Deckard2 said:HOTH ESCAPE:
One thing that always bothered me, Luke blows up the AT-AT and then the next screen he is getting in his X-wing to go to Dagobah?
Wouldnt he be surrounded by stormtroopers? And how does he get to his X-wing and the other rebels without having resistance from the Empire attack force?
Deckard2, I'll have a go at how I've always liked to view this one, judging by the actual onscreen sequence of events -
We only see 5 AT-AT's (and then a following AT-ST - or is it 2 different ones?) as they approach from only one general direction towards the extensive Rebel Base / and it's Power Generators onscreen. Each of these AT-AT's is carrying a small contingent of Infantry snowtroopers inside of them, as the AT-AT's move ever-closer to their target, which turns out to be quite heavily defended by snowspeeders and various Rebel firepower. (I've always looked on all the various action and scenes in the battle as happening in 'real-time', by the way)
Eventually, General Veers tells Vader's hologram "You may start your landing" and that he has reached the main Power Generators and that he'll have the Shield down in moments. (I always think that he says 'moments' to Vader, as his AT-AT is almost near enough at this point where Vader contacts him for a progress report, but not quite close enough yet to properly destroy it immediately) So approx. 2 minutes later into the battle, General Veers orders an Infantry snowtrooper beside him that "All troops will debark for ground assault", as he prepares to target the main Generator at this point. Then approx. 50 seconds after that, Luke crashes his Snowspeeder. (All the debarked AT-AT troops are already off and running towards getting into the Base from a DIFFERENT direction by now) Then approx. 50 seconds later after this, we hear an announcement saying "Imperial troops have entered the base". (The AT-AT troops have succeeded) Then approx. 45 seconds later, we see a now on-foot Luke blow up an AT-AT. Eventually, approx. another 30 seconds after this, General Veers finally blows up the Generators. (Another thing that has probably held up his firing at the Generators a little sooner during these few minutes, is that he has probably had to contend with a lot of defending firepower aiming towards the AT-AT windscreen, which could be a weak point)
During this time before the Generators are blown up, I like to believe that the amount of snowtroopers that quickly debarked from the AT-AT's BEFORE Luke crashed (unseen by us during Luke's still ongoing snowspeeder action, probably all rapidly 'rappeling' down to the ground), were at this point concentrating on heading off in a DIFFERENT direction alongside the EXTENSIVE Base, to infiltrate it, rather than go straight ahead towards the strong Rebel firepower we see in front of the portion of the Base we see onscreen. And Vader who lands just afterwards (when the Shield is finally down) has linked up with some of these AT-AT troops who first stormed the inside of the Base on ANOTHER section of the Base, compared to the portion defended onscreen....with the intention to capture Leia, Luke and the other ringleaders that Vader thought might be inside there.
(However, I can never decide if the majority of the Rebel troops and Snowspeeder pilots are taken up with the AT-AT attack on that particular section of the Base while this separate attack is going on....OR....if there were an equal amount of defending Rebels and firepower on this other side also....that just couldn't stop Vader and his snowtroopers from breaching the Base....)
Either way, we don't see hundreds of snowtroopers onscreen, just a few with Vader, and they have concentrated on getting at whoever's inside of the Base first, during the time that we see Luke blow up an AT-AT on the outside, before he then heads for an as-yet-unassailed position near one side of the extensive Base, where the rest of the retreating Rebels are leaving from, and where his X-Wing awaits too.
It's good luck that Luke just happens to be now outside of the Base at this point, at a distance away from Vader and his snowtroopers, as he makes his way to where the the last of the Transports and his X-Wing are positioned (referred to as 'the south slope' by Leia who ordered some troops to protect the fighters there, earlier). No doubt Vader and his snowtroopers (or the AT-AT's, if able to access this area) would have reached this position very shortly afterwards too....and R2D2 was right to be agitated.
Maybe this can help a little.