Boba Fett: Good or Bad?

I'm not sure if this has already been covered in these forums so I am putting out the question. After reading the Bounty Hunter War's series I thought it would be interesting to see what people think about the galaxy's most imfamous Bounty Hunter. Is Boba Fett good or is he bad?

 

Canonically, it's written that he's a bad guy. (e.g. in a universe descriptor)

 

He seems to have a policy of "strictly buisness" on everything. He's not evil in that he doesn't want to exact vengeance on Han, or do evil stuff for the sake of being evil. He seems to me like the ultimate capitalist, he looks out for himself first, and he'll do any assasination or bounty hunting job for the right amount of money. The one that sticks out in my mind that makes him seem like a good character was in one of the Tales book, apparently Leia is thrown into a room with him while they are in Jabbas palace. Fett makes no attempt to take advantage of her, i think he even gives her a blanket...

 

Well,He really is a bad guy,IMO.But,I remember him saying something in one of the YJK books like, "I'm not good,and I'm not bad.I don't take sides,I'm in the middle" (or somehting like that)

 

He's neither good nor bad. He does what he does because he gets paid.

 

He's a bounty hunter. While that's generally put him on the side of being bad, that doesn't necessarily mean that he is a "bad guy".

 

I believe he is good even though the way he carries out things can seem bad. Like I remember him telling Leia (I don't remember what book off the top of my head) That he believes the Alliance is evil because it is messing with order. So he likes order and laws and thats alright...I dunno hes never been a "bad guy" to me.

 

He's kinda down the middle. He'll do almost anything for credits, except things that go against his morals, such as rape. That stuff is explained in one of the Fett short stories in one of the "Tales" books.

Example:

Jabba sends Leia to Fett as "company" for the night. Fett instead tells her to cover up and sleep on the bed, while he slept in a chair.

 

eh, when Darth Vader has to remind you not to disentegrate people, that's bad.

when you kill people for money, that's bad.

I mean really, just because he says he is in the middle and its all about the credits doesn't make it OK. Having no emotional attatchment to the people you kill because it's all for the cash doesn't make it not evil.

 

If he was evil he would go out and kill people just for the sake of killing he does it just for the money.
Also how many of his hits have been against people that actually deserve to die kind of in a Boondock Saints Fashion.

 

Fett is very particular about what jobs he takes, though. I somehow doubt he'd go off and raze an orphanage for money, as opposed to taking out an expensive and dangerous target elsewhere.

Doesn't his story in 'Tales from the New Republic' make him out to be a decent guy, too?

 

I always saw Fett as a neutral guy. Like stated above, going wherever the higher price took him. I think it's in REBEL DAWN where Fett is hired by one character to get Han, then later takes a deal from another character that orders him to leave Han alone because it paid more. Fett even briefly nabs Lando and some girl at one point in the story, but gives them up when another character offers him more than what he was initially paid.

 

Like his dad said," I'm just a simple man trying to make my way in the universe."

 

He was neither, and that's kind of bad. Fett is the ultimate in distached, amoral characters - but, to quote Dante, "The Hottest places in all Hell are reserved for those, who at time of Great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.

I'd also add that the aforementioned point about Vader's reminder to Fett ("No disintegrations!") really does put a damper on any idea he's good.

He's an anti-hero, which I think explains his appeal. He's not likely to go out, rape, pillage and torture kids; so his "badness" comes from his attitude, not his stereotypical meglomania.

E_S

 

Doesn't his story in 'Tales from the New Republic' make him out to be a decent guy, too?

Yeah, he gives a lot of money to a bunch of poor kids and lets the guy he's been hunting for years live.

 

ok, so he doesn't kill children, and lots of his targets were bad themselves.

So?

1. He had to be reigned in by a Dark Lord of the Sith.

2. That whole bringing Han (i.e. a good guy) back to Jabba because he owed Jabba money to be tortured and killed. Does anybody here think Jabba was gonna give him a slap on the wrist?

3. He worked for Jabba, another bad guy. A crimelord who dealt in slavery and spice. He stood idly by as Jabba whacked Luke into the rancor pit, Luke being another good guy. He wasn't exactly being a good guy on the sail barge either. But lets look over that since he didn't rape Leia when he was given the chance.

4. He seemed fairly vicious in AotC too, but I will let that slide since he was a kid then and following in his father's footsteps (another bad guy).

Guys, there is a very good reason why killing people for money is illegal in most civilized nations in the world. That would be because it is bad.

Now, I think, as a character, Boba Fett is cool as hell. I thought Darth Maul was cool too, but that didn't make him good. And just because he has a personal sence of right and wrong doesn't make him a good person. Lots of convicts think child molesting is wrong, but that doesn't make them good people. They may even be in prison for, say, killing people for profit.

Honestly, I shouldn't be getting so worked up over this, it just seems blatantly obvious to me that he is a bad guy. An interesting bad guy, maybe a bad guy with depth, but still a bad guy.

 

He was a bad guy. He killed people for money, he kidnapped people and held them against their will, he delivered people to other people to be tortured and/or killed.

 

I think it's important to note that bad people are not necessarily bad all the time. Just because Boba Fett has done a few nice things, doesn't mean he was a good guy.

Boba Fett was a bad mama-jama.

 

He wasn't a bad guy. He was just misunderstood & shunned by a cruel galaxy...

...and he lost his father tragically...

...and think of the issues he had about his mother.

 

"No, not evil...he's little more than a machine, a tool to do a job. He's a man with no heart, no feelings, no interest other than the price on another man's head.

~ Sacrifice

Boba might have turned out good, but he was screwed about with loads when he was a kid. Betrayed by his allies, Dooku, Aurra Sing, his only friend, Fett's got a skewed view on the Galaxy.

"I pity Boba Fett."

~ Daron Bren, Rebel leader

 

He's "just a simple man trying to make his way in the universe." He does what he does to make money to survive. If someone's job is an executionor, does that make them a bad person? Boba Fett doesn't take particular joy in what he does, he does it because he has to. He isn't sadistic or anything. If you recall the Han Solo trilogy, Bria Tharen thought that Boba was going to kill her so she asked him to tell Han that she was dead. It turned out that Boba didn't kill her, but later, when she died of totally unrelated causes, Boba Fett tracked down Solo. Fett cornered Solo in an alley, and simply said, "Bria Tharen is dead." He then left. He didn't kill his archenemy and he honored a woman's dying wish. That takes character.

The rebellion hired assasins, they killed people, were they evil? Boba even took a rebellion job or two if I recall. I think I remember reading that somewhere.

And with reference to Empire #7: Sacrifice, Boba didn't kill all of the rebels, he only brought in the one he was hired to bring in. He only killed the others in self defense.

Warrior_of_Mandalore Strikes Again!

 

Boba seems to have skewed more to the light as time went on. First, he did that thing for Bria. Then, a few years later, there was Leia. Then there was the orphanage, and the letting bounties go, and helping sick and dying people, and so on. By the end of the NJO, he was fighting to protect the people on that space station, and he also went from world to world, freeing them and killing the Vong that stayed behind with his pseudo-mandalorians.

Given his childhood, parentage, and how he was raised and lived his early years, he probably turned out pretty well, all things considered.

 

Guys, there is a very good reason why killing people for money is illegal in most civilized nations in the world. That would be because it is bad.

Military snipers and police snipers would seem to be basically government sanctioned and paid to do just that. And while I may not think it is morally right for people to kill someone just to be paid, I think the real reason why killing folks for money is illegal in most civilized nations is because the leaders of those nations fear the fact that if it wasn't illegal it would be a lot easier for someone to kill them and get away with it.

 

Well, first I must ask for a list of the quality Fett-fiction that has been written, as I've learned not all is great. And if it's not great, it's not canon in my mind! I've read the novel Tales of Everything Series, so you know.
I think that the SW universe is improving if we can't decide if a given character is good or bad. I don't think we should. However, I think that Boba is the coolest grey guy in the galaxy. George may not have meant for the set-dressing to get his own following, but that's what happens when an entire culture layers its own mores on a character, and I hope that he lets him mostly alone in ep.III. I feel that he is the product of his life, and growing every day. Yeah, as a little protected kid, he thought 'splosions were cool, but who didn't?Later, we can see his growth, as an enforcer of the law, then disillusioned with the law, using the skills he has to enforce the Law in his own mind, them coming to terms with what being "human" really is.
And I hope that's all we get, as his personal life after the age of 35 is my territory! Yeah!

 

The author Susan Mayse did an essay on Boba Fett a few years ago that explores the good or bad issue. It's an interesting read.
Tao of Boba Fett.
I go along with her opinions on Boba.