Star Wars prequel questions

[jian]

It's weird that a franchise that has been about aping Japanese cinema from the beginning never actually got any Asian movie fight coordinators to take over. It would have been incredible to see even mid-level wuxia level stuff as the default in Star Wars, which Lucasfilm could 100% have afforded to do.

Another, better AU: George Lucas hires Yuen Woo Ping and his team for the prequels. People pass out in cinemas at the awesome.

(On the other hand, McGregor, Neeson, Christensen etc have to spend months in kung fu boot camp to prepare, much as Reeves, Fishburne, Moss etc had to for The Matrix. Honestly, they’d probably have been really into it. Ray Park doesn’t have to, he’s already amazing.)

 

[ART!]

2. What IS that giant room next to the hangar where they fight Darth Maul? Is it the spare walkway storage area for excess walkways? It's in the stone palace/hangar complex, just through a door, and it's this cavernous metal room, clearly bigger on the inside, filled with precarious walkways and some random laser doors which turn on and off sequentially for... reasons? And then a room with a giant hole in it because why wouldn't you have a room with a giant hole in it? Seriously, what IS this room?

Maybe there's are no lawyers in SW, so there are no regulations about where dangerous buildings/rooms/chambers/pits can be located and no one has to spend time or money preventing people from falling into them.

We’re talking about the guy who built the Death Star to dominate the galaxy through fear. He’s quite content to use power as his legitimacy.

Well clearly not! Star Wars very famously tells the story of the resistance.

Maybe he went full Death Star after realizing how much darn trouble a galactic conspiracy and war was.

 

[Morrus]

It's a weakness of the script (in the pedantic sense) but makes it easier to follow, especially for 10 year olds. In that regard it's the same as Obi Wan using "Kenobi" as an alias when he has an established connection to Darth, who knows him as Kenobi and has relatives on the planet (all in OT).

Even the Fellowship film hardly uses "Strider".

I guess. But at least Kenobi is —nominally — in hiding. Amidala is standing right next to her decoy, who introduces her as Padme!

 

[ART!]

The thing about Ben "hiding" in his Jedi robes is a real head-scratcher.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think it's an interesting AU where Palpatine said to himself, "Wait a minute... I'm the elected leader of the largest polity in known space, I have two enormous and completely loyal armies, and nobody else has any armies," and went straight to "I'm declaring myself Emperor and anyone who objects gets shot in the face." If the Jedi and various local militaries (Naboo, Alderaan, whoever) object, they can get shot in the face first, that's literally why he has two enormous armies.

Yes, the Jedi are then driven underground and lead the inevitable resistance for decades, but Palpatine gets to his preferred position without wasting roughly 70% of his men and materiel and about 10 years (or however long it was) on playing Risk with himself. The only conclusion one can reach is that becoming Emperor and dominating the galaxy wasn't the point. Maybe corrupting and sullying the Jedi by making them fight and kill was the point?

The logistics of it might not work in his favor, because there are still many able-bodied people that could be willing to resist.
Naboo did lack support by the Republic in Episode One, but they had their own army and fighters to offer resistance to the Trade Federation. Quite possibly that is true for many worlds, it's not that he's the only two armies/fleets that exist, he's the only ones that are controlled by the Republic and the Separatist directly, the rest probably prefers to use theirs for self-defense or their own "military projects" (within the rules - or the oversight - of the Republic allows.)

Of course, the whole logistics are wonky - clones might be great at making soldiers, but did Kamino also build all those ships and fighters? Just one planet? If so, it seems quite possibly that other planets could outbuild that fast, and their young combat-able people can still be recruited for their armies.

 

[Morrus]

The thing about Ben "hiding" in his Jedi robes is a real head-scratcher.

I think the bigger headscratcher is that all Jedi wear Tattooine desert robes.

 

[ART!]

I think the bigger headscratcher is that all Jedi wear Tattooine desert robes.

Seeing ANH way back when, I just assumed Ben was wearing weather-appropriate desert-y robes. Then TPM comes out and I'm like "HUH-uh?!?!?" Makes no sense any way you slice it...unless the Jedi took to wearing desert robes for some cultural reason (did the Jedi start out on a desert planet?) and just stuck with it? But then Ben is still wearing Jedi robes in hiding...unless the Jedi based their uniform on Tattooine desert robes?!?!? My brain hurts.

 

[Morrus]

Seeing ANH way back when, I just assumed Ben was wearing weather-appropriate desert-y robes. Then TPM comes out and I'm like "HUH-uh?!?!?" Makes no sense any way you slice it...unless the Jedi took to wearing desert robes for some cultural reason (did the Jedi start out on a desert planet?) and just stuck with it? But then Ben is still wearing Jedi robes in hiding...unless the Jedi based their uniform on Tattooine desert robes?!?!? My brain hurts.

His clothing isn’t that dissimilar to that of the Lars family and even the sandpeople. I am 100% sure that the original intent not be that that was a Jedi uniform.

 

[The Firebird]

I guess. But at least Kenobi is —nominally — in hiding. Amidala is standing right next to her decoy, who introduces her as Padme!

Nominally in hiding, next to and known by the brother of his biggest rival.

 

[Morrus]

Nominally in hiding, next to and known by the brother of his biggest rival.

Well, in a cave a few miles away. Unlike ‘Amidala’ is just 3 feet away from Padme. Kenobi’s not making a lot of effort, but he’s making more effort than Padme!