why didnt anakin rescue shmi before?

"What Qui-Gon had to offer at the moment was worth as much as cost of a slave."

What if someone returned to Tatooine and offered Watto enough to recoup his losses from betting on the race...or MORE?


"And if Anakin wasn't worried about it, why would Padme?

If Anakin had approached her in the meantime, telling her that he need to get enough money to free Shmi, she would have probably done whatever she could.

But he didn't."

It sounds like you're supporting my opinion that Anakin should have insisted that someone go back and free Shmi to give her a chance for a better life.

Anakin's attitude should have been...

"Thanks for everything you've ever done for me. You've been a great mom. I'm off to start a new life and fullfill my dreams and once you're free, you can start a new life too."

instead of...

"I'm off to fullfill my dreams, but I don't want to impose on any of these adults around me by suggesting that someone go back and pay off Watto so Mom can be free."

As I see it, Shmi's problem could be easily solved...

...but Lucas wants to leave her there.

 

Obviously.

You are right, Anakin -could- have tried to go back and free her, but the Jedi forbid it.

Padme -could- have kept going back to Tatooine, and offer Watto an obscene amount of money for Shmi's freedom, but she didn't. After Anakin was out of her life, she went on with her own.

It all makes good narrative sense, and works well with the story Lucas is trying to tell.

 

"Obviously.

You are right, Anakin -could- have tried to go back and free her, but the Jedi forbid it."

How can the Jedi forbid Anakin from asking someone to help free his mother, when they don't even want him?

"The boy will NOT be trained....but the Jedi code still applies to him."


Not only can Anakin not go back for his mom, he can't even bring it up to Padme during the flight to Coruscant?

"Padme -could- have kept going back to Tatooine, and offer Watto an obscene amount of money for Shmi's freedom..."

Actually, I'm suggesting one trip would have sufficed, and an "obscene amount" would be relative. Watto is greedy. For him, the bottom line is MONEY.

"...but she didn't. After Anakin was out of her life, she went on with her own.'

Nice. Padme's needs are met, and to hell with the woman who gave her shelter and even gave up her son.

Still, it might have been a good idea for Anakin to at least ask. Isn't that what a REAL little boy would do?

Would you suggest that Anakin doesn't need to have the real emotional response of a ten year old boy just because it's a Star Wars film?

 

I am saying the Jedi have been supressing Anakin's impulses towards his mother. Notice when he tells Obi-Wan about his dreams pertaining to his mother, he tells him that they will pass in time. That's been their hard line stance for generations at the Jedi Order. It's just how it's done.

As far as Padme getting on with her life being a little cold, it's an extremely realistic non response on her part.

The question asked here is why didn't Anakin go rescue his mother ealier than he did. The answer to that is because the Jedi forbid him from going back to Tatooine until after he was fully trained.

The side topic that sprung up wondering why other people didn't take it upon themselves to free her is really a non issue. The point is that they simply didn't feel compelled to.

Cold? Callous? Indifferent? Possibly.

But utterly realistic if you ask me.

 

Yes, but I'm specifically addressing Anakin's lack of action or even vocalization throughout the last half of TPM.

This is the kid who got the great idea to enter the pod race in order to help people he just met...

...but as they fly away from Tatooine, it never occurs to him that there might be a way to arrange his mother's freedom. He's got a powerful friend in Padme sitting right there, she is indebted to him for his help, and apparently they have time to talk during the flight, but he never brings up the possibility.

Can you imagine Jake Lloyd asking Lucas to explain his motivation at this point in the script?

 

If you're going to step outside the context of the films, then we really have nothing to talk about. Because out-of-universe, Shmi not getting rescued makes perfect sense as a plot device. But since you seemed to be looking for some deeper answer, then we have to go in-universe. And in universe, the Jedi are a religious order, and what I said does apply.

'out of universe' the plot device is a mess.
'in universe' - you're obviously sticking to your guns on this matter, fair enough, let's look at what you said:

"In every case, it doens't work because your telling people who've dedicated their lives to a religion that you, an outsider presumably uneducated in the subject, can interpret it better than they can. A presumptous act indeed."

Well now, since you, yourself are an 'uneducated outsider' then you've just negated all your opinions on the Jedi.
Well done!
**Applause**

As for me - well I can't tell the Jedi anything, they aren't real, so I shall be ignoring your idea.

Coincidence is whimiscal; there might not always be a good reason.

So you have no good reason why they wouldn't free her. Great, my work here is done.

Perhaps its a Calamarian Jedi that wants to get off the giant desert that is Tatooine ASAP, and so does the minimum amount of business there possible. Maybe they have another urgent assignment waiting for them back at the temple. Maybe they're just getting over an illness, and are tired, and don't want to over-extend themselves on a mission that they're using as a chance to recover.

Well apart from the Calamari who forgot his sunblock and the lazy Jedi you obviously have no good reasons for them not to.
Great.

Who knows? Who cares? Unless you're telling me that you've done good for others every single time you've had a chance to (or you know someone that has) then I don't see how this is relevant.

Well it's relevant to your idea that they are always free to help someone coincidentally - remember.

Secondly, I never hummed and hawed. I said that in such a scenario, they would be free to help her coincidentally, if they chose to, which is consistent with my position. However, free to does mean free to, something you don't seem to want to accept.

Great. They're free to help her.
That's that then.

Just because you have lots of money doesn't mean that you don't try to use it wisely.

Freeing Shmi would be very wise.

What does all this mean? It means that the Jedi's wealth really has little to do with whether or not its worthwhile to free Shmi. Freeing Shmi still has to have greater merit than anything else they might consider doing with that money.

If this were some hugely expensive undertaking I might have some sympathy with your theory, but you're just taking it to ridiculous extremes. I've seen the movies and at no point do I rememeber seeing any of the Jedi coontacting the accounts department and asking for an "opportunity cost" assessment.

However, since you anticipated that argument, I will address your response. I was not aware the Jedi had any "agents" just sitting around waiting to do jobs like this. Even non-Jedi associated with the order still have their own duties to see about,

Well you've been peddling this idea of Jedi as a corporation long enough I would've thought this matter what quite obvious - logically the Jedi must have other personnel, assistants, envoys, etc. etc. they just give the job to one of them, I mean how hard is that?

Not "Am I capable of doing this" mind you, but "Is doing this more worth doing than anything else I would do instead?" Opportunity cost is what you need to prove here.

*sigh* No. It's what you need to prove.
Show me all the cases that the Jedi have worked on along with their "opportunity costs" and I'll show you why Shmi's wasn't at the bottom.

Because it seems to me your disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing. I'm saying that since this doesn't even seem to be much of a part of the discuss

 

As I've said before, the lack of resources issue is relative to the duties they must fulfill. In other words, this is entirely an issue of opportunity cost.

And yet you're the one who said they'd send Jedi and doctors and archive people to see her on Tatooine. Wouldn't it be better 'resource management' to get her freed then she can come to Coruscant and see all those people without them all having to go there? But that's just my opinion, I'm not an expert in this 'resource management' stuff.

True, unconditional love, won't be removed jut because they free Shmi. And since that's what the Jedi need to do (remove Anakin's love, I mean), then freeing her is of no help at all in regards to Anakin's training.

Again - freeing Shmi would help him stop worrying about her situation as a slave, this would be removing a factor that shouldn't be there anyway (no-one should be a slave). He's going to find it very difficult to stop loving her and this would be a reasonable form of help. They are there to help him remember, when they teach him how to use a lightsabre they don't refuse him training on the basis that he should learn it all on his own, he's given help and then expected to develop his skills.

The first thing that strikes me is your "Qui-Gon obviously thought it too dangerous" argument. It's exactly the kind of argument you insist on not making in this case.

Well actually as you've seen from my other thread I do wonder why he didn't contact the Jedi.
But if you insist that he could've, that it was a preferable option, then there's another hole in the story. I mean are we to believe that he risked the life of Anakin when there was a simpler option?
But it's relevance to this debate is that neither Anakin nor Shmi are aware of any of this, all they know is that these people are apparently in desperate need of help, and they help them.

Compassion is compassion, and rewards are rewards. If you are arguing they should free Shmi for how she aided the Jedi in TPM, then only what she actually did counts. Let's use an example of children at school....
The results count, not the effort.

Right, well let's look at another example:
Say your plane crashes in some Godforsaken 3rd world country, you have no way of getting home, you're being hunted. And then some woman you meet agrees to let her son risk his life just so you can get home.
Compare to this - you go out to the city one night and lose your wallet, you have no money, a guy lends you the bus fare to get home.
Now the end result is the same.
Are you seriously saying to me that what the woman did is the same as what the other guy did?

What Shmi did was incredible.

You say your ideas are consistent with the characterization of the Jedi in the films, and yet all you talk about is resource management (even tho their accounting skills are hardly to be addmired if what you say about the clone army is true!) You've got them pegged as a bunch of bureacratic accountants, where is that characterization in the films? you even think QG was likely to be prosecuted for freeing Anakin!
What's next? Will Darth Vader start charging for 'Information Retrieval'?
And then you tell me I'm an 'uneducated outsider'.
Well what are you - head of the Jedi accounting department?


Plus your continued attempts to downplay Shmi's actions are completely baffling, it's one of the bravest things in the saga.


g

 

GoMer
However, the slavery shown in TPM wasn't any worse than some regular jobs. They take good care of their slaves on Tatooine, because they consider them to be a highly valued possesion. They are symbols of status and power. You may even notice one of the younger slaves hanging out with Anakin even have braces to imrpove their value.

Well that's great. I'm sure George would be thrilled to know that people are getting a positive view of slavery from his film.
But - you're ignoring what I said before - as a slave she's property and as such she can be sold to any scumbag who could do whatever he wanted to her.

After the Award Cerimony, Padme and Anakin parted ways, and she never looked back. She went on with her life.

so Padme's a heartless cow, is that what we're supposed to think of her?

And if Anakin wasn't worried about it, why would Padme?

er... because Shmi risked everything to help her and Padme has the means to help her in return?

g

 

It takes empathy on the audience's part to relate to these characters' choices.

 

Young Anakin would be much easier to empathize with if he acted like a kid who was as eager to help his loving mother as he was eager to help strangers.

 

i see THIS AS A MAJOR PLOOOOOOOOT HOOOOOLLLLLLLEEEEEE.

 

I don't. Meh.

 

I didn't have any trouble empathizing with Anakin, or any of the other main characters for that matter.

 

So if some members of the audience have trouble empathizing with a ten year old boy enthusiastically going out of his way and RISKING HIS LIFE to help some strangers get MECHANICAL PARTS, but who isn't inspired to even inquire if anything can be done for his mother once they leave Tatooine...

...it's the audience member's fault?

 

Individual results may vary.

I am just saying it wasn't a problem for me. Anakin had to really supress his instincts to stay by his mother's side when Qui-Gon took him away for good. Anakin didn't like it, but his mother reassured him that she would be fine, and that he should take the opportunity to get away himself. Anakin always figured he would come back one day to free the slaves, but he knew that becoming a Jedi took the most serious commitment, and that one of the things a Jedi must do is cut themselves free of any kind of emotional attatchments like these. He knew he wouldn't be allowed to free the slaves before he had finished his training, and he accepted that.

For all we know, Anakin kept asking about her every 5 minutes from the time TPM credits rolled and the AOTC title crawl began. It's obvious from his conversation with Obi-Wan that they had talked about his mother numerous times before, and Kenobi kept supressing those impulses Anakin had to dwell on her.

 

"Individual results may vary."

Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Maybe it requires multiple viewings.

 

Just one for me.

 

You're right.

Multiple viewings don't alter the point that Anakin's behaviour regarding his mother is not natural behaviour for a ten year old boy who supposedly cares about his mother.

 

Well only if that is how you choose to see it.

To me, it makes perfect sense.

 

Well only if that is how you choose to see it.

Hmmm, this has the hint of going down the same old path, Go-Mer... making it about the fans. I much preferred your previous argument several posts above that one.

 

Doesn't it depend on how an individual sees it?

If Leia_love_slave thinks it makes no sense, then to him, it makes no sense.

If I think it makes sense, then to me it makes sense.

Individual results may vary.

That's all I am trying to say.

 

I don't think anyone choose to see it a certain way. You each have a different response to the same film, but it's an honest response, like a reaction, ya know?

 

I see your point.

Instead of saying it comes down to how one chooses to see it, I will say that it comes down to how one does see it.

If it makes sense to me, then to me it makes sense, if it doesn't make sense to someone else, then it doesn't make sense to them.

All I am trying to do is explain why Anakin didn't rescue Shmi before. I am trying to explain how this is accounted for in the films.

 

love-slave, I 'm not sure your expectation of Anakin is fair. I agree he should be concerned, but not necessarily seek solutions. After all, things like "childlike innocent," "the naivete of youth," and "faith like a child," all speak to the same idea: children tend to take things at face value. One of the major skills people go to school to learn is problem-solving and critical thinking.

Therefore, when Qui-Gon says there is nothing to be done ("Watto wasn't having it") a young child like Anakin is likely to accept it. It would seem somewhat unusual to me if he started suggesting alternative solutions that take into account details of the Jedi Code, geo-politics, interactions between nation-states, and the extent of Padme's influence, as we have. I find it much more likely that when Qui-Gon said it couldn't happen, he pretty much believed that it was a literal impossibility. Although your right, more vocalization would have improved the realism--I just don't see it as a problem as is.

"Well now, since you, yourself are an 'uneducated outsider' then you've just negated all your opinions on the Jedi."

Incorrect. Mine is the null hypothesis. We are talking about something that has already happened in the films to date. I've said as outsiders, we can't interpret their Code. However, if they've consciously done the thing, and raise no objections even after seeing the results, then we know that by default it must have been part of their Code. Because if not, Lucas would have made that point. However, some people (like yourself) don't understand how their action fits within that Code. I've merely suggested one possible way in which it does. You, on the other hand, are suggesting that it is impossible that what they've done in regards to Shmi fits within their Code, and that they should have been expected to do something other than what they actually did. That's presuming to interpret their Code. While I'm also interpreting their Code somewhat, I'm only doing it as a means of explaining to you the action they took. Regardless of whether my explanation is the correct one or not, there is by default some correct explanation, unless you can prove that their behavior in this instance is absolutely inconsistent. You have yet to do this.

In fact, you keep referencing an old Kenobi and Qui-gon Jinn. The former did the things you describe after the Jedi Order was already destroyed, while the latter was the most rebellious Jedi seen onscreen to date. That makes for the complete antithesis of "typical Jedi behavior." Because remember, in order for this to be a plot hole, you have to show that Jedi actually should have been expected, given their typical behavior, to free Shmi, and didn't. You've not done that.

"So you have no good reason why they wouldn't free her. Great, my work here is done."

Whether intentionally or not, you just overlooked the substance of the whole argument. Again, coincidental help is just that, help by coincidence. Without any further information, we are forced to conclude that a Jedi is as equally likely to help her coincidentally as not to. A 50/50 chance. But this doesn't work for your argument, since you need to show that the Jedi should have been expected to free her. 50/50 doesn't make for expectations, it makes for a complete toss-up. Therefore, the null hypothesis stands and there is no plot hole.

" Well apart from the Calamari who forgot his sunblock and the lazy Jedi you obviously have no good reasons for them not to."

What do you want, an exhaustive list of good reasons not to? First off, asking for "good" reasons is already ignoring the whole principle behind coincidental help as I defined it. But in any case, I don't see how its fair if I can provide reasons then you just dismiss them. Technically, all that's needed is a single good reason not to. And I've already given you more than that.

"Well it's relevant to your idea that they are always free to help someone coincidentally - remember."

No it's no

 

"Wouldn't it be better 'resource management' to get her freed then she can come to Coruscant and see all those people without them all having to go there?"

Possibly. We can't really say since we don't know the details of the SW economy. But just based off my estimations, it at least doesn't seem as obvious of a cost saving option as it might at first appear to be. That is, Tatooine probably has a much lower cost of living than does Coruscant. For a RL example, it would be like someone from the US trying to decide if it would be cheaper for multiple people to go to Mexico (where, because of the exchange rate and cost of living, they could get a good deal) or for one person to go to London (where the exchange rate doesn't favor the US, and it's expensive anyway). Add to that the cost of actually getting Shmi free, and the math becomes dicey. We should also consider that while the Jedi have private transportation and thus there costs are absorbed, Shmi would have to purchase a ticket there and back. Finally, for her to come ot Corsucant would mean a disruption of her life, whereas she would hypothetically be less inconvienced if they were to come to her. But as I said, we can't really say either way. Another option would be to negotiate something where she came to Coruscant for a few days without being freed, that could possibly save some money. But meh. Suffice it to say that although we can't say for sure, these are the kinds of answers I would consider good responses to issues of opportunity cost.

Essentially, opportunity cost is the value of the best alternative not taken. You want to take the choice with the lowest possible opportunity cost, also known as making the best choice available. This is because logically, if you truly picked the best option possible, then its value should by definition be greater than that of the second-best option. That's why I say that I don't need a lot of evidence to presume that the Jedi use this principle. In giving people the benefit of the doubt, we pretty much assume that everyone trys to make what seems like the best possible choice. So yeah, good stuff, although I don't think this finally makes your case.

"You say your ideas are consistent with the characterization of the Jedi in the films, and yet all you talk about is resource management."

I've tried to address that above. I also draw great support from the Jedi Council as presented in the PT. Like when the "vergence in the Force" Mace says that they will dedicate some resources to researching that. Whereas when Mace talks to Palpatine in AOTC, he says essentially that it is a better use of resources for the Jedi not to be counted on as an army ("we're keepers of the peace, not soldiers"). In that way, they do seem to be conscious of how they're using their resources.

You however, seem to draw many of your examples of how Jedi behave from Qui-Gon Jinn and the OT. I would submit that these are invalid, however. TPM was very clear in establishing the fact that Qui-Gon was atypical of the Order, and he was in fact the most rebellious Jedi we've seen in the Saga. Similarly, what happens in the OT is all after the Order has been destroyed, and there are only two survivors. Clearly, how we can expect two former members of the Order to act is not necessarily how we'd expect the Order to act in it's glory days.

"Are you seriously saying to me that what the woman did is the same as what the other guy did?"

I'm not saying I agree with that system, just that that's what it is. Under a strictly rewards based system, you get rewarded for results only. However, this isn't really a valid example, since home from downtown in one's hometown is a different result than home from a hostile third world nation, and that would be taken into account even in a rewards based system.

This is more like someone crashing their car, and rather than using the OnStar service they already have, they decide to get a local to help them out. Yes, it would be appreciated, but its still not really anything more tha