ST Praetorian Guard Discussion

I thought the design was a bit lazy - and the whole fight scene and even the weapons reminded me of a lot of Hong Kong action movies - referenced in the Matrix movies and again here. Cool? Yep - generic? Yep - and I have to say I found the whole fight a bit boring as I’ve seen it all before - sorry but it’s true


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Cool cool cool.

 

I like the plated armor that can deflect sabars more than cloth ponchos, yes.

I like helmets that allow their wearers to turn their heads more than C3PO can, yes.

So, yes. Left all the way because these guys can’t even look left.



Reduced to? They were probably the best non-Force using hand to hand combat experts ever seen in Star Wars as a whole.

 

The left one is cooler. The details in the armor and the samurai-like design are much more interesting to look at than the plain look of the old guards.

The old design is just a mass of red cloth with a more or less cool helmet.

Even the weapons of the new ones are more diverse and interesting.

 

I think the old design is cooler, but in a more mystical sense, so the weapon detracts from it.

 

all four helmets

 

Meanwhile I found some previously unseen footage of the original Imperial Guards attempting to turn their heads while fighting in those old costumes.

 

Oh yes, absolutely loved these guys, and the battle was the best duel since TPM. Now, the original Royal Guards have been my favorite Star Wars design since 83', not counting Boba Fett, so that will probably never change with the nostalgia of it. And yes, the originals are more elegant and have a royal feel. But these guys are definitely more pragmatic, and are designed for combat. I especially love the nagamaki / bisento weapon, it was such great choreography. Yes, these guys are what Grievous' bodyguards should have been. I see that one of the helmet types (mushroom) has a replica in production for around 500.00, and I am actually considering getting one for my man-cave; the pre-order is already sold out lol.

 

Alright!! Now we are getting somewhere... Thanks @thejeditraitor - For some reason I couldn't post pics yesterday. For the purpose of this (ridiculous conversation haha) I will call them guard 1 (top) guard 2 (second) guard 3 (bottom left) and guard 4 (bottom right) going by your pictures.

Now here comes my question - Are the top two helmets (guard 1 and 2) the same and just look different because of lighting and the angles which they are viewed on? I think they look different but I have looked everywhere and you can only find the guard 2 one side on - The top one looks to me like it is lipped, where as the second looks plain curved.

8 guards, 4 different weapons, 4 pairs, 4 helmets made perfect sense to me but here's the problem (sorry) ...when I watch the scene (I did several times last night) the guy in your bottom right pic (guard 4) above is represented 4 times (I counted because I am an idiot) Those top two helmets (guard 1 and 2) together are represented only twice in the fight... So it's either the same helmet, 1 of each in the Praetorian guard OR I am losing the plot haha

?

I don't know why I get fixated on these kind of details... I am still convinced that the RO Death troopers (8 counted in the film) were originally a set of 6 like at the start when they arrive to confront Galen Erso (There were 6 in all the merchandising etc) and all through the film - they only became 8 when they changed the film and Krennic confronts Jyn and Cassian with two extra guards in the data tape vault because he takes two with him and the other 6 fight Baze etc on the beach! Don't even get me started on the Magna guards and their different colours and weapons haha

 

short answer. i don't know.

longer answer. the visual dictionary states what i said. my pics may not be different but it says there are 4 different helmets. or variations? something like that.

 

Guard fight- Best sequence in TLJ, not Jango vs. Obi-wan in AOTC or the duel (TPM) but still pretty entertaining. There are however some issues IMHO:

1. If they're paid guards, and their master was killed do they still fight?, I guess if they consider them Samurai then ok, but still weird, what did they want to accomplish?, revenge for the death of their master, and why did they attack Rey if Kylo was the one that killed Snoke?
2. Rey bested Luke and Kylo yet still had "trouble" with these "normal" dudes? c'mon.
3. These guys get a great battle and choreography and go out fighting against all odds (must've known that these Force users will wipe them eventually yet still they fought), and Phasma gets a really poor fight with Finn?, poor Phasma I hope she stays dead. I feel bad for her.
4. Why did Rey fight alongside Kylo instead of helping the guards kill Kylo? makes no sense to me. Wasn't she really upset that Kylo killed his father!!!???, what?

Again cool fight, but story-wise didn't make a lot of sense to me.

Then Kylo blames Rey for killing Snoke and the guards. So funny that he didn't even have the guts to tell Hux that it was HIM that killed Snoke.

 

1 snoke probably gave them instructions and it's impulse.

2 rey is powerful in combat with a staff. she still has trouble against laser weapons. also it was 2 against 8.

3 phasma is boba fett with lines. the end.

4 the guards were trying to kill rey and she thought she could turn kylo.

 

Those are probably good explanations.

Just seemed off to me somehow. They struggled too much on the fight. Rey and Kylo both are supposed to be so powerful (explaining why they can do all these magical new things). Mace, Obi-wan, Anakin or almost any Jedi from the Republic era (AOTC,ROTS), looked to me more adept at fighting against worst odds without breaking a sweat. Unless these Guards are revealed to be some other 'new' form of super warriors with some 'new' powers we've never heard of.

 

Personal bodyguards of the Emperor and the Supreme Leader are supposed to have extreme mastery of sword and several other types of fighting.

Also, 2 against 8. And they were obliterated with Kylo/Rey suffering only a few scratches and a little help from each other.

Finally, Kylo and Rey are eons behind Mace and Anakin.

Other Jedis from the Republic era were not so powerful as I remember. In AOTC, several Jedis died in an arena skirmish.

 

- Yoda unceremoniously just totally disabled the imperial guards in ROTS, didn't even have to draw a LS.
- The 2 most powerful Force users in the GFFA against 8 "human reflexes" fighters, remember through the Force they have Jedi reflexes.
- but everyone says that the reason Kylo and Rey can do all these new things is because they are MORE powerful than the old Jedi, so are they or are they not?,

anyway not trying to pick an argument. The fight was good, but inconsistent to the whole Kylo and Rey are on a league of their own, story. -IMHO

EDIT: I guess the reason it feels off is that the guards turned out to be a lot more difficult to kill than Snoke. Maybe that's why it feels off to me.

 

Are you comparing YODA to Rey and Kylo? There is no comparison here, Yoda was a 900 hundred year old Jedi Grand Master.

If Snoke, Palpatine or Yoda struggled a little fighting the guards, you would have a point.

Take the UFC heavyweight champion, and make him fight with 8 lower ranked fighters. What do you expect to happen, realistically?

Luke said they have raw strenght, but the movies show us several times that their strenght is not fully developed yet.

Snoke even bashes Kylo due to this. They have potential, but they are not yet fully realised. Otherwise, Rey and Kylo would have killed Snoke on a fair fight.

 

I mean, their cool; but just a complete rip-off of the Emperor's Royal Guard. Can the ST pull off ANY original ideas?

 

*They're
Having the guards fight was an original idea.

 

Also, you need to see Rey vs Luke spar again in the theatre at some point.

She hits him from behind. He’s unarmed. He dodges all of her attacks. Has to force pull a make shift weapon and easily blocks each attack and then disarms her staff and almost stops like “lesson over” and she’s already Force pulling a saber to which he would have no defence against and more importantly he’s big enough and wise enough to realize she’s not in her right mind and that this has escalated far too much. He then drifts back and uses the Force to briefly levitate and puts his hands up like “Fine. Let’s talk.”

He’s been struggling with guilt over his last apprentice so it’s not like he’s keen to see another one turned to darkness. He becomes the bigger person like a parent letting their child throw a tantrum to get it out of their system.

 

I like the fact they didn't cut through the guards like butter - Makes it feel more real to me!

 

Exactly. It’s just like Anakin, except he was never able to reach his full potential. Obi-Wan even mentioned with focus, he’d be able to rival Master Yoda. Doesn’t mean he wasn’t still powerful as hell.

 

Um...because we've never seen Jedi fight guards before?

 

Sorry, I thought we were still comparing the PGs to the IRGs. Totally my mistake.

 

So an "original idea" is taking the character design from another film; adding some frills to the costume, changing the word in their title from "Emperor's" to "Snoke's" and making them fight a Jedi like we've seen dozens of other guards do in previous films?

 

Every single person in position of power, since the ancient times, have bodyguards.

Therefore, Snoke could have his bodyguards as well, and there is nothing to be complained about this.

They are an original idea because unless I have a defective DVD, on RotJ they did absolutely nothing.