Less crucial Star Wars question

[Necron2.0]

For myself, I consider everything coming from and related to the Star Wars prequels as something akin to an alternate reality (and a Bizzaro World one at that). To my thinking, not a single thing in them made any sense whatsoever, and were in no way coherent to the original stories (as presented in "episodes" 4, 5, & 6). I've carried that understanding into Star Wars RPGs I've GMed. What follows is exactly the "openning sequence scroll" that I've presented to starting players:

The first thing to bear in mind is that Episodes 1 through 3 NEVER HAPPENNED! In terms of this game, those stories are completely apocryphal. There are no such things as Midichlorians. The Force is a mystic energy field, not a bacterial infection. Anakin Skywalker was not a slave on Tatooine. He was Owen Skywalker’s younger brother, someone capable of following “old Obi-Wan on some damn-fool idealistic crusade” of his own free will, and having a real knock-down, drag-out angry fight with Owen over it to start with. He was someone for whom Owen had strong personal feelings – someone whom Owen could actually fear Luke would turn out to be just like. Anakin Skywalker did not build C3P0. He did not turn to the darkside out of misguided love. He did it for the same reason everybody turns to the darkside – naked lust for power. Luke’s and Leia’s mother did not die in childbirth. Leia did know her mother, just as she said she did. Yoda did not know of Luke’s and Leia’s births, was not involved in them, and did not instruct Obi Wan to take Luke to Tatooine (If he had, that would have meant Yoda was going senile when he argued with Obi Wan about whether or not to train Luke, since it was Yoda’s idea in the first place, that the children should be separated, and kept safe, so that they could all meet up again, later, at a more auspicious time.)

The only part of the prequels that is true is the basic history. There was a Separatist civil war. It was orchestrated by Palpatine. Clone troopers were used by the Republic to put down the insurrection. Clones did form the backbone of what are now known as Stormtroopers. The Jedi were suckered into overextending themselves, they were betrayed by Anakin/Vader, and were slaughtered by their own troops. Obi Wan did fight and defeat Anakin (who had been Obi Wan’s Padawan) but Obi Wan did NOT mercilessly leaving Anakin to burn slowly and cruelly to death on the side of a volcanic mound. Vader was proclaimed the hero of the republic for rooting out the “Jedi conspiracy” and Palpatine did proclaim himself Emperor. Beyond this, however, the similarities between the sequels and “reality” end.

Oh, and Greedo did not shoot first – Han did.

[Emerald Rose Widow]

For myself, I consider everything coming from and related to the Star Wars prequels as something akin to an alternate reality (and a Bizzaro World one at that). To my thinking, not a single thing in them made any sense whatsoever, and were in no way coherent to the original stories (as presented in "episodes" 4, 5, & 6). I've carried that understanding into Star Wars RPGs I've GMed. What follows is exactly the "openning sequence scroll" that I've presented to starting players:

hehe, you are quite passionate about this.

I will agree with you though, when i play star wars i do modify the lore as presented in 1-3. I don't go as far as you do, and to be honest, I couldnt see vader coming back to the light side due to his son if he fell for lust for power. There was something there, important emotions that caused him to fall.

Frankly i have always found villains that become evil "because of lust for power" to be two dimensional and boring. People rarely turn to evil for something so simple as power, they were either raised to be evil with that kind of thinking, or something traumatic happened to them to make them fall. While I would not have made Anakin a pansy ***** that Lucas made him in 1-3, I think the basic precept of the woman he loved (and thus the only thing keeping his sanity intact) dying and the emotions from that contributing to his fall, and thus allowed for him to later come back because of his son, one of two remaining pieces of her, seems a lot more realistic and makes him out to be a much more interesting character. To me, Darth Vader was the best villain to date, and because of that basic story that only made his actions deeper, and more sad.

But hey, im a girl and i fall for that romatic crap all the time so sue me -giggles-

That is just my take though.

[Necron2.0]

I couldnt see vader coming back to the light side due to his son if he fell for lust for power.

I could - easily. Just because someone is evil does not imply they do not love their children. It is common for someone to be "career oriented" in their youth, only to become more introspective as they age. The story of an aging man looking back through his life and realizing he's lost the truly important things while chasing trivialities such as power is replete throughout literature. A Christmas Carol jumps immediately to mind.

Frankly i have always found villains that become evil "because of lust for power" to be two dimensional and boring.

Mmm. I'd have to disagree with this, but only with respect to point of view. Sure, if all you knew of a villains is that they wanted power, then yes, that is a boring character. But, the same could be said for a villain whose only motivation was misguided love. If all you know of a character is one facet of his personality, then that character is by definition a 2-dimensional caricature. Hitler, arguably one of the most interesting villains of modern time, is probably the most classic "power for power's sake" villains. And yet, when he joined the N.A.Z.I. party, he had no desire to be leader. In fact, he actively tried to shy away from it, but he was lured in and seduced by power brokers who wanted someone like Hitler to enact their policies. That is how it should have been with Anakin.

People rarely turn to evil for something so simple as power

Actually if you look back through history, power hunger is the single most common reason why people turn evil. But, I suppose that depends on your definition of evil.

[DarkLink]

See, George Lucas is great at world building. He made the Star Wars universe what it is.

But he isn't a great director. The basic ideas behind the prequels are great, the execution is just lacking. Ergo, they are still canon, but hope that they get remade someday with a better director.

[Emerald Rose Widow]

I could - easily. Just because someone is evil does not imply they do not love their children. It is common for someone to be "career oriented" in their youth, only to become more introspective as they age. The story of an aging man looking back through his life and realizing he's lost the truly important things while chasing trivialities such as power is replete throughout literature. A Christmas Carol jumps immediately to mind.

In this case though scrooge only made this switch when he realized the end it would bring him to, after he had seen what would happen of his life and what it gained. When vader decided to save his son, it was very different, because as far as vader was concerned the emperor was winning with no end in sight. But I guess that is really just technicalities, I do get your main point and it is very well made. Idk, i just see it differently, and as i said, i fall for that romantic stuff hehe.

I will agree with darklink though pretty much the whole way, George Lucas sucks with diologue and with directing, he is horrid at it. He makes a rocking world, if he would just keep his damned fingers out of things he cant handle all would be gravy. I think if he had just written the basic story and let someone else run with it, the prequels would have been much much better. I liked the basic story of the prequel trilogy, and the fight scenes were amazing, but the rest was all borked up.

[eldargal]

This exactly.

I'm actually holding out hopes that the SW televison series might be quite good because he isn't directing them.

See, George Lucas is great at world building. He made the Star Wars universe what it is.

But he isn't a great director. The basic ideas behind the prequels are great, the execution is just lacking. Ergo, they are still canon, but hope that they get remade someday with a better director.

[Psychosplodge]

I spent years reading all the books from the Han Solo trilogy onwards, and then the ruined the extended universe with the prequels, they turned Boba Fett from an exile to a whiny psychologically scarred clone, and then in the newest books tried to correct the earlier writings in with the prequels.

[Emerald Rose Widow]

I spent years reading all the books from the Han Solo trilogy onwards, and then the ruined the extended universe with the prequels, they turned Boba Fett from an exile to a whiny psychologically scarred clone, and then in the newest books tried to correct the earlier writings in with the prequels.

Well they had to backpedal and fix things so it followed with lucas' messed up recreation which didn't follow the previous books in the least.

[Psychosplodge]

They should have just ignored the films and carried on lol

[Emerald Rose Widow]

They should have just ignored the films and carried on lol

no, if they did that lucas would have taken away their right to use the star wars world, you know how finicky lucasarts can get