#anakin had darkness and attachments and he struggled with it A LOT

[david-talks-sw]

So that whole interaction between Ahsoka and Huyang, where they talk about Sabine's choice to help the enemy find Thrawn (in hopes that she can then find Ezra) is clearly meant to be subtext for what happened with Anakin.

I mean change the pronoun from "she/her" to "he/him", tweak some of the names and...

... it's just blatant.

The parallels were already clear in the previous episode, as pointed out in this post here, and it still holds true:

Sabine's struggle with attachment mirrors Anakin's.

We know Filoni's whole stance on why Anakin fell to the Dark Side: he'll usually acknowledge that Anakin was ruled by his attachments, got possessive of Padmé, but then adds:

"HOWEVER is loving that way really that bad?"

"HOWEVER he never stood a chance because Qui-Gon wasn't there to teach him properly and be the father Anakin needed."

I've already gone into why both these statements don't track with Lucas' intended narrative here and here... but I wanna touch on this notion that "Anakin wasn't trained enough to make a better choice."

He was.

You know how we know? Because we saw him overcome his attachments before.

We saw him explain the theory of the non-attachment rule, before.

In fact, wee saw him pass down a lot of the Jedi lessons, in The Clone Wars, including being disciplined, following orders and not acting impulsively.

The issue is that - while Anakin knows the theory, even has a few minor successes applying it - he never builds the self-discipline needed to master it because... deep down... he doesn't want to.

This is partially because you got Palpatine telling him he doesn't need to, molding him into an arrogant, power-craving person... but the fact remains that Anakin made the choice himself.

Which Filoni acknowledges, sure... but not quite. The difference between his thesis and George Lucas' is that the latter picks a stance and defends it.

"He started out as a very loving and compassionate person. And as he progressed, it was his inability to control his temper, his inability to let go of things, and his quest for power that were his undoing." - George Lucas, E! Behind the Scenes - ROTS, 2005

Anakin fell because he was greedy, just like any one of us can be.

Cool. Filoni, on the other hand, doesn't seem to land anywhere.

He dances around the issue (as can be seen by the debate between Ahsoka and Huyang, with no clear winner) and merely questions whether it's as simple as that.

Clearly he wants to justify Anakin's actions to some degree... but y'know, the narrative considers those actions so reprehensible that Anakin gets friggin' burned alive for it.

"I felt it was important that we actually see that happen so that we could see the consequences of these bad things that he did. […] He forces his friends to turn against him. Which is heartbreaking." - George Lucas, “The Chosen One” Featurette, 2005

Because Anakin's actions are not meant to be justified.

It's easy to see why Filoni likes Anakin. One of the earliest tasks he had when writing The Clone Wars was humanizing a character whose sole functional purpose was to carry out a narrative about how:

"Without self-discipline, greed [can] force a character off the path to freedom." - Micael Hearn, The Cinema of George Lucas, 2005

And Anakin is a very sympathetic character.

His flaws are flaws that we all carry.

Q: Is it fair to assess Anakin is kind of cursed by his own goodness/good qualities? "I wouldn't say that’s true. He’s cursed by the same flaws, and issues that he has to overcome, that all humans are cursed with. There's a lot going on there. [...] The whole point is—and the reason I started the story where I did—is that Anakin is a normal, good kid. And how does somebody who is normal and good turn bad? What are the qualities, what is it that we all have within us that will turn us bad?" - George Lucas, Star Wars Insider #52, 2000

But narratively, Anakin is selfish.

He doesn't want to save Padmé's life, he wants to save himself from the pain of losing Padmé.

And while you're supposed to sympathize with him, you're not meant to agree with him. He's Darth Vader, the space nazi. He messes up and consequentially "leaves the Force in darkness" for 20 years, instead of ushering it towards the light in the chancellor's office, when he has the chance.

So to shift the blame and say that...

HOWEVER, Anakin didn't have the proper support system or training to make a better choice.

... when the whole point of the narrative is about taking personal responsibility and being selfless instead of selfish... well, it is missing that point.

He did know better. He just didn't want to choose better, so he convinced himself he wasn't able to.

#anakin skywalker #george lucas #dave filoni #ahsoka show #ahsoka series #ahsoka #ahsoka spoilers #huyang #sabine wren

[gffa]

THIS IS EVERY INSTANCE WHERE THE JEDI TALK ABOUT ATTACHMENT IN THE MOVIES AND TV SERIES, which paint a very clear, consistent picture of just what attachment meants within the Jedi Order and Star Wars itself. It’s about how attachment isn’t the same thing as love or connection or feelings, but specifically about the inability to let go of someone when its time, that the fear of their loss is so great you would give up a thousand lives to save just the one because you cannot live without them, because you are afraid. George Lucas has been very consistently, explicitly clear about this as well, that attachment is always tied possession, fear, greed, the desire to control people, the dark side, and the inability to accept that life is transitory, that you can’t hold on to people, you can’t keep them, you can’t possess them.  Attachment is fear, greed, the willingness to make a deal with the devil to save one person, no matter how many other lives it costs.  But, setting aside word of god commentary, the above is still the way the term is used within the text itself. That doesn’t mean it’s not difficult!  Feelings are complicated, messy things and it’s not that any personal desire is attachment, it’s not that moments of fear are the same as attachment, it’s the willingness to act on those feelings in ways that get a lot of people hurt, it’s about using the Force for selfish desires, because the Force is your emotions, if you do something for a selfish reason, if you do something based on fear, that is a step towards the dark side. Context for each of the scenes: Star Wars: Attack of the Clones:      “Attachment is forbidden.  Possession is forbidden. Compassion, which I would define as unconditional love, is central to a Jedi’s life.”      Anakin is explaining basic Jedi worldbuilding to Padme and the audience, he directly ties attachment to possession (as Lucas says, this is about wanting to possess a person: “[Jedi Knights] do not grow attachments, because attachment is a path to the dark side. You can love people, but you can’t want to possess them.“), instead explaining to her that compassion is central to their lives. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Downfall of a Droid”:     “I could take a squad out there, track him down.” "Anakin, it's only a droid. You know attachment is not acceptable for a Jedi."      The context of this scene is that Anakin is willing to not only put his own life on the line, but that he would put the clones’ lives and Ahsoka’s life on the line, in the middle of a war where they’re facing a weapon that is killing them in droves, to go find his droid.  This is the only time that Obi-Wan objects to Anakin’s affection for the droid throughout the entire series, when it’s about risking others’ lives to save Anakin’s favorite droid.  Any other time Anakin favors Artoo, Obi-Wan just reacts with fond annoyance. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Jedi Crash”:      "I can still sense your worry for Anakin, your attachment to him." "It's just... I get so confused sometimes. It's forbidden for Jedi to form attachments, yet we are supposed to be compassionate." "It is nothing to be ashamed of, Ahsoka. I went through the same process when I was your age with my own master."      "You were right all along, Master Secura." "About what?" "If I had stayed with Anakin, we probably wouldn't have found this village in time to save him."      The context here is that Ahsoka’s desire to stay with Anakin would have potentially cost all of them their lives, because she couldn’t do anything more for him other than worry over him, but they needed to find help because he was going to die without it.  Ahsoka’s desire to be compassionate to her master is conflicting with her duty to help in a way that takes her away from him, and this is something young Jedi have to find the balance of, and that’s what the show is explaining to the audience.      It’s not always an easy path to find, sometimes Jedi are going to struggle with it, but Aayla was right and Ahsoka understands that at the end, along with the audience, that staying with him out of Ahsoka’s personal desire to do so against her duty to go get help, would have cost Anakin his life. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Brain Invaders”:     “Ahsoka, it's your duty to save as many lives as you can. Barriss knew you could save thousands if the worms were destroyed. Which she thought meant destroying her, too. But you did the right thing. You knew the freezing cold would kill the worms. Letting go of our attachments is a difficult struggle for all of us.“      Barriss posed a very explicit danger to anyone she would come across, just as the clones had infected other clones and then Barriss herself, she would go on to do the same.  While Ahsoka found a way around it this time, the conflict here is that Ahsoka was weighing her personal desire to not have her friend die versus the thousands of people her friend might go on to hurt.  Attachment isn’t just that Ahsoka cared about Barriss, but that conflict of saving her life at the cost of others’ lives, because Ahsoka herself wanted it, because she was afraid to live without her friend.      The opening title card quote for this episode is, “Attachment is not compassion.” Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Voyage of Temptation”:     "My duty as a Jedi demanded I be elsewhere." "Demanded? But it's obvious you had feelings for her.  Surely that would affect your decision." "It did.  I live by the Jedi Code." "Of course.  As Master Yoda says: 'A Jedi must not form attachments.'"      Letting go of attachments isn’t easy, there’s sadness and remorse in it often times!  But the scene here is once again that Obi-Wan is telling Anakin that his duty asked him to be elsewhere and that’s when the conflict between his desire to stay for his own reasons and his duty as a Jedi made it an issue.  Up to that point, we’re given no indication that it was any kind of issue (and in a later episode we’re told romantic feelings are natural according to the Jedi, they’re not forbidden), we see Jedi caring deeply about their friends and Masters and Padawans, it’s only when they’re willing to abandon their duty to save lives, the lives that are depending on them, that it becomes an issue.      Had Obi-Wan been willing to let those people’s lives be in danger because he personally was unwilling to give up being with Satine, then that is what the problem would have been. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "The Rise of Clovis”:    "You’ve met Satine. You know I once harbored feelings for her. It’s not that we’re not allowed to have these feelings.  It’s natural."     In this scene, it’s just after Anakin has beaten the crap out of Rush Clovis because he saw him kissing Padme and lost control, that it wasn’t about defending Padme, it was about his jealousy, even after the dust settles, he still believes she has feelings for Clovis.  Anakin’s inability to trust her and his possessive jealousy are at a boiling point, he is unable to see her clearly, he is sliding into fearful, angry possession of her, which is when Obi-Wan comes to talk to him.      In contrast, in “A Distant Echo”, Obi-Wan makes it clear he knows about Anakin and Padme, (”I hope you at least told Padme I said hello.”) but there’s no conversation about getting himself under control because Anakin is no longer at a boiling point with his feelings.      The Jedi don’t forbid feelings, not even romantic feelings, while they do forbid attachment.  They cannot be the same thing.  (Though, they do say you can’t be in a committed relationship and be a Jedi, but that’s not the same thing.) Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "Front Runners”:     “Ahsoka, remember what I told you about staying focused.” “I can't help it, Master.” “I understand.” “You do?” “I do. But try to remember, always put purpose ahead of your feelings.“      This instance doesn’t directly mention the word attachment, but it’s same the context--Anakin’s advice is in line with everything else we see in the series, that it’s not that Ahsoka’s feelings are an issue, but that she can’t let them cloud her judgement, because the people of Onderon’s lives are on the line here.      It’s the same as how Obi-Wan’s feelings for Satine weren’t an issue until there was a conflict with his duty, just as Anakin’s feelings for Padme in Attack of the Clones weren’t an issue, Obi-Wan saw them quite clearly, until they were in conflict with Anakin’s duty. Star Wars: The Clone Wars - "The Jedi Who Knew Too Much”:     “Every time I think about this, I feel conflicted. It's hard not to let feelings turn into attachment and pain.“      In this scene is that, with so many Jedi dying and the war being so hard on them, there’s a lot of fear and anger that they have to let go of, that Ahsoka and Barriss are coming back from a funeral for several Jedi and it’s a painful moment.  Ahsoka compares it to the Brain Invaders storyline, “Like, when we were stuck inside the battle tank on Geonosis, it was hard not to be afraid. Still, you and I got past it. And I guess we'll get past this.”      The concept of attachment is again directly tied to fear and pain and suffering, that the solution (the one Anakin teaches her, that Ahsoka says he would say, “Our struggle as Jedi is to move past [these feelings of anger and fear].“) is to let go of them, to move past them--which is something Lucas has said multiple times is the theme of his movies.      "[The Jedi] trained more than anything else to understand the transitional nature of life, that things are constantly changing and you can’t hold on to anything. You can love things but you can’t be attached to them, You must be willing to let the flow of life and the flow of the Force move through your life, move through you. So that you can be compassionate and loving and caring, but not be possessive and grabbing and holding on to things and trying to keep things the way they are. Letting go is the central theme of the film.“ --George Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005       “The key to the dark side is fear. You must be clean of fear, and fear of loss is the greatest fear. If you’re set up for fear of loss, you will do anything to keep that loss from happening, and you’re going to end up in the dark side. That’s the basic premise of Star Wars and the Jedi, and how it works.“ --George Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005 Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith:      “Attachment leads to jealousy, the shadow of greed, that is.“     This is a scene where Anakin has become so afraid of losing Padme that he’s starting to go off the deep end about it, he’s butting up against his willingness to make a deal with the devil to save her from something he doesn’t even know for sure is going to happen.  The story of Revenge of the Sith is that Anakin is so afraid to lose her that he will murder not just the adult Jedi and help Sidious create an Empire, but he will murder literal toddlers to save the person he wants to save.  It is the very definition of attachment, of greed and fear. The above are every time that “attachment” is mentioned by a Jedi in the movies and the TV series, this is the entire context for what it means to the Jedi and to Star Wars.  Does the term have other meanings in popular lexicon?  Sure, but this one is closer to the Buddhist meaning and the way the characters speak of it, the context of their scenes and when they talk about it, the events that surround it, are all consistent with that attachment means a specific thing, that it’s synonymous with the fear of losing someone, so intense that you’re willing to sacrifice a thousand lives just to hold onto the one person. Attachment isn’t just harmful for the person who can’t let go, it’s something that costs thousands of people their lives.  And the Jedi only bring it up in that context, when it’s about the conflict of their personal desires against people who are depending on them, we see that otherwise personal desires and relationships aren’t commented on.  It’s only when a Jedi is willing to let people get hurt for their own desires that the Jedi talk about attachment.

#obi wan kenobi #anakin skywalker #padme amidala #yoda #ahsoka tano #aayla secura #jedi order #george lucas #attachment #meta #long post

[illuminatedquill]

Ahsoka Variety Interview Thoughts

Hello, Sabezra nation!

So, it will probably start spilling out soon but, yes, some of the cast members from Ahsoka - Rosario Dawson, Natasha Liu Bordizzo, Hayden Christensen and some guy named Dave Filoni - did an interview with Variety recently to talk about the show.

Now, I know what you're thinking: was there anything regarding Sabine and Ezra's relationship?

And the answer is a resounding NOPE.

But, it's still a very interesting article and there were a few tidbits that stood out to me that I feel is Sabezra related. So, I'll talk about that here.

First up: an interesting quote from Sabine Wren herself, Natasha.

I've written about this before in a previous post but it's very nice to have it be validated here by Natasha: that Sabine is, indeed, meant to come off as Anakin-coded in this first season of Ahsoka.

Others in this fandom have also noted this and this certainly lends credence to Sabine's feelings for Ezra being more than platonic. Sabine's decision to doom their galaxy in exchange for her friend's safety has enormous ramifications for the Star Wars universe going forward - and only one other character has had such an impact on the franchise: Anakin Skywalker.

Anakin made his choice out of desperation to save his wife, Padme. Star Wars loves its mythological cycles. Lucas passed on that love to Filoni so, in theory, Sabine should be following in the foot-steps of the disaster lineage of Jedi she is now a part of.

But, as I've noted before, one of Ahsoka's themes is trying to break cycles. Baylon wants to break the cycle of endless wars, Ahsoka wants to break the cycle of darkness plaguing her Jedi lineage, and Sabine wants to break the cycle of loss that's all too prevalent in her life.

What does that mean? It means that Filoni has the opportunity to do something that Anakin couldn't with Sabine: show a proper redemptive arc. Find a way to move forward with Ezra and everyone else she betrayed. Find a way to be forgiven and properly atone for her mistakes - preferably without dying or someone else dying on her behalf.

Of course, this is just interpretation on my behalf. The skeptic in me points out that Natasha is only referring to Sabine's recklessness and inner struggles as being what Ahsoka sees as similar to her former master. There's no mention of Ezra.

But we know that one of Anakin's "inner struggles" was his increasing attachment and feelings for Padme. So, is a stretch to say that these inner struggles that Sabine is wrestling with include her yet undisclosed feelings for her friend Ezra? No, not really.

With what Filoni set up from this first season, it's an inevitability that - at some point - Sabine is going to be questioned about why she made that decision. I personally see it as integral to her journey as a Jedi. Which means that Sabine needs to search her feelings and come to understand them.

It's significant that Natasha points out the echoes of Anakin in Sabine's personality and actions. It says quite a lot.

And to back up the whole "reverse Anidala" theory I have, here's what Filoni says in this next quote:

So this quote is Filoni referencing Ahsoka's struggles with Anakin's legacy as Vader during Rebels and then later in Ahsoka.

"How does that affect somebody when a person that they really admire and looked up to turned out not to be the person they thought they were? Are we all just capable of a fall from grace? And what is forgiveness? What shape does that look like?"

But, keeping this in mind, you could also apply this to Sabine's situation with Ezra, along with everyone else she cares about that was put directly in harm's way with her decision (Hera, Jacen, Zeb, Chopper).

Ahsoka, having come to terms with her own long struggle of forgiving and accepting Anakin for who he was, now has something else to offer Sabine other than showing her how to fight: how to forgive.

Sabine is, presumably (hopefully if Filoni isn't just going to sweep her actions under the rug), going to be struggling with the ramifications of her betrayal at some point in the future. And, not to mention, everyone else also finding out and will most likely be upset, to say the least.

Ahsoka, armed with her own knowledge of how to navigate that thorny path, can be a mediator in that regard. She'll stand with Sabine, as she promised - not condoning her actions, but providing understanding and her own special viewpoint on how to forgive and move on from such an incredibly selfish and destructive action (thanks to Anakin) - and help everyone else find a way to do so, as well.

I figure Ezra and Hera will probably be the focal point of conflict for Sabine. Hera, for obvious reasons, will be upset since Sabine helped kick-start another potential war with the Empire - something she does not want her child to experience growing up in like she and countless others did.

And there's also the matter of how it directly undermines what Kanan and Ezra sacrificed so much for.

As for Ezra . . . I don't know. It's complicated. No idea how Filoni is planning to tackle that. But it's going to hurt him.

It's going to hurt him so much.

But with Ahsoka's presence, it stands to reason that Sabine and Ezra can find a way to reconcile and build something new and stronger from the ruins of their prior relationship.

Other interesting items/observations from the interview:

Filoni already has an outline for Ahsoka season 2. (Nothing confirmed about a renewal, but he's got one ready.)

Hayden Christensen makes an interesting observation about Anakin's return being that he now has the power to wield both the Light Side and Dark Side of the Force, which also gives him the power to save Ahsoka . . . the same power he was trying to obtain when he pledged himself to the Dark Side during Revenge of the Sith.

There are no current plans on Baylon's recasting as of yet. Filoni is still figuring that out. (RIP, Ray Stevenson).

Natasha sees Ahsoka season 1 as setting up "enduring drama" between Ahsoka and Sabine. They still obviously have a lot to work out to mend their relationship - like what happened to Sabine's family and how that was somehow Ahsoka's fault, also Ahsoka stopping her training shortly afterwards.

There is only one direct mention of Thrawn and Ezra: Filoni's decision to send them to another galaxy was because keeping them in the home one was too easy ("too many people travelling, flying around; you can send a signal and get found"). He knew about other galaxies from a scene in Attack of the Clones.

A word of caution: we'll probably be getting more interviews like this within the coming weeks so there will be, presumably, lots of new info coming in.

Hopefully we'll be getting interviews from Eman and Ivanna, as well, since I'm interested to hear more about their characters (Ezra, for obvious reasons, but Shin we definitely need to know more about) and what they might be up to in a future season.

But . . . some of these interviews might contain, shall we say, indications of where certain relationships might go or where whomever is being interviewed think they might go.

So saying this now: unless it comes from the hat man himself, don't get too caught up in whatever is said. It's all fun and speculation.

Sorry for the long ramble. Hope this all makes sense.

See you all down the road.

#sabezra #sabine wren #ezra bridger #ahsoka tano #ahsoka cast #ahsoka show #ahsoka show spoilers #natasha liu bordizzo #rosario dawson #dave filoni #hayden christensen #anakin skywalker

[antianakin]

And you know what pisses me off about Ahsoka Tano in the Siege of Mandalore arc? Is that she actually considered joining Maul’s crazy ass and that she actually bought into his inane anti-Jedi rant.

I actually kinda like that she considers it for a minute, because my most favorite version of Ahsoka is one who's also just teetering on the edge of darkness herself. Ahsoka listening to Maul talk about how the Republic is an Empire in everything but name and that it can't be saved, but that he alone can help her take out the Sith Lord anyway so long as she joins him, and she genuinely takes that very very seriously is arguably one of the most interesting things to happen to her since like season 4. I REALLY wish that the idea that she nearly joined a Sith Lord was something that was ever at any point followed up on, quite honestly.

Maul as Ahsoka's Palpatine just WORKS for me. Maul was the apprentice parallel back in TPM, both in opposition to Obi-Wan and foreshadowing what Anakin would eventually become. So for him to end up being sort-of Sith Master to Anakin's own apprentice just has a certain SYMMETRY to it.

I don't even hate that Ahsoka turns away from him specifically because he then mentions that they'd have to take out Anakin in the sense that Ahsoka is SUPER FUCKING ATTACHED to Anakin and this is something that's true within Rebels, as well. Ahsoka is RADICALLY attached to Anakin, to that relationship and the loyalty she feels she owes to him and his memory. And it's something that's absolutely THERE in TCW and Rebels, and it would've been a really interesting thing to explore in the Ahsoka show, the fact that she holds this attachment to him that's super unhealthy and that made it difficult for her to accept the truth about him. But they... didn't. And so instead of this kinda neat parallel where Ahsoka struggles with attachments just as much as Anakin did, we get this idea that her relationship to Anakin is what gives her the most strength, that it's the most positive thing to have ever happened to her, the only part of her life before the Empire she really remembers fondly at all (she does remember the Jedi more fondly in Rebels, but that's not there in the Ahsoka show where she explicitly calls them all failures).

And this is one of those things that frustrates me the MOST about Ahsoka's trajectory. There's so many times that they could've really explored Ahsoka's own darkness, her true struggles, and REALLY honed in on that to showcase not only the impact of things like the war and Order 66, but the impact of having had that relationship with Anakin at a foundational time in her life when Anakin was arguably at his WORST (before he became a literal nightmare genocide machine obviously). She's a gullible, malleable child put into a position where she has to have a lot of trust in Anakin and give him a lot of power over herself and Anakin is at a point in HIS life where he's giving into his darkness more and more. He's already someone who's massacred an entire village of innocent people, he's already a fascist who believes in MAKING people do what he wants, he's already a baby killer who feels no real remorse over it, he's already a massive racist who uses that prejudice to justify murdering people. He is selfish and he is greedy and he is losing his battle against his own darkness more and more to the point that he can be four bad days away from double genocide. I find it kind-of impossible to believe that that WOULDN'T have had an impact on how he trained Ahsoka and the way Ahsoka ultimately turned out.

But because the person writing Ahsoka is a fucking anti-Jedi Stanakin, what we get instead is a story that refuses to acknowledge Anakin was super dark at all and so refuses to really look at Ahsoka's OWN darkness at any point and mostly just justifies what Anakin did and the choices Ahsoka makes and her feelings about the Jedi as complete and utter failures because it helps fuel his agenda of making Ahsoka into The Greatest Jedi specifically because she was trained by The Greatest Jedi.

So, in a vacuum, I DO actually like that Ahsoka nearly joins Maul, and I even like that she ultimately refuses to do so specifically because of her attachment to Anakin causing her to be loyal to him over the possibility of getting more information about the Sith Lord. I think that that WORKS narratively and that it could've been a really interesting jumping off point for Ahsoka's character journey. But what I DON'T like is that this moment ended up turning into, as you mentioned, Ahsoka agreeing with the anti-Jedi sentiments and that her connection to Anakin is the better one because it's what allows her to reject darkness or whatever. I don't like that, I don't think it makes ANY sense, and it's boring. It makes her BORING and that's by far the worst criticism I can give any character.

#star wars #ahsoka tano #ahsoka critical #ahsoka tano critical #maul #darth maul #tcw #the clone wars #anakin critical #anakin skywalker critical #anti anakin #anti anakin skywalker

[merrysithmas]

Anakin Skywalker as a tragic hero

To be an Anakin apologist about it haha there are a lot of Takes recently because of the new show that seem to be missing an important POV about his role in Star Wars. Everyone's interpretation is valid but this is another to consider! Re: the concept of Fate in Star Wars as a genre of Tragedy.

Anakin was a demi-god and literal agent of the Force's Will (as per the actual narrative he was conceived from the Force to fulfill a prophecy). He was tortured by his tragic fate to enact the Prophecy (balance the Force). This prophecy ended up being predictably misinterpreted by the Jedi (hence the Tragedy genre) to mean "end the Sith" when it ended up meaning "end the Sith & the Jedi". This was Yoda's entire realization in RotS and why he painfully & memorably admits, "Failed, I have." So caught up was the Council in attachment to the war's outcome, to being warriors, to the Senate's will, to ending the Sith, that the Jedi forgot their principles.

The Sith, naturally, also failed. They manipulated and groomed Anakin from childhood - proving their evil.

Anakin was DESTINED to fall no matter what he tried (hence the genre of Tragedy), because he was DESTINED to enact the prophecy based off the actions of the Galaxy itself & Republic & Sith.

Anakin Skywalker is a tragic hero because his "heroic" destiny was to be an antagonist - to both the Jedi and the Sith until the Force was balanced, which, ultimately, was something the Force~ determined to be a necessary action - not him.

Anakin both is and isn't the Force, Anakin both is and isn't Vader. Microcosmically he has a crisis of personality, but macrocosmically his personality struggle is representative of the Force's response to the actions of the Galaxy at large. He is presented narratively as a messianic figure. He is not entirely human and not entirely beholden to human concepts of morality. He is a reactionary gauge of the moral health of the Galaxy as surely as he is an individual - and this is something he struggles with immensely. His human soul struggles with his fate and the tragedies that befall him and handling them. He is also not entirely in charge of his own free will.

His own free will is actually secondary and although his actions are important because he propels the narrative, from this POV Star Wars is ultimately about the other characters' reactions to Anakin as an agent of fate - Anakin is essentially the Old Woman appearing at the Castle in Beauty and the Beast, and the Jedi, Sith, Galaxy, and his friends are the people tasked with letting him in from the cold.

They almost all fail this test and display the darkness of the Galaxy towards the Innocent: Anakin was enslaved as a child, his mother murdered, the so-called compassionate Light-wielding Jedi made no exceptions for him as a young boy, the Sith took advantage of and manipulated him, Padme & Obi-wan had their own issues and were unable to see him entirely for who he was etc etc. This isn't to say they were all bad or even bad people at all! Or that the Jedi were bad~. But they failed the test anyway.

From this literary POV: Anakin was a test from the Force. And the Galaxy failed. Yet, despite this, Anakin's human half still fought for them, he was desperate to be a Jedi & truly believed in them and even returned to be one after the Prophecy was fulfilled and he was finally free. He mourns Padme (even as Vader) and cannot truly ever let go of Obi-wan as his partner (because he doesn't want to). His human half also burned for 20 years in the purgatory sarcophagus of Vader (it needed to "pay" for the human evil he took to enact the Prophecy).

Anakin wept when destroying the Temple and falling to the Dark. He knew becoming Vader would bring pain and suffering. He did not want to fall. Yes, he made choices that ensured he would because of his circumstances, but the tragedy is any of his choices would have lead him there. He was meant to fall in both the eyes of the Sith and Jedi, and to cast the Force's will upon them. This is why he was allowed to be a Force Ghost and reunited in everlasting life with Obi-wan. Because he was a tragic hero not a true villain.

Anakin Skywalker is a tragic hero who was in fact a slave his entire life. He is a tragic hero because his actions taken as per destiny (The Force at work) were engineered to cast him as a villain. No, he wasn't "evil" and yup... one could even argue... neither was Vader as a demi-god (though of course he commited evil). Anakin/Vader was merely an, sometimes unwilling, sometimes willing, always-tortured agent of the Force. One to be helped (Anakin) or defeated (Vader) as per the Force's test for the Galaxy.

This isn't anti-Jedi, either! Anakin loved the Jedi. You could argue importantly that the Force wanted the Jedi to prove themselves post destruction. It wanted the Galaxy to stop fighting one another (the War!) and focus on the true evil right under their nose (the Sith). It even gave them a target... Vader. One who stole their former future (symbolized by the younglings). And was then regifted as a second chance by Luke and Leia (younglings who represented a new Senate and Jedi Order) by Anakin.

For these reasons Anakin Skywalker is a tragic hero. He is not a villain and was not inherently evil, his destiny, one he fought valiantly against, was tragically to be an antagonist.

This meta isn't to say other's interpretations of Anakin's fall are wrong. They are all valid and fascinating (and often complement one another) - but this is simply another to add to the pile. One to consider when looking at the lore of Star Wars through the lens of the macrocosmic lens of "Fate" in a Tragedy.

#anakin skywalker #darth vader #obi wan kenobi #this isnt anti jedi either #the force wanted the jedi to prove themselves prove they would live on despite destruction #and it wanted the galaxy to stop fighting one another and to take out the sith (and gave them a target... Vader) #obikin #anidala #i have to defend my boy i see so many saying some things that dont seem entirely compelling or encompassing of the narrative #but to each their own honestly its all cool #i love to read everyones pov and incorporate diff things

[phoenixkaptain]

I don’t consider Rey a part of the Disaster Lineage.

(I got a comment that mentioned her on my Chaotic Padawans fic and I just figured I should make it clear why she’s not going to show up)

The whole point of the lineage is that each of the characters who are part of it are disasters, that’s obvious, that’s the name, after all, but furthermore, characters like Yoda’s Master aren’t generally considered part of the Disaster part, so clearly just being one of a Master-Padawan pair isn’t enough to fit the criteria, and honestly, Rey just doesn’t fit in.

Rey doesn’t act like any of the Disaster Lineage. More than that, there’s an element of tragedy to the Lineage. There’s the idea of dying in the light of becoming a Sith, “living long enough to see themself become the bad guy” sort of thing, but not quite.

But all the members are very important for two reasons. They all struggle with the Dark Side. They all change the Jedi Order foundationally.

Yoda is probably the oldest Jedi we meet in the movies. That doesn’t mean he’s the oldest in terms of extra content like books or games, but in the movies, he’s by far older than everyone else. And you may be thinking “Yoda never struggled with the Dark Side!!!1!!” but let’s look at this with a critical eye.

Other Jedi exist in the universe. Other Orders and other Force users who listen and follow the Force. But the Jedi Order on Coruscant is one of the only ones that has a rule against attachment, a rule Yoda specifically was the one to make. A rule he had to have made because of himself. He’s old, but he isn’t old enough to have been around during the time of the Sith. His struggle with attachment, his fear of falling to his attachment, had to have been the basis for why he created the rule.

And anyway, we can see Yoda’s attachment. Just because he isn’t as unhinged as Anakin and Obi-Wan, that doesn’t mean he isn’t attached. He’s attached to his own lineage. He’s biased towards them. He lets Obi-Wan train Anakin because it was what Qui-Gon wanted. And let’s be honest, if he didn’t want Anakin to be trained, there were a thousand things he could have done to prevent it, even just simply telling Obi-Wan that he fears Anakin will meet a similar fate to Qui-Gon. Which would be technically lying, but we know Jedi aren’t actually the most honest people in the galaxy and we know they aren’t above manipulation tactics.

Yoda let’s Anakin be trained because it was what Qui-Gon wanted. That’s attachment, pure and simple.

Dooku is obvious. I don’t need to write a mini essay within this essay. Dooku did turn to the Dark Side. Dooku was attached to Qui-Gon. Dooku only left the Order because he blamed them for Qui-Gon’s death, he blames them for all that happened. Dooku changes the Order foundationally because he’s the one who reveals that there are still Sith. (They suspect Maul was a Sith, even believe he was, but they weren’t aware of what was going on until Dooku basically just told Obi-Wan everything.)

Qui-Gon is a bit of a difficult case, I will give you that. But that’s just because we don’t spend a lot of time with him. Moreover, we don’t spend a lot of time with his motivations. He’s a very mysterious character. Did he struggle with the Dark Side? I don’t know. I’m inclined to believe he must have, because why else would Dooku be so sure that Qui-Gon, were he alive, would be on his side? Dooku trained Qui-Gon, so he would probably know. Especially since Jedi Masters generally try to look calm and collected in front of their Padawans, so yeah, maybe Dooku knows Qui-Gon’s struggle better than Obi-Wan would.

Now, does that mean I think Qui-Gon would have become Sith if he lived? No. I think the opposite, actually. The main drawing point of the Sith is to go against the Jedi specifically. They offer more power and less rules. That’s the key here: less rules. Becoming Sith is attractive to those Jedi who feel overly contained, confined by the rules they have to follow. Qui-Gon isn’t one of those Jedi.

Qui-Gon does not listen to the rules in the first place. Qui-Gon wouldn’t become a Sith because they can’t offer him anything. He wouldn’t join for his Master, their relationship is odd and Obi-Wan is better company (we can assume, since Qui-Gon must have kept the pair from meeting on purpose. Which, there are a million reasons why he would have done that, but the funniest option is that he just didn’t want his time with Obi-Wan to be tainted-) Qui-Gon doesn’t seem to desire more power, because he isn’t renowned for his ability with the Force or a lightsaber, two things he had ample time to train up, he’s renowned for his diplomacy. He focused on his diplomacy over his battle prowess. Yes, that’s canon, just watch the movies, they do not mention his ability with the saber being helpful to Padme, they mention his diplomatic ability, I know, I was shocked too. And they can’t offer him less rules, because Qui-Gon doesn’t give a shit about rules in the first place.

Also, I just think that the Sith ultimately have more rules in place than the Jedi, just unspoken, and I think even if Qui-Gon did become Sith, he wouldn’t make it very far in the industry because I truly believe he would follow even less rules.

Qui-Gon is in an interesting position in the Disaster Lineage because he and Luke are the only mavericks, so he’s the only knowingly maverick in the Lineage. Just wanted to mention that. It’s part of why I don’t think he’d turn, he’s already technically in the grey, he doesn’t need to turn.

Qui-Gon changes the Jedi as a whole by becoming a Force Ghost. Something that seems pretty uncommon, seeing how Obi-Wan is excited at the end of Revenge of the Sith to hear that he can speak to Qui-Gon again (“Qui-Gon???? 🥺🥺🥹” that’s how he says it, I promise, those exact words-) Qui-Gon is such a maverick, he also breaks the laws of life and death itself, he’s doing great.

Obi-Wan technically speaking doesn’t struggle with the Dark Side, per se, but he certainly does struggle with staying in the Jedi Order. His backstory with Satine in one of those times (and while it isn’t in the movies, it is one of the more widely known parts of the Clone Wars, so ¯\ _(ツ)_/¯ ). Obi-Wan is willing to bend rules for Anakin (there are scenes of him pretending not to know what Anakin is up to, and he is very unsurprised by the baby being Anakin’s, he was aware, okay, he probably told the Council “Anakin? Sleep with a senator? I raised him better than that thank you very much!”) And Obi-Wan definitely fights the most Dark Side (users) of any other Jedi, all things considered. But yes, he only fits this definition on a technicality.

But Obi-Wan is one of the most influential Jedi in the series. He’s considered a Master of his form and one of the best diplomats. The Council members all trust him. He taught the Chosen One, and he’s the only Jedi the Chosen One ever really actually listened to (he’s definitely the only one who can make the Chosen One guilty enough to tell Obi-Wan that he isn’t the cause of Anakin’s downfall, just because he started crying). Obi-Wan is also the first Force Ghost to actually be fully visible. (That was one thing, since Qui-Gon didn’t train to be a Force Ghost, for the most part, they couldn’t really see him all that clearly, just hear him. Or so I assume, since he only talks to Yoda and the only time we see Force Ghost Qui-Gon is on Tatooine. Is Obi-Wan Kenobi series canon? If it is, this point is moot.)

Obi-Wan is one of the most trusted generals during the Clone Wars, the remnants of the Jedi still follow his advice in the aftermath of Order 66, Obi-Wan is the only one in the series who ever manages to convince Yoda to do something as dumb as train another Skywalker, Obi-Wan is the one who gets Luke off Tatooine, Obi-Wan really gets the most shit done, he’s fantastic, 10/10 Jedi-ing, Obi-Wan, 10/10.

Also, technically speaking, Obi-Wan caused the Clone Wars.

Anakin both struggles with the Dark Side and changes things. But, he changes things in ways you might not expect. Contrary to popular belief, he is not the only Jedi to have a child, however, he is almost certainly the only Jedi who choked out his pregnant wife had children as powerful as his. He is also the only Force Anomaly that we know for sure is canon (I don’t think the others are canon anymore, but I am uncertain) and he is definitely the first Sith Lord who turned back to the Light after Sithing for nearly two and a half decades.

Anakin is a fascinating character, just from a narrative standpoint, and if you think about and want to feel bad for the rest of forever, technically soeaking, he did bring balance to the Force. It isn’t his fault that Luke represents balance in the Force, okay? (The whole “bring balance to the Force” thing was an awful addition because of the implication that the Force’s idea of balance was no Jedi, no Sith, only Luke. It is also the funniest addition the prequels gave us)

Ahsoka as a character doesn’t seem to have a struggle with the Dark Side, and she doesn’t seem to change very much, but she fits in the Lineage because of the sense of tragedy that comes with her character. Which is another thing I forgot to mention: all members of this Lineage are tragic. And Ahsoka really embodies this just by being Anakin’s Padawan and being one of the characters who watches his descent. Ahsoka has to watch her Master kill everyone she knows and loves. And that fucking sucks, therefore, Ahsoka fits very well.

Luke is a bit of a special case. He is part of the Lineage, that much is undeniable, but he isn’t like the others in that he was not raised by the Jedi the majority of his life. He didn’t get three or four years under his Master. He technically had two Masters, Yoda and Obi-Wan. (It would be neat if they had Ahsoka teach him, then he’d have three Masters, which is triple the amount a regular Jedi has. But they should also let Force Ghost Anakin teach him, making it four. And Force Ghost Qui-Gon can’t be left out, bump it up to five. And I just think it would be really funny if he found old Jedi writing or something and learned from Yoda’s Master- okay, Kacie, stop this). Luke, by all means, shouldn’t fit in, but he does. He struggles mightily with the Dark Side. There’s a constant, lingering fear over Return of the Jedi that he will turn, even when we know it won’t happen. The slow pace of the scenes with Luke, Palpatine, and Vader makes the tension build. You can see the uncertainty in Luke. You can see how close he is. You can see the moment when he makes the conscious decision not to be seduced. But up to that point, he’s right on the edge, he’s toeing the line, and it’s legitimately concerning to the audience because there’s a fear that he will fall for Sidious’ trap, just like Anakin did.

There is perhaps no Jedi who changes the Order as much as Luke does. That’s just what happens when one creates an Order by themself.

Now, I explained all of the others because I think they have similar, for lack of a better word, vibes with each other. They are all fundamentally different. They have different wants and different backstories and are all technically different species (except for Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon, who are both from Coruscant, unless you believe Obi-Wan being from Stewjon is still canon, which I don’t know, but would make this parentheses point moot). But all of them are also similar. Similar in the tragedy inherent in their characters, similar in their struggles with the Dark Side, similar in their influence on both the series internally and externally.

Rey just doesn’t quite fit. She doesn’t quite mesh. She feels like a puzzle piece that’s the exact right shape, but the picture just doesn’t work.

Rey feels like she was supposed to fit. She has that tragedy inherent in her character, but it’s a different tragedy than the ones we’ve seen. The only two who are concerned about their parents in this lineage are Anakin and Luke, and they aren’t searching for answers about their parents. Anakin’s mom dies and he watches it. His dad is the Force. Luke is told in no uncertain terms that his dad is dead, and he believes that until Vader reveals that it was a lie. Luke has to come to terms with his father, but that happens offscreen, for the most part. Return of the Jedi implies that he has already mostly accepted it. That’s why he’s in black, that’s why he Force chokes a Gamorrean Guard. He came to terms with his parent, and he accepted that Darth Vader was that parent.

(Much like how Anakin never has any questions or concerns about his father, Luke never has any questions or concerns about his mother. The one time he brings it up, he does so to reveal to Leia that they’re siblings. He’s never actually all that concerned about who she is. I like to think it’s because he has an irrational fear that she’ll turn out to be an even worse thing than Vader was. “My dad turned out to be Vader after I asked questions. I don’t want to ask any questions about my mom.” That sort of thing. It’s definitely not canon but by god is it funny to think about.)

Rey doesn’t get to come to terms with her parents. She’s told they left her behind for her own safety, even though they left her on the second worst option (first worst would’ve been Tatooine, obvs) and left her without anyone to watch her and basically made her feel abandoned. She doesn’t get to come to terms with their abandonment because the movie doesn’t want the audience to see it as abandonment. They want us to think it was heroic, tragic, and so Rey doesn’t get to come to terms with that aspect.

And when it comes to Rey being Palpatine’s granddaughter, I have a lot of problems with how it was handled. First of all, she shouldn’t have had to be someone’s daughter/granddaughter to be considered important. There are exactly two characters who are important because of their parentage, Anakin and Luke, and literally every other Jedi in the history of fucking ever has not given a single shit. Obi-Wan didn’t turn out to be Yoda’s secret grandson to explain why he was powerful, because needing to be related to someone is bullshit. Anakin is the exception because he became a Jedi so late, and also his parent was the Force. Luke was an exception because the story is about Darth Vader and so Darth Vader’s son should give a bit of a shot about him, but also everyone constantly tells Luke he’s like his father.

Rey doesn’t fit! She’s never told that she’s like her grandfather, not like Luke is with Anakin. Her grandfather is a fucking fish-faced dumbass old man who managed to lose to a Care Bears Special (the power of love). Palpatine is powerful, sure, but he’s powerful because he trained himself to be powerful. He isn’t inherently powerful. That’s just not how the Force works. Blood relation doesn’t make it easier to use the Force, this is shown time and time again. Anakin still turns to the Dark Side despite being the Force’s child. Luke still manages to have trouble learning to focus despite being the Froce’s grandchild. They both still have to learn to use the Force. And while yes, it does come a bit easier to them, that doesn’t actually mean it should come easier to Rey because Palpatine is not the literal actual Force, therefore his ability to use the Force is not transferable.

Think of it this way. If you are a mermaid, that means that you are half human, half fish, just as Luke and Anakin are part human, part Force. So of course a mermaid could learn to swim easier than a regular person could, they have a tail. They are a fish person. But, if your grandfather was an Olympic swimmer, that doesn’t translate to you being able to be better at swimming. Just because your grandfather was on the same level as the mermaid, that doesn’t mean anything. He was still human. He trained to get that ability, so you would have to do the same if you wanted to be on his level. Get it?

But also, Rey never comes to terms with Palpatine being her grandfather. Also, she kills him, which is what he wanted her to do. Yes, she is empowered by the souls of the Jedi before her, but she still kills him.

There’s a reason Luke doesn’t kill Vader. A few reasons, actually. For one, Vader is helpless in that moment. He had his hand cut off. He’s lying on the ground, overwhelmed. He’s having trouble breathing. To kill him there would be to kill an unarmed opponent, and that goes against the Jedi. Two, killing Vader was what Sidious wanted. And giving Sidious what he wants leaves a nasty taste in my mouth and makes me want to throw things. Luke going against Sidious, literally throwing his lightsaber aside, basically going “fuck off. I’m a Jedi, just like my dad. Yeah, like my dad. You turned him to the Dark Side? Guess what bitch, I’m literally not turning to the Dark Side and invoking his name, which means I am literally to your face mocking you and belittling what you did. Sucker.” From an audience perspective, Luke doing this is super satisfying. We want Sidious to fail, we want to see the smirk wiped off his face, we want his overconfidence to be his downfall, and it ultimately is.

Rey killing Sidious just isn’t as satisfying. Vader is killing the man who turned him against everyone he loved and everyone who loved him. Vader is killing the man who told him his Master didn’t respect him. The man who told him the Jedi would never understand him. The man who groomed him. He’s killing his abuser, the person he’s been enslaved to for twenty plus years. And he does it in a fit of passion. He does it because he realizes that Palpatine never kept any of his promises. Palpatine promised that the Dark Side would save Padme and the baby, and now he is being forced to watch as the Dark Side takes the baby Padme died giving birth to away from him. It’s poignant. It’s meaningful. He’s finally finally free of the man who turned him against the people who loved him.

If Luke had killed Sidious, it might have been satisfying, but it wouldn’t have been as impactful. It wouldn’t have been as meaningful. Palpatine dies because he was overconfident, the same thing that killed his own Master. Palpatine doesn’t believe he can lose, and he’s proven wrong as the last person he expects to turn on him does.

Rey just doesn’t have that connection to Palpatine. She barely knows him. She wasn’t a slave to him for years and years. She wasn’t groomed by him. Her being related to him is ultimately meaningless, because their relation doesn’t cause her to hesitate. And while Sidious dying is satisfying on a lizard brain level, it isn’t impactful or meaningful. It doesn’t mean anything. It just means that he died again. It doesn’t change her in any way.

Killing Sidious changed Vader, freed him from the chains, allowed him to finally remove his mask and see his son with his own eyes. Watching Vader kill Sidious changed Luke. He begged his father to save him and ultimately ended up killing him because his begging worked. He believes that Vader is good, wholeheartedly and completely, because he was there and saw everything that happened. Luke burns Vader on a pyre, respects his identity as a Jedi, mourns for Anakin Skywalker. Rey isn’t changed by killing Sidious. It doesn’t affect her. It’s meaningless, narratively and literally. It doesn’t mean anything to her, to Sidious, or to us.

Rey just doesn’t have that struggle with the Dark Side. There’s no fear that she’s going to turn. There’s no dread. We know she isn’t going to, and the pacing isn’t slow enough to draw out our “but what if…” feeling like it was with Luke. They try to make it a fear, but it has no payoff. Sidious tells Luke to kill him, to kill Vader, and the payoff is that Luke literally throws away his lightsaber. He talks back to the Emperor of the Galaxy, to the man nobody has ever dared to speak back to. He basically says “There’s nothing you can do to make me kill anyone. I’m not going to kill anyone, in rage or otherwise, and so you’ve lost.” Luke refusing to kill out of anger is a loss. That’s the moment Palpatine loses. That’s the first time Palpatine loses. Sidious tells Rey to kill him, and Rey does. And the movie pretends that that’s just fine, nothing bad happens, everything is a-OK. There’s no payoff for his taunting. There’s no fear that Rey will fall.

Rey isn’t a Jedi. Not really. Because she got to kill Sidious out of fear and anger. The rules don’t apply to her. She gets to have psychometry when it’s convenient to the plot, then she gets to turn it off so that touching Darth Vader’s lightsaber doesn’t send her into a coma, like it shOULD- She gets to be trained by Luke and Leia both, just because. She gets to fall in love and the only consequence is that the love interest dies. Which, honestly, barely seems like a consequence since it doesn’t actually seem to change her, not like losing Padme did to Anakin. She gets to have attachments and friends and she isn’t expected to restart the Jedi Order and she just doesn’t become a Jedi. She doesn’t make the sacrifices, she doesn’t go through the pain, she doesn’t have to change herself. She isn’t a Jedi, because she doesn’t really want to be a Jedi.

And that’s why I don’t want to add Rey to my Padawan Chaos. The point of the Padawan Chaos is to give them a break. These characters suffer and suffer and hurt and break apart, and I took them out of the narrative before any of that happens and I let them be happy. Rey just doesn’t need a break as much as the others do. She never struggles as much, her powers are all over the place, her character is inconsistent, she just doesn’t fit.

“But, Kacie, why did you add Leia then?” Easy. Leia is more similar to Anakin, attitude-wise, and she almost certainly struggles with the Dark Side. She’s a politician and a Jedi. She has a character that’s consistent and can play off of not only the other Padawans, but also off of the Jedi Council. She’s allowed to be a badass and feminine at the same time, her femininity is never diminished by how powerful she is, she killed Jabba the Hutt with the chains he put her in, she’s a quick learner and she’s good with a blaster and she’s fucking pissed and she’s so happy to learn that Luke is her brother and she is, as all of the others are, the embodiment of a Jedi, because she puts other people above herself and she’s empathetic and she’s kind without expectation and she deserves to be a Jedi because she and Luke build each other up in a way that’s unique to their relationship and powerful and-

Leia is a better female character than Rey, but she’s more than that. She’s a better Jedi.

#the inane ramblings of a madman #star wars #luke skywalker #anakin skywalker #leia organa #yoda #dooku #qui gon jinn #obi wan kenobi #rey #chaos incarnate padawan edition #long post #i know this turned into a ramble #but rey honestly annoys me as a character #that isn’t to say i’ll never write her ever #i have and i would like to expand on the idea #but she just doesn’t fit here #and i don’t want to add her #she leaves a bad taste in my mouth #i can’t put in a character who isn’t a jedi #and rey just isn’t a jedi #she doesn’t ever really want to be one #anyway #here’s my longwinded explanation #very long post

[gabessquishytum]

I feel like you had dark/sith Dream already on your mind when you wrote your ficlet because "I would kill for my lightsaber rn" is NOT a very Jedi sentiment, also losing his lightsaber ("this weapon is YOUR LIFE") doesn't bode well tho it seems on brand for Dream.

Also, George Lucas said sex is A-OK, even love is to an extent, and attachment is unhealthy obsessive love/ wanting to possess a person (so really sith!Dream is looking very likely here lmfao), so go wild with the sex lol, although Dream Force-fucking Hob without touching him sounds absolutely amazing :D

Can you tell that I read a lot of dark Obi Wan fics, lol? I feel like the vibes are slightly similar. Obi Wan is veeery repressed and traumatised by the experience of being a Jedi. If Anakin had asked him to, he 100% would have left the order (whether you see their relationship as platonic or something else). I would imagine that in this au, Dream would be a little like that. I think he'd struggle with the Jedi order on the whole, having all those expectations and following rules, oof. If he did go to the darkside completely I think it would be more of an individual choice for freedom rather than an ambition to take over the universe.

As for sex, I think Jedi Dream would avoid it, because he's frightened of the temptation that might come from it. I don't think he would trust himself. You don’t spend your whole life in a monastic order without coming out with a sense of shame, whether sex is permitted or not.

Buuuut. If he doesn't touch, then there's no temptation, right? Sith Dream on the other hand, well. He's going to take everything he wants and more. I also just think he should have a red lightsaber. Because ~sexy~

#sb-essebi #the sandman #dreamling #nsft #star wars au

[shiftingouttathisreality]

Star Wars (Prequel Series) DR

Name: Alonwy Skydancer

I chose my name in this particular DR as a sort of play on Anakin’s name. Also, it’s fitting because my DR self is a very good dancer. I was an orphan before becoming a Jedi and thus, when Qui Gon saw me dancing, he gave me the surname Skydancer. It’s odd and maybe some people won’t like it, but I love it.

Age: 21

I aged myself down by a few years. My early 20s in my CR were filled with a ton of trauma and I really want to enjoy them. Thus, I aged myself down to when my trauma began in my CR. This has been very helpful.

Love Interest: Anakin

I feel like this should be a no brainer. I was a kid when I first saw the prequel series and Anakin was my very first crush.

Anakin and I have known each other since birth. I was a slave as well and, when Anakin became a Jedi, Qui Gon brought me along as well because he saw my talents. I actually only scripted that I would become a Jedi as well, so I had no clue how this would happen until I shifted. Anakin and I were very close as children and fell in love when we were teenagers.

Changes I’ve Made:

Qui Gon doesn’t die. I had originally scripted that he would die, following canon. But changed this after growing attached to him in my DR. A decision I do not regret.

Padme exists, but she and Anakin never fell in love. They had a brief one night stand before Ani and I fell in love, which did result in the twins’ conception. Unfortunately, she died in childbirth. She’s currently pregnant in my DR, but she has not given birth yet. I am thinking about changing her fate, but I haven’t decided yet. She and I are very close, almost sisters, and I probably will end up saving her.

Obi Wan knows about Anakin and I. He actively helps conceal our relationship from the council, though he did at first try to dissuade us from being together. His support means a lot.

Palpatine is unchanged. He despises me and I have, though Anakin is unsure. Ani doesn’t fully trust him, but he also struggles to fully accept that Palpatine isn’t the good guy. (He eventually will; Ani is not going to the dark side.)

I’m currently pregnant. Just one baby, though we have no idea of the gender.

What I look like;

Pretty much this. I have very pale blue eyes, however. And my hair is longer, reaching my knees. But this is fairly accurate.

#shifting realities #reality shifting #desired reality #shifting blog

[captain039]

PART 2 Force bond

Obi wan Kenobi x reader

Werewolf AU

Warnings: werewolf things, feelings, emotions, light swearing, light gore, hurt/comfort, panic attack

Last part <-

It was hard to leave the shower, you scrubbed your body ten times and brushed your teeth furiously till they bled. You were struggling to stay awake and keep yourself up but you needed to check on your master again. You left the fresher, towel wrapped around your waist before you grabbed some causal clothes. A simple shirt and pants, clean and fresh. A knock came to your room and you frowned opening the door. Your master stood there a smile on his face as you froze.

“What are you doing up?!” You were quick to look him up and down, he stood normal, no pain on his face.

“You should be resting-“ you panicked.

“Padawan” Obi-Wan said firm as he sent out a calming wave in the force. You silenced yourself and let him in, door sliding shut.

“Apologies master” you muttered cursing yourself.

“How long were you by my bed?” He asked after some silence.

“Since you arrived” you muttered looking at the ground.

“Padawan that’s a whole week” he stated and you shrugged slightly.

“Doesn’t matter” you muttered as he stood by you face hard.

“It does matter you neglected simple self care!” he lectured and you cringed.

“You know better than this” he sighed and you felt emotions bubble up.

“I thought I taught you better, what will the council think, did Anakin even try to move you?” You shook your head and he sighed hand running through his hair.

“You were unconscious!” You snapped finally and he looked to you.

“You weren’t moving! I couldn’t feel you in the force!” Your eyes began to water with your outburst.

“I panicked! I didn’t leave your side because I was afraid you left me! I couldn’t care less about me! You only matter!” You snarled feeling pain bubble up as you groaned and toppled over. Your master tried to help but you pushed him away with clawed hands and fell to the ground as you shifted.

You laid on the cool Lino of your small kitchen and huffed trying to shift back. Shirt awkwardly ripped over your fur. You curled in on yourself, wolf body trembling.

“Padawan” your master said softly but you just hid under your tail the best you could.

Someone walked in, Anakin, you looked to him and he froze.

“I’ll come back” he said and quickly left. You trudged to your room, your wolf body a bit too big for the space you had. You shifted painfully, forcing it. You sighed covering yourself with robes and sitting on your bed. You hoped he would leave or comfort you somehow, you don’t know.

Your master sat by you, a sigh leaving his lips as you did. You kept your eyes on the floor, fear leads to hatred, hatred leads to the dark side.

You tried to calm yourself, tried to throw your feelings into the force but they just kept coming back.

“Suppose you’ll say something wise to me?” You muttered and he chuckled quietly.

“No Padawan I’m afraid I don’t have anything wise to say” he said and you smiled lightly.

“I’m sorry for scaring you” he said after some silence making you look to him.

“Anakin was the same, still is though he gives me more space now you’re here instead” he chuckled lightly and you flushed.

“Seems Im almost always going to attach to my padawans more than normal” he sighed voice soft, you frowned at his words though confused.

“The other masters and their padawans keep safe normal bonds, my bonds though seem to go further” he explained though you still were confused.

“You also require a lot of explaining on things” he chuckled and you apologised, but he shook his head.

“When Anakin first arrived here he held a proud stance, head held high his force strong. He wasn’t going to be stopped no matter how much he got challenged, when my master died he offered comfort, it surprised me, but it was that moment I knew I wouldn’t let my padawan be cut off from me, I didn’t feel much pain of my masters death, the connection had gotten weaker but stronger between me and Anakin” you listened intently to his past.

“Anakin grew and kept growing till he decided to be a foot above me” you stifled a laugh at his words.

“He became a general, a great Jedi, the more we worked on missions and real life things the closer we got, even now he projects his emotions to me, knowing I won’t judge like the others” Obi-Wan sighed hand fidgeting on his leg.

“When you arrived-“ he sighed.

“You don’t have to say anymore” you said.

“Attachments are needed” he said and you frowned.

“Healthy ones, ones that make you feel more than just the force, make it worth being with the force” you weren’t quite believing your ears at his words, Master Kenobi saying healthy attachments were needed when Jedi were to have no attachments.

“When you were in classes you would struggle and get this squinted face of annoyance when nothing went right, I watched you look at the teacher silently begging for help but to afraid to say. I wasn’t quite as knowledgeable then but seeing you made me want to learn more to help” you finally looked to him, the calm soft smile on his face as he spoke. He was still young then and so was Anakin, not towering over Obi-Wan but towering over you.

“Your eyes would light up every time you saw me walk through the door though you sat back to let the others ask their questions, you would fidget with questions before I finally got to you” you grew embarrassed indeed you were a little obsessed with him, one of your favourite teachers showing you how to do things.

“As you grew though I noticed you closing off from the bond, closing your emotions and thoughts, I think sometimes you would avoid me if you could” he stated and your stomach clenched. Hitting your late teens you realised your attachment to your master had gotten worse, your thoughts were wild.

“I thought perhaps it was your time to take your path as a Jedi knight, that’s why you focused more on training and completing missions to prove you were ready to the council” he spoke the truth, you were trying to prove yourself worthy of the title than just being a Padawan.

“When we would go out on missions though you would be calmer, more relaxed and the bond strengthened on our missions” you tensed slightly again, did he think you didn’t want the bond? You loved your master, he had done so much for you, but you couldn’t let him see the dark part of your mind.

“I like our bond, I didn’t mean to close off suddenly-“ you sighed, words weren’t coming out right your brain was muddled.

“It’s alright young one” he smiled and your heart sank, it wasn’t alright.

Next part ->

#x reader #obi wan kenobi x reader #obi wan #Starwars #werewolf #light werewolf au #force

[scrabble-scribbles]

I had a thot for Echos, like an au of the au.

What if over the course of the war, Ahsoka and Rex start getting even more jaded? They’re trying to stop Palpatine, trying to save their brothers and friends, but they can’t do enough. Every time, either more people die or they lose the same number, or just lose the ones who survived last time. Ahsoka slowly loses control of her powers, going deeper and deeper into the force (I’ll explain my force headcanon later). At first, using the dark side is completely accidental, maybe a desperate attempt to save someone. But she starts to notice it working, the only time she can save people without losing way more is when she uses the dark side. At first, she’s scared, she doesn’t want to fall like her master did, like barriss did, like so many Jedi have and will, so she fights back. Until a mission where everything goes wrong, off the wall insane, and she has no choice. She draws on the dark side, saves everyone. And then she starts using it more freely. After all, who would notice if one trade federation man ends up dead, from a broken neck? War is dangerous, and they have thousands of enemies. And who would care if a separatist tactician comes out of an interrogation babbling in terror, unspeakable fear behind their eyes, as long as they have data that can help the war?

Rex is more subtle. He doesn’t draw on the Force, he doesn’t have the risk of falling. But him and Ahsoka are connected in the Force. He grows more ruthless, more protective. He dips back into the tactics used by the rebels, gurellia warfare, infiltration and weakening tactics, and plans that are more concerned with protecting his own than worrying about civilian casualties or how the land is damaged, like firebombing runs. During prisoner transfers, he breaks a few bones when prisoners are rude. He doesn’t take shit from natborn officers, Jedi and non Jedi alike. The Togruta Jedi almost always at his side snarls whenever anyone tries to reprimand him, and complaints somehow always end up missing.

The turning point for both of them would probably be Umbara. Ahsoka’s not leaving Rex and his men alone with Krell after Anakin leaves, despite her telling him Krell's bad. She's mad, Rex is furious, both of them are stuck in a campaign thats hell. Ahsoka wasnt here last time, so she gets stuck a few times, and Rex is trying to save anyone he can. Ahsoka and krell are arguing over tactics, with rex on her side. When Krell threatens Fives (lightsaber from the episode), Ahsoka Force pushes him away. Both her sabers are out and she's glaring him down, standing in front of Fives. Rex has both blasters out and aimed at Krell. Nothing really happens, Krell just stands down and lets them continue, until his plan to take the capital happens. Ahsoka goes with the clones, against Krell's orders, and her and rex manage to save more men on the retreat. Fives, Hardcase and jesse go to blow up the ship, and when Krell tries to have them executed, ahsoka and rex dont let him. (i might write this out). When the time comes where Krell sends them out to kill the 212th troopers, Ahsoka stops it before they even can, but then another battalion comes through and tries killing both the 501st and 212th men. (probably luminara's men because barriss was there in the episode), and lots of ppl die. Instead of the clones going, Rex and Ahsoka go to confront Krell. he threatens to have Rex executed for something, to get ahsoka expelled for dark side and attachments. Keystone moment, and Ahsoka goes dark.

The troopers trudging back to the camp see the spinning lightsabers as Krell is thrown out of the building, and smaller sabers as Ahsoka follows. Rex jumps down, and is helped by Ahsoka to land perfectly, both attacking Krell. The 501st men are shocked, because Ahsoka is fighting like a completely different person. her fighting style is near feral, and the besalisk is genuinely struggling to keep up with her. Ahsoka gets him down, cuts two of his arms off. None of them say anything as Rex shoots Krell in the head. Ahsoka's eyes flash gold as Krell's body is dragged away.

So basically Ahsoka falls, and Rex follows her, because of their desperation to save people and stop the sith from taking over, from stealing so much from them. And the kicker? through this, they lose the family they were trying so hard to save.

Anyhoo that was my angst thot for Echos :)

#EOTF AU #ahsoka tano #captain rex #clone wars #pong krell #star wars #fives #sith #jedi order #umbara arc

[david-talks-sw]

What's 'Star Wars' about?

A while ago I got an 'Ask' that concluded with "what is Star Wars about, if not the Jedi, right?" And weirdly enough... I have to disagree.

I mean... to me? Yes. Star Wars is about the Jedi. A Jedi-less, Sith-less, lightsaber-less Star Wars movie or series will struggle to get me on board (which is why I was surprised that I loved Andor so much).

But if you read everything George Lucas said, if you think about the Jedi's place in his two trilogies... they're not front and center, right?

Sure, there's Luke Skywalker... but he's a learner, in the Original Trilogy. Same goes for Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi, in the Prequels. They're going through character arcs.

Otherwise, the Jedi are either used as mentors to the protagonist...

... or to deliver exposition...

... but they're mostly vectors Lucas uses to present his thesis.

Functionally-speaking, the Jedi are important in that they embody the Buddhist philosophies the movie's themes are based on.

But when it comes to the plot, they're secondary. That's because the the themes of these films are bigger than the Jedi themselves.

So the question becomes... what's are the themes?

The primary goal of the Star Wars films is to inspire kids to start thinking outside the box and teach them a set of values and psychological motifs that have been passed down through mythology and fairy tales.

These values can be summed up in the dichotomy between greed and compassion / selfishness and selflessness / pleasure and joy.

We all have both aspects and need to strike a balance between the two. After all, being greedy ultimately comes from fear and being afraid can happen to all of us. Problem is, unchecked fear can lead to anger, hate and a whole lot of suffering.

The more selfish you are, the more you want things and the more you're afraid that you'll lose everything you have, you'll get angry when someone tries to take it and that will hurt everyone around you.

In other words, fear is the path to the tempting/addictive Dark Side.

Thus, seeing as we'll be inevitably tempted by the Dark Side and give in at some point (because nobody's perfect), we should aim to be as selfless and compassionate as possible for our own good... but also for the greater good, because we're all connected to a life energy. You can call it Qi or God; in Star Wars it's known as the Force.

As such, we all form a symbiotic circle and working with that in mind is better than putting ourselves first and draining from everything and everyone around us.

But we also need to be careful because there will be people who give in to that selfish side and will try to control everything. When the time comes, we must stand up for what's right.

So that's Lucas' thesis.

If I had to sum them up, the six movies illustrate it as follows:

The Prequel Trilogy is about the consequences of greed, explored through Anakin on a smaller scale and the Senate on a larger one.

The Original Trilogy shows the triumph of compassion, through Luke, Leia & Han and the Rebellion's fight against the Empire.

Lucas talked about it multiple times, the Prequels are about how Anakin becomes Darth Vader and how the Republic becomes the Empire, and in both those cases, it happens because they're greedy.

The Senate is greedy in the more classical sense. They could give a shit about "symbiosis", no they're taking bribes, letting corporations dictate policy, using loopholes to keep themselves in power and halting any meaningful progress out of fear that the new status quo will conflict with their own self-serving goals.

Anakin's greed manifests in a different way. He turns to the Dark Side because of his attachment. He wants to stop Padmé from dying... but not because he wants to save her, rather he wants to save himself from feeling the pain of loss again and will do anything to not have to live without her, her own wishes and the natural cycle of life and death be damned.

In both cases, they cave under pressure orchestrated by Palpatine, but nobody puts a gun to their head. They make a deliberate choice that comes from a selfish place, and neither one takes personal responsibility for it, they blame others, the Separatists in the case of the Senate and the Jedi in Anakin's case.

The Republic becomes an Empire with thunderous applause, betraying the people it was meant to protect.

And when faced between doing something he knows is right and giving in to his selfish desires...

... Anakin elects to do the latter, thus betraying his family and leaving the Force in darkness.

These selfish choices impact the galaxy as a whole, including the only characters in the trilogy who were doing their best to be compassionate and live in symbiosis: the Jedi, Padmé and Bail.

These champions of the Light Side are stuck playing catch-up or helplessly witnessing the events unfold, throughout the trilogy. They're playing by the rules and Palpatine uses this to his advantage.

Thus, as the galaxy tears itself apart because of Palpatine's manipulations, the Jedi and Bail are ignored and gradually weakened until they're either rendered irrelevant or killed.

A new order is born, one built on blood, lies and greed: the Empire.

But a new hope remains.

While before, the Jedi and people like Bail stood alone as everything around them became willfully corrupt... now, a Rebellion inspired by their legacy has banded together to overthrow the current order. But they don't fight for power or personal glory, they fight for altruistic, compassionate reasons. There's a sense of general responsibility that moves them, they're all doing their part.

On a larger scale, we focus on the Rebels, who are tired of seeing people suffer and decided this needs to stop. They have gone from being passive, to proactive.

On a more personal scale, we see the evolution of Luke, from naive farmer to a hero, and guess what? More and more selfish people - like Han or Lando - are inspired to join the Rebellion, after seeing the exploits of Luke, Leia, or even Ben.

It all culminates in the final film, wherein:

The Rebels band together with the Ewoks - literal teddy bears whom the Empire, in their arrogance, never even considered to be a threat - to destroy the Second Death Star and free the galaxy from imperial tyranny.

At the same time, Emperor Palpatine pressures Luke, who is tempted by the Dark Side like his father was.

But instead of giving in to his selfish desire to kill Darth Vader for all the horrors he's done...

... he finds the strength to rise above it, instead showing compassion for his father, which, in turn, inspires Anakin to do the same.

He faces a choice, like he did in Palpatine's office, two decades prior...

... and this time he chooses right.

Children teach you compassion. Anakin lets go of his fear and anger, and saves his son at the cost of his own life, finally bringing balance back to the Force.

Good triumphed over evil. Its champions achieved victory by being selfless, hopeful and fighting together / helping each other.

And that's it, that's how the movies thematically tie together.

As you can see, the Jedi aren't that directly impactful on the overall plot, because it revolves around Anakin, Luke and the respective factions/institutions around them.

But what the Jedi do bring to the table is their ability to teach and inspire others, both in-universe and out. They're spiritually impactful.

The Jedi are the epitome of compassion, and it's partially through them that George Lucas teaches his values to the audience.

#to be clear: Star Wars doesn't HAVE to be about all this #This is just me trying to summarize what Lucas said in all his interviews and speeches #The post-Lucas Star Wars transmedia franchise made the Jedi more central than they were originally meant to be; especially in the Prequels #You see this in interviews from current SW creators /writers #but also small stuff like renaming the Prequel era “Fall of the Jedi” when it was originally named the “Rise of the Empire” era #meta #george lucas #star wars #jedi order #the force #anakin skywalker #luke skywalker #prequel trilogy #original trilogy

[fellthemarvelous]

Random thoughts about the Disaster Trio that doesn't really go anywhere but I'm talking about them anyway.

I think a lot about the way Anakin trained Ahsoka to be able to take on enemies bigger than her. He trained her to be a survivor too because he was a survivor as well. He always had trouble letting go though because he always feared loss. He had promised his mother he would return to Tatooine to free her, but he didn't get the chance until it was too late. He'd kept his promise that he would free her from the Tusken Raiders, but he had never anticipated that his mother would die in his arms and he blamed himself.

Anakin slaughtered every single one of the Tusken Raiders in that small village. He succumbed to the dark side and he was disappointed in himself. He was angry with himself. He was scared of himself and it's why he struggled with his attachments. He had failed the Jedi, but with Ahsoka he was determined not to fail her. He was able to bring her back from the dead with the life force of Daughter. He was able to do for her what he wasn't able to do for his own mother.

Anakin was selfless and loved so deeply, but his fear of loss caused him to struggle with knowing what the right choice was.

The saddest thing is that Anakin was so selfless and kind as a child. He wanted to help everyone. Palpatine groomed him for years and successfully turned him into the most feared being in the galaxy.

Anakin was the key to enslaving an entire galaxy. He was the strongest JediHe became a slave to Palpatine because of the influence Palpatine had over his entire life. Pretending to be a father figure. Praising Anakin in a way that caused Anakin to doubt the Jedi and steer him in the wrong direction.

Palpatine influenced him, and that moment in the office with Palpatine and Mace Windu was pivotal. It was a test that would either allow him to achieve the rank of Jedi Master or turn him to the dark side. It was his test and he failed. All he wanted was to be a Jedi Master. His visions of Padme dying was the catalyst for his final test as a Jedi. He could have become a Jedi master, but he chose to become a Sith apprentice instead when he helped Palpatine kill Mace Windu. (Side note: I like to tell myself that he actually survived because Samuel L Jackson is a badass motherfucker who is really good at getting his way and also thinks Mace Windu survived)

Not trusting in the Force is what caused him to be the reason Padme died. He failed. The worst thing that could happen happened and it was his fault. He caused the death of the Jedi Order. He caused the death of Padme. Obi-Wan had lost all faith in him and left him for dead.

And the Emperor shared the news of Padme's death with a smile on his face.

He failed and that's when he committed fully to the dark side. When he lost everything. Because Palpatine had lied to him his entire life. He knew this on some level, but he failed and he refused to actually admit it.

He took the pain of loss, the anger, the fear and the hate and projected his rage onto everyone as the Emperor's apprentice.

Anakin trained Ahsoka to be able to take on someone as strong as him. He didn't think it would actually be him, but he also didn't fully trust himself. He never knew where he fit. Obi-Wan was like a father to Anakin, but Obi-Wan considered Anakin a brother. Obi-Wan is only what, 16 years older than Anakin? Obi-Wan not only trained Anakin, but he raised Anakin. He loved Anakin unconditionally and allowed his feelings as family to cloud his judgment when it came to the trouble that Anakin was actually in. He refused to listen to Mace and Yoda when they voiced their concern because of his attachment to Anakin.

Anakin's belief that he failed Ahsoka when she left the Jedi Order caused him to fall even further. It wasn't Ahsoka's fault. He thought he had failed her, but it was the Order as a whole that did. He didn't fail Ahsoka, but he needed that time to reunite with her because of how much he was struggling with his conscience and he never got the opportunity to talk to her.

Anakin failed because of how much he doubted himself. How much he hated himself.

In the end, resurrecting her from the dead on Mortis is what made it impossible for him to kill her on Malachor. Morai had to save Ahsoka and the light of Daughter within her. Morai is the one who got Ezra to rescue Ahsoka just before Vader was actually able to kill her. The light is important.

Holdo and Leia are protecting the light in the sequels and it makes me wonder if Ahsoka sacrifices herself and entrusts Leia to keep the force and the Jedi alive by protecting the light. Anakin brought balance to the Force, but Ahsoka is the one who carries the light and life force of Daughter.

Anakin's sacrifice mirrored the way Son and Father died, and he did it to save the Jedi again. Anakin brought balance to the Force, but the Jedi had to remember who they were supposed to be, and they were not soldiers. They were peacekeepers.

Return of the Jedi had so many meanings. The Jedi and other Force-sensitive individuals were able to live freely without being hunted. Anakin's choice to save Luke saved the future of the Jedi, but more importantly, Anakin's choice to save his son is how Anakin the Jedi returned as well.

Star Wars makes me emotional lol.

I get too many feelings when it comes to the Disaster Trio. These are just theories so don't come at me with why I'm wrong if you don't like them.

#anakin skywalker #obi-wan kenobi #ahsoka tano #star wars #random thoughts

[ryder-s-block]

Jaig Eyes (Ch 85)

Jaig Eyes (85/?)

Summary:

Kida, a former slave who now thrives as a bounty hunter, finds herself sucked into the war she advised Jango Fett against. Now that she’s involved, she has to finally mourn the loss of Jango, seeing his face in the clones that man the GAR. What happens when she allows herself to get attached to one, not for his resemblance to her former mentor, but for his heart?

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

Chapter Eighty-Five: The Jedi’s Deception

“I am Moralo Eval, and I have great influence here.”  So that’s what the psychopath sounds like. The Force trembled as I struggled to keep my concentration, begging it to show me what I needed to see. 

“It’ll cost you. Double my rate.” I knew that voice anywhere, the speech measured, the sound rusted and low. Cad Bane. There were disgruntled discussions, muffled through the confusion of the Force. Or was it the confusion of my connection to the Force? “Make that triple my rate.”

I felt something shift. Time felt…wrong. Like I was drifting within it randomly, rather than along it linearly. “You don’t even remember me? That’s very insulting.” The voice drew my attention immediately, the snark in the words all too familiar, despite the years apart. We’d both changed a lot, but the sass in Boba’s speech was never going to leave him. I hadn’t seen Boba in a long time. Since he was imprisoned, I’d only seen him sparingly. Between being off world and the difficulty to even gain access, it was practically impossible. Padme and Anakin had both pulled some strings for me a few times, allowing me to see my little vod. 

Eventually, though, Boba and I agreed to stop my visits. It pained me, and I’d felt the sorrow within him when he brought it up, but he was right. Despite doing what we could to keep my visits quiet, secrets didn’t last long in a prison. And my affiliation with both the Republic and the Fett family already put eyes on Boba. Especially after the mess with Aurra Sing. I would only make things harder and more dangerous for him.

There was another voice I didn’t recognize from somewhere in the inky darkness, drawing my attention. “Kill him, Hardeen, like the Jedi!” I assumed it was a fellow inmate, and by the echoing sound of clattering dishes, it sounded like the mess hall. I felt my anger rise, making my connection to the Force waver and flux. 

I cooled my emotions with a deep breath. I was a spectator right now and I couldn’t even be sure when these events had happened, or if they were still to come. Either way, there was nothing I could do for someone in the prison. I had to trust in Boba’s ability…and on the word of someone who didn’t particularly like me.

“You got a problem with Boba,” I heard a menacing hissing voice sound, my nerves calming even further. “You got a problem with me.” A murderer and a sadist, but Bossk true to his word; he was protecting my family.

 I could hear a beeping, reminding me of a communicator. I focused on it, trying to strain to hear when it was picked up. But it just kept beeping. Was this what I was meant to hear? Was someone in trouble and unable to pick up?

I listened to beeping for a moment longer before sighing, rubbing my hands against my eyes and relaxing my posture. Strangely, the beeping didn’t stop despite releasing my meditative state. My eyes snapped open in a mix of confusion and worry, convinced my real communicator was beeping and I’d been too stuck in my thoughts. But I didn’t see my office. Instead, I was in a large communications room, the designs of the floor making me wonder if I was seeing the Jedi Temple.

My suspicion was confirmed almost immediately as a door hissed behind me, my head whipping around in shock. Masters Yoda and Windu strode through, their eyes forward and slightly above my head. I sat, my mouth agape with my legs folded beneath me on the floor.

I’d been trying to meditate to sort my thoughts and stop my worrying…did I just transfer myself to the Temple? I hadn’t noticed any feeling of my environment changing. Was that even possible? Turns out it wasn’t, a surprised squeak leaving my lungs as the two Jedi walked directly through me like a cloud. It was a weird feeling, considering I didn’t feel anything on my skin…but my mind felt the pressure and the weird essence of transparency. It made the hair raise on the back of my neck. 

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13221379/85/Jaig-Eyes

#star wars #star wars the clone wars #star wars oc #Kida Fett #Daughter of Jango fic #captain rex #captain rex x oc #mace windu #master yoda #Anakin Skywalker #obi-wan

[gffa]

Hi! I thought it worked well, given the context of the episode that we were given. If it had just been a choice between two harmless items, yeah, then it would have been a jerk choice, but I never saw it as "a Jedi can never have Mandalorian things and a Mandalorian can never have Jedi things", but instead that it was specifically about what we're told of Grogu in the episode--that his heart isn't really in the path that he's trying to walk.  And why that is so important. You absolutely have to have your heart in it if you're going to be a Jedi, and I really like the way a recent High Republic comic put it:

“The Force can send your mind across the galaxy–to the past, to the future. Connect you with others.  Let you talk to beasts.  Make you the best warrior anyone’s ever seen.  And much more.  It’s the greatest power in the universe. Do you think learn to use it should be easy?” Further, it’s also a connection to the foundation of what it means to be a Jedi and why it’s so important.  Yoda is a character that is all over this episode, not just because Grogu is from the same species or because Grogu was from the same Jedi Temple that Yoda was, but because Yoda was Luke’s first teacher, Yoda was the one who showed Luke truly what the Force was and how Jedi interact with it.

And now that Luke is teaching Grogu, he must pass on what he’s learned. So what did Luke learn?  This is the very basic building block of what it means to commit to the life of being a Jedi, because as Elzar points out above--those abilities a Jedi is granted through this life, they’re serious.  They shouldn’t be a trivial, easy thing to learn. You’re connecting to so much life, you’re going to have physical and mental power over other beings, you absolutely do need to take this seriously.  This is something all Jedi taught (you can see it in both the High Republic and the prequels Jedi), that you can’t just half-ass your training as a Jedi, because you’ll hurt yourself and others. Being a Jedi takes discipline, something that is really hard to do and requires a lifetime of it.  The dark side is a powerful, seductive thing and there’s a reason we see nearly every Jedi struggle with it at the mid-point of their training.  We see Obi-Wan struggle with the dark side against Maul on Naboo.  We see Anakin struggle with the dark side when his mother dies on Tatooine and he murders the Tusken men, women, and children.  We see Dooku and Sifo-Dyas struggle with it repeatedly in Dooku: Jedi Lost, like six different instances.  We see Ezra struggle with it in season three of Rebels.  We see Luke struggle with it on Dagobah and again on the second Death Star.  We see Rey struggle with it all throughout The Rise of Skywalker. Jedi are taught this from an early age:      Qui-Gon whispered, “The dark side?” He knew it was a thing all beings carried within them, a part of himself he would learn to guard against—the crèche masters had taught him all that. --Master & Apprentice The dark side is something that’s always there and the only way to rise above it is:      “Only way to overcome the dark side is through discipline.” --George Lucas, The Clone Wars writers’ meeting That’s why Yoda says this, one of the first and most true things we know about Jedi, that this isn’t just a part-time thing, that it requires a lot more than that, from The Empire Strikes Back:

“A Jedi must have the deepest commitment, the most serious mind. This one a long time have I watched. All his life has he looked away…to the future, to the horizon. Never his mind on where he was. Hmm? What he was doing.” That’s exactly what Grogu is doing! He’s looking to the horizon, because he misses Din, because he can’t stop thinking about him, can’t stop missing him:

Luke and Ahsoka both comment on this in the episode--Ahsoka tells Din that Grogu is having a difficult time letting go of his attachment to Din, that if he sees Din, it’ll only make it more difficult for him.  Luke says to Ahsoka that he’s not sure Grogu’s heart is really in this.  Which is important because of the transitional nature of all of what Grogu’s going through, something vital for a Jedi to understand and accept:      “The core of Anakin’s problem is that Jedi are raised from birth so they learn to let go of everything. They’re trained more than anything else to understand the transitional nature of life, that things are constantly changing and you can’t hold on to anything. You can love things but you can’t be attached to them. You must be willing to let the flow of life and the flow of the Force move through your life, move through you. So that you can be compassionate and loving and caring, but not possessive and grabbing and holding on to things and trying to keep things the way they are. Letting go is a central theme of the film.” --George Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005 The entire scene of Din wanting to see Grogu in that episode--which Luke is aware of, he sensed the Mandalorian on the planet and likely felt his motivations, because Jedi are psychic empaths--is a reflection of that and another foundational quote from George Lucas:

     “[Jedi Knights] do not grow attachments, because attachment is a path to the dark side. You can love people, but you can’t want to possess them. They’re not yours. Accept that they have a fate. Even those you love most are going to die. You can’t do anything about that. Protect them with your lightsaber, but if they die they were going to die. there’s nothing you can do. All you can do is accept that fact.     "In mythology, if you go to Hades to get them back you’re not doing it for them, you’re doing it for yourself. You’re doing it because you don’t want to give them up. You’re afraid to be without them. The key to the dark side is fear. You must be clean of fear, and fear of loss is the greatest fear. If you’re set up for fear of loss, you will do anything to keep that loss from happening, and you’re going to end up in the dark side. That’s the basic premise of Star Wars and the Jedi, and how it works.     "That’s why they’re taken at a young age to be trained. They cannot get themselves killed trying to save their best buddy when it’s a hopeless exercise.” — George Lucas, Star Wars Archives 1999-2005 This is why Luke asks Grogu to choose between these two paths.  It’s not that he can never have anything that reminds him of Din, we have seen a ton of Jedi with connections to their birth worlds and it’s fine, it’s not attachment.  We see Barriss and Luminara with headdresses and facial tattoos and even Barriss’ prayer statue.  We see Shaak and Ahsoka with Togruta headdresses.  We see Anakin with a room stuffed full of things from Naboo or a poster from the podrace he won on Tatooine.  Etc. Luke asking Grogu to choose isn’t about the item itself, but about the tear in Grogu’s heart.  That he’s not actually serious about this in his heart, that this isn’t what he really wants, and he needs to make the choice that’s actually best for him.  Both paths are worthwhile and good paths!  There’s joy in either road Grogu can walk! But Anakin Skywalker also refused to choose, George Lucas repeatedly said that Anakin fell because of his attachments (the inability to let go when it’s time, the fearful desire to hold onto someone or something because it soothes you, not because you want that person to be happy, because you can’t accept that things come and go, that life is transitory), and of all people Luke Skywalker and Ahsoka Tano are very familiar with what it means when you haven’t actually chosen your path in your heart.  They know very well what happened to Anakin Skywalker. So, yes, Luke asks Grogu to choose.  And it’s not because a Jedi can’t have things that are important to them or connections to other people, but it’s because Grogu himself is at a point where he’s struggling to let go and, if he’s going to be a Jedi, the kind of abilities that it will give him access to (including using the Force, which relies on your emotions and mindset--look at how Grogu choked Cara Dune because he thought she was hurting Din), he would need to make the kind of serious commitment it means to have that shit under control, so he doesn’t lash out and really hurt people.

Luke’s not asking Grogu to choose because Jedi and Mandalorians can’t mix, like, we see that that’s possible all over the place, including Tarre Viszla with the dark saber in this very series.  Jedi didn’t forbid that!  But they do ask you to be serious about this, you have to deadass want this path, which is why most Jedi who leave seem to be around Padawan age, because they realized it wasn’t the right one for them. (Which, by the way, the Jedi Order was very open about--we see the busts of those Jedi in the Archives in the Attack of the Clones scene, there’s an entire scene in Dooku: Jedi Lost about how younglings ask about them, and Yoda and the other Masters take a moment to talk about how some people just choose another path, not for bad reasons, they usually go off to be leaders or teachers or just simply vanish to have some quiet life.  There’s zero shaming of choosing another path, hell, the Jedi even speak warmly of Dooku in Attack of the Clones until it’s revealed that he’s heading up an army that’s gearing up to attack the Republic.) tl:dr: Luke asks Grogu to choose because Grogu’s heart hasn’t actually chosen yet and the shirt and the lightsaber are representations of those different paths, not ironclan rules of what you are/aren’t allowed to have.  It was forcing Grogu to make a real choice, not a half-measure of a choice, because that’s what vital to what being a Jedi means, when you’re granted the abilities they have.

#the book of boba fett #luke skywalker #grogu #jedi order #george lucas #attachment #meta #long post

[writerbuddha]

George Lucas on attachment from 1999 to 2021

BILL MOYERS: Do you know yet what, in a future episode, is going to transform Anakin Skywalker to the dark side?

GEORGE LUCAS: Yes, I know what that is. The groundwork has been laid in this episode. The film is ultimately about the dark side and the light side, and those sides are designed around compassion and greed. The issue of greed, of getting things and owning things and having things and not being able to let go of things, is the opposite of compassion--of not thinking of yourself all the time. These are the two sides--the good force and the bad force. They're the simplest parts of a complex cosmic construction.

George Lucas and Bill Moyers 1999, Time Magazine (http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,990820-2,00.html)

GEORGE LUCAS: He turns into Darth Vader because he gets attached to things. He can't let go of his mother; he can't let go of his girlfriend. He can't let go of things. It makes you greedy. And when you're greedy, you are on the path to the dark side, because you fear you're going to lose things, that you're not going to have the power you need.

George Lucas to Time Magazine April, 2002 (http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,1002323-3,00.html)

GEORGE LUCAS: In this film, (Phantom Menace) you begin to see that he has a fear of losing things, a fear of losing his mother, and as a result, he wants to begin to control things, he wants to become powerful, and these are not Jedi traits. And part of these are because he was starting to be trained so late in life, that he'd already formed these attachments. And for a Jedi, attachment is forbidden.

George Lucas to CNN, May 8, 2002 (https://edition.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/Movies/05/07/ca.s02.george.lucas/index.html)

GEORGE LUCAS: Jedi Knights aren’t celibate – the thing that is forbidden is attachments – and possessive relationships.

George Lucas to BBC, May 12, 2002 (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/1989505.stm)

GEORGE LUCAS: Well, a lot of people got very upset, saying he should’ve been this little demon kid. But the story is not about a guy who was born a monster – it’s about a good boy who was loving and had exceptional powers, but how that eventually corrupted him and how he confused possessive love with compassionate love. That happens in Episode II: Regardless of how his mother died, Jedis are not supposed to take vengeance. And that’s why they say he was too old to be a Jedi, because he made his emotional connections. His undoing is that he loveth too much.

George Lucas to Rolling Stones, 2005 (https://www.rollingstone.com/movies/movie-news/george-lucas-and-the-cult-of-darth-vader-247142/)

GEORGE LUCAS: The core issue, ultimately, is greed, possessiveness - the inability to let go. Not only to hold on to material things, which is greed, but to hold on to life, to the people you love - to not accept the reality of life’s passages and changes, which is to say things come, things go. Everything changes. Anakin becomes emotionally attached to things, his mother, his wife. That’s why he falls - because he does not have the ability to let go.

No human can let go. It’s very hard. Ultimately, we do let go because it’s inevitable; you do die, and you do lose your loved ones. But while you’re alive, you can’t be obsessed with holding on. As Yoda says in this one, [The scene in which Anakin seeks Yoda’s counsel] You must learn to let go of everything you’re afraid to let go of.’ Because holding on is in the same category and the precursor to greed. And that’s what a Sith is. A Sith is somebody that is absolutely obsessed with gaining more and more power - but for what? Nothing, except that it becomes an obsession to get more. The Jedi are trained to let go. They’re trained from birth, they’re not supposed to form attachments. They can love people- in fact, they should love everybody. They should love their enemies; they should love the Sith. But they can’t form attachments. So, what all these movies are about is: greed. Greed is a source of pain and suffering for everybody. And the ultimate state of greed is the desire to cheat death.

J. W. Rinzel - The Making of Revenge of the Sith page 213, published in 2005

GEORGE LUCAS: Anakin wants to be a Jedi, but he cannot let go of the people he loves in order to move forward in his life. The Jedi believe that you don’t hold on to things, that you let things pass through you, and if you can control your greed, you can resolve the conflict not only in yourself but in the world around you, because you accept the natural course of things. Anakin’s inability to follow this basic guideline is at the core of his turn to the Dark Side.

George Lucas to sci-fi online, 2005 (http://www.sci-fi-online.com/Interview/05-11-01_GeorgeLucas.htm)

GEORGE LUCAS: Love is a secret to the universe, which is compassion, which is love others, take care of others, help each other. (…) Struggle in Star Wars is about passion against compassion. Which is greed, against giving and giving up primarily and the whole issue is the flipside of greed is fear of losing. So you are either trying to get things or afraid to lose things that you’ve got and the idea is to let go of those things." - George Lucas, 2007, Devin Kumar Productions (http://www.devinkumar.com/interview-with-george-lucas/)

GEORGE LUCAS: The fact that everything must change and that things come and go through his life and that he cannot hold onto things, which is a basic Jedi philosophy that he isn't willing to accept emotionally and the reason that is because he was raised by his mother rather than the Jedi. If he'd have been taken in his first years and started to study to be a Jedi, he wouldn’t have this particular connection as strong as it is and he'd have been trained to love people but not to become attached to them.

But he become attached to his mother and he will become attached to Padme and these things are, for a Jedi, who needs to have a clear mind and not be influenced by threats to their attachments, a dangerous situation. And it feeds into fear of losing things, which feeds into greed, wanting to keep things, wanting to keep his possessions and things that he should be letting go of. His fear of losing her turns to anger at losing her, which ultimately turns to revenge in wiping out the village. The scene with the Tusken Raiders is the first scene that ultimately takes him on the road to the dark side. I mean he’s been prepping for this, but that’s the one where he’s sort of doing something that is completely inappropriate.

He’s greedy in that he wants to keep his mother around, he’s greedy in that he wants to become more powerful in order to control things in order to keep the things around that he wants. There’s a lot of connections here with the beginning of him sliding into the Dark Side.

(...)

Because of that, and because he was unwilling to let go of his mother, because he was so attached to her, he committed this terrible revenge on the tusked raiders.

George Lucas, Attack of the Clones DVD audio-commentary, 2008

GEORGE LUCAS: It’s fear of losing somebody he loves, which is the flipside of greed. Greed, in terms of the Emperor, it is the greed for power, absolute power, over everything. With Anakin, really, it’s the power to save the one he loves, but is basically going against the Fates and what is natural.

George Lucas, Revenge of the Sith DVD audio-commentary, 2008

GEORGE LUCAS: It’s pivotal that Luke doesn’t have patience. He doesn’t want to finish his training. He’s being succumbed by his emotional feelings for his friends rather than the practical feelings of “I’ve got to get this job done before I can actually save them. I can’t save them, really.” But he sorts of takes the easy route, the arrogant route, the emotional but least practical route, which is to say, “I’m just going to go off and do this without thinking too much.” And the result is that he fails and doesn’t do well for Han Solo or himself. It’s the motif that needs to be in the picture, but it’s one of those things that just in terms of storytelling was very risky because basically he screws up, and everything turns bad. And it’s because of that decision that Luke made on [Dagobah] to say, “I know I’m not ready, but I’m going to go anyway.

George Lucas, Empire Strikes Back DVD audio-commentary, 2008

GEORGE LUCAS: The core of the Force–I mean, you got the dark side, the light side, one is selfless, one is selfish, and you wanna keep them in balance. What happens when you go to the dark side is it goes out of balance and you get really selfish and you forget about everybody … because when you get selfish you get stuff, or you want stuff, and when you want stuff and you get stuff then you are afraid somebody is going to take it away from you, whether it’s a person or a thing or a particular pleasure or experience.

Once you become afraid that somebody’s going to take it away from you or you’re gonna lose it, then you start to become angry, especially if you’re losing it, and that anger leads to hate, and hate leads to suffering. Mostly on the part of the person who’s selfish, because you spend all your time being afraid of losing everything you’ve got instead of actually living. Where joy, by giving to other people you can’t think about yourself, and therefore there’s no pain. But the pleasure factor of greed and of selfishness is a short-lived experience, therefore you’re constantly trying to replenish it, but of course the more you replenish it, the harder it is to, so you have to keep upping the ante. You’re actually afraid of the pain of not having the joy. So that is ultimately the core of the whole dark side/light side of the Force. And everything flows from that. Obviously the Sith are always unhappy because they never get enough of anything they want. Mostly, their selfishness centers around power and control. And the struggle is always to be able to let go of all that stuff. And of course that’s the problem with Anakin ultimately. You’re allowed to love people, but you’re not allowed to possess them. And what he did is he fell in love and married her and then became jealous. Then he saw in his visions that she was going to die, and he couldn’t stand losing her. So in order to not lose her, he made a pact with the devil to be able to become all-powerful. When he did that, she didn’t want to have anything to do with him anymore, so he lost her. Once you are powerful, being able to bring her back from the dead, if I can do that, I can become emperor of the universe. I can get rid of the Emperor. I can make everything the way I want it. Once you do that, you’ll never be satiated. You’re always going to be consumed by this driving desire to have more stuff and be afraid that others are going to take it away from you. And they are. Every time you get two Sith together, you have the master, the apprentice, and the apprentice is always trying to recruit another apprentice to join with him to kill the master. The master knows that basically everybody below him wants his job. Only way to overcome the dark side is through discipline. The dark side is pleasure, biological and temporary and easy to achieve. The light side is joy, everlasting and difficult to achieve. A great challenge. Must overcome laziness, give up quick pleasures, and overcome fear which leads to hate.

George Lucas, explaining the Force to the Clone Wars writing team, 2010 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nFMBBrliyQ&t=41s&ab_channel=StarWarsCoffee)

GEORGE LUCAS: When you start to care about yourself and the things that you own and the things that you have and you’re greedy and you want things all the time and you don’t want to give them up because you’re afraid to give them up, you turn to the dark side. And that’s what happened to Anakin.

George Lucas Q&A: Field Museum, Chicago 5/8/2010 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRaVjM_goKM)

GEORGE LUCAS: The thing about Anakin is, Anakin started out as a nice kid. He was kind, and sweet, and lovely, and he was then trained as a Jedi. But the Jedi can’t be selfish. They can love but they can’t love people to the point of possession. You can’t really possess somebody, because people are free. It’s possession that causes a lot of trouble, and that causes people to kill people, and causes people to be bad. Ultimately it has to do with being unwilling to give things up.

The whole basis here is if you’re selfish, if you’re a Sith Lord, you’re greedy. You’re constantly trying to get something. And you’re constantly in fear of not getting it, or, when you get it, you’re in constant fear of losing it. And it’s that fear that takes you to the dark side. It’s that fear of losing what you have or want.

Sometimes it’s ambition, but sometimes, like in the case of Anakin, it was fear of losing his wife. He knew she was going to die. He didn’t quite know how, so he was able to make a pact with a devil that if he could learn how to keep people from dying, he would help the Emperor. And he became a Sith Lord. Once he started saying, “Well, we could take over the galaxy, I could take over from the Emperor, I could have ultimate power,” Padmé saw right through him immediately. She said, “You’re not the person I married. You’re a greedy person.” So that’s ultimately how he fell and he went to the dark side.

And then Luke had the chance to do the same thing. He didn’t do it.

George Lucas, 2019 (https://www.starwars.com/news/star-wars-episode-i-the-phantom-menace-oral-history)

GEORGE LUCAS: They (the Jedi) trained more than anything else to understand the transitional nature of life, that things are constantly changing and you can't hold on to anything. You can love things but you can't be attached to them, You must be willing to let the flow of life and the flow of the Force move through your life, move through you. So that you can be compassionate and loving and caring, but not be possessive and grabbing and holding on to things and trying to keep things the way they are. Letting go is the central theme of the film."

George Lucas, "Star Wars Archives 1999-2005" p. 72-73 (2020)

GEORGE LUCAS: Luke is faced with the same issues and practically the same scenes that Anakin is faced with. Anakin says yes, and Luke says no. (…) We have the scene when Anakin decides to save Palpatine and join him, so they could learn how to save Padmé. The equivalent scene in VI is when the Emperor’s trying to get Luke to kill his dad so he can save his sister.”

George Lucas, "Star Wars Archives 1999-2005" p. 421 and p. 212. (2020)

GEORGE LUCAS: The secret ultimately like in Star Wars is that you have to not be afraid. Fear is the enemy; fear is the Dark Side. If you afraid, you are going to the Dark Side. The Light Side is compassion. As long as you love other people and treat them kindly, you won't be afraid. So, the secret is to just love everybody - I know that sounds very 60s but that's what I grew up in - but it its fear that cause the problem. So you have to stop being afraid and be kind to everybody.

(...)

The main theme of Star Wars is that compassion is the good side, fear is the bad side.

(...)

I kind of lost control of Star Wars so it’s going off a different path than what I intended but the first six are very much mine and my philosophy. And I think that philosophy sort of goes beyond any particular time because it’s based on history it based on philosophy. (...)

The thing with Anakin is that he started out a great kid he was very compassionate , so the issue was how did he turn bad. How did he go to the Dark Side? He went to the Dark Side, Jedi aren’t supposed to have attachments. They can love people, they can do that, but they can’t attach, that’s the problem in the world of fear. Once you are attached to something then you become afraid of losing it. And when you become afraid of losing it, then you turn to the Dark Side, and you want to hold onto it, and that was Anakin’s issue ultimately, that he wanted to hold onto his wife who he knew, he had a premonition that she was going to die, he didn’t know how to stop it, so he went to the Dark Side to find, in mythology you do to hades, and you talk to the devil, and the devil says ‘this is what you do’ and basically you sell your soul to the devil. When you do that, and you’re afraid and you’re on the Dark Side and you fall off the golden path of compassion because you are greedy, you want to hold on to something that you love and he didn’t do the right thing and as a result he turned bad.

Mellody Hobson, George Lucas - Virtual Speaker Interview (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRqVdcE5oyI)

GEORGE LUCAS WAS ALWAYS CLEAR ABOUT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LOVE AND ATTACHMENT, AND HOW "PREQUEL-ERA" JEDI PHILOSOPHY WORKS.

#george lucas #anakin skywalker #jedi culture #jedi order #attachment #love without attachment #star wars prequels #star wars #luke skywalker #light side #canon

[anna-pixie]

padawan -> obi-wan kenobi {part three}

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

hello!! i have written and rewritten this part a lot, and i still can’t decide whether i am completely happy with it, so honest feedback is encouraged!! ty all so much for your love on the last part, i hope you enjoy <3

summary: you and obi-wan head out on another mission, but something has got him in an awful mood (lmk if you guys figure out what his mood is about before the next part!!)

pairings: obi-wan kenobi x reader

warnings: mentions of sex

╔═══*.·:·.☽✧    ✦    ✧☾.·:·.*═══╗

“Y/N, when you said you were serious about your training I expected I would see you there on time each morning.” The familiar lilt of Obi-Wan’s voice jerks you up from your incredibly deep sleep. You wipe away the drool from the corner of your mouth and gaze around your room with bleary eyes. 

There’s nobody there. 

Then a knock sounds from your door and you realise that your Master is too respectful to just barge into your room without permission. 

“Come in, Master.”

You hear the hiss of your door sliding open and smile sheepishly as your favourite bearded face peers around into the unhomely expanse of your room. Unlike the Jedi Masters, padawans weren’t encouraged to decorate their rooms. That’s a privilege earnt through time and experience. You’re thankful that you went to bed wearing a large jumper last night, though as you stretch the material exposes your stomach ever so slightly. 

“I broke my datapad yesterday…” You trail off, knowing that this is the third one you’ve gone through this year, “I didn’t have anything to set an alarm on.” An innocent smile graces your lips as Obi-Wan sighs, sitting next to you on your unmade sheets as he returns it with his own wry grin. 

“Whatever am I going to do with you, Padawan?” You know your Master well enough by now to be able to tell what he is feeling by the tone of his incredibly expressive voice, and thankfully right now he doesn’t seem too annoyed by your lack of care for your datapad. However, you also know that you’re treading on very thin ice, that you’re going to have to start putting a lot more effort in unless you want him to give up on you like everyone else has. 

It’s been a few weeks since you met Ahsoka which gave you the motivation you needed to get back on track. To say it’s been a hard few weeks would be an understatement. You’re up every morning before the light, fighting and learning and meditating with Obi-Wan. The two of you spend a lot of time together alone in the mornings and evenings when most other people in the temple have already retired to bed, but a lot of your time in the day is shared by Anakin - he thinks it is a great idea to train you and Ahsoka together. 

Now that was a kick in the teeth. 

You like Ahsoka, you really do, but it’s so humiliating to be trained alongside someone so much younger than you. Especially in front of the man you’re head over heels in love with. And, as another cherry on top of the cake of your shit life, the senate has been quiet as of late, which means Padme has plenty of free time to come and oversee your training sessions. Keeping an eye on the Jedi Temple, she says, but everyone sees the smiles exchanged between her and her Jedi. It makes you feel queasy. 

How are you supposed to focus on training when your biggest distraction is hanging in front of you everyday?

You have to give it to Obi-Wan, he tries his best to steer you away from the pain caused by seeing Anakin and Padme together. He stands directly in your eyeline when he knows they are near each other, so that you can’t see anything except his smiling face. When Anakin suggests lunch with Ahsoka and Padme, Obi-Wan regretfully informs him of the non-existent prior engagements the two of you have with a sneaky smile your way. 

With all the hardship of the past few weeks, you’re happy with how close it has brought you and your Master. 

“Can we just leave it for today, Master? Please.” You flop back down onto your bed, your eyes remaining on Obi-Wan as you send him your best pleading, doe-eyed look. 

“Sadly, we’ve been called away to war so I’m afraid that isn’t an option. It seems as though this is going to be a long operation. We’re first needed in Umbara, it seems as though General Krell has been executed by the clones. After that we go straight to Mandalore.”

“The clones executed a Jedi General?” Your voice is high as you stand up, heading over to your small closet and quickly rifling through your clothes to find something that would hold up for a few days. 

“It appears that he was a Separitast sympathiser. He turned two clone units against each other, forced them to kill their own.”

Your eyes are wide as Obi-Wan continues to explain the situation awaiting the two of you on Umbara, and your heart clenches as you think about what the Clones must have been gonig through during their time there. You know attachments are forbidden as a Jedi, but you can’t help the close relationships you have formed with some of the soldiers. Captain Rex is like a brother to you. 

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

An hour later, you’re holding onto the bar above you as your ship takes off in the direction of Umbara, Obi-Wan looking more jittery than you’ve ever seen him as he paces around next to you. 

“You okay, Master? You seem shaken up.”

“I’m fine, young one.” He dismisses you with a shake of your head, “Come with me, we may as well get some training in whilst we’re enroute.” He doesn’t say anything else, just turns away and heads out of the bridge with not so much as a glance back to make sure you’re following him.

What on Alderaan is going on with him?

His mood doesn’t let up during training, you’ve never seen him come at you so relentlessly. If it wasn’t for the fact that they knew you so well, the passing clones would probably assume that the two of you were fighting to the death in your training room. 

A cry escapes your mouth as he knocks the saber from your hand, as it clatters to the ground and rolls somewhere you don’t bother to look for, you expect him to stop. However his saber remains active, and he seems to be in a trance of sorts as he swings for you once more, only stopped from making contact with a part of your body when you swing your leg out from beneath you, causing the two of you to fall to the ground with a low grunt from him. His saber falls from his grasp in the same way yours did, and you work on figuring out how to calm him down as his body cages yours into the ground. 

The only noise in the room is the sound of you both breathing heavily, and when your eyes finally look up and meet his again you almost feel as though he has used the force to steal your breath away from you. His blue eyes capture yours, not letting up as his gaze seems to only darken the longer the two of you lay there. 

You can’t help but be reminded of a similar situation you found yourself in with Anakin a while ago, the two of you ended up tangled on the ground after a round of playful sparring. It was all heavy breathing and dark looks and you remember that all you could think was how much you had wanted him to kiss you in that moment.

So why, Maker tell, do you have the exact same feeling now? You thought that your crush on Obi-Wan had been a silly, fleeting thing back when you first began training under him. You didn’t think it would return with a vengeance, your mind silently asking him to lean down further as you struggle to pull your eyes away from his own. When you and Anakin has been in this same situation, you had hoped that he was going to kiss you, so it was humiliating when he finally tore his gaze from yours and pulled himself away from you with an awkward cough. 

You think that Obi-Wan will do the same. Of course he will, he’s the most rule abiding Jedi you’ve ever met. 

That’s why, when you feel his lips being placed softly on yours, you think you’re just hallucinating. It takes your mind a moment to catch up to what is actually occurring, your eyes fluttering shut as he pulls away and then presses his lips to yours with more fervour once he realises that you aren’t going to push him away. 

The hand that almost struck you with his saber minutes before reaches up, holding onto your jaw whilst the other keeps him steady on top of you. He breathes heavily as he kisses you, your breath minging as you savour the feeling. This isn’t your first kiss, you had snuck out to the clubs of Coruscant before and kissed random boys before, but this was different. This was your first kiss since you had fallen in love with Anakin. All those nights you had spent dreaming, hoping, praying that he would be the next person you kiss. Yet here you are, your lips moving feverishly against your Master’s as you thread one of your hands into the long hair at the nape of his neck. 

You must stay like that, basking in the feeling of each other for a good few minutes before a loud bang from the corridor snaps you both out of the spell you had fallen under. Obi-Wan quickly gets up, sticking out his hand to locate his saber, unable to look you in the eye as you slowly rise from your position. Your mouth tingles and your eyes are wide as you stare at the side of Obi-Wan’s head. 

He smooths his hand over his beard and mumbles a quick, “That shouldn’t have happened. I’m sorry, Padawan.” before leaving the room hastily. You flinch at the way he says the word Padawan, like he is reminding you both that what you just did was not only forbidden but also extremely morally wrong. You’ve never been one to care about such trivialities, but Obi-Wan is definitely a fair bit older than you, to say the least. 

As you catch your breath and find your lightsaber, you think to yourself that it’s good that you were interrupted, because if you weren’t then you might’ve been found by a soldier who would’ve reported what he saw back to the council. You ignore the part of you that wishes you would have continued, that thinks of how well your lips worked together and how at home you felt with his body on top of yours. And most of all, you ignore the part of you that wonders if him kissing you had anything to do with his sudden mood change since departing for the trip.

The rest of the journey is slow and quiet, you take some time to meditate and gather your thoughts, knowing you’re in no state to be dealing with anything important right now. A soldier offers you something to eat but you have to decline, with the way your stomach is turning you know you won’t be able to stomach any food. 

Obi-Wan seems to have retired to somewhere quiet on the ship, you don’t see him until you touch down on Umbara. The capital has been captured now, and that is where you will spend the night before heading to Mandalore, however you must first deal with the execution of General Krell at a nearby facility that was taken by the clones. 

You walk silently alongside your Master, an awkward tension in the air that is an extreme change from your usual playful banter and general good moods. As you approach Captain Rex and his troopers, he shoots you an inquisitive look, which you quickly brush off with a whisper that you’ll talk to him later. 

The situation is resolved quickly, you and your Master both know you can take Rex’s word for the events that transpired, and you make sure Krell’s body is properly taken care of. 

“We’ve only got one spare speeder on us, General, so Y/N will have to ride with one of the boys.” Are Captain Rex’s departing words before his gunship takes off towards the capital, leaving you, Obi-Wan and a few more troopers to travel back via speeder. 

“You can ride with me, Y/N.” A clone who is about to depart shouts over to you, though your attempt to walk in his direction is thwarted by a sudden, harsh grip on your forearm. You turn quickly, shocked to see Obi-Wan shake his head, gesturing over to his own speeder instead. 

“She’ll ride with me.” 

The trooper offers no argument, simply saluting the two of you before speeding off towards the capital with a trail of dust in his wake. 

You notice that Obi-Wan still hasn’t directly addressed you since the incident on the ship, so you stay quiet whilst climbing onto the speeder, waiting for him to say something. A squeak leaves your mouth when you’re pushed forward, Obi-Wan’s large body enveloping you from behind as he reaches past you to grab hold of the handles, and you’re off before you can even think about what is going on.

“We need to talk when we get back.”

Are the first words spoken to you, and the last, because he quickly falls silent. Though, you can’t help the warmth that spreads through you when his chin rests on your shoulder, his beard scratching your cheek oh so slightly. 

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Dinner in Umbara is a quick affair, you scoff down what you can, not talking as much as usual due to your preoccupied mind. Obi-Wan disappeared after you both briefed Master Windu who is still back at the temple, and you wonder if he is off meditating somewhere, trying to reconcile for the ‘mistake’ that the two of you made. 

You’ve been fighting your own inner turmoil about the situation since it happened earlier that day. Once you finish your food, you retire back to the uncomfortable bed in a tiny room at the top of the large building, assuming that Obi-Wan has decided to forgo the conversation and ignore you altogether. 

As you lie on the hard metal, your mind wanders over the past few months. You wonder how Anakin would react if he knew you and Obi-Wan had kissed. Would he be angry? Jealous? Happy? Deep down you know you would want him to be jealous, you would want him to be angry at the thought of any other man having you in the way that he wants you. 

But he doesn’t want you in that way, you remind yourself. Does Obi-Wan even want you in that way? You know he is a well revered man, and nobody can deny how good looking he is. If he really was looking for a romantic, or even just sexual, connection he could probably find that anywhere - why would he get that from plain old you?

A pang of sadness hits your gut as you think about him regretting the kiss, returning to Coruscant and finding another girl that he would rather betray the Jedi code in order to be with. And with wide eyes and a whisper of ‘oh no’, you realise that this is exactly how you felt when your feelings for Anakin started growing stronger. Just what did that kiss stir within you, surely your years old feelings for your Master haven’t suddenly resurfaced, right?

A knock on your door startles you, that deep in thought you hadn’t heard anyone approaching your rather isolated room. 

“Y/N?” It’s Obi-Wan. 

“You can come in, it’s open.

He slides the door open, his actions sheepish and small and not at all like the overly confident man he usually is. It pains you to see him like this, stumbling and second guessing everything he does. 

“You shouldn’t leave your door unlocked when you’re not on Coruscant, anything could wander in.”

“Sorry, Master.” You’ve shuffled to the edge of the bed now, Obi-Wan sitting beside you, mirroring the exact position you were in when he woke you up this morning. Before everything turned into a mess. 

“I… I’m so sorry, Padawan. I abused my position as your Master and I never should’ve even thought about doing something like that with you. Especially after you confided in me about your feelings for Anakin, I don’t want you to think that I’m taking advantage of your vulnerability.” His voice is so shaky that you barely recognise it, and a wave of sadness hits you when you realise that he must’ve been carrying this burden of guilt around with him all day. 

“Obi-Wan, it’s fine. You didn’t force yourself on me, I was completely on board when it happened, in fact I quite enjoyed it. I know it was wrong, against the code or whatever, but I won’t tell anybody. Please don’t feel guilty.” You make sure he keeps his eyes on you, a delicate touch on his cheek to keep him faced your way. A sigh emits from his mouth and your heart swells in your chest when he leans his head into your hand, seeking your comfort. 

“I’m tired, Y/N. This war, I’m beginning to feel it’s toll.”

“There’s no shame in admitting you need a break, Master, but it’s not just tiredness that is eating at you right now. I know you, there’s something else going on. You can tell me. Is it something to do with Umbara, Mandalore, anything?”

“Thank you for your concern, Padawan, I’m quite alright.”

“Don’t do that, Obi-Wan.” Your voice wavers this time, “Don’t use that title as a way to brush me off. Yes, I’m your Padawan, but I hope that by now I’m also your friend.”

“Jedi aren’t supposed to have friends, Y/N.”

You scoff, removing your hand from his face as you turn away from him, not wanting to look at him as he lies to you. 

“I was always jealous of him, you know.” He speaks again, after a few minutes of slightly uncomfortable silence. 

“Of who?”

“Anakin.”

You turn back, your interest peaked as he looks at you. You swallow, a blush coating your cheeks as you note that his eyes are as dark as they were before. Before he kissed you. 

“What reason could you possibly have had for being jealous of him? Oh, Maker, don’t tell me you’re in love with Senator Amidala.”

He chuckles, “No, little one, I was jealous of him because he always seemed to have your attention when he cared so little for you. I wanted you to look at me the way you looked at him.”

╚═══*.·:·.☽✧    ✦    ✧☾.·:·.*═══╝

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