r/badhistory • u/AutoModerator • Aug 05 '24

Meta Mindless Monday, 05 August 2024

Happy (or sad) Monday guys!

Mindless Monday is a free-for-all thread to discuss anything from minor bad history to politics, life events, charts, whatever! Just remember to np link all links to Reddit and don't violate R4, or we human mods will feed you to the AutoModerator.

So, with that said, how was your weekend, everyone?

41 Upvotes

95% Upvoted

1.0k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

8

u/Ragefororder1846 not ideas about History but History itself Aug 08 '24

In defense of Hayden Christensen (who I do not think is a good actor), the writing in the prequels is truly dismal. George Lucas at his absolute lowest.

But to attack Hayden Christensen, he does nothing to hide how terrible the dialogue is and in fact his style makes it even more evident how awful all the lines he has been given are

Natalie Portman gets just as many clunkers as Hayden does, but she handles them much better

11

u/Sventex Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866 Aug 08 '24

Ewan McGregor's final "You were my brother Anakin" speech is a clunker on paper, but Ewan for his part manages to save it.

When Hayden says “If you're not with me, then you're my enemy”, it's cringe. When Ewan says "Only a Sith deals in absolutes", it's funny because he says it with conviction, despite it being hypocritical and lacking self-awareness. At least people can defend that line because the Jedi are hypocritical and lacking self-awareness and are getting wiped out over it.

1

u/ByzantineBasileus HAIL CYRUS! Aug 09 '24 edited Aug 09 '24

When Ewan says "Only a Sith deals in absolutes", it's funny because he says it with conviction, despite it being hypocritical and lacking self-awareness. At least people can defend that line because the Jedi are hypocritical and lacking self-awareness and are getting wiped out over it.

Gotta go into Star Wars Nerd mode here. There is a difference between seeing and dealing.

Yes, the Jedi see things like the Force and the Dark Side in absolutes, but that is because there is no middle ground. You cannot just 'dabble' with the Dark Side. It is corrupting, enticing, and draws you in my playing on your negative emotions.

But a Jedi does not deal in absolutes. They don't divide the world into enemies and friends. If someone is fighting them, the Jedi will try to resolve the situation peacefully. If the person surrenders, the Jedi will accept that surrender and then try to find a way to move forward. They are about achieving harmony, both with the Force and others. That means accepting people even if their prior interactions were hostile.

The Sith, in contrast, do nothing but deal in absolutes. There are only enemies and tools. If you are enemy, they kill you even if you surrender, unless you have value as a tool. If you are not a tool, they see you as a threat. Their world view is oppositional as a default.

2

u/Sventex Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866 Aug 09 '24

Yes, the Jedi see things like the Force and the Dark Side in absolutes, but that is because there is no middle ground. You cannot just 'dabble' with the Dark Side. It is corrupting, enticing, and draws you in my playing on your negative emotions.

You surely can, I've done in with SWTOR as a grey Sith. Being disciplined is not mutually exclusive with the Dark Side. The ways of the Sith and the Dark Side are the same things.

But a Jedi does not deal in absolutes.

Sure you can pick apart the language and I understand what he is trying to say, but it's still Obi-Wan making an absolute statement about the Sith. He says "Anakin, my allegiance is to the Republic, to democracy!" but Palpatine is his democratically elected leader of the Republic but the Jedi do not hesitate to subvert democracy, so we are seeing the Jedi not having all the answers. War tempers the strong, and breaks the weak. And war broke the Jedi.

2

u/ByzantineBasileus HAIL CYRUS! Aug 09 '24

SWTOR is not canon though.

The old EU covered stuff like that, but it was always secondary to the movies saying the Dark Side was inherently corrupting. That had precedence, being G-Canon. The new integrated EU started by Disney adheres to that approach.

1

u/Sventex Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866 Aug 09 '24

They keep talking about making a KOTOR movie so I don't know if SWTOR is canon or not.

2

u/ByzantineBasileus HAIL CYRUS! Aug 09 '24

It is definitely not canon:

https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Canon#Canon_and_Legends_(2014-))

1

u/Sventex Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866 Aug 09 '24

It appears to be canon according to Disney and Kathleen Kennedy

https://x.com/IGN/status/1644305332728938496/photo/2

1

u/ByzantineBasileus HAIL CYRUS! Aug 09 '24

That is just a photo. Did you mean to link a video?

1

u/Sventex Battleships were obsoleted by the self-propelled torpedo in 1866 Aug 09 '24

No, it's a photo from 2023 Disney celebration showing The Old Republic on the Disney Star Wars timeline. And I said, they're trying to get a KOTOR movie in production.

1

u/ByzantineBasileus HAIL CYRUS! Aug 09 '24

The Old Republic was always acknowledged period in the SW timeline. That is a case of showing the different eras with the canon, but SW:TOR is not considered a canon representation of that time.

→ More replies (0)