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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Lit "Dark Jedi" and "Sith": a blunder on the EU's part

Discussion in 'Literature' started by purplerain, Nov 5, 2013.

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  1. purplerain

    purplerain Jedi Knight star 4

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    Sep 14, 2013
    It would be interesting if the ST has Dark Jedi who are absolutely not Sith.
     
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  2. The Supreme Chancellor

    The Supreme Chancellor Jedi Master star 4

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    Sep 4, 2012
    Someone who has a guide stating "If your reading this I'm already dead.." he knew he was gna croak at some point.
     
  3. Nom von Anor

    Nom von Anor Jedi Grand Master star 4

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    Oct 7, 2012
    Maybe, but I'm not so sure. Maybe he saw it as a distant possibility. We don't really know his intentions. Palpatine is all about contingency plans. He may have even hoped that, in the event of his death, someone would find the Holocron and resurrect him somehow! He may have hoped that someone would learn from the Holocron and use this knowledge to torment Palpatine's former enemies... just out of spite!

    At least this is what I prefer to believe. Because Palpatine doing something just for the good of Sith doesn't sound right to me.
     
  4. purplerain

    purplerain Jedi Knight star 4

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    Sep 14, 2013
    If Palpatine wrote, "if you're reading this I'm already dead", I doubt he intended for it to ever be read.

    On another note, the Battle of Ruusan ending the New Sith Wars is a retcon that I will always hate. The New Sith Wars were supposed to end with the Jedi wiping out a divided Sith Order.
     
  5. Iron_lord

    Iron_lord Chosen One star 10

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    Sep 2, 2012
    The Battle of Ruusan was invented before TPM was- for the Jedi Knight game.
     
  6. DarthJenari

    DarthJenari Jedi Master star 4

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    Dec 17, 2011
    Yeah what's the retcon? From what I remember the Battle of Ruusan always ended the New Sith Wars..
     
  7. purplerain

    purplerain Jedi Knight star 4

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    Sep 14, 2013
    The New Sith Wars and the Battle of Ruusan had nothing to do with each other until the first essential chronology was written.
     
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  8. Iron_lord

    Iron_lord Chosen One star 10

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    Sep 2, 2012
    That said- it was a pretty logical conclusion that a huge war against Dark Jedi 1000-odd years BBY, and the Sith being believed to have been "extinct for 1000 years" were connected.
     
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  9. DarthJenari

    DarthJenari Jedi Master star 4

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    Dec 17, 2011
    Eh, well it's not a retcon I hate. Makes perfect sense.
     
  10. DoubleGold

    DoubleGold Jedi Knight star 1

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    Nov 3, 2013
    Distant possibility? He would have to die at some point, even if it was natural causes. But yeah, I agree with the Holocron idea, that he wanted his tradition carried on. Resurrecting him would be hard, but resurrecting the empire or have someone carry it on after his death would not be.
     
  11. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

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    Feb 17, 2004
    The problematic retcon is that the back story in the Ep1 novel has Bane as one of Ruin's followers and he institutes the Rule of Two after Ruin's group self destructs precluding the correlation.
     
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  12. Nom von Anor

    Nom von Anor Jedi Grand Master star 4

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    Oct 7, 2012
    Well, he didn't plan to die; he intended to live forever by use of clone bodies.
     
  13. Iron_lord

    Iron_lord Chosen One star 10

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    Sep 2, 2012
    Ruin isn't even named in the TPM novel.

    The Sith had come into being almost two thousand years ago. They were a cult given over to the dark side of the Force, embracing fully the concept that power denied was power wasted. A rogue Jedi Knight had founded the Sith, a singular dissident in an order of harmonious followers, a rebel who understood from the beginning that the real power of the Force lay not in the light, but in the dark. Failing to gain approval for his beliefs from the Council, he had broken with the order, departing with his knowledge and his skills, swearing in secret that he could bring down those who had dismissed him.

    He was alone at first, but others from the Jedi order who believed as he did and who had followed him in his study of the dark side soon came over. Others were recruited, and soon the ranks of the Sith swelled to more than fifty in number. Disdaining the concepts of cooperation and consensus, relying on the belief that acquisition of power in any form lends control, the Sith began to build their cult in opposition to the Jedi. Theirs was not an order created to serve; theirs was an order created to dominate.

    Their war with the Jedi was vengeful and furious and ultimately doomed. The rogue Jedi who had founded the Sith order was its nominal leader, but his ambition excluded any sharing of power. His disciples began to conspire against him and each other almost from the beginning, so that the war they instigated was as much with each other as with the Jedi.

    In the end, the Sith destroyed themselves. They destroyed their leader first, then each other. What few survived the initial bloodbath were quickly dispatched by watchful Jedi. In a matter of only weeks, all of them died.

    All but one.

    Darth Maul shifted impatiently. The younger Sith had not yet learned his Master's patience; that would come with time and training. It was patience that had saved the Sith order in the end. It was patience that would give them their victory now over the Jedi.

    The Sith who had survived when all of his fellows had died had understood that. He had adopted patience as a virtue when the others had forsaken it. He had adopted cunning, stealth, and subterfuge as the foundation of his way- old Jedi virtues the others had disdained. He stood aside while the Sith tore at each other like kriks and were destroyed. When the carnage was complete, he went into hiding, biding his time, waiting for his chance.

    When it was believed all of the Sith were destroyed, he emerged from his concealment. At first he worked alone, but he was growing old and he was the last of his kind. Eventually, he went out in search of an apprentice. Finding one, he trained him to be a Master in his turn, then to find his own apprentice, and so to carry on their work. But there would only be two at any one time. There would be no repetition of the mistakes of the old order, no struggle between Siths warring for power within the cult. Their common enemy was the Jedi, not each other. It was for their war with the Jedi they must save themselves.

    The Sith who reinvented the order called himself Darth Bane.

    A thousand years had passed since the Sith were believed destroyed, and the time they had waited for had come at last.

    It's clear from the context, that a lot of time passes, from "almost two thousand years ago" (foundation of that version of the Sith Order) to the point where "The Sith Were Believed Destroyed" (a thousand years before the present).

    It's certainly true though, that Bane of the Sith is very different from Jedi vs Sith- Bane is only a survivor of the collapse of the Sith in the short story - he's a major cause of that destruction in the comic.
     
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  14. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

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    Feb 17, 2004
    The Sith were believed destroyed after the Rule of Two was instituted, which is why Yoda knew about it. The Kaan retcon introduced a plot hole that required its own retcon to fix.

    I find it interesting that people use retcons to defend poor continuity from a decade ago, as though that is how it always was. I wonder if people will defend TCW the same way in another decade. Probably not.
     
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  15. jSarek

    jSarek VIP star 4 VIP

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    Feb 18, 2005
    You've got it backwards. It was the movies, specifically The Phantom Menace, where the mere existence of a non-Jedi trained in the Jedi arts immediately makes everyone think the Sith have returned, even though the Sith have been extinct for a thousand years. The films may not have equated darksider and Sith outright, but they sure made it look that way. But with the existence of the Rule of Two, all of the Dark Jedi from years of stories couldn't be Sith, so the EU was forced to make clear that there was a distinction between mere darksiders of all stripes, and those who are adherents of Sith doctrine.

    EDIT: Whoops, I see I was replying to the first page of the comic, and there were three more pages after that. Oh well, I stand by this, even though it's been said in other ways by several people already.

    Furthermore:

    Oddly enough, Jerec was explicitly connected with the Sith; his tattoos were called "Sith tattoos" in promotional media at the time. It was only after TPM and the introduction of the Rule of Two that his connection to the Sith was downplayed.
     
  16. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

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    Feb 17, 2004
    Wasn't it argued that the films conveyed the opposite impression since only Qui-Gon thought that it was a Sith? The council evidently thought it was something else or they were outright calling Qui-Gon a liar by doubting the Sith returned.
     
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  17. Arawn_Fenn

    Arawn_Fenn Chosen One star 7

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    Jul 2, 2004
    He's the cause of it in Path of Destruction, but in the comic Kaan doesn't get the thought bomb from him.
     
  18. jSarek

    jSarek VIP star 4 VIP

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    Feb 18, 2005
    They're incredulous about the possibility, but they don't question Qui-Gon's conclusion. They might be considering other possibilities, but either no other possibilities occur to them, or they quietly rule them out themselves; otherwise, they would have asked "how can you be sure it's not one of our brethren fallen to darkness?" or "what makes you so sure it's a Sith and not some other darksider?" or even "couldn't it just be some wannabe hopped up on Kessel spice?"
     
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  19. Iron_lord

    Iron_lord Chosen One star 10

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    Sep 2, 2012
    Or at least, Kaan's "idea" isn't attributed to anyone else. Still, Bane does voice to Githany in the comic, well before Kaan announces the Thought Bomb plan, that the Dark Side should be contained in one vessel- one Lord (or two).
     
  20. purplerain

    purplerain Jedi Knight star 4

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    Sep 14, 2013
    Xendor, Ajunta Pall, whoever the Vultar leader was, and Darth Ruin all fell on their own. I wonder how the council would explain them.
     
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  21. Lando Swarm

    Lando Swarm Jedi Master star 2

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    Aug 9, 2013
     
  22. Arawn_Fenn

    Arawn_Fenn Chosen One star 7

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    Jul 2, 2004
    But that comment from Bane doesn't cause the destruction of the Brotherhood in the comic.
     
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  23. BigAl6ft6

    BigAl6ft6 Chosen One star 8

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    Nov 12, 2012
    I think the Sith species origins actually folds rather nicely into the "Dark Lord of the Sith" title. It's a traditional holdover when the Sith were ruled by a "Dark Lord". Then it became a cult. Way to remember their evil, galaxy dominating past.
     
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  24. DigitalMessiah

    DigitalMessiah Chosen One star 6

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    Feb 17, 2004
    Another element which I like that hasn't really been discussed is that "Sith" means different things in different eras. The Sith Empire in the Great Hyperspace War, the Great Galactic War, and the Galactic War is something that inspires nationalist pride. It's a cultural identity. Prior to that, it was a species. And after that, it came to embody the antithesis of the Jedi, as a rival sect with a common origin.
     
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  25. purplerain

    purplerain Jedi Knight star 4

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    Sep 14, 2013
    What's the third galactic war you refer to?
     
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