*OFFICIAL THREAD* Yoda vs. Sidious duel discussion v.2

This debate clearly shows a serious problem with Lucas' decision to place two Jedi at Palpatine's level. It set up two "final fights" with Palpatine involved and that did not work for the film. His final fight was with Yoda because that is what the OT set up, and it is the fight people cared about. I think one of those Jedi was placed at that level because of the high profile actor (and his demands) put in the position. It set up the conundrum that we have, and it is a real shame. The only way GL could have solved it was to settle this debate by going with a yes situation, especially when Gillard filmed the scene in such a way to support it. It just boggles my mind. The Yes vote doesn't even hurt the character of Mace at all because noone really cares about him in the great scheme of things. The no situation harms the series (cheapens ROTJ; damages the aura behind the two great Masters in the movie, etc...) as many have pointed out and satisfies one person.

 

Let's put it this way.

Minus any Force ability, who would be stronger - Mace or Yoda? It's like asking who is stronger, a grown man or a 3 year old kid.

Now if Mace and Yoda are both Masters of the Force and on par with Sidious, it stands to reason that either one of them could beat Sidious and either one of them could lose to Sidious.

Yoda may be faster, Mace may be physically stronger, Sidious may have home field advantage... but they are all Masters and given certain variables, any one of them could beat the other.

It's just that Lucas had to write a scenario where 1.) Sidious' weakness was exposed to give weight to the tragedy that Anakin rejects his destiny and refuses to destroy Sidious when he had a chance, and 2.) where Yoda loses by a nail to explain the circumstances of the OT.

 

"the only thing that bugs me is that we never got to see how his force powers were."

Thats a good point sithrules70. We have never seen his power in the Force, all we know is he can pull his saber back to his hand after he drops it like in AOTC thats about it. It would have been nice to see how powerful he was but I don't think there is a doubt he's not as good as Yoda. I think it says in the screenplay that after Mace's hand is chopped off he tries to block Sidious' lightning with his other hand but he cannot but it didn't make it into the film. But it would have been nice to see something from him.

 

From your point of view. I don't believe Lucas has made the scene to satisfy Jackson, he has made it the way it had to be. Gillard didn't film the scene to support he was faking, it's once again your point of view, I've watched the scene carefuly (even frame by frame) a lot of times before we knew about Georce Lucas' comments and I always found the faking theory absurd.

What I consider would cheapen the saga would be having an all powerful emperor that is never in any real danger, and is sure will get whatever he wants even before beginning to try to get it becasue he is just unstoppable.

 

i agree about everything except for the faking theory.dont get me wrong.im not saying that palps allowed mace to kick him and disarm him but the whole "please dont kill me ,i cant hold on any longer,im so weak " thing is faking ,there is no doubt about that,at least from my POV.

 

We also saw him making a huge jump and landing like nothing, while deflecting the blasters at once. If we consider clone wars (I know some will argue it's just cartoons) he shows a great power. I believe it was Lucas intention to show Mace's combat abilities far beyond the other Jedi's ones. He even breaks Grevious' chest (it's supported by the movie so it's considered true) with one single motion of his hand while other Jedi had lost fighting hard against him.


According to Lucas Film continuity policy since the movie shows clearly the scene and Windu didn't attempt to deflect it, then it never happened. Anyway Windu was caught off guard by Anakin's intervention and Sidiuos attack, so I believe as well as Yoda failed to block the first lighting it's not a definitive proof that he can't block it.

What nobody can deny is that Yoda is definitively the most experienced one

 

That part was always clear, and that's why it has been confirmed. But I always considered it was Palpatine's last try to save his life, and manipulate Anakin to save him.

 

Why doesn?t Mace throw the furniture, or force pushes the emperor, or chokes him??? You only consider the emperor?s power, but what about windu? He has force powers too, was he faking??
Inmediately after losing his saber, the Emperor finds himself with Windu?s blade 1 mm close to his throat. There were few things he could do. And that furniture is no way like the pods, and you also must realize, and I think it?s important, that Sidious used the pods ONCE YODA WAS FAR AWAY. When he is fighting close to his opponent, he can not do it that way.

Anyway, why the hell Obi didn?t use force powers against Grevious?? No Sidious fan has ever explained this, but the truth is that Grevious was not just a weaker force user, but was not a force user at all. He was supposed to be almost as easily killed as Palpatine?s red guards, however Obi was about to die falling down a hole if hadn?t been able to get that blaster. Was he faking too??
Why don't you realize that the characters can not be all powerful if they must be in troubles??



[/quote]


Your questions are exactly the issue I have with GL's decision. Through his commentary, he has built up Mace to be #1 at the expense of so much else in the story. Noone cares if Mace has great Force powers, did it really matter if he was the greatest swordfighter?...no. The movies, outside of this confirmation, didn't even support it. Even the famous quote to me about Obi Wan is as wise as Yoda and as powerful as Windu always meant to me that Obi Wan is very wise (arguably the wisest among the Jedi), but it terms of his fighting skills, he is slightly below the best. That is what the movies show too. He loses to Dooku twice as testament to this fact.

It did not hurt the story to have Yoda be the most powerful of the Jedi...it was what the saga had instilled in fans and casual viewers all along. It hurts the story immensely for a second Jedi to be capable of taking on Sidious. GL doesn't have any other scene in the PT with Mace flipping around or even using Force powers (other than pulling his lightsaber back to him) because it didn't matter. He certainly establishes Yoda this way because he is supposed to be the best of the Jedi. Why does he give Sidious a few flips and twirls in his fight? To show that he is on par with Yoda before they even go at it. To show he was on par with Mace just requires him walking across the room slowly and swinging a saber.

And for the comment about GL not appeasing SLJ, it is in the same documentary. GL pandered to SLJ to some extent. I want a purple saber...ok. I want a good death scene...ok. The book account of the lightning blocking scene is very in favor of Sidious. We didn't even get that. GL even alludes that this demand weighed in on how the scene should go. If he really wanted Mace to be powerful all along, then he just really wanted to do a disservice to both Yoda and Sidious' characters, which is very unsettling to me. If you like that and see it as a good thing for the saga, to each his own.

 

anybody can make huge jumps,even obi as a padawan in TPM.breaking grievous chest is not that impressive.

what i meant is that we never see him levitating huge mechanical pillars(yoda AOTC) or easily throw senate pods.

if we only consider the movies and the clone wars cartoons as cannon thenmac's knoledge of the force is notthat good compared to yoda's or palpatine's.

 

I honestly don't think making Mace or Yoda on par with the Emperor is necessary for the story. On the contrary, I think it detracts from the way the Emperor was initially presented to us- as much more powerful than anyone else. They could have had a scene where the Emperor simply electrocutes Mace when Anakin walks in. Mace doesn't deflect any lightning, and the Emperor suddenly stops and claims he can't continue. After Anakin, cuts off Mace's hand, the Emperor finishes him off with the lightning. In the same way, Yoda could simply have been electrocuted and barely escape with his life after falling to the bottom of the Senate floor without even putting up a fight or blocking any lightning. These scenarios would work much better for the character of the Emperor, and remaining consistent with how he was portrayed in the OT.

The OS said Mace is on par with Yoda. On par doesn't necessarily mean he's as good as Yoda in the Force. It could mean he has a similar rank on the Jedi Council. So I don't see Mace being "on par" with Yoda as contradictory to Gillard's statement that Mace is second only to Yoda. Gillard's statement was on the AOTC DVD Featurette about fighting. Lucas was a part of the DVD, so I assume he approves of Gillard's comment.

 

Windu can make huge jumps too and be incredibly agile too, and he proved that in AOTC. Here they were inside an office, not at an enormous Senate chamber. It was not the place to do those things.

Windu's combat skills have been affirmed a lot of times in books and comics. In the movies there are a lot of things that have to happen in two hours. They can spend all the time they would like to in developing every character. In Clone Wars cartoons for example(I know those are cartoons and the exhibitions of powers shouldn't be taken literally, but Lucas was hardly involved in that and it shows he conceives Windu as far more powerful than most Jedi)

 

Or maybe Lucas could make a movie where the only character was the Emperor, with no other character or location but the Emperor and his wonderful palace, and spend the two hours just showing the Emperor throwing rays through his fingers, destroying everything around and saying how much more powerful than anybody he is.

I'm sure you would like that movie more than anything.

 

"We also saw him making a huge jump and landing like nothing, while deflecting the blasters at once. If we consider clone wars (I know some will argue it's just cartoons) he shows a great power. I believe it was Lucas intention to show Mace's combat abilities far beyond the other Jedi's ones. He even breaks Grevious' chest (it's supported by the movie so it's considered true) with one single motion of his hand while other Jedi had lost fighting hard against him.
According to Lucas Film continuity policy since the movie shows clearly the scene and Windu didn't attempt to deflect it, then it never happened. Anyway Windu was caught off guard by Anakin's intervention and Sidiuos attack, so I believe as well as Yoda failed to block the first lighting it's not a definitive proof that he can't block it.
What nobody can deny is that Yoda is definitively the most experienced one"

Yeah he did make a big jump, but as sithrules pointed out Obi-Wan did that in TPM as a padawan, so it's really nothing impressive. Yeah the Clone Wars show a great deal of Mace's power but alot of that is exaggerated. I mean if one Jedi like Mace is able to take out an entire army of super battle droids what's the use of having clones??? Mace is powerful sure, more with the blade than with the Force I believe, but we never see any of his power with the Force. It would have been nice to see but what is for sure is that Mace is not on the same level as Yoda when it comes to the Force, that's a given I think considering Yoda's 800 years of experience with it.

 

So for you, Mace Windu being mac daddy of the Jedi really helps this story? He is as important a character for you as Yoda? His development as a powerhouse, even over Yoda, is crucial? I just don't see it. He had what, two lines in TPM?

I just can't see how the no voters consider GL's take on this a good thing unless you just want the Jedi to have been defeated by a weak, albeit smart, old guy and his crippled henchman. We need to start a poll that asks was GL's decision on this battle a good idea.

 

These were the jedi in their prime. A wonderful order of warriors that had protected the galaxy for centuries. What I find inconsistent is all the jedi being absolutely unable to fight the sith. I don't mind if it's Mace or Yoda, but someone had to be able to defeat Palpatine, otherwise the jedi are simply useless.

Just becasue he was defeated once doesn't make him weak. He was extremely powerful, but he can't be all powerful. Anyway he didn't destroy the Jedi through his power, but through his plots.

 

"I honestly don't think making Mace or Yoda on par with the Emperor is necessary for the story. On the contrary, I think it detracts from the way the Emperor was initially presented to us- as much more powerful than anyone else. They could have had a scene where the Emperor simply electrocutes Mace when Anakin walks in. Mace doesn't deflect any lightning, and the Emperor suddenly stops and claims he can't continue. After Anakin, cuts off Mace's hand, the Emperor finishes him off with the lightning. In the same way, Yoda could simply have been electrocuted and barely escape with his life after falling to the bottom of the Senate floor without even putting up a fight or blocking any lightning. These scenarios would work much better for the character of the Emperor, and remaining consistent with how he was portrayed in the OT."

No you need to rephrase that. The Emperor was initially presented to you as more powerful than anyone else, not everyone. I personally believed Yoda to be the most powerful especially when he levitates the X-wing out of the swamp. Also if you were just going by the OT as you like to, Yoda states that the Dark Side is not stronger but is "quicker, easier, more seductive." We had no GL quote saying the Dark Side is more powerful, therefore the only source saying it was not was Yoda. No where was I led to believe the Dark Side was more powerful. As for these scenarios of yours, what you don't realize that there are alot of other characters in the saga besides the Emperor and their character development was important as well. If this was all about the Emperor and his development then GL would have made him the central characeter that everything revolves around, but it's not. This is Anakin's story, not Palpatine's(that mayy surprise you but it is). Palpatine is a pivotal character in the saga but so is Obi-Wan, so is Yoda, so is Luke. There is need for the other characters to be developed and GL did that in his story like in all good stories. Especially with the Yoda/Sidious fight. I believe he effectively showed that it was a draw. The Master of the Jedi vs. the Master of the Dark Side ending in a draw was a perfect way to end that fight, yes it has spawned many discussion and arguments because neither opponenet overpowered the other and had a totally dominant victory, but it showed they were equally matched. Yoda with 800 years of experience vs Sidious with many years with the power of the Dark Side behind him. The fight ends in a draw, both were effected by the explosion but Yoda loses because he falls and then decides to flee, hence Sidious wins. The Dark Side prevailed this day, but Yoda was bound to make sure it did not in the long run. If the Emperor was to be shown as the all-powerful characeter who is more powerful than anyone else than GL would have shown the Emperor completely dominating Yoda but that does not happen. What happens is Yoda goes toe-to-toe with the Emperor on every fighting aspect and matches him, it only ends by an explosion that sends them both flying to their destinies, if you will. Sidious to win and rule the galaxy, while Yoda loses to flee and one day train Luke who brings Anakin back.

 

No you need to rephrase that. The Emperor was initially presented to you as more powerful than anyone else, not everyone. I personally believed Yoda to be the most powerful especially when he levitates the X-wing out of the swamp. Also if you were just going by the OT as you like to, Yoda states that the Dark Side is not stronger but is "quicker, easier, more seductive." We had no GL quote saying the Dark Side is more powerful, therefore the only source saying it was not was Yoda. No where was I led to believe the Dark Side was more powerful.

Yes, I can rephrase that statement. The Emperor seemed like he was the most powerful to me, but I can't be sure what other viewers were thinking. I know that I've heard people on this forum say that they expected the Emperor to be all-powerful in ROTS. I assumed this was based on his force lightning in ROTJ.

Yoda lifting an X-Wing didn't lead me to believe he could match the Emperor in a lightning battle. Being able to levitate an X-Wing wouldn't be very deadly or useful in combat if you don't have a ship nearby. If Yoda was in the Emperor's throne room like Luke, he wouldn't be able to throw an X-Wing at him, and I saw no reason why he would fare any better than Luke against force lightning.

 

It seems once you saw the Emperor's lightning... you simply found the sense of your life

 

"Yoda lifting an X-Wing didn't lead me to believe he could match the Emperor in a lightning battle. Being able to levitate an X-Wing wouldn't be very deadly or useful in combat if you don't have a ship nearby. If Yoda was in the Emperor's throne room like Luke, he wouldn't be able to throw an X-Wing at him, and I saw no reason why he would fare any better than Luke against force lightning."

That's because this is merely an opinion, someone's own take on a scene and a characeter. To you the Emperor seemed all powerful, to me Yoda did. It's different for everyone, thats why you can't jump to conclusions that everyone believed the Emperor to be the most powerful. As for throwing and lifting heavy objects, didn't Palpatine lift pods and throw them at Yoda??? Isn't that deadly?? Didn't Yoda throw one back??? That seems pretty effective to me, maybe it's just me. As for the lightning battle, didn't Yoda focus to concentrate the lightning into a ball causing Sidious to grimace in pain and moan??? Didn't Yoda hold off that lightning so it did not hit him??? Because Yoda did this, it was not hitting him. Yoda went as far to hold the lightning back and eventually an explosion occurs sending them both flying. Yoda stopped the lightning and it eventually caused an explosion, effecting them both. Yoda matched Sidious' lightning no matter what you may think. It was there in the film, like it or not it's there.

 

I don't see what that has to do with anything - prophecy or not, Anakin is still clearly an extremely gifted individual, and he has now become a Sith.

Here is my point - when Mace goes to face Palpatine, there is a Jedi Order, and a lone Sith Master whose identity has finally been revealed to the Jedi.
Mace goes to face him with three other Jedi, he gives it his best shot but - here is the crunch - even in overpowering Palpatine he is unable to defeat him.
Mace and his posse end up dead, and Palps has a new recruit.
Against seemingly impossible odds, Palpatine has engineered victory from defeat.

When Yoda goes to face Palpatine, the Jedi Order is history, the war is over and the only real losers are the Jedi.
Yoda goes to face Palpatine and gives it his best shot, but realises that the same thing is only going to happen again, in fact this time the odds are actually on Palpatine's side.
Yoda runs from the fight.
The Jedi have already lost.

No one is saying he is infallible.
Just the way the fight goes makes it hard for Yoda to gain ground.

Firstly, there is no proof that Yoda doesn't believe in the chosen one per se.
But we can assume that Yoda is thinking any variation of the following - 1) Anakin is not the chosen one and therefore never was, 2) the prophecy does not mean what the Jedi thought it meant, 3) that the chosen one's destiny can be perverted/that Anakin is already essentially "dead", so they will never get to know if he was the chosen one or not or 4) that he is not going to hang around to see how the prophecy is going to pan out - chosen one or not, as long as Anakin is a Sith, he is a threat to the galaxy, a threat Yoda is duty bound to extinguish.

If we are presuming Yoda and Obi are thinking along the same lines, we could deduce that option 1 is ruled out by Obi's closing lines to Ani (he was the chosen one, until he died). Obi's words support option 3.
However, what Yoda says on the drop ship implies 2 is possible, while what he says to Obi in the Temple could also facilitate option 3.
Personally, however, I'd imagine Yoda is simply acting on option 4 - kind of an average of all the above possibilities. His logic is, basically "we don't know what the score is with this prophecy deal anymore, but I believe my duty is to protect the galaxy from the evil of the Sith. And as Anakin is now a Sith, I am willing to put my duty before the possibility of our prophecy."

As for Mace being in a position to kill Sidious, that is kind of my point.
Mace can get that close and still lose - that is how desperate things are.
Yoda, at the point when he chooses to run, is nowhere near as close and his chances of getting that close are pretty much nil.
Again, that's just how the fight pans out.
If Mace can get close and lose, it stands to reason Yoda who is not getting close and is now fighting in a galaxy owned by Sidious, as opposed to fighting in a Republic protecting it from Sidious, will also lose.

No - it makes sense because Palpatine was overpowered by Mace in under two minutes, of screentime, and still came out on top.
In style.
In fact it makes more sense because of that.

If we see a big, terrifying monster come up against little guy with a catapult, fruitlessly firing baked beans at its hideous hide early in the movie, then the monster crushes the little guy without even flinching... then later in the movie we see our knight in shining armour come along and fight the monste

 

It seems once you saw the Emperor's lightning... you simply found the sense of your life

Hey, don't disagree with Jedi Ethan. Or He's liable to have a
widdo hissy fit!

 

wo, lots of stuff, and rhondaroo too!

Master_Shaitan
"If you practised your saber skills as you do your wit you would rival Master Yoda as a swordsman"
"I thought I already did"
"Only in your mind my very young apprentice"

Yoda is the business. At least, he should have been. Now, Qui Gon is wiser.

yea, yoda is the dogs-own-duty, both in wisdom and saber ability. mace windu is second both in wisdom and saber ability.

remember, though, that mace windu is close to yodas abilities. its mace windu that explicitly states, "i dont think he can handle it." in that case, yoda is wise by just sitting back and listening to the master himself. thinking about the soon-to-be-truth mace windu has said. anyone threatening sidious would hav been betrayed by anakin, some other jedi wouldnt hav even bothered to say anything to anakin.

all this bit about qui gon, i like him too, but cmon! this guy is a ghost we never see. guess how i see it? its all yoda! if qui gon was trying to say anything, it was to anakin. only yoda picked up on it. all the skill is in yoda, if you ask me. yoda made contact with the ghostie plane, i dont credit qui gon one bit. probably tons of jedi like him, yoda picks up on him.

 

Yoda lifting an X-Wing didn't lead me to believe he could match the Emperor in a lightning battle. Being able to levitate an X-Wing wouldn't be very deadly or useful in combat if you don't have a ship nearby. If Yoda was in the Emperor's throne room like Luke, he wouldn't be able to throw an X-Wing at him, and I saw no reason why he would fare any better than Luke against force lightning."

Farrellg, I don't think you got his point. Of course it's not deadly, it wasn't an attack
The point is: when you see a force user strong enough in the force to lift a space ship from a swamp, I think it's more than legitimate to imagine how dangerous this force user can be in a fight. As far as I'm concerned, the fact that Yoda was strong enough to do that lead me to think that he was extremely powerful in the force, and that his strenght in the force would probably make him able to block Sids' lightning. I was right.

By the way, an X-wing isn't much bigger than a senate pod, so since Yoda can throw one upwards, I think he could move an x-wing pretty fast as well!

 

Don't lose sight of the fact that this is just a movie and Lucas made it clear he wanted the saber duel between Mace and Palpatine to be highly unique and more about the danger of two swordmasters going at each other.

The reason the Sidious fight with Yoda is so grandiose is because it is the climax of the movie.

Beyond that, you can scramble for in-universe explanations for why characters don't try to throw furniture in Palpatine's office, but the bottom line is Lucas didn't want the fights to become repetitive and get stale.