ST The Force, the Chosen One, Balance, and the ST

Really? I think that could be interesting. Anakin is the Chosen One who destroyed the Sith and brought balance to the Force. In the process he helped to hunt and kill the Jedi Knights. Does it follow that the PT Jedi who were killed, Sith? I don't think so, but it's an interesting thought.

 

You can have your opinion, but it would still be wrong. These are the facts.


"Then we will get to the 3rd film, where he is seduced to the dark side, which brings up to films four, five, and six, where Anakin's offspring redeem him & allow him to fulfill the prophecy where he brings balance to the Force by doing away with the Sith and getting rid of evil in the universe."

--George Lucas, The Star Wars Trilogy VHS Boxset 2000.

"It's not that they can't see the Dark Side coming, it's just that the Dark Side begins to envelop everything. It's like walking into a fog. The Jedi's ability to see lessens as the Dark Side grows."

--George Lucas

"The thing of it is: The prophecy was right. Anakin was the chosen one, and he does bring balance to the Force. He takes the one ounce of good still left in him and destroys the Emperor out of compassion for his son."

--George Lucas, The Making Of Revenge Of The Sith; page 221

"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 interview, 1999

It was decided that learning the ways of the Force had to be a constant struggle for Luke and that he would always have to prove himself. In regard to the dark side of the Force, the story meeting transcripts [for TESB] suggest that although one can’t see it, it should be the real villain of the story. In his training Luke discovers the roots of the evil Force. The danger, the jeopardy is that Luke will become Vader, will be taken over. He has to fight the bad side and learn to work with the good side.

--Star Wars-The Empire Strikes Back: The Annotated Screenplays, 1997.

"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, “The Mythology of Star Wars,” Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth DVD, 2001

"The film is ultimately about the dark side and the light side, and those sides are designed around compassion and greed. The issue of greed, of getting things and owning things and having things and not being able to let go of things, is the opposite of compassion—of not thinking of yourself all the time. These are the two sides—the good force and the bad force. They're the simplest parts of a complex cosmic construction."

--George Lucas

"If good and evil are mixed things become blurred - there is nothing between good and evil, everything is gray. 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.

--George Lucas, Time Magazine article, 2002

"The dark side is always there. It is experienced daily by people. It is like a huge cancer, alive, festering—both a reminder of a moral state and, at the same time, symptom and symbol of a very sick society."

--George Lucas, “The Mythology of Star Wars,” Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth DVD, 2001

 

You're using quotes from Lucas? The man who changes his mind about his own story so many times that nobody knows what he's thinking?

"There will absolutely be no more feature films"

Also, he isn't in charge any more. He is now Gene Roddenberry. The FACTS are: Nobody knows where we go from here.

 

He changed his mind about how many movies he was going to make, so we throw out his concept of the Force?

 

No, but we may learn there are additions to the concept. I wouldn't doubt it.


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Additions to the concept, like the Cosmic Force, can still be consistent with the statement "they're the simplest parts of a complex cosmic construction".

 

The way I look at the Chosen One prophecy is to view it as dealing specifically with one threat or situation. The dark side had been growing in influence and overshadowing the light side and Anakin killed Sidious and sacrificed himself and that brought balance to the force. I feel like that prophecy was fulfilled, but the galaxy and the force will still continue on, obviously, after balance was achieved and other problems will come up in the future.

 

I'm hoping that The Prophecy goes on preserved in the sense that Anakin did bring balance to the Force and that thr ST won't contradict that even if a Sith emerges. Anakin returned balance to the Force because for whatever reason Palps, Plagueis, whomever during that Sith line used the Dark side in such a way that was cancerous to the Force itself and therefore decaying so-to-speak the Light Side. Maybe Anakin himself was the cancer due to his unnatural creation along with Palps for abusing the DS. Both being removed from the galaxy immediately rebalances The Force since all those energies were "returned to the Earth."

I hope that the ST introduces the notion that the DS can be harnessed and isn't inherently evil itself unless misused. Flip the switch on the LS as well where we see that too can be abused/misused where it can be the cancerous as well.

 

If you consider the 'opinion' of the Force about such things then it did have problems with the form the Jedi Order had taken at the time of the PT. The Republic had become corrupt and unwieldy and the Jedi served to prop it up. The Jedi didn't cause the imbalance in the Force but they unwittingly served to enable it by allowing the Sith to gain a prominent position in the Republic, which is why there was such an imbalance, even though the was only two Sith.

The Jedi would only ever fight to save the Republic which is why the Force's plan swept them aside as well so that something better could replace them. The Jedi believed that the prophecy meant that the Chosen One would be a hero who would lead them to victory over the Sith - they obviously never considered that they were part of the problem rather than the solution and the way it would actually go down was that the CO would join the Sith, destroy the Republic, and the Jedi and then ultimately turn back and destroy the Sith. Although Yoda does not see this, by Ep III he has misgivings that the rosy future the Jedi believed in will come to pass, which is why he thinks the prophecy may have been misread. He believes that they can no longer be sure what the role of the Chosen One will be. That is probably why Yoda decides to go into exile - he knows the Force is no longer with the Jedi and so chooses to wait and see what will happen and if he can divine what is the right thing to do. So when Luke turns up he knows that he must train him to face Vader, although it seems he and Obi-Wan believed it was Luke's destiny to kill Vader rather than turn him back, whereas Luke had a different perspective because he was Anakin's son.


Regarding the prophecy in the ST, I cannot really predict how it will feature but I feel there will not no be much said about it. Most of the characters who ever knew about it or had a role in its playing out are gone and it is only really Luke who is left who was part of how the prophecy played out. So I think the notion of the Chosen One will feature in quite a general way and it will be through the character of Luke that it is brought up.

It is unknown what Luke's status will be though, so it could be that there will be some who believe in him and his abilities as a leader and some who do not. And maybe the fact that he turned Vader back to the light side and enabled the prophecy to be fulfilled will be a reason why some people have faith in him, and yet there may be others who think that the prophecy is something from the past, from a bad era and do not believe that a 'Chosen One' was instrumental in balancing the Force and it was more to do with the efforts of the people, the rebels, that defeated Palpatine, and whilst Luke was a part of that, and a powerful Jedi, he does not have any special status.

Then it may be that people turned against Luke because he was the son of the so-called 'Chosen One'. Since Anakin turned to the dark side, there may be those who think that Luke could do the same if he is given a prominent role. If Luke has not formed a new Jedi Order it could be because he is tainted by that association and does not have the faith of the people. So perhaps he too has exiled himself until his role becomes clear to him, as it may do if a new threat to the galaxy emerges in Ep 7.

 

We now know I-VI is the first two-thirds of the story. The last third should end the Skywalker story in spectacular fashion. It would be odd for this genre to conclude in anticlimactic fashion. ANH is the best example of SW climactic endings. Taken as IV-VI Anakin's actions are a form of redemption and love. Episodes I-III made prophetic additions to his actions. What will the ST do to his actions, if it is to provide a spectacular climax at the end?


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Lucas wasn't planning to sell his company until he did. He wasn't even 100% certain he wanted to make more movies prior to then. But be that as it may, that doesn't mean that the Force is out of balance in the ST. That the Sith are back. Or any of that. The story Lucas came up with doesn't change what he had done prior. It was intended to be a new story.

 

It is without doubt that the story as we knew it in the OT shifted in the PT. This is the nature of the storyteller. He grows the story by changing our perceptions of what we think the story is about. Right now, I think the story, I-VI, is about the rise, fall and redemption of Anakin Skywalker, the Chosen One. I now know there is to be a sequel too this story. Therefore, I-VI is not the same anymore, it is I-IX, and I like to ask myself...what is the new ending? I thought it was over...it's not. Is everything I thought I knew about the Episodes I-VI story the same? Or, more likely, how will the story shift again to justify a sequel in the first place based on the knowledge of the nature of the storyteller, which shows us this shift several times within the same saga... i.e., the nature of the Emperor, Darth Vader's relationship to Luke Skywalker, Anakin's role was not merely redemption, but prophecy fulfillment. There is a high probability that the narrative will alter and pivot again in order to justify a sequel in the first place. Furthermore, the PT provides plenty of set up to pay off in the ST, if they should decide to make sequels....oh, right, they did decide to do that.

The justification of sequels brings me to the point about the conclusion of the saga, because we have an end in VI, how do the writers create a ST that wraps up and finishes the story in spectacular fashion? If balance of the Force by Anakin as the Chosen One is truly the main point of the saga, then the ST really risks being an anti-climactic let down. If I were in the writer's shoes and having the benefit of witnessing what the writer has done in the past, as you have, too, then I would think Anakin's redemption would be important. But the results of destroying the Sith and saving Luke would have unintended and unforeseen consequences. He redeemed and saved Luke....great job! However, destroying the Sith allowed one to come back more powerful than you can possibly imagine. It is the Curse of the Skywalkers that they are 'intimately' connected to the Sith, that is, the Dark Side of the Force. Aren't we all?

Anyway, I think we need to make a distiction. Getting back to the 'OT style' means Anakin's redemption and act of love in saving Luke is most important. His work as the Chosen One, restoring the balance of the Force must be called into question, if we are going to move forward with a grand Star Wars Saga ending.

 

There's one big question that needs to be asked: Was the Force balanced before Episode I ?

 

I think the answer is 'no' and I don't believe we'll get it until the end of Episode IX. If the Force is balanced in Episode VI, then I see little reason for sequels. I mean I want to see a huge climactic ending to this thing.

 

I don't think so cause they were still awaiting the chosen one. Cause Qui-Gon probably had it in his head that Anakin was probably the chosen one, THEN Darth Maul appeared and the Sith were back.

 

I think the scales were starting to tip in Episodes I and II, but in my opinion the imbalance came when Palpatine declared himself Emperor.
After reading Darth_Sinister post with Lucas's quotes, I'm even more convinced that balance is not the relationship between the Jedi and Sith, it's much larger than than that.
I believe balance/imbalance can be as small as an individual (Luke's struggle) and as large as the Galaxy as a whole. Once the Galaxy was under Palpatine's command, it made everything easier for him to control.

I believe that Anakin was the only one who could over through the Emperor, but balance won't come immediately, it will take some time for the Galaxy to recover -- and probably another very big threat.

 

The point is that there's a new story. A new set of events, most likely tied into the past, but one that goes off on its own tangent that is unrelated to balancing the Force. There might not even be any Sith, but just Imperial remnants that need to be eliminated. Or the Nightsisters make their live action debut.

 

I'm going to go out on a limb and say there will be Sith. In fact, I think they'll get back to that 'OT style' of a mystical Master Sith, whose plan has been unfolding throughout the episodes, I-VI, thus far.

What you propose is feasible, I suppose, yet feeble. The ST must not be an addendum to a better story that already resolved, but the culmination of the entire saga. I've always believed that Anakin's redemption was enough and the Chosen One title ancillary at best. Anakin's grace, however, is part of a larger plan as evidenced in the necessity of a sequel, which allows the Sith to return and the Force persistently disturbed and out of balance. There is no balance until IX.

I find maintaining the balance of the Force intriguing, but ultimately an unsatisfying representation of an existential threat. It implies an absence of conflict. It's not dramatic enough, but as everything else discussed, it is only my opinion. If I had a crack at input in the screenplay of the ST I would make the Master of the Sith the villain whose plan has been unfolding up until Episode IX, the End.

 

Yes, those quotes above are very insightful as to how George views balance. In fact, he basically says what I've been arguing here in this forum for the last year -- it's not the existence of the Sith that create imbalance, but specific actions and successes the Sith have over a period of time. For example, it's not merely that Palpatine is a powerful Sith that unbalances the Force, but that he helps to corrupt the Senate, the Republic, and democratic institutions. That he creates an Empire. This whole slow poisoning of democracy and the compassionate values it implies for people is the fundamental act of imbalancing.

We can draw a few logical conclusions from this. 1) The death of Palpatine and Vader did not immediately balance the Force because their death does not reestablish the Senate, Republic, and democratic institutions. 2) Whatever Imperial machinery or remnant that still functions after their death must be undone. 3) Democracy and compassion must be reestablished in the Galaxy. Thus, the Republic and Jedi Order must be rebuilt.

At the end of Episode 6, we could assume all these things would happen. Now we can't. It's likely that the Force has not been balanced yet by the time of the ST, and that the ST will be about the final acts that balance the Force -- rebuilding a healthy and compassionate democracy and a healthy Jedi Order that protects it.

With an ST we must revise Anakin's legacy as the first necessary act in tipping the balance of the Force back in line. The Emperor and Vader had to be destroyed and at the time, and only a redeemed Anakin could do it. But that was not the end -- it was just a necessary momentum shift in the right direction that only one person could perform.

As a result, in regards to Balance, we are wrong to think the Sith have been destroyed forever. They are just one local aspect of a much larger galactic imbalance. The real key is that the new Jedi and Republic are able to defeat new threats that try to corrupt them, including the Sith. This could be anything that corrupts democracy and compassion on a galactic scale, and war, for example, is one of the main corruptors that never seems to end.

 

Are we all even sure that Sith will be involved in this trilogy? I believe the prophecy has been fulfilled and no we will move on to new things involving these characters. There is still plenty of non-Sith evil floating around the galaxy.....and now that it is canon do you think we will hear anything of Ahsoka's fate? (Maybe just a small mention at least?).

 

I agree with the sentiment that the balance of the Force is not at all dependent on the existence of the Sith themselves, but rather on the actions of such individuals on a galactic and cosmic scale, that tips the balance in favor of the dark. As has been mentioned time and time again, the Force was most likely in balance until the years leading up to Episode I, and we know that the Sith have been in hiding for centuries after the fall of Darth Bane. While the Sith existed before, the Force was considered to be balanced then, even with the existence of two Sith Lords following the Rule of Two. Why, then, is the Force falling into imbalance by TPM? Well, as Dra--- so eloquently stated, the Sith Grand Plan had gone well underway by the events of TPM, with the pawns in place to assure Palpatine's ascension to power, and the Sith were clearly growing stronger. The Darth Plagueis novel elaborates on the machinations of the Sith and the means they used to assure the imbalance, enabling the dark side to gain dominance and weakening the Jedi's ability to utilize the Force while strengthening the hold the Sith had already established in the GFFA. Even disregarding this, we know that Palpatine's political savvy enabled him to put himself into a position of power, the Office of the Supreme Chancellor, and we learn that he has been plotting the Clone Wars long before the actual start of the conflict in AotC; the manipulation of Sifo-Dyas, having Darth Tyranus take over the clone army ordered on behalf of the Republic, etc.

I like the idea that Immortiss brought up, that the ST will ensure the final fulfillment of the Chosen One prophecy, and Dra---'s explanation of the restoration of democracy and peace on a galactic scale is the key to truly establishing this balance. For as long as there is a large-scale galaxy-wide conflict, I don't see the Force as truly being balanced, truly being in harmony. For death, anarchy, and destruction are all things that fuel the dark side of the Force, giving it power. Anger and hatred on a galactic scale could easily disrupt the balance, and I feel that it is the purpose of the Skywalker line to ensure that the galactic conflict ends in order to truly restore balance to the Force. To bring TCW into the topic, specifically the last two episodes of the Yoda arc in Season 6: Yoda is told that his reward of learning the ability to Force ghost is a result of "teaching one who would save the universe from a great imbalance". I initially interpreted this to mean Luke Skywalker, who would indirectly restore balance to the Force by redeeming his father and allowing Anakin to fulfill the prophecy. However, this line is sufficiently vague enough to refer to Luke himself as the true Chosen One, the offspring of Anakin Skywalker; in this case, it will be Luke's role (or maybe even that of his offspring) in the ST to ensure the balance is restored, once and for all. Anakin merely achieved that first step. It is now up to the next generation of Skywalkers to fulfill the prophecy of the Chosen One.

Moreover, I've mentioned before that in the episode Sacrifice Yoda thinks the Jedi can achieve "victory for all time", just before the scene at the Jedi Temple cuts to a three-leafed clover, which I interpret as a metaphor for the "trilogy of trilogies" that George Lucas originally envisioned. That seems to hint that victory for all time (which I interpret as potentially victory over the Sith Order) isn't going to be achieved in Episode VI, but at the end of this three-part, nine-episode saga.

 

Good and logical rebuttal. Thank you.

Too many on here try to make their point by screaming and throwing mud.

 

I don't believe it is an assumption. Lucas is adamant that with Palpatine's death and Vader, the Force is back in balance. The restoration of the Republic is only based on the idea that the government is to be restored and that would most likely be the case. It might come under attack again, requiring a new adventure to begin. But the Force would very well be balanced.

 

But Lucas's insistence is based on the story as it stood I-VI. This is no longer the case and this new adventure will occur within the broader outline of the story. If there were to be no sequels, then I would heartily agree with you, but since we know differently, I think differently.

If I were asked to write the sequel trilogy to Star Wars I would require two things:

1. The New Republic/Jedi Order are not established.
2. The Balance of the Force occurs in Episode IX, at the end of the saga.

Both would be accomplished by the end within a broader context than it occurred in Episode VI. Allowing for an appropriate culmination to the entire I-IX saga story.

 

the prophecy was never meant to be once and for all. That would be ludicrious, and it would deprive us of the sith which are good villians.