CT Was Yoda Dead All Along?

It suddenly occurred to me the other day as I came across a rumor suggesting the same for Luke in the ST. Then I saw someone had already posted some thoughts around this:

https://www.toptenz.net/top-10-reasons-yoda-was-actually-dead-all-along.php

To me, it's always (even before the prequels were made) been such a glaring omission in the OT that Vader and Palpatine do not once mention Yoda or ascertain that he might be the one training Luke. Even if Palpatine is assumed to be so above the fray that he doesn't have time to talk about Yoda, why doesn't Vader mention him or gauge it from Luke's feelings especially if he can so quickly figure out that he has a twin sister? Vader mentioning "Obi-Wan has taught you well" repeatedly, especially both times coming after Luke is fresh off visits to Dagobah, is even weirder.

The theory that Yoda was dead all along, however, resolves this almost perfectly. Perhaps it's some nuance of the Force that one Force user can only detect, via feelings, the "scent" of someone else who has been around another Force user if they are actually living (and not if they are dead). It also adds a whole new layer of tragedy to Yoda's story, that Vader (or Palpatine, in my version) had already hunted him down and killed him on Dagobah and the Whills refused to let Yoda pass onto the netherworld until he made penance for his responsibility in the failure of the Order.

FWIW, I'm aware of the novelization where Palpatine mocks Yoda when Luke arrives on the DS2, but there's a reason a lot of that was kept out of the film (I mean, the novelization also had Mara Jade/Arica added into ROTJ later on, so take that as you will).

Thoughts?

 

Interesting theory. The prevailing wisdom is Yoda chose that place because it was remote and strong with the dark side, so Vader and the Emperor could not sense him.

 

Nah, I don't think he's dead. His speech on the 'crude matter' works because he too is part of it. He also needs to eat, as we see with Luke's rations and his stew. Then there's his becoming ill in ROTJ, I mean why stage a fake 'second death' for only Luke's benefit? It doesn't fit with how the Force Ghosts are ever presented, lacking the blue glow or intangibility (Yoda interacts physically with lots of stuff).

Yoda's just hiding on a remote system with no Imperial or civilian presence, no-one was ever going to stumble onto him. The reason the Emperor or Vader never mention Yoda is cause they have don't associate Luke with him at all. They just know that Obi-Wan gave him training at some point, not that he's been trained by any other Jedi (and Luke himself doesn't correct that assumption).

 

Vader confronts Obi-Wan on DS1, Luke is also present. There is absolutely nothing to connect Luke to Yoda and for all Palps and Vader know, he could be dead by then.

 

I always imagined that Yoda chose Dagobah because the Force is made up of all living things, and the planet was teeming with life, which would effectively act as a shield to conceal his presence from anybody who might try and detect him using the Force.

 

This is a bit of a stretch, but I always liked that shot of Yoda's robe slowly falling and getting caught on a bit of senate wreckage at the end of the fight that him and Papatine have in ROTS. And I thought it would be neat if Palpatine always assumed that Yoda lived after their fight in the senate chamber until Vader reported to him, just after ANH, that when Obi-Wan died all he left behind were his robes. This probably made Palpatine retroactively think that Yoda did die in the senate chamber two decades prior and all he left behind were his robes too.

 

I strongly doubt it, but i would actually like it if something like that would be revealed in the Mandalorian or an upcoming novel or comic.

It would be a very good reason why Palps or Vader never talked about him or searched for him during the OT.

 

No

 

I don't think so either, but there's something strange about him happening to peg out while Luke is there. What are the chances of that? It seems something kept him going just long enough to deliver his last message while still alive. (You'd think he could have delivered said message equally well as a force ghost- indeed it would be easier as a force ghost as he could appear to Luke wherever he was, without obliging him to find a parking space in a swamp.)

 

I think Yoda is alive until we see him disappear in ROTJ

 

The radio drama, not the novelization.

https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Return_of_the_Jedi_(radio)

The series was made with the full cooperation of George Lucas, who donated the rights and allowed the use of sound effects and music from the films. As with other Star Wars Legends material, only material matching what was featured in the original film is considered canon, but many elements of the story first featured in the radio broadcasts were later referenced in other Legends stories.

Because the Return of the Jedi audio drama was released thirteen years after the film it was based on, it gave Daley the opportunity to incorporate multiple references to the Expanded Universe that had been established up to that point, such as Mara Jade appearing as Arica in Jabba's Palace from Tales from Jabba's Palace, and a number of references to material appearing in the Shadows of the Empire novel.

From the ROTJ novelization published after the split between newcanon and Legends.

Beware the Power of the Dark Side:

In Which Luke Returns To Master Yoda

Far away, on the swamp planet of Dagobah, Yoda waits.
For hundreds of years, he taught Jedi younglings the value of patience.
But it has not been easy for him to practice it these last few years.
It is hard to be weak when you were once strong. Hard to move slowly when all around you is moving too fast.
The Force is out of balance. As the Emperor spreads fear across the galaxy, the dark side grows more and more powerful.
Yoda knows that it is Luke's destiny, not his, to fight back. Yoda - once a warrior, once the leader of all those who stood against the dark side - can do nothing but wait.
And it has been a long, helpless wait. First he waited while Luke went to Bespin, then while Luke returned to the rebels, then while Luke went on that insanely risky mission to Tatooine.
Using the Force, he has tried to keep watch over Luke, but he has only a sense of what his runaway pupil has been through.
Yet now he senses that Luke is finally returning. And he is relieved. Because he could not have waited much longer.
Already he has used the Force to prolong his life beyond what is natural. Beyond what is comfortable and almost beyond what is endurable.
But he refuses to pass on.
Not until he can play his last part in this great galactic struggle.
All he has left are a few pieces of wisdom that might help Luke.
And now, the sound of an engine roars through the swamp, and Yoda knows the time has finally come. The wait is over.

 

The Clone Wars definitively shows us why that place on Dagobah. The Force had special properties in that area of the swamp world that allowed Qui-Gon to speak with Yoda. Qui-Gon died before mastering the techniques required to readily appear and communicate to those in the physical world after retaining his identity in the Force beyond death.

For Yoda to be instructed by Qui-Gon he needed to be on Dagobah. Not sure how Obi-Wan learned on Tatooine.