What does Jedi mean?

Star Wars is a narrative that, while not totally dependent for its 'lessons' on the concept of the Force, nonetheless contains plenty of Force-users. And it's telling that I have to use the term Force-user there because that means the concept of what a Jedi is is, post-prequels, fairly specific.

But I don't think that was always the case. In a discussion on another board, I came across people making a distinction between Jedi Knights (Obi-Wan; a warrior, saber-user, server of the Republic) and Masters (Yoda; more guru-like, independent, above the need for weapons). While I had never categorized it exactly that way before, I had a very similar interpretation when the OT was all I had to go on. I think others did too. A random example - the designers of the card game in the 90s seemed to purposely make Obi-Wan and Vader, and Yoda and the Emperor, opposites. Part of that must be for balanced game mechanics, but I think it also had to do with how they interpreted the use of the Force. There were those who were skilled at practical uses of their power, but there were also a few who transcended the need for physical tools and began to function more like elemental spirits (if that's not taking the description too far). (And yes, I know Yoda was to have taught Luke saberplay on Dagobah in a cut sequence, but that doesn't mean Yoda himself would have had a use for one at that stage in his life.)

The practical/transcendent hierarchy is a good enough topic on its own, but its implications for the meaning of 'Jedi' are also interesting.

By differentiating "knights" and "masters" to such a degree, you expand the notion of what a Jedi is. The idea that they all have fairly similar skills, and all would behave fairly dogmatically and are part of a regimented Order, seems alien. And once you've opened the door to variation in the Jedi populace, you wonder what exactly defines 'Jedi,' as opposed to anything else.

But before we had the prequels to tell us how Jedi were, a wider definition seemed to be the norm. In the pre-prequel EU, there are multitudes of Dark Jedi; that is, Dark Side Force-users who aren't Sith. Today's EU is crammed full of cookie-cutter Sith, and it's a direct result of the interpretation having changed from

?Vanilla Force-user = Jedi
?Vanilla Force-user who uses the Dark Side = Dark Jedi
?Sith = member of a specific Dark Side sect (which itself implies there might be other Force-sects)

to

?Light-sider = Jedi
?Dark-sider = Sith

.

I think much was lost in this redefinition. It reduces the amount of nuance one can have in interpreting the moral issues in stories and characters. And it frames the entire story in terms of a religious war. To me, it crushes down interesting particularities in the storytelling to black versus white.

Thoughts (on anything in this post)?

 

Very interesting topic.

I think a history lesson is in order here. I'd say that the Jedi Order is the result of George Lucas fusing two distinct and different groups. One of these groups is the Lensmen of the Galactic Patrol, a corps of space police in Edward Elmer "Doc" Smith's seminal Lensman series of pulp SF novels. (There are similar interstellar police groups in other SF works, such as Isaac Asimov's Lucky Starr series, but the Lensman books are probably what Lucas borrowed from most.) The other major group Lucas borrowed from was the samurai class of feudal Japan.

The Lensmen are a galactic police force, a body of officers who solve crimes, apprehend evildoers, and protect galactic civilization from its enemies. Those who wish to be Lensmen undergo five years of strenuous training at a Patrol academy before they are inducted into the force itself. The training weeds out all those who don't fully measure up, so that only the finest beings join the Lensman Corps.

The corps itself is made up of as many species as are members of Civilization. The Lensmen work for the Galactic Patrol and the government of Civilization; they take their orders from this central authority. Each Lensman wears a Lens--a white shining crystal that gives him telepathic powers of communication and intuition. (This Lens inspired the Kiber Crystal, a crystal that amplifies one's Force power, which appeared in early script drafts of ANH. In the third draft, it's said that each Jedi had a crystal, in the bygone era of the Republic.)

The Lenses are made by the Arisians, a race of almost-omniscient and nigh-omnipotent beings, which has long evolved beyond most physical needs. The Arisians' ultimate goal is to make the people of Civilization virtuous enough and strong enough, by boosting their mental and physical power, to destroy the forces of evil forever. Those Lensmen who undergo advanced training with the Arisians receive additional boosts to their psychic and telepathic abilities, granting them nigh-unstoppable mental power.

The forces of darkness that oppose Civilization are led by the Boskonians or Eddorians, the evil counterparts of the super-intelligent Arisians. Thus the war between the Arisians and Boskonians, in which the fate of Civilization hangs in the balance, is much like the light side/dark side dichotomy of the Force. (In the second draft of ANH, the light side of the Force is known as the Ashla and the dark side is the Bogan, names designed to sound like those in Lensman.)

So to sum up: the Lensmen are a psychic galactic police corps, trained in an academy and reporting to a central authority, who use their telepathic powers to advance the cause of Good, and who fight ceaselessly against a group that embodies Evil. This is very much like the Jedi Order of the prequels, which likewise serves a virtuous (if crumbling) Republic, and which faces an assault from the agents of darkness.

The other group that inspired the Jedi is the samurai of Japan, who are somewhat different. Every samurai served a feudal lord. The lords each ruled over a certain region, and often made war against one another. The samurai acted as the lords' generals, bodyguards, and military advisors. By serving their lord's House faithfully, a samurai might earn a substantial reward, perhaps even a kingdom of his own. All of the samurai followed a rigid code of honor: Bushido, or "the way of the warrior." This code governed their actions, and told them what was moral or not moral in war. The ideal samurai led a life of honorable virtue.

Lucas' conception of the Jedi as being the retainers of a feudal lord was also influenced by Dune, a novel whose plot revolves around interstellar feudalism. Moreover, in the first draft of ANH, the aged Jedi general Luke Skywalker protects the kingdom of Aquilae from invasion by the Empire; his role is very much that of a military advisor and leader of the armies of a feudal lord.

When Lucas created the Jedi, he fused these two traditions, the Lensman servants of Civilization and the feu

 

Your point about Obi-Wan (and the Jedi in general) seemingly having two inconsistent 'callings' is a good one. We all know the Jedi came from multiple sources rolled together (and I have to wonder if the Boskonians were named for the Boskops - and if Bossk was in turn named for them). But I think Lucas et al stumbled upon a good, more original creation in the way the Force-users of the OT worked. When Lucas was able to make the PT Jedi according to 'what he'd always wanted,' I found that in many ways it actually detracted from what they had ended up developing into over the course of 1977-1998.

 

Yes, I'd very much agree with that sentiment.

I should note something from Lensman that may be interesting, which I forgot to mention before. Ordinary Lensmen wear the black-and-silver uniform of the Galactic Patrol, since they hold a military rank in the Patrol and take their orders from its leaders. However, after a certain term of service during which they gain experience, Lensmen become eligible for promotion to "unattached" status. This upper tier of Lensmen wears gray leather uniforms, signifying their special status: they are no longer members of the Galactic Patrol, and they do not have to take its orders. A Gray Lensman can go anywhere in the galaxy, to wherever he feels he is most needed.

Now, this interests me because it suggests that the more experienced Lensmen, like the Jedi who serve as retainers to great lords, have a notable degree of independence. If something similar applied to the Jedi order, it would not be unreasonable that the mature, experienced, "unattached" Jedi knights could enter the service of galactic kings and princes (although they certainly could remain in the service of the Republic). The younger, less experienced Jedi knights, of course, would carry out the Republic's missions and serve as its policemen, at least up until the point where they were promoted to "unattached."

 

As Bail Organa was always one of the 'good guys,' I guess I just never made a distinction between Obi-Wan serving him as Prince of Alderaan or Obi-Wan serving him as a powerful figure in the Republic (though I think there was far too little interaction between Ben and Bail in the prequels). But the Lensman promotion from military figure to possibly-roving do-gooder also could mirror the knight/master setup (minus the eastern philosophical influence). Doc Smith, like many OT viewers, seems to be intuitively familiar with a practical -> transcendent program of development. I wonder if this gets at something familiar to humans in general (Shamans, monks, etc being revered).

 

It is an interesting distinction. Certainly, that progression does show up in Lensman. The higher-stage Lensmen, who receive extra training from the Arisians, have such amplified psychic abilities that they no longer need the Lens to use their now-innate mental power. Physical trappings become no longer necessary, just as Yoda and the Emperor have moved beyond the need for lightsabers and physical combat.

I also want to talk a little about the issue of who can join the Jedi Order, and when. In the earliest Journal of the Whills writings, C.J. Thorpe joins the Intersystems Academy at age 16, in order to become a "Jedi-Templer." There he becomes a "padawaan learner" to Mace Windy, a famed Jedi who is the bodyguard and military advisor to a king. Thorpe remains in Windy's service for at least four years.

In the first draft of ANH, much the same thing occurs. Annikin Starkiller becomes the padawan of the famous Jedi General Luke Skywalker when he is 18 (or 16, in an alternate version of the script). General Skywalker was once the bodyguard to the Emperor, and after being exiled, he now serves the king of Aquilae.

The second draft is something of an anomaly, since it states that Jedi skills are always passed down in families. Jedi fathers teach the ways of the Force to their children, and to no one else. In this version, Luke Starkiller's father is a major figure in the Rebellion, and fulfills the role played by Obi-Wan (or General Skywalker) in other drafts.

The third draft abandons this concept of lineages of Jedi families entirely. It also returns to the Jedi having a master/student relationship of an old man teaching a young man; the two are not required to be blood kin. Now, Luke Starkiller, at age 18-20, in effect becomes the padawan of Obi-Wan Kenobi (who, of course, does not die during the film, and so remains Luke's mentor).

I think, when many people who watched the OT imagined what the Jedi Order would be, they envisioned something similar to what the Journal of the Whills showed: an academy which any young man could join, and which would let anyone who proved worthy be a Jedi. I definitely did not expect the idea of Jedi being trained from birth, plucked from their native worlds to be raised in a dogmatic, cocoon-like Order.

Nor did I expect that Jedi-hood would be based solely on innate Force sensitivity. I, for one, assumed that sensitivity to the Force was something that one could cultivate, if one only had an open mind. Of course, when Lucas made the Jedi Order membership in the PT entirely based on one's genetic heritage, I suppose he was only following the ideas of his second ANH draft. However, I don't think it's really satisfying: I'd argue that Force sensitivity works best as a metaphor for believing in oneself.

 

I agree totally. And even though the basics of heritability of Force power and a very young start to Jedi training were established in the OT, I never felt they really conflicted with that "belief/confidence" view, at least at that point. Yoda's "he is too old" line always struck me as him grasping at straws for an excuse. And even when Luke said "the Force runs strong in my family," it felt more like a convenient segue into the conversation about he and Leia being related. "In time, you'll learn to use it as I have." I've speculated before that perhaps it isn't the Force-power itself that is inherited, but something more basic, like temperament/constitution. Luke and Leia have the personalities to be Jedi, because Anakin did - in the real world, we know that some behavioral traits are influenced by genetics.

 

Hmm, this seems very EU heavy and is probably better suited to the EU or Lit forums (and I'll wager there are several threads on it already). If this is to stay, can we keep it to the films, and leave EU out of it.

 

The EU content was meant to serve as examples of how even the creators of additional SW stories in the pre-PT era seemed to have the same interpretation as many fans. It's interesting to me that the films ended up generating such a relatively uniform interpretation across many viewers, despite that interp (ostensibly) not being the intent.

 

Perhaps we can also turn the question around. What does "Sith" mean? I think the answer may shed light on what the notion of "Jedi" means as well.

In the first draft of ANH, the Black Knights of the Sith are the agents of the Empire, dedicated to enforcing the Emperor's will and hunting down the remaining Jedi. However, there's no notion that they are inherently evil. Rather, they're misguided in their loyalties, and they obey a warrior's code of honor just as the Jedi do. Tellingly, there is no Light Side/Dark Side binary dichotomy in this version of the script: they're all equally Force-users.

In this first draft, the Jedi were once the servants of a benevolent Empire, until the Emperors became decadent and corrupt. At this point, the Jedi (led by Luke Skywalker, formerly the Emperor's personal bodyguard) attempted to overthrow the government. Failing in their coup, the Jedi were driven into exile and hunted down by the Sith, who remained loyal to the Empire.

However, the Sith assigned to hunt the Jedi are not uniformly evil. This is indicated by the character arc of Sith Knight General Valorum, who is assigned to find Annikin Starkiller and Princess Leia. He realizes the capricious evil of the Empire when he, one of the greatest Sith Knights in the order, is reduced in rank to the level of a common stormtrooper, as punishment for letting the Rebels and the Princess escape. Valorum has a change of heart, and when Starkiller and Leia are recaptured, he breaks them out of their prison aboard an Imperial space station, escaping with them to the safety of Aquilae.

(Valorum's character is taken from the analogous General Hyoe Tadokoro in Kurosawa's film The Hidden Fortress, who likewise frees Princess Yuki from captivity and escapes with her to her kingdom. This happens after he has been severely beaten by his feudal lord for letting Yuki's protector, General Rokurota Makabe, escape.)

In the second draft of the ANH script, the Force is said to possess two halves for the first time (here called the Ashla and the Bogan, as mentioned earlier). The Sith now obey the dark half, the Bogan Force, and as a result they become uniformly evil, in a way they had not been before. The character of General Valorum is dropped from the script; there are no defectors from the mind-warping evil of the Sith. Notably, at this stage in Lucas' notes for the film, he first comes to the decision that the Sith knights should "look like Linda Blair in The Exorcist." That is, since the Sith are now all evil and all use the dark side of the Force, this Bogan Force corrupts their bodies just as it corrupts their minds.

Conversely, the Jedi come to stand for absolute good, and become the centralized defenders of galactic justice and of good government. As a result, in this second draft, the idea first develops that there once was a glorious Galactic Republic, of which the Jedi were the guardians. In the first draft, the Emperor was the latest in a long line of legitimate Emperors, of whom the last few happened to be corrupt; now, instead, he is a usurper who has destroyed the ancient, virtuous Republic.

This characterization of the Jedi as the galactic defenders of Civilization is a far cry from their earlier role as feudal samurai, warriors in service to noble houses. This transition, in my view, happened largely as a result of Lucas applying the ideas found in Lensman. Thus, the Jedi and Sith went from being interstellar feudal warriors with a common ethos of honor, who happened to serve different masters, to representing two opposing sides of a morality paradigm, one embodying ultimate Good and the benevolent Republic, and the other serving absolute Evil and a dictatorial Empire.

It's also interesting to note that in the successive ANH drafts, the major change in the way the Jedi Order is structured, from master/student pairs of warriors to families of Force-users, comes at the same time as the Jedi/Sith conflict is made more archetypal and dichotomous.

When Lucas envisioned the Jedi, early on, as primarily an order of fe

 

Came over from the lit thread to see what was going on here.

Very interesting. If I may throw in my cents...I think when Lucas said samurai, he was more picturing ronin than feudal lords. Ronin tales often tell of honorable warriors traveling from town to town, righting wrongs along the way. Similar archetypes can be found in cowboys and in both European and Chinese Knight Errant heroes, all of which Lucas has mentioned as inspiration before.

Though, personally, I have always connected the Jedi mainly with the Shaolin Monks. A militarized order of religion that is none the less dedicated to peace and oneness with the universe, fighting only when necessary to protect people. I could go on and on, but I am rather tired.

Very cool to hear about the original drafts though. Star Wars certainly has changed a lot over its development.

 

I think you're right in suggesting Ronin, heck Kurosawa's Seven Samurai are actually Ronin rather than "samurai" since they don't have a fuedal lord. Before the PT, the OT inspired EU that did not depict a centralized Jedi Order. There were Jedi Masters and Knights across the galaxy on different planets doing their own thing until a great crisis would arise and then they would hold convocations of "all" the Jedi to hammer out the appropriate response. The Tales of the Jedi comics are the best sources of this, showing two distinct crises that required a call for Jedi. We only see a rudimentary Jedi Council once, and this is just considered a kind of meeting of Jedi Masters in an emergency wartime rather than something that happened on a regular basis. Masters had no need for the lightsaber so great was their mastery of the Force they could use a staff to protect against a lightsaber or just use the Force to destroy battle droids, or to meditate the outcome of a battle. Knights were the swordsmen.

I also like your citation of the Chinese knight-errant(xia) and the Shaolin warrior monks(wuseng), to which I would also add the fame of the Wudang mountain swordsmen. In Wuxia fiction(Chinese knight-errant stories), especially in the 20th century, Shaolin and Wudang are the primary schools of martial arts and often depicted as being at odds with each other. Sometimes the Shaolin were antagonists, sometimes the Wudang. Other times they were on the same side and battled against martial artists that did no adhere to the code of the xia. They used chi to do amazing feats, including things we see the Jedi do.

Personally I also see elements of Sufi chivalry(futuwwat) in the Jedi. The teachings of the Jedi on behavior match up, and the ultimate goal of the practitioner of futwwat is Union with God that involves first annihilation of the ego-self in God and then subsistence of the true self with God. I see that in the Force ghost thing. Especially when I read the ROTS novelization and Qui-Gon's exchange with Yoda on Polis Massa as well as the parts in the script that were dumped from the film with Qui-Gon's disembodied voice and Yoda.

 

Dawud, I like your (TOTJ-referencing) characterization of the Jedi. And I agree, they seem more like ronin than actual samurai... until the prequels, when they are linked to a government body.

On a different note, I came across an article by Chuck Klosterman about ESB, generation X, and some other stuff. Of relevance to this discussion is the way be describes Luke's choices before Vader on the gantry: "He can keep fighting a war he will probably lose, or he can compromise his ethics and succeed wildly."

That, to me, is the essence of the dark side/light side struggle. I believe the over-the-top distinctions made in parts of the prequel films and in the post-prequel EU between crazed, foaming-at-the-mouth dark siders and druidic light-siders have negatively affected this aspect of the story/universe. They just become stereotypes, and any sense of questioning or (as I mentioned before) nuance becomes harder to come by. I don't know if Lucas had the pulpier version of his universe in mind the whole time and could only fully achieve it with the prequels (reading early scripts, it sometimes seems that way), or if he and/or the other filmmakers at the time of the OT were thinking of things in a slightly deeper way. But it seems to me there is a world of difference here. Am I making a mountain of a molehill?

Also, not related to anything but too good of a line not to quote, "Quite simply, Winona Ryder [in Reality Bites] is Luke Skywalker, only with a better haircut and a killer rack."

 

To be fair, only the "even longer ago, in a galaxy far far away" TOTJ EU depicts "wandering" Jedi Knights. Pretty much all post-ROTJ EU heavily, heavily links Luke and his New Jedi Order to the New Republic.

 

To a degree. The Bantam stuff had them acting more independently though obviously funded by the NR. Even the NJO series has the Jedi as sort of independent actors geared up by the NR with state of the art starfighters. It's after the NJO series that Luke and his Jedi get really tied up with the government. At times worse than the PT Jedi.

The Jedi acting in support of the most just government around but not intimately tied to it is far more effective, IMO, than the opposite. At least as far as storytelling goes. Besides, the PT conveys to me that the Jedi's close ties with the Republic were part of the problem to begin with. Something that it would seem was to be rectified via Luke. His ties to the Alliance are always superceded by his duties as inheritor of the Jedi Knighthood. This is a young man that can just flee a battlefield and head to some obscure planet for a few months to train as a Jedi, while the Rebel Alliance is regrouping somewhere on the Outer Rim. Without the EU, we don't even know if he ever linked back up with the Alliance after leaving the medical frigate for the rendezvous with Lando on Tatooine in ROTJ. Just from the films, for all we know the guy was in seclusion on Tatooine continuing his Jedi studies, making his new lightsaber, and planning the rescue Han after which point he could summon the courage to return to Dagobah to complete his training with Yoda. The Alliance didn't seem to be too overly concerned with tying him down to their structure. Even with the EU you get that impression.

 

Ehh, I donno just how independent they really were. Given how heavily politicized Luke's speech about rebuilding the Jedi was-he gave it in front of the NR Senate, after all-and Mon Mothma's declaration about how the NR would not be able to stand without Jedi in Dark Empire, it's not exactly illustrating that the Jedi and the NR were linked only slightly.

And in the NJO, we found out that the Jedi had been grappling with political issues beforehand as well, such as that particular Senator (can't remember his name) who was highly pro-smuggler and therefore anti-Jedi.

There's alot of linkage between the NR and the NJO, IMO.

 

I wouldn't say more independent....but less formalised. As in, "jedi" wasn't a rank in the Republic military, and the Jedi Order was not a branch of the government. Plus, people could be jedi and other things at the same time. if a jedi served with the New Republic military, he or she or did it according to whatever rank they had come by- be it private or general, whereas the PT jedi were made generals by default.

Agreed. Now that you mention it, it seems that tying the Jedi to the Republic has made the authors constantly play up the Republic's faults in order to preserve the drama: a heroic character with the full support of the most powerful government in the galaxy would solve most problems a bit too easily.

However, I think the more stateless depiction of the jedi is starting to make a comeback, at least in the comics. The Knights of the Old Republic comic, for example follows a rather...martially challenged jedi who ends up wandering the galaxy and helping the people he meets through cunning and guile. Though there is a major war going on, he rarely deal with it, explaining to the council that he wants to help the people who are forgotten in times of war. The new series Knight Errant is about a jedi without any support, trying to find the most meaningful way to help people caught in the middle of countless feuding warlords. Then there is the Blue Harvest Arc of Star Wars: Dark Times, which is pretty much Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo in the Star Wars universe...many of the characters even look like ronin or yakuza.

Interesting....yeah, I think you are on to something. Not just light and darksiders, but heroes and villains in fiction in general. People forget heroism isn't just kicking ass and being good...it is also about facing down threats you probably can't win against. Too often jedi are depicted fighting enemies that stand no chance against them. Even when said bad guys are clearly in the wrong, the natural tendency to support the underdog can shift sympathy in their favor. Hence why some fans see the jedi less as heroes with a deeper connection to the universe than wizards using magic to bully normal people.

 

That's a good point, and it speaks perhaps to the Bayhem-ization of fiction in general (more battles and 'splosions, less meaning).

But in response to the bolded part - take Vader in ESB for instance. He's not a crazy evil guy doing crazy evil things just to be crazy evil... he (in addition to the whole "son" motivation) seems to be firmly on the side of what he sees as order and authority. These aren't necessarily bad things. What makes them bad in terms of the Empire are the means used to accomplish those goals. That's what I see as lacking in a certain vision of the Force and in fiction in general. The "bad guys" have no goal except to be over-the-top evil. AND/OR, their means to their goal quickly makes them, again, over-the-top evil, rather than... interestingly skewed.

Of course, Palpatine always kind of came across that way... but (1) I always kind of took him to be one-of-a-kind, rather than a paragon for all "bad guys," and (2) his true craziness and glee didn't really come out until he started electrocuting Luke, at which point Vader destroyed him.

EDIT: I'm not sure this post was the best way to phrase the point I was struggling to make. I'm going to see if I can remake it in a more cogent manner.

 

Aight, I think I have a better way to phrase it. Yoda says "Anger, fear, aggression; the dark side are they. Easily they flow, quick to join you in a fight." The Emperor tells Luke to "Use your destructive feelings, boy." So a desire, conscious or not, for quick access to power, can lead you down a dark path.

But I don't think it works as well when you invert it, as Anakin is asked to do in III. "Only then will you be strong enough with the dark side to save Padme." I know you can make yourself feel something, but... A desire to use the dark side seemingly leading backwards to the feelings doesn't work as well. For me, at least. And as we see in the attack on the temple, Anakin appears to feel sadness, not anger or fear.

I suppose this also has to do with a hard differentiation of light side and dark side powers. If some powers are only accessible through the dark side, then situations like the one in III are possible.

 

Nobody uses "Dark Jedi" anymore. I'm waiting for someone to say it's a corruption of dar'jetii ("no longer a Jedi") and we'll be done with it.

I was going to say "Jedi" means "samurai movie". (It comes from jidai geki, after all.)

 

In the films, I also get something of a Second Foundation vibe from them ( but I could be influenced by the fact that Asimov's book had characters named Bail and Han ).

Exactly; since Lucas makes few explicit statements on this topic these days, we're mostly left with analysis such as the above when trying to determine the Force stance taken by the PT.

 

Actually, in the card game, Broken!Luke and Palpatine are opposites, not Yoda and Palpatine. Broken!Luke and Palpatine are the only main characters to have destiny 6.

 

I'm glad someone else remembers the card game!

The destiny-number-oppostition is a good point, but my friends and I were judging based on power and ability. For the uninitiated, power is pretty much what it sounds like (we interpreted as physical power/strength), while ability refers to a character's talent with the Force. Here's how I saw it:

Darth Vader: Power 6, Ability 6
Obi-Wan Kenobi: Power 5, Ability 6

Okay, they both have high power and ability. Obi-Wan is older and is not a cyborg, so he's a little weaker physically. But they're both physically strong fighters in addition to being strong with the Force.

Emperor Palpatine: Power 4, Ability 7
Yoda: Power 2, Ability 7

Both have relatively lower power, but higher ability. Yoda is 900 years old and doesn't use the dark side to enhance his abilities so he's a little weaker physically. They aren't great fighters, but they don't need to be because they each have mastery of Force powers. Kind of the inverse of what happens at the end of AotC.

Luke, when he becomes a Jedi Knight, has Power 6, Ability 6.

If it was just the game, it would seem like a bit much to extrapolate from and might seem a bit too fanboy-ish to bring into a discussion such as this ("What does the scouter say about his power level?!?!"). But it seemed more a confirmation of my/our views of how the Force-users worked. Which is important to me because it implies that the same inferences I made as a viewer were also made by others, regardless of whether those inferences ended up being congruent with later additions to the mythos.

 

On a topic unrelated to the card game but related to views of the Force and Force powers, I submit this image:

[image=http://sweu.ru/images/gallery/tsuneo_sanda/yoda_4.jpg]

Yoda using Force lighting. This is a painting from the pre-prequel era (I forget what year - sometime in the 90s). It's definitely not a major point in the canon or anything but it did strike a chord with me, and I think speaks to an interpretation of the Force and its use that differs from later ones. It seems to conform to a view that what the Emperor was producing/tapping was perhaps simply the raw power of the Force, made physical. It also fits in with my pet view that the Force powers are not light or dark, but their usages can be. Yoda, being a master of the Force, could in theory tap it just as well as Palpatine. But he never would do so in an attack against another living being, as the Emperor did.

 

Of course, assuming this Yoda picture was first released in the 90s, Lucas would in later years go on record referring to "dark side powers", while his AOTC script would refer to the growth of the dark side itself.