PT Plot Holes and Inconsistencies in the Prequel Trilogy

No, bcs it's Watto who enters Anakin in the race. He fronts the entry fee, so he received the winnings. That's why QG says "If we win you keep all the winnings minus the cost of the parts I need". If QG was given all of those winnings (which belonged to Watto) he could blackmail Watto into handing over Anakin. He didn't have that leverage, that's why he had to threaten to take him before the Hutts.
In any case on what planet does it make sense to mean someone will keep all of the money yet say "you keep all of the cash less the cost of this item" ?

 

edit: Didn't add anything to the discussion.

 

No. The cost of the parts will go into Watto's shop and the winnings will go towards Watto's own private holdings. Watto is benefiting on both fronts. If Watto just keeps the winnings, he still won't give him the parts that he needed. Qui-gon needs a way to pay for them and since he has no need for all the winnings, he just decides to cut to the chase and offer Watto the cash prize and he can deduct from that in order to be compensated for the parts. It's carefully worded language, not a brain fart.

 

So while making the bet Qui-Gon is putting on his accountant's hat & telling Watto what to do with his money?? Watto is a two-bit hustler & street merchant. Not a Fortune 500 company. This was the simplest transaction imaginable. Watto gets all of the winnings & QG gets the parts. It's that simple. Or at least it should've been.

What?? Why not? If that's the deal, that's the deal. If Watto tries to screw QG he goes to the Hutts.

So talk us through that. Watto gets all of the cash. He then what, hands QG some of it which is the "cost" of the parts, which is a figure he could just pull out of his blue a**. How would QG know what the cost is? So QG is given that money then...he immediately hands it back to Watto? Is that it? What if Watto still doesn't give him the parts after that? Do they have to synchronize handing over the cash & the parts at the exact same time? Maybe so if QG is so worried about Watto not just giving him the parts if Anakin wins the race!

It's gibberish. Nothing needed to be carefully worded. Just "You keep all of the winnings & I get the parts". Then if he won't hand over the parts it's off to the Hutts.

 

@Darth Downunder, you're way over-complicating this. Qui-Gon is talking in purely monetary terms. Watto gets all of the podracing winnings, Qui-Gon gets the parts, so Watto loses the cost of the parts.

That's it, no complex bank transfers, or anything. It's simple.

 

I'm not the one over-complicating things. You've just given a different interpretation to @darth-sinister who's take was different to Natalie earlier. That shows that this whole thing is as clear as mud.

What QG says isn't what you've described. He says: "If we win you keep all the winnings minus the cost of the parts I need". Ok? This sentence clearly means that Watto does not keep all of the winnings. He keeps it all "minus" the cost of the parts. The cost of the parts is to be deducted. Which makes no sense. What you've said would be stated as something like: "If we win your profit will be all the winnings minus the cost of the parts I need".
But QG didn't refer to profit. He only mentioned the winnings & how much of it Watto will keep. It's an amateurish writing blunder. Any first year writing teacher would hand that back to the student with a red line through it. Yet here we're talking about a $100m film! Honestly there are so many of these in the PT I doubt Lucas even had anyone proof-read his scripts.

 

He mentions the winnings of the Podrace. Watto keeps all the money from that.

He then gives Qui-Gon the parts, as per their arrangement. He then is down the cost of those parts, due to not being paid for them.

That's exactly what was stated in the dialogue. It couldn't be clearer.

 

Nope. He says nothing about profit or how much Watto will be "down". You're trying to re-state it in a way that makes sense. The only description we have is the one in the movie. He tells Watto that he gets to keep all of the winnings "minus" (less, deduction) the cost of the parts. That is an objective fact as per the English language. No spin can undo that fact. Not a huge deal except that it adds to the long list of dodgy writing we find in these movies.

 

How is that dodgy? Watto keeps all of the winnings, except the parts cost. That's exactly what Qui-Gon says!

 

& it’s exactly wrong. Watto keeps all of the winnings - full stop. Every single dollar of it. The cost of the parts is not deducted from the winnings.
If QG means what you’re saying he means then this dialogue is wrong.

 

Only if you insist on having Watto lose only money, and not it's equivalent in the parts. Watto loses the same amount from the race winnings either way, and the dialogue is fine either way.

 

@darkspine10 explained it perfectly.

This seemed straight-forward to me as well, I don't see the issue.

The prize if Qui-Gon wins the bet is the ship parts. He is saying Watto keeps all the prize money even if Qui-Gon wins, he is just stating it like this to mention that besides that they get the parts free.

Honestly, it's not difficult to understand, this is baffling.

 

It makes perfect sense.

"If we win, you keep all the winnings, minus the cost of the parts I need...If we lose, you keep my ship."

Honestly!

I suggest you them take issue with Vader for not wanting the Emperor's prize to be damaged then he just goes and bloody well cuts Luke's hand off!

 

He's just complaining to complain about the film and Lucas.

No, that's not how it works. Watto would still want the parts to be paid for. Simply winning the parts isn't going to cut it and he would never go for that. He wants money and Qui-gon knows this. This is his way of paying for the parts and getting them, because Watto isn't going to hand the hyperdrive over for free. This is most likely not Qui-gon's first go around with a gambler.

Watto is given the cash prize by the organizer of the Boonta Eve Classic. He then deducts the cost of the parts and puts it in his register/safe/whatever. He then hands over the parts. That's it. Say the prize is $500,000 dollars. The parts cost $2,000. Watto takes the two thousand for the parts, keeps the rest for himself. If he tries to cheat Qui-gon, then he threatens to take it to Jabba. Watto gets to keep the money. That's the bottom line and he gets to do business. Remember, Watto is a very shrewd businessman. He still wants to profit from a transaction involving junk from his store.This isn't a mere barter exchange. This is a for profit business. And not only that, Watto doesn't believe that Qui-gon will win since Anakin has never finished a race. So he's not worried because he will bet against Anakin and for Sebulba, and that money will make up for the lack of a cash prize and having to deduct for the parts. He keeps the parts, keeps Anakin, profits off of Sebulba and gains Qui-gon's ship.

Instead, he loses Anakin. He doesn't get the ship. He doesn't get Anakin's pod. He loses all the money that he bet on Sebulba, who didn't even finish the race and is left flat broke. The only thing he keeps is the cash prize, of which he has to deduct the cost of the parts. He lost more than he gained.

 

The parts & the money are two separate things. Watto keeps all of the winnings. Separate to that he hands over the parts. That's not what QG says though.

It's called a trade. QG forgoes any share of the winnings if Watto gives him the parts. Simple.

Why not? It's the same net result as that convoluted explanation you've offered. "You keep all of the winnings & I get the parts". Both agree & if either try to cheat out of the deal they go to the Hutts. You haven't clearly established why that would be a problem. Just saying it "isn't going to cut it" doesn't cut it.

He wouldn't be bcs he'd get to keep all of the winnings. Also, later he wagers Anakin & the pod. Neither of those are money. So clearly he's fine with accepting & giving items & property in these wagers. So again, "You keep all of the winnings & I get the parts". Still not seeing a problem with that.

What does he do with the rest of the winnings? Puts it in the same register/safe/whatever or a different register/safe/whatever? Why not just keep all of the money together, since it's all his? Are there strict bookkeeping regulations on this frontier backwater?

No he keeps it all for himself. Full stop.

A solution which brings us back to why QG doesn't simply say "you get the winnings, I get the parts".

The "cost" of the parts does not need to be deducted from the winnings. The dialogue in the movie would make sense if the parts were owned by someone else. Say the trader across the street. Then QG needs the cost of those parts in cash so he can buy them. The dialogue would be perfect for this situation. It doesn't make a lick of sense when the guy who will collect the winnings is the same guy who will hand over the parts. It's silly absurd dialogue but at least it's a laugh.

 

Honestly, you're complaining about such tiny semantics.

If I won a horse race, owed you all the money, but you owed me, say, a fridge, I'd say "You'll keep all of the winnings, minus the cost of that fridge you owe me". That's a perfectly logically consistent sentence.

This. Sentence. Makes. Sense.

That's it. You can't argue that it's contradicting something, because it doesn't. This isn't some subjective interpretation, it's clear as day.

 

Nah, you'd say "You keep the winnings but I get the fridge". If you wanted the cash to go & buy a fridge somewhere else you'd say "You keep all of the winnings, minus the cost of that fridge".

 

But if we were talking about the money, I'd say "You keep all of the £20000, minus the cost you'll have to pay to replace that fridge I'll take from you".

It still works fine.

 

If it's so clear why are you & Sinister arguing two different positions? You're saying QG means the "cost" of the parts are deducted from his profit. So he's speaking in figurative terms. Sinister's saying he's literally going to separate the cost of the parts, & do one thing with that cash & do something else with the rest. The clearest evidence proving that this is gibberish dialogue is that so many people have different explanations.

That's something completely different. QG doesn't say that. He says that Watto gets to keep all of the winnings minus the cost of the parts "I need".
The inescapable (& incorrect) message from that is that Watto does not get to keep all of the winnings. He doesn't get winnings equal to the cost of the parts. Only the balance. Which is stupid. Watto gets all of the winnings bcs they're his parts.

You can't reinvent the English language. Neither can Lucas.

 

Yes, Watto keeps All of the Winnings... Minus the cost of the parts Qui-Gon needs.

Qui-Gon literally states that he doesn't get 100% of the winnings.

So not all the winnings no, all the winnings from the race, then the parts to Qui-Gon, thus Watto's down the cost of the parts.

And Sinister's explanation is just a slightly more complicated version of mine, where instead of just taking Watto's parts, Qui-Gon converts the cost of the parts to credits, takes those from Watto, then buys the parts... thus getting the same result, of Watto losing the cost of the parts.

 

No one in their right mind would describe it like that. Watto does literally get 100% of the winnings. That’s part 1 of the bet. Part 2 is that QG gets the hyperdrive from Watto. They’re two separate things. Trying to mix them together is dumb. The winnings are the winnings. Winnings is not profit. The winnings is whatever cash the race victory delivers - & Watto keeps it all.

 

Correct. He also loses the hyperdrive parts to Qui-Gon, without him paying.

Therefore, although he won the podrace winnings, he lost the cost of those parts he gave away, as he could have otherwise sold them for profit.

 

He doesn’t lose the cost of the parts. He loses the parts. He parted ways with the cost of the parts long ago when he acquired them. So this is simply a case of “You keep all of the winnings & give me the parts”. Do you see any problem with that?

 

Watto converted his money into the parts. He doesn't do the same when he gives the parts to Qui-Gon, Qui-Gon doesn't give Watto any money for them. He still has a net gain from the podrace, but the cost of the parts is completely lost to Watto.

 

Maybe Watto didn’t buy them at all. Maybe he salvaged them. Or won them in another bet. In any case this is complicating the simplest arrangement imaginable: you keep the winnings, I get the parts. It’s factually incorrect to say that Watto doesn’t keep all of the winnings. Lucas was trying to say the cost of the parts reduces his profit. But he didn’t have QG say that. He fluffed the dialogue. Not for the first time.