In Choices of One, Pellaeon is "third bridge officer" of the Chimeara, and doesn't seem to be a particular important person. But then i remember in one of *sigh* Karen Traviss's *end sigh* Clone Wars books, he was captain of a republic equivalent of a Star Destroyer. You'd think in 25 years he would have made some progress career wise, and at least not get demoted . . . It seems like a relatively minor continuity error, and one that could be easily retconned, but is there any explanation as to this? like was he demoted or something to do with transition of Republic --> Imperial fleet status?
I haven't read No Prisoners, so someone correct me if I'm wrong, but from reading reviews of it I got the impression that Traviss took the 90+ year old, well-weathered, finally lax on protocol veteran of several wars that she wrote in Revelation and transported him back in time to the Clone Wars, in the process ignoring the Pellaeon from Timothy Zahn's nameless trilogy altogether. With that said, I don't think the Captain-during-the-Clone-Wars thing is her fault; he was a Captain at Merson in Republic 64, wasn't he?
Politics maybe? Some bug-eyed imperial hardliner decided he wasn't fascist enough for the New Order and replaced him with some young nutcase. The stigma of not being a xenophobic jagoff might holdoff any further promotion until he comes under the command of someone like Thrawn.
It's more likely that being a complete failure isn't good for one's career prospects. He's plenty fascist enough -- he hates aliens like Rukh, he was complicit in slaving operations, and he has this delightfully disgusting gardening metaphor about how people who don't perform up to his standard are essentially noxious weeds. His embracing of multiculturalism and gender equality is a dictator's ploy, aimed at enhancing his power base in an area where fascists come in all stripes (see: the soi-disant Imperial Interim Ruling Council).
From the very beginning, there's been an implicit conflict between Pellaeon being this seasoned veteran of impeccable competence, and the fact that five years ago, he was second-in-command on a Star Destroyer. The guy was a lifer, in the Fleet since he was sixteen, an extremely competent, by-the-book officer with a good reputation, but after forty years in the fleet he was still the second fiddle on a ship of the line? It's rather implausible to begin with. But then, when we get Pellaeon captaining an Acclamator (which, to be fair, is John Ostrander's fault, not Traviss's), it became a bigger problem. It's not just that he had a slow rise -- it's a big navy, and maybe competent officers get lost in the shuffle -- but now we have Pellaeon taking essentially a step back. He was the captain of a ship, and twenty-five years later, he's XO. You could put a little twist on it -- say, as a competent captain of a midsize ship, going from there to XO of the biggest, grandest new thing in the neighborhood was seen as a lateral move when the ISD was first rolling out, and then somehow he stagnated -- but it's still a stretch. But with Choices, I don't think we're left with any option but a demotion. He's a fifty-year-old former captain of a fighting ship, and he's buried on the depth chart of a standard ship of the line? Something has to have happened. He's up-and-coming as of Bail Organa pointing him out to Leia, so that had to be within about five years of ANH. If he'd been busted down way back, there should have been enough time for him to work his way back up again, so I'd suspect that whatever happened happened afterward -- that sometime shortly before ANH, he got knocked down a rank and demoted to third officer on Chimaera. He works his way up quickly enough by ROTJ that long stagnation before that doesn't make much sense anyway. I'd thus propose him as a fairly prominent captain who looks like he's moving upwards before, sometime a few years before ANH, he gets busted down for something. This could help explain the unusually high regard he seems to be held in by the rest of the Navy post-ROTJ, when he's just a random captain. If he's a longstanding captain previously who was considered on his way to the Admiralty before he got busted down, probably unjustifiedly in his colleagues' eyes, that could explain the existing name recognition and respect once he reemerges as a captain. If whatever caused his demotion was Intelligence-related, that would be even better, as it would help explain Isard's refusal to promote him despite calls to do so.
Knowing his rather bizarre distaste for the Court, Pelly probably blundered into something that offended his betters and put a black mark on his career. If only that mark had been permanent. Refusing to promote him is the only intelligent thing Isard ever did.
I'm sure Imperial Intelligence wasn't too happy with him having had a fling with one of their spies who vanishes from his ship and is later in the company of a splinter cult of the Jedi Order led by someone who is rather high on their hit list. He must have reconnected with her at some point because I don't believe their son is old enough for him to have been conceived during NO PRISONERS. Which means he was probably seen as a security threat at the very least. I don't mean to insult fans of Pelly, but it always seemed that the support he enjoyed came more from the rank and file's respect rather than actual military victories. He also wasn't a forceful enough personality to get the Fleet away from the warlords until Daala showed up to start murdering people. By the NJO time period and the Second Galactic War it seems he's respected more for being a relic of the Empire rather than any actual great victories (yes, I'm sure that can be argued, but I don't know that he was ever a considered a tactical genius by characters in-universe).
In the Essential Guide to Warfare Pellaeon is mentioned to have served the Imperial Ruling Council. If I remember correctly, Pellaeon was called 'Admiral' in Crimson Empire 2 (if it was indeed him). Afterwards, when Pelly is serving Teradoc, he is given the rank 'Vice Admiral'. Did he get demoted?
That book Armed troop transport, 3 bridge officer on a ISD does properly have more prestige. Nothing Traviss wrote ever happens is the easier fix or the Clone Wars never happend works as well. Though yeah him not getting along with the new administration works as fix.
Teradoc was a warlord...I'm not really sure how stable promotions and ranks were among the warlords. If there's one thing Daala could be credited with, it's getting the Fleet back together as a fighting force as well as setting them back up as a body that wouldn't be so easily divided again. The breaking of the Fleet post-Endor was a large part of what lead to the collapse of the empire, imo, and if there'd been a strong military leader in charge they could have checked the ambitions of the warlords, kept the fleet stable, and held out against the rebel assaults. Instead it wasn't until later that the Fleet would become a quasi-political entity as well, with the threat of it walking out being enough to bring the Empire into the Vong war.
I could easily see Pelleon having issues in the transition between the Republic and the Empire. Its not a stretch that he refused some order and was busted down. Or, also plausible, was that his earlier captancy was a wartime/brevet promotion. The US military, after WW1, demoted a lot of officers because of down sizing (Patton was demoted from Colonel to Major). The only problem with this is that I doubt the Empire shrunk the military post-Clone Wars. However, I do think that it is possible that career officers were passed over for promotion in order to promote politicians. Pelleon was never an outlandish personality that would have attracted the attention to get promoted very highly. He was a quiet professional that did his job.
Could depend on context admittedly, as Rear and Vice Admirals are often just addressed "Admiral" in conversation, same as Lieutenant Colonels just being called Colonel, etc. Was the "Admiral Pellaeon" reference in CE2 a person speaking it in dialogue, or in one of the narrative boxes?
Pellaeon was addressed as 'Admiral' by Emperor Carivus in conversation. I kinda forgot about the difference between 'Rear' and 'Vice' Admiral. That probably solves my question. Thanks!
Warfare states that Pellaeon watched the Crimson Empire's rise and fall from the Deep Core after already joining Teradoc --- looks like the CEII guy is someone else. I believe he was addressed by about three different ranks throughout CE2, but I've always chalked that up to Carivus madly giving out field promotions while the New Republic closes in on Ord Cantrell.
can you explain your dislike of him please.....i'm curious for your POV on his character in totality.
You're probably right... I still love to think it was him though. We need to see more of him in future comics!
Well, he's a coward and a deserter who somehow gets embodied as "Mr. Imperial" by virtue of being the guy who stood behind Thrawn's chair. He's the guy that the authors used to make Imperial fanboys feel better, when in reality he's just another warlord.
"An inferior bud soon feels the strength of my pinch"- seemed a bit atypical of the guy we see in HoT. A much more explicit "The galaxy is a garden full of weeds- I am the gardener." metaphor is used by Jacen in Traitor- perhaps foreshadowing. Whom did he desert? And as for cowardice- as Thrawn himself points out- there is no shame in retreating to retrench.
He deserted at Endor. He ran with his tail between his legs and took most of the fleet with him. I'd call it mutiny, too. As far as Thrawn goes: Thrawn could retreat from Sluis Van because Thrawn was in charge. Random lackey #5 doesn't get to make that call. Random lackey #5 gets a firing squad for that. As far as the gardening bits -- I suspect that fighting a war meant that he didn't have the time for the social engineering he wanted once peace was created. You have to admit that the guy -- despite his hypocrisy about it -- was big on military protocol. He chastises Lt. Tschel for breaching protocol, he addresses Thrawn with old-timey parade ground formality, and even Leia remarks in HoT that he has a certain fussiness about him. Doubtless his militaristic tendencies led in the direction of fascism once he was able to turn his eyes towards the civilian sector. Under the Emperor, people like him were strictly regulated by their betters so that their harmful tendencies could not come to the forefront. But under the Remnant, Pelly's vision became reality -- a kinder, friendly "empire" indeed!
It would appear that Pestage wouldn't. Nor Isard. They didn't promote him- but they didn't arrest him either. After the battle, Harrsk tells him that now the battle's over- his command's been nullified- implying that it wasn't nullified at the time of the retreat.
Err -- the guy asked me to explain why I disliked Pelly, so I answered him. I'm happy to talk about other aspects of the character, but do we really need to relitigate an issue that we spent a couple pages on in the Warfare thread just a few months ago? If you'll recall that thread, I stated that I preferred to interpret the passages in Warfare consistently with the material in the TTT sourcebooks and chose not to infer a continuity breach / retcon unless either: I. clearly stated or II. unavoidable. The TTT material indicated that both Harrsk and Dorja were upset at taking orders from a junior captain, and the former wasn't even aware -- due to his injuries -- that it was a mere XO who had ordered the retreat. And frankly, both Pestage and Isard had bigger fish to fry -- you'll note that the latter distinctly held a grudge against Pelly though.
the question I'm wondering is- how much of the "Pellaeon is cowardly" rhetoric is based on an impartial reading- and how much is an "in character role-play"? And what about the various bits of evidence suggesting that he's seen, in universe, as reliable and loyal?
I always thought it was a bit strange the CE2 guy was established as not being Pellaeon, given how much it looked like him and how it would have fit in well with his then-details. Especially since, given Pellaeon's actual appearance in CE3, I think it was likely the authors' intention to begin with.
