Lightsaber injuries

I did a search and couldn't find any discussion regarding injuries inflicted by a lightsaber. I think most of us will agree that a body part cut by a lightsabre will cauterize rather than bleed. We see this when Luke gets his hand cut off and again when Anakin gets his hand cut off. Both wounds were instantly burned and sealed closed. We see this again when Maul is sliced in half, no blood. Obi-Wan is slightly grazed by Dooku and again, no blood. Mace cuts off Jango's head cleanly without a trace of blood. It seems like the logical thing to happen and characteristic of what a lightsaber would do - cauterize and seal the wound.

Now you have in ANH the cantina scene where Obi-Wan cuts off the arm of the thug picking on Luke. Blood everywhere. In ESB, Luke cuts off the arm of the Wampa and again we see blood. Then again in ESB, we see Han use Luke's saber to slice open the belly of the Tauntaun. The Tauntaun's belly is sliced open and spread like it was cut with a very sharp knife without a trace of burn marks. There is no cauterization and sealing of any of these wounds.

The only difference I noticed is that when a lightsaber wound cauterized it was on a human. The other wounds that didn't seal up were non-humans or animals. But still, living tissue is living tissue and it technically shouldn't make a difference.

Thoughts?

 

Well, Maul is not human, he is a zabrak. Zam, the clawdyte assasin who gets her arm chopped off by Obi is also not human, so the whole human-cauterization theory goes down the drain.

As far as those scenes with lots of blood. I think that when Lucas first filmed ANH, he had no firm idea of what the lightsaber could do. Same with the wampa. In the original film, all you could see of the wampa was the arm, so they gave it some blood to make it look more real.

The real question is why didn't they digitally eliminate the blood when they did the SE in '97, or now with the DVDs...

 

Your points are well made, C2PO, but I think that the entire issue relates more to staying within the parameters of a "PG" rating than anything else. The MPAA has all these weird conditions attached to every considerable "offense"; it's likely that blood from an alien creature or animal is deemed less disturbing or objectionable than blood from a human. That is ridiculous, I know, but such is the nature of the ratings board. From an artistic perspective, I think that it was a wise decision for Lucas to aviod extreme gore and instead focus on the characters and situations - if we were to see blood spurting from severed extremities I think that it would have the potential to become distracting and take us out of the movie. By the way, in AOTC, Obi-Wan is bleeding after being "grazed" by Dooku's lightsaber - watch the scene again more closely.

 

This has already been discussed in the CT forums more than once, and one of the theories was that it depends whether the person (or creature) has a open blood circulation system (that means that he/she/it has no veins, instead the blood seeps through their flesh freely) or a closed one, (like that of a human). If there is blood, it probably means they have an open circulatory system.

 

"Slight" cauterization is mentioned in an EU novel. Luke did keep his arm elevated in ESB!

Plus, I recall a bloodied arm from ANH not a bloodied stump. Heh, I know that doesn't mean squat!

 

It seems to me that sabres don't cauterize a pretty good portion of the time-the bad guys in ANH, Maul in TPM, and I reckon you can see blood on Qui-Gon when he gets run through, as well as on Obi-Wan's thigh.

Note: The ANH novel describes the sabre blade as not being hot at all-and is this is a 2nd-hand canon item coming as it does directly from the script, I'd take it more seriously than the rest of the EU.

 

I agree that the primary reason for no-blood is the PG rating. The lightsaber probably would slightly cauterize the wound in certain places, but slicing through an arm (and the major arteries) would absolutely gush blood no matter what did it. It's not like the circulatory system would melt itself shut. Veins and arteries do constrict themselves to limit blood-loss when severed, but the biggest ones couldn't do this.

Getting a head sliced off, like Jango (and someone else) get, would cause them to bleed out in less than a minute.

 

Perhaps a lightsaber wound that is taken cleanly and directly is more likely to cauterize than one that isn't. Luke didn't have much time to prepare his attack on the wampa, so he could have just struck out not taking care to do a "clean" slice across. Same with Obi wan in the cantina. As for the tauntaun, it is an alien species, so we could just assume that the underbelly of a taun taun in maintained with the fatty-looking stuff that showed when Han cut him open. Darth Vader sliced Luke's hand off from the wrist, perhaps, if he had cut off the hand from the side or through Luke's fingers, Luke would have bled. Just a thought.

 

C2PO,

We don't know what properties the flesh of other creatures has in the GFFA. Perhaps the thing in the cantina has skin that reacts differently to heat. If it didn't evolve in an earth-like environment then I imagine it has different traits.

 

it would seem that a saber swung in haste produces blood, while a more deliberate, or pre-meditated swing gives the cautireization. or something. for example, when ben swings his lightsaber on tatooine, it's a last effort, he didnt want to do it and maybe he hadnt even warmed that bad-boy up in the last 20 years. and when luke kills that wampa, or takes his arm off, he's doing it to save his life and he's not really even trying to hit anywhere specific. and finally when obi-wan kills darth maul, he's giving it all he's got and he doesnt know if it'll even work. yes, i think that might be it.

 

If you look closely when Obi slices Maul you can see a slight mist of blood....

 

If you look closely when Obi slices Maul you can see a slight mist of blood....


yes its very hard to miss you can clearly see a mist of blood