Qui-Gon's failure concerning Anakin: Not being mindful of the future in that Anakin was dangerous!

i think you're spot on darth sin!

qui-gon was a bit extreme. he lacks balance... too much focus on the moment imo.

 

How does this board stand on the expanded universe?
because according to that Luke also turns to the darkside for a period, something else which is overlooked by both Yoda and OBI-WAN....

Not sure if you guys take this stuff into account so i thought i'd ask...

 

Anakin had the makings of a great jedi in him there is no doubt about that.

It is really Obi-Wan and the Council's fault for not instructing him better

 

If it weren't for Qui-Gon finding Anakin,

the Emperor would still have taken over, all the Jedi would be dead and the Empire would still be here

Mmmmm...perhaps, perhaps not. Without Anakin the temple might never have fallen to the clones, or at the very least they would have held out longer than they did. Without Anakin the separatist leadership might have survived and the war would have possibly gone one longer than it did. But then on the other hand, without Anakin Naboo would have never thrown off the shackles of Trade Federation control (he was the one that blew up the droid control ship in TPM after all).

It's really tough to say exactly what might have happened had Anakin never become a Jedi. There is a good possibility that Sidious might have been killed had Anakin not killed Mace and the war really would have ended right then. Who's to say? GL I suppose.

 

Let's not act as though no one else was at fault when it came to Anakin's fall. Yes, Anakin made the ultimate decisions that led to his fall. However, there are those individuals in his life that in some ways help contribute to his fall.

It was the will of the Force for Qui-Gon to find Anakin; however when it came to Anakin's future, he failed not only to see that Anakin was potentially dangerous, but he also assumed he would be in Anakin's future as his Master. Qui-Gon assumed he would be there in Anakin's life training him to become a Jedi, so he felt that if there were any possibility of danger, he would be the one to avert that from happening.

Qui-Gon was not mindful of the future, for if he had himself listened to the Force(with the midichlorians help---Oh God!!!), he could have possibility heard that his death was imminent and his time with Anakin would end soon. He then could have made preparations to have Anakin trained by a more mature and wise Jedi, and a Master at that.

From there, starting with Obi-Wan and then the Council, Anakin's potential dangerous future was overlooked. The focus was mainly on his skills and abilities, and not those things that could lead him to danger. The Jedi Council no doubt also allowed Anakin to be trained for fear he could fall into the hands of the Sith if they had let him return to Tatooine. So they so focused on finding the Sith, and keeping Anakin away from the Sith, that they did not deal with those issues and problems he had within, particularly his attachments and fears, that strangely it caused him to become the very thing they did not want him to become.

Lastly, how in the world did Obi-Wan and the Council allow Anakin to spend so much time with Palpatine? Even though they did not know he was a Sith at the time, shouldn't they have thought something strange for the Supreme Chancellor to want to spend so much time with a Jedi padawan learner.

Qui-Gon is not to be blamed totally for Anakin's fall. Anakin is ultimately responsible. However, there are those in his life that had certain responsibilities in regards to him that were not taken care of that helped contribute to his fall. Qui-Gon's defiance and lack of mindfulness toward Anakin's future caused a chain reaction of irresponsibility that only focused on Anakin as the Chosen One, and not dealing with him as any other Jedi that had issues that needed to be dealt with.


Darth Sin!

 

It was the will of the Force for Qui-Gon to find Anakin

i think that is very much left open to interpretation. only qui-gon actually says it was the will of the force...

He then could have made preparations to have Anakin trained by a more mature and wise Jedi, and a Master at that.

i think obi does a great job. not sure if anyone could've handeled anakin better. there's a reason obi is not around when anakin makes his fatal choice...

 

Good stuff. Great to see other people?s views on this.

QUI-GON: Don't center on your anxiety, Obi-Wan. Keep your concentration
here and now where it belongs.

OBI-WAN: Master Yoda says I should be mindful of the future...

QUI-GON: .....but not at the expense of the moment. Be mindful of the
living Force, my young Padawan.

IF Qui-Gon made a mistake at all, I might consider that it was actually the opposite of QG being too entrenched in the Living Force (In the moment) and that he actually began to deviate from his philosophy, in regard to Anakin. In other words, he began to focus too much on the future, Anakin?s future, ?at the expense of the moment.?

The first half or so, of TPM, QG acts intuitively with the Force. Events happen and they end up stranded on Tatooine. QG?s only concern, at that moment, is to get everyone off of Tatooine and get the Queen safely to Coruscant. He ends up at a junk shop only to find that they have nothing of value in order to get the part they need. But this is where we see QG?s faith in the Living Force showing through:

QUI-GON: ...Obi-Wan, you're sure there isn't anything of value left on
board?

OBI-WAN: A few containers of supplies, the Queen's wardrobe, maybe.
Not enough for you to barter with. Not in the amounts you're talking about.

QUI-GON: All right. Another solution will present itself?

And it does ? In the form of a little slave boy, called Anakin. QG begins to see things in this boy, finds out he has no father and gets a blood sample. I think by then, QG begins to realize just exactly who he may have stumbled upon ? The Chosen One. In regard to Anakin, this is where I believe we start to see QG begin to act proactively and less in league with the Living Force for guidance.

Whereas I just illustrated how willing QG was to putting faith in the Living Force to guide him, he now seems to take matters into his own hands ? determined to affect the future. Did the Force guide QG to consider getting Anakin off of Tatooine, manipulate a chance cube and gamble to set Anakin free. The Force placed Anakin in QG?s path, but did it tell him to take Anakin off of Tatooine and train him to become a Jedi?

SHMI: Now you can make your dreams come true, Annie. You're free! (turns to
Qui-Gon) Will you take him with you? Is he to become a Jedi?

QUI-GON: Our meeting was not a coincidence. Nothing happens by accident.

Which is funny, because so far in the Saga, nobody has stated that the Chosen One need be a Jedi. This may be an assumption on QG?s part. Even Mace?s statement about it (And the best definition of the Prophesy in the movies so far) is ambiguous at best:

MACE WINDU: You're referring to the prophesy of the one who will bring
balance to the Force...you believe it's this boy??

I mean sure, what was QG to do? Just leave the Chosen One on Tatooine and leave him to fate. The Force placed Anakin in QG?s path, but it seems obvious that QG ?forced? the issue in making sure he got Anakin off of Tatooine and to Coruscant to make sure he was trained as a Jedi.

But you see what this is all based on? The Chosen One, who?s bound to a Prophesy. It?s about a destiny and that destiny is about the future. It?s the very nature of a Prophesy ? A predestined event that has yet to come to pass. And despite the Council?s objections and warnings about the boy, QG does ?What he must? and decides that this kid is going to get training, one way, or another ? Even when he?s dying:

QUI-GON: Obi-Wan promise...promise me you'll train the boy...

OBI-WAN: Yes, Master...

QUI-GON: He is the chosen one...he will...bring balance...train him!

?He will?? A statement about the future. It almost appears that QG has gone against the very principal that he had told Obi to adhere to, during their first exchange in the movie and is being too mindful of the future, ?At the expense of the moment?. He makes his Padawan promise to train a ten-year-old boy, who already h

 

Excellent DT421!! That was powerful stuff you presented, and even much better than my own views on this. You are so right when you consider Qui-Gon's actions, once he determined that Anakin must become a Jedi. Qui-Gon is then focusing on the future moreso than the moment.

But, is he mainly focusing on the prophecy of the Chosen One, moreso than Anakin the person?

What am I saying? Qui-Gon knew the prophecy was a future event, so it may not have been so much that he is focusing on the future per se, but rather in the moment to do whatever is necessary to get Anakin off Tatooine to make sure he becomes a Jedi, so that this future event, the prophecy will happen.

Qui-Gon in my opinion is more focused on the prophecy itself, and his belief that Anakin is the Chosen One, moreso than Anakin's future and what he has to deal with in order to fulfill the prophecy.

There is a fine line between Anakin the boy, and the Chosen One, who will bring balance to the Force, if you understand what I am getting at.

But again, this was a beautiful interpretation DT421, and one that I will give more thought to.

Thanks!

Darth Sin!

 

yeap, the emperator still rise to power, with dooku as his side, the jedi still have faild (with a batallion of clones, EVEN air attack...and QuiGon could never return from the grave to teach Yoda or Obi-Wan...all hope could be lost

 

Excellent DT421!! That was powerful stuff you presented, and even much better than my own views on this.

Thanks, Sin. Just cool to get different views and consider them.

There is a fine line between Anakin the boy, and the Chosen One, who will bring balance to the Force, if you understand what I am getting at.

Yes I do. I think QG was so focused on what he ?stumbled? upon and the importance of it, he forgot to be ?in the moment? and consider what it was doing to the boy himself. But to be fair, QG did warn Anakin that the life of a Jedi would be ?hard?, before Anakin made the choice to go with him. It isn?t as though QG ?hogtied? the boy and made him go. But really, what a choice ? Life of slavery, or becoming a Jedi? Hmmm?

 

perhaps in qui-gons opinion, since anakin was destined to bring the force into balance, whatever means he brought that by would not be dangerous. Perhaps he believed that if anakin were to destroy the jedi order then it was simply the will of the force. albeit there are no signs that qui-gon thought that way, but the one thing he had in spades was faith in the will of the force.

 

I think Qui-Gon was right, and Anakin does bring balance to the force, and he does it sooner than everyone thinks - from a certain point of view. Sometime between ROTS and ANH all the jedi except Yoda and Obi-wan are destroyed. I'm not sure if all of them are dead by the end of ROTS, but by the original series it is said that Luke and leia are the last hope. So there are 2 jedi and 2 sith. Sounds like balance to me.

 

Balance isn't about numbers. It's about getting rid of the Sith. The Sith abuse the Force, bringing it out of Balance.

 

Dictionary.com defines balance as:

A state of equilibrium or parity characterized by cancellation of all forces by equal opposing forces.

Who are you (or qui-gon, or yoda, or sidious) to decide what the will of the force is? Perhaps the force is neutral with respect to good and evil.....

 

I always believed that the Force being out of balance was in that the Sith misused and abused the Force, and it caused instability within the Force, which is the imbalance.

I never thought it came down to the number of Jedi and Sith. If this is the case, then once the Sith were destroyed, then there was only one Force-user that remained, and that being Luke. So if this theory is true, the Force was out of balance again with only one Force-user.

And from a certain point of view, though Leia was technically a Jedi, she was a Force-user, on the way to becoming a padawan to Luke, so she would be a Jedi.

So then there would be no Sith, but two Jedi. So again, if it is based on numbers, the Force would be out of balance. So this cannot be the case.

The Force is in balance when there are no persons accessing the dark side of the Force.

Darth Sin!

 

Who are you (or qui-gon, or yoda, or sidious) to decide what the will of the force is?

Not me, my friend. It's what George has to say about it:

"I think it is obvious that [Qui-Gon] was wrong in Episode I and made a dangerous decision, but ultimately this decision may be correct. The ?phantom menace? refers to the force of the dark side of the universe. Anakin will be taken over by dark forces which in turn destroy the balance of the Galaxy, but the individual who kills the Emperor is Darth Vader?also Anakin. The tale meanders and both the prediction and Qui-Gon are correct?Anakin is the chosen one, and he did bring peace at last with his own sacrifice. Luke couldn't kill the Emperor himself, but he could make Anakin reflect on his life and kill the Emperor."

-? George Lucas, Cut Magazine, 1999

"If good and evil are mixed things become blurred - there is nothing between good and evil, everything is grey. In each of us we to have balance these emotions, and in the Star Wars saga the most important point is balance, balance between everything. It is dangerous to lose this. In The Phantom Menace one of the Jedi Council already knows the balance of The Force is starting to slip, and will slip further. It is obvious to this person that The Sith are going to destroy this balance. On the other hand a prediction which is referred to states someone will replace the balance in the future. At the right time a balance may again be created, but presently it is being eroded by dark forces. All of this shall be explained in Episode 2, so I can't say any more!"

-- George Lucas

"I wanted to have this mythological footing because I was basing the films on the idea that the Force has two sides, the good side, the evil side, and they both need to be there. Most religions are built on that, whether it's called yin and yang, God and the devil?everything is built on the push-pull tension created by two sides of the equation. Right from the very beginning, that was the key issue in Star Wars."

-?George Lucas

Not from dictionary.com. It isn?t about numbers. It?s about balancing good and evil in the GFFA. The Sith have this Balance taken out of whack. The Force begins to go out of Balance as Palpatine rises to power in TPM:

"One of thematic issues here is how Palpatine becomes Chancellor. Telling how he moved to the next level, and then when you see all of the films together it will all make a lot more sense. But this is kind of a very small thematic issue that transcends all six movies as opposed to something that's actually neatly tied up in this particular movie alone. Step one is that Palpatine becomes Chancellor, and you'll see in Episode II that he then makes another step (Emergency Powers), and in Episode III he makes another step (Emperor)."

--George Lucas

"As evil begins to take over, it pushes the Force out of balance."

--George Lucas, AOTC DVD commentary.

Balance is restored when Anakin kills Sidious in ROTJ.

Anyway. Back on Topic.

 

Darth Sin -

I mostly agree with you assesment of the force, BUT -
to play devil's advocate here - The prophecy says Anakin will bring balance to the force - by killing all the jedi and equalizing "good" force users and "bad" force users Anakin fulfills that prophecy. Who kills Sidious? Anakin? No, Vader kills Sidious. Vader, a sith lord then brings imbalance back to the force. Ok, I know, its a strech, and I'm only half serious, but it is interesting to look at things a different way. Anyhow, back on topic.....

 

i still dont agree with GLs assessment of the story (and it is not his story, almost all the important peices of it are adapted from other myths). For me it is too much of a westernized outlook. Good is right and evil is wrong is an objective opinion. Neither truly exists beyond the fathoms of the individuals who define them. truly in nature (which i place akin to the force in the star wars saga) there is no such thing as right and wrong or good and evil, they are concepts that do not exist. All that is true is life moving forward in balance, balance being the "equal" forces cancelling each other out, meaning good has no effect and evil has no effect. That Theoretically is what nature does, but in the actual span of any one moment the balancing act is occuring meaning that nature is never in balance, but in theory it is.

EDIT: by the way vin, technically it is anakin who kills sidious, because luke was awakening anakin within vader. When the man in the black suit makes the conscious decision to kill the sids he is once again anakin.

 

"Potentially dangerous" is an essentially useless term. Everyone and everything is "potentially" dangerous. This is what QG was saying. Things were uncertain. The only way Anakin would be dangerous was if the Jedi let him become so.

I think George has painted a pretty clear picture that the "living Force" approach is the most "correct" approach. Just look at the way the narrative develops. In the prequels, the Jedi are painted as arrogant and blind, and this comes to pass with great emphasis on fortune-telling and reading the future. Too much focus on what could happen as opposed to what, at the time, WAS happening. QG recognized the ignorance of this position. As others have said, he placed emphasis on the most important tense, the present. Then look at the OT..."never his mind on where he was, what he was doing..." "always in motion, the future is..." Yoda doesn't want Luke to leave just because of some "vision" of the future he had (which, as the story shows, Han and Leia didn't end up needing Luke). Yoda has come to recognize that NOW is what is most important. The future is merely a set of possibilities, not certanties. NOW is certain.

George has set the story up in a manner to make us really question whether Anakin would have really fallen under QG's guidance. Look at the things that plague Anakin...living in the past by fearing his life without his mother and wanting to change the future, by becoming obsessed with "visions" of his wife's childbirth. Under QG's influence Anakin would likely have been taught much greater control over his desire and propensity to live in the past and future.

While it was QG who introduced Anakin to the council, and we all know what Anakin ends up doing, it is extremely easy, even logical, to make the counter argument that had the Jedi listened to QG and adopted his philosophies, Anakin would have never fallen.

 

QG was a genius and a cut above the rest of the Jedi council.

QG represents what the old Jedi's are.

 

Qui Gon didn't fail; he was just killed before his time. That's the whole point of the Duel of the Fates.

Qui Gon dying left Anakin with an inexperienced teacher and lack of a good friend and father figure in Qui Gon. The death of Darth Maul gave Palpatine cause to seek out a new apprentice. This led to his discovery of Anakin's talent. So he set himself up as a father figure when he was a little boy. All through his training, Palpatine planted seeds to cause him to become rebelious and emotionally conflicted. Dooku was a fall guy from the start.

Had Qui Gon survived, even if Maul hadn't; he would have picked up on small shifts in Anakin's behaviour and possibly prevented his turning in the long run.

Qui Gon never failed. The Jedi simply failed to see the wisdom in what Qui Gon was doing. They allowed Kenobi to train Anakin because it was better than losing Kenobi. This way they can have some monitoring control over Kenobi and Anakin.

The Order should have humbled themselves to see that Anakin needed quality instruction from Windu and Yoda to insure a stable foundation. This would have empowered him to resist the dark side and balance emotion with duty.

 

I can agree with that, and even moreso that Qui-Gon's death was untimely as the death of Darth Maul. It is quite possibel that if neither or one of these deaths had not occurred, the events may not have transpired as they did, at least some of them anyway.

Qui-Gon was an excellent Jedi, and that is no doubt. However, to say he was completely flawless in his approach to Anakin is not true.

His failure moreso for me, was that he assumed he would be there for Anakin, and so he did not make the correct provisions for Anakin to be trained. He turned Anakin over to Obi-Wan, who would be made a Jedi Knight, then suddenly is given a padawan.

Anakin should have maybe started with a more mature Jedi Master, and then maybe later Obi-Wan could have taken him on.

Qui-Gon's defiance was picked up by Obi-Wan, and it caused Obi-Wan to change his approach on things, even in regards to Anakin, as he tried to be more like Qui-Gon, and this I believe hurt in his training.

Yoda said he feared grave "danger" in Anakin's training. Well unfortunately, the training of Anakin was in Obi-Wan's hand, and that is what Yoda had the problem with. But he failed to step in himself.

Darth Sin!

 

This is an excellent and mature thread discussion. I love it.

I have always believed that the fear sensed in Anakins training was a result of Obi and the council not ready to train him.

As Qui Gon stated in TPM, Obi was headstrong (set in his ways) and still had much to learn of the living force (which created Anakin).

I agree that Obi was not ready to take on a padewan,
as he still had much to learn from the emotional side.

I believed that Anakin should've been allowed to go back and help his mother, Obi knew of the dreams and blew them off. The reason I'm stating this is because the Jedi themselves were out of balance with the force.
There should have been some structure in their training,but the living force was totally ignored by them.

IMHO

 

I think if Qui-Gon had lived and trained Anakin, it is very possible he would occassionally taken Anakin to Tatooine to see his mother if he saw where he was growing in fear over her.

This is where Obi-Wan held onto his rigidness of keeping the code. When Anakin spoke of the dreams he had of his mother, Obi-Wan should have looked into those dreams, and been sensitive to his fears, which he knew is what leads to the dark side.

In going back to Qui-Gon training Anakin in regards to his fears and attachments. Since Qui-Gon actually got to meet Shmi, I think he would have even been more sensitive to Anakin in this.

Qui-Gon's experience would have him recognize that though Anakin was the Chosen One, he did not start his training as other Jedi children, and he had an attachment to his mother that had to be dealt with.

Darth Sin!

 

i still dont agree with GLs assessment of the story (and it is not his story, almost all the important peices of it are adapted from other myths).

Actually it is his story and he owns it, everything that is Star Wars. Yes he has been inspired by other myths and he has said it many times before, but it isn't any of that myth, it is Star Wars, his story. Whatever inspired him, he made it, his decisions to base it on anything. Every major piece of work and every artist is inspired by something, and they create works that in turn inspire others. It's simply ridiculous to say that all the research done or the inspirations mean the work is not his..That's not how it's done in the world, not just in filmmaking but in everything - writing/painting/sculptures/anything.

Good is right and evil is wrong is an objective opinion. Neither truly exists beyond the fathoms of the individuals who define them. truly in nature (which i place akin to the force in the star wars saga) there is no such thing as right and wrong or good and evil, they are concepts that do not exist.

That's only what you think. In the real world, it's your opinion and what others believe is theirs. In Star Wars, facts are what GL believes and what he has said.

There are many religions in the world with beliefs based on good and evil and right and wrong, so it's not something just thrown in from nowhere. In fact all of the major religions are based on that concept, and the Taoist/Buddhist/Zen philosophy which heavily influenced GL, is mainly based on the opposites in nature - light and dark, life and death, good and evil etc. And the "force" is based on God and devil, Yin and Yang (Tao) etc. which are the basic beliefs of the major religions of the world, representing opposites. The force is one, with has the light and the dark side - the good and the evil side, based on the opposites of those beliefs and his own, with some fantasy elements thrown in, as he has explained many times.

You have the right to believe those are mere concepts that do not exist, but that's only what you think, and in the real world it's all about personal beliefs - including GL's, but in Star Wars, everything that matters - the "truth" and the facts, is what GL says and presents. And Star Wars is based on clear cut good and evil as he has mentioned numerous times before. Star Wars is not a religious/real life documentary. It's a mythological sci-fi fantasy created by GL, with ideas inspired by traditional mythology, and in his world (everything Star Wars), that's the basic rule. It's just as what Rowling says and her views are the facts in Harry Potter, Tolkien's is what're the facts in Lord of the Rings etc.



Qui-Gon's failure - I don't think Qui-Gon failed at all. One major aspect here is the free will that everyone has. Anakin had the choice to do what he wanted, and he chose the wrong thing. However, he later atoned for it by doing the right thing near the end of his life. Qui-Gon was right as GL said, and Anakin did bring balance to the force at last. Anakin's selfish decisions failed him, not Qui-Gon or Obi-Wan.