One thing about TROS and its finale/resolution is that you can wank some interesting world-building out of it.
Highlander had an arc about how since immortals absorb each other's Quickening, ones who spend their lives killing evil immortals risk being overwhelmed by them.
Highlander had an arc about how since immortals absorb each other's Quickening, ones who spend their lives killing evil immortals risk being overwhelmed by them.
If the whole "anger leads to the dark side" thing is less about "emotions = bad" and more about "emotionally charged killing means you leave yourself open to the energy of the person you kill"... the Jedi strictures begin to make more sense?
If we assume the situation where the most powerful Sith in history could pass his essence onto his killer in an overwhelming way is the most extreme expression of a thing that is normal for Sith/Jedi-level force sensitives fighting each other...
...then the Jedi training to be dispassionate killers (zero problems with killing, several problems with passion) becomes more critical and less just... punitive of human nature.
And the Sith willingness to taunt people into killing them less Pyrrhic. It's a legitimate victory.
And the Sith willingness to taunt people into killing them less Pyrrhic. It's a legitimate victory.
We get Jedi seeking a death that allows them to transcend mortal existence to exist as energy and Sith seeking a death that allows them to transcend mortal existence by attaching themselves to and (ideally overwhelming) their killer.
Believe me, the word "wank" was used in the first tweet with deliberate intent. You have to flog the canon pretty hard for this.
This thread isn't mean to defend TROS's storytelling but more lament lost opportunities, how they were degrees off from some great stuff.
Especially when we consider it in light of Rose's epiphany in TLJ about fighting to preserve love instead of destroy hate. Rey's victory *wasn't* dispassionate. She just moved from hatred of her enemy to love of those who had come before.
"Bringing balance to the force" could have been not "defeat the dark side/destroy the Sith" but "reconcile the light side with humanity and emotion".
Luke's failing was succumbing to fear, first his fear of Ben Solo and then his fear of his own failure. Love -- seeing Ben not as a Jedi-to-be but his nephew, his family, his friend, a frightened child in his charge -- might have prevented his failing.
And that's one thing I thought about TLJ at the time, and still do: Luke did fail. Even if he would never actually have killed Ben in his sleep, Ben woke up and saw him standing over him, armed and frightened, and that's the moment Luke lost him. Lost his trust.
And I appreciated that TLJ understood this. That Luke, while holding Kylo responsible for all the things he had done, was still full of remorse even confronting him. Luke knew they were both responsible, and for what.
Yeah. I think a lot about that, in comparison to Palpatine's repeated entreaty for others to strike him down. The bones are there.
It's a lot like the difference between Dumbledore's view of death as the beginning of something greater and Voldemort's fear of death as the end of everything, which is one of the more interesting things about Harry Potter's philosophical universe.
Or the Dark Crystal universe where the Gelflings mourn death but see it as a return to oneness with Thra, versus the Skeksis who fear death and will overcome it at all costs, even the destruction of the means and meaning of their existence.
Granted that it's largely a function of "these are the people the audience knows and cares about from the narrative", but the Jedi Masters who most freely manifest as force ghosts are the ones who seem to have embraced love and interpersonal connections, at least at the end.
So we could read from this that the Jedi order, overcorrecting for the problems of psychic entanglement, missed a bet in spending centuries training themselves to purge emotion, refute connections to others. They closed themselves off to a positive aspect of the Force.
Qui-Gon, long a bit of a heretic, was able to become one with the Force in a way that was supposedly unthinkably rare/unprecedented. His apprentice Obi-Wan did not embrace his ways until later, but duplicated the feat much later.
Yoda had been more of a traditionalist but lived long enough to see some of the follies of the old ways and embrace new ones. Luke learned everything he knew of the Force from Obi-Wan and Yoda, and actively refuted the need to cut himself off from love and family...
...and of course Anakin's fall and rise were both predicated on the same type of refutation.
Love and connection and a refutation of some Jedi tradtions seems almost like a prerequisite for becoming one with the Force in the way that Obi-Wan did.
Love and connection and a refutation of some Jedi tradtions seems almost like a prerequisite for becoming one with the Force in the way that Obi-Wan did.
That's what the lore says but I feel like we see the exact opposite?
