Lit SOS: Save Our Skywalker, Luke Skywalker (v3)

It could be said that all they did was break his grip on his Force Storm- then leg it while the storm consumes Sidious and his ship.

 

He did defeat him in a duel just beforehand ! I think that's the only time Sidious has lost a duel.

 

Mace did manage to knock Palpatine's lightsaber out of his hand in RoTS- though opinion is divided on whether Palpatine was intentionally fighting at less than "full strength" in order to ensure Mace would appear to be trying to kill an unarmed man when Anakin arrived.

 

This! This exactly!!!

LOL Yeah, me too!

 

Of course, there is the earlier, non-cold blooded murder instance of Luke killing a villain:

 

I think part of the problem is that it's one of the most memorable parts of his character arc that he doesn't finish off the 2nd most evil man in the galaxy. Thus, people think it's part of Luke's "character" that he doesn't kill people. Well, yes, he loves showing mercy but unlike Batman we have Luke Skywalker killing 1,000,000+ Imperials on the 1st Death Star. He's a one-man Walking Apocalypse and the fact we don't see him kill too many people directly doesn't mean that he'd hesitate to do so in self-defense or the defense of others.

As mentioned above, Starkiller is cathartic as a character because he's basically the chance to play Luke Skywalker cut loose with all his full force potential without the guilt. The Grand Theft Auto character of the Star Wars universe. While I'm not sure Luke killing his way through hundreds of soldiers is the best way to do a game--the Jedi Knight and Jedi Consular characters make it work just fine in "The Old Republic."

It's also why I appreciate Fate of the Jedi's aims even if I felt the execution was severely lacking. Abeloth is a ridiculous and ludicrous character but I'm glad Troy Denning remembered that in Star Wars, it's entirely possible to make whatever sort of character you need for our hero to fight. If you're worried Luke Skywalker is too powerful, create some sort of ancient evil Force User who terrorized the galaxy or some guy who drained an entire planet dead to become that powerful. Hell, make a genetic experiment of Palpatine or giant monster. It's the fun of Star Wars there's always a Bigger Fish.



I gave Fate of the Jedi a LOT of slack simply for the fact we got to see Luke Skywalker regularly killing Sith left and right.

 

Killing every single person on the Death Star affected Luke pretty profoundly after he became a Jedi. Killing every single stormtrooper in the Taspan system affected him doubly so.

"Fighting is not a game. For the Jedi, combat is failure. It is a tragedy. When blood must be shed, a Jedi does so quickly, surgically, with solemn reverence. With grief."

 

Yep.

However, repeatedly, Luke's business takes him to meet people whose capacity to be reasoned with amounts to a lemming's desire to throw themselves off the cliff of trying to kill him.

 

Yeah, right, because that is so murder. If you're being sarky, you really need to use emoticons - they're provided, use 'em!

 

That's the non-"cold blooded murder" killing of a villain.

 

It'd be clearer and easier on everyone if you simply said it's not murder, which it's not, but since it isn't why even use the term in the first place?

 

In response to this:

 

I use the term murder to refer to any person setting out deliberately to kill another person, irregardless of the reasons. By that quality, Shimmra and Jacen both qualify as do Lumiya even if all three are general pieces of garbage. Technically, this means all war is murder. It's just justified to a semi-extent. You could say that killing three is proactive defense but I don't think changing the word makes the act any less violent--or that the acts are damning just because they're about Luke choosing to kill for the greater good.

The Dark Side is in the details.

I wouldn't have had any problem with Luke ordering Jaina to kill Caedus if the conversation had gone like this:

"I can save him. I can help him."

"Jaina, I am torn about this. Jacen is my nephew, almost like a son, and everything that's happened breaks my heart. I want you to try to reach him if you can. Try to help him. However, there's something else--"

"What?"

"Don't hold back. Jacen is sick. Mentally ill. Whether it's do the Dark Side or something else. He won't hesitate to kill you. He's displayed that repeatedly. He's tried to kill Han and Leia, Ben, and me already."

"I can save him! I know I can."

"I know you have to believe that. I want to believe that too. It's just..." Luke trailed off.

"Uncle Luke?"

"Losing Jacen is the worst pain I've felt since Mara's death. Jedi Master or not, I couldn't live with myself if I lost you too."

 

If I was doing the cryptic crossword, this would be fine. As it is - your point is?

 

I think I'm just going to stop posting in this thread. Apparently even when I defend Luke it's misconstrued negatively.

 

Please stay. Just understand SOS is an argument thread. Even I have to take breaks.

 

No, it's construed as: I can't tell what your meaning is so can't tell how to respond - my initial take was that yeah, you're being sarky, but I'm not sure you are being so.

I'm all for playing around online and having fun, but if you're doing that be clear that is what you're doing. Flag it up, use the emoticons and that will likely reduce misunderstanding and confusion.

 

That's fine, but when I am disagreeing with it being viewed as a good thing that Luke murdered Lumiya by pointing out that he killed an earlier villain and it wasn't cold-blooded murder, and I get jumped on for that, I lose interest in discussing it.

 

You could have phrased the point better and this whole exchange wouldn't have happened. I couldn't work out that you meant this!

 

I'd actually argue that it was cold-blooded murder. Just justified by wartime.

Luke decided Shimmra had to go and did him in.

Lumiya, by contrast, was HOT BLOODED murder. The very opposite in fact.

 

DigitalMessiah

I've lost count of the amount of times I've posted something, thinking it was perfectly, perfectly clear what I meant and it couldn't possibly be misread! Wrong, so many times wrong. All I could do is revise and correct or just write it off as a post beyond all repair.

To me, it isn't a big deal and all I was asking for you was to make it clearer so I didn't misread it and respond wrongly - that's all it was intended to be.

 

I disagree with you on the last part. Your first part, I could take or leave–yes, setting out to kill someone is murder. But "all war is murder" is totally something I cannot get behind. War is protecting what you care about from those that would hurt it. Yes, you sometimes have to kill to protect those things, but there's a different thing from shooting an enemy across a battlefield and stabbing a guy in the throat because you get mad at him and can't control your emotions. Murder is an outright, unsanctioned killing. Killing in war is both sanctioned, legal, and I'd argue it's even moral, if you're protecting yourself. Rolling over and letting your loved ones get hurt is more immoral than shooting someone who's hurting them, in my opinion.

 

You assume murder is a condemnatory word. I consider it a neutral-to-dark term.

At least in terms of war, assassination, and other matters.

Murder can sometimes be justified, it's always a tragedy.

 

Plus, in the case of Shimmraa, it suggests some other, less harsh action would have sufficed, when TUF and everything we know about the Vong says not - Shimmraa was never going to back down, never going to relent, never be reasoned with and never stop killing other beings in the galaxy. In this respect, by his own actions, he no longer had a right to life, as it was based on taking the lives of others. The same was true of Onimi, who, unless Jacen Solo killed him, was going to kill the galaxy! Nothing else was going to suffice in this instance.

The case of Lumiya is far less clear cut, not least, because from most accounts, Luke out-classes her utterly and she has no chance whatsoever, which in turn perhaps permits less harsh options as being affordable. The question is, given the greatly expanded Force-abilities displayed in LOTF, is a Force-user who is skilled ever unarmed? Hence Luke executes her. One possible alternative is the wall of light technique to sever her from the Force, but Luke sems to have neatly forgotten that!

 

I'd say the majority do see it as a condemnatory term Charles, murder has a quite specific weight attached to it, for good reason.