PT An Analysis of the Final Battle in TPM... Mirroring or Rehash?

Isn't it? Anakin "frees" them by killing them -- one of many tragicomic fates that befall and befoul droids in Star Wars. It's the Gungans that are "actually" freed. That said, Jar Jar defines the droids as being "all broken", so perhaps they aren't so much destroyed, as it were, but placed in some kind of stasis or torpor state. But however you slice it, there remains an arresting link between Anakin's little bit of outlander-impressing performance art at the dinner table ("And they blow you up -- boom!"), and then his being the one to blow up the "main reactor" of the TF "control" ship. Re-actor. Re-en-actor. Hmmm. Everything repeats. Nietzsche's "Eternal Return". And control, you must learn control; only to then detonate. Ah, now that I really start thinking on it, there is a cool TPM-ROTJ link between Leia threatening Jabba with a "thermal detonator" and Anakin destroying the sphere that is helping to menace Naboo. The very threat of the detonator causes Jabba, the great slug-king of Tatooine, to acquiesce, while Anakin blows up a much bigger ball in space in order for Amidala and the great bullfrog-king of Naboo, Boss Nass, to get their planet back. Their planet? Ownership? Remote detonation? The thermal detonator also looks like the training remote used by Luke aboard the Millennium Falcon; a variant of which appears in the younglings scene in AOTC. And they all look like the Death Star. What is it with these explosive spheres?

Well, you know, ROTJ, when pushed against its immediate forebear, TESB, and when situated against its prequel bookmark, represents a kind of recrudescence of that ol' ANH/TPM, lighthearted, pulpy magic. The saga is like some rolling tapestry of oscillating psychological states: from the idyllic innocence of TPM and back again. There and back again, a Skywalker's tale, by R2-D2. And neither bookend is all *that* innocent, either. TPM interweaves into its whimsical surface a shadowy, beginning-to-bud Sith plot, while ROTJ has all those black-clad, super-serious Luke scenes, as our formerly-naive hero moves forward on his personal mission from God and discovers he must, in order to save Anakin and the universe, first remove the beam that has lodged and festered in his own eye.


As for assorted links between TPM and ROTJ, you may recall the following thread; and specifically:

http://boards.theforce.net/threads/...w-movie-pairing.50023836/page-2#post-51890434

Before.

Anakin crash-lands in the hangar, pulls himself to a stop, murmurs about everything being overheated, and then the film cuts away to Maul, just before the 2-hour mark. This is actually a really neat transition, in my opinion: the film goes from a close-up of Anakin pushing down on a thick silver button with a red dot in the middle, which is immediately preceded by a panning shot (this, in fact, is all the same shot) of him first trying, in vain, to flip a set of dark-red switches on the left, then the camera moves across and catches a series of red vertical LEDs (in contrast with those switches, which are aligned horizontally) as Anakin reaches for and presses the button (an adjacent set of LEDs later turn green when the film returns to Anakin and he exclaims, "Yes, we have power"; symbolically anticipating Obi-Wan's victory over Maul with Qui-Gon's laser sword). Then Maul's satanic face appears in close-up. It is like Anakin is "activating" Maul or "pressing" on his own fate; still the size of a simple unresponsive button/switch at this point, but soon to grow into something with serious presence and impact. In this way, the film almost lasciviously hints at Anakin's fate, while communicating something powerful about the apparent remoteness of that fate. This is an aspect of the film that greatly interests me: how it is both in the same pool as the other films, yet not. One of the really great things about all these films, in fact, is how tightly-woven they are, but each with their own personality: as keen as they are to speak to and interact with one another, they also go on leading "separate lives".

Anyway, where was I?

Oh, yes. The hangar. See, once Anakin lands inside, it seems to present the perfect excuse for the film not to have to deal with his thread for a while; so it doesn't. Once Anakin is safely "tucked away" in the hangar, continuing to comedically obey Qui-Gon's original instruction to "stay in that cockpit" (surely the masonic father/architect of this entry), it essentially frees the film up to deal with the other threads and tangents that have developed ("You're a slave?"). So then we have the following events, in the following order, before getting back to Anakin:

a) Maul pacing in front of Qui-Gon, the gate opening, Maul and Qui-Gon doing battle, Maul cutting Qui-Gon down, Obi-Wan's reaction, Maul gloating to Obi-Wan behind the resealed gate.

b) A short scene of Gungans being rounded up and in a state of surrender, along with Jar Jar being threatened and immediately consenting: "My give up, my give up."

c) Amidala and her security team being led straight into the throne room by a detachment of battle droids, and then her and her team retaking the throne room, with Amidala threatening Gunray: "Now, Viceroy, we will discuss a new treaty."

d) Obi-Wan finally getting his shot at Maul and unloading on him, breaking his staff, and being knocked by Maul into the pit, losing his own saber in the process as Maul kicks it over his head, with Obi-Wan helplessly watching it tumble by.

In the midst of these moments, the Queen appears to achieve victory: the main goal is reached. However, Obi-Wan lands in a perilous predicament, and the Gungans are still under threat. Anakin's actions, when the film goes back to him, resolve the latter, but Obi-Wan must still contend with Maul, beyond the help of the other actors. And once all these threads have been resolved, there is still the main Sith plot, completely unaddressed by the "good" guys, lending the feel of a Pyrrhic victory to everything; further underscored by Amidala, who "achieves" her objective in a dark manner, having both initiated a supremely destructive chain of events (the violent response to the "alarming chain of events" mentioned at the beginning of the film) to drive back the oppressors of Naboo, and also, at the moment of realization of her objective, directly threatened her opponent down the barrel of a needle-like gun chamber, after having her security chief "jam" the doors: a stark rhyme with Vader, the "demonic" side of her future husband, threatening their daughter with an interrogation device, and employing near-identical quasi-diplomatic language, "And now, Your Highness, we will discuss the location of your rebel base." Insidious stuff.

The climax of TPM may be messy, perhaps even overstuffed, but there's a salience about it all.

Which kind of sums up my admiration for the film in general.

Nice getting the chance to revisit this thread.

May you all be well.

 

Cryogenic

 

Let's not start that again!

Okay: main hold.

 

Hangars, hangars, hangars... those things are everywhere once you start looking for them. Hangars are the most dynamic of places. For example, one moment Anakin is completely helpless and vulnerable, with his ship overheated and his capture seeming inevitable, and then but a short while later his shields are up and he's torpedoeing the main reactor, dramatically turning everything around. Just before that, in the other hangar at the palace, Amidala's posse of security volunteers were all hopelessly pinned down by the droidekas, trapped in a corner and with Darth Maul blocking their only line of retreat, until only a moment later when Anakin is trivially blasting the droids away with his ship's laser cannons, which effortlessly puncture the destroyer droid shields. Or think of the hangar on Geonosis (yes, that hangar) where the power shifts quickly from Obi-Wan and Anakin, to Dooku, to Anakin again, then back to Dooku, to Yoda, and then finally to Dooku again as he escapes aboard his ship. Hangars contain the possibilities of arrivals and escapes and they're the places where man and ship intersect and interact, sometimes to the advantage or disadvantage of one or the other. They're the most unpredictable places, where anything can happen from attempted assassinations to sudden escapes to unexpected arrivals and meetings (well actually, I guess the assassination attempts were on landing pads, technically, but it's close enough). So, all I'm saying is I have a great appreciation for hangars (and landing pads). I very much like the trade federation hangar, with its series of massive sliding doors, but I also quite like the palace hangar with its stacked rows of elegant yellow fighter ships. The first death star hangar is also a memorable one with its dangerous-looking elevator and bottomless pit.

 

HANGERS=HASH, X

 

Without Anakin's actions the whole planet would still be at gunpoint by thousands of troops & tanks. The Viceroy would know that, so it would've made for an interesting stand-off. Since Padme values the lives of her people so much I'd assume she would've been the one to back down. Lucky for her Annie hit the off switch just as she arrested Gunray.

 

Well from a more purely pragmatic point we see that droids actually have to be charged. We also see that droids are built just odd in the first place as ordering them to do something doesn't necessarily mean that they will do it hence the restraining bolts.

There are any number of fictional explanations and as seen in the movies these seem to be early first generation battle droids and the way they were controlled and powered simply wasn't near as good as they eventually were 10 years later.

Lucas was going to make a point of this in AOTC where the droid control ship was taken down by the Jedi and the fighting stopped until independent units took over. So that was good in one sense but now their power can probably only last so long before they give out anyway.

We might as well ask why the first Death Star was destroyed so "easily" as the droid control ship was. In both cases Skywalkers got through the shields. The Naboo fighters could not get through the shields only Anakin was able to by being able to use the Force without knowing and get through the split second the shields were down as other fighters were coming out. Luke need to fire proton torpedos at the thermal exhaust (which was ray shielded) in a nigh impossible shot. As impossible as Anakin getting through the shields.

In the chronological fiction. In ANH it's not really addressed in that way anymore than how it moves is or what powers the laser.

Did a relatively minor thing like it need to be addressed? Probably not and Lucas only thought of adding it later in the process but lots of things are left out and lots are mentioned.

Besides that now they are doing an entire movie the core basis which is about addressing the Death Star.

 

I really don't understand the comparison between the Trade Federation control ship and Starkiller Base.

The control ship in TPM was the fall-back plan. It was much more important as part of the movie's resolution to capture Viceroy Gunray and the personal Jedi matter in regards to the mysterious darkside user. Padme achieved victory for Naboo with the Viceroy's capture and Obi-Wan defeated Maul, proving the reemergence of the Sith was indeed fact. Those two objectives meant much more to the outcome of the story than the destruction of the control ship. This is a reason why TPM doesn't feel like a rehash of ANH.

Meanwhile, everything came down to the destruction of Starkiller Base in TFA because nothing else is resolved until after the fact. It takes over the third act of the film and makes the film feel incredibly disjointed and needlessly rehashes the ending of ANH. There isn't any resolution in regards with Kylo Ren other than he lives to fight another day, and finding Luke feels like an afterthought because of the film's change of focus. This is a reason why TFA feels like a rehash of ANH.

Comparing the Final Battles & Story Resolutions for (in terms of importance to the third acts of the starting films):

TPM: Nute Gunray's Capture >/= Defeat of Darth Maul > Destruction of the Control Ship > Gungan Battle
ANH: Destruction of the Death Star
*ROTJ: Redemption of Anakin Skywalker & Defeat of Sheev Palpatine > Destruction of the Death Star II > Ewok Battle
TFA: Destruction of Starkiller Base > **Finding Luke > Defeat of Kylo Ren

* = I threw in ROTJ just for comparison's sake in regard to destruction of a sphere-like target.
** = Finding Luke, the focus of TFA's plot, has absolutely nothing to due with the film's final battle. What was the point of the third act exactly?

Those are my two cents. Probably more than two cents, but whatever.

 

No that's not right at all. The attack on the DCS wasn't thought to have any chance of success. That's why Padme called it a diversion. However, the fact that Anakin did manage to destroy it had far more impact than capturing the Viceroy. In fact had Padme etc had confidence in the fighter attack succeeding she could've sat back & just waited. Then when all of the droids were deactivated she could've strolled in & captured an undefended Viceroy.

Then there's the scenario if the DCS wasn't taken out. They have Gunray in custody but the whole planet is still occupied & blockaded. All of their citizens are at gunpoint, as well as the entire Gungan army. They're still at the mercy of the TF. Sure they have a valuable bargaining chip but a far weaker hand than the TF. The goal was to end the occupation. Only taking out the DCS was certain to achieve that. Capturing the Viceroy is what turned out to be meaningless. As soon as all of the droid soldiers & Gunray's bodyguards were turned off he was automatically captured anyway. He had no way of getting out of the palace.

 

They had the leader(s) of the Trade Federation capture, and they were cowards. The would have surrender regardless. If I call the control shop a diversion, which I don't think I did, I meant it was the fall back. But the battle for Naboo was won with the capture of Nute Gunray and the occupation would have ended regardless. It's as simple as that. The destruction of the control ship did lead to a more lives being saved though. The gungans were just about to be wiped out if it hadn't been destroyed.

 

Nutella Gunray! That's a great name for a sock account.

 

Yeah...my phone is trying to autocorrect at the worst times. I just woke up ten minutes ago.

 

That's one guess about what may've happened. Padme hoped that simply capturing Gunray would achieve that. In reality she'd still be completely surrounded by an army of troops. Her people would all be held at gunpoint. Gunray would have a very strong hand to negotiate. He could demand release & if she refused 100 people would be executed every minute. Padme wouldn't even be able to get Gunray out of the palace & away on a ship to face justice. It would be a siege situation. Really her plan was quite bad. Sacrifice fighters & Gungans to capture Gunray so that the entire TF & their armies would be..."confused" !

Fortunately her plan was saved by little Anie's zany accidental takedown of the DCS.

 

No guess. Padme captured the leader of the enemy. The battle was already won. With his capture, they have proof of the occupation and Gunray as prisoner. Add to the fact Gunray was a coward, he would do nothing to worsen his situation, unless anyone honestly believes the execution of more civilians would be a good idea. If anything, after the capture of Gunray, Maul would have been the only person who could turn the tables. But Sidious had no further need of the occupation and Maul was taken down my Obi-Wan anyways. Anakin's action ended up just saving lives when it's all said and done.

All Padme would do was negotiate the terms of surrender.

 

Wait a second... when was it ever said that the droid control ship only affected the army on the field, but not the droids in the city?

Seemed like an multi-front attack - if the infiltration failed (which it almost/seemingly did, but they had a back-up plan themselves in the form of the decoy), the pilots could've still blown up the station and saved them - or give them free passage without risk of getting shot.

After defeating the Gungans, the army could've returned to the city and gotten Padme before she got the Viceroy etc.


However, while certainly more crucial than just to save the Gungans (pfft who cares about those? no, I'm serious STEP RIGHT UP), all the battles (field, city, space) were auxilliary and secondary, yes: if those succeeded, but Nute fled, he would've returned with another army as was stated.

All of those cheering, happy Gungans at the end, incl. Tentacle-Stache and beloved Jar Jar... wouldn't it have been horrible if something happened to them?

Anakin did something worthy that day.

"Bad" writing, or maybe just mediocre, or not as tightly written as a three-front battle where everything depends on everything could've been - the battles sort of become disconnected from Padme's mission, something like "she almost loses, butt then captured him just before he escaped... but then the army starts closing in... but then finally the station is blown up" would've been a way to fully explore this set-up, and it wasn't done.

Instead, Padme triumphs after "everything seemed lost", then Obiwan is shown at his emotional low-point, almost triumphs but then is defeated and seems lost, then Anakin "regains enegy" and saves himself from his low point to triumph, that saves the gungans from their and also to triumph, and finally Obiwan triumphs.

Where's the weak point in those transitions? Well, lightsaber falling down the pit -> "we've got energy again" isn't that great, is it... so maybe have some bit inbetween there where the army's closing in on the city, threatening Padme's victory, and just then Anakin saves the day, justifying the epic tone while also not taking away other leads?

Where does it say it didn't mean anything? Surely eliminating the enemy's army does mean something - also, they never said it was supposed to prevent a single Gungan from being defeated; ultimately, it did save those who remained, which were quite a crowd.

So how was it a failure?

Aside from the "Skywalker and R2", the whole thing is a lot closer to ROTJ actually.

Well, the father becomes an epic space dictator and helps with the establishing of said dictatorship - that's quite an accomplishment, only an evil one.

"Stumbling" into a battle, accidentally winning it in a farcical fashion, but the victory not being as day-saving as it could've been as Padme already used her trump card and won by herself, doesn't mirror that in the slightest.

There is no theme of "his accomplishment on the good side are meaningless" theme running through the trilogy - mostly because there aren't any such accomplishments to begin with.

AOTC is mostly focusing on his own subplot disconnected from the main plot - and when he is involved, he's kind of a hothead in that movie and loses every major conflict; doesn't really catch the assassin, gets his saber broken and himself arrested, then loses to Dooku.

3 has Anakin defeat and Obiwan defeat Grievous, both ending up serving Palpatine's plan and lead to evil - that hardly is "meaningless victory", more like a backfiring victory against an enemy way ahead of you.

That is ACTUAL mirroring - and, if you notice, the ROTS bit doesn't involve him comically flying around on autopilot and then blowing up a ship while saying "oops" except some more important person already won the battle



Anything of "narrative dramatic importance" that could've been in TPM's space thing, was squandered in favor of the "wisecracking kid stumbles through the battle" gag - and the lacking connection between the battles didn't help matters, either.

I didn't find this OP convincing...

 

This will never not annoy me. What made Luke's victory so amazing were his skills and his reliance on the Force. Would've been amazing to see Anakin do likewise. Why, George, why?

 

So you could enjoy all of the hilarious madcap antics. From JarJar accidentally destroying battle droids to Anakin accidentally taking out the DCS.

 

The sequence of event is:

The Droid Army overruns and captures the Gungan Army
Vice Roy is Captured
Obi Wan is down and out
Anakin blows up Droid control ship
Obi Wan defeats Maul.

The most important part of the plan happens before Anakin destroys the ship, which was capturing the Vice Roy.

The problem I see here with people taking issue with my initial post is that not many are taking into account the plan that Padme lays out and what each step of her plan was meant to do. People are only looking at the final battle and adding their own factors onto it (ie could have's, yeah but's, and other factors that are in direct contrast to what Lucas has Padme say in her briefing). If Padme's initial plan and how it worked wasn't important, than why would Lucas go thru the step of detailing it and having the Jedi approve of it?

In Padme's plan, the most important factor was getting to the Vice Roy. He was the key as Padme points out, once they have him the Droid Army would be confused and leaderless. Meaning that even if the droid army was still active, it would be useless because they had the Vice Roy.

The plan to blow up the control ship, as per Padme, had nothing to do with capturing the Vice Roy, it had nothing to do with ensuring victory. It was a means to lessen the loss of life to the Gungans that were sacrificing themselves to draw the Droid Army out of the city.

The plan, as how Padme lays it out, is that Gungans draw the Droid Army out, this means that the Naboo Resistance can now attack the small drod forces left behind in the city, allowing Padme and her group to sneak in the Palace and capture the Vice Roy. The Vice Roy is the most important part of the plan. It is even said so in her plan.

The only time the droid control ship comes up is when Qui Gon brings up the fact that many Gungans will die, to which this is when Padme says she has a plan for that, and that is to send pilots up to take out the droid control ship. The entire point of the raid on the control ship was to lessen the loss of life for the Gungans during their battle, the point was hoping that the droids would be deactivated before the Gungans suffered a lot of losses. We see this is not what happens because the droids breach the shields, kill many gungans, overrun the gungans, and capture many gungans before the droids are deactivated. So the entire point of why the droid control ship must be taken out, is a failure because it doesn't do what it was meant to do.

It is a hollow victory on Anakin's part because his action doesn't save any lives because the gungans were already slaughtered, overrun, and being rounded up and the most important part of the plan, getting the Vice Roy had already happened. To which Padme pretty much states that as long as they have the Vice Roy, the droid army is irrelevant anyway.


Here's is the dialogue from Padme's plan from the movie...

Again, notice what Padme says about what is the most important part of the plan, what part of the plan everything is riding on and what role the raid on the control ship plays in her plan...

Edit: Padme's last line of Dialogue (bolded) shows is that even if the raid on the control ship fails, as suggested by the Jedi, that the most important part is still the Vice Roy...

To me, this has to be done purposely by Lucas in order to show that while Anakin did something heroic on the surface, it really meant nothing. Which mirrors what his son will do in ANH all those years later.

Lucas uses that Father Son mirroring between the OT and PT, between Anakin and Luke, doing similar things with different meanings and results. Another example is the confrontation on the second Death Star mirroring that of what happens in ROTS on Grievous ship. Anakins choice to kill a Sith Lord that he cut the hand(s) off of, which cements his path to the darkside while doing so in front of a Sith Lord clearly mirrors what Luke does on the Second Death Star, but the results, the choices, the meanings, are different between Father and Son.

So it is still my assertion that Lucas purposely mirrored the ending of ANH with TPM, but, the results of what Father and Son accomplish are completely different in their meaning and impact.

 

Um okay, so... how is her bringing up the space battle after the Gungan thing proof that its only purpose was to help the Gungans?
That circumstance CAN be used to suggest such a possibility, but that's kind of the problem isn't it? The writing's just not tight.

No one said anything about a "droid control ship" before the final act - in fact, when they were seemingly on that same ship in the beginning, the Jedi could've concluded that staying on the ship and trying to disable all the droids would've been the best move... but at that point, there was no droid control, was there?

It was something that was "invented" for the ending of the movie, and to boot, things don't get explained sufficiently either - do they control ALL the robots, or just those hanging around inside those hover tanks? Occam would opine that it's the former.

The droid control is only ever shown in conjunction with the grass army, but then again, that army was transported there from the city - Panaka said there was a huge army in the city that they wouldn't be able to take on, and this was the army that got lured away, so the droids probably just entered those tanks, got hanged on the things, and then got reactivated again.


So she brings up the space battle after it was said the Gungans would be killed - so what? They were obviously ONE of the reasons deactivating the robots had to be done, but then you gotta bring that up at SOME point in the brief... briefing, and that was a pretty apt moment to bring that in - obviously she would've regardless.

So then of course other outcomes can be considered - could it have happened in such a way that Padme would've required the rescue from the army? DID she, at the end of the day, but it simply never got close to such a situation?

Could she have Nute order the army to stop fighting? Several scenes happened between that and the ground battle "victory", so... the movie just forgot about the possibility, didn't it.



Point is, the script just comes up with this four-way attack, and the idea of the DCS, at the beginning of the last act, doesn't explain all the connections, and not all the connections are explored in the battle.

The fact we can sit here and argue about whether the DCS was controlling all the robots or just that one subgroup, is kind of a huge indicator that things weren't explained enough.


So, with all that considered, your idea of "empty victory" hinges upon all these assumptions, and also ignoring the fact that the outcome could've been a lot worse for the Gungans without that intervention - and that grabbing the Golden Snitch after your team had already won, IN NO WAY resembles or mirrors anything in Anakin's "arc" aside from that one episode in space.

 

Except Anakin and Jar Jar were using the Force.

That is rather the point.

Quite.

It was a dangerous, daring plan that could have went wrong.

Which is no different than the ludicrous Rebel plan in ANH which had no real chance of success save for the Luke using the Force. In comparison actually Padme's plan was sound but in the end it too succeeded due to another Skywalker using the Force.

Which was far better than doing nothing and having Naboo taken over and who knows how many Naboo and Gungans being killed.

 

Anakin didnae use the Force.

 

I disagree with the ANH comparison.
First one must look at Padme's plan from the start, ie when she is on Coruscant.
She knows next to nothing about the situation on Naboo.

As far as she knows the blockade would still be there. And given that they barely got through it last time, then her going back would most likely result in her ship getting blown up or captured.
But the TF are kind enough to withdraw all but one of their ships for no reason.

Second, she has no idea if the Gungans are still free or if they'll join her. And she also would have no idea if those Naboo fighters are still there or that they are fueled and armed.
But again the TF are kind enough to leave those fighters untouched in the palace they control.

To compare with ANH, the rebels had studied the DS plans and they had a good idea about what they were facing. They had seen that the DS defenses were designed against capital ships and not small fighters. A weakness they exploited.
They also knew were to hit the DS and while they knew it wasn't easy, they still thought it was possible. Red leader came quite close. Still it was very much a gamble, or maybe "just a fools hope."
In short, they made plans based on what they had and what they knew, Padme makes plans with no idea what she has or much knowledge.

Lastly, consider the alternatives.
What options did the rebels have?
They might be able to leave the base and get most of the people away but they would loose their base and much of their equipment. With the DS out there and causing terror, the rebels support would quickly dry up and they would get weaker by the day.
No, they would most likely never get a better chance at this. The DS HAD to be destroyed or the rebellion would be finished soon enough anyway.

Padme did have options, she could wait for Palpatine to become chancellor and see if he could do something. Sure her faith in the senate wasn't exactly good at this point.
But her actions seem more like she is making a gesture rather than doing something that could work.
She doesn't want to sit and wait while her people die. Sure I can understand that.
But if she gets killed or capture, that won't help them and could make it worse.
The rebels pretty much had to destroy the DS or the rebellion would be over soon anyway.
So waiting could and probably would spell the end of the rebellion.
Waiting for Padme would probably mean more deaths, not an easy choice to be sure, but it wouldn't doom her planet or her cause.

@mikeximus

I disagree that the destruction of the droid ship has NOTHING to do with getting Nute.
If the ship is blown up then Nute is without protection and has no means to leave the planet.
So capturing him would be made MUCH easier.

Also, how come Padme doesn't immediately order Nute to contact the droid ship and tell them to deactivate all droids on the surface?
That was her plan right? Capture Nute and thus rendering the droid army without a leader and she wants to save as many Gungan lives as possible.
So the first words out of her mouth would be just that, telling Nute to stand down all droid armies.
But instead she talks about making a new treaty and as far as the film goes, Nute never is told to contact the droid ship. So why does she waste time?
She knows that the droid ship has not been destroyed as the droids in the place are still active.

And suppose that she tried this plan at the start on the film, right after the Jedi had freed her.
If she and the Jedi could get to Nute, they would win. Nute would not be expecting this, he thought he had won and he had no idea that the Jedi were there. So if they could get close to him, take out his guards, they win. Would make for a very short film tough.

Also Padme's plan seem to operate under Chess rules of engagement, that all battle stops as soon as the King is captured.

But this shows that she did plan for that even before Qui-Gon mentioned Gungans dying.
So it possible and even quite reasonable that she would think that taking out the droid ship would make things much easier, not just for the Gungans. So it wasn't just to save Gungan lives.
If the droid ship is destroyed before they have gotten to Nute, they win.

So Padme is playing back up here, if they can get to Nute, they win.
And if they can destroy the droid ship then Nute is without protection or means to escape and easy prey and they win. So whichever happens first wins the day for her.

Do we see many Gungans dying? I don't recall even seeing one Gungan directly killed onscreen.
And the destruction of the droid ship as far from a failure as had that not happened, all those captured Gungans would most likely have been killed as Padme didn't tell Nute to stand down.
The droids had been ordered to kill them all, remember?
So you are wrong, Anakin saved many lives.

And I disagree for several reasons.
One, as I have already showed, Anakin saved the lives of all the captured Gungans and probably the lives of the remaning Naboo pilots as they would have kept trying to destroy the ship and would most likely have been shot down eventually.
Two, Luke's actions in ANH were far from hollow or meaningless, had he not destroyed the DS, it would have meant the end of the rebellion. Sure while ANH sort of implies that the loss of the DS would mean the end of the empire or that it would severely weaken it, ESB showed that this didn't happen.
But had Luke failed, then the rebellion dies. Story over. That makes it very different from Anakin.

And I think your interpretation overlooks some things.

Since her goal is to capture Nute but they know he is well guarded, by said droids, then taking out the droid ship will remove those guards and make capturing him much easier.

And again, if the droid ship is destroyed then Nute is most likely stuck and can't escape.
And taking out the droid ship makes it harder for the TF/Nute to call for reinforcements.

Bye for now.
Old Stoneface

 

" the Jedi could've concluded that staying on the ship and trying to disable all the droids would've been the best move"

Definitely. Especially after getting into a stand-off and being chased away just by a mere two droidekas!

 

And even if they could have done that, it's not like the federation didn't have an entire blockade's worth of other ships to help them out.

 

It was a "stand-off", they sounded pretty casual - with an all-winning option like deactivating the entire army, I'm sure they'd face the challenge (maybe by sneaking around and doing gorilla attacks).