Lit SOS: Save Our Skywalker, Luke Skywalker (v3)

Mindor response would have been......

Luke:"I did graduated Jedi school."
*disarms Brakiss*
Luke:"You on the other hand drop out to find yourself, how's that working for you ?"
*explosions in the background"



Jedi Ben,



Regardless if Anakin Solo would have survived or not, I can't see Luke risking the lives of children in a half-baked plan at best without putting his life on the line as well. This was a questionable decision by Luke and that's putting it mildly.

 

Yes, I would have been quite happy with a planet afire as the Game Over option for the Vong's voxyn project!

 

might as well, I'm not saying to nuke the entire planet that's overkill and un jedi like. But a strategic orbital strike should be the meat and potatoes of any Republic Fleet

 

I had to revisit it but this was explained, in detail. The Vong prepared the hyperspace routes with interdictors "everywhere". It also explains that the Jedi could not raise a fleet large enough to make such an attack, but even if they could it would be playing right into the hands of the Vong.

The only way to do it was an infiltration, but Wraith Squadron had been trying to infiltrate similarly defended routes for over 6 months and had failed every time.

So it ended up being what it is. Again, if Anakin doesn't die I don't think anyones cares. I think it is only the consequence of the action that make people feel like the action was foolish. If Anakin had returned unscathed, he would be a hero - Luke would be brilliant and all would be right with the universe.

I think I'm not that hard on this use of child soldiers, when compared to the use of child soldiers by the old Jedi Order just because the consequences were so high. When the old Jedi Order was sending kids to the front line it was about trade disputes and a war that had zero effect on how people lived their lives in most of the galaxy. The Yuuzhan Vong invasion was a different scale, a different kind of threat. Every single being in the galaxy was at risk from these invaders, life was going to change or end for every single person in the galaxy. In the Clone Wars only a small percentage of the galactic populace were really effected and life went on more or less as usual even under the Empire once the war was over.

 

I second Rob's opinion and add that Luke's operational objective was destroying the voxyn, specifically the voxyn queen.

Voxyn were a major threat to Luke's Jedi, but less so to non-Force-Users; so, given the political and military climate at the time, would anyone other than the Jedi have been interested in dedicating scarce warships to the task?

Additionally, the voxyn nursery was on a Vong Worldship - and we know what it takes to destroy one of those - an SSD converted into a bomb! Not quite the decant, bomb and hype type of target, IMO.

Not an enviable decision for Luke, I agree, but the job had to be done - and a strike team on the cusp of Knighthood (young enough to appear not much of a threat, but skilled and experienced enough to hit the Vong where it hurt) was probably the way to do it.

 

why gather a huge fleet, when a robotic piloted decoy ship loaded with barradium missiles could do the trick ? Add in the tech from the stealth-x to remain hard to detect and you could still hit the Voxyn Depot. I don't deny that Luke had a priority in stopping the Voxyn but sending you're more untested students without a Master seems foolish. Even if they had succeeded with no casualties why take unnecessary risk ?

 

Again, part of the problem with STS is that the standards for using kids going out to dangerous stituations isn't one single one- We have Harry Potter stories - and there we see eleven year olds fight trolls and evil wizards and it's quite ok. The teachers admonish a little and leave it at that. But when the same is done in a novel that's so serious as the NJO was, Luke and the others easily appear irresponsible. I can see JediMatteus point - and based on f.ekx. the PT that's launched the same year, (and where Anakin's in war and Padme is actually elected queeen!!!), it should be more than ok. But I admit that wehn I read a story so dark, and being adult myself and having kids, I don't like what i read. But as Darth_Pevra points out eariler - SW is partly working inside a different, adventurous landscape - in which it's quite ok that kids go out and to adult stuff. But if SW in general tries to have the best of both worlds, this is even more true with NJO.

 

Mark Hamill: Hey pal, that's my face up there next to the pepper steak, and don't you forget it.
Fat Tony mobster: You're all talk, Hamill. You never even finished Jedi school!

 

instantdeath, that's the second fat tony reference I seen on the boards yesterday

 

Again though, it is discussed in the book as not being an option due to hyperspace lanes being blocked off.

They couldn't get a ship there, period. Thats why they allowed themselves to be captured to allow the Vong to take them there.

Story wise it is some hokey concepts to be sure(which are on the author, not Luke), but when the narrative of the novel makes it clear that a particular course of action is impossible then something else has to be done.

 

Robimus, I understand what you're getting at Rob, but it's more an issue with the author and the publisher's decision. When killing off characters I have yet to see them do one well with a logical reasoning for why it had to be the particular character who kicked the bucket. I think Ganner's death was probably the best one out of Njo-Legacy era and that was due to Stover's execution more than anything. Anakin's planned death was probably one of the few that were thought out of the bunch but that's not saying much. also the behind the scene reason for his death is particularly lame. It still remains one of Luke's more questionable decisions he has made altogether and when written by Denning

 

Luke clearly did not like sending the young generation out on this mission against the Voxyn, but could the republic have won against the Vong if it was not for this mission?? Outside of that i did love reading Star By Star. Great book. I was shocked and dismayed by Anakin dying. I just did not see it coming at all. I was more affected by Anakin dying then even Chewie. Anakin was the future.

 

Depends on how much you rate the supply of voxyn relative to the Jedi impact on the republic war effort I suppose.

The problem with SBS is not so much that they killed off Anakin but they had no real idea how to follow through on it and the loss that the character was to the EU. Which is the problem with a lot of NJO's destruction, there was no thought given to how to replace what was swept away. Had there been NJO may be better regarded now.

 

^this, NJO had a lot of take but no give...Legacy era went overboard on this concept

 

This is probably why I have the problem I have with NJO, it has this dark and deadly serious tone that forces a different view of the use of teenagers as opposed to the other series. Didn't care for how Anakin was in TPM or Amidala either for that matter, that its ultimately ended up with Allana out-shooting Sith in firefights is kind of insane and not in a good way. The other problem is the lack of strategy we see from the NR, courtesy of Suicidally Self-Interested Borsk & Friends, looks far worse in a story as serious as NJO.

 

Darth_Pevra :

The Dark side cloud likely remained until the death of Palpatine, but it didn't seem to affect Luke. Maybe it's because Luke *is* a Force prodigy and he is simply so powerful in the Force that it doesn't seem to matter in his case.

I think that's a great point.







MasterSkywalker86:

It said in the novelization that Luke released him after he passed them, so we know he didn't kill them.








Jedi Merkurian:

I am hopelessly behind, but if I ever manage to get caught up, I'd like to check out that discussion.

I'm not quite sure that I understand what you're saying here, JM. Do you mean that Luke was taught those "Force tricks" but that he wasn't given the lessons in how to be a Jedi? Don't you think it's more important to know how to be a Jedi and to understand Jedi philosophy than to just be able to do some tricks with the Force? Yoda did give Luke some lessons in Jedi philosophy, but I'm pretty sure he probably didn't have time to teach Luke everything.







JediMatteus:

Well, you would expect them to be the focus of the book where Ben was born, yes. I went back to check pages, and Luke and/or Mara were present on 45 of 292 pages, which is more than I remembered. However, almost all of their parts in the book involved Mara's problems with her pregnancy. They didn't really do anything until Mara gave birth, when Luke and baby Ben miraculously cured Mara.

Luke may have been given a decent amount of "page time". The problem is that he didn't do much of anything In many of the scenes in which he appeared, particularly after the Dark Tide duology.







kataja:

While I think that the vengeance killing of Lumiya was the worst thing Luke has ever done, I agree that the voxyn queen mission AND not going to rescue the Jedi kids on Yavin IV when they were in danger, were pretty bad failures as well.








DarthJenari:

Yes, every source is taken into account here, I think.

Luke does come off as far too unsure of himself in the NJO. He is far too indecisive, and when the galaxy is being over-run by hordes of violent aliens who don't seem to respect life, action is needed. They need to be stopped. What made it especially annoying and frustrating was that Luke has always been an active person who gets involved and who is able to think on his feet. And even as a new recruit, Luke showed that he could be a natural leader, taking over command of that X-wing squadron during the battle to destroy the Death Star without panicking, and successfully completing the mission.

So why Luke wasn't portrayed as a competent, decisive, resourceful head of the Jedi Order makes no sense. The writing team already had tons of villains and a rift between the government and the Jedi, why did they feel they also had to present Luke as a poor leader and the Jedi as a fractured group ? It was very disappointing and unsatisfying.








MasterSkywalker86:

Tell me about it! I don't think it's ever going to happen. In fact, I may just give up pretty soon and just comment on the most recent posts. I'm forever behind here!

Great point, MS!

Why do they always have to do this with Luke? If they want to write about someone undergoing darkside trials, it's time to use a different Jedi, in my opinion. This has been WAY overdone with Luke.







Darth_Pevra:

Sadly, with all of the times they've written about Luke undergoing darkside trials, poor Luke doesn't seem like a "shiny idol". He seems more like "damaged goods".








MasterSkywalker86:

EXACTLY, MS! That's why it annoys me so much when they do this to Luke!

Definitely!







DarthJenari:

I would say from Truce at Bakura to Union. I must admit that I'm not a fan of the NJO. Even though I love TUF, I'd be willing to give it up to save some of the galaxy's worlds and to save Anakin Solo. I just never found the whole alien invasion of the bio-tech Yuuzhan Vong all that "Star Warsy". Plus, I'm hoping that Luke and Mara can have more than just one child.







MasterSkywalker86:

I like that!



More another time...

 

What kind of logic are you looking for though? Anakin Solo died because the head cheese told them he had to. Chewie died because we were coming off of a Bantam run where the primary critcism from fans was "no one ever dies". Borsk died in a blaze of glory, going down with the ship. Mara died to try and build up Jacen(not very well done of course.) Gilad died because they wanted to have the Empire side with Jacen Solo and they never would with Pellaeon in charge.

I don't think the issue for people is that the deaths were not logical, it is that people just didn't want to see anyone die, ever. Some of the deaths worked better than others of course, some were poorly written - but there is logic into why they happened and what Del Rey was going for.

 

ChildOfWinds

That's what I mentioned too, the Dark Side cloud didn't affect the Skywalkers as it did the other jedi. Perhaps that's another reason why they were the only ones who could truly defeat Sidious

thanks for the input, I thought as much as well. Luke just needed to have them knocked out and as long he uses choke for incaciptation like a sleeper hold then I see no harm in it. It's so awesome how he learned that completely on his own like his dad. Now if you really want to win some brownie points please tell me how did Luke bypass the gate droid in Jabba's Palace

c'mon Child I believe in you Ok how about you answer some of the latest deeper posts ? start with mine

maybe we should start a list of each time they do this to Luke in each book, cause it seems to come up more times than necessary.

Yoda didn't say "Relearn what have you learn."

heck Luke knew how to conceal himself in the Force before Jacen showed off with it and to greater degree.

 

well for starters I'm certainly not looking for any of Del-Rey's logic. Let's face it they have been wanting to kill off major characters since the beginning, starting off with Luke himself in NJO. Yes let's literally killed hope in the galaxy That doesn't sit well with me when a creator needs to shake up the status quo because of a shameless character death, it screams lack of creativity on their part. With other genres like the Walking Dead(survival horror) or Game of Thrones(dark fantasy) it works far better since we are introduced to worlds where any character can truly die off and continue the story on. Star Wars isn't like that, as Jedi Ben, had mention in ANH yes we lose a lot of no names red shirt pilots, but Luke, Wedge, Han, & Chewie survived so everybody is happy. ESB is the darkest of the trilogy yet none of the main cast died and RotJ retreads ANH's happy ending as well as redemption. Del-Rey selling Star Wars, as a hard boiled, realistic, hard sci-fi galaxy is not the one we been watching for decades.

maybe logic is not the right term, but execution on more than half of those deaths on the list were just abysmal. Not to mention it has left a lot of empty seats in the cast of characters.

 

I would consider Obi-Wan, Yoda, Beru & Owen, even Biggs as fairly important characters myself, nevermind Vader.

To me the execution, at times, is a legit complaint. It is just difficult for me to look at the back drop of Star Wars, a galaxy spanning war in which billions are killed, and just narrow it down to being a happy story, with a happy ending, because no one we care about gets killed.

 

Well most of fantasies have millions of casualties but the good guys survive, it all comes down to perspective and character investment.

 

it has been shown that Luke can outpace Jacen in learning new skills. Twice he's shown to learn an ability quicker than his nephew

what i loved was that in Inferno Luke just bedazzled jacen, to the point where Jacen could not figure him out. He fooled Jacen into thinking that he was dead, and then he appeared on Jacen's ship out of nowhere, and Jacen could not figure out how Luke could have appeared and disappeared on and off his ship. Loved Luke in Inferno

 

Indeed it is! Say what you want about the PT, but it is bold and original!

Agreed!!!

I think you're right. I don't think it's in any other novel either.

Actually, I disagree. He's not as bad a smartmouth as Han Solo, but he is of the same garden. Remember "Lock the door" being his advice to Threepio when he leaves him and Artoo on the Death Star. I generally like him best when he's perpared to give back as good as he gets! It's most IC, IMO

Exactly! And one argument too, is that he'd never be able to hold his own against Han and Mara, if he was!

Perfect analogy!!!

Yes, it doesn't really fit together does it? The realistic, dark touch with the use of kids? Yeah, I know children are afected by war too - and thus has their place in war stories - but adults are suppsoed to try to protect the kids - not send them out.

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This is correct, of course, and since these are the truths at the end of the day, it is a question of self-preservation for a fan to find in universe reaons that explain and cover them. Yet, inside that survival mission, I think it's quite ok to complain if the writers didn't cover their reasons well enough - or gave the characters memorable enough endings.​

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