The Ewoks aren’t killed off unless Lucas says they are. The Star Wars Universe is ruled by the whim of the writers, not the laws of physics.
If the destruction of Alderaan is not evidence of the character of the empire and emperor then I am not sure it’s worth discussing further.
The only way to deal with corruption was to start a civil war in which casual genocide was an option (at least for the “bad guys”, who answered to the same leadership as the nominally republican forces)? Physical, economic and humanitarian devastation on a huge scale - it is hard to believe that the Empire could conceivably so very enlightened that the price paid in the clone wars was worth it.
Even assuming that the Old Republic had all the flaws of which it’s opponents complained, do any really believe that after eradicating all of the secessionist forces and leadership that Palpatine would initiate a considered program of devolution and reform?
The empire as constituted has zero accountability. The emperor was self proclaimed and not only had no democratic or constitutional limitations on his actions, but had an army that was created and programmed solely to obey unquestionably his intentions. No due process, no feedback loop whatsoever. This is government designed for abuse of power.
Even prior to the destruction of Alderaan and the dissolution of the figurehead senate, if we are to believe Leia’s words many systems were chafing under the heavy hand of the imperial governors. The empire used torture freely (no amateurish stuff here - specialized and customized equipment only). Summary executions also appear to be the norm.
Look at Tatooine’s experience. Though outside the jurisdiction of the empire, imperial forces casually slaughtered native populations, even cooperative ones.
Look at Bespin’s experience. Though outside the normal jurisdiction of the empire imperial forces casually annex the world for no good reason other than that the Emperor’s envoy feels like it (violating the agreement with Lando several times over). The prospect of imperial rule is sufficiently dire that some proportion of the citizenry decide to vacate before experiencing the full love of the imperial embrace.
Despite the total victory of proto-imperial forces in the clone wars (over a foe that were largely the creation of Palpatine), the empire continues to build ever larger and more powerful fleets of ships. Given the absence of external foes this seems to be a pretty strong indication that the Emperor does not expect the vast majority of systems to flourish peacefully under his gentle hand. (I mean seriously, it took what - less than a decade for the republic to go from zero military to annhilating the secessionists entirely. The new, efficient and beloved empire should not need super star destroyers and death stars to keep the peace)
During the first world war, the allies had a similar opinion, thinking that parachutes would discourage the heroism and focus that the leadership felt pilots needed, while wasting valuable planes. The Germans figured out somewhat earlier that the pilots are the more valuable part of the equation.
Yeah, I love that site. It also has a semi-compelling argument that Leia lied when she said that Alderaan had no defenses.
I think the SWTC is just as canon-worthy as the novels, given than George Lucas invalidates quite a few of those every time he makes a Star Wars movie. I personally find the SWTC more entertaining than Timothy Zahn.
I always wondered what Jawas hid under those robes. I said candy corn, my wife said nuts.
Anyway, your meme reminded me of one more vote for the “Rebels were not exactly perfect either” side, straight from today’s world - after smashing the Imperial executive and military structures, what system did the Rebels have in place to prevent the ensuing anarchy? They could barely function as a hit-and-run army, much less execute any kind of peace-keeping and nation-building duties. I can’t see a government that large toppling without civilian deaths on a massive scale.
Do we know it’s outside the Empire’s jurisdiction? It’s apparently outside the Republic’s jurisdiction in the prequel movies, but by the time of A New Hope, it’s sending people to the Imperial Naval Academy (Biggs goes, and Luke wants to go), and Mos Eisley apparently has a stormtrooper garrison. No doubt some of the stormtroopers come from Darth Vader’s fleet, we see in the movie that some of them are riding Dewbacks, the giant lizards that are used as mounts on Tatooine. These animals obviously need to be trained. Clearly there has to be some preexisting garrison that has trained and uses the animals.
And there’s not a “casual slaughter of native populations.” Stormtroopers do kill a Jawa troop (who were dealing in stolen property, and had been in posession of a robot containing vital Imperial intelligence), and also a settler and his wife, who had purchased such property. The Jawa are scavengers and a nuisance anyway, and they don’t seem to have any civilization to speak of, so their extermination is no great loss.
Admittedly, the death of Owen and Beru Lars is more problematic, but they were in posession of vital military intelligence, which they didn’t turn over to the government (no doubt trying to tell some story about how the droid had “run off”, when it was obvious that the droid, as a new purchase, would have been fitted with a restraining bolt. Undoubtedly, they were lying, and withholding vital information from an Imperial official, under such circumstances, as you know, is a treasonous offense.
If I had the dough I’d send you the non-special edition VHS version. Only the ewoks celebrated, because only the ewoks triumphed!
YUB YUB
Was the city celebration part of the “re-mastered” sets? I saw RotJ an eon ago in the theater but the most recent time I saw it was a month or so ago when it was on a TV in the background at my sister’s. That was the time I wondered what all those people thought was going to be so different.
I got the impression that, except for the Emperor’s “Hands”–like Mara Jade–women, even human women, were also treated like second-class citizens.
My 12th grade Spanish teacher loved giving us the grammatical analysis of sentences about half the length of that one. I’m thinking I may take up about half a roll of toilet paper and write the tree analysis of yours, just to see if I still remember how… bravo! Bra-vo!
Threepio and Artoo are pre republic era droids meant for a time that you elude to, one without need of slaves, but there are somethings that humans can do better and replacing them is a matter of biology.
The problem for palpatine is that they are badass, had the republic actually had a draft or a general call up then the political situation would have ended up slightly different. One of the first things that he would have had to do is shut down and embargo all worlds that were producing or could produce combat mechs , they are just a mechanical clone army that could be mass produced and deployed to combat an expansionist proto empire , the way that he abolished clone grown troops.
I would say the same thing about the Jedi knights, but replace evil with fanatical and you get the opposite side of the coin. Someone posted a link that compared the practices of the Jedi with the practices of the Empire and damm if the Jedi dont come off looking like Al Zawkawi.
The imperial starforce seems to have the luxury of attacking with overwhelming odds, thus the Tie fighter design reflects that philosophy. Cheap , fast gun platform. Bought in the hundreds of thousands probably.
The rebs attacked the death star with 30 xwings and y wings , so they may have had shields ,but there was only a few of them. Some time after alderaan they seemed to have surged an increase of fighters ands ships into their ranks, up to the return of the jedi were ackbar is able to stand up to an imperial fleet.
Bottom line for me is that the rebs got quite a bit of mileage out of the alderaan debacle , while the empire was just starting to change its doctrine on deep strike,with the introduction of the improved tie fighter, with hyperdrive and missiles.
They would not need to , almost all the member worlds had their own civil goverment, ie queen amidala. Anything else would have been an imperial redoubt that would encompass so many systems and could be bypassed.The empire was decapitated not gutted.
The trick however would have been to convince the goverments that you are legit and they really should remit those taxes before a new republic envoy shows up to do some aggresive diplomacy.
In ansewer to your question , the new republic has the fleet that keeps the space lanes open and free of piracy, so the folks like the trade federation cant simply blockade a planet thats not paying the vig.
Declan
The author of that article presumably never read the novelization of the original Star Wars, in which Biggs Darklighter tells Luke Skywalker that the Empire will soon be proceeding with the “Imperialization of commerce” in the outer rim territories. Even if they hadn’t been slaughtered by the storm troopers, Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru would soon have been toiling away on some vast Impkhoz moisture farm for the greater glory (and profit) of some Grand Moff sitting in a palace light-years away.
And that’s fair enough. “Star Wars” is first and foremost a movie, and most people care not a whit for the myriad of crappy books it has spawned.
What’s the point of a “Moisture farm”, anyway? I can perhaps see small scale water collection for some desert substance farming, but why at an Imperial scale? There has got to be better places to collect moisture than a desert planet if, for some reason, you needed to harvest and export a lot of moisture. But why would you? It’s water – not exactly a hard substance to create chemically. I’d think a level of civilization that can hop from star system to star system and create giant, planet sized spacestations could noodle out how to combine oxygen and hydrogen without traveling to some far-flung desert world to squeeze it out of the rocks.
Well, exactly. They could make droids. But instead of that expense they used humans. Evil.
They didn’t topple the government. They destroyed a big part of the fleet (though apparently some of the fleet jumped out when they saw the Death Star go up), killed the Emperor and his right-hand man. There’s still planetary governors, and Palpatine’s advisors. Certainly there’s anarchy, but the system is still there. It’s not as though the Rebels get to move in and take over as a result of Endor.
Grevious wasn’t a droid. He’s one of them there biological/bionic combos, like Darth Vader. After he was gravely injured in some conflict, they put what was left of him in a super suit type thing that enabled his continued survival. (It’s my understanding that he was more gravely injured than Vader, yet put into a far more interesting and advanced get-up than Vader’s that’s also curiously much more vulnerable as well. Weird thing, these retcons.)
God, I’m a geek.
According to the books and EU, the water vapor wasn’t being collected for use off-world, but for on Tatooine. Presumably it would be cheaper and more efficient to pull it out of the air than try to import it from another planet.
That’s why I was wondering why you’d need a “vast Impkhoz moisture farm” or how anyone would profit from it. It doesn’t seem likely that you’d establish a major agricultural export business on Tatooine, no matter how dry you wring the atmosphere.
I dunno… the whole thing maybe sounds plausible on a “get enough supplemental water to scratch out a meager existance” level but becomes silly on a large scale.
Maybe Tattooine had a lot of methane.
It was all from Bantha farts. Gaseous animals, Bantha. Why do you think the Sand People wore those masks?
Retcons? What retcons? Remember the true fan’s mantra: There is no Star Wars but Star Wars and Lucas made no movies after 1983.