Solo The Kessel Run

Looking back on these pasts posts of mine, I’m happy with how everything turned out.

 

Was it done in a way that it becoming folk law was believable? I haven't seen it yet but TFA sort of turns it into something more than Han big noting himself.

 

I was happy with it.

It’s a hard thing to explain in film since it’s more about charting a unique route through a very dangerous area of space than it is speed and I thought they did explain that aspect pretty well. Though I still think most will think it has more to do with time than distance the line from Han about rounding down kind of works either way for people who don’t get it.

I’m still not sure exactly why there’s so much emphasis on WHY it’s a big deal to complete it in as short a trip as possible but this new emphasis on fuel in the newer films helps on that end a little bit. A more direct route means less fuel spent.

To me, it comes off more like something other pirates/smugglers/pilots would know and talk more around bars, cantinas and trading outposts as a sign of bravery and navigational skill. I’m guessing that’s where Rey heard it.

As a kid I used to think it was speed based and more of a formal race so I’m sure many in the general audience would as well.

It’s hard to think of an Earth parallel around completing something in as little distance traveled as possible and that being a big deal. Most of our records here are the opposite. Like Felix Baumgartner’d free fall record for dropping and traveling the MOST distance.

I love the L337 Navigational tie-in. This is something that Lucas said as early as the DVDs about the Falcon in the special features:

“It’s a very simple ship, very economical ship, although the modifications he made to it are rather extensive – mostly to the navigation system to get through hyperspace in the shortest possible distance (par-sects).”

 

It's feeling like navigation, maybe like the Cape of Good Hope sort of situation?

 

That seems like a decent real world parallel. Nicely done.

Finding more direct paths in the past on Earth would have been less about the savings on fuel for the ships, I suppose, and more about savings on time and food for the crews.

 

It's not that different from the Legends "short route dangerous, long route safer" explanation. However, based on the Visual Guide (haven't seen the actual movie yet) the fact that the Kessel system is in the middle of a huge nebula, does explain why the gap between "safer route" and "dangerous route" is so large.

In Legends, a safe route was some 18 parsecs, and a dangerous route 12 or so. 6 parsecs of "steering wide of hazards" is a heck of a lot.

With the nebula, and a spiralling path out of it where the nebulosity is thinner, (and the dangerous route passing straight through) the extra parsecs make more sense than they did before.

 

What error?

Parsecs was always about distance. Shorter distance equals faster time.

 

Why, on top of escaping from a black hole at the last second, did we also need the Falcon barely flying through a small opening between colliding rocks? It was just too much, and hurt the otherwise admirably focused and smaller-stakes nature of the movie.

 

Shorter distance equals less time, not faster time, and then only if the speed is the same. Fortunately relativity does not exist in the GFFA!

The error, of which I feel you are perfectly aware, is in ANH it is the speed of the Falcon that is referred to:

"If it's a fast ship."

"She'll make point 5 past light speed."

"I can still outrun them."

The parsecs comment comes directly after the first quote. For Han to reply with a boast of navigational achievement does not match with Obi-Wan's statement, and the general opinion is therefore that Lucas made the error in using the word "parsec" and it was subsequently retconned that the navigational feat to do the run in a shorter distance was the meaning of fast.

You'll come back with something along the lines of, "No, that's what George meant all along."

I'll probably counter with asking why all other references to the Falcon were about it's outright speed.

Then we'll get into a round of quoting from obscure interviews from the 1970s, touch briefly on the physics, then some name calling, and we'll get shouted at by the mods.

 

The use of parsecs wasn't a mistake, but trying to retcon it into making sense was. It wasn't supposed to make sense. The script makes that very clear. Han was making stuff up.

 

I thought it was a neat way of explaining the parsec thing in relation to the Kessel Run.

I especially liked the lights that acted as navigation beacons along the safe route through the maelstrom, sort of like the lights you would string up down a tunnel. Very cool idea.

 

Loved the Kessel run - really well done .....kept you on the edge of your seat .......

 

None of us can read George's mind in the '70s, but I think it's pretty clear what the actual explanation is, George's revisionist memory notwithstanding...

Using the word "parsec" was not a mistake, but it was always wrong. Intentionally wrong, but still wrong. George used it because he needed a space-y sounding unit of time, and parsec (despite being a unit of distance) has "sec" in it. 99.99% of the audience has no idea what a parsec is and only has context clues to go on. So we hear "sec," the official abbreviation for second, and our brains automatically assume parsec must be a unit of time.

It was actually brilliant world-building by George. By fudging a single word none of us know anyway, he helped create the impression that we truly are in a galaxy far, far away. The only "problem" is that the internet happened, and since the early '90s, every SW fan knows that "parsec" is a unit of distance, not time. As for the script saying that Han is spouting "obvious misinformation," it just means Han is making obviously false boasts about his ship ("My Toyota Camry goes 0-60 in 3 seconds!"). Basic salesman B.S.

Anyway, the way they did the Kessel Run was perfect -- both the action side and the way it squares with ANH. We're told that 20 parsecs is the shortest possible route, but thanks to L3's one-of-a-kind navigation system, they get it down to just-under-13, which Han rounds down to 12. And then rounds down again in ANH to "less than 12." No wonder Obi-Wan knows Han is full of it. Not only did it take a miracle to get it down to 13, but Han exaggerates it to the point of impossibility.

 

Nicely said. Lost in the discussion was Han's desperation to get paying work. He was unscrupulous in that respect cause his head was literally on the block. His response was to secure the client's money who specifically needed a fast ship.

 

Was that a Purrgil?

 

I kinda think so. All it takes is Han bragging to people he meets, like he immidiately does after landing the ship in Solo. Eventually it would turn into myth.

 

There was some type of gravimetric distortion event that would drag ships in that strayed too close. perhaps a small black hole feeding on the nebula. Travel at a high rate of speed to reach escape velocity for the gravity well coupled with hyper accurate navigation data to plot the safest route out allowed for the Falcon to take a shortcut other ships could not match.

NASA uses a somewhat similar technique by using the gravity wells of planets to accelerate space probes to high rates of speed along a chosen route.

 

I just read something in Wookiepedia which clarifies something. We’ve been viewing the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs as a mistake meaning time. It’s not, Han actually meant distance. Shorter distances meant lesser time since ships can’t go straight.

“In a commentary track on the Star Wars Blu-ray release, George Lucas stated that ships in the Star Wars universe can't travel in straight lines while in hyperspace due to collisions with celestial objects. Thus, distance is an important factor in how quickly a ship can get from point A to point B. The Millennium Falcon's superior navigation computer allowed it to travel shorter distances between points and arrive faster.”
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Kessel_Run

 

Now we know how the Falcon got his superior navigation computer. It downloaded the L3-37 database which was unique and allowed it to find a safe route near the black-hole-like-stuff.

And the Falcon had a boost from hyperfuel that no other ship has access to.

And Han rounded down.

 

I predicted that Han would kinda lie about doing Kessel Run in under 12 parsecs and I was right! "Not if you round down!"

 

If I heard and understood correctly, then the figure of 12 is obtained by rounding down - if this is so then "under 12" is just plain wrong, isn't it? However, I may have misunderstood.

 

That Kessal Run scene stole the show. It was a good touch that they used TESB music during that scene.