my head but you’ve mentioned how George was explicit that nothing in The Clone Wars directly influences Anakin’s fall to the Dark Side, what about indirectly? There’s the obvious one: Anakin finds it easier to give into his anger as the war goes on. But I was also thinking the events of Hardeen and Wrong Jedi arcs weaken Anakin’s trust in the Order that then plays into the circumstances in which his fall to the Dark Side took place. Like that weakened trust meant Anakin distanced himself which gives context for why he refused to go to Obi-Wan when the visions started.

It also fits with his character because one of Anakin’s flaws is that he takes things way to personally, e.g. he was not the only person the Council lied to about Obi-Wan’s fake death. Then when Ahsoka was leaving the Order after the Council let her down, which they did let her down, she had to remind Anakin that it was about her not him.

Of course weakened trust is nowhere near enough to cause someone to commit genocide and Anakin didn’t seem to make any effort to mend those fences either. And of course none of this would have happened without Palpatine manipulating things. Hence my question of how you think The Clone Wars indirectly influenced his journey to the Dark Side even as none of really tied to why Anakin ultimately fell.

I think you summed it up perfectly, actually.

If you're using Lucas' word as the "be-all, end-all", then The Clone Wars is indeed just an asterisk/addendum to the story of the films.

Its purpose? Providing context for the minor changes between Episode II and Episode III, changes that aren't exactly relevant to the story of Anakin's downfall.

"Anakin seems more mature and less whiny, in Episode III, what happened to change that?" He got a Padawan of his own during the Clone War and when you're put in charge of someone, you grow up real quick.

"He and Obi-Wan were constantly bickering in Episode II, now they're best buds, why?" In Episode II, Anakin was in Obi-Wan's care but felt he needed to leave the nest, whereas Obi-Wan was being a helicopter parent. In The Clone Wars, we see that once Anakin gets knighted, their relationship smooths over, now becoming a more brotherly bond than a parent/child one. Obi-Wan will sometimes worry that Anakin will fly off the handle, but he's also able to recognize his former Padawan is now his own man, whereas Anakin takes responsibility more frequently, now, due to now having a Padawan of his own.

"We've only seen him with hat's the relationship between Anakin and the other Jedi we saw in the background of the movies?" Find out by tuning in to The Clone Wars!

"The clones have names, now? And they're the Jedi's friends, when did all that happen!" You can find out by seeing them fight side-by-side with the Jedi and slowly becoming independent thinkers, only in The Clone Wars.

"The Jedi are more scheming and political in Episode III, they and Anakin are at odds... why the shift in attitudes?" They were drafted into a war, and forced to make compromise after compromise to a point where their values have been rendered pointless and they've become begrudging hypocrites. They're playing politics (and sucking at it) because they've been dragged onto a political chessboard and are trying to keep up with a far more skilled opponent. These terrible decisions impact all of them, even Anakin.

Stuff like that.

But none of that is relevant to Anakin's story, which is more personal, in nature. It's a story about how his own greed turned him into the very thing he swore to destroy, which parallels how the Republic became the Empire for those same reasons.

The films show us this, and The Clone Wars *reinforces* this narrative by giving us further examples of it.

While Anakin is aware of what's right and wrong... the more the war rages on, the more frequently he takes the "easy" path and gives in to his anger and selfish desires, enabled by Palpatine.

Sometimes Anakin does manage to get a grip, he does manage to take responsibility, he does learn to let go... but then something happens (often orchestrated by Palpatine) and he goes right back to square one... then square zero... then square minus one, etc.

He never takes that final step to being a more enlightened person.

The Clone Wars challenges the Jedi at times, questions their actions... but ultimately, the responsibility falls on Anakin's shoulders. The series will show you moments where they fail Anakin, but there's as many moments of him failing them.

Could the Jedi have done more? Yes. But if you think them doing more would've solved the problem, you're missing the point of the story of the Prequels.

Functionally, all that is achieved from the Council/Anakin conflict (again, orchestrated by Palpatine), in Episode III, is creating more pressure for Anakin to cave under. That's it.

They're not a meaningful factor in his turn to the Dark Side.

Padmé is.

When he's hesitating between saving Mace or saving Palpatine...

... he's not thinking "one of them was nice to me, but the other one was mean to me and kicked out Ahsoka, so I'll chop his hand off".

And he's not thinking "this isn't by the book, Mace you hypocrite!"

Lucas tells us what's going through his head, in that moment.

It's about Padmé living. And we've already established that what that's really about is "Anakin not wanting to live without her". So, really, it's about Anakin.

Mace and Anakin butting heads isn't even considered. If Mace had been laughing with Anakin and hugging him on the daily, Anakin still would've ended up chopping off his hand. It wasn't about Mace, it was about Anakin.

If Ahsoka had stayed with the Jedi Order, he still would've joined the Dark Side. Because it was never about Ahsoka, it was about Anakin.

If Qui-Gon had lived, Anakin would've still turned. It was never about Obi-Wan or Qui-Gon by the teachers, it was about Anakin.

Because the message of the story is that:

"Ultimately, it's up to you to take personal responsibility and be compassionate. If you avoid responsibility and give in to your darker impulses for selfish purposes, bad shit happens. The only meaningful change can come from within."

And in Anakin's case it didn't. He zigged instead of zagging at almost every turn.

Now, you can agree or disagree with that message. But that's what it is. Even some of the current Star Wars authors acknowledge this.

The story of Anakin Skywalker is told in the movies.

The Clone Wars is there as an addendum to:

Shine a spotlight/provide context on minor changes between Episode II and Episode III.

Humanize Anakin, to further drive the point that what happened to him can happen to anyone.

[ne0n-and-garbage]

Mandalorians as Jewish Allegory

First of all, we have this quote right here:

"We'll rebuild [Mandalore]. Isn't that our history? For thousands of years, we have been on the verge of extinction, and for thousands of years we have survived." ―Din Djarin

If you just replace the word Mandalore with Israel, it is a completely plausible thing for a Jewish person to say.

Anyway, on to my essay:

History:

Both Mandalorians and Jews have an indigenous homeland that is intrinsic to their culture and belief system, (Mandalore and Israel respectively). Throughout their entire history, they have been consistently under attack from various regimes seeking to commit genocide against them, (Jedi, Empire for Mandalorians, Romans, Nazis, Soviets, Arab colonialism for Jews), and yet each group has managed to remain alive and retain their culture. The Siege of Mandalore has a lot of parallels to the destruction of the Temple, and the Mandalorian Purges are very similar to the antisemitic Pogroms. Both groups are forced out of their indigenous homelands and into a diaspora, under which they are consistently hunted and attacked. Eventually, both groups regain control of their homeland from the colonizers who held previous rule over it.

Culture:

Mandalorians are either born into the culture or adopt the Creed, which is similar to born Jews and Converts. There are groups of Orthodox Mandalorians, such as the Children of the Watch, who observe the traditional laws regarding the Creed, as well as headcoverings, (similar to Orthodox Jewish people). In contrast, there are also more liberal factions of both Mandalorians and Jews. There are specific foods and religious clothing associated with both groups, their own languages, their own mythical beasts. Also, both cultures have a ceremonial bath/Mikvah associated with rituals and conversion.

Overall, I think it's fair to say that Mandalorians are an excellent allegory for Jewish people. Mandalorians are Space Jews. You can't change my mind.

This Is The Way

Am Yisrael Chai

[skykind]

A Clone Wars Episode Deep Dive

I didn't discover The Clone Wars fandom until 2021 and only started watching the show in mid-2023 (finished a few months ago), and I want to discuss and analyze all sorts of odds and ends—years after most people watched. This includes cool stuff in episodes I think some fans understandably skip when doing re-watches and therefore no longer remember well, but I’m digging into one of them anyway. So, have a long post about S2:E11, "Lightsaber Lost," and then come talk to me about it if you’d like!

This episode is saying three things at once, and the closer you get to the symbolic message meant for mostly adult audiences, the wilder things get.

The literal plot: Ahsoka’s lightsaber is stolen, and she recovers it with the help of a Jedi elder who teaches her life lessons along the way.

The morality tale for young viewers: gun control (a bold choice).

An eerie interlude for older viewers: A pair of brief scenes—only 45 seconds or so in length combined—communicate the future purge of the Jedi order via symbolic visual storytelling and a speech that’s being broadcast in the background. No dialogue required.

I'm going to focus on this third bullet point, but I also recommend a re-watch for the gun control angle. (Hint: if you think the writers are only arguing for handling guns responsibly, you haven’t taken the Jedi’s current context into account; also, the writers aren't referring to literal in-universe guns—Ahsoka’s lightsaber is the gun.)

Back to the episode’s message for older viewers: Split over two scenes, the audience watches Ahsoka chase a bounty hunter in possession of her lightsaber, then the bounty hunter partially damage and destabilize an enormous levitating billboard so she can get away from Ahsoka, and finally Ahsoka tumble down and precariously cling to the billboard’s screen. The billboard shows Palpatine delivering a—likely prerecorded—speech that is meant to sound supportive of the Jedi, but is instead priming Coruscant residents to believe anti-Jedi rhetoric; just before this two-scene sequence ends, Palpatine also begins to explain why he needs more executive power in order to support the Jedi.

It's great to pinpoint an example of Palatine's propaganda, but what does the visual storytelling communicate, with this speech for a backdrop?

Note: the text of Palpatine’s speech, shown in captions in the following screenshots, is not in alt text as that would chop the speech up between image descriptions, and is instead in a single paragraph after the final screenshot.

Palpatine's Speech

"I have no doubt that the Jedi are doing their very best to ensure the safety of every citizen in the Republic. The accusations that the Jedi created the Clone War to give themselves more power over the government is absurd and I will not stand for it."

Ahsoka as Symbolically at Palpatine's Mercy

After a scene break, Palatine's speech picks up mid-sentence and we see just how small and vulnerable Ahsoka is compared to Palpatine's soaring and vast projection. She appears entirely at his mercy, and somewhat at the mercy of Coruscant as well.

Palpatine's Speech, Resumed

"…Count Dooku and his droid army. To support the Jedi's efforts in the war, I ask the Senate to pass these new laws, giving more jurisdiction…"

The Genocide to Come

As this speech is broadcast to Coruscant, the seemingly trustworthy and dependable Chancellor of the Republic symbolically collapses beneath Ahsoka and leaves her stranded over a chasm. All while Palpatine spreads propaganda that will eventually convince the public to support her people's genocide.

Perhaps the best way to describe this is:

An unarmed Ahsoka struggles to hang onto the edge of a high precipice, that precipice is a symbol for Palpatine—and in a few years, Palpatine will shove the entire Jedi order off the edge of a much higher cliff.

Given how the sheer visual scale of Palpatine in this second scene represents the power he can wield over the Jedi—as the staging emphasizes Ahsoka's relative smallness and her physical vulnerability—it's clear the Jedi will not be able to rescue themselves when this future betrayal comes; Palpatine has amassed too much power and put too many plans in place. And no one who's bought into Palpatine's propaganda will try to catch the Jedi when they go over the edge.

Ahsoka’s Survival

Ahsoka’s individual survival of Order 66 is signaled here by her ability to get off the levitating billboard, but nothing about the staging suggests this comes down to unique skill—any number of well-trained Jedi could have gotten out of her predicament when the right opportunity (a single speeder that veers out of its lane and passes unusually close to the screen) presented itself.

In both “Lightsaber Lost” and "Victory and Death" (S7:E12, see below), her survival involves flinging herself through open air (and into an out-of-place flying vehicle), a nice nod to Ahsoka’s association with flight and Morai, though I feel like that’s a coincidence (?) as of season 2. Or maybe not. I have no idea if Ahsoka’s symbolic associations—flight in the case of “Lightsaber Lost,” rather than Morai specifically—were planned out in advance.

What About the Propaganda?

Returning to season 2, we come to the final big-picture takeaway of the "Lightsaber Lost" scenes: I’ve referred to Palpatine’s speech as something that plays in the background because Ahsoka doesn’t pay attention to his propaganda, even though it’s literally in her face. What does this mean if we treat Ahsoka as a stand-in for the Jedi, and Palpatine’s speech as a stand-in for his growing threat to the Jedi?   In these scenes, Ahsoka first doesn’t pay attention because she’s trying to stay alive in precarious circumstances, just as Jedi across the galaxy are kept distracted from the big picture by trying to keep themselves, their Padawans, their troops, and civilians alive as war swallows up the galaxy. Then, Ahsoka is distracted by tracking the bounty hunter who has her lightsaber; in the context of this episode (which asks, ‘who should be allowed to use a lightsaber, and when?’), Ahsoka’s lightsaber also comes to represent Jedi’s efforts to fight the Clone Wars as ethically as possible. It presumably takes more time and effort to fight a war when you’re concerned with morals, at least when the opposition is perfectly happy to commit war crimes.   By tossing the Jedi into a war, Palpatine keeps them too busy to systemically search for the Master Sith (in addition to Sith stuff diminishing the Jedi’s ability to use the force), as their time is eaten up by upholding the equivalent of the Geneva and Hague Conventions (etc.) when almost no one else is, by protecting as many other lives as possible, and by staying alive.

And The Clone Wars communicates all of this in a minute! Though I’ll admit my final point about Ahsoka’s lightsaber representing ethical combat is a stretch. I love it when TV shows and movies make full use of visual storytelling, and The Clone Wars is fabulous at it.

Whew—and that’s that! I’m grateful if even a single person has read this far and would love to know what you think, but regardless, I had fun analyzing this episode and organizing my thoughts about it. Cheers to the Clone Wars fandom.

[moonlit-imagines]

Headcanons for being another displaced Padawan with Cal Kestis

Cal Kestis x jedi!reader

warnings: angst, STAR WARS JEDI SURVIVOR SPOILERS

a/n:

prompt:

you and cal went way back

like, jedi padawan back

so after the purge, about five years later, you guys reunited by chance. thanks to cere junda, no less

and, god, seeing someone so familiar after trying to get by on your own, someone who knew the feeling of the trajectory of your life being thrown off before you were ready, that wasn’t easy to come by

“you’re here” -cal

“i’m here” -you

“we survived” -cal

“just barely” -you

cere was delighted that the two of you could have lifted each other’s spirits so much, which was very much needed in desperate times, as you two were just given a very important mission by a former jedi master in your order

you and cal kicked some serious ass together, helping one another relearn old lessons your masters had taught during your youth

“i think running across walls was the hardest thing i was ever taught” -you

“it took me forever to get that right! i could only get two steps in before i plummeted to the floor!” -cal

you shared a lot of stories and emotions during travels, in private

and not all of them were positive, but this was the first chance you’d had in five years to face these emotions, to air out your feelings

“do you miss the clones? i was so fond of our battalion, they were always so kind to me” -you

“i think…i think that was the worst part. the people who defended us in battle, gave me pep talks before training, always there, that same face at every turn suddenly behind the blaster that was meant to put me down” -cal

“i miss them” -you

cal and you had your missions together…and separately. you’d be on one planet and he on the other, trying to race the empire and inquisitors to the holocron

“it could happen all over again” -you

“it could be the key to saving the galaxy” -cal

“or we’d be creating a generational tragedy” -you

“so would the empire” -cal

“you’ve got me there” -you

cal gifting you ponchos from his travels (lol)

“any chance you like pink?” -cal

“well…” -you

braving zeffo alone while you knew cal was somewhere far more dangerous, you had a bad feeling about it

but your teachings from the order were always the same, no attachment. mission first, feelings second…no, last

but on cal’s adventure, he found merrin, a nightsister from dathomir

you hadn’t seen any nightsisters since ventress, which did happen to make you feel a bit off

“cal…you sure?” -you

“trust me, y/n. things have changed. merrin is just like us” -cal

“cal told me much about you. another survivor. a pleasure” -merrin

you and merrin grew quite close actually

she was truly spectacular, and swapping stories with her was sort of educational

“wait…the jedi responsible for the nightsister genocide? you said lightsabers, plural? how many?” -you

“four” -merrin

“two green, two blue?” -you

“precisely. how did you know?” -merrin

“hang on, no way—” -cal

“my master killed him shortly before we were split up…when the clones turned” -you

“grevious? really? master kenobi finally got him?” -cal

“who is this ‘grevious?’” -merrin

“general grevious, he was a separatist general—a cyborg. he wasn’t a jedi, he stole lightsabers from his kills. he ordered the attack on your home” -cal

“i’m so sorry, merrin” -you

you three were still healing from many scars, but doing it together was much more achievable than trying alone

it was a wonder you even made it to fortress inquisitorius

you, cal, cere. all three of you fought like hell to save those kids.

now, cal and you, you two had much different perspectives than say, cere or trilla

displaced padawans. little guidance. cal was barely old enough to even be a padawan learner, but times were desperate and the order called upon the youngling to start quite early. you were in a similar boat. it made you two see eye to eye better than most

trilla, a padawan with much more training and insight, one who was failed by the order that she was most loyal to. failed by her own master.

cere, a devout jedi master who failed many people who were counting on her. who lost herself to a side of herself that every jedi is supposed to fight.

and just before any resolution could come of all of you together, the famed and feared darth vader showed himself

and the sinking feeling you felt before he arrived froze you

“what is it, y/n? y/n?” -cere

*ominous breathing sounds*

you shook off the feeling, fleeing instead

cal and you were split up when you swore vader made a point to hold you back

“run cal! get out of here!” -you

“y/n l/n, i was hoping i would see you” -vader “where is obi-wan?!”

“i thought you were dead” -you

“is that what he told you?” -vader

“you’re going to kill me to get back at him? i haven’t seen him since the purge, anakin! i left!” -you

“there is no anakin!” -vader “did you leave, or did he leave you?”

“are you just going to let cal get away?” -you

“he can’t get far” -vader

“my journey is not important to you” -you

“you are like me, y/n. obi-wan failed us. these inquisitors are weak, impressionable, disposable. but i know how you think. i know how he thinks. i give you the opportunity to join me. fight with me.” -vader

“i saw the holotapes, anakin. i saw what you did to the younglings and i will not let you do it again. we are not alike, obi-wan did not fail me. i took a page out of ahsoka’s book, i found my own path. and it is not beside you.” -you

“this is not over, y/n. i trust you’ll find your way out” -vader, force pushing you off a ledge

you did find you way back out and merrin was quick to save you before going back for cal

you were left completely unharmed, as well, which was quite the surprise to everyone else

“what happened back there, y/n?” -cal

“nothing i’d like to relive” -you

cal nodded and let it go, focusing on the holocron floating before you all

your mind kept replaying memories as they discussed what to do with it

memories of anakin’s massacre. vader’s speech. younglings you couldn’t save. luke and leia somewhere across the galaxy. the inquisitors.

“destroy it.” -you

in one quick swipe, cal took his lightsaber to the glowing blue cube. no questions asked

and from there on, it was no longer about the order. you remembered why you left in the first place. the purge, the politics, your master couldn’t contain himself. your troops turned their blasters on you. everything you were taught was bantha fodder. and you were just a padawan

it was now about disassembling. scaring the people in power while giving the little guy some hope.

“this is a much better gig than obi-wan playing by the rules” -you

“from what you told me, him and anakin never played by the rules” -cal

the name made you shudder, but you pushed past it

“well, anakin was known as the rulebreaker. obi-wan always tried to reel him in. but, i’ve noticed a rule or two that master kenobi had bent” -you

“anakin has a padawan too, right?” -cal

“he did. she was also a rule breaker. when she left the order, i almost followed her. last i heard, she went to mandalore with half of the 501st. i, uh—” -you

“right…” -cal

you were still haunted from the encounter on nurr. still hadn’t told cal and it was eating you up inside.

but the fighting made it feel better

dismantling, stealing, helping

and then merrin left. and cere. and greez settled down. and you and cal were just two makeshift jedi knights with your tragic pasts and your need to keep your place in the galaxy

and keep each other close

but not too close

those rules you followed, the one’s obi-wan followed, you threw them out a long time ago. the jedi order was corrupt. you examined each council master postmortem and decided that they were all flawed despite their rank. you hated them for it.

but decided the one teaching you would follow would be to lose hate, a step to the dark side.

you didn’t really even know at this point, what was the difference between right and wrong anymore

cal and you continued fighting. joined up with saw gerrera. never left each other’s sides

which…sparked feelings you’d never really been taught or told how to deal with

only aversion, really. but it wasn’t like you didn’t really talk about it

“i don’t really see the problem with it. look at everything else we do, that’s not exactly the jedi way” -you

“it’s dangerous” -cal

“love is dangerous?” -you

“attachment is” -cal

“i figured you already had attachments. we were all a crew before this” -you

“i let them all go” -cal

“and you’d let me go?” -you

you began constantly questioning these ways and trying to fight for a new future with cal, without pressing too hard

but it was hard to ignore those feelings and harder to constantly be denied by your old life

and it was harder when the new crew always teased you two

“come on, kestis. if you don’t, i will” -gabs

“yeah, just go for it. who’s it hurting?” -bravo

“i’m just not ready to go there” -cal

you were more bothered than you let on

but you always put the mission first

up until your trip back to coruscant

“this is just a reminder of how little it all matters now. there’s no one left.” -you

“that’s why it matters” -cal

the intensity of this mission made it so it was just the two of you again

and maybe that would spark something…but you doubted it

taglist: @alwaysananglophile // @locke-writes // @sweetheartlizzie07 // @queen-destenie // @captainshazamerica // @ravenmoore14 // @gabile18 // @sweetjedi // @retvenkos // @swanimagines // @randomfandomimagine // @dontyousassmeok // @dindjarinsspouse // @zoeyserpentluck // @summersimmerus // @scarthefangirl // @sheridans-dynamos // @lady-violet // @simsrecs // @xoxobabydolls // @ruvaakke // @simp-legend // @evilcr0ne // @thedarkqueenofavalon // @your-local-simp0 // @elenavampire21 // @pheonixfire777 //

[istillbelieveinmagic142]

👆

Just rewatched RotJ, currently having emotions after noticing that the Jedi Temple can be seen in the background on Coruscant at the end. (And then got more emotions from finding out Palpatine made it his palace, SHEEV IS THE WORST AND NEEDS TO STOP.) I can’t really put the importance or the triumph or the lingering tragedy/bittersweetness of this scene into words, but AAAH, PREQUELS FEELINGS, JEDI FEELINGS, SEND HELP

It’s all the more moving because what Sidious did to the Jedi Temple was a violation and desecration of their home.  The Jedi were a religion/culture, when Palpatine sent out Order 66 it was an order for genocide on them just for being adopted by the Jedi, even just for being born the way they were.  It wasn’t about just the adults, but about the children of the Jedi.  About anyone who had a genetic connection to the Jedi.When you realize that, you realize what Sidious is doing to their Temple, to their home, is a desecration of the place that was sacred to them, that was the source of their culture, their art, their history, their traditions.  He took it specifically because it was theirs and wanted to ruin the symbol of everything they were.  So he made it into his Imperial Palace.  He raided their collections for his own personal use, stole their art and artifacts and creations.We see it in several places in the novels and comics, including when Palpatine stands on the steps of the Jedi Temple, Imperial banners hung down its sides, and makes a speech about how the Jedi are no more, standing on their home and showing that everything they were has been violated and ruined.  Including their lightsabers being tossed into a furnace:

But even more so when Jocasta Nu returns after the dust has settled, to retrieve their list of known Force-sensitives, to keep it out of Sidious’ hands.  She’s devastated by what they’ve done here.Everywhere she looks, their statues and walls have been attacked, have been scorched or broken or destroyed.Their home, the place that was beautiful to them and so full of light.

What Sidious did to the Jedi Temple is horrifying because it’s not just about an enemy in a war.  I don’t use the word “genocide” lightly, but that’s exactly what happened, including the horrific violations on everything that was an extension of who they were, just because they were Jedi.So when we see the Jedi Temple in the background as part of the celebration on Coruscant after Palpatine’s death, there’s so much more meaning to it, because now it can be returned to the people it belongs to.It’s no longer stolen by someone who wants to destroy it, but instead it can be recovered by the people that actually belong to the Jedi.

It means something because it isn’t just “oh [x] number of people died in Order 66″, but instead this was an attack on an entire people.Knowing that the Temple was finally freed from that monster is more than just a celebration of freedom, it’s about how a horrific wound to a people can maybe start to heal even just a little bit.  AND I HAVE A LOT OF FEELINGS ABOUT THAT.

[jedi-enthusiast]

@confusledqueer apologizes for not responding sooner, it’s been a busy couple days and—honestly—I forgot for a bit.

Moving on-

—————

Me equating some of the things that anti-Jedi people say to antisemitism and, sometimes, outright Nazi-esque rhetoric is not “wild” or “a stretch,” as you’re implying.

Justification of their genocide, denial that it actually was a genocide, a belief that the genocided party “caused” their own genocide, and a belief that they genocided party were wrong or “led astray” while one person was sent to make things right- (via either making them change their ways or outright destroying them/their culture) -are all things I’ve seen people say about the Jedi…

…but they’re also things that people have actually said about Jews.

Take the example I put in the post of someone denying that the Jedi Purge was actually a genocide, and how—by changing “Jedi” to “Judaism” and “Force-religions” to “Abrahamic Faiths”—it sounds verbatim to Holocaust denial.

Or, as another example, people claiming that the Jedi “kidnapped kids to brainwash them”…don’t you see how that sounds like Blood Libel?

So me pointing out that a lot of stuff anti-Jedi people say sounds like antisemitic rhetoric isn’t a stretch, not when a lot of it sounds verbatim to what people are saying with the rise of antisemitism and stuff they have said in the past.

—————

Now, I’m not Jewish, but it’s not just me, your neighborhood White Girl™️, who’s pointing this stuff out.

Actual Jewish people have pointed out the alarming similarities between anti-Jedi rhetoric and straight up antisemitism. So, if you wanna argue about- “you shouldn’t compare real world discrimination to fictional stuff” -then you should probably take that into account.

Go ahead and try telling Jewish Star Wars fans to stop calling out antisemitic rhetoric in the fandom, I’m sure that’ll go down real well.

I also find it hilarious that you’re telling me to be careful about the rhetoric I use in a thread about how I shouldn’t point out that some of the rhetoric other people spout is basically antisemitism rebranded.

And my point in that post wasn’t- “since this is based off of a real world culture/religion, you can’t criticize it.”

My point was- “since this is based off of a real world culture/religion then you need to be careful about how you criticize it, otherwise you might unconsciously be spouting bigoted beliefs and antisemitic rhetoric because you don’t recognize that that’s what it is because you’re saying it about a fictional culture.”

By all means, I get that some people just don’t like the Jedi, that’s their prerogative and we all have our own tastes.

Criticize them, if you feel like it, but don’t go around spouting rebranded antisemitism to do it. I’m sure you can come up with plenty of things to complain about them for without doing so.

—————

Now, I can understand why you might be worried about the slippery slope from this to shit like actual censorship—which, I think we can all agree, is a bad thing. Or how you might think criticizing this could lead to the whole “fandom purity” debate.

My thing is, it all comes down to does it actually harm people?

Perpetuating harmful stereotypes via saying stuff like the Jewish based characters “steal children,” or “lost their way,” or “they caused/deserved their genocide”—that does cause actual harm.

Think about why the “angry black man” stereotype or the “cheating bisexual” stereotype are bad and people- (rightly) -push back against them. It’s the same thing here.

Shipping a problematic ship, calling a fictional serial killer “babygirl,” writing about dark topics*, headcanoning characters as gay or trans…none of that is actively harming people.

(*obviously when writing about dark topics you should tag appropriately so people can avoid triggers, but that’s another topic for another day)

That’s the difference.

And, for the record, I think letting people spout bigotry just because they’re saying it about something fictional is the more dangerous mindset than calling it out.

[rebelscum218]

Sometimes when I think about the Ahsoka series, I think of how much I would have preferred if Sabine was the one who pulls Ahsoka out of her jaded and weary self. The more I think of Ahsoka and Sabine's respective stories, the more I think the show has missed the opportunity of bringing us a fleshed-out and strongly-connected relationship, because there is much these two have in common.

They both share a similar eagerness when they were younger, a desire to prove themselves (Ahsoka to show she's not too young to be a Padawan learner; Sabine wanting Hera to trust her with more details of the Rebellion), they were both survivors of genocide (Order 66, the Mandalorian purge), they both know what it's like to be named a traitor by their family (Ahsoka being accused of bombing the Jedi temple, Sabine being shunned by her clan after creating the Duchess), they both knew what it's like to walk away from home, as well as being a wanderer without much purpose (Ahsoka tagging along with the Martez sisters, Sabine being a bounty hunter with Ketsu), they both have a snarky sense of humor etc etc. The list can go on even longer if we look deeper into their stories in the animated shows.

So to bring these two characters together in the Ahsoka series and not touch on any of that is a pity, because I can imagine the interactions they could've had that would give us much more reason to invest in their relationship. (For example, finding solace and understanding in knowing that they are both relics of a past they could never return to, comparing notes about Jedi and Mandalorian values/training methods, how they reminded each other of previous dynamics with other people while working together, how Ahsoka is not affiliated with the Jedi anymore but still behaving like one is similar to Sabine's own confusion about whether she can still identifiy as a Mandalorian given her new role as Jedi apprentice etc etc.)

And as much as I enjoyed Sabine in the series, I couldn't help but think how it would be like if she was a character that acts as a reflection of Ahsoka's Rebels-era self: centered and reserved, but still forging ahead with a clear purpose. And that she was the one calling the shots during their journey, the one who reminded Ahsoka what it's like to believe in and fight for something again, and how much Sabine represented the youthful optimism she once had, making her realize how much she's hardened and changed, liberating her from the ghosts of her past and returning her to the Ahsoka Tano people once knew. It's difficult to come up with an arc for a character that has been developed for over 13 years already, but by bringing Sabine into play, the depth and dimension of the story as well as the possibilities it could bring are still yet to be fully utilized.

Anyway, these are some stray thoughts I've had from time to time, and it's been on my mind long enough that I feel like putting this out here. Comments and thoughts are more than welcome.

[inquisitor-apologist]

hi I would personally LOVE to read thousands of essays on your thoughts about the inquisitors, so if you feel comfy posting them just know they will be received with gratitude :)

Alright, I’ve got a 4-hour car ride, so nothing but time.

The first thing that I’d say is absolutely essential to my understanding of/obsession with the Inquisitorius is that they’re expendable. Both in-text and out-of-text, they’re disposable and that is absolutely essential to their whole existence.

On the Doylist level, the Rebels team created them/reincorporated them to canon to be the replaceable early series antagonists. They're there to build the characters up to face the real threats of Maul’s temptation to the dark and Thrawn’s existential threat to the Rebel cause. The rest of the Star Wars media that shows them only reinforces this.

In Kenobi, they're there in the background, to set up Reva (who is, in the show, functionally not an Inquisitor) and Vader, in J:FO they're scary bad guys meant to be defeated and killed for Cal's growth (though, notably, J:FO is one of the only pieces of Inquisitor media that views them as victims worthy of empathy), and, while I haven't read (all of) the Vader comics, they're in the Vader comics, not in their own stories.

On the Watsonian level, they’re a sort of… buffer between the true power of the Sith and the public. They’re the one attacking the regular Force-sensitives and taking babies (someone much more qualified than me could probably talk a LOT about the very interesting ways the Jedi, Empire, and Inquisition (like, come on) parallel and draw from Judaism and historical antisemitism) and they’re the ones the Rebellion direct their anger about the Jedi Purge at. It’s easy for the two masterminds and main perpetrators to hide behind the atrocities of a dozen faceless subordinates.

This is really clearly shown in Kenobi, where the Inquisitors are dismissed as “Jedi who turned to the dark side. Now, they hunt their own kind”. They’re not seen as victims who’ve been forced into self-destructive monsters, but as the perpetrators of their own genocide, personas that they readily claim. I mean, Reva is literally a survivor of the Temple Massacre who was turned into one of the Inquisitors that Obi-Wan dismisses as traitors. They’re very convenient, effective, scapegoats.

That’s honestly a very underrated part of Palpatine’s genius; one of his most important traits is his ability to manipulate the media. By creating the Inquisitors and delegating most of the work of completing the Purge to them, he distances both himself and Vader from any public outcry against the actions of the Inquisitorius (and, to some extent, their own actions), allowing Vader to be seen as a more legitimate military officer and extension of the Emperor’s will, which is itself legitimized by that distance.

The lines between the Emperor, Vader, and the Inquisitors are also very important. There's a very clear distinction between the Sith and the Inquisitors in of autonomy, which is the second thing that defines my view of the Inquisitors. The Inquisitors are largely pawns for Palpatine’s ends, manipulated and indoctrinated kids, and as such there’s kind of a spectrum of the Empire’s Force-sensitive hierarchy between Sidious, Vader, and the Inquisitors.

Sidious is the first extreme, where he chose everything; he Fell on purpose, became a Sith on purpose, consolidated power and killed the Jedi on purpose, became Emperor on purpose. And then there’s Vader, who very much chose to Fall, kill the Jedi, and become a Sith, but he was manipulated and pushed to it by Sidious. He chose, but Sidious kind of underlies all those choices, driving him to them. Lastly, the Inquisitors chose nothing; they were hunted and persecuted by Vader and the Sith, then tortured and indoctrinated to serve Sidious, brainwashed into continuing to serve. It’s really a gradient of autonomy, if you think about it; Sidious is the only Dark Sider afforded full choice, both by the narrative and in-universe.

The Inquisitors are, fundamentally, kids ripped from their family and people, tortured and indoctrinated into self-loathing and anger. They don’t get names; they’re told they were born wrong and tortured until they believe it, then pressed into service, because, while they might have been born wrong, they were also born useful.

This is why I kind of hate the idea of Inquisitors who choose to join, and one of the reasons I’m not particularly inclined to read the new Inquisitor book (also it apparently implies that the tortured inquisitors were actually just. Force-brainwashed??). One of the most interesting and most fundamental things about them is that they are victims of horrific genocide coerced into becoming their own oppressors. If you take that away, you make them so much less interesting—they turn into stock evil traitors.

The protagonist of the new Inquisitor book is, from what I’ve gathered, a jerk who was already half-fallen in the Clone Wars and who seized the chance to gain more power with the Empire. That’s just diet Vader, and I, personally, have seen too much of both real Vader and diet vaders, so I’m not interested.

So, uh, @stellanslashgeode, you asked me for my thoughts on Iskat Akaris, here they are. Sorry it’s probably not what you wanted.

So, like, there’s my opinion on the fandom-and-canon obsession with Inquisitors who chose the Empire. We literally haven’t seen pretty much anything about how the normal inquisitors join, can we focus on the actually interesting stuff? The Inquisitors' lack of autonomy, their lack of choice, is a huge part of what fascinates me so much about them, because it's very unique. Let's not take that away.

Another piece of why I think the Inquisitors are so interesting is how their abuse at the hands of the Empire shapes them, though this part has more speculation than the stuff above due to lack of clear information.

In canon, we know that inquisitors go through fucking hellish initiation criteria (“Isolation! Torture! Mutilation!”), stuff that absolutely breaks them until they no longer believe that the Empire can be stopped at all (“You can’t stop the Empire!” “She said something about becoming an Inquisitor… like it’s inevitable”). We also know that, however it happens, it's very fast and effective. The Vader Comics are set just months after Order 66, and there's already at least ten fully initiated Inquisitors.

Unfortunately, we never directly see the exact initiation protocols the Inquisitors are subject to, but we do get quick glimpses, like in the flashbacks from J:FO, and with Reva in Kenobi. Right now, I want to look at what those flashbacks from J:FO, together with the dialogue above, tells us about what exactly happens to Inquisitors.

In the flashback, we see Trilla, strapped to the torture chair that Cere's in later in the flashback, being subjected to Star Wars' favorite kind of torture, weird electricity chairs. I'm going to call them shockseats, just to distinguish them from real-life electric chairs. We transition from the torture to some time later, when Second Sister has been fully turned, wearing the Inquisitor uniform and everything.

That, annoyingly enough, is all we get to work with. It's basically the "Being tortured makes you evil" trope, but Ninth Sister's dialogue gives it some nuance. She says "Isolation! Torture! Mutilation!", and, well, we just saw the torture part, and I'm guessing the mutilation is the whole thing in the comics where Vader teaches the Inquisitors by cutting their limbs off, so that leaves isolation, which I think is probably a very significant part of the process.

Based on the vault vision and the Fortress Inquisitorius section in J:FO, most of the Fortress's prison has a kind-of panopticon feel, with see-through energy shields, guards everywhere, and several prisoners in one cell, so I'm guessing there are probably some deeper isolation cells. The isolation is probably where most of the indoctrination happens, because we never hear anyone saying anything during the torture scenes.

This is mostly headcanon from the scraps we get, but I'd say initiation probably goes something like this: 1. a survivor is captured 2. They're taken to Nur, and tortured on the way there (per Rebels) 3 The timeline here is annoyingly unclear but I think the ‘isolation’/indoctrination comes before the rest? 4. They're tortured in an attempt to get them to turn to the Dark Side 5. They're somehow fully initiated into the Inquisitorius with their full title and uniform 6. They're trained ('mutilation') 7. They're a full Inquisitor

obv I have headcanons (ie a full-on not-really canon-compliant system that I think works better than the disjointed 'being tortured makes you evil' bits we have now, but I'm trying to stay as canon-compliant here as possible) but I think this is about what we get in canon, and it’s kind of necessary to have a vague idea about what probably happens in order to understand them, and dang is this very important to basically their entire self-concepts.

In Kenobi, Third Sister is hated by all the others, probably for not going through what they did. We see throughout the show that she’s just as good, or better, than most of them, but because she wasn’t tortured (or, at least, not to the same extent), the rest despise her. She does the exact same things we've consistently seen all the other Inquisitor's do, but she's punished and derided for it. In J:FO, Second Sister goes out and threatens civilians in order to draw Cal out, and everyone’s fine with it, but when Reva does it, everyone hates her.

There’s no rational reason; she does exactly what they do , what she’s been taught to do, but she’s treated differently. The only reason for this, in-universe, is that she’s the only Inquisitor we know of that wasn’t brought in for being a Jedi—she explicitly hides that she was one. The rest of the Inquisitors clearly do hate each other, but it’s on a different level with her, because they do not see her as one of them. She wasn’t a Jedi, and thus she didn’t go through the same things they did. There seems to be a sort-of trauma-induced bond between the other Inquisitors. They hate each other, but they all see each other as Inquisitors, largely the same as them. They don’t share that with Reva because whatever happened to them didn’t happen to her, to the same extent.

Connecting to my earlier point about Inquisitors who chose to join, I think that that's WAY more interesting than a bunch of jerk coworkers who just decided to be evil.

These people were family in the Jedi, and then their whole family died as they watched and heard and felt it in their brains, and they were chased and hunted and tortured until they broke and brought back together, warped and different and told to call each other siblings—and at this point, aren’t they? They were raised together in the bowels of Nur, subjected to the same horror and misery; they’ve been through everything together, in the worst way possible, constantly competing and fighting and killing for anything they can get. Who else could understand them in any meaningful way?

I'm getting off-topic, but the physical abuse and torture of the Inquisitors seems fundamental to their identity, even if we don't know exactly what it entailed. 

So, with the isolation and indoctrination, I think it's fair to say that there's probably quite a lot of mental abuse there. The Dark Side, in itself, is pretty horrible mental health-wise (the Jedi actively use cognitive behavioral therapy just to prevent the possibility of the Dark) and being literally tortured and forced into it must be like. so much worse. Plus, isolation has been shown to be really fucking awful for your brain and the Inquisitor’s utter hopelessness (they literally do not believe that the Empire can be stopped and are really angry at anyone who tries) kind of seems like the whole being unable to believe that things can be better and getting angry at people who try to help part of depression? 

Basically I don’t really know enough about mental health to say definitively, but I’m guessing a core part of Inquisitor Initiation is like. Insane mental abuse to get them to crack.

This last bit is less supported, and I know even less about it, so I’m going to keep this real brief, but I think there’s a possibility of some sexual abuse as well? This is a pretty big thing in fanon with the Grand Inquisitor, and then there’s all the creepy pervy stuff with Seventh Sister that she did not learn from the Jedi, but that’s as much as I’ll say for that because I know nothing about this kind of thing.

So, those are really the three things that define the Inquisitors to me: their expendability, lack of autonomy, and how their abuse defines them. I could write more on this, but this post took a fucking month already, so I’ll stick to those points.

[frostycatblr-fandom-files]

It's such a simple, silent scene in the very beginning of the game, and it managed to make me so emotional and upset in a matter of seconds. Because seconds was all they needed.

The Jedi Temple, wrapped in the red banners and the insignia of the Empire and cog... The perversion of such a holy place to Force-wielders during the time of the Great Jedi Purge...

This was the first time Cal sees the Temple in years since the start of the Purge, since Order 66, and it no longer looks like home to him. The stonework is the same. The temple grounds probably look the same from the sky lanes, and maybe minimal change has been made to them. But the banners... the wings of the Order are not-so-gently replaced.

And who knows exactly what has been done to the interior of the Temple in the time it was restored after Operation Knightfall. What replacements were made when everything was gutted, leaving only the outer walls as they were; a husk of what the Temple once was.

What became of the Room of a Thousand Fountains? What took the place of the vast libraries and archives? The meditation chambers? The rooms where the initiates were once cared for before their time as padawans began?

How gleefully was that all destroyed, replaced, painted/sealed over or melted down and whatever else when Palpatine turned the Jedi Temple into the Imperial Palace?

Cal sees the Temple while flying over Coruscant, sees what it's been turned into, and immediately he must know he'll never be able to return to what had once been his home. It would never be the same even if he did drive the Empire from those hallowed halls. Every stone would echo with pain and anguish to him. It would reek of the extermination of his kind. To Cal, with his psychometry, the Temple likely becomes too great a wound in the Force for him to bare.

JEDI: SURVIVOR (2023)

[vodika-vibes]

Hiya! I hope you're feeling better ❤️🌸

Can I request some crumbs of A'den Skirata, pretty please?🥺It can be some light angst with Order 66 with Jedi reader escape shenanigans, maybe some comfort or even something spicy? Whatever you feel like writing!

Thanks in advance~

Not Your Fault

Summary: After escaping the purge by the skin of your teeth, you seek comfort in the arms of the person you still trust, A’den Skirata.

Pairing: A'den Skirata x F!Jedi Reader

Word Count: 677

Warnings: some angst, implied spice

Tagging: @trixie2023 @n0vqni @imabeautifulbutterfly

A/N: Hi there! I am feeling a lot better. Well, sorta. I didn't stretch my foot properly, so there's an ache and some discomfort, but I'm getting better every day. Sorry that this is so short, but I kind of wanted to write a snapshot of them right after order 66. I hope you like it!

It hurts.

The loss of the other Jedi, of your former master and your padawan siblings, echo through the force. It’s like taking a punch to the chest.

Over and over and over—

Every time you remember that you’re alone in the galaxy now, the pain returns.

A warm hand smoothes over your hair, and you shudder before curling into A’den’s warmth.

He sent you a heavily encrypted message several hours after the Purge happened. He offered you a safe place to hide from the Empire and promised to protect you.

For a moment, you feared that it was a trap, that it was a trick for him to get his hands on you so he could kill you…but if that were the case, A’den would have just tracked you down and killed you.

So you took a chance and came to him.

You’re glad you did.

“How are you feeling, cyare?” A’den asks, his voice quiet and comforting.

“Awful,” You reply, honestly. “I never thought that I would be alone in the galaxy.”

“You’re not.” A’den smooths his hand over your hair and then turns your head so you’re looking up at him, “You have me, and my brothers. We’re not going to leave you alone.”

You lightly grip his wrist, “I’m grateful for it, but it’s not the same.”

“I know, cyare.” He shifts on the bed to lay beside you, rather than sit over you, “How can I help?”

Your hand presses against his cheek, “Can you make me forget?”

He leans in and presses his forehead against yours, “If I could, I would.”

You blink tears out of your eyes, “Did we do something wrong?” You ask, “Did we somehow deserve—”

“No.” A’den rolls you so you’re on your back and he’s laying over you, “No. You did nothing wrong. This isn’t your fault.”

“I survived. No one else did.”

“That doesn’t make it your fault.”

“I can’t help but think—” You trail off, hesitantly.

“Go on.”

“That maybe it would have been better if I died with everyone else.”

A’den pulls back to stare at you, “How can you think that?”

“I don’t know.”

Smoothly, A’den pins your hands next to your head, “I’m glad you’re still alive.”

You sigh softly, “I know.”

“You’re the best thing that came out of this war,” A’den adds, “The only good thing that came from the war.”

“No.” You shake your head, “No, A’den. That’s not right.”

“Cyare—”

“The only good thing that came from the war is you and your brothers.”

A’den stares at you, startled.

“You’re all good men. You deserve better than what we did to you.”

A’den shakes his head and his grip tightens around your wrists, “I love you.” It’s blunt and straightforward, just like him, and you know that he means it. “You didn’t do anything. You, and your people, are as much victims in this war as me and my brothers.”

“It’s not quite the same—”

“You’re right. It’s not. The majority of my vod’e are still alive, after all.” He leans in and presses himself flush against you, “Your people were the victims of a mass genocide. A genocide committed by my people.”

“It’s not your fault either.”

“Oh, I know.” A’den presses his lips against yours, “But you’d be well within your rights to hate me.”

“I don’t think I could.” You admit, “I love you too much.”

“I’m glad for it,” A’den murmurs, he scans your face for a moment, “Do you still want to forget?”

“Yes.”

“Keep your hands here. I’m going to help you forget, at least for a little while.”

“How?” Your face heats when his hands drip under your tank top, sliding the thin material up.

“In a very physical way.” A’den slides down your body and presses his lips against your sternum, “Unless you’d rather not?”

You lower your hands and card your fingers through his hair, “Please, A’den. Help me forget. Just for one night.”

His gaze locks with yours, and he smiles soft and warm, “As you wish.”

[gffa]

THE MANDALORIAN TIMELINE

50 Years Ago - Grogu was born ?? Years Ago - The Mandalorian Civil War.      Obi-Wan Kenobi and Qui-Gon Jinn were sent to help Duchess Satine Kryze and protect her from insurgents as her people were embroiled in civil war, killing most of them.  Jango Fett fought in these wars at some point. ?? Years Ago - Din Djarin doesn’t have an exact age, but he’s likely in his 40s, so he would have been born at some point in here. 41 Years Ago - The Phantom Menace, Boba Fett is born 31 Years Ago - Attack of the Clones, the Clone Wars begin, Kamino’s clone army is discovered, Jango Fett dies on Geonosis 31 to 28 Years Ago - The Clone Wars      While Mandalore attempts to remain neutral in the conflict between the Republic and the Separatists, Death Watch uses the rising tensions (and are secretly working with Count Dooku of the Separatists) to stage attacks on Sundari, attempting to kill Duchess Satine Kryze and take over the planet.      At some point in the war, there seems to be an attack on Din Djarin’s home planet and they’re shown being fired on by Separatist battle droids, when Mandalorians come to rescue him.  The Mandalorians are wearing the symbol of Death Watch (despite that they’ve previously been allied with the Separatists?), though, it’s unclear what the connection between Death Watch and the Children of the Watch is.

     Pre Vizsla of Clan Vizsla is the governor of Concordia (a moon of Mandalore), voiced by Jon Favreau, secretly leads the Death Watch and reveals that he has the darksaber when he fights against Obi-Wan Kenobi after its revealed that Pre is part of Death Watch.       Clan Vizsla is one of the most central Clans of Mandalore, including the only known Mandalorian Jedi (Tarre Vizsla, creator of the Darksaber) was from their House, which is why Pre feels entitled to it, despite that Tarre left it with the Jedi.  Paz Vizsla is also likely from this clan.      The Children of the Watch were also hidden on Concordia at the time of the Great Purge, which is how they survived the genocide of their people.      Bo-Katan Kryze is also part of Death Watch at this point in time.

27 Years Ago - Bo-Katan and Ahsoka meet when Death Watch invade and occupy a village on the planet of Carlac, though, they are enemies at this point in time. 28 Years Ago -  Darth Maul (who was found still alive on the garbage planet of Lotho Minor and rescued by his birth mother, Mother Talzin, and another Nightbrother from his clan, Savage Opress) was defeated and stranded, but is rescued by Death Watch.      They use the Sith for their Force abilities and connections to crime syndicates for resources and to play the invader while they play rescuer to get the Mandalorian people on their side.  Their ruse works and Duchess Satine is overrun, placing her in prison, while Death Watch rules a puppet master Prime Minister.      Because Death Watch betrayed Maul once they had taken over Mandalore, he fights his way to the throne room, battles Pre Vizsla and wins the Darksaber (decapitating Pre), as well declaring himself ruler of Mandalore, having won the fight.      While most of Death Watch kneels and swears allegiance to Maul, Bo-Katan refuses to follow an outsider as ruler of Mandalore and leaves Death Watch.

     Maul uses the prisoner Duchess Satine to lure Obi-Wan Kenobi to the planet so he can have revenge, killing her and forcing Obi-Wan to retreat, leaving him in charge of Mandalore with no one to oppose him.      Not much later, Sheev Palpatine (Darth Sidious) decides Maul has become too much of an unknown variable and thorn in his side, so he travels to Mandalore to fight him.  He kills Savage and secretly imprisons him, but the puppet Prime Minister (Almec) remembers that Maul freed him previously (after he was imprisoned for being corrupt) and sends Gar Saxon and Rook Kast to free him.     After rebuilding himself for a bit of time, Maul regains the Darksaber and returns to Mandalore to take it over once again.     Bo-Katan, having left behind Death Watch, gets in touch with Ahsoka Tano and asks for her help in fighting off Maul, who agrees and they go to ask the Jedi and the Republic to send troops.

     While the Republic has no legal standing here--and is in danger of violating several treaties, as well as this is an invasion of a neutral planet, but Mandalore needs taking care of, because Maul is dangerous--they send enough clone troopers to defeat Maul’s Death Watch.      Ahsoka defeats Maul and Bo-Katan is left in charge of Mandalore (the clones staying behind to help clean up the mess, but within a day or two, Order 66 is enacted, the Jedi are genocided nearly out of existence, and the Empire rises, folding Mandalore into its clutches and they are no longer a neutral system.     Emperor Palpatine leaves Gar Saxon as Governor of Mandalore and the clans of Mandalore go along with this, because they are in too bad of a shape to resist. (It was a busy year, okay.) 11 Years Ago - The crew of the Ghost (from Star Wars Rebels, including Sabine Wren, of Clan Wren, of Mandalore) come across the Darksaber and take it with them.  It passes into Sabine’s possession.       Fenn Rau works to convince Sabine, as the daughter of House Wren of Mandalore, to take up the darksaber and unite Mandalore with it.  It’s a symbol of House Vizsla and the other clans greatly respect it, so if Sabine of Clan Wren, a vassal of House Vizsla, were to show up with it, she could unite them.       Sabine briefly trains with the Darksaber, but struggles to decide how to proceed with it and her contentious relationship with her family.  Returning to Krownest (a planet in the Mandalore sector, home to the Wren clan) to talk with her family, Sabine’s mother Ursa Wren gives the Darksaber to Gar Saxon. When Saxon threatens to kill off the entire Clan Wren, aiming for Ursa first, Sabine steps in to fight him with Ezra’s lightsaber, defeating him in combat for it. 10 Years Ago - Sabine Wren, having won the Darksaber in combat, rallies her family into deciding to fight back against the Empire’s occupation of Mandalore but gives the darksaber to an initially reluctant Bo-Katan Kryze.         Leaders of several clans of Mandalore swear allegiance to her and they vow to fight the Empire, after many years of living under Imperial rule.

~9-10 Years Ago - Mandalore is united under Bo-Katan’s leadership and they fight back against the Empire, but it does not go well and the Empire basically glasses Mandalore, a planet that was already devastated by years and years of civil war, the only habitable zones being under glass domes.      "Or perhaps the decommissioned Mandalorian hunter, Din Djarin, has heard the songs of the Siege of Mandalore, when gunships outfitted with similar ordnance laid waste to fields of Mandalorian recruits in the Night of a Thousand Tears." --Moff Gideon

9 Years Ago - A New Hope, the Death Star is destroyed, the crew of Rogue One die in getting the plans for it 6 Years Ago - The Empire Strikes Back 5 Years Ago - Return of the Jedi, the Second Death Star destroyed, Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader and Yoda all die, the early formation of the New Republic happens, Boba Fett fell into the Sarlacc pit      Operation: Cinder takes place just after Palpatine’s death, it was a backup plan devised by the Emperor that, if he should die, several key worlds would be orbitally bombed out of existence, because if the galaxy failed to keep him alive, he wanted it punished.       Not much longer after the ending of ROTJ, Boba climbs out of the Sarlacc pit and is taken prisoner by the Tusken Raiders. 0 to 5 Years Ago - It’s unclear the exact timeline of The Book of Boba Fett’s events, but he must stay with the Tuskens for several years because he was taken in by them shortly after ROTJ (4 years ago) and is shown regaining his armor in season 2 of The Mandalorian (0 years ago), which he has in the current day flashbacks of TBOBF. 4 Years Ago - The Battle of Jakku happens, widely considered when the Empire fully fell.  The wreckage on Jakku that Rey is scavenging in The Force Awakens is from the massive battle over the planet. 0 Years Ago - The Mandalorian, season 1     Din Djarin meets Grogu and is tasked with finding a Jedi to deliver him to, meeting Bo-Katan Kryze and Boba Fett and Luke Skywalker along the way.  In rescuing Grogu from a kidnapping, he wins the Darksaber in combat (end of season 2) and is still in possession of it during TBOBF.      It’s unclear how much time has passed since season 1 started, but it’s unlikely to be more than a year or so.  (Pedro Pascal said not much time passed between s1 and s2, so it’s probably safe to assume not much time passed between s2 and TBOBF, maybe a few months.)

[mann-walter]

My latest post, that is my post on Order 66, is a response to another post actually. I’m not really interested in that part of the lore. By and large, I’m never too keen on lore diving when it comes to Jedi philosophy and the Jedi purge. I think the Jedis are popular enough, meaning there have been vast discussions done about them which I don’t know where to begin with and I don’t know what I can contribute meaningfully to—unlike when it comes to Palpatine for example. Order 66 is also something very popular, both the franchise runners and fans have discussed it extensively—some people even complained of Order 66 fatigue—and frankly, it is something cut and dry: Palpatine, a dude from an opposition philosophy/religion, took power and slaughtered the Jedi. But apparently, it is not.

Basically, I encountered a post that denied Order 66 as genocide and was very hostile toward the Jedi. Having been a Star Wars fan on Tumblr for a while, I don’t think these are unusual. But then it got a little crazy when… let’s just say OP blurred fiction and real-world events too much, outright condoning real-world genocide on certain religious groups, dehumanization was aplenty, going as far as calling said groups “parasites” and saying it is merely getting rid of pests when you eradicate them. At the end of it all, they accused people who are pro-Jedi, not only the extreme part of that camp, and even people who are casual about this whole Jedi business but are against Order 66, as supporters, nay, part of this real parasitic religious group. They said such people should just die. They also called the Jedi Nazis.

There is a part of me that wants to believe it was an act of trolling, but it mixed up real-world and fiction too much…. Ish, it was just lowkey disturbing. I still let out a gobsmacked chuckle when I try to remember what the words were.

I suggest you all check out the post especially the reblogs section. It is fucking wild, pardon my French, it is fucking WILD. We got colonialism down there, we got the Nazis, we got religion, and of course we got Star Wars. I don’t put up links to it or straightforwardly reblog it because… because I’m a cowardly bastard and online fights are exhausting. So, check it for yourselves

P.S.: that definition is a little skewed in comparison to the Convention because of its exclusivity (“…minority”.) whereas the Convention is inclusive. But anyway…

[haltraveler]

I swear the pro-Jedi crowd are getting just as ridiculous as the anti-Jedi fans at this point. The Jedi Order was around and a major force in the galaxy for more than twice the length of the Holocene epoch. Portraying them as making a few poor decisions or being on the wrong side of a few issues in that time span is not justifying the Purge or saying they weren't broadly a force for good.

And personally I think a Jedi order that fucks up on occasion and accidentally funds a genocide on Kalee or sometimes has phases of overly rigid dogma is far more engaging as a story than saying they literally did nothing wrong ever in literally twice the length of time that humans have had domestic cows.

[autisticsupervillain]

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Stats Equalized!

This Month's Fighters...

Emperor Palpatine vs Her Imperious Condescension!

Conditions:

Dark Empire Palpatine. Legends material only. "Dubiously Canon" Homestuck materials are ignored.

Scenario:

Just when Palpatine returns from the dead and sets out to conquer the galaxy with his new Dark Empire, the Alternian Empire invades, forcing him to direct his new armies at the incoming threat.

Analysis: Sidious

Of all the Dark Lords of the Sith who would come to terrorize the galaxy over the centuries, there is one and only one who could be said to have been born pure evil. He was not a man. Not a monster. But the Dark Side twisted into a barely human form. To the Sith, he is remembered as Palpatine the Great, the last of the Rule of Two who conquered the galaxy and destroyed the Jedi as no one before him ever had. To the Jedi, he is Darth Sidious, a genocidal monster behind the greatest tragedies and wars in galactic history. And to the Galaxy at large, he is just Emperor Palpatine, ruler of the First Galactic Empire.

Palpatine (not Sheev, that's Disney exclusive) always felt that the Naboo royal lineage he'd been born into was beneath him. Even as his family spoiled him rotten, he always felt he was destined for more. So, when Darth Plagueis the Wise, awed by his limitless potential in the Force, offered him secrets of the Dark Side, Palpatine did not hesitate. He murdered his family as a teenager and took the name Darth Sidious.

Sidious would manipulate his way to the top of galactic politics to become the Supreme Chancellor of the Republic, before murdering Plagueis in his sleep. Then, under the guise of innocent, kindly Palpatine, he would instigate the Clone Wars, one of the bloodiest conflicts in history, to transition the Republic into a paranoid, fascist police state. Grooming the young Anakin Skywalker into the horrific enforcer Darth Vader, Palpatine would dispose of all his former allies when he took the throne, before purging the Jedi to grasp the galaxy in his iron grip.

Palpatine would reign unchallenged for decades, destroying planets with superweapons, instigating slavery and genocides, creating whole new forms of Dark Force magic, and crushing all resistance to maintain his iron grip on the galaxy. It was not until Anakin's son, Luke, reminded him of the man he was and turned him against his master that his mad reign would finally end. Palpatine would be cast into the reactor of his own Death Star, vaporized and obliterated. And at last, the Galaxy would know peace....

But, even after all that.... somehow, Palpatine returned.

Paranoid and meticulous, Palpatine planned ahead. He transferred his soul to a cloning station he'd prepared, letting the rebellion fight with the remnants of his empire as he rebuilt his armies and bolstered his strength, Palpatine would re-emerge to slaughter them all for failing and defying him. He would return not as a man, but as the embodies of the Dark Side itself. A being of the dark, twisted soul unconstrained by death or mortal morality.

Darth Sidious was a nearly unparalleled master of lightsaber combat, viewing it as little more than a way to mock the Jedi. Having mastered all seven forms, Palpatine would fight against some the greatest Jedi who ever lived, including Grandmaster Yoda, Mace Windu, Darth Maul, Galen Marek, and Luke Skywalker.

Despite their tenacity, the Jedi could not match Palpatine's sheer raw power in the Force. Galen Marek, who was powerful enough to pull starships out of the sky, Yoda, who could annihilate entire armies, and Luke, who had become an equal to his father Darth Vader by the time of Dark Empire. None of them alone could match his raw power on their own.

With Luke, Palpatine would spend months chipping away at his mind, driving him slowly mad to break him into his perfect apprentice, sucking out all his will the first time the young man challenged him. Palpatine could hide his darkness in the Force for years from all the Jedi in the Galaxy, flooding the Galaxy with his darkness so none could sense anything. Palpatine could slow down the Jedi Mace brought with him with a confusion haze, drive people mad with a thought, trap people in entire worlds made of illusions, bolster the willpower of his armies to effectively turn them into a hive mind, and even turn people into mindless drones with just a recording of his voice.

Palpatine spent so much of his time studying the Dark Side, he perfected every single power the Dark Side could provide at the time and could even invent brand new ones in a whim. He can vaporize you with lightning, suck the life our of you with Force Drain, crush you to death with telekinesis, fly, absorb energy, and will things to explode. He taunt Dooku how to create an army of zombies, can duplicate himself with hard loght copies, can shoot fire from his hands or freeze you solid, and can create fields of death that instantly kill any life form in their radius. Period. Alongside many.... many others...

Palpatine's being is nothing but a soul now. He doesn't need a physical body to survive. Whenever his current clone body dies or is defeated, he just transfers his soul to the next body or even to your body. He can take over your body and replace your personality, destroying your soul with his if you destroy his body through the power of Essence Transfer. Functionally, he is immortal so long as he has a body on hand.

But his most devastating ability of them all was dreaded Force Storm. This higher dimensional vortex in the fabric of space and time tears apart reality itself, wiping the life off planets and even punching holes in time. He used a Force Storm to teleport Luke across the galaxy and other Jedi such as Revan have tanked naturally occuring Force Storms only to end up getting teleported thousands of years across time. It is a literally apocalyptic power that could destroy the universe, higher dimensions and all, if Palpatine ever losses control of it.

So is this Dark Emperor the invincible god he says he is? ....No.

Firstly, Sidious strongly favors his force abilites. He thinks lightsaber combat is archaic, useful only to mock the Jedi. So, every single major victory against someone his own level came by way of his Force powers, with Mace and Yoda even disarming him outright before Sidious wised up. It says a lot that Palps doesn't even use his own lightsaber anymore. His old one was vaporized with the rest of him after his death, so now he uses a stolen blue Jedi one from a Jedi he killed personally. Probably one of the ones accompanying Mace. The only opponent Palpatine did beat with the blade is Maul who.... frankly, isn't even in the same galaxy as Sidious in any timeline....

Secondly, his own raw power is a detriment to his clone bodies. The more he exerts himself, the faster they rot under the weight of his might. Given that his clones range in age from fifteen to eighty, each body rots at different rates. After Leia freed Luke from Palp's control and gave him the strength boost he needed to overpower the Emperor, Palpatine had to keep transferring to weaker and weaker bodies that break down faster and faster.

Finally, if he fails to overpower the mind of his victim when possessing them, his soul will be wiped from existence, reduced to nothing and chaos. Though, for good measure, the ghost of every Jedi who ever lived did band together to destroy his soul forever and make sure he could never return.

Therein lies Palpatine's greatest achievement. He's bathed the galaxy in so much blood, that every Jedi who ever lived utterly despised him by the end. For as powerful as every Sith that came after him was, none was truly born evil like Palpatine.

Analysis: Her Imperious Condescension

The Alternian Empire. The ultimate terror in the universe, and eventually, the multiverse. A species of planet conquering trolls that has bathed the stars in blood, destroying countless civilizations and rending planets down to ash. What do you imagine when you picture such a fearsome foe? What diabolical mastermind do you see piloting the helm of this mighty empire?

Did you picture Betty Crocker, the baked goods brand? Because that's who it is.

Her Imperious Condescension was the immortal ruler of Alternia and all its colonies, forcing her empire into a bloodthirsty might-makes-right dystopia. Keeping her people in line under threat of being obliterated by an eldritch monstrosity and exterminating any blood caste that threatened her, she was a monsterous tyrant that banished all trolls to space upon reaching adulthood so they could immediately serve her eternal armies.

Until suddenly, her empire died out from under her. The eldritch monstrosity she used to keep her people in line cried out in hunger, signaling the end times of her people as their minds melted across the galaxy. Her people had died in a single cry. And now The Handmaiden, the grim reaper of her species, was staring her down.

The Condescension emerged victorious over the Handmaiden after a pitched battle and, with no one left to conquer, replaced her as Lord English's servant. She would now pave the way for her new master to destroy all reality.

Being second fiddle to the biggest threat Paradox Space has ever seen, The Condescension is monumentally powerful. As the highest of the sea dwelling high bloods, Betty is immortal and unaging, as well as completely immune to all psychic powers. She was conquering worlds for thousands of years before Lord English cursed her with "conditional mortality", keeping her from dying until her master had no further use for her. As a denizen of Paradox Space, she follows video game logic. She can store things in a hammerspace inventory known as a specibus, including objects she couldn't possibly be hiding on her person like her iconic trident, and can level up and grow stronger from any random action she makes.

Really, trolls are very hardy species just by baseline. The Condescension herself can survive the vacuum of space unharmed and several trolls could survive the heat of orbital re-entry as a freshly hatched grub. The fact that Condy stood as the unquestioned queen among them for possibly millions of years just showcases how tough she is.

With nothing but time, she manipulated the media and governments of Earth B until it was under her complete control, masterminding mankind's downfall before reducing the world to a flooded apocalyptic wasteland. In the meantime, she experimented on herself to unlock more of her latent abilities. While she could never quite get her psychic powers to work on humans, forcing her to rely on specialized mind control tiaras to deal with them, they did wonders on animals and half animal hybrids, bending them to her will absolutely. With her advanced telekinetic powers, she could throw around statues and even planets with ease, destroying entire worlds with her might, while her eye beans could blast apart entire planets.

Perhaps more daunting than even that was her power to control life. As a latent Thief of Life she could "steal" life from other people and give it to others or herself. In this way, she could keep the ones she cared about from dying, preserving the Helmsman's lifespan as he served as the battery on her ship, forcing him to live forever as the life was sucked out of him.

However, she couldn't restore the dead. As her competition might say... it was ironic that she could save others from death... but not herself.

Ultimately, the Condescension turned out to be such a formidable foe that even the heroes destined to destroy Lord English failed against her on the first go. She vaporized Kanaya with a single blast, snapped the neck of Aranea Serket, and stomped every God that stood in her way. So won so badly that John Egbert had to use an artifact that removed him from fate and break the laws of time travel just for anyone to have a chance at beating her.

Even then, she put up a very long fight. Going toe to toe with no less than four gods at once, many of whom could control space and time itself, all throughout the final battle. Next to her master, the Condescension was the toughest threat the heroes of Paradox Space had to face. Keep in mind, many of these Gods, such as John and Dave, could fight First Guardians, who could destroy entire multiverses and tank their destruction in turn!

But, eventually, even her bloody reign had to end. Millions of years of bloodshed and conquest were finally brought to an end by the Condescension's death, ending the legacy of the cruel Alternian Empire.

Throwdown Breakdown:

This fight would be a spectacle.

Both characters have plotted the rise and fall of empires through years of careful political manipulation and both are responsible for the destruction of countless worlds and the extinction of countless species. In raw power, both have the range to tear worlds apart and the power to crumble the multiverse if left unchecked. But... there can be only one.

Both Imperials have a devastating variety of powers and abilities, with both having a lot of counters to each other's arsenals. While his telekinesis doesn't quite match the sheer scope of the Condescension's, his Force Storms definitely do, tutaminus allows him to absorb her laser beams, any life force she steals from him can be yanked right back with Force Drain, and his trained immunity to mind control makes her tiaras useless. On the other hand, he can't control her mind either thanks to her natural immunity, Lord English's curse would counter out the Death Fields, and Condy's demonstrated toughness against the elements shows she could withstand Palp's fire, ice, and lightning for a long time before going down. Hard Vacuum is colder than freezing cold ice, while the heat of orbital re-entry and exploding planets can match the heat of fire, lightning, and lightsabers, giving Condy a buffer.

Now, I'm not saying she could just no-sell a lightsaber. Not at all. I'm just saying she'll endure the lightning and stabs a lot better than most people and should be capable of clashing blades with her trident just fine.

In terms of skill and intelligent, both are consummate chessmasters. Palpatine improvises his plans constantly throughout the movies to keeping coming out on top and has fallbacks for when things go wrong. Apprentice dead? Corrupt Dooku, then Anakin as a fallback when Dooku outlives his usefulness. On the Condescension's side, her first approach is usually to open with faux diplomacy before letting her armies swoop in on a helpless planet, a method that served her well when it came time to conquer the Earth. By the time anyone was ready to fight her, it was already much too late.

Sidious fought and defeated Grandmaster Yoda, someone who had been protecting the galaxy for nearly 900 years. But even that life span is a drop in the ocean to Condy, who has been conquering for thousands, if not millions of years. Sidious is a manipulative sorcerer first, warrior second, and he views combat as just a way to mock whoever he's fighting. The Condescension is the top rung of violent warrior race of planet conquers. She has more experience and a greater warrior's mindset than Palpatine. This exasperates the fact that, due to her immortality, Palpatine's win condition in this fight is to cripple the Condescension to the point that she can't fight anymore, which is much tougher to do if he can't chop her up with his lightsaber.

This fight is guaranteed to be an endurance run, and that's ultimately where Betty's victory lies. Lightning and lasers will clash through the vacuum of space, planets will be thrown around and destroyed, stars will explode until a chunk of the galaxy is gone. And through it all, Palpatine's body decays under the weight of his own power. Against an equal in power who surpasses his skill, Sidious will be forced to give everything he has even as his body rots around him, before ditching it to find another clone as it dissolves.

Despite being physically much older than him, Condy's body is stuck in her physical prime, while every clone Palpatine brings out will only grow more decrepit. Palpatine suffers from a snowball effect in this fight where once he starts losing, every action he takes to bounce back will push him down further, require exertion that makes him weaker, while every clone the Condescension kills will push her higher up her echeladder and make her stronger. Force Storms, duplicates, illusions, Palpatine surpasses in variety to be sure, but the Condescension has fought that, beaten that even during Game Over. It will be a long, drawn out batte of equals, and that's part of why Palpatine losses.

Darth Sidious's best shot is to launch the Condescension across time and space with a Force Storm, but I find that unlikely. Beyond Condy fighting Time and Space manipulators before, Force Storms are monumentally difficult to control and take an exponential amount of power, making the snowball issue even worse if it doesn't work.

Taking over the Condescension's body wouldn't work due to her in-built immunity. Interacting with the Horrorterrors does the exact same thing passively and the Condescension was raised by one just fine.

Out of trump cards, Palpatine would beg for his life beneath her heel before the trident spears his chest, the Condescension's laughter echoing through the ruins of his empire.

This Throwdown's Winner is....

Her Imperious Condescension!

[floaromaxtowns]

Order 66 = The great Jedi purge

Sweetheart that's literally a massacre of an entire group of people, which evolved into a persecution of any remaining jedi. ALL WHILE, the empire burned & wiped out the jedi temple's archives & disappeared with its relics.

Palpatine from the get-go always had the plans to wipe out jedi from existence.

If this shit isn't a genocide, then what the actual fuck it is meant to be?