Did Sidious destroy Mace's posse TOO easily?

Taking down those 3 Jedi in a couple seconds is there to show that nearly no Jedi stands a chance against Sidious. I do not believe that they were destroyeed too easily, but I can see why you would think that.

 

lol. Yeah I read that just now in someone's signature and I started laughing. 500 times faster is extremely fast. And then if you end up crawling on the ground at the end, you obviously arent THAT fast.

 

no it is NOT improbable to think that, as it has been known (in the EU however) that use of the darkside for a very long time damages your features.............maul and dooku were not sith for very long...and they were as evil as palpatine was...then there is the issue of the mask, which i wont get into here, for this is not the right place....but what IS imporobly to think is that it was the lightning ONLY that damaged his face, as luke nor yoda nor mace nor anakin get deformed in the least bit....the insider states that the lightning was was sparked/ damaged his face, but it was his tremdous raw darkside usage/power that actually shapped it...i was simply throwing some ideas out their on how they could solve that problem

and they did NOT change it because "it was improboblee that he would stand there"...they changed it because when they had shot that scene, the orignal sript had anakin becoming a sith in the halway the scene before, but they felt it was rushed, so they decided to make his fall to the darkside more spur of the moment and more believable

 

In response to the main topic, yes and no.

I think we were meant to see that Sidious had some serious speed and ability. The first time I saw this in the theater, I was in total fanboy mode and thought it was so badass...upon subsequent viewings I have noticed slight flaws with the choreography which sort of lessen the experience.

He telegraphs his stap against Master Kolar way too long, and Master Tinn seems to be on some sort of drug because his reaction time is way too slow.

Master Fisto could have lasted a bit longer, to add some realism to the fight.

Overall, it does a fair job of showcasing Sidious as a true Sith Lord..but... the choreography....

 

I would've liked to see the duel less about just Mace and Sidious and have the council members get killed off progressively during the duel, maybe have one killed at the beginning, have the other 3 push Sids back, he can kill another one of them 10-20 seconds in, and have him take the last two until almost the end, where he kills the third, and after he and Mace duel for slightly longer, Mace disarms him.

 

It's not that unrealistic in this Universe that he finishes them quickly, as I said, because his Darkside abilities greatly augment his speed, but the choreography made it look a little less believable.

 

This has probably been said before (though not in this thread). Anyway...

You might have raised a telling point there. In Qui Gonn's monologue in TPM, he explains the nature of Jedi reflexes: it's not that they have terrifically quick reactions, but that they can see what happens before it happens and are thus prepared for the coming events. Now, assuming that the Dark Side is clouding everything more than ever at this point, perhaps the weaker of the Jedi present fail to see what's approaching them extremely fast (not 500 times as fast, perhaps, but extremely fast nevertheless)? This scene can, therefore, be interpreted as indicating that the force is now talking less effectively to the Jedi.

My regret is that we didn't have one other relatively major character being cut down in this way (ie one who'd had lines in the past), as this would have doubled the shock value of the scene, e.g. viewer: "Ki-Adi's gone? just like *that*??? <Luke-style howl>NOOOOOO!</Luke-style howl>"

NB I just used Ki-Adi as an example: I wouldn't give up his death scene during Order 66 for *anything*!

Angus

 

There's a reason he's the Emperor, the guy's just bad. They had never fought a Sith Lord master before, and his speed took them off guard. it;s one of my favorite scenes in the film.

 

I agree totally. They were trained Jeid masters and they were cut down like nothing. They didn't even move... except for Kit. Anyways, I feel it owuld have shown Palp's ability mroe if he cut down three jedi masters while in a duel with all three plus Mace, but oh well.

 

(to padawanjoe)

1. Who said it only damaged his face? The face is just the only part you see. I would compromise to say that because he is the one emitting the lightning, it is messing him up, because he is using up power while simultaneously getting fried.

2. I have a source that says they changed it because it wasnt believable that Anakin would stand there as 4 Jedi get killed. I will post it if you'd like.

(to angus)

1. What about blaster bolts, they often block blaster bolts by thousands of battle droids, even while the dark side is clouding things, and they duel dooku, duel maul, block lightning, and mace beats sidious and yodas duel him evenly. The dark side may cloud things, but the Jedi still have extradordinary reflexes.

 

How about Palpatine's eerie scream before attacking, as he spun through the air?

Some speculate this is a Force ability used to dull and confuse an opponent's reflexes.

 

What's worse is that Mace Windu does nothing to show that he's any better than a normal Jedi. His moves are average yet they defeat the guy who just killed his friends in less than 10 seconds. The fight is very inconsistent.

But we must keep in mind that this scene was filmed twice. It started out with Anakin in the room originally. So they edited both versions together after pick-ups and thought they came out with the best version possible. I wonder how different version one was from version two.

 

Ya, it did seem like he went through them a little fast. When watching the film I immediately thought: okay, "he's killed one, two, maby I should get ready because Pals is coming at me?" It didn't seem too realistic? It just looked like they were standing around: come on kill me, i'll give ya the first swing!" I know that the scene was designed to make Palps look ridiculously powerful, but I think it should have been just "a little" bit more realistic.

I like cidfireeyes' idea: "I think they should have replaced Grievous?s 4 lightsaber dual with obi-wan and made Palpatine?s a 4 lightsaber dual. That would have been a lot cooler and would have really showed how powerful he was to defeat them at the same time instead of taking them out one by one. They way it looked in the movie it is like they just stood there and let him cut them in two. Didn?t Mace tell them before they got there that Palp was a Sith and maybe they should be ready and not stand there and let him kill them. Or did Mace really think that Palp was gonna stand up and say ?OK, you got me I guess the gig is up, take me away.?

-I agree, the Grievous/Obi Wan fight was cool, but I thought that there should have been more emphasis placed on the "Pals/Mace and Crew" Fight! It seemed like more was at stake.

 

If anyone has ever swordfought, or even swung arounda broom, you'd see theduel with Palpatine is just ridiculous. Like when he's in bewteen Kit and Mace. And he effectively blocks them both and such. That is ludicrous. It's like they cut at the saber just to hit the saber, not even trying to kill the other guy.

And why did Mace pull his saber back to swing? He could just nudge it forward to kill him. No force was neccessary.

 

I give Palpatine credit where credit is due. I think what Mr. Lucas is telling us during this scene is either Palpatine's power on display, or his speed is unmatched. Even Yoda had all sorts of problems with Palpatine one on one. Mace Windu showed that he should have come alone and arrest Palpatine since he was the only one out of the four to give Palaptine a real fight. It would have given better satisfaction to some people who didn't like the idea of three Jedi Council members getting dismembered so easily.

 

yes i would like to see that source, he could very well just stand there, because when they shot that version of the scene, he was already crowned a sith...simlilar to how palaptine watches luke and vader duel and just sits there, similair to how dooku just watches at th e arena

 

? No not similar at all.

Dooku didnt go down into the arena because it increased his danger. Both with friendly fire and being more accessible to being hit by the Jedi.

Palpatine just sat there because the goal was to turn Luke, not kill him.

Anakin would have helped Palpatine if he was truly a Sith, or helped Mace if he hadnt yet turned.

Source- (if you dont wanna read the whole thing) As you would imagine, the fact that Anakin just stands around watching all this and does nothing is a little hard to swallow so Lucas decided to re-edit some of this sequence to make it flow a little better while reshooting much of the ending plus some other scenes to fill in the gaps on Anakin's whereabouts while the fight is going on.

Link- http://www.starwarz.com/tbone/cut_scenes/ep3/mace_windu.htm

 

well lucas didnt say that was why they changed the scene, they may have been a reason, but i would have prefered anakin to watch the duel still trying to decide if he watned to join mace or palpatine

 

yes, because it would be hard to swallow.

 

Yes! Also true...we never really see Mace doing anything to show he's the second best in the entire Jedi order (Clone War cartoons aside), and maybe the best lightsaber duelist. Yet he defeats Palpatine, or at least out-duels him, while the other 3 are chopped like liver.

And to me, if Palpatine was SO powerful that he could totally cloud their force usage to the point where they couldn't see anything coming at all, then even Mace and Yoda couldn't have stood up to him. Yet Mace outdueled him and Yoda showed (in my opinion) an overall stronger force ability and power, even though circumstances led him to lose the duel.

 

The scene remains disappointing because Sidious didn't look like he was moving quickly.
Perhaps they should have used slow-motion?

 

Yes, he took them out too quickly. Even though Mace was more powerfull than the other Jedi of his party...he shouldn't of lasted as long as he did IF Sidious could take out 3 masters in a matter of seconds. Personally I think that the fight should have lasted a bit longer with Sids defending and attacking against 4 Masters for an extended period...That would have shown me that he was a bad mo fo. Sure leave Mace as the last one standing and end it all the same but Sids should have used some really low down dirty cheap cheating way of killing the other 3 masters to just show how ruthless he is. One other thing is that he entered a straight up fight. No one as crooked as him would enter a fair fight. Yea i know that he beleived that he would clean house, hence not a risk...but he still fought fairly. Dooku was more underhand than Sids.(picking up Obi and flinging him across the room and dropping the walkway on him) Sidious should have done things to make that look fair. I just think he should have been made a little more sneaky and bad.

 

I don't think Lord Sidious took them out too quickly. It is obvious that the Jedi had no idea how powerful he was, and thus were taken completely by surprise.

Their arrogance blinded them, and they paid the ultimate price for it.

 

FWIW, I also didn't care for how the Jedi, other than Mace, were made to look like chumps. But hey, it was done for effect and in all honesty, arguing about realism in SW is like complaining about the lack of scientific truth in Spider-Man.

What's amusing to me is that if the four Jedi came in there and proceeded to give Palpatine/Sidious the beating of his life and he had to let Anakin save him, we would most likely have a thread griping about how "Sidious was too much of a wuss" and "he shouldn't have needed Anakin to take them out."

 

I just think it was portrayed badly. Using the description from the book (I know, I know, not canon) it said that Palpatine used exceptionally fast speeds when cutting down the Jedi. That would seem to be what happened during this scene in the movie. The only problem is the movie failed to show Palpatine at excepetion fast speeds. The movie made him look slow, and therefore the scene looked off.