10 Things (George Lucas) & Revenge (3/17)
Sep. 14th, 2011 05:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anghraineI've been meaning to do this for awhile, and I guess -- here goes.
Ten Things George Lucas Has Said That Don't Fill My Soul With Rage
Cheerfully taken out of context! But I can provide the original sources if you want them. :P
(1) “Han and Leia probably did get married. They settled down. She became a senator and they got a nice little house with a white picket fence.”
Personally, I don’t picture Leia going back to politics after ROTJ and I can’t really see her in a little house with a picket fence either. But of all the possible fates for them, this has to be one of the most satisfying. They get married, they settle down, they live happily ever after.
(2) “The Emperor doesn’t get cloned and Luke doesn’t get married.”
Yes please. I really prefer it if, I don’t know, the central arc of the entire series isn’t negated and Anakin’s sacrifice rendered temporary at best and meaningless at worst. And I really don’t see Luke getting married at all (for various reasons, but most of all the one I talked about here -- and I certainly prefer Mark Hamill’s version of Luke’s future to the EU’s), so yay!
(3) “As the saga of the Skywalkers and Jedi Knights unfolded, I began to see it as a tale that could take at last nine films to tell -- three trilogies -- and I realized, in making my way through the back story and after story, that I was really setting out to write the middle story.”
That would be awesome.
Okay, it might be awful too -- I am a prequel hater, after all! -- but ehh, I think it could pretty cool if done right. We’ve had the Republic/Jedi falling apart and being replaced by the Empire, we have the overthrow of the Empire, so it’d be interesting to see the reconstruction. Or alternatively, something set after both have been established, maybe a couple generations later, and dealing with new problems (like, not Sith Lords) that don’t diminish the OT’s victory. Sort of like Korra!
(4) “I don’t read that stuff. I haven’t read any of the novels. I don’t know anything about that world. That’s a different world than my world.”
That’s a . . . very comforting way of putting it.
(5) “You know, I try not to think about that [the EU].”
Amen.
(6) “Boba Fett was just another one of the minions, another one of the bounty hunters and bad guys.”
… Yep. Honestly, I don’t really get his popularity. He’s just some bounty hunter who sounded kind of cool and got summarily killed. By Han in the thick of hibernation sickness, no less.
(7) “The thing about science-fiction fans and Star Wars fans is that they’re very independent-minded people. They all think outside the box, but they all have very strong ideas about what should happen, and they think it should be their way. Which is fine, except I’m making the movies, so I should have it my way.”
Quite right. As creator, it’s his right to make them however he wants. As audience, it’s my right to react to them however I want.
These statements are not contradictory. And as far as I’ve seen, Lucas completely respects the audience’s right to react to his creations.
(8) “I think Anakin got it [his scar] slipping in the bathtub, but of course, he’s not going to tell anybody that.”
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
<3 <3 <3
(9) “What is required for true credibility is a used future.”
I’ve always really liked this. The SW universe, whatever its failings, gives the impression of being a place where real people actually live; it’s not all perfect and shiny and sparkly.
(10) “Then we have the third group, the holy ghost, which is the bloggers and fans. They have created their own world. I worry about the father’s world. The son [the licensing group] and holy ghost can go their own way.”
Nice. Honestly, that’s pretty tolerant by any standards (let alone a massive franchise). Also: lulziest analogy ever, y/y?
(Honourable Mention) This isn’t a direct quote, but Wookieepedia says he cut Anakin’s fight with Greedo "because he wanted Anakin to be shown as a genuinely good kid who turns bad later."
Yes! I’ve never understood the people who wanted him to be, like, baby Vader. It’s not to say that he couldn’t have been slightly more nuanced, but that would have been way over the top. How is his fall a shocking tragedy is he’s a bad seed from the start? Admittedly, some kind of transition between Anakin-the-genuinely-good-kid and Anakin-in-the-process-of-turning-bad would be nice, but still. I like this.
---------------
Title: Revenge of the Jedi (3/17)
Fanverse: Revenge of the Jedi
Blurb: Luke becomes more adept with the Force and starts experimenting. Also, moar backstory!
---------------
The next day was very much the same, as was the one after that. On the fourth, however, the Force’s grip on him seemed a little less overwhelming. He didn’t feel engulfed in it, merely lost. However distantly, he could tell something lay beyond the apparent chaos, just something so incomprehensibly complex and convoluted that he couldn’t begin to understand it.
It wasn’t much of an improvement, he thought, slumping against against a tree -- he’d been so tired by the time he was done that it took him a full thirty seconds to pull himself back into reality. But at least it was something.
After a week, Yoda’s various gravity-defying demands had become as routine as training with his squadron had once been, and not appreciably more difficult. Back on the Death Star, he hadn’t known what Obi-Wan meant, but now he understood. Even when he couldn’t sense the Force, it was there. It would always be there.
In fact, he was almost reluctant to reach for it. That, too, had grown easier with time, but it was growing progressively harder to let go of it. Even as he lost fewer hours to meditation, it took him longer and longer to climb back to reality. He hadn’t even noticed at first; thirty seconds didn’t mean much. But last time it had been five minutes, and the time was only growing.
Had this ensnared his father? Vader, Luke felt certain, never released the Force at all. Had he reached for more, and more, until he demanded more than it would give him?
Yoda insisted not. He said it was a good sign that Luke struggled to return, that it meant he was growing more in tune with the Force.
“I don’t want to be too much in tune with it,” he said, and Yoda scoffed.
“Impossible!”
On the eleventh day, he stood on his thumbs and saw Leia. It wasn’t like before -- or rather, it was exactly like before, but neither horrible nor urgent. She was simply greeting an elegant, auburn-haired woman in a white robe, who returned the salutation with restrained affection. Then they vanished.
Artoo lurched in the air, beeping all the while, but Luke’s disorientation only lasted a moment, this time. He managed to keep everything suspended around his feet, and didn’t move until his mind grew tired.
He stopped counting days after that.
Yoda continued to set him superhuman tasks. He jumped to the top of a tree, or thirty feet into a valley. He ran through the swamp so quickly that he shouldn’t have been able to see anything but a blur, yet everything around him looked sharp and clear. He levitated himself into the air to meditate, much to the relief of his droid. None of it was easy, but he couldn’t call it a challenge, either. It just was.
All the while, he felt the Force pulsing around him. Sometimes, he felt it even when he wasn’t using it -- he’d be listening to Yoda, or talking to Artoo, or eating breakfast, and the now-familiar awareness would spring into his mind. He would sense everything around him, every strand binding them to each other and to him, and a quarter-second later it’d be gone and he’d have rootleaf stew in his mouth.
Yoda scolded him often and praised him occasionally, but he seemed largely approving of it all. Obi-Wan, when he showed up, appeared almost optimistic.
Visions -- if the snippets that passed before his eyes could be so termed -- came and went. He never saw anything very important, though nothing irrelevant either. A bounty hunter presented Han to an enormous Hutt: the infamous Jabba, Luke assumed. Leia argued with General Madine, slamming her hand on a table. Lando, his face half-concealed, bowed to a tall male Twi’lek.
They didn’t tell him anything he couldn’t have guessed already. It was reassurance, he supposed: Han was in Jabba’s palace, Leia was Leia, and Lando was in place. Everything was going according to plan. But it seemed rather a waste, to be clairvoyant and see only what he already knew. He should be able to do more.
He had never tried to see anything. He didn’t know how. But he knew it was possible. Yoda had foreseen more than a trivial flash of the future, when Luke went to Cloud City. Apparently, so had the Emperor.
Early one morning, Luke walked off with Artoo -- in the general direction of the cave, though he didn’t dare approach it. He glanced down at the soggy ground and sat in the air, folding his legs and letting his hands rest on them.
He could already feel the Force blazing in him -- flowing, Obi-Wan and Yoda said, but it had never been like that for Luke. For him, it was fire. Had it been like that for his father?
I could ask.
He recoiled at the thought and opened his senses further. The Force gathered around him, as vibrant as ever, but it no longer overwhelmed him. It was nothing so crisp and controlled as Yoda’s presence, or Obi-Wan’s or Vader’s, but neither was it the wild tangle that had surrounded him originally. There was a coherency to it now, a discipline that sufficed to keep it in order -- barely.
He still didn’t know how to do much, Luke realized. Physical feats, yes, that kept him connected to the Force. He’d largely controlled his senses and reflexes. Beyond that, there was only levitation.
He stifled the voice that told him Yoda would have taught him more, if he were ready. Yoda was always talking about control, how he must do nothing without it. These bursts of prescience might be inadvertent, but they were exactly the kind of thing he was talking about. He had to stop them, or teach himself to control them. It wouldn’t be easy, of course -- he understood that now. It was just necessary.
How had he felt when the other visions came? Calm, but a little bored, worrying about his friends and the future. Of course it would be more complicated than that, but he replicated the feeling as much as he could, tamping down the restlessness that never seemed to leave him, letting his mind drift to the future. Perhaps he’d get some idea, anyway, of what he should do --
Luke, all in black, stood on the bottom step of a raised platform, looking out at several thousand people. He didn’t recognize most of them, but he saw a number of Rebels, along with the auburn-haired woman from before, and at least one man he could have sworn was an Imperial.
Leia was also standing apart from the crowd, just a few feet in front of him. She seemed unlike herself in about every way: her gown was stiff, ornate, and deep red, her hair long and plain, her eyes wide. Behind them, he saw a throne made of some dark wood -- stark in its simplicity, but undeniably a throne.
The other, future, Luke began to speak in a language that Luke himself didn’t understand. Leia looked like she might be sick.
The real Luke very nearly was when he saw the entire crowd kneel before them. Then a bell tolled, Leia turned to face him, and she, too, fell to her knees.
Luke squeezed his eyes shut, as if that could erase the vision from existence. He knew before he opened them again that he would see only the Dagobah swamp.
He hadn’t so much as twitched in the air. Luke stared blankly ahead, not even tired, and unable to congratulate himself on either success.
After that, visions came more quickly and more readily, whether Luke sought them or not. They were always of some point in the future -- some point in motion, as he often reminded himself. He’d stopped Yoda’s visions from coming true. He could stop his own, too.
None of the others, at least, were quite so bleak. Not as far as he could tell. Neither were they so readily comprehensible; half the time, he didn’t even know what he’d seen. Sometimes he wondered if he’d just fallen into daydreams -- he knew he’d fallen asleep once or twice.
After all, he felt reasonably certain that Jabba the Hutt wouldn’t be killed by a bolt of lightning.
Luke continued his usual exercises with Yoda, or what passed for usual with Yoda, but his divided attention earned him more than a few bruises.
“I’m sorry,” Luke said, rubbing his shins.
“Ha! Sorry you are not, or pay attention you would!”
“No, I -- ” Luke only hesitated a moment. “A few days ago, I tried to see the future, and now I can’t stop. I’m seeing things all the time now. I really am trying to concentrate, Master, but it’s like my head is about to split open.”
Yoda, clearly preparing for a longer lecture, stopped, one of his ears twitching.
“A few days? And nothing you said?” He stared up at him, punctuating the words with taps of his cane against the ground, and Luke could tell that he was anything but displeased.
“I thought it might . . . pass,” Luke protested. “I just tried the once. But it’s getting worse.”
“Not worse,” said Yoda. “Better.”
Luke stared.
“Many things are possible, with the Force. Many. But -- ” he waved his cane -- “this may come more easily to one, that to another. All are different, all have different strengths.” Yoda gave him a piercing look, then his eyes seemed to drift to something over Luke’s shoulder. “An affinity, Obi-Wan had, for sensing the motives of others. His student Qui-Gon, for understanding the Force. Many of mine, for healing.”
“You mean . . . ” Luke struggled to wrap his mind around it. He knew he was strong in the Force. Everyone had said so -- even Yoda, once or twice. Even his father. But it had always been such a struggle to learn anything. He hadn’t thought -- “You’re saying I have some kind of -- of gift for this?”
Yoda’s eyes swivelled back to him. “A gift, yes, yes.” Then he sighed. “Not surprising is this.”
Luke didn’t need to ask what that meant.
“It’s like somebody flipped a switch in my brain,” he said instead.
“Ha! You did.” Yoda considered him for a moment. “Foresight, hm? A dangerous gift, it is. Most dangerous of all, perhaps. Difficult to control. But control it you must.”
“I know, Master,” said Luke tiredly. “I’ve tried, but -- ”
“Teach you this, I will.” Yoda chortled at his surprised look. “You think I have not learned it? After nine hundred years? Or that nothing new, I would teach you?”
“Well, no -- ”
Yoda made himself comfortable on a stump. Luke took this as the message it was and sat.
“Seeing the future, the past -- not uncommon for Jedi is it. For anyone who lets the Force flow through him.”
“Like the Emperor?”
Yoda nodded. “Yes. Sees much, he does -- but not as much as he thinks. Wary, you must be, of overestimating your knowledge. Never can you see all.”
Luke nodded. “Yes, Master.”
“Wary you must also be, of permitting your sight to dictate your actions. What you see may be -- or may not.”
“Always in motion, the future is?” Luke said, with a faint smile.
“Yes! Always. This is the danger: that you take the future you see as a certainty, and do nothing, or become consumed by it, and think of nothing but avoiding it. You must do neither of these things.”
Luke frowned, puzzled. What was the point, if -- “I don’t understand,” he admitted. “If we’re not supposed to accept our visions or reject them, why do we have them at all?”
“Said that, I did not.” Yoda’s eyes slid half-shut, his face softening. “Guides, they are. What we see is likely to happen, but may not. You must neither close to your mind to other possibilities, nor to those which you see. Let them help you, not overwhelm you. Understand?”
Luke chewed his lip. “I -- I think so,” he said. “It’s like other information, I guess? It’s ridiculous to ignore your own advantage, you just have to be careful.”
“Careful, yes. And especially you.” Yoda fixed a sharp eye on him. “Visions come to all with any strength in the Force. But you sought them. You continue to seek them.”
He opened his mouth to protest.
“No excuses do I require! Intentional it may not be. Not important. With the Force, once you start down a path, forever you stay on it.”
Luke gulped.
“You wished to see more than the will of the Force showed you, yes?”
“Well, I -- ” He dropped his eyes, ashamed. I brought this on myself. “Yes.”
Yoda gave a small shake of his head, but it seemed less exasperated than -- amused? Luke didn’t understand, but he’d long ago given that up, when it came to Yoda’s sense of humour.
“Understand this, I do.”
“What?”
Yoda chuckled. “Think that nine hundred years old, I have always been? No. Proper it is, for a Jedi to wish to further his abilities. Dangerous! And now you suffer the consequences. But proper. And now you must learn even more control.”
“I was trying to control it,” Luke said.
“Hm, told yourself that, you did? Heh.” Without a pause, he continued, “You opened yourself to the future. Now the future will make itself known to you, but you have not the focus or knowledge to find what you seek. You have learnt to open your mind, but you must learn to close it, too. And you must learn to open it further.”
With a decided effort, Luke managed not to drop his head into his hands. “Further? But anything more -- ”
“Have I not spoken of the past? Of other places, other people, in the present? Certain knowledge this is, not like foresight. But never do you think of it. Always the future it is with you!” This time, the shake of his head was anything but amused. He added pointedly, “Just like your father.”
Luke winced. But the old fascination still pulled at him, and in many ways, the new horror augmented, even justified it. He fought with himself for a moment, then glanced up at his teacher. “He told you what he saw?”
Yoda’s ears drooped. “What he saw? No. Only that he had. Came to me for advice, he did.”
“Advice,” Luke repeated blankly. He imagined Vader sitting across from Yoda, asking him what to do, and almost broke down laughing. “Did he, um, take it?”
“Impossible to say. Never saw him again.”
It took a moment to sink in. Then Luke’s mirth died instantly.
“Said he’d seen something terrible. For the galaxy and for him, for his family. He talked of chaos spreading without end.” For a moment, the regret that seemed to have taken up permanent residence on Obi-Wan’s face passed across Yoda’s. “The duty of the Jedi it was to stop such things, I told him.”
“And he believed it?” Luke asked, but he already knew the answer. Of course he had.
He still believes it.
“Perhaps.” Yoda struggled to his feet. “This is why you must learn. Learn to think of the present, the past. Learn to judge the future properly.”
Luke only nodded.
This, he thought, was his destiny. Not killing his enemies, as they all seemed to think. Anybody could do that. His father had, and it’d destroyed him. But not before he’d passed his gifts and hopes on to his son. Anakin Skywalker might have fallen beyond all redemption, but Luke would redeem his legacy.
Ten Things George Lucas Has Said That Don't Fill My Soul With Rage
Cheerfully taken out of context! But I can provide the original sources if you want them. :P
(1) “Han and Leia probably did get married. They settled down. She became a senator and they got a nice little house with a white picket fence.”
Personally, I don’t picture Leia going back to politics after ROTJ and I can’t really see her in a little house with a picket fence either. But of all the possible fates for them, this has to be one of the most satisfying. They get married, they settle down, they live happily ever after.
(2) “The Emperor doesn’t get cloned and Luke doesn’t get married.”
Yes please. I really prefer it if, I don’t know, the central arc of the entire series isn’t negated and Anakin’s sacrifice rendered temporary at best and meaningless at worst. And I really don’t see Luke getting married at all (for various reasons, but most of all the one I talked about here -- and I certainly prefer Mark Hamill’s version of Luke’s future to the EU’s), so yay!
(3) “As the saga of the Skywalkers and Jedi Knights unfolded, I began to see it as a tale that could take at last nine films to tell -- three trilogies -- and I realized, in making my way through the back story and after story, that I was really setting out to write the middle story.”
That would be awesome.
Okay, it might be awful too -- I am a prequel hater, after all! -- but ehh, I think it could pretty cool if done right. We’ve had the Republic/Jedi falling apart and being replaced by the Empire, we have the overthrow of the Empire, so it’d be interesting to see the reconstruction. Or alternatively, something set after both have been established, maybe a couple generations later, and dealing with new problems (like, not Sith Lords) that don’t diminish the OT’s victory. Sort of like Korra!
(4) “I don’t read that stuff. I haven’t read any of the novels. I don’t know anything about that world. That’s a different world than my world.”
That’s a . . . very comforting way of putting it.
(5) “You know, I try not to think about that [the EU].”
Amen.
(6) “Boba Fett was just another one of the minions, another one of the bounty hunters and bad guys.”
… Yep. Honestly, I don’t really get his popularity. He’s just some bounty hunter who sounded kind of cool and got summarily killed. By Han in the thick of hibernation sickness, no less.
(7) “The thing about science-fiction fans and Star Wars fans is that they’re very independent-minded people. They all think outside the box, but they all have very strong ideas about what should happen, and they think it should be their way. Which is fine, except I’m making the movies, so I should have it my way.”
Quite right. As creator, it’s his right to make them however he wants. As audience, it’s my right to react to them however I want.
These statements are not contradictory. And as far as I’ve seen, Lucas completely respects the audience’s right to react to his creations.
(8) “I think Anakin got it [his scar] slipping in the bathtub, but of course, he’s not going to tell anybody that.”
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
<3 <3 <3
(9) “What is required for true credibility is a used future.”
I’ve always really liked this. The SW universe, whatever its failings, gives the impression of being a place where real people actually live; it’s not all perfect and shiny and sparkly.
(10) “Then we have the third group, the holy ghost, which is the bloggers and fans. They have created their own world. I worry about the father’s world. The son [the licensing group] and holy ghost can go their own way.”
Nice. Honestly, that’s pretty tolerant by any standards (let alone a massive franchise). Also: lulziest analogy ever, y/y?
(Honourable Mention) This isn’t a direct quote, but Wookieepedia says he cut Anakin’s fight with Greedo "because he wanted Anakin to be shown as a genuinely good kid who turns bad later."
Yes! I’ve never understood the people who wanted him to be, like, baby Vader. It’s not to say that he couldn’t have been slightly more nuanced, but that would have been way over the top. How is his fall a shocking tragedy is he’s a bad seed from the start? Admittedly, some kind of transition between Anakin-the-genuinely-good-kid and Anakin-in-the-process-of-turning-bad would be nice, but still. I like this.
---------------
Title: Revenge of the Jedi (3/17)
Fanverse: Revenge of the Jedi
Blurb: Luke becomes more adept with the Force and starts experimenting. Also, moar backstory!
---------------
The next day was very much the same, as was the one after that. On the fourth, however, the Force’s grip on him seemed a little less overwhelming. He didn’t feel engulfed in it, merely lost. However distantly, he could tell something lay beyond the apparent chaos, just something so incomprehensibly complex and convoluted that he couldn’t begin to understand it.
It wasn’t much of an improvement, he thought, slumping against against a tree -- he’d been so tired by the time he was done that it took him a full thirty seconds to pull himself back into reality. But at least it was something.
After a week, Yoda’s various gravity-defying demands had become as routine as training with his squadron had once been, and not appreciably more difficult. Back on the Death Star, he hadn’t known what Obi-Wan meant, but now he understood. Even when he couldn’t sense the Force, it was there. It would always be there.
In fact, he was almost reluctant to reach for it. That, too, had grown easier with time, but it was growing progressively harder to let go of it. Even as he lost fewer hours to meditation, it took him longer and longer to climb back to reality. He hadn’t even noticed at first; thirty seconds didn’t mean much. But last time it had been five minutes, and the time was only growing.
Had this ensnared his father? Vader, Luke felt certain, never released the Force at all. Had he reached for more, and more, until he demanded more than it would give him?
Yoda insisted not. He said it was a good sign that Luke struggled to return, that it meant he was growing more in tune with the Force.
“I don’t want to be too much in tune with it,” he said, and Yoda scoffed.
“Impossible!”
On the eleventh day, he stood on his thumbs and saw Leia. It wasn’t like before -- or rather, it was exactly like before, but neither horrible nor urgent. She was simply greeting an elegant, auburn-haired woman in a white robe, who returned the salutation with restrained affection. Then they vanished.
Artoo lurched in the air, beeping all the while, but Luke’s disorientation only lasted a moment, this time. He managed to keep everything suspended around his feet, and didn’t move until his mind grew tired.
He stopped counting days after that.
Yoda continued to set him superhuman tasks. He jumped to the top of a tree, or thirty feet into a valley. He ran through the swamp so quickly that he shouldn’t have been able to see anything but a blur, yet everything around him looked sharp and clear. He levitated himself into the air to meditate, much to the relief of his droid. None of it was easy, but he couldn’t call it a challenge, either. It just was.
All the while, he felt the Force pulsing around him. Sometimes, he felt it even when he wasn’t using it -- he’d be listening to Yoda, or talking to Artoo, or eating breakfast, and the now-familiar awareness would spring into his mind. He would sense everything around him, every strand binding them to each other and to him, and a quarter-second later it’d be gone and he’d have rootleaf stew in his mouth.
Yoda scolded him often and praised him occasionally, but he seemed largely approving of it all. Obi-Wan, when he showed up, appeared almost optimistic.
Visions -- if the snippets that passed before his eyes could be so termed -- came and went. He never saw anything very important, though nothing irrelevant either. A bounty hunter presented Han to an enormous Hutt: the infamous Jabba, Luke assumed. Leia argued with General Madine, slamming her hand on a table. Lando, his face half-concealed, bowed to a tall male Twi’lek.
They didn’t tell him anything he couldn’t have guessed already. It was reassurance, he supposed: Han was in Jabba’s palace, Leia was Leia, and Lando was in place. Everything was going according to plan. But it seemed rather a waste, to be clairvoyant and see only what he already knew. He should be able to do more.
He had never tried to see anything. He didn’t know how. But he knew it was possible. Yoda had foreseen more than a trivial flash of the future, when Luke went to Cloud City. Apparently, so had the Emperor.
Early one morning, Luke walked off with Artoo -- in the general direction of the cave, though he didn’t dare approach it. He glanced down at the soggy ground and sat in the air, folding his legs and letting his hands rest on them.
He could already feel the Force blazing in him -- flowing, Obi-Wan and Yoda said, but it had never been like that for Luke. For him, it was fire. Had it been like that for his father?
I could ask.
He recoiled at the thought and opened his senses further. The Force gathered around him, as vibrant as ever, but it no longer overwhelmed him. It was nothing so crisp and controlled as Yoda’s presence, or Obi-Wan’s or Vader’s, but neither was it the wild tangle that had surrounded him originally. There was a coherency to it now, a discipline that sufficed to keep it in order -- barely.
He still didn’t know how to do much, Luke realized. Physical feats, yes, that kept him connected to the Force. He’d largely controlled his senses and reflexes. Beyond that, there was only levitation.
He stifled the voice that told him Yoda would have taught him more, if he were ready. Yoda was always talking about control, how he must do nothing without it. These bursts of prescience might be inadvertent, but they were exactly the kind of thing he was talking about. He had to stop them, or teach himself to control them. It wouldn’t be easy, of course -- he understood that now. It was just necessary.
How had he felt when the other visions came? Calm, but a little bored, worrying about his friends and the future. Of course it would be more complicated than that, but he replicated the feeling as much as he could, tamping down the restlessness that never seemed to leave him, letting his mind drift to the future. Perhaps he’d get some idea, anyway, of what he should do --
Luke, all in black, stood on the bottom step of a raised platform, looking out at several thousand people. He didn’t recognize most of them, but he saw a number of Rebels, along with the auburn-haired woman from before, and at least one man he could have sworn was an Imperial.
Leia was also standing apart from the crowd, just a few feet in front of him. She seemed unlike herself in about every way: her gown was stiff, ornate, and deep red, her hair long and plain, her eyes wide. Behind them, he saw a throne made of some dark wood -- stark in its simplicity, but undeniably a throne.
The other, future, Luke began to speak in a language that Luke himself didn’t understand. Leia looked like she might be sick.
The real Luke very nearly was when he saw the entire crowd kneel before them. Then a bell tolled, Leia turned to face him, and she, too, fell to her knees.
Luke squeezed his eyes shut, as if that could erase the vision from existence. He knew before he opened them again that he would see only the Dagobah swamp.
He hadn’t so much as twitched in the air. Luke stared blankly ahead, not even tired, and unable to congratulate himself on either success.
After that, visions came more quickly and more readily, whether Luke sought them or not. They were always of some point in the future -- some point in motion, as he often reminded himself. He’d stopped Yoda’s visions from coming true. He could stop his own, too.
None of the others, at least, were quite so bleak. Not as far as he could tell. Neither were they so readily comprehensible; half the time, he didn’t even know what he’d seen. Sometimes he wondered if he’d just fallen into daydreams -- he knew he’d fallen asleep once or twice.
After all, he felt reasonably certain that Jabba the Hutt wouldn’t be killed by a bolt of lightning.
Luke continued his usual exercises with Yoda, or what passed for usual with Yoda, but his divided attention earned him more than a few bruises.
“I’m sorry,” Luke said, rubbing his shins.
“Ha! Sorry you are not, or pay attention you would!”
“No, I -- ” Luke only hesitated a moment. “A few days ago, I tried to see the future, and now I can’t stop. I’m seeing things all the time now. I really am trying to concentrate, Master, but it’s like my head is about to split open.”
Yoda, clearly preparing for a longer lecture, stopped, one of his ears twitching.
“A few days? And nothing you said?” He stared up at him, punctuating the words with taps of his cane against the ground, and Luke could tell that he was anything but displeased.
“I thought it might . . . pass,” Luke protested. “I just tried the once. But it’s getting worse.”
“Not worse,” said Yoda. “Better.”
Luke stared.
“Many things are possible, with the Force. Many. But -- ” he waved his cane -- “this may come more easily to one, that to another. All are different, all have different strengths.” Yoda gave him a piercing look, then his eyes seemed to drift to something over Luke’s shoulder. “An affinity, Obi-Wan had, for sensing the motives of others. His student Qui-Gon, for understanding the Force. Many of mine, for healing.”
“You mean . . . ” Luke struggled to wrap his mind around it. He knew he was strong in the Force. Everyone had said so -- even Yoda, once or twice. Even his father. But it had always been such a struggle to learn anything. He hadn’t thought -- “You’re saying I have some kind of -- of gift for this?”
Yoda’s eyes swivelled back to him. “A gift, yes, yes.” Then he sighed. “Not surprising is this.”
Luke didn’t need to ask what that meant.
“It’s like somebody flipped a switch in my brain,” he said instead.
“Ha! You did.” Yoda considered him for a moment. “Foresight, hm? A dangerous gift, it is. Most dangerous of all, perhaps. Difficult to control. But control it you must.”
“I know, Master,” said Luke tiredly. “I’ve tried, but -- ”
“Teach you this, I will.” Yoda chortled at his surprised look. “You think I have not learned it? After nine hundred years? Or that nothing new, I would teach you?”
“Well, no -- ”
Yoda made himself comfortable on a stump. Luke took this as the message it was and sat.
“Seeing the future, the past -- not uncommon for Jedi is it. For anyone who lets the Force flow through him.”
“Like the Emperor?”
Yoda nodded. “Yes. Sees much, he does -- but not as much as he thinks. Wary, you must be, of overestimating your knowledge. Never can you see all.”
Luke nodded. “Yes, Master.”
“Wary you must also be, of permitting your sight to dictate your actions. What you see may be -- or may not.”
“Always in motion, the future is?” Luke said, with a faint smile.
“Yes! Always. This is the danger: that you take the future you see as a certainty, and do nothing, or become consumed by it, and think of nothing but avoiding it. You must do neither of these things.”
Luke frowned, puzzled. What was the point, if -- “I don’t understand,” he admitted. “If we’re not supposed to accept our visions or reject them, why do we have them at all?”
“Said that, I did not.” Yoda’s eyes slid half-shut, his face softening. “Guides, they are. What we see is likely to happen, but may not. You must neither close to your mind to other possibilities, nor to those which you see. Let them help you, not overwhelm you. Understand?”
Luke chewed his lip. “I -- I think so,” he said. “It’s like other information, I guess? It’s ridiculous to ignore your own advantage, you just have to be careful.”
“Careful, yes. And especially you.” Yoda fixed a sharp eye on him. “Visions come to all with any strength in the Force. But you sought them. You continue to seek them.”
He opened his mouth to protest.
“No excuses do I require! Intentional it may not be. Not important. With the Force, once you start down a path, forever you stay on it.”
Luke gulped.
“You wished to see more than the will of the Force showed you, yes?”
“Well, I -- ” He dropped his eyes, ashamed. I brought this on myself. “Yes.”
Yoda gave a small shake of his head, but it seemed less exasperated than -- amused? Luke didn’t understand, but he’d long ago given that up, when it came to Yoda’s sense of humour.
“Understand this, I do.”
“What?”
Yoda chuckled. “Think that nine hundred years old, I have always been? No. Proper it is, for a Jedi to wish to further his abilities. Dangerous! And now you suffer the consequences. But proper. And now you must learn even more control.”
“I was trying to control it,” Luke said.
“Hm, told yourself that, you did? Heh.” Without a pause, he continued, “You opened yourself to the future. Now the future will make itself known to you, but you have not the focus or knowledge to find what you seek. You have learnt to open your mind, but you must learn to close it, too. And you must learn to open it further.”
With a decided effort, Luke managed not to drop his head into his hands. “Further? But anything more -- ”
“Have I not spoken of the past? Of other places, other people, in the present? Certain knowledge this is, not like foresight. But never do you think of it. Always the future it is with you!” This time, the shake of his head was anything but amused. He added pointedly, “Just like your father.”
Luke winced. But the old fascination still pulled at him, and in many ways, the new horror augmented, even justified it. He fought with himself for a moment, then glanced up at his teacher. “He told you what he saw?”
Yoda’s ears drooped. “What he saw? No. Only that he had. Came to me for advice, he did.”
“Advice,” Luke repeated blankly. He imagined Vader sitting across from Yoda, asking him what to do, and almost broke down laughing. “Did he, um, take it?”
“Impossible to say. Never saw him again.”
It took a moment to sink in. Then Luke’s mirth died instantly.
“Said he’d seen something terrible. For the galaxy and for him, for his family. He talked of chaos spreading without end.” For a moment, the regret that seemed to have taken up permanent residence on Obi-Wan’s face passed across Yoda’s. “The duty of the Jedi it was to stop such things, I told him.”
“And he believed it?” Luke asked, but he already knew the answer. Of course he had.
He still believes it.
“Perhaps.” Yoda struggled to his feet. “This is why you must learn. Learn to think of the present, the past. Learn to judge the future properly.”
Luke only nodded.
This, he thought, was his destiny. Not killing his enemies, as they all seemed to think. Anybody could do that. His father had, and it’d destroyed him. But not before he’d passed his gifts and hopes on to his son. Anakin Skywalker might have fallen beyond all redemption, but Luke would redeem his legacy.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-09-26 08:14 pm (UTC)Leia/New Jedi Order OTPOh! I think it would have been awesome if Anakin had been clearly using the Force and Just That Powerful -- which would match up nicely with Obi-Wan being all o_O about it in ROTJ.
I really wish there were more about the Padmé-Palpatine relationship, because there unquestionably is one that falls apart at some point, but we don't see it or anything. I had a blast writing a Padmé-Palpatine side-story for Revenge, ha.
Anakin... I really think would have basically said "Yes dear" to anything Padme came up with politically and then shoved it down the rest of the galaxy's throat with his lightsaber.
THIS. In fact, I think that's exactly what he wanted and settled for Palpatine as second-best. And if Luke had accepted his offer on Bespin, that's what would have happened there, too. Even as Vader, his patience with politics seems to reside somewhere in the vicinity of negative infinity. (A scenario I think would be especially interesting is if he made the offer to both of them -- suppose Luke and Leia were both sent to Tatooine [I'm still not sure why they're separated, honestly, though I fanwank reasons for fic] -- and they accepted and ... yeah.)
And yeah, I think Leia as Empress would be marginally less disturbing (assuming she's not Dark Siding) just because there would be people around to go 'wtf?!'
I can actually see Anakin attempting the high moral ground here, as a former slave of the Hutts
Oh, that's interesting! And honestly, I think he ... might have a point? Anakin, as far as we can tell, completely believes the Empire is Right and Just and Bringing Order. Even though he does things that are so much worse morally and Han has every right to loathe him for the rest of his life, Han knew exactly what Jabba was and what was going on. And I don't get the impression that the Empire had much tolerance for slavery as a system, so when it comes to that issue specifically, Anakin would have some moral ground as a former slave who opposed slavery for his entire life. Just not, ah, in general.
And oh my word, but I LOVE the idea of Han being a mediator in Three-Way Skywalker Family Regularly Scheduled Rages. (I also love that term for it, btw.)
Ahahahaha, thank you! Even in a less dysfunctional setting, I suspect they just need to scream at one another every once in awhile. And Han's much more low-key than they are, so once he got past OMFG VADER, I think he'd go between "pass the popcorn!" and ego/righteousness-puncturing.
Ha, I definitely think Padmé's real reaction can be summed up as "oh, dear."
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-09-27 11:53 pm (UTC)Oooh, I'm glad you like Force-prodigy!Anakin! Really, the Podrace scene is just So Much Awesome for me, because Anakin's a kid but he's not twee or cutesy there, he's serious and hardcore and competent and awesome while still being completely a kid. And then we get to the big battle, and he already knows that what he's doing is Jedi-stuff, but he... regresses, almost, and I'm like "Give me back my child prodigy best starpilot in the galaxy cunning warrior NAO" because
for me, best-starpilot-cunning-warrior!Anakin only becomes cooler when you throw in "child prodigy". Except, you know, we didn't actually see that onscreen. *shakes fist*
Yes, the Padme-Palpatine dynamic just gets so... erased. And it would have been so interesting if he'd been grooming both halves of the couple, Anakin as his Sith apprentice and Padme as his political one, and then only Anakin stayed true. Or, you know, just about anything where Padme actually got independent character development, lol.
YES! Totally with you that being Palpatine's enforcer ran a poor second in Anakin's mind to being Padme's enforcer. Palpatine is just... all he's got left, and the poor boy clings. (I think that's a piece of what happened between ESB and RotJ when he goes from "rule the galaxy with me, my son" to "I must obey my master"--- Luke rejected him, he basically went crawling back to Palpatine, and, IDK, I think Palpatine probably messed with his head using that?)
OMG, Luke and Leia getting The Offer from Vader! I love this so much! Yes! Extremely interesting! And not one I'd ever really considered, but now... well, see above on my whole "Anakin was Palpatine's Sith apprentice, Padme was his political one", and this is the second generation. (Yeah, I really can't, at least not yet, get my head around Leia ever fully embracing an identity of "Force-user". Especially because in this scenario, she'd be rationalizing her decision as "Must restrain my father's sentients'-rights violations" and also with Vader having, as you say perfectly, negative infinity patience with politics, there'd be a power vacuum there for her to step neatly into. So it's the perfect meld of "ideologically a Rebel, temperamentally an Empress"--- I love that description, btw!--- because she's got the moral justification of fixing the broken parts of the Empire, but there's also all this lovely power lying around to be picked up and her father is more than happy for her to do it, because Force knows he doesn't want it. And I could see Luke and Vader just really bonding over the Force-training in that scenario, and Leia is kind of left out but she's also the Empress. And doesn't have quite the same daddy-issues Luke does, because she had parents, as opposed to an aunt and uncle. And was apparently close enough to Bail at least that he entrusted her with missions and so forth, and I think being Empress with a goal of making the Empire a better place would make her feel like she was... balancing... her two fathers?)
All of which are pieces of "Empress Leia is at least a little bit better than Empress Padme".
Ooh, really good point about Anakin's relative high moral ground--- and especially the part about the Empire's tolerance for slavery. (It is totally my headcanon that somewhere in his early years as Vader, he asked Palpatine for permission to go eradicate the slave trade. And Palpatine let him, because he knows his Anakin, and his Anakin's propensity for epic violence, and having Anakin go massacre slavers where the Holonet can see it would get it into the heads of most "right-thinking" beings, or at least those who want to be seen as right-thinking, that the Empire is more effective at eliminating sentients'-rights violations than the Republic was, and that Darth Vader's more brutal tendencies are only being enacted against Really Bad People, so when Palpatine starts pointing him at other people, the general consensus will be, "Oh, they're Bad, Darth Vader only hunts, and hurts, Bad People." I.e., they'll assume he's justified.) And, so much yes on "Just not, ah, in general" about Anakin's claims to high moral ground. (This is so much why I see him and Han as getting each other, because Han is a kinder person but not necessarily a more moral one--- as witness his willingness to work for Jabba--- and they sort of get each other's grey areas, in ways that Luke and Leia really can't. And they can also call each other on their morally problematic places, because those are similar but not identical.)
Yes, this! They are all high-intensity people who thrive on stimulation, and they'd just express themselves at full-throttle top volume, without it necessarily being a Bad Thing, as opposed to an intense one. And Han is definitely more chill, and could just cut through the stimulus-needs to the underlying issues, when left to themselves, the Family Skywalker would probably just keep screeching because it feels good. And I think Han would definitely ego-puncture, but he'd also be the one to get the places where the screaming is at once a way to show you care and something that's covering it up and just be able to find the places where they all need to meet in the middle. And LOL at "pass the popcorn" because THIS.
Ahaha, yes, Padme's reaction = "oh, dear." :)
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-03 03:40 am (UTC)My personal headcanon is that, traditionally, there are two basic types of Jedi: paladins and monks. That's why Obi-Wan's description of them as warriors fighting for justice is so different from Yoda's -- they're following different traditions.
I can't see Leia as the guru-type Jedi ever, but I can see her as extremely gung-ho about superpowers FOR GREAT JUSTICE. I think she'd cheerfully crusade across the galaxy -- though I think it's probably for the best that she has an organization to answer to.
(That's where Luke starts out too, but I think he would shift over to the guru/master tradition through his twenties, while Leia becomes the ultimate Jedi Knight. So even the baby NJO is more balanced than the old school leadership was.)
And Luke's total comfort with Leia learning the skills in whatever philosophical orientation she chooses is also a big YES.
Oh, thanks! That came very late in the writing process, but I really like the idea. The whole concept of concealing someone's own innate abilities from them because they don't follow your idea of what they should do with them is really iffy to me. Which might have bled through a little. :P
Palpatine grooming them both would have been awesome -- and potentially given Padmé a role independent from Anakin's-love-interest, which is really what she became after the opening of AOTC. I don't like TPM, but I did like that she had her own concerns and motivations and goals and life and wasn't just prodded into Incubator For Luke and Leia.
Well, I was thinking that w/ the dual offer, Luke and Leia had been brought up together in the first place, so Leia would be as up-to-her-ears in the Force stuff as Luke.
If it happened differently (say they were separated in childhood rather than infancy, and knew who each other were), I can see it happening your way. Though I think Leia would still want to master her abilities -- having an advantage and just opting not to use it isn't very Leia to me -- but I agree that she'd focus much more on politics, which her father and brother really don't have the patience for. And yeah, she definitely wouldn't have the father-issues that Luke does (though possibly brother-issues!).
I definitely agree about Palpatine being all about siccing Anakin on slavers and generally despised types for the PR, while Anakin is just BURN KILL DESTROY. And I think that's the last time he went to Tatooine -- he went to forcibly obliterate slavery (at least the open, legal, organic, explosive-transmitter kind; there's no sign of that by Luke's day).
I can definitely see Han and Vader getting the grey areas in ways that Luke and Leia can't -- especially what might be termed unnecessary greyness. Luke would understand doing something ambiguous or even wrong for a loved one or a cause, but not for something so prosaic as a living. Leia probably wouldn't get it at all (she could do ambiguous things, but I think she'd have to convince herself they weren't).
the Family Skywalker would probably just keep screeching because it feels good
Ahahaha, I love this description. Yes. And ten years later, Han's sort of bemused at how he went from smuggling for Jabba to family facilitator for Princess Leia, Darth Vader, and Luke Skywalker.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-05 01:11 am (UTC)I like your idea about the monk/paladin separation in the Jedi Order! And I also like Luke being more chill as he ages, moving more toward that guru role. My own headcanon is much more nebulous/flexible on the subject, and is much more likely to spawn all kind of weird subtypes of Jedi if I think about them too long, kind of like Catholic religious orders, lol.
Totally with you as regards the ability-development thing! It is squicky to hide someone's powers from them because you might not agree with them.
And, yeah, the fact that Padme gets erased except as wife/mother in the latter two parts of the PT is one of the things I hate about them, even though *shiftyeyes* I am actually a huge PT fangirl. (Yeah, I know. *blush* But blast it, the PT is what made me an Anakin/Vader fan, and RotS is what made Star Wars fun for me again as a grownup.)
Oooh, Luke and Leia raised together! And, yeah, you're right, that would be a whole different landscape. (For some reason, the Leia in my headcanon seems to find the Force as something "other" and not-her, possibly because the Leia in my headcanon is nearly always raised by Bail and Breha, who would have had lots and lots of reasons to encourage that perspective on their adopted daughter's part!)
Hee, I'm so glad my headcanon about Vader doing the BURN KILL DESTROY FOR GREAT JUSTICE thing at Palpatine's behest. Because... just yeah. It would be very unlike Palpatine not to use that. And very unlike Anakin not to be all over it. And, yep, last visit to Tatooine for him.
Yep, you're right about the relative moralities of the Solo-Skywalker clan. :)
Heee! Glad you like my screech-for-fun Skywalkers. Because, well, yeah. And totally with you on Han's reaction to his changing role. (I can see him thinking of it as, "And I used to think running spice for Jabba was dangerous! Now I get in the middle of famiy feuds between people who use lightsabers and Force lightning!")
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-06 05:10 am (UTC)Of course, that changes in ROTJ, where she (1) very definitely does risk herself, and (2) doesn't seem to be a leader. OTOH, she's not really a good little subordinate either and mostly just does her own thing (though I imagine that she's too much of a leader to not be running something). So I imagine that she'd be highly versatile as a Jedi, able to act as a lone agent when necessary, or as a temporal leader of the Order, or as a diplomat, adapting to different situations. Basically the exact opposite of what the old school Jedi were. Which is probably for the best -- both for the Jedi and for Leia herself.
Oh, I think there'd be waaaaaay more types of Jedi within those basic categories. I can see philosopher types who clash with researchers who have zero patience for the mystics who the teachers politely avoid, while idealistic paladins are all *gasp* *shock* at practical warriors who are just "lol, whatever gets the job done." And of course it'd all just sort of evolve over time and they'd have to deal with the whole as they went along.
(Honestly, I find the idea of a flexible, ever-changing Jedi Order and how it would work completely fascinating. I had a lot of fun playing with it just with a story about two of Leia's children -- both are guarding-truth-and-justice types rather than knowledge-and-defense tpyes, but the elder is a relentless lone operative and the younger is a peacemaking diplomat.)
I figured you liked the PT! Heh, all my SW friends seem to. Personally, I was a Vader/Anakin fan from ESB and didn't even see the whole OT until the first two prequels had come out, though, so I don't have that attachment. But enjoyment is kind of subjective, anyway -- we seem to agree on the specific things so far, they just don't ruin it for you. Which is kind of nice!
And as someone who likes Splinter, I can't throw any stones. :PWell, I think Leia's separation from the Force is mostly a penalty of the retcon -- she just wasn't conceived (er, artistically) as a Force-sensitive so that was never introduced. And ROTJ is a bit slipshod and so it wasn't done very well there, either. In-story, I can see it as an environmental thing, definitely. She's just not ... inherently alienated for me. (In fact, I think even canon!Leia would be furious once she realized how much she'd been sidelined from the whole Force thing.)
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-07 12:09 am (UTC)Oooh, I like your description of the myriad types of Jedi! And, yeah, ever-changing Order = AWESOME. (I feel like it's implied by the PT that Yoda is a Major Part of the Problem there, because if he's been Grandmaster of the Order for some significant part of said Order's history... well, yeah. That's his baby.) And oh, I liked that story of yours, especially your ghost!Anakin being about to lay the smackdown on his granddaughter who stepped out of line. (I love all stories where ghost!Anakin is an important part of his descendents' lives, because, well, Anakin. That man will be showing up to tell stories to his descendants for probably longer than the Old Republic was around. He missed out on his kids' childhood, he's gonna make up for it for the next zillion generations or so. LOL.)
Whew! And, yeah, I am totally a love-it-with-all-its-flaws kinda fangirl about the PT, and will in fact admit cheerfully that the OT are better movies, it's just that I like the PT more for the most part. :)
(Splinter?)You're right about the retcon effects with Leia; that's something I often forget about, because I take the whole twin reveal so much for granted in my headcanon that I forget it wasn't originally planned!
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-07 09:00 pm (UTC)Oh, thanks about the story! I didn't know if you'd read it, so yeah. I too love those kinds of stories (you can probably guess that I think the ghost thing is waaaay under-used from Revenge, ha) -- and really, there is no way someone like Anakin is going to be distant and uninvolved when even Obi-Wan hung around and meddled. And I sort of imagine that he feels the need for ... penance, of a sort, that dying didn't wipe the slate clean. So he's constantly trying to make up for what he did as Vader (ghost!Leia: Father, it's fine now, we're over it. THAT HAPPENED TWO HUNDRED YEARS AGO.)
will in fact admit cheerfully that the OT are better movies, it's just that I like the PT more for the most part. :)
Then clearly we can get along. :) Even I like bits of the PT that I think are objectively bad, just for the shiny!!! element. (And the shiny makes it fun to dislike them, too; there's stuff you hate, and then there's stuff that's actively fun to hate. IDK.)
Splinter = Splinter of the Mind's Eye, first EU book ever. It's got ridiculous purple prose, lolarious Luke/Leia subtext (and possibly Vader/Leia if you squint), is generally awful, with the occasional good line and some interesting character stuff.
Revenge forced me to think about the retcons a lot obviously, but yeah, it's a bit odd to try and balance the meta-understanding of what happened with the in-story reasoning.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-09 09:37 pm (UTC)Yes, I had, and had meant to go and review it!!! Will do that shortly!
The penance angle... I can see that, and I LOVE your idea of ghost!Leia's response! I can also see Anakin being, "Yes, I know, and at this point I'm just sticking around because, kriff it, I missed out on the whole 'family' thing with you and your brother, I am making up for lost time." That even after he works through the guilt, he sticks around because, well, Anakin, he's all about his attachments. And he got cheated of them by the OJO, so it's like cosmic justice to him that his Jedi powers let him make up for that in the afterlife, lol.
Also, the dying-didn't-clean-the-slate angle is one of the reasons I really love AUs where Vader didn't die, and he and his kids and the NR and the Empire all have to cope with one another--- Vader doing his penance/working through the debts he owes to various people and institutions while he's still alive just makes me squee.
Hee, yeah, if I'm ranking the movies based on quality its ANH, ESB, ROTJ, ROTS, TPM, AOTC (ANH wins because it stands alone, whereas ESB is very much a second film in a trilogy). Now, as to which I like best, it's ROTS, tie between TPM/ANH, tie between ROTJ/AOTC, ESB. (Whether I like ROTJ or AOTC best depends on if I'm in a mood where I can tolerate Anakin's tragic death, versus if I'm in a mood where I can tolerate bad dialogue for the sheer squee of watching Anakin and Padme roll around in a meadow together and generally have a few happyfuntiems before their world ends.) And, oh, yes, on the fun-to-hate parts! :)
Oh! Right. OMG, Vader/Leia subtext. That's it, Skywalkers are officially overprone to genetic sexual attraction when separated from each other too early. LOL.
And, oh yeah, the Doyleist/Watsonian balances are headachy.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-10 10:15 pm (UTC)Anakin would definitely stick around anyway! I suspect Luke and Leia would too and they'd be an awesome ghost triad of emotional attachment and badassery. (I could never quite believe Legacy, because it seemed incredible that Anakin wouldn't have shown up to slap some sense into his descendants by that point. I mean, if Luke's showing up to badger them, you just know Anakin would be too, and Leia's not what you'd call uninvolved either.)
I completely agree about the ... unfinishedness, I guess. The last time I watched ROTJ, I promptly ran off and wrote an AU where Vader turned back early on (it was a pre-Revenge vehicle for my other Issues With ROTJ, so there's more AUness, but that too) and thus lived to deal with the fallout. But these days I'm more interested in your scenario, since there's so much more baggage and that makes it all the more squee-worthy. :D
(I think that's partly why I like the Vader-accepting-Luke's-offer scenario -- it basically allows for the same basic thing. I've only seen it done once, too, and that version was okay but not really how I see it.)
Quality-wise, hmm, ESB has the edge for me despite its sequel-ness just because it's everything I liked about ANH only more. I'd go ESB-ANH-ROTJ-ROTS-TPM-AOTC -- so wow, we are mostly on the same page! But subjective-enjoyment-wise, I'd go ESB-ROTJ-ANH-ROTS-AOTC-TPM -- AOTC beats out TPM for the same reason that you said, ha (TPM is more consistent but kind of blah for me), ROTS because it's just so much better, and the Luke-Vader plot in ROTJ makes up for everything. ;_;
When it comes to the "lol hatred," I keep hearing people ask, "why do you keep paying attention to it if you dislike it so much?" I mean, not to me in particular, but I'm like "duh, because it's fun." I don't know, maybe not everyone enjoys disliking things quite as much as I do, but honestly given the Internet, I doubt it.
The Vader/Leia is a lot more subjective, but still. Ick. I think he says that he'd like to show her all the things he can do with his lightsaber, if she'll promise not to pass out. ...Yeah, this was before ESB.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-11 12:07 am (UTC)Oh, a ghostly triad of Skywalker awesomeness!!! I love this! And honestly, I basically stopped reading the post-ROTJ EU after the Zahn/Thrawn trilogy, and what you're saying confirms this decision for me. *wrygrin* IMO, the only excuse for any post-ROTJ EU written after ROTS that doesn't include a fondly-meddling ghost!Anakin is basically either continuity with pre-ROTS-written EU, or executive dictates of Lucasfilm. I.e., there is nothing in-universe that really makes that work. And, totally agree on his kids being just as strongly attached and present.
Oooooh, I'm glad you like the whole "Vader lives, he and everyone else have to cope" scenario! I've stumbled over a couple and... I inherently like them because I like the concept, but I've never been completely satisfied, either. I think it's hard to do right because "what you do after you're redeemed" is... an archetype all its own, maybe, and also that reconciling PT!Anakin and OT!Vader is also its own special challenge, and pulling off who he'd even be at that point is... a conceptual plate of spaghetti, lol. But it's still fascinating, all the more so because it's hard. But so much this on "there's more baggage and that makes it all the more squeeworthy" because emotional depth and complexity are fun to play with in stories!
Vader accepting Luke's offer is also fascinating--- even just to get into Vader's headspace where he'd do that is... wow!
I see what you're saying about ESB--- and for me it's exactly the opposite, because a lot of what I loved about ANH (hope and camaraderie and adventure that ends happily) went away in ESB; instead, Han and Leia were snarking at each other horribly and Luke was off training with Yoda who was rather harsh on him and then Bespin happened and ouch. So there is definitely an element of personal liking in my estimate of the quality as well! But, yeah, we're almost on the same page with quality, awesome! And, oh, yes, on the Luke-Vader plot in ROTJ! Except of course for Anakin's death, IMO, because that kind of... wounds it for me. (Sooooo much more interesting for Luke to have to wrestle with his father as a real person, heheheheheh.) And ROTS is just... it has flaws all over the place, but, oh, it makes me love Anakin as a person and hurt for him, and that's my touchstone for a story I love: do I care about characters therein and sympathize with them? And ROTS does that, more in some ways than the OT, because Anakin is not only so damaged, but he's damaged in ways and for reasons that are deeply relevant to the story--- his damage is the culmination of what's wrong with the Jedi Order and even the Republic, and that makes the story for me. Luke and Leia and Han are all fighting a system or systems (the Empire and Jabba's criminal fiefdom) that's acknowledged in the storyline as corrupt and downright evil, and they're all doing so outside it; Anakin is the guy who doesn't fit in a healthy way within a system that's supposed to be "good" but has its deep dysfunctions (which are less acknowledged by the storyline but are evident if you start picking at it), and who tries to fit, and ends up bringing it down with a wrecking ball (to paraphrase L.A. Confidential). And that kind of fighting-from-within is a more compelling, or maybe more meaningful, tale for me.
Oh, man, I get you on that! And there is enough that I love in it that the parts I don't are precisely what turn my brain on and make me get creative and reflective and transformative about it! I want to make it better and that's always fun! And then there is the level at which I like picking at the disconnect between my impression of what the story was designed to do and what it does from my point of view, and what that tells me about how I think (e.g. the part where I consider the Jedi Order downright abusive, and I don't think Lucas would necessarily agree). And lol @ because QFT.
You have managed to break my brain. BRB, squicking forever. *gags* Eeesh.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-13 04:43 pm (UTC)I inherently like them because I like the concept, but I've never been completely satisfied, either.
This, exactly. It is a difficult scenario -- what afterwards? And I find it incredibly interesting for reasons that ... I didn't get to that point in Revenge, but the original plans I was working off of actually involved a repentant Vader as the Atoner. This could have been canon gah.
Re: ESB -- oh, I see. I didn't see much of a change in Han and Leia's relationship in terms of the combativeness (which I see in ANH too), but for me it's a lot skeevier in ESB and that's really my issue with it. Newsflash, Han: no means no.
I did think the ending was essentially hopeful (that final image omg <3 <3 <3), though certainly not as optimistic as ANH! And it's definitely a harsher movie in general. (I think I have a list of all the reasons I love it so much floating around, but I don't know whether you've run across it or not.)
ROTS is ... it makes me care for him more than I did before, which was pretty much not at all. I mean, I wanted to like him because I loved OT!backstory!Anakin and I tried to work with him on the strength of Darth Vader, but any investment I had in his character came from outside the movie until ROTS.
But "nothing" to "mild concern" is still a bit underwhelming, and his turn was just bizarre to me. The thing is that there's a lot of material there to play with in terms of his character and background, but I don't think the movies actually do that.
Like, the parallels between Anakin's messed-up-ness and the Order's -- I'm not sure they're even intended in the movies? Or that the Jedi Order is supposed to be worse than a little hidebound? There's potential for compelling, meaningful stuff, but I don't see it realized in the text itself. I guess for me, it makes for fascinating meta but isn't fascinating itself.
and there is enough that I love in it that the parts I don't are precisely what turn my brain on and make me get creative and reflective and transformative about it!
Right! I mean, that's SW as a whole for me, but I understand what you mean.
And then there is the level at which I like picking at the disconnect between my impression of what the story was designed to do and what it does from my point of view
Yes, this -- this is exactly what I was talking about, ha. And it is interesting in an analytical way. I really enjoy the picking. It just ... doesn't make me like the movies any more? IDK.
Re: unpopular opinion time! (maybe!)
on 2011-10-15 02:32 am (UTC)OMG DO WANT.
Ah, gotcha! I felt like there was the lovely bonding moment at the end of ANH and then in ESB they've... backslid. Like they haven't actually had the relationship mature any in all that time and that in fact it's regressed--- like you said about Leia becoming a politician after ROTJ, it's a backsliding in the character arc. The no-means-no thing--- I always read that scene as involving a lot of non-verbal cues and being about two people who do know each other well enough to understand the subtext: Leia not snarking at Han and Han backing off on the "Your Worship" stuff is a coded form of communication. But, honestly, "no means no, dammit, Han" makes a lot more sense than a reading that involves that much subtlety.
I think I have read your ESB-love post! And I remember thinking it was awesome.
Yeah, I never got all that into Anakin/Vader in the OT, and then ROTS came around and I was just SQUEEEEEEEEE about him. But, yeah, if I'd been all about the character beforehand... not so much with any of the PT.
And oh, the movies definitely leave stuff dangling. Everywhere. Whether it's poli sci or psych or any of the social-science issues that come up with that kind of worldbuilding. (Instead we get a half-hour long lightsaber duel montage. Which I love for the eye candy but really.) But I like it because it gives me space to play. And because even if the complexity isn't intentional, there's enough there for me to play with.