PT How did Obi-Wan and Yoda find out about Owen and Beru?

So as we all know at the end of ROTS Obi-Wan and Yoda decide to send Luke to Owen and Beru on Tatooine. How did they know about them though? As far as I know they had never met them before in Canon or Legends. I don't think Anakin would of mentioned them either, with them being related to his mother. Anyone got some good explanations/theories?

 

They probably learned about them when they debriefed Anakin in Episode II. Anakin obviously hid his Tusken massacre from them, but he almost certainly would have had to tell them most everything else.

 

Case closed.

 

I wonder how much Anakin told the Jedi about the Sand People. It's different circumstances but Anakin went on to kill quite a few Geonosins a short time later. If we get an Obi-Wan movie, maybe we'll find out more about when he and Yoda knew and his relationship with Owen and Beru.

Speaking of Obi-Wan, if he had showed up in A New Hope and killed the Tusken Raiders that attacked Luke before we knew anything about the Jedi, I don't think the audience would have thought it was wrong at all. Very telling that he didn't kill though.

 

No debrief of Anakin is even alluded to in AOTC or ROTS.

If we are to use the excuse for Jedi complacency regarding the clones, a war just started so they didn't have time or opportunity to ask Anakin what he was doing on Tatooine. They are either oblivious or unperturbed at him going off the Naboo to marry Padme so it would not seem that Anakin was under any real scrutiny at that point.

 

The Jedi know Anakin has returned to Naboo at the end of AOTC, Obi-Wan says he's escorting the senator home.

 

This could have played countless ways as the films never stated that Anakin or anyone else kept the existence of the Lars family a secret, why would they...?

1. Obi Wan knew Anakin was on Tatooine (R2 told him in AotC) when contacting them. Also, it seems easy to retrace transmissions (ANH plan transmission) and thus locating where someone is.

2. The Jedi/Yoda felt Anakin's great pain and anger when his mother died. They likely as his mentors/teachers talked about it afterwards.

3. Obi Wan knew Anakin went to visit her on Tatooine. They even talked about his mother in Clones. It is unfathomable that Obi Wan and Anakin (slowly becoming friends with time) would not talk about that visit (against orders) and what transpired there. Anakin likely left out/toned down the massacre parts, only telling that to Palpatine, as we know...

3. Also, Padme could have told Obi Wan about the Lars family (maybe they even had a thing going). I deem item 2. and 3. above more likely or natural, but it's a possibility.

4. Last but not least, even if the natural persons strangely kept it a secret, does anybody think C-3PO kept his mouth shut about where he came from, or after the twins were born and they were pondering what to do with them (before his memory wipe)...? Or even R2-D2 for that matter. I think the the droids did it.

Anyway, there are many natural explanations so that we do not have to stress a deus-ex-machina "the Force did it" explanation...

 

So they were just unperturbed or uninterested with whatever happened or didn't happen that resulted in him disobeying direct orders.

 

He told them that he went back because of his dreams about Shmi, which Obi-wan would collaborate as having been occurring for a month. While there he found out about his new relatives and his mother's freedom and then he found her, only to see her die. They're not pleased that he disobeyed orders to stay on Naboo, much less on Tatooine, but the deed is done. He disobeyed orders twice. As far as we know, he was not punished for it.

 

They probably figured he paid his penance for his excursion to Tatooine by experiencing firsthand the awful suffering that comes with holding on to attachments, and that he paid his penance for going to Geonosis by losing his arm to Count Dooku. Anakin does seem to (outwardly) mature very quickly in between the end of Episode II and the start of TCW, probably as a result of these experiences.

 

So it's a yawning gap in the narrative that is only filled by a spin off animated series.

Imagine Luke leaving his Dagobah training before it's finished without any scene with Yoda telling him not to go and there never being a scene in ROTJ where they discuss Luke's experience on cloud city, what Vader told him, how he feels about it.

 

No, not at all. TCW doesn't explain the situation anymore than ROTS, Phantom Calamari was just using the nearest chronological point after AOTC to show a shift in Anakin.

As for your comparison, it would be exactly like Luke going from a rash, not fully trained Jedi, to a fully trained, refined, character, including building his own lightsaber, without any exposition how.

 

So this Anakin debrief and what he did and didn't tell the other Jedi, and Obi Wan/Yoda/The council's response to what happened, or what Anakin told them happened is fan ficition?

Not at all. For that is not even the narrative of ROTJ.

A fully trained, refined Jedi is by no means defined in any film.

IT's not set up that one kmust be a fully trained and refined character in order for Luke to preform as he does at Tatooine (which is arguably not fully refined although he is ultimately successful. He requires the help of several non-Jedi to achieve this.). So your definition that this is what Luke represents at the beginning of ROTJ is purely your own imposition.

The requirement to be fully trained or the special qualities for building a lightsaber are not set up or narrated in any prior Star Wars film. So again, that's purely your assumption that this is the requirement that needs to be conveyed prior to Luke brandishing a new weapon and it not be a gap or a plot hole.

The very next scene after this is Yoda telling us that Luke requires not further training. And that he already knows that which he needs. In reference to the training he has already had on Dagobah and the ordeal which he survived on Bespin (i.e. things that we know happened in the narrative). When Vader recognises his skills as being complete, this is adding more definition to what Yoda has already said.

In other words there were no pre-conditions applying to Luke's performance and equipment at the beginning of ROTJ that required exposition. The exposition that comes afterwards adds definition to what we already know has been said and done.



In AOTC, Anakin goes to Tatooine is secret. He goes looking for his mother in secret. He discovers a step-family he never knew he had. Learns that his mother has been abducted. Goes in search of her and finds her. Watches her die and goes on a killing spree in the Tusken camp. All in secret from the Jedi.

No debrief is alluded to. If we assume that one took place then what was said and how the Jedi reacted to it are absolutely crucial in adding dimension to what came before and what is to come after it.

At the beginning of ROTS it's as if Tatooine and Geonosis never happened.

If Anakin lied, which means Padme would be compelled to lie, to cover up the slaughter then it makes the Jedi seem rather credulous, but it also marks a big watershed moment for both Anakin and Padme. As crucial a moment as the slaughter itself. One which you would think deserves to be either depicted or exposited. So that we can understand how the Jedi became satisfied with the answer enough that they allowed Anakin to escort Padme back to Naboo almost immediately.

If Anakin was truthful in the debrief, then that is just as crucial moment for the Jedi. Anakin admits breaking just about every code the Jedi follow, and disobeying a direct order. He slaughters a village, including women and children. And in the aftermath of Geonosis, where the residual effects of his experience on Tatooine almost gets Obi Wan killed, the Jedi pack him off with Padme back to Naboo like business as usual. Even though Obi Wan is aware of the growing attachment betwen the pair, and attachment that will now have to replace the one between Anakin and his mother which got him into this awful mess in the first place.


Either of these probable scenarios adds different dimensions to what we already know was said and done, but we don't know if ANY scenario took place, never mind the crucial details of it. So for all intents and purposes, the Jedi never took any interest in Anakin's excursion to Tatooine or are entirely oblivious.

This is the sum total of narration of what happened to Anakin on Tatooine.

And that's it. It's never spoken about, even obliquely, that would add definition to Obi-Wan or the Jedi's thoughts on what Anakin might be doing there. And no allusion whatsoever to them discerning the truth or Anakin concealing it from them after Genosis. It's as if it never happened.

As far as we know, what happened on Tatooine with his mother is something that ONLY Palpatine is aware of or even interested in, beyond Obi Wan's double take when tracking him down there in AOTC.

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ESB

As Luke is leaving for Bespin,

Yoda: Luke! You must complete the training!​

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If you end your training now, if you choose the quick and easy path, as Vader did, you will become an agent of evil.​

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Ergo, Luke's training is incomplete​

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ROTJ​

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In Yoda's hut,​

Luke: I've come back to complete the training​

Yoda: No more training do you require.​

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Unfortunate that you rushed to face him... that incomplete your training was​

​

Later, on the Imperial walkway,​

Vader: I see you have constructed a new Lightsaber. Your skills are now complete.​

​

Ergo, Luke has gone from not being fully trained, to being fully trained offscreen between the movies, with no explanation how or why. He hasn't returned to Yoda in that period at all.​

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Additionally, Luke's entire attitude changes between films. In ESB, he's impatient, rash, cocky. In ROTJ, he's stoic, patient, and much more serious.​

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This change is completely unexplained.​

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As for Anakin, from what we can tell from the films, Anakin must have told the Jedi he went to Tatooine with Padme, as they know about Owen and Beru in ROTS, and Obi-Wan would probably have wanted to know what he was doing there in the first place.​

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As the Jedi seemingly have no knowledge about the Tusken Slaughter, I think it's fair to say that Anakin must have lied to the Jedi about, no major leap in logic, as he's already lied to them about his relationship with Padme.​

 

Luke went to Bespin, survived and returned as he promised. Yoda did not expect this and so concluded that he had nothing more that he could teach Luke ergo, his training is now complete. Ergo, Luke's performace on Tatooine can be described as that of a trained Jedi.

You would be changed and less cocky if you had someone cut your hand off then tell you he's your father, and not the man who was supposed to have murdered your father. Is quite adequately explained how Luke has changed. And it's suggested by the final scene of ESB where he's giving commands to Lando and Chewie re finding Han.

Yoda and Obi-Wan's knowledge of Owen and Beru does not come to light until almost the very end of ROTS. And it is purely to allow the characters to be in the place we find them at the beginning of the next episode. Not to add dimension to what happened between Geonosis and the end of AOTC in the previous movie. If that were its intention then it fails abysmally because the two possible.probable scenarios are still undefined.

That lie is crucial to Anakin''s characterization. The existence of a scenario where Anakin would have lied about it is not alluded to even faintly until Obi Wan is sent to Tatooine, to his "family".(Did Anakin declare that Clieg and his kids were now his family? Does that sound like letting go following the death of his mother? Or did Anakin lie about his mother being dead altogether and Obi Wan/Yoda believe that she is still allive?

So it's no use to us at this point that we can figure out that Anakin lied. Anakin just slaughtered the Jedi younglings and doomed the galaxy to a generation of tyranny. A bit late for oblique references to his capacity for honesty.

If it's because the narrative makes no effort to allude to either of the possible scenarios that we "must assume" in then it is a leap. It is a gap.

The only time that this is permissible, and sometimes desirable, if there is only one possible scenario which the narrative doesn't exposit but which were are nevertheless happy to leap over the gap in order to rejoin the narrative.

The lie must be part of the narrative. Knowing how good a liar Anakin is important. Knowing how credulous or otherwise the Jedi are is equally important. If that is what happened.

"You were on Tatooine. What happened?

Nothing.

Well ok then.

Senator Amidala. Was everything ok on Tatooine?

Totally.

Well ok then.

 

No, it means that it happened between the films. Since Anakin was never kicked out of the Jedi Order, nor killed for his crimes on Tatooine, it is apparent that he never told the truth. Same with his being married on Naboo and later with his being a father. The same way that the Jedi's initial investigation into the Clone Army was off screen and Han's reasons for not paying off Jabba sooner.

If she's willing to lie about being married to him and pregnant with his child, it's not hard to conclude that she wouldn't tell them about the Tusken slaughter.

And that's because Anakin told him and not Obi-wan. That was Lucas addressing it since Obi-wan never addressed it in either ROTS, nor TCW. Lucas was showing us how much Anakin trusted and valued Palpatine over Obi-wan, in that he would open up about his crimes to him and not to his Master. He didn't have to show a full on scene with Obi-wan and Yoda talking about it. He shows us throughout ROTS that Anakin isn't entirely honest with the Council about everything.

 

It's made completely obvious in ROTS that Anakin confided in Palpatine and Palpatine alone about his slaughter of the Tuskens. What's being complained about was literally addressed in the movie in a way that only someone being willfully obtuse could possibly accuse of being in any way obscure.

 

So taking that premise the real question then is why do the gaps in the PT seen to bother some but the same gaps in the OT don't?

In comparison the gaps in the OT actually are a bit more yawning than the PT ones and the OT ones have even less "explanation".

 

This has nothing to do with PT vs OT. The topic of the thread is quite clear.

The movie only tells us that Anakin told Palpatine something about his mother.

 

It's truly amazing how you constantly manage find supposed flaws in the PT yet are unable to see exactly the same in the OT. So yes, this has everything to do with OT vs. PT.

Somehow it is wrong to mention certain stuff in the movies, because "it ruins the mystery", yet at the same time minute details that are covered to a fitting extend in the movies cause you to ask for more and more obscure stuff to be mentioned. Your entire approach couldn't be more hypocritical. You were given explicit examples that show this kind of openess is completely normal throughout the saga, and instead of being able to acknowledge these facts you turn and try to evade so that you don't have to admit that your arguments were faulty.

As mentioned above, we were never shown how Luke went from not having finished his training to suddenly being ready. We were never shown how Vader found out about Luke, Mon Mothma and Admiral Ackbar appeared out of nowhere, Lando is one of Jabba's guards with no explanation of how he got in there. All that stuff is perfectly fine the way it is in the movies. You don't need to be explicidly told all this, nor do do we need to know exactly how much Anakin told Obi Wan or Yoda about what happened on Tatooine. We need to know that Anakin never told anyone about Padme and him, and that shows up in the movie. We need to know that Anakin told Palpatine because the trusts him with things he can't tell the Jedi (no need to tell Padme, he already did so in AOTC) and this can be seen in the movie. There is no reason for him not to tell Obi Wan how he met the Lars family, as a matter of fact, not telling all that makes no sense whatsoever. Obi Wan knows about the dreams Anakin is having of his mother and he knows that Anakin was on Tatooine. Anakin doesn't have any other reason to be on Tatooine, so it is obvious what this is about. Telling him about Cliegg, Owen and Beru is the one thing that Anakin can freely do without any problems. Mentioning that his mother died works out as well. Talking about what he did to the Tuskens not so much. Telling Obi Wan that nothing happens is suspicious, telling him about having found his mother, how she got freed and lived with the Larses and ended up dying is a completely fitting explanation. None of this needs to be explicidly stated in one of the movies, it doesn't even fit anywhere. It's perfectly valid not to treat the audience like poor dummies who need every tiny detail explained to them. The answer to the question how the Jedi knew about the Larses doesn't require any particular jump in logic, assuming that Anakin told them is perfectly logical. Luke suddenly being a fully trained Jedi is something that stretches things a bit, certainly much further than the Jedi knowing about Owen and Beru, but it can be understood as well.

 

I always assumed that Master Yoda knew Anakin was in terrible pain, as noted in Attack of the Clones, and that he met with Ani privately back at the Jedi Temple to discuss what happened at a later time.

Anakin is shown to have met with Master Yoda for private training/discussion sessions in Revenge of the Sith, and one can assume this happened several times over the course of Anakin's apprenticeship earlier and afterwards.

Master Yoda was obviously a very engaged, hands on teacher, willing to meet with and advise all of the Padawans and apprentices in the Jedi Temple.
There is no doubt in my mind that Anakin told Yoda about the Tusken massacre and his family on Tatooine; not to mention that Master Yoda would have surmised these facts on his own, in any case.

 

If there are any perceived flaws in an OT movie that you wish to discuss then I'm happy to go to the relevant thread on the OT forum and discuss whatever issues are relevant there.

 

I can believe in him telling Yoda that he killed Tusken guards while retrieving Shmi's body.

I can't believe in him telling Yoda that he killed a whole village, for revenge, including Tusken children, and there being no consequences of the "ejected from Jedi Order" kind.

Which is why we have Palpatine making the point that Anakin has told him about the Tusken encounter, and how it was a vengeful massacre.

Chancellor Palpatine: You did well, Anakin. He was too dangerous to be kept alive.
Anakin Skywalker: Yes, but he was an unarmed prisoner. I shouldn't have done that, it's not the Jedi way.
Chancellor Palpatine: It is only natural. He cut off your arm, and you wanted revenge. It wasn't the first time, Anakin. Remember what you told me about your mother and the Sand People?