Lit Sam Witwer "Karen Traviss, She Didn't Get Everything Right"

I'm refering to them being clones at all. I'm fine with the similarities bewtween the poster article and Karen's views.

I'm not even sure why the Poster book vs Karen's books is an issue at all really?

What did she say on the record?

 

The more recent books (The Essential Guide to Warfare for example) do clarify that clones existed in the ANH era stormtrooper ranks - they just weren't the majority, but took up about 1/3.

 

I

It's possible to make a statement without there being a point to it. Sorry if that threw you for a loop.

 

Some of what she has said on record has been posted already.

 

You mean this bit"

"Let me get this clear," I said. "Somebody creates a secret clone army. Then they manuever the Jedi into using them to fight the Separatists."
"That's right," said Ryan.
"So...." My journalist brain was whirring. I had no preconceived happy notions about Jedi. I was new in town. "This is a slave army. They're bred to age at double the rate and die young. They have no choice. And the Jedi just take them and use them as cannon fodder? No questions asked? No big moral debate?"
"You got it," said Ryan.
I was outraged. "And these are the good guys?"
That was the exact moment when Star Wars moved from being a nice little earner into something I really, really wanted to write.

 

Ah, so you were injecting an ad hominem complaint into an unrelated conversation for no other reason than you felt like it. Got it.

 

And that reconciles the situation to be sure. That doesn't mean that Karen went looking(or didn't) to see if Stormtroopers were clones circa 2004 or so and found much resembling that answer. Sources like the ISB indentify their origins as unknown, later sources - taking EU characters into account - show that they at the very least were not all clones(if there was any evidence that any were beyond the poster book.)

For instance the 1997 Encyclopedia mentions nothing about Stormtroopers being clones specifically but gives bio's for stormtroopers who were not clones.

 

I didn't see it as a complaint, but if you did, then it's best to agree to disagree.

 

True. It's more that she manages to produce something remarkably similar to pre-existing material without trying.

People saying "Clone troopers being treated as slaves in SW had no precedent" would be incorrect though.

 

It's an illustration with a Star Wars-y mech/droid in the background. Immediately seeing it as yet another opportunity to hollowly bash TCW is just bizarre.

 

It indicated that powerful Jedi Masters can be completely wrong about the Force, which was borne out by the PT.

 

I've seen comments on how the phrase "light side" is never used in the movies.

Maybe "The Force" is amoral, rather than good, even if the dark side is evil.

Thus, Jedi sticking to "The Force" doesn't mean they're getting any moral guidance from.

 

Uh.... hmmm....

The fact that "dark side" is used implies there is another side, which, most logically, is probably the "light side."

We also know that the Force partially guides actions. It's possible, I think, that the Force can guide someone into an evil act.

 

"If you start down the dark path .... You will become an agent of evil"

"That cave, is strong with the dark side of the force. A domain of evil it is."

It might not be "Good Light Side, Evil Dark Side"

but "Neutral Force, Evil Dark Side (Corruption of Force)"

 

Said droid first appeared in the Clone Wars film. It's not an out of field jab.

 

By the way, the article pertaining to that Gand went up for review last night, which I tackled.

FOR GANDALORE!

 

That's not why it's bizarre.

I mean, unless you particularly dislike the design of the droid or something. Damn Filoni and his EU-hating animator minions, coming up with new droid designs without even asking Jan Duursema's input first!

 

How is it so hard to Dislike TCW

 

I think everyone knows I don't like TCW, and I find it bizarre to look at that pic and think of the horrible disease that is TCW. It's just a picture, that happens to have a droid that first appeared in TCW, but isn't in any way emblematic of TCW's terrible flesh eating virus.

Besides, that droid is based on concept art for the droideka.

Maybe I'm mistaken, but isn't this incorrect? Were there not examples of questions, debates, dissension, even schisms before KT got involved?

 

But I don't recall the schisms in the Republic comics being related to use of the clones.

 

I guess I just don't recall people saying that.

Question IU or OU? There was definitely fan discussion about the clones as slaves theme after AOTC came out. Even Salvatore's novelization has hints of it:

The callousness of it struck Obi-Wan prfoundly. Units. Final product. These were living beings they were talking about. Living, breathing, and thinking. To create clones for such a singular purpose, under such control, even stealing half their childhood for efficiency, assaulted his sense of right and wrong.

Certainly Karen championed the idea but it was a thought on some peoples minds for sure, apparently including Salvatore & Obi-Wan.

 

True, but as we know, (by her own admission) Traviss never reads novels.

 

We do know that she used the Holocron though, as well as having fans like Patchworkz help her out on occasion.

Its likely just an accident, but True Colors does have a scene where General Zey mentions how he and Obi-Wan were having discussion about some of these moral issues. But it does seem to fit with that POV from the AOTC novel.

 

I don't understand all the fuss.


Traviss is gone, she's not coming back, and all her stuff has been overwritten by TCW. Let's let the bad aspects of Star Wars vanish into the Mists of Forgetfulness, shall we.