Originally posted by: Tiptup

Originally posted by: Go-Mer-Tonic
No, Midichlorians are what allows life to exist in the first place. The Jedi communicate with the force through them in the same way they hear sounds with their ears.

No, Qui-Gon specifically said that midichlorians speak to Jedi and "tell" them the will of the force. They aren't just organs or appendages. They're supposed to be intelligent.

Originally posted by: Go-Mer-Tonic

Are living beings "luminous," like Yoda said, or do they simply carry varrying amounts of hereditary bacteria?

Why can't they be both? It's not like the Force wasn't hereditary in the classic trilogy. I figure with the Midichlorians, we have a solid basis to say it's about all life, not just the Skywalkers.

In the original trilogy, strength with the force was only vaguely hereditary. Only in the prequels does the source of such powers become so physically limited. I believe it was better when the force was presented as permeating everything and existing everywhere, including the mind's of Jedi. Requiring arbitrary counts of bacteria to give the minds of living beings a connection to the force makes the Star Wars universe a lot smaller and less interesting at best. At worst, it makes the force into an annoyingly indistinct plot element that is difficult to accept on the surface.

Absolutely. The truth is, like many additions such as that general grovus robot guy and his useless guards and Ian's face contortions during battle, this seemed to me as an unnecessary convolution, like taking time to sit down and explain Yoda and Chewbacca were old friends. Why? Nobody cares. And it brings up more questions than it answers. I'd rather learn about force ghosts, but no the movie has to wrap things up quickly. So yoda says basically "I was just chilling one day in the meditation room and someone told me we can become immortal somehow. I'll teach you." End of story. Shinaninagans... I'm supposed to believe Midis were more imporatant to detail than that?

We don't need it. We don't need a scene dedicated to farts and we don't need a scene dedicated to saying Jedi are x-men. Mystical powers are GASP actually mystical?... OH really? Now kiddies are wondering why Leia tells luke she could never have powers like his, when all she needs to do is test her blood to find out. Thus is the consequence of Lucas' careless writing for the Pt. Nothing was sacred since he constantly changes all the movies, right...

It's like a class system where once there was only level of experience and skill. Jedi are to be classed as a mutants, than a mysteriously cool supernatural warriors. Yoda could train every day for 400 years but never achieve enough force power as someone with more 'size' than him? I can not accept this.

It's like... uh. Remember in Rots when count dooku expends his energy to flip over the rails instead of walk down the stairs. that's metaphorically what midichlorians are, an unnecessary flip where you could easily walk down the stairs called "I sense great force potential in him" And that's just how the new Lucas likes to do things for whatever reason. My guess is that no one told him that it'd be wise not to.

I'm reminded of full metal alchemist and how there exist parallel worlds, one where science dominated and one where mystical powers did. The mystical powers if I recall were only explained so far as saying certain people were able to control the elements to do cool stuff like re-shape them, turn anything into something else. It's an ambiguous sort of magic that I found even more fascinating because aspects of it could only be imagined, it's magic powers... Going back to a point about children someone made. I think it's important to allow them to use their imagination in these fantasy stories. I love fantasy for that. I don't know why a suit of armor can walk on its own, maybe it's magnetically controlled by invisible forces of earth's gravity. I don't know! That's what makes mit magic, and that's part of the fun of it to me. with the intro of midi count determining force potential, I wonder if Luke's count is half of vader's or on par with yoda's or do sith use a midi sensor . They're both children of a powerful jedi knight bla bla bla luke tells leia the force is strong in their family. He doesn't say his midichlorian count is high, just that the force is strong. So I assume the likely hood of someone having a force capable child is increased, not necessarily determined exactly by whether there was enough midichlorian juice in the sperm. but I always wondered after the midichlorian thing started if Anakin's sperm dna dominated Pad Me's egg dna so that luke and leia's midi count was still quite high despite padme just being a regular human.

It's more interesting to me to continue the discord rather than erase it and simply turn magic into science. In the original, certain people were the midichlorians, or force users. There was never a need to add smaller force users inside a force user. it would add nothing but confusion.

"I find your lack of midichlorians disturbing."
"The midichlorians are with you young one, but you are not a jedi, yet."
"Judge me by my size, do you? And you should not, for my allys are the midichlorians, and a powerful allys they are."
"Trust your midichlorians"
"I sense something, a midichlorian I've not sensed since..."
"Lord vader we've run some routine tests and have discovered the princess has a midichlorian count of one billion zillion."