Okay, so we all know the scene. Luke returns to the homestead to horror. We see the charred remains of the Lars'. So exactly how did this go down? Was the homestead set ablaze with the Lars inside and they died trying to escape? Were they shot down and then the homestead burned? Did they escape the burning house only to have troopers open fire on them. Get to sleuthin'...what do you think happened?
Two EU stories combine to give us a pretty good picture of what happened: 1) The Rise and Fall of Darth Vader shows the scene from Vader's point of view as he watched via holocomm with the stormtrooper commander. In this story, the stormtroopers tell Vader that the droids are nowhere to be found, but Vader doesn't want to leave any witnesses so he orders the Larses' executions. 2) Davin Felth's tale from Tales From the Mos Eisley Cantina shows the scene from a trooper's point of view. In this story, Owen grew belligerent towards the stormtrooper commander, even going so far as to spit on the commander's helmet. The commander then orders his nearby air support to lay waste to the homestead.
Keeping in mind that there is nothing definitive about the EU, I always imagined Owen went down fightin'... I never interpreted it as if they were burned alive, but they were shot and killed and then their bodies were left with the homestead which was subsequently burnt down. So when the stormtroopers were pouring gasoline (so to speak) over everything, they also poured it on the already-dead Owen and Beru.
I agree with Beezer (Biggs even said something in a deleted scene about how tough Owen was with a blaster). First they were killed, and then, the Stormtroopers attempted to cover it by lighting the place on fire.
With 10 herbs and spices. It's supposed to have 11, but some Corellian yahoo dumped #11 at the first sign of Imperials.
The two are compatible though. Vader could give the order, and Owen grows belligerent before Owen is shot. Then burn it all down.
Whoever they send, I hope one of them is an attractive lady with long hair and wearing six inch heels. You know, a professional crime scene investigator.
Why is it that whenever these kinds of hypotheticals are posed I always think of Pulp Fiction... "What does Emperor Palpatine look like?" etc...
The thing is they didn't actually seemed charred to me - they kinda looked like they were melted with acid or something. I realize now that this probably wasn't the intent but nonetheless that's what I had always thought. I figured that the troops used some weapon not shown - or used some type of high setting on a conventional blaster
