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dalekofchaos · 3 years

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The complete lack of Anakin Skywalker in the Sequel Trilogy is an insult to the story of Star Wars, Anakin’s story and in the end they destroyed Anakin’s fall and redemption

The fact that Anakin is never mentioned by name, let alone shows up as a force ghost. Just shows how much Disney, JJ Abrams, Rian Johnson and Kathleen Kennedy were so afraid of the Prequels and couldn’t even bother to have the man who is the main focus of Star Wars to be featured in the sequel trilogy period. The Star Wars Saga was about Anakin and his family. I will forever be bitter and disgusted that Disney went out of their way to erase his presence.

Disney did everything to show what Anakin trained for, struggled for, went to the dark side for and sacrificed everything for was pointless. They introduced force healing, force resurrection, Rey taking the prophecy for herself, his family was tormented by Palpatine until his bloodline became extinct and now we know people can communicate with Tusken raiders. If all of this existed in the prequels, Anakin would’ve never even become Darth Vader. They made Anakin’s entire fall and redemption completely pointless.

I don’t know what it is with Disney, but apparently they get off with backhandedly disrespecting Anakin at every opportunity they get.

I do love Rey, but I agree with this YouTube comment I found a year ago “Rey single handedly destroyed Anakin's entire legacy, and made his whole life a joke. - you don't need to train to be stupidly powerful with the lightsaber or the force. Training isn't necessary anymore, as Rey proves in TFA and TLJ, and in some ways in TROS since I doubt Leia taught her force heal, force skype or force lightning. Thus, Anakin's tough decision to leave his mother in slavery while training to be a Jedi powerful enough to one day save her is made pointless. - you don't need to be in control of your powers. Hell, fits of unexplained anger are encouraged and other characters love you for it. Rey can be rude, destructive and irrational all she wants, and everyone supports her, while Anakin was always taught to obey orders and not think for himself, furthering his feeling of being enslaved and controlled. But nah, he was just wrong I guess. - the path to the dark side is no longer the easy and fast one. Everyone can just decide freely, flip flop between allegiances and do whatever the fuck they want to. I don't know what Anakin was tempted by, Rey is angry all the time, uses force lightning, a power only the most powerful sith can do, and is never tempted in the slightest, always making the morally perfect decisions and never giving in to any temptations. Just be incorruptible, Anakin! - You can force heal easily at no cost. Anakin's mother died for nothing, as did Padme. Anakin's whole turn to the dark side was made utterly ridiculous by this movie. Anakin trained for years, mastering everything he could, striving for more knowledge and wisdom to be powerful enough to save and protect those around him, when he could have just done everything he wanted by closing his eyes. Fucking hell Rey, is there anything you aren't perfect at. - He didn't even kill Palpatine. He didn't redeem himself. He didn't bring peace to the galaxy. He did bring order though, the First Order. Fucking hell, did he actually do anything right or did Rey seriously outclass him in every _single thing he ever did This trilogy just shits on everything that came before. Everyone in Star Wars sucks because Rey is just perfect at everything she does, and all the other characters, with their flaws, struggles and problems they have to overcome just look stupid compared to her and her god powers. I hate this trilogy so much omg words can't describe it”

Let’s look at how much damage was done by not showing Anakin and how much the Sequels destroyed Anakin’s story and legacy

Anakin never warns his children about Snokeatine preying over his grandson, just think if Anakin told them a powerful and ancient dark side user was targeting Ben, Han, Lando, Chewie, Luke and Leia all would’ve gotten together and killed Snoke and by doing that, killing the First/Final Order in the crib.

Anakin never tells his children Palpatine himself is alive. If Anakin told them the truth, he could’ve directed Luke and Leia to his wayfinder, then Orchi’s ship and the stupid knife map. They would find both wayfinders and Luke and Leia would’ve killed Palpatine on Exegol.

Anakin doesn't warn Leia that visions are not all they seem or how he lost himself because of a vision and tells her not to fall for the same trap he did.

Anakin never once visits his grandson during his Jedi training or his time as Kylo Ren and tell him his story, Anakin appearing before his grandson and telling him HIS SIDE of HIS STORY could’ve prevented Ben’s fall

Anakin by name is never mentioned

Rey, someone who believed Luke was only a myth. Suddenly knows that Luke redeemed Darth Vader(again, Anakin is never mentioned by name)

Anakin does not appear before his son in his time of need. Instead Yoda does. Anakin knew all there is about failure and what happens when you fall to the dark side. “failure, the greatest teacher is,” is bullshit. Yoda never learned this lesson to begin with. Yoda is the last person who should be saying anything like this to Luke. Anakin should have went to Luke, not Yoda. You know who would have been the perfect person to tell Luke that failure is the greatest teacher? His father, Anakin Skywalker. If anyone deserved that moment, it was Anakin Skywalker. Both because this should have been his chance to speak with his son AND because when someone is the embodiment of the failures of the Jedi Order, they’re really the one best qualified to call out the bullshit of that organization. Anakin would’ve been the best person to tell Luke to confront Kylo, his grandson. He knows failure more than anyone. Failing to save his mother, failing to save Padme, his failure into giving into the dark side and his fall. Anakin would’ve told him. “It wasn’t your fault what happened to Ben, I’m asking you to come back and save your sister, my daughter. Leia needs you. You never gave up on me. Don’t give up on your friends, your sister or even yourself. You saved me when I thought all was lost, there is still time to make things right. Remember you are a Jedi, like me. Not the last of the old Jedi, Luke. The first of the new.“

Anakin died to save his son. He does not attempt to save him.

The fact that Anakin didn’t even show up to speak to his son when he was at his lowest or when his son was literally dying , was just proof that Disney Lucasfilm didn’t care about him as a character or his story. Anakin’s redemption was saving his son, yet for some reason he just didn’t give a shit about him. There is not even a reason given as to why he didn’t show up.

Anakin does not appear before his grandson in his turning point. It should have been Anakin who met with Ben, not Han. No one knows more about Palpatine and the dark side than Anakin and revealing the truth could have destroyed the dark side’s hold over his grandson and brought him back to the light and unlike Harrison, Hayden actually wanted to be there. We needed the one moment between Anakin and his grandson. All they did with Han was make little to no sense and just repeat lines from TFA. Harrison is clearly there to collect that sweet Disney money lol he doesn’t like Star Wars or Han Solo, he returned to have Han killed off. Hayden Christensen, however loved Star Wars despite the hate that was directed towards him. He wanted to return to play Anakin one last time. and the perfect way for him to return and to guide his grandson back to the light was Anakin. Anakin knows more than anyone what the dark side can do and what Palpatine is capable of and how much pain he has inflicted. Kylo has always admired Vader, and Anakin can show the truth of how he was manipulated into betraying everything he loved and why the dark side is not the path he should be taking. I really hate to toot my own horn, but I wrote out a scene where Anakin’s force ghost visits his grandson and helped along his redemption. “I never wanted you to repeat my mistakes. That pull to the light you were feeling was always me. I wanted you to be better than I was, who I could have been” and showing Ben his memories and what he had to go through. His life as a slave, meeting Padme, meeting Obi-Wan, becoming a Jedi, losing his mother, Order 66, losing Padme and being saved by Luke and finally destroying Palpatine(lol but not really). And telling Ben “Let the light in. You still have a chance, no one is ever really gone“ Ben would then tell his grandfather “I know what I have to do, but I don’t know if I have the strength to do it.” Anakin puts his hand on his grandson and says “this time we’ll do it together.”

Anakin does not play a role in the defeat of the monster who destroyed his life. Anakin’s redemption, victory and the fulfillment of the Chosen One Prophecy is now meaningless. He doesn’t even return to face Palpatine or to even power up Ben and Rey. When Rey says "be with me" in the final fight. What should've happened is the force hears her pleas for help and sends Anakin to confront Sidious. Just imagine Palpatine:It cannot be....Lord Vader? Anakin:That name no longer has any meaning for me No, I am Anakin Skywalker, Jedi Master and the chosen one. Palpatine:So be it, "Jedi" Anakin with the help of Luke, Leia, Obi-Wan, Qui-Gon and Yoda help Ben rise and empower Ben and Rey. Rey and Ben rise. Ben with his Grandfather’s lightsaber and Rey with Leia’s lightsaber deflecting Palpatine’s Lightning Palpatine"I AM ALL THE SITH! Rey and Ben:And we are the Skywalkers And together they deflect it back at Sidious. Once and for all, Anakin fulfills the prophecy, while not doing it directly, he guided his grandson and Rey and together they destroy the SIth and brings balance to the force. Then Anakin brings back Rey, and bids farewell to his grandson and fades in peace knowing that balance has been brought back and the force is in the safe hands of Rey and Ben.

The entire Skywalker Family goes extinct and everything Anakin fought and sacrificed for is completely meaningless

Anakin's Lightsaber is not recognized as his lightsaber, it is recognized as Luke's Lightsaber and Rey's Lightsaber. Luke has a Lightsaber of his own. He even used it for most of his life after the war as a Jedi master, yet it never makes it into the Sequel Trilogy outside of flashbacks. Where is it????? NO SERIOUSLY WHERE THE FUCK IS IT??????? Rey has a lightsaber of her own as well, but for SOME REASON, they needed Rey to have the Skywalker lightsaber and Leia’s Lightsaber throughout the whole movie. Rey cannot be defined on her own. She needs the Skywalker Lightsaber, she needs the falcon, she needs to be related to be Palpatine and she needed to take the Skywalker name in the end. Anakin doesn’t even get to be acknowledged as the master of his own lightsaber.

Rey steals Anakin's legacy as the chosen one. A PALPATINE STEALS THE SKYWALKER PROPHECY

Anakin’s Lightsaber was buried on Tatooine. Make all the “I don’t like sand” jokes you want. But this is like burying a possession of a freed slave in the remains of a slave plantation. Anakin and Shmi were slaves on this planet, his mother was brutally tortured and murdered, his step-brother and sister and Luke’s aunt and uncle were brutally murdered and his daughter was a Hutt’s sex slave. This is the absolute last place he’d ever want his Lightsaber to be buried. Every Skywalker and Solo hated Tatooine. Anakin wanted to escape a life of slavery and see the stars. Luke looks at that double sunset, longing to escape his mundane life, wanting to travel the galaxy to fight the good fight. Rey looks at the double sunset because it's supposed to pander to the OT fans. Bury Anakin’s Lightsaber in his wife’s mausoleum and his spirit would be at peace. But oh no, we can’t have that, the money needs it’s OT nostalgia and we can’t legitimize the prequels because this movie was made by a prequel hating asshole. I don’t understand why Luke’s Green Lightsaber was never used again. Could’ve been given to Finn and when he’s done, Rey helps him build a Lightsaber of his own. Then Rey can bury Luke, Leia, and Anakin’s Lightsabers in Padme’s mausoleum with Rey, Finn and Ben looking on as the force ghosts of Anakin, Luke and Leia looks on them in peace and it would be a fitting way to end the Skywalker Saga.

Anakin does not appear as a force ghost. He doesn’t see his grandson. He doesn’t see Rey. He doesn’t appear with Luke and Leia at the end of the movie. It’s like JJ Abrams has some sort of vendetta against the Prequels. This is what happens when an OT purist is given power.

Ben Solo dies and is not given a chance to earn his redemption and thus the Skywalker family dies out. He did terrible things as Kylo Ren, but if you want him to redeem himself, actually give him a redemption arc. When he feels his mother die, let him truly feel remorse for his actions Let him see the force ghosts of Luke and Anakin. They set him on the path to make things right. Ben and Rey stop Palpatine together, they kiss and Ben goes on a path of atonement. Ben gets in the falcon and takes Leia’s lightsaber and goes to every known First Order base with the intention of righting his wrongs and making things right. When he returns to Rey, they go to Naboo to place Anakin, Luke and Leia’s Lightsaber’s in Padme’s mausoleum and it ends with Rey and Ben holding hands as the Skywalker family looks on proud and happily that the future is in good hands. Like....Anakin, Leia and Luke would’ve wanted their family to live on and wanted Ben to live. It isn’t rocket science, Anakin would’ve wanted Ben to be given the chance he wasn’t given to redeem himself and live to tell the tale.

Bringing back Palpatine back destroyed Anakin’s entire arc. I don’t care if it happened in Legends. It was fucking stupid then and it was stupid now. The impact of Order 66? The Sequel Trilogy ruined it. I hate how the Sequel Trilogy really shat on this moment. Order 66 was a tragedy for the Clones, Jedi, Separatists, Mandalorians, Night Sisiters and even Maul. Everyone lost except Sidious. When Darth Vader threw him over the railing he was avenging basically everyone. But the Sequel Trilogy rewrites that moment and makes it redundant. In my book, the series timeline ends at the Mandalorian. The Prophecy of The Chosen One? It’s no longer about Anakin. He is no longer the one to destroy The Sith and to bring Balance to the Force. His fall and redemption? It’s now pointless, Palpatine’s clone body was the one that got destroyed, not Palpatine himself and he returned and built up the Empire stronger than ever. Anakin saving Luke and finally killing Palpatine was beautiful. Something that really makes Darth Vader/Anakin Skywalker saving Luke beautiful in my mind is actually Anakin/Vader’s perspective. Qui-Gon was killed, his mother died a senseless death that he couldn't prevent, the Jedi Council was always wary of him and never took him seriously, Padme spurned him after he became Vader -- which he only did to protect her from dying -- and died anyway, his best friend hacked off all his limbs and left him to burn to death and Sidious manipulated and lied to him from the time he was a kid, only wanted him for his force powers to use as a glorified hitman and openly contemplated replacing him constantly after he lost his duel to Kenobi on Mustafar and was maimed. The dude either lost or was (in his mind) betrayed by basically everyone he ever knew and cared about, except his son, who even to the end never lost faith in him. He was beaten and helpless and Luke had just severed his hand. Sidious then goaded Luke to finish Vader off and become his new apprentice, but Luke refused to turn on his father. The minute he realized Luke was the only person who hadn't betrayed, used, abandoned or left him was the minute Vader died and Anakin returned. This, in a nut shell, is the story of Star Wars. It is the story of a child from Tattooine who was finally able to save someone he loved. Anakin has been manipulated by Palpatine since the moment he became a Jedi. Palpatine put visions of Padme’s death in his head until it was a reality. He went to the dark side to save his wife and children. He manipulated him into destroying the Jedi. He turned Anakin into Darth Vader and used Darth Vader as his enforcer. Until a moment of hope. His children lived. He thought all was lost until his son believed in him. In his final moments, his life, he saved his son and fulfilled the prophecy. Darth Vader is the ultimate villain deconstruction. He started out as a faceless monster to be defeated, a demon to be slain so peace would be restored. But Luke managed to look beneath the mask of intimidation and saw his father for what he truly was; a broken man who had been a slave his whole life and had lost all hope of redeeming himself. In the end Luke brought Anakin Skywalker back not because he convinced Vader to love him, because Anakin loved Luke since the moment he knew he would be born and never stopped loving him. And the decision to reveal that Palpatine didn’t really die and manipulated his grandson to kill Luke, that honestly cheapens Anakin’s arc. Just think with how he was brought back. They didn’t have an explanation. He is just there in the opening crawl. We didn’t hear his message in the movie, we heard it in fucking fortnite. And Poe’s line. “Somehow, Palpatine has returned” plays like a line from some kind of parody to Hollywood franchises. It’s actually... insulting. Like they are basically slapping us with “this is happening, we don’t have an explanation, just watch the damn movie and get us paid” without even the decency of trying to hide it. That line didn’t have to be in there. It revealed nothing, it provided no character development... it was literally just there to admit that the film really is as bad as you think. And of course, it’s something we HAVE to read in a book to figure out. If it’s not in your fucking movie, don’t fucking bother having it. Bringing back Palpatine made the first 6 movies entirely pointless. Palpatine outliving Anakin, Obi-Wan, Padme, Han Luke and Leia is the ultimate desecration of Star Wars. “it was always the plan to bring Palpatine back” and that is the problem. Its actually amazing how little the folks at Lucasfilm, Bad Reboot and Disney “get” Star Wars. Having the ultimate bad guy of the first 6 films live to see Episode 9 when the heroes who supposedly defeated him are long dead. It literally destroys the core mythology of the Star Wars universe and makes the selfless choices our characters made unrewarding. That’s just depressing. Their sacrifices and triumphs are ultimately undermined, devalued and utterly pointless. Moral of the story, nothing you did mattered, let the new generation clean up your mess because the money says so. And making Rey Palpatine’s granddaughter, killing EVERY LIVING Skywalker and having a Palpatine steal the legacy of the Skywalkers is desecration of Star Wars. Rey isn’t related to the Skywalkers it’s so creepy that she stole everything from them. She stole the falcon, she stole Luke’s lightsaber, she stole their family name. She stole Anakin and Luke’s ultimate victory over Palpatine. Their legacy. Palpatine won…..This is disgusting. The Skywalkers all dying and Rey taking the name is an exact summation of this trilogy. Tearing down all the old heroes and everything they did just for the new ones to do the same exact thing. Just to prop Rey up? You CAN build up new characters without tearing down the old characters and their legacy. Everything in this trilogy was done to break down and humiliate the characters we cared about and imitate something that was done in the past and has no substance.

Rey didn’t need to be a Palpatine or take the Skywalker name. This isn’t me hating on Rey. Rey can be a great character by standing on her own. Rey being related to NO ONE was powerful and shows us that even someone who came from Jakku can be a powerful Jedi. She doesn’t earn anything on her own. She downloaded all of Kylo’s abilities. She took the Falcon, she made Chewbacca her personal uber, she took BB-8 from Poe and buried Anakin and Leia’s lightsaber on the literal symbolic oppression of the Skywalker family instead of something peaceful like Naboo or Ach-To. She has her own Lightsaber, but never uses it. Rey being a Palpatine and taking the Skywalker name undoes the beautiful story the revelation TLJ had does. She didn’t need to be a Palpatine and she didn’t need to take the Skywalker name or even their relics. Rey Nobody works. Here’s why. Rey’s story is her own, it is not her parents, it is not about where she came from, it’s about where she is going, and who she decides to become. Maz Kanata said “The belonging you seek is not behind you. It is in front of you.” Rey in the TFA trailers said “I’m no one” Rey never thought or wanted her parents to be important in TFA, she was literally going to pass up adventure and being important to stay on Jakku because what she wanted was her family to finally come home. She didn't want to be important or wanted her parents to be important. The audience wanted that. Any more lingering discussion of the possibility of Rey’s parents being ‘somebody’ only is distracting you from the actually beautiful story that is being told. Rey is a story of a girl who raised herself, who held onto hope for people who didn’t deserve it, she is a story of how light can be born from darkness, and Rey is story of someone who was scared of her own truth—but then finally faced it. Rey being a Nobody is the story I was skeptical of at first, but grew to love, the story that gives me more hope than any Rey Skywalker or Rey Solo story ever would. Rey calling herself "Rey Skywalker" was so forced and unnecessary because all the whiny pissants did not like that a girl was skilled and powerful in her own right and because Rey did not have a good relationship with Luke in the first place. JJ was so set in just making Rey a Luke clone that it just undoes character development. If Rey had to take a name, Solo or Organa would make the most sense since she actually had a relationship with Han, Leia and Ben. Say what you want about how RIan Johnson handled Rey in TLJ. At least he treated Rey like her own person, with her own journey, and her own desires and fears, rather than consigning her to be a vessel for OT nostalgia. And at least he allowed her to actually have a new outfit and new hair style. At least he let her change. Like him or not, Rian Johnson treated Rey with more respect and identity than JJ Abrams ever did. It means more than making her related to anyone because Rey was every lonely girl who wanted to be a part of something but didn't feel like they belonged. Every woman who learned to make her way in the world alone. Every person who clung to hope when they had nothing left. She is so many things to so many people. Rey Nobody can be fierce, angry and powerful without it connecting to a man or evil bloodline. She can love, be curious and emotional without being weak. She is a scavenger, a Jedi, and one half of a powerful Dyad. She is Rey of Jakku and that's all we needed. Rey calling herself a Skywalker denied her every last inch of who she was. Her character arc was ruined to please men that thought her power needed to be connected to a man for it to make sense. All we needed her arc to be was Rey accepting that she needs to be her own hero and loving herself for who she is, rather than who she wanted her hypothetical parents to be. And honestly Rey in TROS was a huge disappointment. Her entire character arc was regressed, she's back to wearing the buns and dressed all in white and sticks to the glorification of the Jedi. It's like everything she learned in the last movie never happened. And honestly her character in TROS is what men think a "strong female character" is She fights, but they don’t have to deal with her processing internal pain. She loves, but they don’t have to deal with her fully exploring her desires. She’s a “badass,” & for them that is enough. When I say "A Palpatine is left and steals the legacy of the Skywalkers" I am not suggesting she doesn't deserve the title. I am saying that essentially, Palpatine won. Anakin, Padme, Luke, Han, Leia and Ben are all dead. Leia died for nothing. Leia deserved to see her son come home, and to see the end of the monster who ruined her family. She didn’t deserve to feel her child die. The entire line of the family is now extinct. The wiki even says "the extinction of the family name" what kind of depressing garbage is this? JJ Abrams ended the entire Skywalker saga on Palpatine successfully using love to manipulate, corrupt, hurt or kill every single Skywalker across three generations, ultimately resulting in the total eradication of the Skywalker, Solo and Amidala bloodlines, whilst Palpatine's heir lives on and claims the Skywalker name and legacy. Rey calling herself "Rey Skywalker" was patronizing and insulting and demeans what Rey's journey meant in the first two movies to everyone who loved her. Rey coming from Jakku and nothing but rising up as a heroic Jedi means more than "you have his power...you are a Palpatine" or "Rey Rey Skywalker" ever will. Women Of The Galaxy author Amy Ratcliffe says it best. “Even beyond the trappings of the Star Wars saga — the First Order, the Resistance, the Force — Rey’s story is inspiring, familiar, and timeless. Just because you come from nothing doesn’t mean you’re not part of the story. You’re not no one, because anybody can save the galaxy. Anybody.“

If anyone still cannot understand my problem with bringing back Palpatine and why I find it narratively offensive. Just imagine this. What if Harry discovered that Dumbledore was wrong and Voldemort had far more than 7 horcruxes? Ashamed and afraid, he hides Ginny and the Potter children among the muggles. A defeated Ron returns to the burrow, while Hermione spends her days searching for Horcruxes. Years later, a 17 year old, Rachel Marvela Riddle, begins discovering her new powers, despite never receiving her Hogwart’s letter. Her magic is incredibly strong, but she is everything Tom was not. With the help of some friends, she tracks down the remaining Horcruxes and finally destroys the true Voldemort, for good and realsies this time! Also she starts calling herself the Girl Who Lived. This is the plot of Disney’s Star Wars Sequel Trilogy.. What if Harry didn’t actually destroy Voldemort? What if The One Ring survived Mt. Doom? Interesting concepts, but they would devalue everything that came before. The entire point of the Sequel Trilogy is disregarding generations of storytelling because no one behind this trilogy had any original or creative stories to tell. This is how Star Wars dies, with uncreativity and greed.

Anakin Skywalker’s story and family was destroyed, belittled, insulted and stolen by a Palpatine. Hell, even from a certain point of view PALPATINE WON! AGAIN!

#Anakin Skywalker #Anti Lucasfilm #Anti TROS #Anti TFA #Anti TLJ #Anti JJ Abrams #Anti Rian Johnson #Anti Kathleen Kennedy

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queenof-literature · 4 years

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Star Wars Linked Universe AU

Soooo I'm making a Linked Universe AU that's Star Wars themed and I'm super psyched about it. I decided to get some facts and headcanons out there because I'm so excited and I couldn't wait, and also because I want to get my ideas out there. The Linked Universe characters belong to @linkeduniverse but the specifics of the Star Wars universe such as lightsaber colors and fighting forms were thought of by me and I'm really excited to share some ideas before I get started actually writing the series!

Basic Facts:

Hylia is essentially the Force, which guides our heroes in the same way Hylia does, guiding the boys to meet and leading them to wormholes where they can switch to different places.

I know a lot about Star Wars and legend of Zelda, but combining the two needs compromise so not everything will be exactly the canon you know

Magic exists, but in different ways. It’s kinda branched out from the Force.

The Links are all Grey Jedi, because they have all been on very different paths in life and while they all want what is best for the galaxy, their paths would not meet while they were all at the Jedi Temple.

Order 66 did happen, but it was different in different timelines and was more spread or less devastating in some, but wiped out thousands in others.

Time:

Fight Style: Used to be Juyo (extremely powerful, only for the most force sensitive), but now sticks mainly to Soresu (A more modern version of the traditional Makashi, very strong defensive tactics)

Color: Blue. Used to be green, but he was very mad at the force for a time and lost the extremely strong connection he had.

Facts: Did not agree with the Jedi’s views on marriage, married Malon after he became a Grey. Order 66 killed his old master, Deku, who made sure Time escaped.

Twilight:

Fight Style: A modernized version of Makashi (emerged along with the Sith. Very strong against other lightsabers. Very graceful and calculated, but the traditional form was almost completely abandoned when blasters emerged)

Color: Orange. Midna’s old lightsaber, it turned a bit paler when he started using it. Orange represents pure strength, but only killing when necessary.

Facts: Grey Jedi don’t have padawans, but he is mentored by Time and mentors Wild. He still grew up in Ordon which has technology but is still farming and agriculture based. Very young when Ganon caused Order 66 in his world, not old enough to remember but he was smuggled away and ended up in Ordon with Rusl.

Wild:

Fight Style: Jar’Kai (Two lightsabers, mainly one forwards and one backwards). Used to have a traditional version of fighting, but turned more towards acrobatics and dual blades after his 100 year sleep. Not good with blasters, Ganon destroyed all tech except Sheikah tech 100 years ago, so his world is very rudimentary. Heck of an archer though.

Color: Yellow. From the old Jedi Knighthood, one is darker from his knight days, while the one he acquired 100 years later is paler.

Facts: Died during Order 66 and was put under the Jedi Temple in the Shrine of Resurrection and lost his memories. Dual wielding seemed the most natural to him for some reason when he woke up, so he self trained in that. Has never seen Space before since there’s no way to get off his Hyrule. Really likes hoarding uniforms from Ganon’s forces on his Hyrule and storing them in his slate but don’t tell Twilight.

Warriors:

Fight Style: Shii Cho and Makashi hybrid. Shii Cho is traditional for defense, while Makashi is a traditionalized offense/defense. Warriors was trained in this when in the royal army on his planet.

Color: Purple. This color is used by an aggressive and powerful fighter who leads others into battle.

Facts: The Jedi order isn’t as prominent in his time, so he holds no ill will towards them. The Grey Jedi stepped up to protect the Royal Family. Although some Grey, like the Grey Jedi Cia, are much darker and almost ally with the Sith when necessary.

Hyrule:

Fight Style: Djem So. Mainly uses the opponent's force against them, similar to Shein which uses blasters against them.

Color: Black. His old blue lightsaber was destroyed, and he had no other option but to take the one he found in the abandoned Temple near where he defeated the Sith Lord Ganon. He doesn’t mind it too much, he enjoys giving the blade a second chance after being forced to kill in cold blood so many times.

Facts: Comes from a world decimated by Order 66. He is force sensitive which he must hide or monsters will hunt for his blood. Unfortunately, some have already figured it out. Like Wild, he is self taught from old books that somehow didn’t get burned by Ganon’s forces. Found out he has the rare gift of force healing where did that come from?

Legend:

Fight Style: Ataru. Mainly used by the Sith, which makes him uncomfortable and untrusted by many which made him turn to the Grey side instead of the Jedi. He is the furthest thing from the Sith, he just excels in that style of fighting.

Color: Pink. Known for being a balance between the light and dark of the force.

Facts: Single handedly took down a death destroyer after it destroyed the planet of Koholint to avenge Marin. Although in his world some force users could be reborn into an animal. Something tells Legend that Marin was one of them. Not a hoarder, just likes collecting useful items from planets he visits.

Wind:

Fight Style: Shein. Uses the opponent's force against them, just like Tetra and her space pirates taught him. Shein focuses on using the opponent's blasters against them.

Color: A slightly darker blue. This shows he is more on the physical side of the force. No one he knows well (Like Aryll, his grandma, and Tetra and her pirate crew) are force sensitive so he learned how to get by without using it as much.

Facts: Very good with a blaster. His time with tetra and the pirates taught him very good skills like blasters, fighting, cursing, the things he needs. Visits his home whenever possible but he loves exploring the galaxy. He’s also a very good pilot.

Four:

Fight Style: Niman. This is a combination of many past Jedi arts. He incorporates different styles very well into his, so he is very adaptive and always changing his fighting.

Color: White. Represents neutrality. A white lightsaber somes when a red lightsaber is healed. Four healed a past enemy's lightsaber to give it a second chance.

Facts: Yes, Vio, Red, Green and Blue all exist and Four can still split up like in the Linked Universe, but the others don’t know yet. Niman fighting style because Four is adaptable? Sure, but also because the four assholes in his head couldn’t decide on a fighting style Blue I swear-

Sky

Fight Style: Juyo. Used to have the more classic style but he turned out extremely force sensitive so he started incorporating Juyo in.

Color: Green. Green lightsabers are for the diplomatic, very force sensitive Jedi.

Facts: Grew up in Skyloft, before Order 66. Has a very deep connection to the force, but still grew up as a Grey Jedi, although they weren’t called that. Jedi didn’t really exist in his time. It was just the knights academy which he was a part of.

Sorry if this is stupid, I'm excited to combine the world though. Wish I could draw so I could help people visualize it better but I can't at all lmao.

#linked universe #legend #hyrule #four #sky #time #twilight #warriors #wild #wind #star wars #alternate universe #AU #linkeduniverse #LU #LoZ #legend of zelda #QoL Announcement

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tessadoesstuff · 4 years

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Run It With Love - Chapter 6

Day 6 - Revan

(Sorry this is late, forgot to post on tumblr!)

A non-linear story of Bly, Aayla, and Quinlan in the time of the Knights of the Old Republic games (about 3,800 years before the prequels) designed to be read without any knowledge of that game or time.

First Chapter! Previous Chapter!

The first time Sam ever remembers hearing about Darth Revan, it was during their escape from the crashing ship where their memories begin. The words echo and stick in Sam’s head, and Sam has no idea why.

"That smack to your head did more damage than I thought. Bastila's a Jedi. She was with the strike team that killed Darth Revan, Malak's Sith master. Bastila is the key to the whole Republic war effort. The Sith must have found out she was on the Endar Spire and set an ambush for us in this system. I believe Bastila was on one of the escape pods that crashed down here on Taris. For the sake of the Republic war effort, we have to try and find her."[1]

Sam knows, deep in their soul, that those words are important, that they’re the key to something.

They’re not Sam’s first memory from after the amnesia. Their earliest memory is from twenty minutes before, being shaken awake in a bunk in the crashing Endar Spire . The man who had apparently been their bunkmate filled Sam in as quick as best they could, but Sam felt detached from the whole incident until Carth said those words.

On the surface, those words are what caught Sam, and drew them into this grand adventure. They led Sam to their partners, to Carth and Bastila, who quickly became two of the most important parts of Sam’s life. Those words set Sam on the path to find Bastila on Taris, which led to them being bonded in the Force. That bond became the key to Sam being trained as a Jedi, and the quest to find the Star Maps.

Which brings Sam back to Revan. The quest for the Star Maps which comes from visions they share with Bastila, visions of Revan and Malak hunting for the same Star Maps years ago.

At the end, Sam’s journey begins with Revan, and when they find the Star Maps to guide them to Malak’s weapon, this chapter of Sam’s journey will end with Revan too.

---

Bastila Shan has been tied to Revan as long as she can remember. When she first came to the Jedi Temple as a child, Revan was there. When they were just younglings, Bastila has been told they were briefly inseparable. Bastila doesn’t remember that so much, she just remembers when Revan reached a point when it wasn’t cool to have a little kid hanging around all the time. They had a fight, and Bastila stopped seeing Revan after that.

But that didn’t mean her ties to Revan were broken. Revan would always haunt her every step.

After her friendship with Revan ended, Bastila became fast friends with Lucian Draay, and whenever the other boy came to the temple, they would study together. However, as they grew, the world became tormented, and so did their friendship. The war that had taken place just before they were born, the war against the Sith Lord Exar-Kun had killed Lucian Draay’s father, and left him and the rest of the Jedi scattered and afraid. Lucian was always afraid of the return of the Sith. Bastila knows now he was likely even right, but at the time it seemed ridiculous.

When Revan began to speak out against the Jedi’s stance of neutrality in the budding Mandalorian Wars, Lucian protested, dug in his heels, and began to speak out about the return of the Sith. When Bastila confessed that while she supported the Jedi’s neutrality, she believed the Mandalorians a larger threat than the Sith, she and Lucian fought. She stopped seeing Lucian after that.

Lucian denounced her as a Revanist, despite the fact that she swears she wasn’t one.

Despite being called more and more a heretic by higher ranking Jedi as Revan continued to argue for the Jedi to go to war, Revan was still the brightest padawan of the generation. As Bastila progressed through her studies, she was surrounded by examples of the excellence of her childhood friend. Bastila was talented, and as such was constantly measured against Revan in every class.

That stopped when Revan left.

When Revan and Malak took most of their generation to go fight in The War alongside the republic, Bastila stopped hearing the name ‘Revan’ around the temple. At least, for a couple of years. The masters disapproved, and they were afraid that more of their ever shrinking group of padawans would follow Revan to war, that those who went off to war would fall the way so many had done during the war with Exar Kun. Bastila listened to the Masters and tried to forget all about Revan then.

The Masters were right to be concerned.

When the Republic won the Mandalorian Wars, Bastila thought Revan would finally come home. She remembered her best friend from childhood, the friend Lucian had never been to her, she saw that now. When Revan came back, she had promised herself, she would fix what had been broken.

Revan didn’t come back.

When Revan and Malak disappeared with more than two thirds of their forces and the Jedi that had been with them, the temple once again lit up with talk of Revan, of Revan’s disappearance. No one had any idea where they went, or how to bring them home again. Sometimes there were rumors of either Revan or Malak being seen around the outer rim, but they were never more than rumors.

It would have been better if they never came back from their hunt for the Star Maps.

When Revan did come back, it was as a fallen shadow of Bastila’s old friend. Revan wore a mask of steel and commanded armies that destroyed the Republic and terrorized its people. Revan came back as a Sith Lord. The Jedi council turned to Bastila, with the Battle Meditation ability she had crafted over her life. She was their only choice. She had to kill Revan.

Revan killed the others who went with Bastila, and for a moment Bastila wanted to do the same. Bastila refused to let the dark in then.

These days, Bastila keeps having visions of Revan’s lost days. Sam has the same visions. Bastila worries what that means. Revan hunted the same Star Maps, and now so do Sam and Bastila.

These days, Bastila holds the lovers her teacher told her she should be above having, holds Carth and Sam so very close, and tries not to think about Revan at all.

---

Carth Onasi has never met Revan. During the Mandalorian Wars, Carth was just a lieutenant, while Revan was functionally a general. There was never any reason for them to cross paths. But Revan was a brilliant strategist. The men and women Revan fought alongside won nearly every battle they engaged in, and Revan single handedly changed the tide of the war. Carth admired Revan during those days. The thought now makes Carth sick.

Carth used to think Revan was some sort of hero. A grand warrior who came out of a dangerously uncaring or even corrupt Jedi order, but who managed to rise above it to fight for what is right. Carth knows better now. The dangerously uncaring one was Revan. Who betrayed them so easily, who talked others into betraying everything they’d known alongside them.

When Revan had left, over half of the Republic’s soldiers had gone too. It disgusted Carth; he couldn’t understand it at all. What Revan had done to earn that loyalty from so many? To earn that loyalty from Saul?

When Revan left, Admiral Saul Karath had gone with. Before that, Saul was Carth’s mentor, his friend, his confidant. And when Saul betrayed the Republic for Revan and Malak, he betrayed Carth to Revan and Malak.

After the desertion, Carth was promoted to Saul’s position. And when the desertion was revealed to be a betrayal? Carth led the battle against the new Sith Army, fighting throughout the outer rim. And so, Saul told Revan and Malak where to find Carth’s family.

Malak and Saul went to Telos IV together, and they destroyed the planet. Bombarded every city, every town, until there was nothing left living anywhere. That bombing killed Carth’s family. Killed his wife and son. Killed Morgana and Dustil.

It was Saul’s fault, it was Malak’s fault, it was Revan’s fault.

As Carth holds those who now have his heart, clings to Sam and Bastila, he swears that he will kill Saul with his own hands, and that Saul, and Malak, will never touch them.

And yet, the ghosts of Revan remain.

---

Canderous Ordo has knelt at Revan’s feet, and has starred up from the ground at the cold steel mask Revan wore. It was Revan who brought the Mandalorian Neo-Crusaders’ war against the Republic to an end, who put a stop to their conquest. It was Revan who demanded Mandalore’s unconditional surrender, and who claimed their weapons. Revan destroyed Mandalore.

Canderous does not hate Revan. Canderous respects Revan.

How can he not? When it came down to the end, the war between them was a battle of strategists, Canderous leading his warriors and Revan leading the Republic’s soldiers. When it came down to it, Revan had been willing to make the sacrifices and take the chances that allowed for the Republic Army to outmaneuver the Mandalorians, even when no one else was willing to give the orders to do so.

And in the end, when Canderous had crossed blades with Revan, Canderous had been soundly defeated, unable to so much as scratch Revan’s mask. How could Canderous not respect that strength?

Canderous has heard that what truly led to Revan’s death was a betrayal from the inside, from Malak. Canderous can believe that. No matter what Revan did, Canderous knows that Revan will always be the greatest warrior and tactician Canderous ever encountered.

---

Juhani knows that Revan was a bad Jedi and was an Objectively Bad Person. But still, Juhani can’t make herself forget.

Juhani knows that she will never forget how Revan saved her during the Mandalorian Wars, how Revan inspired her to finally leave Taris and go to Dantooine, who gave her the dream of becoming a Jedi.

Juhani will always remember her life on Taris, growing up hated by the humans who held all of the power, and the feeling of her family being the only Cathars on the planet. She knows she was shaped by her childhood as a refugee in the gang-ridden Undercity. She is haunted by the murder of her father, and the way her mother’s life faded out slowly after that until Juhani was alone.

When Juhani’s mother died, Juhani barely had time to make arrangements for the body before the Exchange came. Juhani will never forget the moment the big enforcers told her of her parent’s debt, or the way they took her afterwards.

Juhani can’t ever hate Revan because Juhani can’t ever forget the feeling of standing there, waiting to be sold, only for Revan to lead the Jedi to interrupt the sale, to save her. Because even though Revan never took off that mask, Juhani knows that Revan smiled at her.

---

To Jolee Bindo, Revan is just another page in the never-ending chain of Sith. An interlude between Exar Kun, Jolee’s first chapter, and Malak, Jolee’s current chapter. Revan isn’t even a particularly notable page - Jolee missed Revan’s entire life during his stay in Kashyyyk’s Shadowlands.

From what Jolee has heard and seen though, Revan was nothing special. Revan was just another Jedi, then just another soldier, and then was just another Sith. Jolee has seen hundreds of Jedi, Thousands of soldiers, and more Sith than he cares to count.

People talk about the shock of Revan’s betrayal as though Exar Kun had not done the exact same thing 50 years prior. They talk about the way Revan convinced other Jedi to desert, to fall, as though Exar Kun did not do the same thing first. As though Exar Kun did not convince Jedi to fall in far greater numbers, as though he did not lure away even the best of the Jedi, as though he did not lure away Jolee’s Nayama.

The galaxy talks about what Revan has done, about the people they know betraying them to follow Revan, as though Exar Kun did not inspire the same, as though Jolee never found his wife’s lightsaber at his through as her eyes glowed yellow.

The Jedi Jolee has encountered since returning from Kashyyk talk about the potential Revan had, how great a Jedi Revan could have been, as though there have not been hundreds of Jedi with great potential who never lived up to it. As though Zayne Carrick, Andor Vex, or Shad Jelevan were not padawans with equal potential who did not live up to their greatness the way they were expected too.

Jolee sees how the galaxy talks about how Revan was a brilliant tactician, how no one could outthink Revan, but he’s suitably underwhelmed. He remembers how Krynda Draay out-thought Exar Kun, how she rose up from loss to lead the Republic to victory.

Jolee Bindo never met Revan, but he remembers what came before Revan, and he will remember what comes after.

---

To Zaalbar, Revan doesn’t stand out. Revan is just another human in a galaxy of humans. Zaalbar never even heard the names of Revan or Malak before he left Kashyyyk. If the tales of Revan were told on Kashyyyk, it would be simply added to the list of terrible humans Zaalbar’s father once carved.

Revan was just another human slaver. The only difference is that Revan went after his own people rather than just the Wookies or the other sentients who don’t look like them.

To Zaalbar, Revan is nothing remarkable. The remarkable ones are those who are on board the Ebon Hawk with him, the ones who welcomed him as the family he has longed to have for so long.

---

Mission heard of Revan just once when she was a little girl, before Griff left. She heard of Revan in hushed tones, murmured between the people of Taris, after the destruction of the temple. The Jedi temple that had once been the pride of the governors of the planet, before it had been destroyed in order to chase the Mandalorians from Taris.

After the taxes were raised in the undercity so the governors could build an even more lavish temple to replace it, in hopes of drawing the Jedi back, that was when Mission first heard the name Revan. She learned that Revan was a champion of the non-humans of the galaxy, and that Revan wasn’t there when the temple fell.

Revan came later, to chase out the Mandalorians who remained, or so the stories tell. They talk of how Revan walked through the same filth covered streets they did, who stayed in the same filthy inns they did, who walked for a few days in their shoes.

To Mission and the people of the Undercity of Taris, Revan was a legend, a figure who brought ever so small a taste of equality. Even when the stories the people from the Uppercity told became tainted, talking of a darker Revan, they were considered just another political play by those who lived below. Another attempt to take away the light in their dark world.

Mission believed that as long as she could. She believed it right up until she was aboard the Ebon Hawk , looking out at the destruction Revan’s student rained down. Mission believed in Revan until Revan’s legacy left her one of the last survivors of Taris.

---

Revan first really mattered to Quinlan Vos during an undercover mission on the planet of Dromud Kaas, about six months before he was sent back in time. It was a terrible mission on a terrible planet, largely due to the cultists.

Even nearly four thousand years after the time of Revan, the cult of Revan remained, and Quinlan spent three months undercover in it. During that time, he learned very little, and none of the things he went there hoping to learn. Instead, he learned that many people learn of Revan and view Revan very differently. As Quinlan performed his initiation tasks, he dove deeper into the history of a figure that, while famous at the Jedi temple even in his time, had previously just been another historical figure.

To the cultists, Revan represented balance. The grey between the light Jedi and the dark Sith, given the time that Revan spent as both. They claimed to strive to walk that pathway, neither light nor dark. Quinlan wished that was possible. He didn’t believe it was back then – most of the cultists were deeply dark, and a few light enough that with training Quinlan would label them Jedi. There was no middle grey to be found there, despite their awareness of both.

Now here, in the era of Revan? Quinlan was more sure of that belief than ever before. There was no middle ground here in the galaxy. Those who had once been on the side of the republic were most assuredly not anymore. That did not make them half sith, half-republic, they were entirely Sith.

The same was true for the Jedi who had turned their backs and left their principals and teaching. They did not become grey, they became dark, Sith, the same way Quinlan very nearly had once. If they wanted to be anything but Sith, they would have to work every day to walk in the light the same way he does.

No matter what the cultists of Revan believe, Revan did not walk grey lines. Revan simply walked white and then black. In the force, no one ever managed to walk grey, no matter what they believed or how strong they were.

---

Notes:

1Directly quoting from KOTOR 1.[return to text]

did someone say world-building and foreshadowing? Too bad you get it anyways. Also, a wild Jolee makes his first appearnace.

#knights of the old republic #kotober2020 #soft wars #non-binary revan #bastila shan #carth onasi #canderous ordo #juhani #jolee bindo #zaalbar #mission vao #Quinlan Voss #star wars time travel #Tessa’s Fanfic #Tessa’s Soft Wars #Tessa's Run It With Love

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echodrops · 6 years

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Voltron or Final Fantasy 7?

In my last Voltron post I mentioned that Voltron Legendary Defender is really just Final Fantasy 7 with robot lions, so I wanted to elaborate on some of the comparisons.

Obviously this is mostly facetious; there are still several note-worthy differences between the two series, and if you want to get technical, Voltron certainly existed before Final Fantasy 7. However, it’s pretty obvious that someone on the writing team for Voltron Legendary Defender has been influenced by the plot and characters of Final Fantasy 7.

I mean...

We start out our story with the world in the clutches of an evil dictator, who by all rights, has no logical claim to the parts of the universe he controls, except that he has consolidated access to a seemingly unlimited supply of energy, which gives him military and utilitarian power over the hapless masses. (Also, bonus for their outfit color schemes matching almost exactly.)

The energy that these two scumbags are powering their military forces with is not just any energy, no sir: it’s actually the lifeblood of planets, the force that keeps worlds and everything on them alive.

In one of the most blatant cinematic parallels of all time, they forcefully draw out and refine this energy, using it for various purposes from powering their cities, building massive weapons, to creating armies of typically monstrous super soldiers, usually hopped up hard on the energy drug.

Meanwhile, our evil dictators rule from the thrones of their conspicuously ring-shaped dark fortresses that continue to slowly drain the life and peace from everything in reach.

But everyone knows that any villain worth his salt is backed up by an even more morally bankrupt and terrifying Mad Scientist:

Whose preoccupation with a calamity from another world

and penchant for creating horrific chimeras of flesh and machine

is about to cause everyone to have a very, very, bad day. Now where else have we seen pink glowing eyes, hm...

Of course, evil never reigns without opposition, so we have to have the consistently-out-of-focus-for-the-rest-of-the-series band of well-intentioned extremist rebels:

Although they talk a big game, their biggest accomplishment seems to mostly be getting themselves blown up.

They certainly aren’t responsible for killing their respective evil dictators, for example. Nope, that honor goes to:

The mysterious light-haired pretty boy with weird bangs, cat eyes, a sword, and a big ass chip on his shoulder over his parentage. He seems calm and rational, even sophisticated and princely--but it’s a thin veneer hiding a life-time of trauma and horror, and one wrong reveal about the identity of his mother could tip him over the edge into no-holds-barred madness. A dangerous free agent whose loyalties are questionable and whose existence is inextricably tied to the calamity from another world. He thinks He is among the last of the ancient mystical race of Cetra Alteans, who were eradicated by the creature from the other world, who infiltrated their society by possessing some of their closest allies.

Lotor also has shades of Rufus Shinra: seizes command after his father’s death, possibly still evil but everyone loves him anyway, commands a Quirky Mini Boss Squad:

Featuring in order: the One Who Rushes Into Everything, the Most Competent Right-Hand, the Quiet One, and the Plucky Redhead.

Of course, when the world needs saving from certain doom, a most beloved band of bizarre heroes will arise to answer destiny’s call:

The Stringy Inherited-Sword-Wielding Hero With Wack Hair

It’s a running gag to refer to him as a lone wolf and disinterested in other people, but under his prickly facade is a much softer, confused boy who is struggling hard with identity issues. He’s forced into a leadership role for which he is particularly ill-suited, and even though most people will leave the game/the show with the impression that he really grew into his leadership, the sum total of his accomplishments is actually causing far more trouble than would have occurred if he had just stayed home.

His obsession with finding and defeating light-haired pretty boy causes everyone no small amount of grief and then he ends up siding with said light-haired pretty boy anyway...

Can’t overcome the fact that he is deeply connected to the very thing he must defeat; he has Jenova Galra genes that lead him to question his role in the universe and whether or not he is a monster.

Incurably socially awkward country boy. Let’s mosey!

He learned everything he knows from:

The Black-Haired Best Friend with a Scar on His Face

Older, wiser, and in every way more competent than the stringy hero, this guy, complete with noticeable black and purple color scheme, is REAL hero material. He’s been through it all: held captive for year(s) by the mad scientist, “upgraded” and experimented upon with intentions of creating a true Super Soldier, something-something clones everywhere something-something... He has the good attitude and the powerful loyalty necessary to be a shining example of a white knight for the princess and is the standard which stringy hero knows he will never exceed. Stringy hero looks up to this guy more than anyone in the entire world, and this guy would give it all--even his life--to protect the people who mean the most to him. Complete with dramatic mid-series meaningful haircut!

Despite being a fan favorite, the creators spend more time writing this guy out of the series than they do actually using him to his best potential...

Shiro also has some shades of Vincent Valentine: atoner who fears he has become a monstrous tool for the enemy, despite his deep-down incredibly good heart. Some people like to pair him with the Genki Girl.

Mostly seen in the company of:

Princess Last of Her Kind

Don’t let her soft looks and pink color motif fool you! The “princess” is a strong, independent girl who does what she wants, when she wants, up to and including sacrificing herself to save the day when all the other heroes fail at life. As the last of her mystical and mysterious race, she possesses strange magics that allow her to feel the life force of all living beings and tap into the very energy that Shinra the Galra Empire are harvesting. Capable of wielding a staff, her actual greatest strength is her healing magic, which has the power to bring an entire planet back from the brink of death.

Her people were destroyed from within by betrayal at the hands of the calamity, and their sole remaining Plot MacGuffin, the white materia Voltron is the only thing left that can save the world. Despite being technologically advanced beyond all reason, her people were ancient peacekeepers who still, inexplicably, built stone temples.

The Promised Land Oriande is not a faerie tale.

Strongly flower-themed:

Then we have:

The Brilliant Young Rascal

As a character, Pidge isn’t actually a one-for-one to anyone in FF7. Yuffie’s acrobatic stunts and mischievous Genki Girl personality embody one obvious part of Pidge, but Yuffie lacks Pidge’s tech-ish brilliance and competent follow-through. In that regard, Pidge is actually somewhat closer to Red XIII: smart, inquisitive, and usually mature, their deep inner-conflicts, especially regarding the fate of their fathers, reveal their weaknesses and the truth that they’re still young, uncertain people who fear for the future of their world and sometimes feel helpless in the face of the staggering tasks put before them. They are deeply attuned to nature but also raised by someone whose technology is capable of revealing incredible truths about the universe. Both of them are also fish out of water when it comes to befriending new people, and they often feel like they do better on their own than trying to rely on people who aren’t part of their trusted family.

Courage the Cowardly Cat

Although it’s certainly tempting to compare Hunk to Barret, based somewhat on appearance and even, to a certain extent, on personality--Barret is a huge softy underneath who just loves his family and wants to do right in the world--Hunk has much more in common with Cait Sith, the robotic cat/moogle combo who is secretly an alter ego for the brilliant architect Reeve Tuesti. Cowardly and often the butt of jokes from teammates and enemies alike, Cait Sith is frequently underestimated and flies under the radar, allowing him to keep his own secrets even while sticking his nose in just about everyone else’s business. Although he’s not initially sold on the heroes’ goal of saving the world, he soon has a change of heart that makes him into a fast and loyal ally. Despite the fact that he’s made of “fluff,” in the hour of greatest need, it’s Cait Sith who steps up to rescue everyone, essentially single-handedly saving the world.

His creator is an incredible and genius engineer who longs to use his creations to better the lives of common people, but he’s also sarcastic and unafraid to tell it like it is, even if that means he’s telling his own allies where they’ve messed up badly.

His predictions about the future always seem to come true...

The Emotional Backbone of the Party

Don’t get me wrong, both Lance and Tifa are formidable fighters on their own, whose talents shine in different areas of combat than the traditional sword-wielding heroes. But their greatest strengths actually seem to lie in their ability to support their allies. When stringy hero falls into despair and falters in his leadership, it’s this right-hand role who steps up to bear the weight and get the party back on track. The voice of reason and drive, Lance and Tifa are go-getters who won’t let anyone settle for giving less than their best, and they definitely aren’t willing to sit around listening to tired old excuses when they could be out saving the world. Razzle Dazzle time!

They are both influenced strongly by their families and tend to listen to the feelings and struggles of others much more than they are willing to share their own feelings and fears. The others come to rely on them as an emotional crutch, whose central job it is to reassure, validate, and empower the team, sometimes at the cost of their own happiness.

But they weren’t always this way, and in fact, in the past, they happened to be a bit shallow and excitable, with a penchant for throwing themselves into situations which were way, way too far out their league and for rarely, if ever, listening to good advice. Head-strong and romantic, they started out as dreamers before the war took its toll.

They definitely had a rocky beginning with their stringy hero--they were not friends--but, by the middle end of the series, have grown and matured as characters into a strong person who not only helps guide the hero but also holds up better in the face of all the trauma and suffering the party experienced.

Even being such a central character, they get a bare minimum amount of dialogue, leading many fans to interpret the character however they see fit, causing both Lance and Tifa to become common stand-ins for the fans themselves.

(Despite both losing their place as the “heart of the party” to the “Princess,” they never become jealous of her.)

And finally:

Coranic The Mechanic

Coran and Cid Highwind don’t have that much in common in terms of personality, except both being extreme dorks with notable accents, but I wonder how much of that is because Voltron is a kids’ show and Cid’s chain-smoking, curse-laden, women-abusing attitude just wouldn’t fly in a place like that. In terms of story role, they fill the exact same niche: the older male mechanic who advises and leads when needed to, despite his advice often seeming eccentric at best to those he’s trying to lead. He’s in charge of flying the ship while the others race off into danger, and if you lay one dirty finger on his baby, he will probably throw you overboard.

Tough as nails, despite all appearances, but also tried, true, and loyal to a fault. Won’t give up, even in the face of insurmountable danger, and gets a big kick out of killing bad guys. Impeccable timing for dramatic last second saves.

PHEW, got ‘em all!

In case you need anything else to convince you that you’re watching an at least partially repackaged story, don’t forget the:

Bizarre Egyptian-themed ancient stone temple where the mystical race of the Cetra Alteans kept the deepest secrets of their magic.

Really unlucky magic rock from space.

Gigantic killer robot beasts.

An overly-drawn-out and somewhat poorly explained clone plot line that just leaves the fans even more confused.

youtube

And OF COURSE: infamously long unskippable summoning sequences.

tl;dr:

If you’re in the game of predicting where Voltron’s future plot might go, you would not be misguided to go play FF7 as fuel for your predictions. And if you’re a Voltron fan who still hasn’t played FF7... What are you even doing with your life? Get out of here!

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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The Mandalorian: How Luke’s Powers Compare to Ahsoka’s

https://ift.tt/3sNIrpO

Just last year, The Mandalorian’s unforgettable second season finale provided the early post-Original-Trilogy glimpse of Luke Skywalker for which Star Wars fans have long-craved. Yet, it was apparent that the Original Trilogy protagonist’s powers increased exponentially in the five years that passed in the timeline; a notion that reinforced the belief that Luke is the most powerful Jedi in the universe. However, the impressive live-action debut of animated icon Ahsoka Tano earlier in the season invited a debate on Jedi powers. It’s a topic that was recently reignited, thanks to comments from executive producer Dave Filoni.

The recent premiere of Disney+ documentary series Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian Season 2, Episode 2 has proven profoundly revelatory about the technological magic that brought a Return of the Jedi-era Mark Hamill back onscreen in 2020 as Luke Skywalker for The Mandalorian “Chapter 16: The Rescue.” Interestingly, it also revealed the thought process that went behind the way that this rendition of Luke would be presented, powers-wise. After all, the scene in question, while poised to deliver the reddest of red meat moments to the fandom, still needed to be executed with the narrative discipline to present Luke as an awe-inspiring Force-powered figure while avoiding the pitfalls of making him an obscenely overpowered plot-lifting deus ex-machina manifestation. However, in explaining his though process on limiting Luke’s powers, Filoni unwittingly kicked an Ahsoka-shaped hornet’s nest.

“It would be very easy to just make [Luke] so over-the-top skilled,” says Filoni. “But I was like, ‘You know, what’s interesting is he’s had training, but I don’t know who’s been teaching him sword-fight training lately.’ So, he had to have a style that was better than what we saw in Jedi, but fundamentally still of the same tree of sword-fighting technique. And his technique and Ahsoka’s technique should be very different. And technically, she’s had vastly more training than he ever has. She’s actually his senior, which is, I think, difficult for people to remember ‘cause of when these characters were created.”

Filoni’s comment led to a debate of sorts on (where else?) Twitter, the welcoming social media hub for measured, mature and always-respectful discourse over differing opinions. Possibly attributed to perceived bias on the part of Filoni (as Ahsoka’s creator), the comment was taken as a claim that Ahsoka is more powerful than Luke. While that, of course, remains subjective, his actually-stated notion of Ahsoka being Luke’s senior is factually accurate, based on the canonical timeline. Additionally, her training in the ways of the Force was substantially longer and more formal. While that doesn’t necessarily make her more powerful, it does likely mean that she’s more knowledgeable than Luke, not just from being older, but due to the pedigree of her Jedi training.

Ahsoka’s academic program started after being found by Jedi Master Plo Koon as a small child on her native planet of Togruta, after which she went through the regular academic wringer at the Jedi Temple under the direct tutelage of myriad Jedi Knights and Masters, patiently trained to harness her innate Force powers in what was to be a life-long learning endeavor. Indeed, the grandiose, elite life path of Jedi was first implied in The Phantom Menace when Yoda initially deemed an 8-year-old Anakin Skywalker “too old” to be trained in the ways of the Force. Clearly, Coruscant’s Jedi Temple is no one’s backup school.

How The Mandalorian Resurrected a Jedi to Cover Luke’s Surprise Role

By Joseph Baxter

What The Mandalorian Means for Ahsoka Tano’s Future in Star Wars

By John Saavedra

Indisputable facts state that Ahsoka was wandering the galaxy toward the end of the Clone Wars as a formidable apostate Jedi well before Luke was even a forbidden gleam in the sand-hating Anakin Skywalker’s eye. We even witnessed a notable step in her extensive training process in Star Wars: The Clone Wars’ 2008 series-launching feature film, in which an adolescent Ahsoka—already a skilled fighter—was first assigned as a Padawan learner to an initially-reluctant Anakin. Naturally, we saw Ahsoka’s skills evolve for years on the series, tested against the events of the titular war, and she would even rise to supreme splendor years later upon resurfacing on Star Wars Rebels to take on Darth Vader. Consequently, by the time we reach the post-Return of the Jedi era of Rosario Dawson’s live-action Ahsoka on The Mandalorian, she clearly achieved a sagely level—not just when comes to her signature two-lightsaber combat style, but also deep wisdom regarding her spiritual connection with the Force, through which she was able to reveal Baby Yoda’s true name as Grogu. In the very least, most can agree Ahsoka would have a lot to teach Luke—that is, if they haven’t met already, which we don’t know for sure.

Nevertheless, in a stark contrast pertinent to our pandemic era, Luke Skywalker was the original distance learner; a product of formerly-lofty institutional standards loosened out of necessity (in this case the extermination of the Jedi Order). His in-person training was—at least, as portrayed in the Original Trilogy—severely limited to a few fundamentals imparted ever-so-briefly by Obi-Wan Kenobi on the Millennium Falcon, and later from what amounted to a few days of Force training on Dagobah with Yoda. Consequently, in the arena of formally recognized Jedi credentials, Ahsoka is an Ivy League university graduate with workplace experience from years fighting the Clone Wars. Luke, on the other hand, came off a fast-tracked Jedi GED to earn a Jedi Skills Certificate from the proverbial online school of discovered Jedi texts and holocrons, making him a galactic Zoom class student, presumably deprived of opportunities to physically implement what he’d learned.

Of course, those ideas don’t necessarily seal the deal in the Luke/Ahsoka debate (if it even is a debate), since the true extent of Luke’s post-Jedi education is not really known. While “The Rescue” didn’t answer the question of who’s been teaching Luke advanced lightsaber techniques, the ease and stylistic panache with which he single-handedly dispatched a heavily-armed and armored platoon of Moff Gideon’s robotic Dark Troopers make it abundantly clear that his combat skills somehow evolved substantially from the rudimentary wide swipes and overhead caveman-swings showcased in Return of the Jedi. Thus, Luke’s upgraded skills seem attributed to something far more substantial than ancient books. Additionally, his life in the post-Original Trilogy, pre-Sequel Trilogy remains fertile ground in the Disney-designated franchise; a state due in no small part to the company’s canonical erasure of the vast array of Expanded Universe books and comics, now dubbed the “Legends” lore, which extensively showcased a now-apocryphal version of that era.

However, as we’ve seen with the Force, combat skills don’t necessarily make one more powerful, at least not in the manner through which the Jedi view the balance of the universe. For example, Qui-Gon Jinn was defeated in a duel with a mere Sith apprentice in Darth Maul, but his spiritual knowledge facilitated a subsequent trail-blazing ascension to the living Force, becoming the first fully-manifested Jedi Spirit, as vaguely teased in the Prequel Trilogy, and showcased on Star Wars: The Clone Wars. Moreover, Matthew Stover’s novelization of Sequel Trilogy closer Revenge of the Sith provides a key contextual moment omitted from the film, since Qui-Gon appears to Yoda fully-manifested as a Jedi spirit, offering to teach him the technique. At that point, the ancient and conventionally more-powerful Jedi master admits his hubris and exercises humility, stating to the spectral Qui-Gon, “A great Jedi Master you always were, but too blind I was to see it. Your apprentice, I gratefully become.”

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Pertinent to this point, the version of Luke we saw over 30 years beyond the timeline of his monumental Mandalorian moment in sequel films The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi may have been—to much controversy—disheveled, disenchanted and oddly-indifferent, but he was able to demonstrate some unprecedented Omega-level abilities (to borrow from the X-Men’s parlance). This idea proves that Luke’s Force education—such as it was—was nevertheless substantial enough for him to form a Jedi Academy to carry on the lost traditions—tragic ending of said academy notwithstanding. Consequently, any earnest debate about which Jedi is more powerful would likely require far more detail and nuance than the various agendas of the Twittersphere are able to conjure.

The post The Mandalorian: How Luke’s Powers Compare to Ahsoka’s appeared first on Den of Geek.

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fuzz1912 · 6 years

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The Penultimate Jedi

As the hours tick down to the release of “The Last Jedi” (rather presumptuously labeled “Episode VIII”), I’ve been reflecting on the state of Star Wars and in particular what exactly is going on with the mainline ‘continuation’ of the Skywalker saga. Unlike others who seem to think publicly proclaiming their thoughts on early previews of the film (basically showing off that they have had the privilege) is somehow not a totally crappy thing to do, I want to warn anyone reading this that some of this speculation may stray into spoilers (I hope it doesn’t) and that my thoughts on the actual film itself will follow soon after with similar warnings. Also, I have not read any secondary sources that may provide any context to this beyond the films themselves, so I acknowledge that some of the thoughts below may have extra-canonical explanations.

The Phantom Unease

If you’re one of the few who have read my previous entries, you’d know that I wasn’t really that impressed with “Episode VII: The Force Awakens”. I had the opportunity to rewatch it for the first time last week accompanied by the fantastic Melbourne Symphony Orchestra performing its score live in a theatre. The music still doesn’t feel as memorable as the original trilogy’s or as soaring as the prequels’, but it was nevertheless fantastic hearing even a lesser John Williams score performed by such wonderful musicians. My opinion on the film, however, did not change. As my partner pointed out, it’s entertaining enough while you’re watching it - but then, so are many other movies. Does it stay with you after you leave the theatre? Are there moments that take your breath away? Does it tell a story that you can’t stop thinking about or relating to? Does it have performances that are etched in your mind? The Force Awakens may have contained a heap of humorous banter (no fart jokes sure, but nothing particularly clever either) but I can’t say yes to any of those questions in respect of that film, yet most of them have been satisfied by every other Star Wars film (including last year’s Rogue One).

For me, Star Wars has always been about the story. Story is supposedly king when it comes to film, such that everything else should serve it. From that point of view, whatever problems I might have with anything else (performances, effects) melt away if I’m engaged with the story. Both the original trilogy and the prequels had stories I felt engaged with, and plots that were solid (except, ahem, perhaps the mystery of Master Sifo-Dyas and the clone army which have been better served in the Clone Wars TV series). They were stories that resonated and that were worth being told, and I was invested in them all the way. The original trilogy may have started in media res (in the middle of the story) just as The Force Awakens did, but it fleshed out this broader story world while adapting Joseph Campbell’s archetypical Hero’s Journey. For all of their perceived faults, the prequels are an incredibly relevant precautionary tale against concentrating power without oversight, sacrificing freedom for the appearance of safety, and the lengths to which someone can be driven to protect those they love.

An Attack by Clones

As some sort of rebuke of George Lucas and his ambitious prequels (and given the popular derision towards them both), instead of developing a logical continuation of the story that ended with Return of the Jedi, Disney and the new management of Lucasfilm seemed to buy into the Hollywood zeitgeist of rebooting and remaking existing stories with a layer of modern sensibility and sleekness to capitalise on nostalgia and cheap laughs. Though it was clear to me on first viewing, I’m glad to see that over time the feeling that The Force Awakens is a laughably poor imitation of A New Hope has finally gained wider traction. Certainly it proved commercially successful enough (though the prequels set their own box office records during their time) where riskier story world developments (such as Blade Runner 2049) have not been; though you have to ask why that capital couldn’t have been better applied to original stories instead (no one is remaking The Godfather, for instance). While there’s always value in returning to good story structures, there’s so much creativity wasted in beat-for-beat rehashing existing stories that have already been told well.

I’m rather cynically going to predict that The Last Jedi will resemble The Empire Strikes Back, just as The Force Awakes xeroxed A New Hope - and the trailers seem to suggest this is a safe bet. Rey clearly goes to Luke for training and probably acts in a manner that conflicts with Luke’s own plan (as he did with Yoda). Rey probably seeks out Kylo Ren who makes some persuasive arguments as to why he should train her instead of Luke. Finn seems to have a continuing beef with Captain Phasma that he needs to sort out, much like Han with Lando or Jabba the Hutt. Coming off its victory against Starkiller Base, the Resistance probably takes a severe beating at the hands of the First Order. Oh, and one last thing - there’s probably a pretty big cliffhanger or revelation that has been designed to echo the shock of “No, I am your father”.

But that’s all mere plot - I still have not figured out what these new films are actually supposed to be about (other than a cynical reboot of the original trilogy for commercial exploitation), or why we should care. By virtue of the world created by their predecessors, and the vast ‘Legends’ expanded universe I grew up with (now unceremoniously dumped by Disney), I care deeply about the larger story in which they take place - so I will persist and watch these remaining films in the hoping of trying to make sense of it all. There are two major areas where this uncertainty manifests: the personal and the political.

The Personal

Star Wars follows two intertwined and similar, but slightly different, personal stories within the Skywalker family - one person’s search for purpose (Anakin), and another’s search for belonging (Luke). The essence of these two stories (and similarly, the slight distinction) is reflected in the two leads of this new tale - Finn and Rey, respectively. However, what is less clear is how the background in which these stories take place fits into the broader Skywalker family saga.

Obviously Rey’s family background has been left deliberately mysterious - Ewan McGregor’s voice cameo suggests a Kenobi connection, but then she could possibly also be a Palpatine - but neither of the leads appears to be connected to the Skywalker family. The first movie seems to suggest that their connection to the Force is symbiotic - they both appeared to have ‘awakened’ at the same time, though Rey’s journey appeared to be accelerated by her vision at Maz Kanata’s cantina (ahem) and on board Starkiller Base (ahem). Luke and Anakin Skywalker, the Chosen Ones, took years to master the Jedi mind trick, but Rey’s got it down in minutes. And both Rey and Finn pick up enough skill to engage and challenge (if not necessarily defeat) Luke’s protege, a supposedly powerful dark side user who must be genetically teeming with midichlorians. Why is this, and does any of this fit in with what we know about the Force, the prophecy of the Chosen One bringing balance, or the Skywalker family itself? These are questions I hope this film and the next attempt to answer.

On the other hand, we do know that Ben “Kylo Ren” Solo IS a Skywalker descendant who, rather unsurprisingly, turned to the dark side (the stories of his grandfather obviously weren’t scary enough). He killed his father for, reasons - that don’t involve avenging any lost limbs or turning his wife against him. He is the Master of the Knights of Ren (ahem, Dark Lord of the Sith), a group that we have not yet met or been given any context for. Apparently he is so powerfully dark that he forced his uncle (who has defeated the two most powerful Sith of all time) to go into hiding, and yet he is easily engaged by two newbies, and his current master feels that he still needs to complete his training (so these Knights of Ren he leads must be total schmucks). In the trailers he flies around in a jazzed up copy of his grandfather’s TIE Fighter (so both the Force sensitivity and piloting skills pass down through the midichlorians) and appears to be gunning for his mother because, reasons. And his master, a disfigured hologram known only as “Supreme Leader Snoke”, turned him to the dark side and wants him to help him destroy the Resistance because - I don’t know, reasons? Palpatine was a malevolent presence who emerged from the shadows to completely dominate the galaxy over the course of six films. How did Snoke become so apparently powerful (while still only commanding a rump of a political or military force), and how does he fit into the saga after coming seemingly out of nowhere? And again, why should we care? I hope this film spends some time showing us.

Someone who actually has been developed over the course of three films (though certainly not the fourth) is Luke. The opening crawl of The Force Awakens introduced a massively unearned and very sterotypical Macguffin - “Luke Skywalker has vanished” - laying bare the basic plot of the film, namely trying to find him (let’s be honest, it’s a one-for-one rehash of Leia looking for Obi Wan Kenobi). First, we know nothing of why this is significant - despite almost single-handedly being responsible for freeing the galaxy from the tyranny of the Empire, Luke has apparently become a ‘myth’. So his disappearance is simultaneously Very Important to the Resistance (why?) and totally unimportant to galactic society at large. Other than failing to properly train his nephew (not unoriginal at all), we don’t know what Luke has done in the intervening 30 years to have made us care at all about his disappearance. We know why Kenobi disappeared - Vader and the Empire hunted down the Jedi, and he had a young ward to protect - but such a reason doesn’t exist for Luke (yet). We’re supposed to believe he got spooked by repeating his own mentor’s obvious mistake and decided that hiding was better than fighting back. That’s putting aside the implausibility of the disappearance in the first place - Luke hasn’t told his family and friends (let alone students) where he’s gone, but he’s left half a map in a conveniently powered-down R2D2 and another with the Exorcist (why?). And, until now, no one’s thought to look in those two completely obvious locations. None of his Force-sensitive relatives seem to have been able to undertake the task of locating him either (nor his best friend, who knows at the very least that he went searching for the ‘first Jedi temple’, which is clearly not on Jedha from Rogue One).

Which brings us to Leia: Carrie Fisher sadly passed away after shooting her scenes for this movie. Given that not much of a big deal has been made of this publicly in relation to this film (as opposed to her cameo in Rogue One), and the appearance of some massively spoilerish scenes in the trailers, it would also be a safe bet to assume Leia dies during this film. So what I’m interested in is what purpose does her death serve? Han Solo’s death certainly didn’t provide any, unlike the death of Obi Wan that it was designed to mimic. Her death would make some sense in that the completion of this particular story should be left to the next generation, as has been the case in previous iterations - but none of that helps us understand what the hell Leia has been doing acting as a general for an insurgency when by rights she should be presiding over the dominant power in the galaxy, namely the New Republic; or why losing her should be so consequential. This brings us neatly to the next serious of questions that relate to the broader political context of what’s happening in the Galaxy Far, Far, Away, and why we should care about it.

The Political

On a broader level, Star Wars is about how good institutions fall when they stagnate and arrogantly believe in their natural infallibility (the Republic / Jedi), and how evil ones fail because they unilaterally impose order to oppress (the Empire / Sith). Taken at face value, this new trilogy is a rehash of the latter, but in order for that to have any resonance the players need to be similarly placed and have similar motives.

So, what exactly is the dreaded First Order? What is ‘First’ about it? We know that Palpatine called his Empire the “New Order” but how does that connect to this new group? And what is its relationship to the remnants of the Empire? That same galaxy-spanning Empire whose bountiful resources only provided for the construction of two moon-sized system-limited super lasers and a fleet of kilometres-long starships, while its territorially-localised successor can build apparently colossal capital ships and a planet that can suck the life out of ‘suns’ (ahem, gravity and general relativity) and destroy multiple planets instantaneously from light years away? What purpose does the First Order serve? Sure, they’ve been portrayed as your stereotypical Nazis, but what specific ideologies do they advance that makes those they seek to conquer so repugnant to them, and in need of conquering? Does it exist purely for Snoke’s pleasure / power? Does it seek to impose order on the galaxy and give humans a platform for supremacy as the Empire did (though, to be fair, the Resistance is pretty human-heavy as well)? Does it merely seek to destroy the New Republic (seems likely) for reasons, with no particular plan as to what to replace it with? And most critically, why have they so closely modeled themselves on the the structures and styles of the Empire, which has already lost a galactic war?

What about the Resistance itself? Clearly it is resisting the First Order, but why? What territorial or ideological claims are made by the First Order, and how do they conflict with those of the Resistance? And, most critically, where is the New Republic in all of this and why does it need a localised ragtag Resistance to defend itself? We know the “Republic fleet” wasn’t available to defend the Resistance base in the Ileenium system (ahem, Yavin IV) or the now-destroyed Hosnian system (ahem, Alderaan - I only learned those names when I saw the subtitles at the live performance). And yet the New Republic’s presumptive political and military leaders (Leia and Admiral Ackbar) seem to have committed themselves to this cause rather than fulfilling the higher callings that they earned by fighting another much more consequential galactic civil war. Unlike the Rebellion’s first encounter with a Death Star, which relied on small maneuverable snub fighters, Starkiller Base is large enough that a fleet of capital warships would have been very useful - much as they were when the Rebels took on the Empire at Endor and Scarif. And somewhere in this mix must be the “new Jedi” that Han said Luke Skywalker was apparently training, of which Ben Solo was just one (and apparently the only one who predictably fell to the dark side) - though by looking at the title of this film, they’re probably not going to be around any more.

Finally, what about the minor players in this conflict - crime families like the Hutts and the bounty hunters or power-hungry entities like the Trade Federation? We know from The Force Awakens that there’s still some sort of underworld, reflected though Solo’s Rathtar dealings with the evil Scots and Asians - I mean Guavian Death Gang and Kanjiklub (again, names I only picked up recently from subtitles). But how do they influence the ongoing story and interfere with the conflict between the Resistance and First Order? What new characters complicate the protagonists’ objectives - is there a Lando, a Jedi Council, or even a Jar Jar, or is Poe Dameron all we get? Are the Porgs of the trailer as significant as the Jawas or Ewoks, or merely there to imitate their merchandisability?

A Final Hope

I hope that while it inevitably traverses the well-known tropes of the original trilogy sprinkled with simple amusing banter, The Last Jedi takes some time to address some of these questions in the broader story and earns its place in the Skywalker saga (and possibly goes some way to redeeming its predecessor). I hope, and yet a phantom menace keeps me believing that the photocopier will strike back for the cheap buck. I’ll be staying up into the wee hours of tomorrow night to mull on the film, and will hopefully have committed my thoughts to paper shortly thereafter to continue the conversation with those of you who have similarly persisted.

#the last jedi #star wars

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ramajmedia · 5 years

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Harry Potter: 10 Movie Villains You Wouldn’t Think Are More Powerful Than Voldemort (But Actually Are)

In the fictional world of Harry Potter, there has never been nor will there probably ever be another evil, existential threat like Lord Voldemort. This boy who came from even more humble beginnings than Harry went on to become the most powerful and dangerous dark wizard in the history of the wizarding world, and he nearly destroyed everything in order to take all of the power for himself.

RELATED: Harry Potter: 10 Hidden Details About Dementors You Probably Missed

While Voldemort is the villain to end all villains in the Harry Potter film series and absolutely one of the most powerful baddies of all time, there are still other movie villains who have Lord Voldemort's number. Voldemort may be unique in his world, but there have been many other characters who wielded unimaginable power to even darker ends. Here are 10 of those villains who are actually more powerful than Voldemort.

10 Magneto - The X-Men

Although Erik Lehnsherr only has the ability to control metals, he seems to make a lot better use of his ability than Voldemort does with his powers. It seems like his power in that particular arena is actually stronger than Voldemort's powers in general.

Putting aside his literal ability, Magneto is the kind of bad guy who actually has the charisma and manipulative abilities to get people to join him because they have faith in him. Voldemort's Death Eaters are formidable, but most of them aren't there for Voldemort, they're either too afraid to go against him or they just want the freedom to do bad things.

9 Hela - Thor: Ragnarok

Voldemort's ultimate end goal was to dominate the world and live forever, however beating death is no easy feat, especially when death looks like Hela from Thor: Ragnarok. Voldemort is only a wizard while Hela is a literal god, and she happens to be the scariest god in all of Asgard.

RELATED: Harry Potter: 10 Hidden Details About Basilisks You Probably Missed

Hela's father Odin banished her from the realm when he realized what a danger she was, and clearly he was right since she managed to single-handedly destroy all of Asgard within a matter of days of being released. Voldemort wishes he could be half as expedient and effective.

8 General Zod - Superman/Man Of Steel

Although Lord Voldemort is more powerful than any human and most wizards, even he can't compete with even the weakest Kryptonian in existence. And General Zod is far from the weakest Kryptonian.

Zod is gifted with all of the abilities that come with being Kryptonian, and he's one of the most knowledgeable, capable, and ruthless warriors in the history of Krypton. On top of all of that, he has an army of other Kryptonians at his beck and call. While Kryptonians are not resistant to magic, they are also fast enough to stop Voldy before he can even utter a spell.

7 Pennywise - It

Both the Tim Curry and Bill Skarsgård's versions of Pennywise the clown will give any child or adult nightmares for years to come, but the movies only allude to the fact that Pennywise isn't what he appears to be.

Pennywise is actually an ancient primordial evil that has existed since the beginning of time, and the truth of "It" is something that is so grotesque and cosmically horrifying that the human brain couldn't even comprehend it. Pennywise the dancing clown is the form that "It" takes on Earth, but it's one of the most powerful beings in the universe.

6 Freddy Krueger - A Nightmare On Elm Street

When it comes to creating a terrifying movie villain, writers are constantly looking for new angles and interesting twists to exploit the kind of fears that most people would never conceive of or think was possible. One of the most brilliant instances of this is with Freddy Krueger.

RELATED: Harry Potter: 10 Biggest Twists & Reveals, Ranked

Freddy Krueger was the creation of horror mastermind Wes Craven, and this spirit of a deceased serial murderer is arguably the most powerful horror movie villain of all time. Why is that? Because he is literally inescapable. People can run away from something like Lord Voldemort, but no one can escape sleep. In spirit form, Voldemort did not need to sleep, which does give the Dark Lord an edge over Krueger. However, in any other state, Voldy is the underdog.

5 Darth Vader - Star Wars

Tom Riddle is easily one of the most gifted wizards who had ever lived. While wizards don't exactly exist in the Star Wars universe, the closest equivalent that they have is the Jedi and the Sith. If Tom Riddle was gifted as a child, then Anakin Skywalker was the Albert Einstein of the Force.

Even once Anakin has succumbed to the dark side of the Force and lost half of his physical body, he appears to be more powerful than Lord Voldemort, both when it comes to his supernatural abilities and in terms of the power that he wields in the Empire.

4 Sauron - The Lord Of The Rings

Harry Potter is undoubtedly one of the best and most successful magical fantasy stories of all time, but when it comes to working their magic, honestly, J.K. Rowling's characters can't compete with J.R.R. Tolkien's. The Lord of the Rings redefined what high fantasy could do, and its main antagonist Sauron is undoubtedly one of the most powerful villains in the history of film.

Sauron was one of the first beings to ever exist in his world, and this dark lord of Mordor was closer to being a god than an elf, hobbit, or any other sentient being that inhabited his land.

3 Agent Smith - The Matrix

Agent Smith from The Matrix series is one of the most frightening villains in film history for one simple reason. How do you fight the world that you inhabit? Yes, Agent Smith is the physical form that this computer program takes on, but the reality of Agent Smith is that he is essentially the matrix searching itself to destroy whatever could harm it.

RELATED: Harry Potter: 10 Hidden Details About Goblins You Probably Missed

There is a reason that every freed human before Neo enthusiastically obeyed the rule that if you ever saw an agent, run. The matrix may be an imaginary world, but you can really be killed there, and Agent Smith is literally all-powerful in this world.

2 Thanos - Avengers: Infinity War

Even before Thanos assembled the infinity gauntlet he was arguably more powerful than Lord Voldemort. Like many of the heroes and villains within the MCU, Thanos has superpowers of his own, but what really makes him such a threat before the gauntlet is his army. In terms of real-life destruction, Lord Voldemort's body count doesn't even hold a candle to the damage that Thanos has inflicted.

Obviously, once Thanos has achieved the near-impossible and collected all of the infinity stones, it is literally the end of the universe. Or, the end of half the universe anyway. Voldemort never came close to matching what Thanos did with just a snap of the fingers.

1 Sheev Palpatine - Star Wars

When it comes to the villain who can defeat all other villains, it's pretty hard to top Sheev Palpatine. Chancellor Palpatine played absolutely every one of his cards right and managed to do so while hiding in plain sight. When he destroyed the entire Jedi order and took over the galaxy in one fell swoop, Palpatine essentially managed to achieve Lord Voldemort's dream.

Palpatine has the powers to match Voldemort, but what really makes him such an exceptional threat is that he has the brains to ensure every power and ability is used to its fullest and darkest potential.

NEXT: Harry Potter: 12 Ravenclaw Logic Memes That Are Too Hilarious For Words

source https://screenrant.com/harry-potter-movie-villains-more-powerful-voldemort/

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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10 Best Star Wars Villains Ranked

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Star Wars is a story about good triumphing over evil, the heroes overcoming all challenges before them and defeating the villains. But we love to watch the antagonists, too! What would the saga be without its iconic, larger-than-life villains?

The hum of a lightsaber echoes in a hallway filled with smoke. A mastermind works behind gilded walls against his enemies. A bounty hunter zips through the sky with his jet pack. A dark lord awaits her prey from the core of a dying planet. These are moments that stay with us long after the credits have rolled, and they’re the reason why a few of the villains on this list are considered some of the best ever created regardless of the medium.

We’ve ranked our top 10 favorite Star Wars villains below:

10. General Grievous

Like many characters and concepts in the Prequels, Grievous is perhaps most notable for his visual design and powerful presence. A spindly four-armed droid, he looks like a mix between a robot, a spider, and a dinosaur. This non-human form wields four lightsabers at the same time, all of which he stole from Jedi he killed.

While Grievous’ personality isn’t really the draw here (he has a brief backstory and a tendency toward the dramatic), you can see some of his history in the excellent The Clone Wars episode “Lair of Grievous.” But we’d especially recommend you check out his first on-screen appearance in Genndy Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars microseries. Scary stuff!

9. Grand Admiral Thrawn

Inspired by Sherlock Holmes and legendary military strategists like Alexander the Great, Grand Admiral Thrawn is the first character on this list to originate in tie-in books. He also has the distinction of being the first major villain of the post-Return of the Jedi era. The “Thrawn Trilogy” in the 1990s remain the most famous books of the lot for rejuvenating the franchise and introducing this tactical genius.

The epitome of working smarter, not harder, Thrawn is a no-nonsense thinker who can tell what a culture’s war strategy will be like based solely on their art. His clashes with characters from the Original Trilogy to the Rebels crew to his own Chiss Ascendancy are beloved as tactical puzzles and a showcase for his intimidating personality.

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Fans love Thrawn so much that he was one of the first non-canon Legends characters to be retconned back into the Disney continuity after the House of Mouse bought Lucasfilm in 2012. The Mandalorian season 2 has even set up the Grand Admiral to make his first live-action appearance at a later date.

8. Kylo Ren

While there’s some debate among fans about whether Kylo Ren should still be considered a true villain after The Rise of Skywalker, his appearance in The Force Awakens is our favorite, and he’s firmly in bad guy territory there. From the intimidating crossguard lightsaber to his chaotic nature that makes the audience feel like even he doesn’t quite know what he’s going to do next, Ren’s vivid characterization and volatile personality (not to mention Adam Driver’s performance) helped sell The Force Awakens as a worthy successor to the Original Trilogy.

He sometimes borrows too much from Darth Vader in that first installment to be truly unique, but that’s the point: Kylo is a fan of the villains who have come before, a member of a new generation of characters who inherit the saga and choose which role they want to play. Ren joins the dark side knowing exactly where it will lead.

7. Asajj Ventress

Ventress has been many things. A witch, a bounty hunter, a Jedi, and a Sith disciple, but her different roles are all in service of finding what she really wants: A home.

Introduced as the acrobatic and creepy antagonist in the first and second seasons of the Clone Wars miniseries, she goes toe-to-toe with Anakin Skywalker on several occasions during the galactic conflict. Throughout The Clone Wars, we also see how her part in the war changes, all while she tries to fill the hole in her heart created by her separation from her parents and death of her mentor when she was just a child. Ultimately, she’s both a tragic and sympathetic figure but also a frighteningly unpredictable villain.

6. Kreia/Darth Traya

Knights of the Old Republic II features one of the most inventive and critical explorations of what it means to wield the Force. The game’s Jedi and Sith are conflicted, use their powers in unique ways, and hold personal philosophies about the light and dark sides beyond the beliefs of their respective orders.

Into the life of the game’s Jedi exile protagonist comes the mysterious Kreia, a Sith lord disguised as the hero’s mentor in the ways of the Force. And her teachings about the ancient energy are unlike anything else we’ve seen or read to date.

Instead of following the light or the dark side, Kreia feels the Force itself is a malevolent barrier between people and free will. Although her philosophy technically leads her to the dark, her ideas about going beyond that dichotomy entirely make her one of the most thought-provoking characters in the series. It’d be interesting to hear what she thought about the Force dyad from The Rise of Skywalker.

5. Boba Fett

Boba Fett began his Star Wars career as a mysterious cartoon character in The Star Wars Holiday Special and as a faceless villain in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, before making the jump to the classic Legends tie-in books and comics. Now, he’s back for the first time in the Disney canon, thanks to The Mandalorian, which gives a new generation of fans plenty of reasons to love the iconic bounty hunter.

Although he isn’t the first actor to portray Boba Fett, Prequel Trilogy veteran Temuera Morrison brings newfound charm and power to the legendary bounty hunter, whose armor, jetpack, and laconic personality made him a breakout star despite his relatively minor screen time in the Original Trilogy. On The Mandalorian, we finally get to see his legendary prowess as he single-handedly breaks stormtroopers with his bare hands before even regaining his armor.

Boba Fett’s history is almost as long as Star Wars‘ itself, debuting in 1978, and he’s been a fan-favorite ever since, living many other lives on the page beyond the movies. He’s worked for the Empire, teamed up with other bounty hunters, and even become the leader of the Mandalorian people. With his return to Disney canon, he gets a whole new future full of adventures for fans to look forward to, including The Book of Boba Fett.

4. Darth Maul

Maul just keeps coming back. While he was easily one of the best parts of The Phantom Menace, it’s his development in The Clone Wars that really puts him near the top of the list. A perpetual student always looking for a master, Maul’s tutelage under Sidious means he never really learned how to live outside the structure of the Sith order. That mentality clashes with the Jedi in one of the most dramatic confrontations in The Clone Wars, where Maul reveals he knows the Empire is coming and the Jedi are too late to stop it.

From a martial arts expert to the galaxy’s Cassandra, he’s played many different roles, including the secret leader of a galaxy-spanning criminal organization in Solo. In Rebels, his death serves as a moving capstone to what began in the Prequels, when Obi-Wan Kenobi finally ends his life in a battle not of martial skill but of the kind of mercy and solace only a Jedi at their best can offer.

3. Moff Gideon

While the villain of The Mandalorian hasn’t had nearly as much time on screen as many of the others on this list, he’s climbed to the top through force of personality. Giancarlo Esposito gives even Moff Gideon‘s expository dialogue a sinister life.

As an ISB agent, he differentiates himself from most Star Wars villains by not being a Force-wielding warrior first and foremost. He’s cool because he thrives on information, and frightening because of the lengths he’s willing to go to get it. And don’t forget, he’s willing to handcuff Grogu. You get in the Villain Hall of Fame for that.

2. Emperor Palpatine

The mastermind of many falls (Anakin’s, the Republic’s, Ben Solo’s), Emperor Palpatine, aka Darth Sidious, is the shadow looming over the entire saga. He has a hand in everything, from the inability of the Jedi to hold on to even their own Force powers (as they discover in the Prequels) to the rise of the First Order. He’s the ultimate example of ambition gone wrong, the desire to rule the galaxy for the sake of ultimate control in human form. And the performance by Ian McDiarmid through the decades has become a staple of pop culture.

1. Darth Vader

From the first part of A New Hope to the finale of Rogue One and beyond, Vader’s intimidating visage is synonymous with Star Wars. Designed by Ralph McQuarrie in part after the shape of a samurai armor, the apparatus that keeps Vader alive was made to look dark, intimidating, and “spooky.” He doesn’t have to run or use flashy lightsaber moves to kill you: instead it’s his inexorable approach and brutal moves that are so fearsome. And he has no problem Force choking his own men to get what he wants.

While part of what makes Vader number one is how frightening he is, that’s not the whole story. As Anakin Skywalker, he also brings pathos to the saga and inspires endless debate. His choice to turn to evil is the event on which the rest of the saga turns. Decades later, he’ll inspire Kylo Ren to start down a similar path.

Let us know your own ranking in the comments below!

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