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#the don’t like the mandalorians bc they force their own path or whatever
foundfamilynonsense · 7 months
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Mace Windu said fuck the rules fuck the law fuck tradition the Chancellor is a Sith Lord and has made himself an emperor and I’m not going to sit by and let it happen.
Mace Windu said if I do nothing I’d be betraying the democracy I thought I was fighting for this whole time, which means more than the crimes I’ll be charged with when this is over.
And yet people try to praise Anakin or Dooku for “leaving a corrupt system”. As if that was why Anakin left. As if Dooku did anything but make it worse. People praise the Mandalorians for only following their own rules. As if we’ve ever seen the Mandalorians truly stand for anything.
As if we don’t already have the most metal anti-authoritarian, badass character for people to praise.
And yet these parts of the fandom hate him. I wonder why 🤔
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levitatingbiscuits · 4 years
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hi sorry i just need to rant about lightsabers for a bit. (bear with me. i swear this isn’t just nitpicking the accuracy of physics and swordplay in a space opera, bc I swear I wouldn’t make a post JUST for that)
so, i have a bit of experience with swords. not actual swords, but bokken and wooden replicas, at least. i’ve been trained in basic shakespearian stage combat since i was 8 years old, but the only move I got really good at was the moulinet, aka that flippy thing everyone complains about in the prequels:
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however, unlike everyone claims, THIS MOVE IS NOT USELESS. sure, it can be used to show “i’m fancy and well-trained,” but it’s ALSO extremely useful for acquainting yourself to the heft and length of your weapon, as well as readjusting your grip if your other hand is occupied (historically by a shield), or even if you just wanna do it quickly because you’re worried the other guy is about to stab/disarm you. it also helpfully keeps others at bay when your grip is at its weakest because they don’t wanna get hit by the blade and bleed tf out, much like poor anakin up there. Not to mention, IN UNIVERSE they can use moulinets to deflect blaster fire and seek openings in other saber users’ defenses.
HOWEVER X2: this move should not be possible with a plasma blade/”laser sword.”
plasma is weightless. the moulinet depends on the weight of the blade to function. imagine trying to do this move with a deadly flashlight instead of a sword, which is essentially what a lightsaber is. ewan and hayden were given sticks to stand in for the lightsaber blades, which is the only reason they can physically perform this move. (also probably why their stances are all so dumb -- the physics are COMPLETELY different. Only Makashi even vaguely resembles irl blade combat, and that’s because Christopher Lee was a fencer and George incorporated that. Maybe Ataru too, to a lesser extent, but that was because Liam Neeson got trained in broadsword combat for Rob Roy and kept accidentally using irl techniques during his fight scenes.)
BUT: that’s where the Force comes in.
Why is the lightsaber the signature weapon of ONLY the Jedi, when they can so easily be used to devastating effect? Simple answer: lightsabers are super fucking dangerous. They can cut through anything, with minimal effort, so if you drop it it can and will cut through whatever it touches, ESPECIALLY flesh and bone. it’s also weightless, and therefore it’s SUPER FUCKIN EASY to overexert yourself and cut through more than you intended, because it goes through your opponents and solid rock like a hot knife through butter. Even in metal’s case, it’s like a cold knife through fudge. if you aren’t Force-sensitive, you’re just as much of a danger to yourself and your companions as you are to your enemies. that’s probably why the mandalorians didn’t immediately manufacture a million more darksabers, despite it being the weapon equivalent of a wet dream for them: shit just isn’t practical. it’s a status symbol precisely because it’s such a pain in the ass to use.
but we KNOW there’s some force fuckery afoot with the kyber crystals, as well. they’re sentient, and the main way Force nulls can even use them is in giant superweapons. Jedi gotta bond with those little assholes, have to have a fucking vision quest before it will deign to be used by them. Sith have it even worse: they gotta break them to their will by running the gauntlet of their own worst (lightest, technically) thoughts and deepest self-doubts. in return, it sings to its Jedi, and screams at its Sith. 
so i theorize that the only reason why saber users can keep track of where their blade is going is because the saber tells them through the Force. The moulinet is the ultimate expression of skill in saberplay because it signifies complete trust in, and a constant connection with, your crystal. There is a reason Anakin Skywalker often moulinets, and Darth Vader does not. His crystal chose him, and later chose his son, but he stole that red saber from Master Infli’a and made it bleed. It hates and fears him.
This is also likely why the Jedi emphasize control above all else: they don’t really need power or strength that much if the saber is doing 90% of the work for them. They just need to guide its path. Vader can probably get away with being reckless because of his plasteel armor and robot limbs (when Luke hit his armor in ESB it bounced right off). Instead of practicing restraint, as the Jedi did, he just cuts his son’s hand off when he wants to disarm him (eh? eh??). Severing limbs was typically a last resort for the Jedi, the final way to end a fight without killing your opponent, which is why it’s so tragic that Obi-Wan has to cut off so goddamn many to protect those he loves. It gets to the point that he’s pretty blase about the whole thing by the time of ANH. Vader does it to scold his kid. He’s at his farthest point in his fall here.
Anyway, the lightsaber physics of the sequels ended up REALLY bugging me because of this. Sure, they were hardly realistic in the earlier films, but at least they were consistent. This video essay makes a lot of great points, the primary one being that WHY IS NO ONE FUCKING DYING WHEN THEY GET HIT BY A LIGHTSABER. Finn should have lost the use of his legs, at the very least, and Kylo’s skull should have split open like a ripe melon. The REASON the comics emphasized that Asajj was showing off when she gave Anakin his facial scar is because it takes incredible precision to do that to someone without instakilling them, much less leaving him the use of his eye. Rey swung that shit at him like a baseball bat and Kylo was totally fine! 
AAAAANYWAY, this is yet another reason in a fucklong list of why the Order has to start its training so young: so those cute lil babies don’t accidentally kill everyone with their Space Powers when they throw a tantrum or cut off something important whenever they get in a fight.
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