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The Death Star trench run

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http://fxrant.blogspot.com/2017/01/the-death-star-and-final-trench-run.html

Star Wars fans pride themselves on knowing each and every detail from the original trilogy. But there’s one little detail from “Star Wars” (1977) that might surprise a lot of fans, and the reality of this detail is different than our collective head canon.

At the end of the original film, Rebel ships fly along the Death Star trench in an attempt to blow up the space station. Look at the photo of the Death Star at the top of this post: can you point to the trench that Luke and the Rebels flew down to fire upon the exhaust port that would ultimately destroy the space station?

Nearly everybody points at the equatorial trench of the Death Star. I asked dozens of die-hard fans, including many co-workers at Industrial Light & Magic, and nearly every single person pointed to the equatorial trench. If you asked me, I would also have said the equatorial trench.

I can see how people make this mistake, despite the indicators in the film to the contrary.

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MTFBWY…A

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 (Edited)

I always thought the trench runs towards the north pole where the exhaust port is. I think I got that feeling from the briefing scene where the plans show it to be on the north side.

真実

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 (Edited)

Yeah, I never thought it would be the equator. It’s way bigger than the trench. So no news here.

And in the time of greatest despair, there shall come a savior, and he shall be known as the Son of the Suns.

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Since Rogue One featured the plans exactly as they were in ANH, and it seems most prequel edits omit the plans’ appearance in AOTC, perhaps the Death Star prototype in ROTS could feature an equatorial laser dish.
It’d suggest that the plans the rebels intercept are the “original plans,” from before a revision to move the dish.

My stance on revising fan edits.

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LexX said:

Yeah, I never thought it would be the equator. It’s way bigger than the trench. So no news here.

Agreed, I thought this has always been obvious.

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NeverarGreat said:

The one thing I never noticed was that the dish bisected the equatorial trench in the plans. I wonder if that is something Ady will fix for his new Star Wars Revisited project.

He did that almost 10 years ago now:

But he is changing it back thanks to Rogue One, I believe with the argument the Story Group came up with that the plans contain all of the variations and each one had the exhaust port.

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Moth3r said:

LexX said:

Yeah, I never thought it would be the equator. It’s way bigger than the trench. So no news here.

Agreed, I thought this has always been obvious.

When I was younger I thought it was the equatorial trench, but as I grew up I realized it was a polar trench.

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

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I never really thought about where the trench was actually located. However, it does make sense. Now everyone can sleep easy.

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I have from time to time considered it… for about 5 seconds.

“That Darth Vader, man. Sure does love eating Jedi.”

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I always knew it wasn’t the equatorial trench, but I never gave any thought to which of the other trenches or which direction.

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It’s fairly obvious once you connect the plans where they show several polar trenches and then zoom in on one.

I was dumb when I was young, what can I say?

Keep Circulating the Tapes.

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Agreed. Although 62.5% is perhaps a little low for “most.”

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I don’t think I ever assumed it was the equatorial trench, but I didn’t really give it much thought beyond that. I don’t think I assumed it was longitudinal either. Yeah, it does seem obvious when you think about that and look at the plans, but the plans are rather obfuscating too since it doesn’t really zoom in directly from the complete picture into a trench. It zooms into a square, which zooms into another square, which zooms into a trench. By the time I get through all those different layers, I’ve totally forgotten its orientation!

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