Masters of the New Jedi Order- The success of Luke's first students

A recent thread about the size of the New Jedi Order got me thinking. Jedi Masters are pretty uncommon in the new Jedi Order, especially when you consider that nearly every Master is one of Luke's first students. Let's take a quick look at Luke's first batch of Jedi trainees:

Kam Solusar- Jedi Master
Tionne- Jedi Master
Kyp Durron- Jedi Master
Kyle Katarn- Jedi Master
Corran Horn- Jedi Master
Streen- Jedi Master
Cilghal- Jedi Master
Kirana Ti- Jedi Master
Madurrin- Jedi Knight
Dorsk 81- Jedi Knight (deceased)
Gantoris- Jedi (deceased)
Brakiss- Jedi/turned Dark Jedi (deceased)

Out of twelve students, nine have survived the Galactic Civil War, Yuuzhan Vong War, Swarm War, and Second Galactic Civil War. The three who have died all passed away within one year of the founding of the Jedi Praxeum. Considering the horrible losses that the NJO suffers during the Yuuzhan Vong Invasion, it suddenly makes this group of Masters quite impressive.

Luke has a 75% success rate with his first class. These eight Jedi Masters and one Jedi Knight (arguably Madurrin is now a Master) go on to form the core of the new Jedi Order. Given the focus that fans tend to place on the second and third generation of Jedi Knights, it is easy to overlook how successful these Jedi have been.

Thoughts? Comments?

--Adm. Nick

 

Unfortunately, Brakiss, Kyp, and Gantoria are pretty huge failures.

 

Well, Luke was able to redeem Kyp and he's now quite the powerful Jedi Master, so I don't know how you could argue that he's a *huge failure* at all. Not to mention that the reason Kyp did turn to the dark side for the short time that he did is that Exar Kun, a very powerful Sith Lord, decided to show up; not exactly something Luke could have foreseen.

 

I like this thread. She wasn't one of the first students at the Academy, but I think Mara Jade was technically the first Force user that Luke ever taught, in TTT before the JAT. It was on-the-fly, need-to-know survival training, but still counts I think. (Unless there's someone I'm forgetting in the 5 years between ROTJ and TTT.)

 

Kyp was a failure at the beginning, but was redeemed and i would say has done a decent job of making ammends by becoming a leading Master in the order.

Gantoris was a huge failure? How exactly? He was tempted, challenged his master to a lightsaber fight and then came back to the light to the point where a Sith Lord spirit killed him because he would not fall to the dark side again.

Brakiss was a fake student from the beginning and Luke knew this, yet accepted him anyway in hopes of turning him back to the light. How this is considered a huge failure just because Luke cant redeem every single person who stupidly falls on their own is beyond me.




I think you need to define what you consider a "huge failure"
If it is just "not completely perfect", then yes, i would agree


Otherwise, i really dont see how these are huge failures at all



huge failure seems to imply Anakin becoming Vader type of situation
not minor bumps in a student's training before they even become a knight (though kyp's was admittedly more than just a "bump")

 

Well, there was Dev Sibwarra, the force-sensitive boy the Ssi-ruuk had brainwashed and used to help with their entechment. Luke bonded with him, but I can't remember if there was any actual training involved there before Dev died. Then there was Corran Horn, who rejected Luke's offer of training until the Academy got started up.

Of course, there was Ken too, assuming you count him as canon .

 

his sister

 

Actually, Brakiss died 12 years later, but he did leave the Order 3-4 years after its founding.

 

AdmiralNick22 : Out of twelve students, nine have survived the Galactic Civil War, Yuuzhan Vong War, Swarm War, and Second Galactic Civil War. These eight Jedi Masters and one Jedi Knight go on to form the core of the new Jedi Order. Given the focus that fans tend to place on the second and third generation of Jedi Knights, it is easy to overlook how successful these Jedi have been.

Thank you, Admiral Nick! Too often I've heard people say that Luke was a terrible teacher. There was even a thread that was titled something like "Luke's Jedi Order is Made of Fail". But as you pointed out, out of Luke's twelve original students 9 went on to form the Core of the Jedi Order. I think you can add Mara to that list as well.

I don't think the fall of Kyp or Brakkis can be considered Luke's fault. Luke didn't know that there was a 4,000 year old Sith Spirit on Yavin IV when he set up the Jedi Academy. Luke's training didn't cause Kyp to fall to the dark side. It was the secret seduction and training by Exar Kun that did that.

Gantoris actually ended up refusing to follow Exar Kun, and Brakkis was an Imperial plant who was already dark when he arrived on Yavin IV. Luke tried to redeem him, but was unsuccessful. But Luke and Luke's training didn't turn Brakkis dark.

Luke's first class was also able to defeat that 4,000 year old Sith Lord with a bit of Luke's help. I'd say *that* was pretty impressive and reflects well on Luke's training too.

I'd say Luke was a very successful teacher.

 

I thought Flint at first, but Luke never trained him according to the wookiepedia page.

 

Interesting to see so many are still alive. Pity we don't see more of them then.

I can somewhat understand why they're probably still alive: authors have forgotten about most of them, they've become largely background characters, killing them would be rather empty and not achieve the narrative goal they were going for, etc.

But all those drawbacks come back to not seeing more of them. Cilghal, Corran and Kyp have all had a fair bit of page time, but it'd be good to see more of the others again. Kyle, Kam and Tionne get more than some others, but to me still largely feel more "background".

Admittedly, I do half wonder whether the ones we've genuinely not heard from for yonks might just have died during the NJO off screen. Though... checking Streen's Wookiee page I see he and Kirana went to start a new Jedi Praxeum on Dathomir. Why don't we ever hear of that? Did Caedus subjugate that too? Or if not why didn't they evacuate to there? Etc. So many untold stories.

 

this thread is making me wish more and more that they'd tell us who some of the "new" masters are... after so many years there is absolutely no way it's only the ones on the master's council

 

I agree with Zorrixor. It's a damned shame so many of them got the literary shaft. Tionne is one of my favorite characters. *Sigh* It's an entire galaxy... more than enough room for them to shine.

 

Well, mainly it comes down to the authors being too lazy to create new characters. Or even if they create new characters, or say "hey, this character was one of Luke's early students and has been around for years, we just never saw her!", they usually introduce them just to be killed off too. Like Saba's Master, Eeshaya or something like that. And wasn't some Jedi killed by Alema and Lumiya while following Jacen? I forget her name though but I thought she might've been a Council member, though not entirely sure. And it happened a lot during the NJO too- we get some new Jedi knight, and either they get killed, or are ignored. The only exception might be Saba, but even she has faded from prominence somewhat since the NJO ended, or at least since the DNT. Allston occasionally introduced some junior Jedi, but they never show up again, not even in other strike missions, even in his books. Though what's even more annoying now is that in the current book series they introduce some young Jedi just so they can go crazy.

During the Clone Wars, having plenty of redshirt Jedi is ok (still sad to see Jedi die though) since their Order numbered in the thousands. Luke's Order keeps losing members due to galactic disasters.

I think Luke's first class turned out pretty well, even if we mainly see... Kyp, Corran and Cighal from those early days. Although Kam and Tionne are at least mentioned occasionally as running the Academy while Luke is busy with bigger matters. The rest have mostly faded by now, but then again, even if they did show up, it would probably only be to be killed or suffer (like what happened to Kam and Tionne in LotF).

 

To be fair to LOTF and FOTJ, we are starting to see more screen time or at the very least mentions of these characters. Only Streen and Kirana Ti seem to have been mostly forgotten, though I would love for Denning or Allston to show us briefly the Jedi school on Dathomir.

--Adm. Nick

 

It's catch 22 to a certain extent. If they bring back the old characters, they'll just get unceremonious ends, so instead they introduce new characters... just to die.

All things considered, I'd actually probably prefer to just slowly kill off the old cast and keep the new characters alive instead. It slowly shifts things into the future (which prepares the scene for when the Big Three are finally the only oldies left to go), and it means we get new characters built up, not just suddenly appearing out of nowhere.

Problem though is what you said: to kill people off when they've not been seen for ages feels lame. Before that they'd need some screen time first for it not to feel like a needless kill. This is oddly why I'd be more in favour of the "bigger names" going out first (to then allow the other ignored oldies to take their places, before finally offing them later). For instance, I'd prefer to see Corran himself die before his children (not saying his kids will die, but I'll honestly be surprised if all the crazies turn out okay). But then killing Corran is to kill the more well known character off... so instead we get left with random new characters like the one you mentioned from LOTF instead, whose name escapes me too.

Damned if they do... damned if they don't...

The status quo was perhaps okay up until the NJO or DN as the new cast (the Solo kids generation) were still learning, they themselves were only just getting to grips with being Jedi Knights, they weren't Masters themselves yet. So at that point the older Jedi Masters still needed to be there, training the new generation. But now that we're moving into Ben's generation, it should really be that first new generation that is training Ben's, so rather than seeing Saba we should now be seeing her kids as the Masters of Ben's classmates, etc.

This is one reason why I am going to be interested what happens in Crosscurrent, as by now Jaden Korr should really be a Jedi Master with his own apprentice.In an order of 500+ the 12 Jedi Council Masters can't be doing it all. But if he's still just tagging along behind Kyle I'm going to scream.

 

When a student falls to the Dark Side of the Force or is killed before his training is complete.

 

[cynic]Yes, we see Tionne... lose three of her limbs and Kam get a chunk blasted out of his back. [/cynic]

She got more screentime/development in the YJK/JJK series. Hell, in the JJK she was pretty damned awesome. Kam... has he had even a semi-major role in anything since around six years after Endor?

 

that seems like an awfully tough measurement for calling something a "huge failure" but i see your point

Brakiss wasnt really a student since he was a spy, so i dont know if he would count
Though i guess you are saying Luke loses out with him for failing to turn him to the light


Gantoris though gave his life fighting the dark side in a sith lord
Is the failure that he wasnt yet strong enough to fight back without dying?
Or is it the fact that a Sith Lord was able to get that close to a student?

 

Oh yeah! Duh, Trace.

 

Gantoris and Dorsk 81 did their jobs, and gave their lives in the process. Dorsk's was certainly the more traditional heroic sacrifice, but both died as Jedi, fighting for peace and justice. Gantoris stumbled, but, had he lived, I doubt that in a couple years, anyone other than Gantoris himself (and possibly Corran Horn) would have thought much about it. Kyp was the only true failure IMO, and he was able to return stronger and become a full Jedi Master, and that is largely due to Luke. I don't mean that Luke redeemed Kyp like he did Vader or even Mara and Kam, but I think that Luke's entire belief that it is possible to return from the Dark Side had a great effect on the New Jedi Order. Personally, I fanwank that one of the reasons for Anakin's sudden allegiance to Palpatine in ROTS was Yoda's mantra that "Once you follow the Dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny." Once he (indirectly) causes Mace's death, he sees no way to return to the Jedi. Thus, Padme was the only thing he had left.

Back on topic, I really thought that the Bantam books were setting Kam Solusar up as Luke's Second-in-Command. I was surprised that Kenth Hamner ended up taking over from Kam.

 

Wasn't Kam basically a functioning Jedi when he arrived at the Academy? Luke turned him back from the Darkside for sure but I wonder how much Luke mentored him compared to some of the others?

 

Yeah, Kam's first days as a Jedi were spent chopping up Dark Jedi in DE2. It didn't seem like Luke gave him much instruction-iirc, his training was more or less senior Padawan/Jedi Knight-level when the Dark Side got ahold of him, so I'm not sure how much actual instruction Kam received, if any.

 

I think with Kam, it was more that Kam himself didn't feel ready to be a Knight, and that his early time on Yavin was mainly for him to practice old techniques that might have been rusty, hone his control, and build his self-confidence. However, I could be drawing from fanon rather than canon.

 

I wouldn't say the authors are particularly lazy... there are a number of Jedi Masters on the Master's Council that have gotten more page time in recent years than the majority of those first 9 of Luke's apprentices. Kenth Hamner, the Chev that Lumiya and Alema diced up etc. I mean, where the kark did Kenth Hamner come from originally? And yet he's the acting Grand Master right now. What about Kam? The biggest role he's had in anything since basically DEII or JAT is getting shot up like a punk in LOTF! Kam Solusar is Bruce "Die Hard" Willis gosh darn it! How's he gonna get shot up like that? Let alone allow his charges and academy be so easily disarmed by the GAG in the first place. There's so much wrong with that. Same with Tionne, biggest thing she's done since YJK is get her hand shot off in that same book. Saba also, she just showed up and then became like the most prominent Jedi Master next to Luke and Mara.