Backtracking on the Vergere = Sith Retcon?

While perusing the latest issue of Insider today, I came across this in the Darth Krayt bio:

"Vergere, a fellow ex-Jedi who now lived among the Vong, seemed to reinforce the teachings of XoXaan by pointing out the folly of shutting out the totality of the Force by only focusing on its light side. By the time he left the Vong, A'Sharad had vowed to reestablish the Sith Order with himself as ruler."

Maybe it's wishful thinking, but this passage really struck me as a step away from the "Vergere is a Sith" direction that the EU has gone recently, and back towards the idea of Vergere as a much more ambiguous figure. We already have a retcon that can explain away Vergere's behavior in the Legacy comics, and so far I don't think there's been anything that's pushed the "Vergere = Sith" idea past the point of no return.

So, could this be an indication of a step back in the right direction? Are the authors taking into account fan backlash and moving Vergere out of the realm of Sith? (The article is by Dan Wallace, for those wondering.) Or am I reading way too much into this?

 

You're reading way too much into it. It'd be nice, though.

 

I don't think there is any way to explain away Vergere saying that she was a Sith trained by Sidious himself. Krayt had no reason whatsoever to lie to Cade about some random ex-Jedi woman from 1000 years before, who was emanating dark side vibes, had little to no impact on Krayt in the end - and who Cade had never heard of.

Anything is possible, but I think it would be difficult to achieve. However, I don't have a problem with her being a Sith, so I don't really see them as having taken a step in the wrong direction.

 

Maybe Vergere lied.
That's not because she said to Krayt she was a Sith that she really was.

 

Fact 1. Vergere never said she was a Sith, the only thing she ever claimed to be was a Jedi
Fact 2. The one who claimed Vergere was a Sith was Lumiya, and she had her own agenda

 

I can't help but picture Basil Fawlty saying "Don't mention the war!"...

I think keeping the issue vague might be a good course of action to avoid alienating fans of both persuasions, so yeah, it might be deliberate. It would be funny, though, if it wasn't and it's just a case of no author spelling the Sith status out explicitly.

 

I expect this is simply because Dan Wallace is actually good at writing reference material without colouring it with his particular prejudices, whichever side of the fence he himself may choose to sit, i.e. he's just better at writing this sort of thing than whoever writes the Jacen Skywalker articles.

Honestly, I doubt we'll ever get a straight answer about Vergere unless they decide to give us a novel from her point-of-view about her time in captivity or something. Given training with the Aing-Tii doesn't automatically make you into a Monk, at present all we know, from this article or anything else, is that Vergere was a lot like Jacen in that she studied everything but didn't particularly identify with any one thing, choosing instead to just be "Vergere".

At least, that's what we know from Traitor, and subsequently know from DW and LOTF that because she had trained with different people, it meant subsequently other characters became just as confused about her true agenda as we, the readers, are, with Jedi calling her a Jedi, and Sith calling her a Sith. So, until we actually get something from her POV, it seems between articles like this or the new encyclopaedia, etc, they're just committed to doing like Grey1 says: not answering the question.

Well, unless we go by what Mr. Jacen Skywalker says, which does establish her as Lumiya's Sith master IIRC, but... yeah... I also think that was the article that also talked about Jacen Skywalker, so admittedly, while I have no problem with the Sith retcon, I can't help but take everything in that article with a touch of "did this guy do any research?" salt.

 

I have the impression that they wanted to be definite in LotF, yet then realised they had gone too far and stepped up with the backpeddaling. Now we're back to square one I believe, what a waste of paper!

 

Try not to see it as "backpeddaling" but rather as "challenging your preconceived notions". Doesn't work for me, though.

 

The Vergere debate is like Republicans vs. Democrats... it never ends, does it?

 

There are several questions here:

1.) Was Vergere a Sith?

2.) Was Vergere lying to Jacen in Traitor?

3.) Was Vergere a bad person?

I'm not sure what the answers are, which is probably a point, but it's worth pointing out that before Traitor, she'd been developed as a very ambiguous character by Bear, Luceno, and especially Denning, who established that her advice to Tsavvy directly facilitated the destruction of two NR fleets, and that she was responsible for betraying the Myrkr mission to Nom Anor and for leading the YJK into a trap...

We shouldn't discard the subtleties of Traitor, but we shouldn't discount the fact she's got a very nasty streak, as well...



- The Imperial Ewok

 

Am I missing something? Doesn't this passage lend support to "Vergere = Sith" rather than contradict it?

 

For someone standing completely outside the debate, I find it amusing that this could somehow be LFL responding to "fan backlash".

As I recall it was "fan backlash" at the possibility of there being someone so ill defined by the "Jedi/Sith" hierarchy that supposedly had Vergere declared a Sith in the first place. The whole NJO aftermath was a circus of redefining things like the Unifying Force and Vergere's theories to protect the light/dark mythos.

If LFL is truly being that wishy-washy with the whims of the screaming minorities on message boards, the franchise has lost another leaf of integrity.

Fact of the matter is they need to just be still about it. Leave it to rest...and as with most things in the universe that are semi-suspect...fandom will mutate the explanations into a plausible acceptance by most.

 

The other one (Krayt) who asserted to Cade that Vergere said she was a Sith and trained under Palpy (and there was dark in her), gained nothing by the telling from what I could tell. Cade hadn't heard of her. Anyway I think it was more that revelation than anything occurring in NJO/DN/LOTF that lent to the idea of her being a Sith.

I don't see that it matters much since people will judge Vergere on what she said and did anyway. Although initially a Jedi for certain; if she was ultimately a Jedi, then she was a darkish one to me and if she was a Sith, then she wasn't quite up to snuff. If she claimed to be neither, then she was fooling herself as I see it.

 

Vergere having once been trained as a Sith by Sidious (and then rejecting his beliefs and trying to kill him) does not make her a Sith, Sith-allied, or a darksider in later life?which to me has always been the real meaning when people say "Vergere is a Sith". Since the crux of that whole retcon is her training of Jacen and what it meant, and what she was up to 60 years ago wouldn't be particularly relevant to that.

Recall that Vergere went through nothing there?train under Sidious, learn Sith teachings, turn against him?that the Grand Master of the Order himself didn't do.

 

I agree with that ^^, but by the time we caught up with her in canon as a more embellished character (NJO), she was purposely and continuously undertaking acts that I consider 'dark'. She also did some 'light' acts, but that never saves one from being a darksider. What I meant above by her fooling herself by claiming to be "neither" wasn't quite stated correctly, I meant if she claimed she was 'nothing' at all except 'Vergere' and free from mundane labels such as light and dark (distinguished from Sith/Jedi) - then she was mistaken in my opinion.

 

Hm. So now rejection of his teachings and attempted murder is a valid disqualifier for being a Sith? But still any Sith who tries to kill their Master, no matter the circumstance, is as true a member of the RoT as any other?

Enlighten me on this apparent discrepancy?


Oh, and as you bring up, that would extend to Luke as well. Making him a true RoT. Whoa! Tell me you don't seriously think so.

 

I believe Hydronium was being rhetorical. "Just because of X, does not necessarily Y make."

Just stick [automatically] in his sentence and I think you'll get what he actually meant, i.e.

"Vergere having once been trained as a Sith by Sidious (and then rejecting his beliefs and trying to kill him) does not [automatically] make her a Sith..."

This is true, however in light of the "rainbow" philosophy of the Aing-Tii it isn't as unusual as it sometimes sounds. Even though the Jedi are right (which they are, per G-Canon), the list of wider Force cultures shows not all of them necessarily recognise the dualism of the Force.

Which raises the question of whether all of them are misguided too or whether it's just not possible to reconfigure your mind to understand unless you've genuinely been brought up since birth in a culture that treats everything in a similarly abstract way, which presumably anyone that's been raised in the GFFA is going to struggle to comprehend, since their whole social structure is built on opposites (humans and aliens, left wing and right wing, peace and war, etc, etc).

In contrast, since people like the Aing-Tii seem to be, um, how shall I put this politely... arguably somewhat wacko and living in a fantasy dream land the whole time, utterly clueless about what to do when they have a political disagreement, forever gazing into the past, present and future all as one, it may be that their minds just don't see absolutes in anything.

 

No, I got that. It is just that he has in the past implied that a Sith apprentice of Palpatine attempting to kill him categorically makes that apprentice a RoT, regardless of the circumstances under which it was done. So I found it odd to hear him cast doubt on Vergere's validity as a Sith when she had done the same, just because she rejected his teachings.

 

Well that is how I saw it - it works for the Aing-Tii, who live off in the wilds of the galaxy and don't have much going on in the way of interacting with others. It doesn't really matter whether their view is misguided or not, it works for them, but it doesn't work in the galaxy proper. While living with the Vong, it could work for Vergere, but once they all arrive in the galaxy proper - well you know, when in Rome...

I never bought into the unifying force or the rainbow ideology. Not because of constraints set forth by G Canon, because I allow for EU to grow in terms of philosophy and ability, etc. (you have to figure that is normal overtime) - but rather because the outcome appeared to be confusion and nothing concrete. There was no need to create an entirely new outlook or philosophy merely because the Vong could not be felt in the Force. Just accept that and broaden your view to encompass that all living things may not be felt in the Force and move along. What they were doing was wrongful to other living beings and they had to be stopped - I mean to me it was pretty academic.

 

Let's try reading that again, shall we?

If you're going to try quoting me to catch me on a statement I made six months ago, at least quote the full context of what I'm saying.

Yes, rejecting the teachings of the Dark Lord of the Sith does, in fact, have an effect on that whole "being a Sith" thing. As you can see in your quote there, the idea that killing one's master is the only prerequisite for being an RoT Sith was your statement. One also has to kinda, well, choose to be a Sith. Rejecting them and running off would seem to preclude that, yes?

 

So let me see if I got this right:

Maul not being trained to supplant Palp, yet attempting to kill him after being goaded into it, makes Maul a genuine RoT Sith, but Vergere having actually learned but rejected her Sith teachings makes her a non-Sith? That about right? Rather inconsistent logic there. I trust you can see where I got confused.

EDIT: Just to clarify the inconsistency: In the first instance you say not knowing or practicing a philosophy makes someone an adherent to it by unwittingly following it once, against his better judgment. In the second instance you say knowing a philosophy but rejecting it doesn't make you an adherent. Both feature individuals not following a philosophy, yet one of them is an adherent in spite of this, while the the other isn't. That's not consistent.

 

Do we know Vergere rejected the idea of being a Sith?
I thought the story was she saw Palpatine as too much of a monster, thats why she tried to kill him

Not because he was a Sith, and she was suddenly against Sith ideas

 

We only know what Krayt told us, so ultimately we don't really know either way. This is why I want a novel about her life with the Vong.

I daresay one of the reasons Krayt liked her was because he rejected what the Banites taught too. He probably felt a sense of shared understanding with her, taking her to have come to a similar epiphany as he did, i.e. that the Sith are good, but just Palpatine wasn't.

What she thought though? Not a clue.

 

What about the argument that the dark side begins inside sentient beings, most notably oneself? That's G-Canon, it was the lesson of the cave in ESB as well as being in TUF.