Lumiya's Lightwhip

I have two questions:

1. In Duel With a Dark Lady, Luke repeatedly touches the physical tendrils with his lightsaber, but only after he takes control of the lightsaber tendrils can he cut them. Did the lightsaber tendrils soehow protect the physical ones?

2. Why didn't the lightsaber tendrils cut the physical ones when they came in contact? If Luke's lughtsaber could cut them, why not tendrils made of the same energy?

 

Not sure if it'll answer your question... but it is a featured artcicle! It's pretty comprehensive. I hope your answers are in there.

 

Actually, reading that article is what made me wonder, lol.

It just makes no sense that Luke's lightsaber hits the tendril multiple times but they only break when he cuts them.

 

Get used to being confused by lightwhips- they can't keep the physics behind the karking things straight. The only time I've ever seen the physics behind the difference between a lightwhip and a normal lightsaber explained, it was in the Coruscant Nights books and stated that a lightwhip extrudes a flexible length of metal that acts as an extended emitter, like the disc at the end of a lightsaber, explaining how a lightwhip's blade can be flexible yet maintain its cohesion.

Yet, Lumiya's was supposed to be the ONLY lightwhip that contained both solid lashes and energy lashes as well, meaning in the end there IS no coherent in-universe explanation for lightwhips that takes everything into account.

Like I said, it's best not to expect ANY sense to come out of lightwhips. I learned that the hard way (IE, working myself into several headaches going over every source that mentioned them and trying to figure out how the kark they worked, to no avail).

 

I think Star Wars canon could learn from Star Trek's designers in some respects.

"How does a lightwhip work?"

"Very well, thank you."

 

Speaking of Lumiya's lightwhip, what happened to it in the end. During the Duel on Terephon, Luke knocked it into a canyon, and then he killed Lumiya via decapitation. Come to think of it, what happened to Lumiya's body, did Luke just leave it on the ground, or did he do something with it?

 

Ah, come on man, his wife like, just died.

 

At the very least, there was probably a little foreplay.

 

My personal canon is that the force user must be protecting physical matter in the whip and even controlling the whip to some degree with the force. Which is part of why it's such an uncommon weapon; while psychologically intimidating, it's got to be crazy hard to use for even a trained force user.

 

If Duel with a Dark Lady is the source of the problems, while everything else meshes well, you don't need to worry, as that comic is most likely S-canon.

 

Your notions of the meaning of S-canon notwithstanding, that comic was reprinted in 2003 and is on the schedule to be reprinted in Omnibus format soon.

 

It was also recently reprinted in a Hasbro comic pack.

 

It's also one of the best comics Star Wars has ever published.

 

My canon is that it projects a kind of gel-like plasma that nevertheless works together like a whip.

Why?

Because it's STAR WARS!

 

Well, that fact is what convinces me, actually. Because three years later the Comics Companion omitted it from its timeline, and Leland said Marvel was S. So, in spite of a post-Holocron re-print, it still wasn't considered worthy for some reason. What are we to assume has changed since then? Especially if there are problems between it and the rest of continuity, as indicated by this thread? That is far too much doubt for any fan to be asked to implicitly and uncritically respect its continuity value.

I have actually lost any faith in re-releases meaning anything as far as continuity is concerned. That would indicate that the Lucas money-machine favored continuity over cash, a notion to which I can only say: Hah. Last xmas I saw a LucasArts ad for tons of old, AFAIK problematic games sold on Steam. I'm not terribly inclined to think this must mean a continuity elevation.

 

How does that work? ()

 

i posted about this a while ago...just can't find it now.


anyway the Cestus Deception has a pretty reasonable explanation for the lightwhip (of course my copy is in a box under other boxes). but then again, its prob just the one cord whip, not lumiya's dual duel whip.

 

Leland's been very clear as to what S-canon means --- if it's referenced in another source, it's canon. The events of this comic issue have been referenced in several other sources. There is no doubt...

 

That's sorta missing the point, isn't it?

Has the problematic parts about Lumiya's lightwhip been referenced? That is really the only thing that particular fact has to do with the discussion. Holocron tracks by entry (subject), not by source, after all. The duel itself can be referenced as much as it wants without bringing details about what exactly transpired, or what proprties the weapons used had, with it.

 

"Pretty much all of the planets, creatures, and characters in the Marvel comics are considered available for continuity. It's only the plot elements that are contradictory to the rest of the EU that are not. " - Chee

 

You can't change your argument after you're called on it and then accuse me of missing the point...

 

I'm not seeing how MRN changed his first point, really. The discussion is about the properties of a lightwhip. He offered that if every other (C) source was in agreement and it was only the S source that had it working differently, then we didn't have to worry about it: and under those conditions (I don't know whether they're accurate) we don't. *Shrug*

 

First he was explicitly saying the comic was s-canon. Then I said "No it wasn't" and he was like "I wasn't talking about the comic, I was talking about the specific details of the lightwhip."

Amending your argument is OK, but just acknowledge that it's been amended.

 

Ulicus got it perfectly. I never meant to imply that I amended myself on Duel with a Dark Lady being S-canon. As far as I'm aware, it still is.

You said it wasn't, on account of having been referenced. But as best I know my S-canon, being referenced means only the referenced topics/stuff becomes C, not the original source. So I contend that even if the duel in its generality is perfectly within continuity, the comic (and the specific events it alone contains) are S. And as far as this discussion has informed me, those specific, un-referenced events, are the problem, not the duel.

Make sense?

 

I don't think that's right. Not in the case of the Marvels, anyway. The characters, plot points, duels, battles, weapons, etc, have all been referenced elsewhere. Everything in the comic is affected by those referenced things, and something as trivial as lightwhip physics, which, as this thread has shown, can't be kept straight anywhere (even in c-canon), isn't going to prevent the entire issue from being elevated to c-canon.

I'm pretty sure that the entire source being elevated to c-canon is the rule, not the exception.