Jabba-wocky, I've tried several times to make a similar point regarding Force attunement. From an OT-based perspective, for all we know the genetic component could simply relate to heritable personality traits, the presence of which would make one a "better" Jedi. Good luck trying to convince others of this. I also got a similar reading to yours on who the Jedi were, from the OT. I think it's a valid reading, though as Lucas was heavily inspired by materials like the Lensmen stories, I suspect the PT Jedi are actually close to what he 'always wanted.' Even if what we read out of the OT seems different and works just as well. Though, I don't agree that ESB is not enjoyable. For me, the atmosphere of the film - conveyed by the design, the score, the shot composition, the colors, lighting, the particular mix of humor and seriousness, etc - makes it a favorite.
"Just because many people find it enjoyable, that doesn't make it true." Isn't that a contradiction? If a movie is found enjoyable by so many, yet it is still not enjoyable? Fair enough. But to be honest, there is far more people who believe the movie is enjoyable than those who don't.
It's enjoyable for many, and it's not enjoyable for other many. Where's the contradiction? you are arguing opinions, not facts. Even if true (which nobody knows), that's irrelevant.
It does when it's not ignored. Or it would imply that, not being Jedi themselves, they don't really understand it. If you're letting Imperial admirals define things for you, you could easily end up with concepts like the Empire being the good guys. The same goes for Han. Using Han's unenlightened skepticism as an explication of the nature of Force sensitivity seems like a pretty weak argument. Also, if we're using ANH as supposed evidence, TESB and ROTJ should be fair game as well. TESB and ROTJ are also OT films, and as previously stated they provide evidence which tends to discredit the "anyone could join" theory of the ANH era. That's a typically ridiculous statement. If there's someone in this debate who's getting hung up on "stuff that has nothing to do with the films", I'd say that would be the person insisting that things like basketball and alcoholism are relevant to inherited Force potential. Meanwhile, my evidence comes entirely from the films. Once again you insist on distorting the situation portrayed in the films. The Force potential of Luke and Leia is not "predicted with reasonable certainty" by the OT; it's guaranteed. Actually, you do need to. If you're so sure that genetics are not the only factor in the OT, then you can explain what other possible kind of factor would be involved. Your unwillingness to do so implies that you realize your argument is teetering on the edge of an abyss. That's the whole point. Beyond speculation, there is no suggestion that they aren't the only factor. This is something you choose to believe and are writing into the OT. The OT merely fails to establish explicitly that something analogous to midichlorian count is the determining factor. We have the PT which does so; we have an OT which is entirely consistent with it. The suggestion exists in your imagination. So what you're calling a "change" is the fact that the PT doesn't permit this speculation on your part, while the OT supposedly does. But this is really just tantamount to saying "midichlorians weren't mentioned until the PT". No, he doesn't. I'm talking about the amount of years spent training as a Jedi. Zukassa has been training significantly longer than Luke has, even if we start Luke's training at ANH. Luke gets a crash course.
Feel Like What: Yeah, I suspect you're right on all points (although we obviously disagree about the quality of this particular film). I'll go ahead and give it a try, though, to see if I can't at least make a few people pause for thought. You miss the point. All the people in that room were adults by the time of the Clone Wars. Han was, too. Tarkin had probably already past the halfway point in his career. All of them would have been extremely familiar with what the Jedi could do at the height of their power. They knew what the organization was and what it was about. In spite of this: A) None of them were impressed. Everybody thought of the Jedi as having mostly "parlor tricks" and doing things that could be attributed to luck. That suggests Lucas probably didn't originally intend for the Jedi to be as super powerful as we saw in the PT. Otherwise, such skepticism really doesn't make sense at all. B) Even if they didn't know about everything the Jedi could do, they would certainly have known the difference between a simple religion and a group that had to do genetic testing to find eligible members. The fact that they never talk about it as the latter suggests Lucas did not intend for it to be anything like that. As I said, these things are relevant to how anything is inherited. You're trying to argue, without any real reason, that inheriting Force sensitivity is special, and somehow different than everything else we know about the science of genetics. Why? Okay, but as we reviewed earlier, real genetics doesn't work like that. Even if Force sensitivity is a dominant trait, there's still a chance Anakin didn't pass it on to Luke. Kenobi has no way of knowing. So either A)Kenobi's certainty comes from something other than scientific knowledge or B)Force sensitivity is not genetically heritable, but operates by some weird, otherwise unexplained theory that lets you have 100% certainity. Either way, it doesn't support your theory. That doesn't logically follow. I can show you suggestions that an alternative explanation might be true. I've done that. But I can't definitely prove a negative. You, on the other hand, could prove that genetics are the only important factor. Except the films themselves never say that. That's the whole point. Beyond speculation, there is no suggestion that they aren't the only factor. This is something you choose to believe and are writing into the OT. The OT merely fails to establish explicitly that something analogous to midichlorian count is the determining factor. We have the PT which does so; we have an OT which is entirely consistent with it. The suggestion exists in your imagination. So what you're calling a "change" is the fact that the PT doesn't permit this speculation on your part, while the OT supposedly does. But this is really just tantamount to saying "midichlorians weren't mentioned until the PT". Why does that matter? Luke was still a Jedi Knight, which is more advanced in terms of training than a Padawan. Your argument is like saying that a kid who fails the third grade three times is smarter than the kid who skipped 4th grade and moved out of elementary school a year early. It doesn't matter how long you've been doing it. It matters whether you've learned all the lessons. According to Master Yoda, one of the greatest Jedi in all of history, and a widely renowned teacher, Luke had done so. Zukassa had not. I think we ought to take Yoda's opinion as more authoritative than your own. Even if we put this aside, though, there's not a very big difference. Endor took place in 4 ABY, giving Luke 4 years of training. Jett was 10 years old at the time of his death. If we are generous, and assume he began serious training at age 4, he would only have 6 years of training. Are you really telling me that you think Luke qas only 2 years away from turning in a performance like Jett did? They're in entirely different leagues. It seems unlikely Luke ever would have become such a proficient killing machine at all, let alone in a mere 24 months.
You don't know that. You're imagining things, and overlooking the fact that they're suitably "impressed" with Vader. No one ever said "parlor tricks" in any of the films. Han said "simple tricks", and Han isn't "everybody". He's one person, and again, using him as an authority on the powers of the Jedi seems extremely misguided. Don't forget that he turned out to be wrong. They display the same powers that we saw in the PT. Remember when I asked you to name an example of something the Jedi do in the PT that they don't also do in the OT? Exactly. Tarkin never called it a "simple" religion. You're reading too much into the use of the word religion. As it turns out, Tarkin's nomenclature is accurate, because it is a religion to the Jedi, who believe that the dead transform into the Force and say things like "may the Force be with you". The films, Lucas, the books. As we reviewed earlier, midichlorians do work like that, because that chance was treated as being equal to zero. You're making the mistake of assuming once again that fictional midichlorians must adhere to the rules of real-world genetics as manifested in certain characteristics. You might as well argue that there's no dark side in SW because there isn't one in the real world. That's a bit of a stretch. It stands to reason that the Jedi have studied this subject over the years. Also, Kenobi is not the only character who thinks so. You have two characters coming to this conclusion independently, and there doesn't seem to be any particular indication that they are meant to be seen as wrong, so it looks like legitimate exposition on the topic. I'm not hearing an alternative explanation. That may be because the quest for alternatives leads to a logical morass and doesn't hold up well in the context of the later OT films. This is kind of getting into apples and oranges territory. Last action hero Luke is conferred the title of Jedi Knight for facing Vader a second time. With Obi-Wan as a notable exception, it should be clear that this kind of thing can't be the requirement for the average Jedi. What's the sum total of the relevant training and experience which Luke received in that period, as displayed on screen in the OT? - blaster deflection training on the Falcon. - uses Force pull on Hoth. - trains on Dagobah during TESB. - fights Vader. - calls out to Leia. - makes a lightsaber. - uses the Jedi mind trick. - kills Jabba's guards. - deflects a few blaster shots. - levitates 3PO. - fights Vader again. That's it. No, they really aren't. All Jukassa does is some acrobatics, some fairly workaday swinging of a saber, and some blaster deflection ( ultimately insufficient ). We've seen Luke do all of these things, and also not die. The EU disagrees with you.
Force speed, TPM. Calming Jar Jar and accidentally turning him unconscious, TPM. Anakin jumping off a speeder and freefalling like 100 ft and propelling himself from side to side while in free fall to evade oncoming traffic, before landing on Zam's speeder softly enough to survive, AOTC. That last one is a bit of a stretch as we witness Vader levitating in TESB too, but it's not necessarily the individual abilities, but the extent of their plausible power that is the main difference between OT and PT. Mace Windu jumping off that pretty high balcony while deflecting shots in mid-air on Geonosis...
Luke's speed-enhanced jump, TESB. Luke dropping off a pretty high AT-AT and other acrobatics; Luke using blaster deflection. "It's not necessarily the individual abilities, it's the extent of their plausible power."
I'll give you that one. Good catch. Acrobatics has nothing to do with it. Dropping off that AT-AT happened in a point in his life where he had trouble concentrating enough to pull a lightsaber towards himself. Not buying it. He didn't die when he fell off the AT-AT because of the snow. Also, he never deflects shots while in free fall or while anything really. He concentrates on one thing at a time. "It's not necessarily the individual abilities, it's the extent of their plausible power."[/quote] I don't know what you mean by this. Do we see anyone using the Force to calm others in the OT, so that the extent would be less?
I thought it was said somewhere that there was more to it than that. But he does other things that are impressive. In fact, one could argue that fall augmentation is merely the inverse of the speed-enhanced jump, and as you pointed out yourself, Vader can do it. It doesn't have to be all about Luke. Although a Sith, Vader counts as a Force-using OT character, and we're not talking about a dark side skill. ( Speaking of Vader, we never see a long-distance Force choke in the PT. ) So imagine him having to do two things at once. He's not unable to comprehend the concept. The point is that the individual powers are of similar magnitude. I don't see it as all that powerful in the first place.
He does that after his training on Dagobah. Before Dagobah, his full extent of training is a deflection practice session on the Falcon in ANH, and with a lot of concentration and effort managing to pull his lightsaber out of the snow toward his hand. It's not likely that he was able to soften his landings at this point. Furthermore, the short example of levitation performed by Vader in ESB pales in comparison to the free falling stunt Anakin pulls off in AOTC. Except he doesn't. Able to perform the concept, however, is a different matter. One has to assume that concentrating on doing two things at once in the GFFA is as proportionately more difficult to doing one thing at a time as it is in real life. But your question was whether any powers are displayed in the PT that are not displayed in the OT. By your own admission, right there is an example.
Is there an echo base in here? ( Ghost Ben could have been talking to him as well, I guess. ) The point is that he does it in the OT. I wasn't comparing Vader to Anakin, I was comparing him to Mace. That's why we call it imagination. Like walking and chewing gum? In context of the assertion that the PT Jedi are much more powerful. If "calming Jar Jar" is it, I don't think that's an especially convincing outcome.
How is controlling another living, thinking being's entire state of consciousness not radically different than anything we saw in the OT? It bespeaks a huge amount of power, and doesn't have real parallels.
I don't want to read too much into things, but even some of the powers that are the same in the trilogies seem slightly different. For example - in TPM, telepathy is treated exactly like ESP, with Zener card-equivalents even. A mind seems like it could be read like an encyclopedia. From the OT (Vader sensing Ben on the Death Star, Vader sensing Leia in Luke's mind) it seems like this process is more ethereal. If a mind can be read like a book, why use "the mind probe" on Leia in the first place? (Unless "the mind probe" is actually a Force technique - but even if it is, why the difference between her and Luke? Perhaps the accessibility of presences or thoughts depends on what the read-ee is currently aware of, and a mind cannot simply be rummaged through? And even detecting a personal presence in the mind seems different from essentially seeing through another's eyes, as Anakin does in the test in the Jedi temple.) I could be overemphasizing differences, but it's an illustration of how to me the Force and the Jedi feel more esoteric in the OT and more practical in the PT.
Since any assumptions about the nature of mastery over Force powers, a fictional concept we have no way of comprehending, will require interpretation by the individual viewer, any answer goes really, but I'm going to go ahead and say that I find it very implausible that a skill set that according to the films takes years of training to learn and a lifetime to perfect, is comparable to walking and chewing. I would compare it more to the likes of juggling while skateboarding, which I'm sure you'll agree takes considerable skill.
By that logic than nothing could ever be classified as "bad" or "good" since its all "opinions". Yet it happens all the time. I presume it's true since ESB is widely regarded as one of the if not the best of Star Wars films. How is it irrelevant? Is it irrelevant if most people think Jar-Jar is annoying, to determine whether or not he is annoying? I don't think so. I have to disagree with the first paragraph.I thought the characterization and development of the characters in the PT was bad, except for Obi-wan. Anakin jumped all over the place. In TPM, he was a kid, so this film was a waste. Next, we see Anakin in Aotc 10 years later being a completely new character. He is a teenager full of angst, mentally unstable and a bit evil. Next, we have Rots where Anakin is supposed to be this great and noble Jedi. Which I didn't see but supposedly he was. We see Anakin Skywalker the Jedi for so little and then his fall is rushed. Padme is bad too, particularly in the last movie. She is unrealistically cast as a Queen of an entire planet at 14 and she is the most boring character ever.It's not until the end that we see her do something. In, Aotc she gets much better becoming an action girl who isn't afraid to get her hands dirty. But then this is ruined in Rots when inexplicably she is reduced to a stay-at-home worried wife, who does nothing but cry. Losing the will to live despite having newborn twins to live for. Obi-wan was the only good characterization, but it was only for the last two movies. In TPM he was different to how he was later on. His characterization from Aotc to Rots was brilliant. In the OT, we see Han go from a selfish smuggler with a dark streak (shooting Greedo) to a more selfless caring hero, who is willing to fight for something above himself. Leia goes from an overly stuck-up closed character to a more loving character.
Just because real genetics doesn't work like that doesn't mean Star Wars genetics can't. It's called artistic license. Midichlorians do seem to be genetic since both Yoda and Obi-wan see the twins (offspring of the man with the most midis ever) as the only two options left to defeat the empire. Furthermore, Vader notes that Luke is strong in the force in ANH indicating he has a large force potential. Your basketball example is also wrong because force skills and basketball skills aren't the same. The effect a great basketball player can have on whether his kid is going to be a great basketball player is limited to passing on certain genes of favorable qualities to basketball such as tallness, thin-build etc. However, there are no "basketball genes" that can be passed on which make it easier for kid to learn basketball quicker than any other person. This however, is the case with force potential. If the parent has a high midi count this can be passed on to their offspring. And a higher midi count leads to more force potential and an easier time gaining force power, as shown by Anakin in the PT. These things don't work the same.
Glad to see you've caught on. More seriously, though, I would not be able to say that any work of art can objectively be classified as good or bad, especially based on majority opinion. You know what else has a lot of fans (and this is the tried and true example on the internet)? Twilight. Yet I will maintain that no matter how many fans that series has, no matter how much money it makes at the box office, no matter how many people swoon over the awful characters, that Twilight is a terrible, terrible romance. I don't care that it's regarded as one of the best romance stories in the past decade by a large percentage of the population -- to me, it's still utter tripe. In regards to Jar Jar, you might want to check out this Gallup poll: http://www.gallup.com/poll/3757/Public-Gives-Latest-Star-Wars-Installment-Positive-Rave-Reviews.aspx Gallup is interesting because, unlike internet polls which sample only a select subset of the population, it is scientific data gathering, so it gives us a good measure of the general public's reaction to a character. And guess what? Of people 18 and over who were surveyed, at least 10% consistently listed Jar Jar as their favorite character. And while TPM may not have gotten rave reviews, most people rated it as either "good" or "excellent." Opinions are tricky business and the legitimacy of your opinion does not depend on how many others agree with you. It's fine if you don't agree. In fact, I welcome it because good discussion is often based on differences of opinion. However, I don't think we're going to persuade each other so this discussion probably isn't going to go anywhere. Obviously, I heartily disagree with you in terms of Anakin -- I think he's the most interesting character of all the Saga and well written. TPM lays much of the foundation for his behavior while AOTC, I feel, does a good job of expanding upon how life on Coruscant has affected him, his relationships, his faults as a character, and his issues. ROTS, then, shows a more matured Anakin (who also happens to be more likable, or less unlikable, if you prefer) that lays out how he has grown as a person but also plays on his susceptibilities and personal failings to show how he falls. I felt his fall was well constructed. You disagree, and that's your right, but I don't think we'll persuade each other either way. That's okay though. I really like Padme's character. She's more understated than Leia's feistiness, but I don't feel this makes her less interesting or any less realistic. People have often described her as boring and while I respect the fact that they can't get into her characterization, I disagree. I see Padme, in some ways, as the antithesis of Anakin -- selfless to the point of self-harm, where Anakin can be selfish to the point of self-harm. Her characterization in TPM, in particular, I like -- her naivety but her stubbornness are nice contrasting forces to her character. Unlike a lot of people, I also am not as troubled by her role in ROTS. Although I love the deleted "seeds of rebellion" scenes, I've come to recognize that Padme's diminished role as a Senator is also a consequence of her decreased power in ROTS as Palpatine accrues greater and greater strength. I also don't mind the "losing the will to live" aspect -- I think it ties well into her tendency to be a martyr. A lot of people (perhaps you) don't see it that way, but I don't mind. It's a scene open to interpretation. I don't know why Obi-Wan's characterization in TPM rubs people the wrong way so much. He was still young and finding his footing -- by AOTC he's much more secure though. I've always found it interesting, though, that Anakin is always younger in the PT than Obi-Wan. We meet Obi-Wan when he's 25 in TPM, but Anakin is at most 23 by ROTS. For Han, I will say he had a compelling arc in ANH -- going from selfish smuggler to hero. I find him largely static in ESB and ROTJ, though. He's already a "good guy" in those films and doesn't really progress much beyond that. Likewise with Leia. Urghh...I could write a dissertation about how disappointed I am with how Lucas handled her character. Leia was always loving -- look at the way she comforts Luke in ANH after Ben's death. No, I don't see much character development in her. She certainly never gets to face her father or resolve her issues with him, which I would have greatly preferred seeing in place of her insipid romance with Han. But I should stop ranting. Again, it's merely different points of view. I'm not "right" but then neither are you.
Yes, Charlie, I'd absolutely agree that the PT establishes this. But what I was saying is that the OT doesn't really give any hint that things work this way. It's part of a big shift in how the Jedi (and the Force in general) is presented in the two trilogies. Also I was pointing out how unfair it was for Arwan to cite the science of genetics when it supports his side, but when the exact same facts don't support his theories, then they don't count. That doesn't make sense. Either we should be able to consider genetics or not. We can't just cherry pick the stuff that only agrees with our pet theories.
