Vader & Palpatine's Venator-Class Star Destroyer...

Greetings people... Something is driving me mad and I need help!

I've been searching everywhere, I've have been all over Wookieepedia... and I can't find the name of the Venator-Class SD Vader and Palps are aboard at the end of ROTS. I cannot believe that this Venator doesn't have a name, and I have found everything about it, including info on the officers aboard, etc... BUT NOTHING ABOUT THE FRIKIN' NAME!

Is it possible that something on SW DOESN'T HAVE A NAME?
This is the only Venator bridge we get to see in full detail in the movies, and even the SD at the Battle of Coruscant have names!! What about this one?

I know it really sounds like a dumb question, but you know, is one of those things that gets in your brain!
Help me fellas, please!


EDIT: I asked this here because the EU is my only hope for an answer, if there is one. If I'm posting at the wrong place, please feel free to lock this one out!

 

It's not the Executrix?

EDIT: No, wrong class of ship. Hm...

 

You know, the funny thing about the Executrix is that it looks like it is Tarkin's flagship at the time, but Wookieepedia says it's an Imperial-Class SD, even when later in the same article it says that it's class is never stated in RoDV...

 

Whether or not it is a Venator is actually in the air. It has triangular viewports. But look at the exterior of the Venator models from ROTS - they have square viewports. Behind the scenes commentary from Dr Saxton is that the reason the Theta class shuttle was given such a short hyperdrive range, and how the non hyperdrive equipped V-wings were able to be at Mustafar, was that ala ROTJ Palpatine took his shuttle to a big commandship, took it there, and descended. Same idea for going to see the Death Star. But it then got muddled. Poor communication between the ICS and VD crew meant there were contradictions between the sources and some say those craft could have the range. Then Dark Lord came about and said it was a venator after all. Now the models in The Clone Wars show Venators with triangle viewports, unlike the movie ones.

So it's unclear which of these sources we run with. The EU is pushing the venator angle hard, but the movies rule that out. But given Lucas involvement in the new series that discrepancy could be gone. So we have no idea what kind of ship, much less their names, that they are on.

 

Viewports or not, the rules of visual storytelling (Lucas' native tongue) dictate that the ship we see on the screen is the ship that the following scene takes place on. Ignoring that would be like saying that beginning and end of any given sentence in a novel might not refer to each other.

As for 'artistic license' when a ship looks different... is there a canon explanation why Obi-Wan's hair in Ep1 changes back and forth from real hair to totally different looking wig in seconds?

 

The trouble with that is, we might as well assume those three ships, mirroring the Executor intro scene in ESB, are simply accompanying a much larger vessel (which would make sense for the Emperor himself to travel in). Just pointing out how that can go different ways.

 

Look at the exterior of the Executor command-tower model from RotJ - it has a much flatter bridge bulge than the one we see on the set.

Look at the exterior of the Millennium Falcon model from ANH - you can't fit the interior cabins and corridors inside.

Look at the exterior of the Home One model from RotJ - the hangar bay looks fundamentally different.

Look at the shots of uptown Coruscant throughout the Prequels - they're hillariously inconsistent.

Do you mean public-domain comments, or stuff he tells to his friends/supporters? I'd be interested in more clarification here - was this basically his idea?

No, canon establishes that the bridge at the end of Revenge of the Sith is that of a Venator-class Star Destroyer. The minor quirk about viewport shape isn't enough to override that.

The trivial inconsistency in different views is by no means unprecedented, and the Clone Wars cartoons add their emphatic support to the idea that VenStars use an ISD-style bridge (or rather, a Star Wars Technical Journal bridge, with the command salon directly behind the crew-pits, rather than at the end of a semicircular corridor).

This, however, has obviously disappointed that part of fandom who have an enthusiasm for big ships.

During production, George Lucas did seem to envisage the ship the bad guys were aboard as something bigger than a VenStar - but it was an Imperial-class Star Destroyer: as the script says, "EXT. IMPERIAL STAR DESTROYER - SPACE ... A Star Destroyer is surrounded by ATTACK CRUISERS".

If there's anything else that the Imperials might be aboard, it's the Exactor. This didn't make it to the final film, however.

- The Imperial Ewok

 

The fact that McEwok loves to push his personal view of what Star Wars is doesn't override that looking at the film, that cannot be a Venator bridge they are on. Triangles are not squares, though I'm certain that in his little spin world they may be and that we shall soon here some made up justification for that fact.

 

Maybe there's a Venator II that has differant windows. Maybe they were on a secondary bridge that has differant windows.

Maybe someone made a mistake.

Are you going to tell me that Darth Vader's lightsaber is double-ended because the blade comes from the other end when he's throwing it?

 

By this logic, Fake Wedge is an entirely different character that Denis Lawson's Wedge because they are clearly two different people. Sure lets completely throw out the author's intent and nitpick some random fluke of the medium that isn't 100% consistent and take that as literal canon. It's called artistic license guys, get over it. Someone messed up with the exterior model of the Venators, that's all there is to it.

 

more likely whoever was in charge of making the "set" for the bridge was instructed to make it look reminiscent of the ISD/SSD bridges of the OT...probably wasn't even considered what the ship would look like from exterior.

heck...they might not have even chosen what that ship they would be would be when the set was built.

Maybe it should've been the bridge of a Vic, but they stood in the Venator instead.

 

Yeah. Either way someone messed up or there was a change in plans along the way and there is a small inconsistency, but I hardly see that as grounds for saying that we are dealing with anything but a Venator at the end of the day in that shot.

 

Why such an interest in keeping it as a Venator? This is the Emperor of the Galactic Empire, we're talking about. I was half-expecting him to have something unique at the end of the film, being Emperor and all. I hope someone in WOTC is thinking about doing an article on it. Right now, they're the ones coming up with a lot of new ship stuff. 8)

 

OP: That's actually a pretty good question. It's odd, now that you mention it, that there's very little actually known about that scene: nothing about the names of the ships, nothing about when it's taking place (other than before Obi-Wan reaches Tatooine), nothing about where they are, nothing about the context of the visit. As far as I know, nothing but ROTS and its adaptations have said anything about it, and that's only what we see in the movie.

 

I've always thought that that scene's very time placement could be in question, honestly, based on how Vader is walking a whole lot better on his prosthetics than he was immediately post-surgery. Nobody walks that good on new legs after a couple of days.

 

The interest in keeping it a Venator is because that is what the scene tells us visually. I think it would take away the credibility of the invisible narrator we have if it actually was a Victory or something else. I have no real qualms about Palpatine having a bigger and cooler ship than everyone else, though I think I would prefer it to be at best the Air Force One version of whatever ship already exists as I am against the overnight transformation of the Empire.


As for the scene, yeah little is known, and looking at Wookieepedia's list of Venators it looks like we don't know the names of any of those ships. And on the time frame, I was always under the impression that the scene took place about two weeks after Anakin's surgery. I'm not sure where I got that, the novel maybe?

 

And the visual storytelling of the AOTC duel, tells us Dooku switches lightsaber holding positions in the blink of an eye and partially finishes some slashes.
I know Lucas loves to edit away on scenes, and I'm not fully convinced it's absolutely meant to be anything of anything in that scene. It stands to reason why we should accept Palpatine's ship to be a Venator when its own command tower windows neither match the Venators in the film. And the Ryan Church concept art showed a distinct cross between a Venator and an Imperator in that scene, but oh well, it's a pipedream, I reckon.

True, even Vader's Devastator had some snazzy extras to set it apart from other ISDs.

I think Dark Lord hinted at something like that. 2 or 4 weeks after the rest of the events.

What. LFL actually maintains that's Wedge in the briefing room scene? Aren't there people there being paid to make up profiles for new characters?

 

OK, I'm out. Someone please post that picture.

 

Yes, they do, vehemently.

What new character? That's Wedge, speaking with Denis Lawson's voice (his voice was dubbed over Colin Higgins) and speaking lines belonging to Wedge in the script, novelization, and other sources.

 

That's right!! It's almost like this moment has been deliberatedly kept undefined in every detail! I mean, it's really weird that even this Venator gets a name but not the one where 3 main villians of the Saga oversee the construction of the biggest weapon in Galactic History!!!

And even the fact that most people can even tell if the ship is actually a Venator or not just shows how weird it is.

A black hole in SW Canon Knowledge!

 

I doubt that's what was intended...

PALPATINE: Tell Captain Kagi to prepare my shuttle for immediate takeoff.

Not to mention the fact that we don't see any command ship in the relevant scene from the ROTS trailer.

We've been told that Palpatine's shuttle has a class 1 hyperdrive.

 

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