What happened to Leia's red lightsaber?

It's not just chakras, though, it's a much wider, human, psychological color association.

They should be bound by Earth culture because SW is fiction consumed by Earth people.

 

Not necessarily. Black was far more common in Medieval art, though, to be fair, Judas' hair was traditionally represented as being red as a sign of his treachery.

Word.

 

While I'd agree that at a basic level, Americans don't expect their villains to wear pastels, I don't think the association is as deep or as near the surface as is being insisted. Superman and Spiderman both wear an awful lot of red, and they're nothing but heroes. Whereas the villain Green Goblin wears . . . green. My school colors are red and white . . . and I find it aesthetically pleasing, not alarming.

I think too much is being made of color, and I think a lot of individuals' personal mystical or philosophical persuasions are being projected onto the Jedi in a way that's quite common across fandom, but not necessarily objectively justifiable.

 

Traditionally in Western culture, red has positive symbolic overtones as it represents blood (especially the blood of Christ), and therefore dedication, sacrifice, redemption and mercy. Green, by contrasts, seems to have poisonous connotations, as well as being representative of Islam, and therefore all that stood in opposition to civilization.

 

Blues and greens are referred to as the "cool colors," and reds and oranges as the "warm colors." Warmth, heat, passion,action, lust, desire, and anger versus calm and serenity.

 

Or, life and energy versus decay and entropy.

 

Well, for one you're never going to find a better and more consumable metaphor for Taoism than Star Wars and the Jedi Order. If there is anything on Earth they ARE most comparable to it is Taoist swordsmen and Shaolin monks. As far as continuity goes... Tom Veitch invokes the chakras in his notes to Dark Empire, Whie and the girl in Dark Rendezvous recall Yoda teaching them one half of the Taoist microcosmic orbit... the descending channel specifically, and in Medstar Barris Offee reflects on her morning sun salutations with Luminara Unduli(if you don't know what that is it is a dynamic set of yoga postures).

Beyond all that, color symbolism is embedded in collective unconscious of the human species and for all the positive things we associate with red... it is more often than not used to convey danger, fire and evil.

 

And yet green represents the vitality of life far more than does red.

I think people discounting the importance of color symbolism to the collective unconscious are strikingly unaware of their surroundings and what's going on on levels that most people never see.

Hell, the whole hero myth that Star Wars is modeled after is part of the collective unconscious. And don't blame me for "projecting" Eastern philosophy and mysticism on Star Wars... it was there from the start, and far more overt than most Abrahamic overtones.

 

Not human life.

More overt, maybe, but in the end, the Western philosophical tradition is inevitably going to be the stronger influence in the philosophy in Star Wars, simply as a condition of the context of its creation and its creator.

 

Yeah, and taupe walls are soothing. They're also industrial drab and people hate them for it. Color symbolism and associations are only so much crap that has been almost completely overlaid by rational thought.

Really, give me any reason for Leia not wielding a dark red, non-Sith-colored lightsaber as she does other than "it's bad chi or chakra or whatever on Earth". Any reason other than "in my opinion it's a negative color".

Star Wars is a made-up universe. It obeys its own rules. It takes its inspiration from everything -- the ships are all futuristic, but the combat is 18th-century high seas adventure style (except when it's WWII fighter-on-bomber style). The Mandalorians are Vikings with future-supersoldier technology, a Mongolian past, and medieval armor. The Jedi began in ANH as wise old hermits and wizards mingled with knights-errant straight out of Western legend. Then some Eastern philosophy and monkish aspects were layered on it. Han Solo is a Wild West cowboy except when he's a 1920s Mafia bootlegger or an 18th-century ship captain or a WWII flyboy. The Empire is a mishmash of futuristic dystopia, Nazi Germany, Satanic cult, and Bond villain. Star Wars borrows from everywhere, and to try to force it into compliance with one Earthly inspirational element because it happens to appeal to you is silly. It's vague inspiration, not mandated outline.

 

Best.

Post.

Ever.

 

Really? I think I've done better than that, but I'll take praise wherever I can get it.

 

And to think I was going to make my first post back from the Great Computerless Beyond a shot at Q_M for saying that Islam was "all that stood in opposition to civilization."

However, here, I must agree. This is the most succinct explanation of what Star Wars is and why I love it that I've ever read.

 

Now that you mention it I'm quite offended by that, being a Muslim and all.

Funny thing is... The Jedi Knights are far more like Chinese knights-errant than they are any Western "knights-errant" complete with mystical powers and everything. Of course, I don't expect you to bother researching that at all. If you're interested, look up "Wu Xia fiction." You see, Chinese knights-errant were often wizards themselves. At the very least the used the life-force(Qi) around them to accomplish extraordinary feats. Blasts of energy from their palms, Qi powered leaps... uncanny martial ability.

And still, color symbolism is of great import and our reactions to colors are on an instinctual, primal level. Oh yes, there's rational thought... but it does not out do our instinctual and primordial reactions to those colors. And regardless of what you might think should be, there's color symbolism inherent to Star Wars by design, especially in regards to lightsabers. Greens and blues are for the good guys, red for the bad guys.

Besides, were I arguing the importance of red as a color associated with danger I wouldn't argue it from the Chinese perspective as it is the color of luck and success to them. Western society largely associates red with DEATH. It's also associated from Roman days with Mars, the god of war, and being as so much of Western society is based on Roman civilization it is no reason red is associated with war and danger and death to this day. Hence the red blade of the Sith.

 

Just look at it as a statement made in the context of the Medieval European mind.

Quite so.

 

Of course, it is interesting how color patterns have changed in sic-fi in general. Particularly lasers.

For example, in the original star wars movies, the good guys shot red lasers and the bad guys shot green ones. This was also repeated in the many sci-fi action cartoons I saw when I was a kid. But in episode 1 the good guys shot green lasers and the bad guys shot red ones, and then in the other two the good guys used blue lasers. Similarly, this seems to be the trend in many shows that still use lasers.

Its also interesting to note during Veitnam, the Communists shot green tracers and we used red ones (and presumably our allies as well).

 

They're not lasers.

 

They sure look like lasers at night.

Not to mention the image will have stayed in the minds of many Americans, so it gives a ready defenition of "good guy-bad guy" to the public.

 

I meant the blaster bolts.

 

I'm offended that you're offended, if that means anything.

Interesting use of quotation marks there.

As I pointed out before, that's not "largely" true.

But then we also have the red armour of the Imperial Knights, combined with their silver/white lightsabers, interestingly...

 

I'd argue that it is. Humans have bled red (an action generally considered to be unhealthy) for thousands of years before Jesus died on the cross, and for thousands of years after. To argue that the positive symbolism of Jesus' blood is more pervasive than the negative connotation of bleeding to death is simply untrue, even among Christians. While red may very well be linked to holy blood, it is usually only in a religious context.

Regardless, I would say that modern culture has strayed away from the symbolism of colors. Yes, a caution sign is yellow and we take that to mean "Warning!", but we also eat Cheerios out of a yellow box, which does not have any warning meaning. Colors can still be symbolic, but the importance of that symbolism has diminished.

 

Again, not neccesarily. The heroic connotations of bloodshed in a secular context have been employed by everyone from Thomas Jefferson to whomever dreamed up the shoulder flash of the Royal Tank Regiment.

 

So...Jedi Knights borrow heavily from Chinese Mythology where red is associated with luck and success, yet they shouldn't adhere to a Chinese perspective regarding color associations, they should adhere to the idea of chakras and/or Western colour association?

Why?

(For the record add me to the list of individuals with a different association with red - to me it's patriotic as it's the colour of the dragon on my country's flag and the colour adopted by our sporting teams, etc. While it might not change the general association, the more people who note on this thread that they have subcultural differences in interpretation, the more clear it becomes that it's a general pattern with many, many exceptions. A subculture like the Jedi could easily be one.)

Also, if the answer is, "Because Lucas said they were supposed to be associated with chakras," (and I have no idea if he did or not); why should the EU recant its more individual approach to the NJO Jedi with regard to lightsaber colours when they haven't done re: marriage, attachment, posessions, etc.? A lot of the EU contradicts Lucas' vision in the movies. As long as the change occurred organically and makes sense (as I'd argue the change in the Order does), I don't mind.

Edited for clarity.

 

I've looked it up. Loners performing political assassinations as the root of the genre, with a move later towards wandering distributors of justice. Hardly unique to Chinese storytelling. The Qi is a bit like the Force, but then again Western fantasy throughout the years has relied on magic as well. Wu Xia may be one element, but it's not the only one. One could argue just as successfully, based on Lucas's stated inspiration from Campbell, that Star Wars is a fundamentally Western story using Western themes and the Jedi represent Western archetypes.

In a history of warfare class I took, I was struck by the resemblance of various elements of Macedonian culture to that of the Mandalorians. I was instantly reminded of them. However, you won't find me arguing that the Mandalorians were therefore obviously inspired by the Macedonians, or that they were in the creators' minds at all. And you certainly won't find me arguing that the Mandalorians should be canonically bound by the strictures of Macedonian culture.

Star Wars embraces dozens of influences. Any time a storyteller has tried to focus too strongly on one element and bind the Star Wars galaxy by that element, it hasn't come out well. The early Marvel run put the Buck Rogers influence over everything else and it leaves a sour taste in the mouth of many fans. Kevin J. Anderson took the Empire as Bond villains too literally, imagining that all Star Wars villains must be megalomaniacs with world-destroying superweapons, and his stories suffered for it. Some fans argue that the Saxtonite focus on space combat, military sci-fi, and hard statistics makes Star Wars something it isn't. Others argue that restricting Star Wars simply to retelling Campbellian mythic stories does the larger galaxy a disservice. When the NJO overwrote the more knight-errant leanings of Luke's Jedi with PT-inspired pacifistic-philosopher-monk persuasions, it left many pre-PT fans cold. Star Wars encompasses a vast array of Earthly influences, and it should no more be "Wu Xia in space" than it should be "Gunslinger Westerns in space" or "Pirates of the Caribbean in space".

As RF pointed out, color symbolism is incredibly weak in modern culture. Colors can have symbolism when put in a symbolic context (on a road sign, in a warning label, filtered in a movie, as part of a logo or symbol), but outside that lack any significant psychological impact. Green means go and red means stop -- but the red light on my TV means that it's going. I'm not confused by Superman wearing red. There are no "instinctual and primordial reactions" associating him with de

 

I 'm reading Star by Star and it clearly states that Leia is utilizing a red saber during lando's demonstration of his new droids