#there's also tarkin and some random pilot

[mario-art]

so in "star war: galaxy of heroes" the recommended extended party for vader includes thrawn and, surprisingly (for me at least), wampa. and my first thought was this scenario

[mugichaaaa]

Bad Batch Analysis prt2

Welcome back everyone to part 2 to my Bad Batch analysis trailers. The trailer just happened to be posted around midnight and my wifi went out in the morning so I couldn’t really do much until now. Since we got another AMAZING trailer for the Bad Batch series I believe it’s time to do another analysis. If you haven’t read my first analysis from the first trailer you can read it here 

Without further ado let's get started. 

The first scene we get from the trailer is a shot after that one shot we got from the first trailer. This could probably be around the time they landed on Kamino because if you look in the top right corner there is the Havoc Marauder. 

Training Sequence

Next we see one of the many training grounds on Kamino. It’s strange seeing only one training ground and not multiple. It seems like this specific training ground might be underwater, as there is this long pole in the center with surrounding lights around it. Now that might be a reach, but honestly where could you see that training ground on the round houses above the ocean. 

Along with that in the Legends there was a Kaminoan Jedi who lived under the sea to try to prevent the vision she had. (the vision was the clone army betraying the Jedi) So it could be possible when the Kamioan’s were building the floating city they builded the bottom levels to be used as training grounds or something. 

In this scene we can see that Echo is using a vibroblade. Now is this Echo’s own vibroblade or does this belong to Hunter and Echo just picked it up to destroy one of the droids?

I feel like this shot can tell us a lot about the bad batch and how they interact with each other. Hunter and Crosshair are looking at the camera to which I can probably assume where Tarkin speaks to them. Echo lightly turns towards the direction of Tech, Hunter, and Crosshair. Tarkin probably said something that would make Echo turn to look at the three of them. 

Also Tech although very subtle looks at the ground. Now this could be two things, if Tarkin said something then it might be tech looking at the ground like a Child does when their parents scolds them. Or it might be Tech is exhausted and is looking at the destroyed droids all around him. 

Hunter is seen talking to someone (probably Omega) telling them that their squad (aka the Bad Batch) is nothing but trouble. We can see Crosshair and Tech walk to a door which I can assume to be their barracks for the time being (before they escape). 

I really like this scene from Crosshair. This seemed to show how well the Bad Batch worked together. Hunter throws his knife in the air and Crosshair goes and shoots it in place. Which might make it even more sad if Crosshair betrays the Bad Batch. Imagine this, The bad batch is in this certain situation where a duo between Crosshair and Hunter would work. Hunter turns to where Crosshair would normally be. 

“Cross lets-” 

All he sees no one, and the feeling of betrayal and pain seeps through him. 

“Right…” 

Hunter Civilian Clothing

So we see Hunter in Civilian clothes which is like. UGH please let me hold your hand Hunter. The first time we see them is at 0:31 where Hunter steals a speeder, probably to catch up to Fennec as we can see in 1:39 who has a kid. 

We get a better look at Hunter’s Civilian clothes, it really reminds me of Cut lawquane’s outfit from The Clone Wars Season 2 “The Deserters”. Maybe we might see Cut lawquane in the Bad Batch, if so I think that would be really great to see. Cut’s children with Omega might be the cutest thing we might get from Bad Batch, that’s if it happens.  

Now in this scene we see Tech piloting the ship, but if you look at the corner there is Hunter on a control panel with bandages wrapped around him. So this might be either Hunter getting injured from a mission (maybe from Fennec Shand??)

This kid (not Omega) is dangling onto a cylindrical object. The Following scene with Hunter and the kid following a speeder that belongs to Fennec Shand. 

The Final Part of the Clone Wars 

At 0:37 we see the Batchers coming down from what seems to be like a hill destroying B1 battle droids. While the next shot is Tech and Echo shooting down said droids. 

So in my previous analysis I mentioned how for one the explosions I was wondering if it was the Batchers or the Empire. Now with this new Trailer it seems to be leaning more towards the Batchers doing this. 

We see Hunter putting away his knife with Wrecker carrying what seems like to be a destroyed droid. 

Now I mentioned in my previous analysis that the snowy planet might be a Crosshair arc. But now with these new scenes with the snowy planet it might be a set up to Crosshair being something that most Bad Batch Stans don’t want. 

Crosshair as the traitor

So I know I talked about this in my last trailer analysis and I said this was very unlikely. But uhhhh now with this trailer I'm 70% sure Crosshair will betray the Bad Batch. Now the reason why I said Crosshair wouldn’t betray the Bad Batch was because the Purge trooper and Crosshair just didn’t have things that lined up. But now with this new trailer I am pretty worried for our boy Crosshair. 

This is the ONLY scene we get of Omega and Crosshair together. Any other scenes with Omega and the Bad Batch Crosshair is nowhere in sight. 

I literally called this when I wrote about my predictions about the Bad Batch series. Where I wrote two paths. One where Crosshair was not the traitor and stays with the bad batch and one if Crosshair was the traitor (I censor the right since it had my actual name since I did the bad batch analysis during school)

And 1:19 seems to likely prove my Crosshair is the traitor snippet I did. All the batchers + omega are running through what seems to be like the late night halls of Kamino. Who knew Echo would be following his brother’s footsteps. 

Again Crosshair isn’t here 

… or maybe he might be hiding him behind Hunter to give us anxiety about what happened to Crosshair. But if Crosshair is gone then they need a new sniper to fill in his role...

Omega

We are first introduced to a new character who is called “omega”.  Now who is Omega? Well we don’t know this is the first we EVER got to see them anywhere. Now when I first saw Omega I immediately thought of Satine’s Mandalore. We are not talking about the houses and clans (like house Wren). We’re talking about Satine’s Mandalorians (the pacifist) in which when we see her people in the clone wars they are normally pale with light colored eyes. Omega almost fits that but without the bright blue eyes. Another thing is that Omega kinda sounds like they have a Satine Mandalorian accent. As I was listening to Omega speak I was comparing it to Korkie and his friends and Omega lowkey sounds like Korkie’s friends but that’s probably a really big reach.

This is where I think if Crosshair betrays the Bad Batch this is where Omega would come in and take Crosshair’s role as sniper. We don’t know how good Omega is but with Hunter’s heightened sense his sight might be just as good to teach Omega to work with a bow and arrow

The Explosion

Now we have an explanation for the explosion we saw in the last trailer. It was definitely the bad batch and now we know it was part of the thrusters from a broken Venator Star Destroyer. Since now we got more context to that explosion, I believe that this will be on Bracca where maybe MAYBE we might see a young ginger Cal Kestis. 

Rex

*breaths in* 

REX I MISSED YOU SO MUCH 

I’m so happy Rex and Echo are going to a reunion. I really hope Rex and Echo have a moment where Rex completely vents to Echo about everything that happened. Like Umbara, how much Five’s death took a toll on him, and when he left Jesse and his brothers during order 66. It would be really interesting to see if Rex has some sort of survivor's guilt. I know we see a little bit in Season 7 when he’s talking to Cody about the Domino squad but after order 66 I think it would be nice to dwell onto a little more. 

Another thing I really hope we get to see how Rex meets up with Wolffe and Gregor. 

AT-ET Walker

We get a couple of scenes here of the AT-ET but here look at this. The republic symbol and the red paint is completely removed, it’s completely bare (which is so boring). Another thing is that the AT-ET are completely cutting across a group of people, these could be protestors of something that we yet not know of. 

It seems like Hunter and Tech snuck into and AT-ET, now the next scene we get is an AT-ET blowing up another AT-ET. There are two possibilities on who shot at the AT-ET, one could be the Bad Batch themselves shooting at the other AT-ET or two it could be the Empire shooting at the Bad Batch stolen AT-ET 

Saw Gerra

It’s really nice to see Saw Gerra, we have seen him in 5 star wars projects (Clone wars, Rogue one, Rebels, Jedi Fallen Order, and now Bad Batch). Since this is the beginning of the Empire we get that small time between Clone wars and Jedi: Fallen Order to see what Saw was up to. 

Fennec Shand

My wifey, I love her so much. But I did get something wrong and right with Fennec Shand in my last analysis. 

First of all the explosion we see with Fennec Shand is NOT connected to the factory arc but instead connected to Hunter saving the kid. 

But the thing I did get right was that one scene where Fennec was holding a gun out. That fog is from a fight and Fennec and her opponent are at a standstill. 

One thing new about Fennec is that she had a Kid dangling off her speeder. First of all that’s not safe at all and 2 why does Fennec have a Kid with her and then why does Hunter have the child in the next scene?

Small theory but this kid might be just like Omega that escaped. Fennec is sent out to retrieve the kid but Hunter is like “not on my watch” and takes the kid. Fennec looks shocked that Hunter interferes with her job and looks ANGY. 

Or this kid might be just some random kid that Fennec took. 

Now a recurring segment called Cool things I saw on the Trailer 

Just any scenes from the training scene with Wrecker is just cool and I’m like yes sir go off. 

I swear every scene with Wrecker is a joy to see. He just brightens my day all the time

Bad Batch are taking notes from Waxer and Boil about adopting kids during war times. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This segment was short due to most of the trailer being analyzed and not much random spread out scenes. 

And that’s that! Thank you all who read this far, I hope I was able to make this clear enough for you all to understand. If there’s anything else you saw in the Trailer that I miss I would love for you to comment about it! I think i’m going to do a countdown for Bad Batch, idk let’s see how I keep this up. 

[piermanwalter]

Army Swap AU: Luke and Leia

In a galaxy where the Confederacy of Independent Systems went super into biotech instead of mass industrialisation, and the Jedi’s secret deal with the Kaminoans fell through so they had to create a different army, the Republic soldiers are droids and the Separatist soldiers are clones.

Following the Droid Wars, instead of a masterful transfer into absolute power, Palpatine was barely able to scrape together enough support from the Galactic Core to become Emperor. Palpatine embarked on an epic information control campaign, purging data archives all across the galaxy, rewriting maps and hyperdrive computers to erase knowledge of specific planets from existence, and more importantly setting up a series of hypershield satellites blocking off every recorded hyperlane into the Outer Rim, essentially isolating that region from the rest of the galaxy.

It’s not that the hypershield actively blocks anything. It just makes everything passing through it via hyperspace travel very slowly. Most beings would die of old age and holotransmissions would be irrelevant before making it to the other side. Terrible things happen when ships try to drop out of hyperspace while caught in the shield. A taboo on mentioning certain planets was enforced to such a degree that species originating from those planet were eradicated from the Galactic Core. These planets never existed. The Confederacy of Independent Systems invented these names to make their territory seem larger. There is nothing beyond the Mid Rim. 

It was under this environment of ironclad facades and overcompensation where Luke Crashburn was raised. His father was an organic Republic soldier who served under Admiral Tarkin. His father died in combat and it was due to Tarkin’s influence that Luke was accepted into the prestigious Sector 1 Imperial Academy. But no matter how hard he studies or how well he fights in the sims, his final grades never improved more than mediocre. As graduation looms nearer, Luke finds himself sidelined into the worst specialisations imaginable.

Research and Development? Supply Line Management? That’s impossible. His flying score was better than anyone else’s in his class, and some of them were sent off to become pilots. Luke knows something is wrong. It seems like everyone is hiding something from him. 

If he can’t impress anyone with his grades, he’ll try to get in via connections. Recklessly throwing himself into officer meetings with the vague justification of “Savcus Crashburn was my father. Admiral Tarkin likes me. Please give me a job aboard your ship. Sir!”, Luke finds himself in a world of political intrigue he wasn’t trained to handle. Does everyone actually appreciate his skills or are they using him for clout? Why would someone like himself have clout? What’s going on?

Due to the absolute chaos of the Outer Rim and their tenuous control over the Mid Rim, the Empire lacked the resources to build an entire Death Star, choosing to forgo most of the superstructure. The first Death Star is much smaller than the initial blueprint and the shape of a compass rose, containing only the superlaser, officer and technician housing, and enough starship docks to provide a support escort. It has much less intimidation compared to the original, but its more efficient design allowed it to go on a killing spree targeting the planets most dangerous to the newly formed Empire.

Kamino? Gone. Geonosis? Gone. As more and more planets were destroyed,  Separatist worlds began sending huge chunks of their population on reckless colonisation missions. By the time Pure Neimoidia was destroyed, it had less than a hundred million occupants and the Neimoidians of that world had transitioned into obligate spacefarers much like their Duros relatives. The Rebellion tried to use these atrocities to turn people against the Empire, but anti-alien sentiments were at an all time high and most humans didn’t mind if planets got destroyed as long as not too many of their own kind were caught in the way. The information control campaign was so effective that few people ever knew the destroyed planets existed. 

Due to a clerical error resulting from insane levels of mutual xenophobia, multi-layered mind games and conflicting information from captured Supertacs, and the Empire’s own pervasive censorship backfiring, Skako Minor, the planet populated by Poletecs used mostly for weapon testing, was accidentally blown up instead of Skako Major, the actual planet where 500 billion Skakoans live. 

Using the spectacular failure of destroying the wrong planet as political leverage, Bail Organa was able to gain some support from people who lost trust in the Empire’s ability to protect them. Not exactly the message of unity and respect he wanted to send, but in the meantime let’s go with it. Alderaan, the new hub for Rebellion activity, became the greatest threat to the Empire and was the only planet uninvolved with the Droid Wars to be destroyed. After many humans died, people of the galaxy finally began to reject the Empire en masse. 

Meanwhile, in the lawless Outer Rim, the Death Star superstructure without the laser was manufactured by Separatist expeditionaries based off Poggle the Lesser’s blueprint. The Hive Orb was never able to achieve any level of military functionality, but large numbers of people could sustainably live in it.

A majority of the Hive Orb’s occupants are surviving Separatist-affiliated species and battle clones. Most of the rest are Droid War refugees, who see their uncontested ownership of Separatist-made Hive Orb as reparation for all they suffered through. There is also a significant population of gangsters and myriad fugitives. A few surviving Jedi also live on the Hive Orb, albeit under false identities.

Constant fighting between factions only stops when a serious structural flaw or outside threat is discovered, after which everyone calls a ceasefire to fix it, and then start attacking each other again. The most hotly contested area is the bridge, which controls where the Hive Orb goes. You can go to sleep in the Hive Orb and wake up in hyperspace because the bridge was taken over by another faction within the last few hours and they wanted to go to the other side of the galaxy. It is universally agreed upon that the Hive Orb must never be flown into Imperial Space. Pirates and crime syndicates make regular attempts to take over but the Hive Orb occupants crush them with more zeal than they crush each other.

Rumors of a moon-sized giant space station that appears and disappears at random are starting to leak through the hypershield, but for the most part are dismissed by the Empire because the concept is objectively ridiculous. 

It was under this environment of wild unpredictability interspersed with unconditional trust where Leia was raised. After failing to arrest Palpatine, only surviving due to Count Dooku suddenly turning on his Master and getting killed in his place, Mace Windu returned to the Jedi Temple to find everyone dead. Leia was the sole survivor. Mace bluntly stated he didn’t read enough of her Temple datafile to remember her last name. They spent a few years running away from the Empire but eventually settled in the Hive Orb because the whole thing runs away from the Empire by itself.

Although Mace decided to be an unaffiliated executor of justice aboard the Hive Orb, Leia threw her lots with The Spires, refugees of the Christophsis Invasion. Mace suddenly stopped teaching her in the ways of the Jedi, claiming it was too dangerous to be recognised. Leia joined The Spires mainly to protect the innocent, but also to have an excuse to travel the Hive Orb in hopes of finding another Jedi willing to teach her.

[swan2swan]

Idk I think the defining dark moment of Rebels was when Tarkin shows up and has the Imperial Team Rocket duo of most of the first season executed

See, that’s one of those moments that was a Super Tone Shift, but was also...I don’t know what to call these moments, but they’re something that need to be addressed in a lot of shows. 

A False Drop, maybe?

It’s essentially a point in a show--usually a kid’s show, I think, but it’s probably prevalent in adult media--where an early season Does Something shocking or cool that shakes up the Status Quo, but then the show basically returns to the Status Quo for the rest of the show.

Another solid example is when Pidge comes out to the crew in Netflix’s Voltron. The audience went wild there, because that was such a daring move! Revolutionary! I’m not exaggerating! Here’s a subtle announcement that this character is trans! Truly this show is progressive! It’s the first season, and we already have a trans character! Surely this show will stand as a bastion of LGBTQ rights and representation, and won’t be afraid to address these issues in the oh wait that’s it? That’s all your giving us? 

That’s literally all you’re giving us?

...okay, so you gave us gay stuff five seasons later, but we need to address the fact that nothing gay happened between then and this point. 

What made The Clone Wars work was that when it started killing off characters, it didn’t go on long droughts without doing it again. You worried for your clones and your Jedi and your side characters, and you worried with reason. Rebels didn’t have immortality for any of the main characters, either, and so you spent the whole show worrying about them a bit, but when they showed that they Weren’t Afraid to Kill People in Season One, it took ages before other characters you might have gotten attached to died (Maketh Tua being the notable, AMAZING exception, I’m still upset). They blew up a lot of random pilots, but there were no Donos or Tarpals or Ninety-Nines. 

Obviously that’s not completely to the show’s detriment (you don’t want to be murdering all of your favorite characters Just Because You Can), but when you start worrying about your side characters and then repeatedly have no reason to keep worrying, it deflates some of the adrenaline. Even if you think you know a character is going to die and then they do die, it helps to keep the tension going because you’re all “Hahahaha, yeah, I knew he was gonna bite it...so that means no one else is going to, right? Right?”

I know there are other examples of shows doing similar things...where they pull a trigger really early in the run and the fandom goes “Ohhhhhhhh!”, but then Nothing Happens for two seasons, and the audience’s investment that was purchased with That Moment begins to feel like a huge scam. 

Rebels needed to give us more characters that we got attached to is all I’m saying. More named Rebel pilots and soldiers, and more extras with character (sidenote: the two Rebel pilots with faces who blow up during the assault on Lothal are really good examples of how to do it Right, because you THINK they might have roles to play and you get a little bit attached, but then They Die). 

This also goes hand-in-hand with my mantra that you need to have your villains win at least two episodes every season for a show to be good. Not devastating victories, but ones where the villain’s grinning at the end because the Heroes Failed, not because He’ll Get Them Next Time.

[swtorramblings]

A Good Day

SW POC Positivity Project, Day 23: Rogue One No One Dies AU

No one? No one at all? Ow. I think I’m going to have to go with the people in the invasion. And one other. I��ve had to miss a lot of these, mainly because of lack of time and preparation, but also because a number of them were just outside whatever talents I might have. This, though? No way I’m skipping this one. Tragedy is a valid form of expression. I mostly am good with how the film ended. If it hadn’t been the most diverse central cast in a Star Wars film to date (I think), I would have had fewer complaints. I still think one of them should have lived, perhaps due to being left behind, but so it goes. What I’m doing here has the feeling of having the bodies scattered all over the stage at the end of Hamlet hop up to explain how they faked their deaths. And I’m good with that. Some of the timing may not work, I haven’t seen the movie in years, but this is an AU and I’m good with that, too.

1666 words.

“The Force is with me. I am one with the Force. The Force is with me. I am one with the ULP!” Chirrut felt the cable wrap around his torso, then was jerked off his feet and sailed through the air. He felt the heat of the blast, burning at the soles of his feet. He barely kept hold of his staff as he landed in a heap. “Are you all right?” It was, of course, Baze’s voice. “The rescue could have been more graceful.” He could hear some blaster fire, and then a short pause. “Is that all you have to say?” “Thank you.” “What about trusting in the Force?” He got to his feet and felt for the cover before saying, “I did. I told you. It’s why I have you.” “We will talk later. Here they come.” Chirrut heard soldiers closing. He swung, knocking the first one to the ground. They were still most likely going to die, he knew. But at least they would die together, and for a cause worth fighting for.

K2 was making calculations, playing out scenarios as he slowly, over the space of agonizing microseconds, shut down. None of them were possible, of course. Fantasizing ways for Cassian to live. One impossible scenario after another. Then, two unexpected things occurred. The first was in the data stream that had just been sent to the rebels. A tiny thing, a second plan by a father desperate to protect his daughter from a supremely unlikely threat. A threat she was about to die from. He didn’t like her, she had caused all this, but he still sent the signal. Maybe it would work, and marginally increased the odds of Cassian’s survival. The second, he had to speed up his perceptions for. More blaster fire even though he was already disabled. One of the Imperials fell next to him. He had to admit it gave him a feeling like pleasure. It was probably due to the damage in his cognitive circuits. He heard them speaking before shutting down completely. “What, the droid, too?” “Those are our orders. It’s mostly intact, but get all the parts you can find back to the ship. And hurry.”

Bodhi couldn’t reach the grenade in time, but he had the ship’s guts exposed in front of him. In desperation, he slapped some of the wiring together, and the thrusters roared to life, tilting the ship, almost flipping it over. The soldier that had thrown the grenade registered with shock that it bounced back out of the ship, just as it exploded. The ship crashed back to the ground hard enough that he knew he was going to bruise from slamming into the floor, but he didn’t think anything was broken. Well, no more broken, anyway. He was sure the blast and the fall had damaged the ship enough to make it unusable, though. He’d known he wasn’t going to make it, but he ran from the ship, keeping his head down as best he could. Surviving was a habit he wasn’t going to break until it was broken for him.

Raddus looked down at the message. They had an unknown benefactor, or so they would have him believe. There was no point in not taking precautions, though. He chose a heading at random and had the flagship brought around. No transmission, no message that might be intercepted and deciphered. The fleet knew what to do without orders. Survival often depended on it. The new calculations were made. He would wait as long as he could, but they were ready for whatever happened next.

They staggered out of the tower. Jyn was almost carrying him, in spite of being exhausted, herself. The metal moon overhead made it all pointless, but she wasn’t going to stop trying, he knew. Was it admirable, or insane? He’d lived his life in a state of desperation, fighting for the barest scraps of hope, even as what he had to do for them slowly destroyed him. He wasn’t going to tell her to do anything else. Soon, the battle station would fire, though. He had no doubt Tarkin would destroy this place to keep his secrets. He thought they wouldn’t have to wait for it as he heard the ship’s engines, waited for the blaster fire to erase them. Then, it spun, and landed in front of them. Jyn saw who was on board. “Gerrera?” “Yes! Get on! We don’t have time!” Just as shocked, Cassian said, “How are you alive?” “I’ve been doing this a long time! Now, get on!” Jyn was saying, as they went up the ramp as quickly as they could, “You ran?” “Of course I ran! And now I’m saving you!” He strapped himself in. “What? Couldn’t you trust me?” “I don’t trust anyone! It’s why I’m still alive!” She couldn’t argue with that, and dragged Cassian aboard. Gerrera made a gesture to the pilot and the ship lifted off. It wouldn’t matter. They were too low. Once that thing fired, it was still over.

“You may fire when ready.” The weapon was powered, though at a mere fraction of its capacity. Hundreds of the crystals would have been drained and need to be replaced. A small price to pay, Tarkin believed. He smiled, the smile of a man who knew the power at his command and enjoyed exercising it. Then, one of his people turned to him and said, “Sir, the weapon won’t fire!” He forced himself to remain calm. “Explain this.” “The computers won’t allow us to finish the sequence! And they are speaking!” Hoping it wasn’t a countdown, he said, “Play it for me.” As the speakers came on, it was just, two sentences, three words each, over and over again. Six words that had disabled the most powerful battle station the galaxy had ever seen. A father’s voice, saying, “Stardust is here. Do not fire.”

Somehow, the small ship had reached the upper atmosphere and the rebel fleet. Jyn looked around the cabin. Counting the soldiers she had convinced to go on this suicide mission. Chirrut smiled at her, a bit weakly. Baze had his arm around him, and scowled at her for their injuries, but still seemed relieved to see her. Bodhi was calling back from the pilot’s chair that they were about to make the jump to light speed. K2 didn’t look good. Hopefully he could be repaired. He’d probably be surprised that she thought that. Cassian was sitting right next to her, looking relieved. There were over a dozen other rebels she hadn’t had the time to learn the names of. She had to make sure she did if they lived through this.

Vader stood on the bridge. The trap had been sprung, and none of the rebel fleet would escape. By now, Tarkin would have destroyed all trace of the project, he was sure. They emerged from hyperspace, only to see the enemy fleet jump away on alternative course, one pre-planned and random. They had been warned. The installation was still intact, not obliterated as he’d expected. There was a signal coming from the planet. It seemed Krennic had also lived. For now. He turned to his troops and ordered, “Send troops to the planet, and to the Death Star. I want Tarkin and Krennic here. Someone must answer for this failure.”

Rogue One had done its part. No one was asked to fight for the Rebellion again. Some did, of course. Chirrut stayed with the Rebellion, helping the youngsters learn the history of the Jedi, so much of which was lost. Baze stayed at his side. What the Force had brought together, nothing would part. Cassian left, though. He had seen and done too much and needed the time to heal. Years later, the fighting over, he returned, and joined the new Senate. Hoping that his experiences would help them to be better than they had been, or than he had been. K2 was repaired and remained with Cassian, though more as an adviser than a bodyguard. Perhaps it was the damage, perhaps he just was well past the time for a memory flush, but he had stopped taking the orders of anyone but himself. Some might call him a “droid rights advocate”. He thought they were stupid. Jyn stayed with the rebels, and rebelled. She did eventually learn all of their names, because as risky as her life was, there was time, now. Bodhi still suffered from the probes and the interrogations, but eventually recovered as best he could. He became one of the best pilots in the Rebellion, running supplies, and, when necessary, fighting. His was one of the few ships to survive the battle over the Death Star, and while he wasn’t the one that fired the fateful shot, he was satisfied to be present as it was destroyed. He took holos to share with his friends. It was a good day.

[goddamnmuses-a]

Dan Watches: Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope

Alright so I did this for Episode I which you can find here and then Episode II which you can find here and then Episode III which you can find here. So here’s my weird live reaction/note taking/whatever this is.. to Episode lV.

I remember this being my favourite of the original trilogy because it sets everything up and basically kick started everything but lets see if that changes when i’ve finally got through all of these. 

Also I’m just watching whatever version i can find online because I can’t be bothered to go and find my dvd of it so yeah.. whether we get weird updated version or original effects or whatever, who knows. 

All the old effects like how C3p0 looks and r2d2 are impressive. 

There wasn’t really anything in the opening crawl i felt like commenting on, no big THEY DID THAT IN THE OPENING? but i guess it’s the first one that came out so that makes sense. 

WTF did the stormtroopers use to get that door open, that was so explosive wtf.

Also the blasters are like set to 10000 and smoke is everywhere. 

How did nobody shoot the dorids?

Yooo little Ani nice suit my dude. 

Hold on, she sent a msg with r2 to go to Obiwan which for 1 howd she know he’s alive? I’m gonna presume her dad said or something and 2.. ..why not just.. go yourself? 

So when they’re set to stun a Stormtrooper can shoot someone no problem

Also we dont get enough stun weird circle blaster shots

Ohhhh she didnt go because the scan for lifeforms thing alright ill allow it

but my dude.. even so.. maybe just shoot it just in case? like.. droids exist and people know about them?

DARTH VADERS LITTLE HANDS ON HIPS! Omfg he’s like “God damn, this bitch again.”

This Vader is a sassy boy. 

I love this guy who works with Vader and doesnt mind chatting back to him. 

Loving the droids in the desert. 

R2 does not look like it would work in a desert. 

C3 like “He tricked me into going this way” stop being a lil bich. 

WOOTINI!

The crawler thingy is badass. 

I thought that was a magnet it was just a big sucky pipe. 

GONK

Oh yep theres the new effects. 

Droids sleep? I guess power saver mode. 

Wtf is that dome droid

Luke! Luuuuuke! Iconic 2 words there. Well reused for that episode of Rebels where Obiwan watches from a distance. 

Bocce.. what a classic language. 

OMG OWEN JUST LET HIM GO INTO TOSHE STATION TO PICK UP SOME POWER CONVERTERS JEEEEZ 

How is that “wasting time with friends” and not chores, going into town to get something sounds like a chore to me. 

Why did they get an atromech anyway? Like.. what’d they need the other droid for? 

C3 is a real bro lbh, if it wasn’t for him, R2 would be with the jawa still. 

Oooh oil bath. sexy. 

I wonder if people ship R2 and C3 because tbh it makes sense to me. 

Luke got an erection at the mention of the rebellion. 

Now it’s getting harder at that random blurry image of his sister. 

R2 is a cheeky lil shit. 

This is just some good home life shit. 

Dat soundtrack. 

You know what.. it’s a really nice home. 

Is it just me or is Owen dressed kinda Jedi-y. 

So is “Sand People” like the racist way to say “Tusken Raider”?

Obiwan, thats a ridiculous fucking noise. 

“Hello There” iconic. 

You know what the Prequels do add a lot to this. 

A young Jedi named Darth Vader.. im sorry.. thats just not a name. 

For someone who wants to get off the planet, Lukes like “Naa but i gotta get home”

Obiwan also just being like “You know what, fuck it here.. lets go.”

You know what as much of a bitch as that guy who gets force choked is, he’s a good actor. 

Also Tarkin yay. 

NOOOOO OWEN AND BERU! YOU BASTARDS!

I feel like he should have dropped to his knees or something there. 

That is a scary droid. 

Cool door close. 

Thats a weird ass CG droid with a hole in. 

None of the other storm troopers gonna wonder why Dave’s being weird? 

Wahey! Figrin Dan and the Model Nodes! Love that Jizz music. 

Who just ugs on the back of a bartenders shirt? Wtf Luke

Yo he didnt even pay for his drink, free drinks?

Who gets the death sentance in 12 systems and goes around bragging? 

The first arm cut off and theres all sortsw of blood which there shouldnt be because lightsabers cauterize the wound, tut tut. 

Gooood scene with Han and Obi, honestly i keep forgetting to comment because im just watching xD

Wahey! Greedo 

If we’re doing a han shot first thing.. Greedo shot first in this version and missed and then Han shot him but tbh i prefer the Han shot first.. makes him more interesting. 

Jabba looks smaller. 

Casual Boba Fett appearance. 

Yooo Poncho. My boy Cal approves. 

Fuck those weird long nose aliens. 

The Falcon looks so good. 

Get those poor guys by the Death Star laser a damn rail. 

We just cool with igniting the lightsaber in front of Han and Chewie? Chewie at least knows wtf it is.

Chewie is a badass. 

Let the Wookie win. 

WTF that isnt the lightspeed effect.. it’s like a weird blanket tunnel 

The fact they get onto the Death Star with no issue is kind of ridiculous. 

The motion of Darth Vader is kinda just.. not fitting right. 

Han just pat Chewie like hes a dog. Rude. 

Han just gets caught up in this without a choice rly. 

He just wants those sweet credits. 

Also Set Design on Star Wars is amazing. 

Leia just lounging all sexy like 

Also does she have a stain on her tit? .. Not that im looking >.>

The Jedi being called a religion is kinda weird but i guess accurate. 

This has to be the worst star to a friendship for all three of them. Chewie seems cool though. 

I also thought the trash compactor scene was earlier on in this movie than it is. 

Who the fucks voice was it that said “Thats your imagination” ? 

How the fuck are they standing if the water is that deep?

I liek the touch of the monster whos name im sure i learnt but forgot let go as if it knew the trash compactor was about to turn on, that implies it has a safe spot down there that it stays. 

Some of the voices sound off on this but ah well 

Hans already a little Handsy with Leia but i think Harrison Ford was sleeping with Carie at the time so like.. i get it. 

Obiwan just strolling about, as you do. 

I love just these giant pits with walkways with no rails. If I worked on the Death Star it’d be a nightmare for me to get around. 

“NO WAIT THEY’LL HEAR!” ...and they’re not gonna hear you shouting?

Stormtroopers just shooting the shit is the best. 

You know what with everyone being like “Wow that ships a shitheap.” I can understand why the prequels made their ships look nicer and newer. 

I love that shooting a door panel in star wars just makes it so the doors wont open at all, thats some good shit. 

Lukes as bad of a shot as a Stormtrooper. 

First little kissy incesty moment but hey it was on the cheek, universally thats fine but im sure at the time this was him setting up that Luke and Leia were gonna end up together, before he decided they were siblings. 

Vader just standing there, lightsaber already out like “Ahhh Mr.Kenobi I’ve been expecting you”

As lack luster as the chroeography is in this fight im kinda thinking of it as like, they’re reading each other, like Obiwan and Maul’s final fight. 

I don’t really know why Obiwan just chooses to die like that but heyo. 

Vader stomping on Obiwans clothes? Why? I guess because he gave himself to the force and thats the first time he’s seen that? 

I love the gunner seats moving around, idk why i just love it. 

Whats the point of the ear peices if they’re just gonna shout at each other. 

Not mentioned it until now but everyone says Leia wrong. 

They’re really harsh to Han tbf

This is like if you got an Uber to a place and then the Uber driver got pulled into a police station because you’re a terrorist and then you have a go at the Uber driver for wanting to leave after he’s got you out of there. 

Another kiss for Luke.. .. okay

I like how Biggs earlier scenes are deleted so when he shows up it’s just this random dude who somehow knows Luke

That air traffic control guy has no idea what hes doing, nobody is even in the air yet or moving, wait. 

Man X wings are cool, makes me think of Battlefronts VR mission thing where you get to pilot one and it’s the coolest VR thing ive done. 

For a space station the size of a moon you’d think they’d have enough fighters to just wipe out the rebels no biggy. 

ALSO if they know the rebel base is on that planet, why not just blow that planet up? 

YAY WEDGE

The targetting computer seems very invasive. 

Those turrets are useless. 

I would have rated it if they let that random dude blow up the Death Star.

Tarkins thinking face is beautiful. What a man, 

If Luke missed this shot, everyone knows he’s turned his targetting computer off, so they would be PISSED

RIP R2. 

HWHAT!? 

Woooo Mr.Solo. 

Well.. Well done Luke you killed a lot of people, some just trying to do a job and live their lives. 

Han, Leia and Luke all went off together all holding each other.. like.. Threesome? 

I’m sorry but after that, someones doing some fucking. 

Leia just giving her lovers, dont @ me, a medal. Thats why Chewie doesnt get one, he wasnt there for the orgy. 

R2 looking fresh. 

You know what, that is a good complete story that actually works on its own, i appreaciate that. 10/10. :P

[polterbeist]

So in a world where they both are as obsessed with Star Wars as I am, Bucky and Tony get into an argument about who’s more like Anakin when Tony starts listing off who on the team is which Star Wars character.

“You know you literally have a metal arm, right? And you fought in a war against the dark side.”

“Both of those things also apply to Luke, dummy.”

“Well, you didn’t let me finish.”

“Besides, Anakin’s a pilot, and a mechanic, and he figured out he had the force on some random sandy planet in the middle of nowhere -”

“Yeah, where he was a slave! Huh! And that’s another thing, when Ani did turn dark side, it was because Palpatine locked him into service by using the force to manipulate him, send him traumatic visions, and taking away everything else he ever loved. He even fought to kill his best friend, but failed! The same best friend who refused to fight him years later! The parallels are beautiful!”

“Would you shut up? That’s not... That isn’t the same thing. Kenobi was Skywalker’s master, a master who’d lied to him and used him as a weapon in the war. Know anybody like that?”

“Okay, don’t insult my babe, Obi-Wan, by comparing him to Stane. That’s going too far. He was trying his best, and he told Anakin not to follow him.”

“Whatever, we can argue about the Deception Arc later. Besides, Anakin was the Jedi’s greatest general, and he was constantly saving everybody by sacrificing himself for the cause. Who does that remind you of, Mr. I-Flew-A-Nuke-Through-A-Space-Portal-To-Save-New-York-City?”

“Okay, first, um, source? When does Anakin sacrifice himself for the greater good again?”

“Tony, I know you’ve seen Clone Wars - you’re the one who made me watch it. I know you remember Anakin trying to use his own ship to divert the enemy’s attention to protect that planet. You kept interrupting to complain about how well he and Tarkin got along.”

“Fine, point ceded. Second, source again, for me. It’s your word against mine, that I wasn’t totally flying that nuke into a portal for the street cred. Completely selfish.”

“Tony.”

“Anyway, you would’ve done the same thing, Buckaroo, so it doesn’t matter.”

“Well, what about the plucky young apprentice that teaches him how to be responsible? Kind of reminiscent of Parker, don’t you think?”

“Wha... What? This isn’t ‘who has the most relationships reminiscent of Anakin Skywalker’s’, it’s ‘who’s the most similar to Anakin Skywalker’!”

“Oh, now, you’re just being an ass!”

“Even if it was allowed, which it isn’t, Parker and I are nothing in comparison to you and Steve. Kenobi and Skywalker, reuniting in the force, long after their time?”

“You know what? I’m ending this here. Somebody replaced parts of your body with machines after you got hurt on the battlefield, and you survived to run around in a metal suit tossing lasers in everybody’s faces.”

“I don’t like your tone. This is a very serious line of inquiry, you know?”

“Oh, trust me, doll. I’m taking this very seriously.”

[emeraldspiral]

Initial thoughts after just getting out of Solo

Loved it. WAY better than Rogue One. As I’ve said before, premise < execution. Was this a story that was wanted or needed? No. Was it a coherent story with compelling characters whose fates you can get invested in? Absolutely.

There were loads of characters in Solo, but every one of them was more memorable than the entire cast of Rogue One put together.

There was also a lot of name-dropping so-and-so who works for the what’s-their-name crew on random planet IV who are in the midst of a turf war with the something-something syndicate, but it’s still easy enough to follow on a first-time viewing.

I fucking love that the Imperial March is a canonical musical composition that exists in the Star Wars universe and they use it in army recruitment ads. Now all they need is a bunch of PSAs for the kids at the Imperial Academy staring Darth Vader talking about physical fitness and getting detention and having your time wasted by disappointing end-credits scenes.

Starts out insanely fast paced but it does still give you breathing room between big action set-pieces to have nice character moments.

I do feel like it was kind of a cheat that we just completely skipped over the training Han went through to become such a great pilot. It’s the thing he’s best known for and constantly referenced throughout the film, yet we go straight from him signing up to having already been kicked out and moved to infantry. Like, why couldn’t he have just run into Beckett and crew while still part of the flight academy?

The four-armed guy totally reminds me of Rocket Raccoon.

The film overall gives off strong Guardians of the Galaxy vibes, what with everyone being morally gray outlaws who can’t decide whether they love or hate each other.

Donald Glover is perfect as Lando.

I love that there was a non-humanoid robot x human element and that the non-human robot actually had the line “I can’t do it when you’re watching”. I feel like they did that just for me.

I also really liked that they explain that Lando pronounces Han’s name weird in Empire on purpose to annoy Han. Now I want a Leia stand-alone that makes it canon that she does that faux-British accent to mock Tarkin and other Imperials and Tarkin calls her “Lee-a” to get her back for it.

Gorgeous costumes are gorgeous.

Qi’ra may not be a Jedi, but she still had some of the sweetest melee combat moves I’ve seen in a Star Wars film.

I wish they hadn’t pussied out on telling us what she did though. Could’ve had a really powerful scene where she actually said something that would make Han, and the audience, look at her differently. Like, if she personally had gone around cutting the tongues off of men, women, and children who tried to stand up to her boss.

When Enfys revealed herself I totally thought she was Beckett’s daughter cause she looked black but she had light skin and red hair. She totally could’ve been his and Val’s kid. But then it turned out the twist was just that Samus Is A Girl and also a good guy.

But then there was a way bigger twist, which I’m honestly quite shocked they actually did. Cause like, general audiences don’t know that Darth Maul’s been alive and kicking in expanded universe canon for years. So I’m sure that left a lot of people scratching their heads, if they even remember how The Phantom Menace ended 19 goddamned years ago. Also if they, like me, forgot that he had like 2 lines in that movie and spent those last 19 years thinking his character was mute.

For a moment I was confused why they left that loose thread hanging with Qi’ra being alive and Han just walking away and not hesitating to chase after the next strong-willed brunette to come into his life, and I thought it was weird and egregious to throw in Darth Maul at the last minute and say that Qi’ra would be “working closely” with him. But I’m onto them now. This is just like Thanos at the end of Avengers 1. They threw him in there not just as an egregious cameo to make fanboys jizz in their pants. They’re setting up the Obi Wan movie.

[absolxguardian]

Rey Palpatine Theory

Now the problem with a lot of Rey parentage theories is they can’t present a good reason why she would be on Jakku of all places. You know, the site of a battle and really just a really bad dead-end planet, worse than Tatooine, and even then Luke was left in the care of his aunt and uncle, not a scrapper like Unkar.

Well, there is one theory that answers that, and even hinges on it. Rey Palpatine. All because of Palpatine’s contingency plan.

So for those of you who don’t know Palpatine’s contingency plan, it is in the case of his and Vader’s death:

However, one thing is off about this plan. Palpatine believed in a Sith Empire as much as he believed in a Galactic Empire and well, Rax wasn’t force sensitive.

A scorched earth policy on several planets, called operation Cinder(you might know that from Battlefront 2)

A series of tests to gather the best and most loyal remaining members of empire led by an orphan on Jakku Palpatine groomed named Gallius Rax.

After choosing who is worthy out of the empire that failed their emperor, as much of the empire as possible should make a final stand on Jakku, an out of the way planet with a building called The Observatory on it. (There were several, but this one was important for the contingency)  This building contained information about paths through the unknown regions and presumably instructions for creating the first order.

However, one thing is off about this plan. Palpatine believed in a Sith Empire as much as he believed in a Galactic Empire and well, Rax wasn’t force sensitive.

But what if there was a reason? What if Rax wasn’t his only heir? What if the Jakku Observatory contained more than unknown regions maps, a replica of the emperor’s yacht, and a Sith thingie to blow up Jakku. A child, created by the force, to be the heir of the Sith Empire.

The thing is, the contingency plan didn’t fully work. Rax was killed by Rae Sloane and she was the one who led the first order. And she didn’t know the whole plan. What if part of the plan was that there was a child, grown part through cloning tech, genetic manipulation, and force/Sith magic? Galius has hidden information in his POV before, so it makes sense to hide the existence of a Sith heir from the reader. But how did Rey come into the possession of Unkar? Well, there were most likely many or at least a few stormtroopers and other low ranking imperials who survived Jakku and stopped fighting. Not every imperial was a zealot. We already saw this in the Poe Dameron comic with Terex and Corlac. And with both Ciena and Admiral Veriso calling an evacuation of their ships before crashing it, many escape pods could have landed all over Jakku. And that’s only counting the ships we know had time for people to get to. And that’s who Rey’s “parents” are. They could have come from the Inflictor somewhere else, been stormtroopers or officers. That part doesn’t matter. What matters is that they shed their allegiance to the empire, were desperate, and were left on Jakku after the battle. Or they could have even been people who were already stranded on Jakku. Whomever they are, all that matters, is that years after the battle they found the Observatory.

And there they found Rey in stasis. They released her and since the child had no memories but a blank developed mind, she naturally bonded to her rescuers. Eventually, they reached Niima outpost and met Unkar. Desperate to get off planet, they traded their “child” and possibly some relics from the observatory to get off planet.*

Sounds a bit far-fetched? Well, if we use the criteria from MatPat’s Rey parents theory, I can answer each of them, most importantly the left on Jakku part. Those criteria were:

1. British/Core World accent 2. Strong connection to the force 3. Luke/Anakin’s lightsaber calling to her 4. Good piloting skills 5. Left on Jakku as a child 6. Thematic meaning/“It’s like poetry, it rhymes” In addition, I will also apply my theory to a few key scenes:

Kylo’s reaction when he first hears of her Rey’s flashback Kylo’s “you still want to kill me?” line Rey’s ability to use a mind trick untrained The Leia-Rey hug Some lines from trailers The Chosen One Prophecy 

So let’s begin. First the core world accent. A lot of people have used this as evidence for Rey Kenobi, however, accents are barely genetic. And a lot of people including Phasma and probably Tarkin changed their accents to seem more respected and from a core world(rather than post-apocalyptic and outer rim)

MatPat’s point about her picking it up from Unkar stands, but if the first words Rey heard were imperials, who odds are adopted core accents, that could also explain how she picked it up. And strong connection to the force? Palpatine would have made his clone-child extremely powerful with the force, as powerful as he could make her. So that’s pretty much covered. Also, her main displays of force powers were from the dark side. The pushing back on Kylo’s mental connection and use of a mind trick were both motivated by fear. Being able to hold her own against Kylo could be the force assisting her via the dark side. And as we saw from Ezra in season 1 of Rebels, the dark side is much easier to call on than the light. As for Anakin’s lightsaber calling for her, that doesn’t even have to do with familiar relation. The inquisitor’s kybers called to Ashoka and they most certainly aren’t related. And a green kyber crystal called to a random Tusken Raider when she was asked to steal it from the Jawa’s that sold R2. That was a really weird story and I wonder if it was setting something up, but it doesn’t matter. It’s canon. The kyber crystal in the saber or the force in general was calling Rey. Because it chose her. Because kyber crystals are basically wands from Harry Potter. And her piloting skills? That could easily be explained by a combination of force boosted instincts/reaction time and well, practice. She did know all of that stuff from using an old flight simulator. And the point about piloting skills could be used just as well to make her the child of Thane as it points to Han or Luke on its own. There’s a lot of really exceptional pilots in the galaxy. As for being left on Jakku, I guess I should explain the timeline better. According to the TFA script, she is 19 in 34 ABY(when the movie takes place). And she looks to be about 4 during the flashback scene of her being left with Unkar. At first, that doesn’t seem to add up, but Palpatine would have set his child into a non-aging stasis after they reached a reasonable age for starting dark side training and feeling into the Unknown Regions. If the Empire survived much longer than it did, the contingency plan using an adult with no memories would be weird. Heck, after reaching 4, she could have been moved to carbonite (do people age in carbonite? I’m not sure if that’s been answered. It’s not important). Terex and Corlac seem to have been on Jakku for a while, so Rey’s “parents” could also have, surviving as scavengers before finding the Observatory. This would also give enough time for the scavenging economy to get properly set up, as Niima Outpost was only founded after the battle of Jakku. 11 years would have been enough time that a low-quality ship from Unkar could actually be purchased. And for thematic meaning. Well, we got that down. We got Kylo, the child of two rebellion war heroes, trained as a Jedi having turned to the dark side. And we have a child, who grew up in a situation even worse than Anakin, who was literally created to be the next emperor who chose the light. This would fit with Star War’s strong themes of personal choice and growing beyond heritage. It would also fit with the newer themes of the force not being so black and white. And without the Aftermath series, Rey’s parentage could easily be explained as “Palpatine had a contingency plan that ended with a final battle on Jakku. The man the emperor choose to lead the soon to be first order died on Jakku and so the plan couldn’t probably be carried out. That including retreating to the unknown regions with a clone-child created by the force who would be raised to be the next emperor.” And for readers of Aftermath, it would strengthen already existing parallels. Those between Rey and Gallius Rax. We got Rax, who even before being groomed by Palpatine was very cruel and did what he had to for survival on Jakku. And then Rey, who is basically the child of evil, who remained kind in a cruel environment. And then both of them ended up on ships off Jakku and were found by their original owners (Han and Palpatine). Upon finding the orphans, both owners preformed mentor like roles. The ships also brought them into the organization they would become a vital member of. Rey also didn’t want to leave Jakku, while that was one of Rax’s only wishes. And for Rax, well the desert planet became his grave. Now that we got all of those points squared away, what about those scenes I promised to explain? Alright, let’s start with when Kylo first finds out about Rey. As MatPat pointed out, his reaction is much too violent for having never heard of Rey. Well since Palpatine was in magic sith force communication to what we can assume to be Snoke, it is possible Snoke knew of the contingency plan, including of Rey.

Later when Kylo joined the First Order, he would have been informed of the failure to properly carry out the plan. Of course as far as they knew, Rey would still be stuck in the Observatory in stasis and not worth extracting. As for Rey’s flashback, a lot of the scenes she saw would have came from the force or from reading the history of the object, but even that is indicative of powerful force abilities. However, the scene we know is either memory brought to the surface or unlocked by the sequence is when Rey has just been sold to Unkar in exchange for a ship, the very one we see flying off. The imperials would have been the only humanoids and comfort she would have known at this point, explaining her reaction to being abandoned even if they were ambivalent to her. The reason Rey thinks they are her parents is because that was probably the lie they told Unkar to explain where they obtained a literal child, or what Unkar told her. To the scrapper, they seemed as people so desperate to leave after the battle, they would sell their child.   As for Kylo’s line “you still want to kill me” witch MatPat took to mean Kylo knew Rey from before, there’s another way to read this line that supports my theory. The “still” part refers to their encounter on Takodona, when Rey tried to shoot him. Because he knows or suspects Rey is Palpatine’s heir he expects it to be easy to turn her to the dark side. This is also why he says she needs a teacher, because he sees her as similar to him, the descendant of a Sith Lord. As for the mind trick, my other points about Rey’s artificially created power stands, but I feel like I should specifically address this. Palpatine was extremely adept with mind tricks. In Lords of the Sith, he manages to control a Twi'lek child so well she would stand there as Palpatine and Vader argued over killing her, their lightsabers in front of her face. This pales in comparison to the suggestion Rey manages to pull of in a moment of extreme stress and fear. And since Rey was only supposed to be awakened after his death, the emperor wouldn’t mind making her more powerful than him if she was fully trained. As for the Rey Leia hug, I don’t have that good of an explanation, but neither do Rey Solo-Organa theorists. You’re not going to be able to recognize someone you only knew as a child a minimum of 20 years ago as a child. All I could think of is that since Leia’s untrained force skill (Ashoka book tells us every untrained force sensitive has one skill their sensitivity manifests as) is sensing (sensed Luke hanging from cloud city and Han’s death) is that she could sense the dark side coming off of Rey and from knowing Chewie isn’t a fan of being comforted, she decided that Rey was the one who need comforting. And the aura of darkness coming from Rey would be part her predisposition and part the anger and rage towards Kylo for killing Han and possibly Finn. Ok now how about some lines from the trailers? Well first we got Luke’s “I’ve see this raw strength only once before” line is most likely about Kylo, however it is referring to Rey because she’s so damn strong with the force. Don’t forget the trailer has a scene where she cracks open the ground, to Luke’s shock and horror. As for Snoke saying “Fulfil your destiny” that’s probably to Rey, and under this theory, it’s because he still sees her as meant to join the dark side, because that’s what she was created for. Alright, now for chosen one stuff. Well we know 2 things about the prophecy: 1. The chosen one is created through the force (technically midichlorians but it’s better if we all forget those exist) and 2. Will bring balance to the force. Now with the new narrative angle about the balance of the force being much more literal, with things like Bendu, Rey reaching out for “something else” may signify she is the chosen one. Of course that’s if the prophecy is real. And if you follow the theory that it was by force magic that Anakin was created by Palpatine, it just means it’s possible for Palpatine to make another force child. And with an increase access to lore after becoming emperor it’s reasonable he could create a force child with no human parent at all. I hope this theory actually makes internal sense and there’s no thing from the eu that could ruin this theory. Or maybe there’s something that could enhance it. All I could think that I haven’t read that could apply is Rey’s Survival Guide, the full tfa novelization, and the visual dictionary for Tfa. Thanks to @lj-writes for checking this theory before I posted it and pointing out the script says Rey is 19. I guess we’ll find out if this works or not on the 15th

*@lj-writes also states that it might not be possible for a ship to be purchased with a child and some scrap, especially since Unkar wouldn’t see the value of sith artifacts. She states that it is possible that the “parents” sold Rey as “look at this child we found in the observatory, she’s probably magic or something.” And then when Rey didn’t show an obvious signs of power, she was put to work as a scavenger. Unkar simply hasn’t told Rey because he’s too embarrassed at seemingly being conned, so Rey simply thinks they’re her biological parents and left her.

[javen-tiger]

I just saw Rouge One again and this time I have THOUGHTS (really really disorganised thoughts)

- First time I saw it I was all why does this man have vaporaters?? he clearly lives on a planet with sufficient water. I’m still confused tbh - obvs they’re there because they’re the universal signifier for Star Wars Farm, but in-universe maybe it’s more efficient to vaporate than to pipe it from somewhere - also I didn’t notice that those patches of green in front of his house were fields the first time I watched it - I wonder what the significance of having the confrontation in the field is?? Is it because the empire callously tramples over Galen’s life, over all he has struggled to create, just as they trample his hardwrought crops? Is it because this is a turning point, a new beginning in the story, just as life springs anew from the earth (from seeds planted before, oooo)?? - overall I really like this biome though. it’s nice. - I really liked how his wife is all ‘fuck you imps’ hell yeah this family is equally passionate about the rebellion, I like that - also Jyn’s stormtrooper toy :) we all need the baddies in our sets :))) - I get that Jyn had to watch to make sure the troopers left & probably couldn’t risk the noise of moving. but hell I would have gone straight down into that thing, FUCK - how did the stormtroopers not notice the rocks had eyes :/ - the rings of the planet at the start of this scene also look super cool. although lmao I didn’t notice the first time I saw it that there was an IMPERIAL SHUTTLE in the frame of the first shot, which made it kinda cool but v/ disorientating w/o anything to latch onto - have I mentioned that Imperial shuttles are fucjing awesome? I love imperial shuttles ok they’re the second best - a fun fact: the second time I wrote ‘shuttle’ I made the typo ‘shittle’ IMPERIAL SHITTLE EVERYONE

- ok I love love love the look of that trading outpost that’s in the rings of somewhere. I love settings that are ‘the rings of ____’ and are literally set on a bunch of rocks that make up the rings of a planet, it always looks really cool. could aslo be like the space version of islands - this time it’s even cooler because it’s two rocks joined together. although idk how that would work. super strong space infrastructure - Male Lead’s accent 👌 - tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit

- look, I’m trying to do this in vaguely chronological order but whatever - the first time I saw this I didn’t know Tarkin was CGI (i figured they found a cushing look-alike and gave him prosthetics or smth??) and I did not notice at all that he wasn’t real - this time I did know and yeah, I kinda did notice he was just a little little bit not real and I feel like that probably will/does bother some people. I did find myself devoting some of my attention in those scenes just to the fact that Tarkin was CGI - overall though I DO NOT GIVE A SHIT !!! :))))) - TARKIN IS IN THIS MOVIE and I don’t care if it had to look a weeny bit fake for that to happen. - I don’t really mind being remided of the fact that I’m watching a movie, a product of human effort, so little irrealisms don’t bother me too much tbh - Tarkin!! :))))

- Jedah city is really really beautiful - I didn’t notice the first time at all, but honestly it is so lovely - there’s this one shot where we see for just a second, the city peeking over it’s walls - it’s v/ lovely, like a white pearl within a rugged orange shell - I also love the star destroyer (3rd best spaceship) LOOMING over the entire city. Scale. - Does anyone else notice that most of the Star Wars spaceships are either 1) Fucking huge 2) carry like 10 people max or 3) fighters - where’s the inbetween ?? Star Destroyer and Millenium Falcon what goes between that. - also the Imperial Cargo ships look like turtles :) 🐢 - I love how the Jedi had a whole Kyber temple. Like they could’ve just gone and picked some up for their sabres but NO they must have a ~spiritual journey~ and almost die on fucking Ilum - IS THAT THE GUY WITH THE DEATH SENTENCE IN 12 SYSTEMS!? :D I didn’t even realise the first time - I love fanservice so muchhhhhh - I love that .5 second shot of SPACE MARX - I have a lot of questions about the Whills, specifically Donnie Yen - why hasn’t the empire killed Donnie Yen - HE’S JUST OUT THERE BRAZENLY USING THE FORCE ALL THE TIME WHAT THE FUCK - also did Jyn’s mum give her a Kyber necklace? I didn’t realise the first time that it was the same stuff. - well what’s the symbolism of that then. Donnie Yen said something but I forget what it was. Jyn carries at her breast that same thing which destroys worlds. Which her Father used to design a machine to destroy worlds. hmmm. - duplicity - or smth lel idk - i, for one, support Cyborg’s men violently attacking the Empire’s resource train - maybe don’t do it in such populated areas - ah, but the entire operation never leaves a populated area - tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit - to be real though, the first time I saw it I didn’t register the initial line that gave the reasoning for the Star Destroyer (Cyborg’s dudes have been attacking the supply chains or whatever) so when I first saw this I thought it was a bunch of random oppourtunist guys in it for the cash that comes w/ precious Kyber - but then they came arrested Male Lead and Jyn and Donnie Yen and Donnie Yen’s friend - is Donnie Yen’s friend also a whill? does this mean not all whills have the force? is that why the whills are still alive? wouldn’t the empire kill them anyway because they’re reminders of the Jedi? - or does Donnie’s friend have the force and has just lost faith - y'see we don’t know. this is part of a problem I have w/ the film that I’ll talk about at the end - i think i saw at least two (2) girls amongst Cyborg’s people. coulda been more though, I mean, aliens? face coverings? - someone else go have a discourse about how most of Cyborg’s dudes look like the popular conception of a terrorist - though that does change a bit once we get a closeup look at them at their base - I really like the look of the inside of Jedah city - ok, how has the Empire not found and killed Cyborg’s dudes? they live within shouting distance of Jedah city in this really obvious structure carved into the rocks - whatever - there’s a really good shot of a felled and buried Jedi statue earlier on, which is super cool - but also why the fuck are the Jedi buuilding giant statues of themselves aren’t they supposed to be 'austere’ or whatever - they had giant statues of themselves in their own temple so whatever. I guess this is from their other temple, the Kyber temple - I love how a centre of civilisation seems to have sprung up around the Jedi temple, as if they know the Jedi there will keep them safe - but the Jedi are gone and it became their doom that they ever had anything to do with them :))))))) - the effects of that horizon ripping are too damn good - also a robot saying 'there are shit odds’ before a dude trys to fly through a field of rapidly moving rocks? I know this formula 😏 - I take major issue with the Pilot going crazy, being crazy for one scene, and then not being crazy at all afterwards. - narratively it makes no sense to have that plot point in the first place if you aren’t going anywhere with it, and it seems a bit callous for him to just 'get better’

- I love how Tarkin is all 'i’m transferring command to me’ - WHITE IMPERIAL IS IN DANGER OF HIS BOSS TAKING THE CREDIT FOR HIS WORK - the empire is really just any other office workplace :) beaurocracy :) - wasn’t anakin’s dictatorship supposed to get rid of this :) remember that whole arc of clone wars tarkin and anakin spent bonding over a mutual predeliction towards fascism :) - it was a lie anakin :) depose the emperor :) - rule the universe with luke, as father and son :)

- I CAN’T BELEIVE ANAKIN LIVES ON A FUCKING LAVA PLANET IN A LAVA CASTLE WITH A LAVA WATERFALL - fuck will his drama never end - exactly how much of his time does Darth spend in his glorified bacta tank? - that shot where darth vader’s shadow is revealed, swallowing White Imperial with it’s sheer size is mint 👌👌 good film making hot damn 👌👌 establish those power relations nice - DON’T CHOKE ON YOUR ASPIRATIONS - the sickest double pun ever know to man

- soundtrack: there is one theme in the soundtrack that I really like until the next note happens - it’s the beggining and swell of the music when the title comes on - I like it until the next note after the swell, which never does it for me at any point in the film

- I really enjoy the fact that Mon Mothma exists - she is Good - also Bail Organa

- ok so they piss off to the Rainy Planet which I think is a really cool biome. It’s nice, my mum hated it with a passion, we had to drive home in the dark while it was raining :) - I actually kinda love how this entire act of the movie is a colossal clusterfuck - and Male Lead has to not shoot the guy! (ok i don’t really see the entire logic behind kiling him since the Death Star is already finished, but … whatever?) - anyway … tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit - why is White Imperial shooting the scientists outside in the rain, like, surely it’s more pleasant inside mate - I really love the massive military mistake that happens. The Rebellion ain’t perfect (tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit). - I also like this between Jyn and Male Lead (wherein Male Lead gets some character :)) - before there was some stuff between Cyborg and Jyn about 'the cause’ and Jyn is all 'it’s not a problem if you don’t look up’ which is clearly the Star Wars version of “Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.” which is a Rosa Luxemburg quote (bless Rosa btw) - It’s an understandable position, but a very frustrating one - she says that stuff about having 'the luxury to be political’ which reminds be of ()()()THE PYRAMID OF NEED()()() I was gonna fill this in later but honestly I can’t be bothered, basically it’s the idea that only once you can fulfill your base needs like food and shelter can you even begin to think about other shit - anyway I really like Male Lead’s stuff about 'being in this fight since he was six years old’ and 'you’re not the only one who lost everything, some of us just decided to do something about it’ HELL YEAh fight that evil empire. too right you’re right stop being an apolitcal sook Jyn - what’s Male Lead’s name I feel suddenly fond of him. It’s Cassian, nice. - anyway Jyn takes that to heart, bless her (also motivated by Dad I guess), and delivers her nice 'Rebellions are built on Hope’ bit. Which lmao reminds me of this quote about rebellions being built on despair, actually:

- (look how fucked my dash is i don’t understand) - anyway there’s division in the Rebellion, some of them (the guy from sherlock … anderson?) are scared it’s understandable, it’s good, it’s tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit 

- SOME REBELS REBEL and thus begins the third act of the movie - ok, the third act is the best, the absolute best, it’s tense and holds your attention like nothing else and time isn’t real anymore and the first two acts feel like they almost never happened, like they’re some faint background noise - really I think part of that 'faint background noise’ is that the 'tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit’ theme about the Rebellion being flawed, just … goes away. besides the initial rebelion of rebels which kicks the action going the theme disappears - maybe it’s there in spirit since it was some tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit, that actually kickstarted the act.. idk it couldn’t really be there for all of act 3 to happen properly and act 3 is the best so whatever. I guess maybe it’s also there a bit when Cassian shoots White Imperial . maybe - it’s also really noticable in the bit where Cassian brings some guys over to help that they are all dudes. - Like I give Star Wars a pass on this mostly actually because they gotta maintain continuity with the seventies, it’s actually quite nice how they end up adding in a bunch of lady pilots etc. (esp. since they cut lady pilots from Return of the Jedi :/ thanks 1983) - idk I just … that was my immediate thought, maybe I’m being silly - even though I give Star Wars a pass I also wouldn’t have minded if they did just make half the rebels women, continuity be damned, I don’t mind being reminded that yes, I am watching a movie ( as i mentioned before).

- Scarrif is such a cool environment. Ok I love it. I also love the shield thing!!! - mind, when the rebels were running through the palms all the palm trees were in straight lines … like … did the empire plant them? - did the empire see some scraggly rainforest and say WE MUST BRING ORDER TO THE GALAXY - or is the empire making money off palm oil on the side??

- NOOO BAIL! DON’T GO BACK TO ALDERAAN?? - when did he say stuff about Obi-Wan and Leia? idk if that was before or what but I dug that. - it was probably a bit before when Mon Mothma (best) said 'war is inevatable’ - ok on that note idk what those other systems were thinking … like … are you gonna overthrow the empire peacefully?

- Except the empire ownes their arses  - The Empire: *commits genocide* Anderson: I respectfully disagree with your opinion on Lasats

- anyway, back to rebelling. Jyn’s Imperial disguise is the number one (1) costume the imps have. it is the best uniform. get and maintain that job for that uniform kids. also I wanna know what exactly it is she’s got on her back. - Cassian is v/ scruffy round the face and I’m surprised none of the othter Imps noticed that he was not regulation. I assume that’s not regulation anyway none of the other officers have face hair - I’m surprised noone noticed it was a different Inspector who went in than came out … but … whatever - ON THE TOPIC OF UNIFORMS - THEY STILL HAVE BOMBADIER HATS IN SPACE - i’m fucking laughing - 'I have an inside job pressing the button that makes the death star fire but i still wear this RIDICULOUS HELMET’ - is this one of those stupid military traditions that just keeps going … like … it’d make sense if you were firing artillery outside I guess?? and recieving fire?? but do they not have an alternative uniform for INSIDE JOBS - both the Rebels and the Empire are guilty of this

- Those explosions were cool as - also i’ve seen this meme too many times:

- idk what else to say other than everything looked really cool. like it was fucking awesome and tense, especially when the Mon Calimari dude showed up

- X-Wings are the best thing. I love X-Wings. I used to have this old X-Wing toy from 197-whatever that I played with at Christmas (it was my dad’s really, and up in Brisbane). Fuck I love X-Wings. Best Plane - I would not get in an X-Wing though. If you get hit in space YOU DIE - A PARACHUTE WILL NOT SAVE YOU YOU WILL DIE fuck that noise - in the background you can hear ’..aptain Antillies’ - WEDGE WEDGE WEDGE WEDGE - did you know I have to start watching Rebels again because I heard Wedge is in it? like once? - unless captain Antillies of Leia’s ship isn’t actually the same person as Wedge, which he wouldn’t be because Vader captured that ship - i’m disappointed - is Antillies a common name in this universe? - it’s cool how Red 5 dies. now Luke can join up :) - that;s a fucked up thing to say whhy am i like this - I looked over at my dad during this bit and he had his hands to his face bless him he was havin’ a good time

- I felt sad when Sassbot died. which is remarkable considering - I did not feel that sad when anyone else died - because most the characters that aren’t Jyn and are in the 'gang’ feel v/ flat to me - like we don’t know much about them or why they’re doing this at all. We don’t even know really why the Pilot defected (Jyn’s dad … spoke to him?) and that’s basically his entire character?? Pilot is kinda sweet and earnest and defected. ok… i guess he’s endearing but I don’t really have a sound motivation here to make me attatched to him - Donnie Yen I guess is motivated because The Force. I felt like he was in this movie just so The Force would be in it. I guess Donnie Yen’s friend goes along because Donnie Yen does and they love each other. I’ll grant that friendship was sold super well, but otherwise who/why are they? Donnie was a Whill who still believes in the force, his friend is a bit disillusioned to all that. This is their character. - THey did do Donnie’s death pretty well though, even though I wasn’t that sad about it I guess. He puts total faith in the Force and if the Force wants him to pull that lever then let it be so, if the force wants him to die then let it be so. - the weird thing is that when Donnie goes out all the rebels are pinned down by super heavy fire, but when his friend runs out he has a long grieving sequence where … he just … doesn’t get shot - no offense but I don’t think the Stormtroopers respect that he is grieving - sometimes I feel bad for stormtroopers bcs they’re just doing their thing having mundane conversations and then get shot. but maybe they shouldn’t have become imps. but maybe they’re conscripts?? tough desicion making, gotta shoot a dude, nasty, grit - Cassian’s a bit better than the others on this front (ignore stormtrooper digression) but still … - eeh maybe i’m just pulling this outta my arse. I did find the characters had a bit more depth the second time through since I paid closer attention to dialouge etc. though.

- I’m genuinely surpriesed the top of the transmissions tower had a railing on the sticky-outy bit. I’m entirely unsurprised it had an unecessary sticky-outy bit. - I’m deeply appreciative of the fact that Jyn and Cassian never kiss, that they just hug it out. Fuck you do not know how much I am glad for that. - bit weirded out by the fact that the Death Star apparently got shitter at aiming?

- the move with the Hammerhead was super cool, but do you know what was cooler? everything involving that transmission - visuals: ace - and just the miraculous hand passing - DARTH VADER HALLWAY SCENE - I was giddy throughout this scene does such a terrific job of being tense and terrifing. - Darth Vader ignites his Sabre and appears in from the dark just slightly further forward than you expected him and damn if that isn’t a) unsettling and b) a wild assertion of power then I don’t know what it is - dude flat out puts a dude ON THE CEILING nice. - “help us help us” changing to “take it take it” is so amazing and desparate as these Rebels realise that nothing, not even their silly bombadier hats, is getting them out of this - and then the guy who took the transmission through the door just barely escapes too. fuck. - AND THEN LEIA GETS IT - LEIA LEIA LEIA - I DID know Leia was CGI the first time but honestly it’s barely noticeable, probably since she has a much smoother face? and fewer lines? - whatever she’s beautiful - I’m sure you’ve seen plenty of posts about the start of ANH in the light of this, how Leia is SO OBVIOUSLY BULSHITTING VADER with her 'im on a mission for the imperial senate’ - reminds me of that scene in Chronicles of Yilmaz VIII: The Outlaw: The Fall of Yilmaz, when Tobian says 'You can’t prove shit’ to the shopkeeper who just accused him of stealing and had security footage of it

- anyway how cool is it that two A New Hope patches have been filled - Leia was at Tatooine for a reason (Obi-Wan) and the Death Star had a glaringly stupid weakness becuase they made a GUY WHO DIDN’T WANNA DO IT MAKE IT - also lmao the empire blew up it’s own records wtf were you thinking Tarkin have fun functioning properly now

[goingnerdyofficial-blog]

SWGOH May Updates

In preparation for May the 4th, the powers that be have done everything they can to keep holotable heroes excited about the latest event. Last week they introduced the newest character in the game, the fan favorite R2-D2 and the event that he will be associated with. In tonight’s update, they continued to outline what changes players can expect to launch as part of the SWGOH May updates. In this post, I will outline what players can expect to see from these updates.

R2-D2’s Legendary Event

So we’ve already done a post about R2 but I wanted to talk about what to expect from the event. There are 7 tiers to this legendary event where players will take their Empire teams and face off against Rebels. You will specifically face Luke, Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Old Ben, and R2. Since this event takes place on the Death Star, it’s meant to be an homage to the original film. The video below shows you what you can expect from the event. NOTE: Turn Meter Reduction is nullified in the final Tier of the event. You may want to lead with Emperor Palpatine, Grand Moff Tarkin, or the new and improved General Veers. You’ll see from the video below that I did well with Darth Zader.

Trooper Updates in Place

All Empire Troopers are all classified as having the “Imperial Trooper” tag. In addition to this tag, many of the troopers got some pretty drastic updates. These updates take these formerly fairly worthless characters and turned them into at the least viable and at best incredibly useful. Snowtrooper, Magmatrooper, and Stormtrooper have been completely reworked. The basics of each have become more powerful, with the first two having increased damage added to their maxed basic and the third exposing anyone that doesn’t suffer a critical hit. And this is not where the changes end. For more information on the adjusted imperial abilities, check out the Star Wars Galaxy of Heroes Forums. In a brilliant way to make more money, Imperial Trooper packs are available in the Shop for 19.99 per character. Players who buy these packs get 80 character shards and enough gear and ability mats to level their characters to Gear 5 and level 3 in the each ability. There is also a Power-up Bundle available with multiple Imperial Characters, gear, and mats. This bundle is 59.99 and not worth it for those who already have 1 or more of the characters in the pack maxed out.

Ship Updates

You may have noticed that you can now see the pilots of ships react to actions they take during the battle. Also, it’s easier to see which ships have target lock as the abilities which perform the debuff are now clearly marked with its symbol. This is a nice change if you are like me and forget which ships have the ability and which don’t.

Crystal Sale!!!!

Crystals are on sale until May 12th. If you have ever planned on buying crystals, now is the time. Packs range from as low as 1.99 to 100 bucks. Of course, the more you spend, the more you get. Use prudence when buying these packs and make sure to plan how you are going to spend your crystals.

Event Schedule

Finally, May is going to keep holotable heroes challenged with some much needed and even new events. Daring Droid (The R2 Event) Runs from May 4th until May 10th. Emperor’s Demise Runs from May 11th until May 17th Omega Battles Jakku: May 6th; Requires Nightsisters and Jawas Hoth: May 7th; Requires Scoundrels and First Order Empire: May 20th; Requires Resistance and Clone Troopers Endor: May 21st; Requires Sith and Droids Assault Battles: Military Might: May 13th until May 14th; Requires Rebels and Clones Forest Moon: May 27th until May 28th; Requires Empire and Droids Upcoming Event Series Starts May 25th We don’t know much about this new event. We’ve been told that this new event will have multiple facets to it and incorporate some form of player interaction. In the May 1st release notes, we were told that EA will be launching many new event modes that will keep players interested. Some of these include player level appropriate events and bonus reward events. The player level appropriate events are meant to actually challenge players skill and strategy. Hopefully, we will see these as a difficult addition to the game that really does what it sets out to do. The bonus reward events will be limited time events that add bonus rewards to specific battles and/or tables. While they haven’t said what these rewards will be, I expect that we could see additional crystals, character shards, ship blueprints, and credits. What I am hoping to see is a ship credit heist so that players can start to build out their fleets more effectively. Since the developers have seemingly pushed the ships more in the last few months, I wouldn’t think this is too random an idea.   What do you think about May’s updates and event calendar? Is this anything you are looking forward to specifically? How have you or did you fair in the Daring Droid event? Leave a comment in the section below.   Click to Post

[absolxguardian]

Rey Palpatine Theory

Now the problem with a lot of Rey parentage theories is they can't present a good reason why she would be on Jakku of all places. You know, the site of a battle and really just a really bad dead-end planet, worse than Tatooine, and even then Luke was left in the care of his aunt and uncle, not a scrapper like Unkar.

Well, there is one theory that answers that, and even hinges on it. Rey Palpatine. All because of Palpatine's contingency plan.

So for those of you who don't know Palpatine's contingency plan, it is in the case of his and Vader's death:

However, one thing is off about this plan. Palpatine believed in a Sith Empire as much as he believed in a Galactic Empire and well, Rax wasn't force sensitive. 

A scorched earth policy on several planets, called operation Cinder(you might know that from Battlefront 2)

A series of tests to gather the best and most loyal remaining members of empire led by an orphan on Jakku Palpatine groomed named Gallius Rax.

After choosing who is worthy out of the empire that failed their emperor, as much of the empire as possible should make a final stand on Jakku, an out of the way planet with a building called The Observatory on it. (There were several, but this one was important for the contingency)  This building contained information about paths through the unknown regions and presumably instructions for creating the first order.

However, one thing is off about this plan. Palpatine believed in a Sith Empire as much as he believed in a Galactic Empire and well, Rax wasn't force sensitive. 

But what if there was a reason? What if Rax wasn't his only heir? What if the Jakku Observatory contained more than unknown regions maps, a replica of the emperor's yacht, and a Sith thingie to blow up Jakku. A child, created by the force, to be the heir of the Sith Empire.

The thing is, the contingency plan didn't fully work. Rax was killed by Rae Sloane and she was the one who led the first order. And she didn't know the whole plan. What if part of the plan was that there was a child, grown part through cloning tech, genetic manipulation, and force/Sith magic? Galius has hidden information in his POV before, so it makes sense to hide the existence of a Sith heir from the reader. But how did Rey come into the possession of Unkar? Well, there were most likely many or at least a few stormtroopers and other low ranking imperials who survived Jakku and stopped fighting. Not every imperial was a zealot. We already saw this in the Poe Dameron comic with Terex and Corlac. And with both Ciena and Admiral Veriso calling an evacuation of their ships before crashing it, many escape pods could have landed all over Jakku. And that’s only counting the ships we know had time for people to get to. And that's who Rey's "parents" are. They could have come from the Inflictor somewhere else, been stormtroopers or officers. That part doesn't matter. What matters is that they shed their allegiance to the empire, were desperate, and were left on Jakku after the battle. Or they could have even been people who were already stranded on Jakku. Whomever they are, all that matters, is that years after the battle they found the Observatory.

And there they found Rey in stasis. They released her and since the child had no memories but a blank developed mind, she naturally bonded to her rescuers. Eventually, they reached Niima outpost and met Unkar. Desperate to get off planet, they traded their "child" and possibly some relics from the observatory to get off planet.*

Sounds a bit far-fetched? Well, if we use the criteria from MatPat's Rey parents theory, I can answer each of them, most importantly the left on Jakku part. Those criteria were:

1. British/Core World accent

2. Strong connection to the force

3. Luke/Anakin's lightsaber calling to her

4. Good piloting skills

5. Left on Jakku as a child

6. Thematic meaning/"It's like poetry, it rhymes"

In addition, I will also apply my theory to a few key scenes:

Kylo's reaction when he first hears of her

Rey's flashback

Kylo's "you still want to kill me?" line

Rey's ability to use a mind trick untrained

The Leia-Rey hug

Some lines from trailers

The Chosen One Prophecy 

So let's begin. First the core world accent. A lot of people have used this as evidence for Rey Kenobi, however, accents are barely genetic. And a lot of people including Phasma and probably Tarkin changed their accents to seem more respected and from a core world(rather than post-apocalyptic and outer rim)

MatPat's point about her picking it up from Unkar stands, but if the first words Rey heard were imperials, who odds are adopted core accents, that could also explain how she picked it up. And strong connection to the force? Palpatine would have made his clone-child extremely powerful with the force, as powerful as he could make her. So that's pretty much covered. Also, her main displays of force powers were from the dark side. The pushing back on Kylo's mental connection and use of a mind trick were both motivated by fear. Being able to hold her own against Kylo could be the force assisting her via the dark side. And as we saw from Ezra in season 1 of Rebels, the dark side is much easier to call on than the light. As for Anakin's lightsaber calling for her, that doesn't even have to do with familiar relation. The inquisitor's kybers called to Ashoka and they most certainly aren't related. And a green kyber crystal called to a random Tusken Raider when she was asked to steal it from the Jawa's that sold R2. That was a really weird story and I wonder if it was setting something up, but it doesn't matter. It's canon. The kyber crystal in the saber or the force in general was calling Rey. Because it chose her. Because kyber crystals are basically wands from Harry Potter. And her piloting skills? That could easily be explained by a combination of force boosted instincts/reaction time and well, practice. She did know all of that stuff from using an old flight simulator. And the point about piloting skills could be used just as well to make her the child of Thane as it points to Han or Luke on its own. There's a lot of really exceptional pilots in the galaxy. As for being left on Jakku, I guess I should explain the timeline better. According to the TFA script, she is 19 in 34 ABY(when the movie takes place). And she looks to be about 4 during the flashback scene of her being left with Unkar. At first, that doesn’t seem to add up, but Palpatine would have set his child into a non-aging stasis after they reached a reasonable age for starting dark side training and feeling into the Unknown Regions. If the Empire survived much longer than it did, the contingency plan using an adult with no memories would be weird. Heck, after reaching 4, she could have been moved to carbonite (do people age in carbonite? I’m not sure if that’s been answered. It’s not important). Terex and Corlac seem to have been on Jakku for a while, so Rey’s “parents” could also have, surviving as scavengers before finding the Observatory. This would also give enough time for the scavenging economy to get properly set up, as Niima Outpost was only founded after the battle of Jakku. 11 years would have been enough time that a low-quality ship from Unkar could actually be purchased. And for thematic meaning. Well, we got that down. We got Kylo, the child of two rebellion war heroes, trained as a Jedi having turned to the dark side. And we have a child, who grew up in a situation even worse than Anakin, who was literally created to be the next emperor who chose the light. This would fit with Star War's strong themes of personal choice and growing beyond heritage. It would also fit with the newer themes of the force not being so black and white. And without the Aftermath series, Rey's parentage could easily be explained as "Palpatine had a contingency plan that ended with a final battle on Jakku. The man the emperor choose to lead the soon to be first order died on Jakku and so the plan couldn't probably be carried out. That including retreating to the unknown regions with a clone-child created by the force who would be raised to be the next emperor." And for readers of Aftermath, it would strengthen already existing parallels. Those between Rey and Gallius Rax. We got Rax, who even before being groomed by Palpatine was very cruel and did what he had to for survival on Jakku. And then Rey, who is basically the child of evil, who remained kind in a cruel environment. And then both of them ended up on ships off Jakku and were found by their original owners (Han and Palpatine). Upon finding the orphans, both owners preformed mentor like roles. The ships also brought them into the organization they would become a vital member of. Rey also didn't want to leave Jakku, while that was one of Rax's only wishes. And for Rax, well the desert planet became his grave. Now that we got all of those points squared away, what about those scenes I promised to explain? Alright, let's start with when Kylo first finds out about Rey. As MatPat pointed out, his reaction is much too violent for having never heard of Rey. Well since Palpatine was in magic sith force communication to what we can assume to be Snoke, it is possible Snoke knew of the contingency plan, including of Rey.

Later when Kylo joined the First Order, he would have been informed of the failure to properly carry out the plan. Of course as far as they knew, Rey would still be stuck in the Observatory in stasis and not worth extracting. As for Rey's flashback, a lot of the scenes she saw would have came from the force or from reading the history of the object, but even that is indicative of powerful force abilities. However, the scene we know is either memory brought to the surface or unlocked by the sequence is when Rey has just been sold to Unkar in exchange for a ship, the very one we see flying off. The imperials would have been the only humanoids and comfort she would have known at this point, explaining her reaction to being abandoned even if they were ambivalent to her. The reason Rey thinks they are her parents is because that was probably the lie they told Unkar to explain where they obtained a literal child, or what Unkar told her. To the scrapper, they seemed as people so desperate to leave after the battle, they would sell their child.   As for Kylo's line "you still want to kill me" witch MatPat took to mean Kylo knew Rey from before, there's another way to read this line that supports my theory. The "still" part refers to their encounter on Takodona, when Rey tried to shoot him. Because he knows or suspects Rey is Palpatine's heir he expects it to be easy to turn her to the dark side. This is also why he says she needs a teacher, because he sees her as similar to him, the descendant of a Sith Lord. As for the mind trick, my other points about Rey's artificially created power stands, but I feel like I should specifically address this. Palpatine was extremely adept with mind tricks. In Lords of the Sith, he manages to control a Twi'lek child so well she would stand there as Palpatine and Vader argued over killing her, their lightsabers in front of her face. This pales in comparison to the suggestion Rey manages to pull of in a moment of extreme stress and fear. And since Rey was only supposed to be awakened after his death, the emperor wouldn't mind making her more powerful than him if she was fully trained. As for the Rey Leia hug, I don't have that good of an explanation, but neither do Rey Solo-Organa theorists. You're not going to be able to recognize someone you only knew as a child a minimum of 20 years ago as a child. All I could think of is that since Leia's untrained force skill (Ashoka book tells us every untrained force sensitive has one skill their sensitivity manifests as) is sensing (sensed Luke hanging from cloud city and Han's death) is that she could sense the dark side coming off of Rey and from knowing Chewie isn't a fan of being comforted, she decided that Rey was the one who need comforting. And the aura of darkness coming from Rey would be part her predisposition and part the anger and rage towards Kylo for killing Han and possibly Finn. Ok now how about some lines from the trailers? Well first we got Luke's "I've see this raw strength only once before" line is most likely about Kylo, however it is referring to Rey because she's so damn strong with the force. Don't forget the trailer has a scene where she cracks open the ground, to Luke's shock and horror. As for Snoke saying "Fulfil your destiny" that's probably to Rey, and under this theory, it's because he still sees her as meant to join the dark side, because that's what she was created for. Alright, now for chosen one stuff. Well we know 2 things about the prophecy: 1. The chosen one is created through the force (technically midichlorians but it's better if we all forget those exist) and 2. Will bring balance to the force. Now with the new narrative angle about the balance of the force being much more literal, with things like Bendu, Rey reaching out for "something else" may signify she is the chosen one. Of course that's if the prophecy is real. And if you follow the theory that it was by force magic that Anakin was created by Palpatine, it just means it's possible for Palpatine to make another force child. And with an increase access to lore after becoming emperor it's reasonable he could create a force child with no human parent at all. I hope this theory actually makes internal sense and there's no thing from the eu that could ruin this theory. Or maybe there's something that could enhance it. All I could think that I haven't read that could apply is Rey's Survival Guide, the full tfa novelization, and the visual dictionary for Tfa. Thanks to @lj-writes for checking this theory before I posted it and pointing out the script says Rey is 19. I guess we’ll find out if this works or not on the 15th

*@lj-writes also states that it might not be possible for a ship to be purchased with a child and some scrap, especially since Unkar wouldn’t see the value of sith artifacts. She states that it is possible that the “parents” sold Rey as “look at this child we found in the observatory, she’s probably magic or something.” And then when Rey didn’t show an obvious signs of power, she was put to work as a scavenger. Unkar simply hasn’t told Rey because he’s too embarrassed at seemingly being conned, so Rey simply thinks they’re her biological parents and left her.