We saw a Star War! Last Jedi spoiler thread

[billd91]

The *fleet* didn't do much at all, other than explode. Isn't it Lando and Nien Nub (did I get that right?) in the Falcon that shoot out the 2nd Death Star's reactor? With one or two surviving escort fighters.

Don't forget Wedge. He's more than just an escort fighter - he's a named support character who survives the whole trilogy!

And that feat was possible because of Han, Leia, Chewie, R2D2, and C3PO disabling the shield generator on the forrest moon, which in turn was made possible by Luke turning himself in to Vader.

The point is Star Wars takes a heroic view of history. The Rebel victory at Endor depended entirely on the actions of small number of individuals, just like the victory at Yavin. A small group of heroes, who, coincidentally enough, would all fit in comfortable in the Millennium Falcon, end up saving the day.

Fleet's come and go. Protagonists, on the other hand...

Star Wars really is the silver screen equivalent of an RPG campaign in which the actions of the PCs are most important.

 

[trappedslider]

One thing thast I think we're all fogetting and forgive me if some one else pointed it out but iirc, the ships were all basically "we can either jump and end up with no shields and dead in space or we keep powering the shields and go at slow to this hideout and hope for backup."

 

[Ovinomancer]

One thing thast I think we're all fogetting and forgive me if some one else pointed it out but iirc, the ships were all basically "we can either jump and end up with no shields and dead in space or we keep powering the shields and go at slow to this hideout and hope for backup."

It was more, "jump and be out if fuel while the 1O can track us (somehow) through a jump", or, "dying jump and stay just outside of range to conserve grill and stay alive as long as possible. Maybe something will turn up."

Shields weren't mentioned.

 

[delericho]

What do you think the odds are that in Episode IX Poe won't get another ship, the Resistance won't rally up a new fleet, Finn and Rose won't do something rally heroic and important, and generally-speaking, good won't triumph over evil?

I'd rather expecting that at the end of the third film the First Order will remain in control of most of the galaxy, with a New Rebellion opposing them.

Not sure how that ties in to our protagonists - they'll no doubt do something heroic, quite possibly including bringing down Kylo Ren and ending the Skywalker line, but I can't see them leaving it with "job done". After all, Disney want to make more films, and that's best done if the Galaxy is as close to the way it was at the start of IV as possible.

Of course, there's still [-]Chekov's[/-] Luke's X-wing, so maybe not.

Surely Luke's X-Wing was paid off - in the "he's a Force projection" misdirection?

(Which isn't to say that Poe isn't going to end up in the cockpit, of course.)

 

[Maxperson]

The *fleet* didn't do much at all, other than explode. Isn't it Lando and Nien Nub (did I get that right?) in the Falcon that shoot out the 2nd Death Star's reactor? With one or two surviving escort fighters.

And that feat was possible because of Han, Leia, Chewie, R2D2, and C3PO disabling the shield generator on the forrest moon, which in turn was made possible by Luke turning himself in to Vader.

The point is Star Wars takes a heroic view of history. The Rebel victory at Endor depended entirely on the actions of small number of individuals, just like the victory at Yavin. A small group of heroes, who, coincidentally enough, would all fit in comfortable in the Millennium Falcon, end up saving the day.

Fleet's come and go. Protagonists, on the other hand...

Contrast this with something like Nolan's Dunkirk movie last year. While Dunkirk does highlight the heroic actions of individuals, those actions take place within the context of a massive collective effort to evacuate the Allied forces.

It seems exactly like Dunkirk to me. Take away the fleet entirely and just send a handful of people to the planet to get rid of the shield and send only the Falcon and two escorts against the imperial fleet and death star, and the result changes dramatically. Falcon goes up in a ball of fire along with the escorts and the Empire marches on. The entire massive rebel fleet is what allows those heroic individuals their chance to succeed.

 

[Mallus]

You know, I don't go much in for speculation, but the scenes with the arms dealers makes me think that maybe, just maybe, we've seen the last of the X-wing as a staple of the good guys. 1) they were all blown up, 2) it's now known that the profiteers that support the 1O are also providing the Resistance, 3) Poe needs a new ship.

I hope you're right about this. I'd love to see the new movies stake out their own design language, and as you point out, the design change could be a plot point.

The X-Wings are a classic, but 40+ years old. So far the most successful new design on the Rebel/Resistance side have been Vice-Admiral Holdo's hair & outfit. I'd say the Empire/First Order is doing a bit better, but mainly on the interior decorating side. Snoke's throne room killed it!

 

[Mallus]

Don't forget Wedge. He's more than just an escort fighter - he's a named support character who survives the whole trilogy!

OMG I forgot Wedge Antilles! This is the point in the conversation where I should mention I'm really more of a Trekkie.

Star Wars really is the silver screen equivalent of an RPG campaign in which the actions of the PCs are most important.

Truth. A single PC with a lot of Force Points is worth more than a moon-sized battle station. More than a planet-sized battle station, even.

 

[Mallus]

It seems exactly like Dunkirk to me.

In Nolan's Dunkirk, the success of the entire evacuation doesn't hinge on the actions of Mark Rylance in the boat and Tom Hardy in the plane. Their actions are heroic & impactful, but *do not* dictate the overall success of the mission.

The same cannot be said of the protagonists in Return of the Jedi.

Which was my original point: individuals play an outsize role in the Star Wars franchise. The fate of the galaxy is in their hands. Therefore, the Resistance being reduced to a handful of heroes chilling in the Falcon is sad and certainly a set-back, but nothing the good guys can't come back from.

The entire massive rebel fleet is what allows those heroic individuals their chance to succeed.

Given the "established facts" (note the scare quotes) of the Star Wars universe at the time of RotJ, you could easily write the Battle of Endor without the fleet.

Rebel Alliance fighters & bombers have hyperdrives. They're not carrier-based. Instead of the whole Rebel fleet, you could just as easily have had the Falcon and a handful of escorts fighters jump in really, really close to the 2nd Death Star, then do their 'inside-the-superstructure' bombing run.

I think the reasons it wasn't written that way was obvious. It would have been too directly similar to the end of Star Wars, and the creative team wanted to show a full-fledged fleet battle between the Empire & the Rebels. Which looked terrific! But in terms of the what we saw on the screen, the Rebel fleet didn't accomplish much. They basically acted as a tension-raising element; each capital ship getting picked off by the 2nd Death Star was like the tick of a countdown clock.

 

[Ryujin]

In Nolan's Dunkirk, the success of the entire evacuation doesn't hinge on the actions of Mark Rylance in the boat and Tom Hardy in the plane. Their actions are heroic & impactful, but *do not* dictate the overall success of the mission.

The same cannot be said of the protagonists in Return of the Jedi.

Which was my original point: individuals play an outsize role in the Star Wars franchise. The fate of the galaxy is in their hands. Therefore, the Resistance being reduced to a handful of heroes chilling in the Falcon is sad and certainly a set-back, but nothing the good guys can't come back from.


Given the "established facts" (note the scare quotes) of the Star Wars universe at the time of RotJ, you could easily write the Battle of Endor without the fleet.

Rebel Alliance fighters & bombers have hyperdrives. They're not carrier-based. Instead of the whole Rebel fleet, you could just as easily have had the Falcon and a handful of escorts fighters jump in really, really close to the 2nd Death Star, then do their 'inside-the-superstructure' bombing run.

I think the reasons it wasn't written that way was obvious. It would have been too directly similar to the end of Star Wars, and the creative team wanted to show a full-fledged fleet battle between the Empire & the Rebels. Which looked terrific! But in terms of the what we saw on the screen, the Rebel fleet didn't accomplish much. They basically acted as a tension-raising element; each capital ship getting picked off by the 2nd Death Star was like the tick of a countdown clock.

Given the way that TLJ went the rebels could either start doing Kamikaze runs with fighters, or just automate a straight line jump sequence on unmanned fighters (after all, you don't need to make a SUCCESSFUL jump), and blow the best warships that the FO has out of space.

 

[Jester David]

Given the way that TLJ went the rebels could either start doing Kamikaze runs with fighters, or just automate a straight line jump sequence on unmanned fighters (after all, you don't need to make a SUCCESSFUL jump), and blow the best warships that the FO has out of space.

I don't see that being very viable.

Hyperspace isn't regular space. It's another dimension. You're not really there. So if you time the jump wrong (too far away) you just fly through the enemy ship. And if you're too close, you don't fully accelerate and just ram the enemy ship, and likely splatter over their deflector shields. If you make it that far...
So you have to be exactly the right distance. In the sweet spot for a hyperspace ramming. Which is apparently *just* within the enemy's weapon range. Really, as presented by the movie, several seconds to almost a minute of travel inside their weapon range. And then you need to sit perfectly still as the ship accelerates to lightspeed. No evasive actions or fancy flying. You just go straight as the hyperdrive powers up. Aka a sitting duck.

So that trick wouldn't work with small craft. Larger ones would just blow them out of the sky in the seconds they're sitting, spooling up the hyperdrive.
Assuming they have enough mass at all. Smaller fighters might just splatter off the shields, even almost at lightspeed. I doubt it'd be nearly as devastating.

Very likely to repeat the tactic, you'd need a larger capital ship. The kind of ship you don't want to throw away to take out one of the enemy's ships.