The Jedi of the PT

Did anyone else find a massive discrepancy in Lucas calling the Jedi of the PT era "the best overall" and their lack of accomplishments? Did anyone else cringe or laugh at how badly Saesee Tiin, Kit Fisto, and Agen Kolar went down when fighting Palpatine? Do you think the OT had it right when it kept the Jedi as just a historical old religious sect that perished at the hands of the empire? Did Lucas's attempts at them fighting nothing but easily killed droids come across as clumsily done to anyone else? 

yes. the prequels should not have been made.

The OT Jedi were spiritual warrior monks who served as the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic for a thousand generations. The PT Jedi were aloof genetic supermen who served as the enforcers of a corrupt Republic for a thousand years.

Carthage said:

Lucas calling the Jedi of the PT era "the best overall"

Where did Lucas say that? I've never heard it before.

DuracellEnergizer said:

The OT Jedi were spiritual warrior monks who served as the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic for a thousand generations. The PT Jedi were aloof genetic supermen who served as the enforcers of a corrupt Republic for a thousand years.

I don't think anyone could sum it up any better than this.


At the start of the prequels, the Republic should have been in a golden age.  The Jedi should have been almost entirely separate; off on some relatively undeveloped planet being used as a monastery for training and meditation.  The only contact between the Jedi and the Republic should have been in the form of occasional moral guidance with respect to "the force."

Having some sort of proxy between the Jedi and the Republic would have been a great role for Anakin.  He would have developed close ties within the Republic and a desire to involve the Jedi in political matters.  The Jedi would naturally be opposed.  Even when it is revealed that there is a Sith lurking in the shadows, the Jedi still avoid political involvement, instead, opting to conduct their own investigation.  Anakin would grow frustrated with their lack of "open" involvement, and take matters into his own hands, fighting for the republic and leading their armies into battle.

doubleofive said:

Was it ever explained why the Jedi were running the Clone Wars? You'd think the Republic would have, you know, military generals instead of letting a bunch of monks and clones making these strategic decisions.

Especially when "canonically", there were only about ten thousand Jedi in existence throughout the entire galaxy at the time.

Too much samurai, not enough Zen Buddhism, and the PT suffers for it.

At the very least, Palpatine had read the Book of Five Rings.

The Jedi were much more appealing in the OT, where as far as we could tell, they were primarily a spiritual group of clever old guys who apparently practiced swordsmanship as a path to personal betterment--in contrast to the Sith, who only knew how to use brute force and treachery to get power, and used swordplay only to hurt others. PT Jedi, while very flashy fighters, don't seem to uphold that legacy. They're blind, and not even in that cool Zatoichi way. They're horrible detectives, on top of it--it doesn't seem like they're particularly good at anything, when the least they could do is be tragic heroes.

That line in AOTC about 'our powers are diminishing' almost seems like an attempt to explain why they're so lame, but it's a lame explanation in itself.

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Sadako said:

Too much samurai, not enough reptiles.

 Fixed

So Lucas was secretly making The One this whole time?

Obi-Wan was as powerful as he was because he was just that good. He was strong enough as a Padawan to take out a Sith Lord, and that was when there were thousands of other Jedi still alive. Yoda was pretty much always as strong as he was, no matter how many other Jedi there were, and we don't see either of those two getting sudden boosts in power as Order 66 is carried out. Obi-Wan, Yoda, and Luke were all as strong in the Force as they were because it was fate/the will of the Force/whatevs.

The Force is something shared by all living things--at least it was, until Lucas made it into something genetic that could be inherited by special bloodlines of Übermenschen. But even that aside, there are plenty of other Force traditions in the Galaxy (some of which have even been canonized in the movies and TV shows, like the Witches of Dathomir), whose numbers didn't seem to be culled by the Empire. The number of these other Force users doesn't seem to affect the strength of the Jedi or the Sith. I don't think the Conservation of Ninjutsu applies to Jedi (or at least it SHOULDN'T apply). Otherwise, ANY Jedi could have been the Chosen One, as there would be no 'fate'/'will of the Force', and ANY Jedi could have defeated Darth Vader.