Lit The Definitive Sinre Poll Series: Was Vergere as a Sith a good retcon?

Look I barely remember Vergere or much of any legends cause I haven’t read them in like a decade. But I am against this on the sole purpose that I think the Sith should be dust post ROTJ. Stuff like Andor, Ahsoka, the high republic show that the Sith do not need to be the bad guys for Star Wars to feel like Star Wars. It’s one of my biggest problems with legends and I guess canon now that Palpatine is back. But legends still had it worse.

The Sith do not need to keep coming back. You can move on and make other stories. Jacen didn’t need to be a Sith. Vergere did not need to be Sith the one Sith didn’t need to be a thing. Have ROTJ mean something more in the grand scheme of things then just the Death Star blowing up. Have it be the final blow of the Sith.

But authors are far too tempted to play with the toys they are the Sith.

 

Vergere's methods were questionable, and probably was very jaded/warped after being with the Yuuzhan Vong for 50 years, but I didn't see her as Sith.
Lumiya being the one to say Sith, makes me disbelieve it on principle.

 

A talking chicken with a pain fetish.

That is all.

 

Yes, because Star Wars has never had aliens based off of animals before.

 

It's an old joke long, long before your time @Dream-Thinker.

 

Well hold on now, I joined this site 3 years ago while you joined...24 years ago...oh...

*starts rapidly de-aging*

 

I didn't read the relevant books and have no idea whether it's a good retcon or not, but I'm almost inclined to vote "yes" just to maintain my contrarian reputation. (Don't worry, I won't. But I've noticed that Vergere's name still pops up here with some regularity and I promise I will, one of these days, find out what all the fuss is about.)

 

She said she was a Jedi, she also said that everything she said was a lie...

 

Such a paradoxical thing to say.

If taken literally, that means that the statement "everything I say is a lie" is, itself a lie. So she's telling the truth. However, if the aforementioned statement is true then that means that it's a lie. But if it's a lie then that means... *spirals off into madness*

It makes me feel like I'm back in philosophy class. XD

 

In the context of the absolutely idiotic idea to have the NJO followed by a story where Jacen turns full-ham evil, I can see where making Vergere a secret Sith has merit. But it is wildly inconsistent with all of her previous appearances, what the Sith are supposed to be, what she taught Jacen, her ability to Force Ghost after her death, and the general point of the NJO.

 

Wait, what? 24!? Damn, the maths check out!

 

My Brother in Christ, you joined this site a few weeks after I turned 4 years old.

Time is wack yo.

 

Daaaammmnnn.

On Vergere and lying I'm sort of surprised by now that no one has done a Kantian critique of it, but it might well be out there in the internet.

 

You joined the site when I was negative 3 months old. Just an annoying kick in my mom’s womb.

 

Related to this, though Vergere isn't an example, is the obsession with bringing all Force traditions back into the Jedi/Sith duality. Which is fine when it's that way from the start, i.e. the Jensaarai, but then they kept retconning other groups to be like that. The Sorcerers of Tund? Turns out they were actually founded by some runaway Sith after the Great Hyperspace War! The witches of Dathomir? Turns out they got their start from a rogue Jedi who was exiled there! Because God forbid we have more independent Force traditions that just evolved organically, especially in a galaxy with fifty million inhabited systems. It's just reductive worldbuilding.

 

That was part of their story from the start.

Don't know about the Nightsister of the current EU.

 

I don't know if you've been following along with Ahsoka but they do go into the Nightsisters a bit there and, not spoiling anything, their origin is a bit different.

 

More then a bit I would wager

 

Different to the point of absurdity in retaining the same name, I would wager.

 

But hasn’t that always been the case with a lot of legends stuff brought to canon. The nightsisters might be the most extreme example.

 

Can't think of many other examples that even approach this level of deviation or needless connection ('in name only' as it were). That being said, if there were other examples, I would still take issue with it.

This is off-topic though.

 

Touché

 

Wasn't that established right from the introduction of the Witches?

The Courtship of Princess Leia:

Teneniel wrapped her arms around her legs, and stared into his eyes. “Long ago,” she said, “the old ones came from the stars. They were warriors, masters of machines who built forbidden weapons—machine warriors that looked like men. And they sold them to others, cheap.
“Your people cast them out of the sky for their crimes, and sent them here. The warriors were given no weapons—no metal, no blasters. So they fell prey to rancors.” Teneniel half-closed her eyes. She’d heard the story so many times that now she envisioned that distant past, saw the prisoners sent to Dathomir. They were violent people who had committed gross crimes against civilization and who, therefore, merited only a life outside civilization. Many of the prisoners considered themselves above the law and thought of their weapons only as toys. So the ancients had considered it just to strand them on a world without technology.
“For many generations they lived like beasts, and were nearly hunted to extinction, until the star people cast out Allya.”
Luke had a faraway look in his eye, the way old Rell did when she saw visions. “This Allya was a rogue Jedi,” Luke said with certainty, leaning forward. “The Old Republic did not want to execute her, so the Jedi exiled her, hoping that given time she would turn away from the dark side.”
Teneniel said, “She used her spells to tame the wild rancors and hunt food. She taught her daughters all of her lore, and taught them to hunt for their mates, even as I hunted for you. While rancors dined on others, the daughters of Allya prospered from generation to generation, teaching their own daughters the spells. We divided into clans, and for a long time the clans vied for men in friendly competition, stealing mates. We governed ourselves, punished anyone caught using the night spells. In my grandmother’s day, we pushed the wild rancors from these mountains. My grandmothers hunted the last of them. We hoped for peace at last.
“But in my mother’s time, the outcast Nightsisters gathered together. At first, they were not many, but …”
“Some of you tried to fight them, using their own tactics,” Luke offered. “And those who did became Nightsisters themselves.”

 

Only a few years ago I would have said no. But I voted yes.

Why?

Because just because she was a Sith apprentice, because she was a candidate for Palpatine-does not make Vergere a caricature. She makes this lesson clear to Jacen herself-Sith and Jedi are ultimately labels, their meaning is self derived if they mean anything at all.

Vergere is the Vong familiar, the teacher, the torturer, the Jedi knight, the Sith candidate, a hero who died at Ebaq 9 and a monster who tortured a young man, but also forged him into fulfilling his destiny and who cared enough for him, she let him open his cocoon, on his own.

People think because she was a Sith that means she must have been insincere, or simply a cackling monster-she wasn't. Not in the NJO, not in her Jedi days and not in Lumiya's telling-she wanted Jacen to succeed so much she died for him.

I think its odd honestly people get upset about this-when Jacen accuses her of being a Sith in Traitor, and she doesn't that I recall go out of her way to strenuously defend her Jedi identity.

Because she is more than just a Jedi, or a Sith, or a Vong agent. She's Vergere, a teacher, deceiver, guide, mentor, friend and enemy. She is also none of these things and more.

That makes her unique, and her lessons are not diminished by this, nor her sincerity when it came to Jacen's development.

I think the biggest issue as far as being a Sith is concerned is...well she must have been just using Jacen or lying to him. (Sith can't be genuine teachers after all) and that's why most people, including myself were hostile to the idea. I don't think this is the case-Vergere's lessons were not deceptions, and she did what most Sith do not-she gave her life for him. So he could fulfill his destiny. Both in saving the Yuuzhan Vong(something else a generic cookie cutter Sith wouldn't care about) and what happened later.

@Sinrebirth thoughts?