DarkFather

One change that came to mind while I was talking with vaderios:

Vader's helmet flaps in the breeze during the last moments of his duel with Luke. It makes Vader's helmet seem too flimsy. I don't know if anyone here is even capable of changing that, but it's worth noting.

From what we're told from Obi-Wan, and what we can infer from everything else we see, we get all the history on the character of Anakin/Vader that we really need in the OT. Or all that I need, anyway. Sure it was awesome going back to see how things unfolded (or at least the prospect of doing so was awesome), but still, it didn't add much. Even going by just the OT he was a complex character: an admirable Jedi (undermined by what we see in the PT), best star pilot in the galaxy, a cunning warrior, that gave in to temptation from the dark side, though the good still lingered under the surface. By ROTJ he's stuggling with what side to choose, and only when push comes to shove does he cast aside Vader. Not many villains can boast that sort of complexity.

I think Vader became definitive. At face value he's cliche, but when you get down to it, he's a really complex character. An evil cyborg that still has a spark of good, always fighting on the outside, as well as himself internally.

Palpatine to me is more of an all-around joke than anything. Vader gets spoofed all the time also, but at the end of the day, people take him a lot more seriously as a villain.

Vaderisnothayden said:

Scruffy said:

Vaderisnothayden said:

Once you start resurrecting characters you lose something.

*cough*obiwankenobi*cough*

Kenobi wasn't resurrected. He became a ghost. That's dead.

Dark Empire is probably both the best vision of a near-term post-RotJ galaxy yet, but it's also great science fantasy in its own right. On film, Palpatine is merely a cackling megalomaniac, with no real motive except to take over the Galaxy then wander about it in his bathrobe. DE and its associated WEG sourcebook really delve into Palpatine's plans for himself and the galaxy. The story was unfortunately truncated, but most of what there is is good.

I thought the Dark Empire portrayal of Palpatine was pathetic. In ROTJ he was a distinctive villain, whereas in the Dark Empire, Dark Empire 2 and Empire's End comics has was just a non-disticntive cliche villain and rather annoying. And they didn't bother to draw him looking anything like Palpatine.

 I always saw Palpatine as a stock, cliche villain, even in ROTJ.

That's why I don't believe Vader post-Mustafar personally hunted down and killed Jedi. His injuries left him in no condition to do so.

He went up against Obi-Wan in ANH because it was a profoundly personal situation that he needed the final say in. He went up against Luke because he knew Luke was a total amateur.

Vader probably did some training over the years, but if he had went up against a Jedi while they were in their prime (still young, yet highly skilled), he would be toast.

The Jedi Purge is one subject where I do reject EU. That's not to say that EU can't come in handy in answering questions we have from the films. Sometimes it does so brilliantly, and others it fails utterly.

Ziz said:

I think what would have added a little something to HC's performance in the prequels is if they modulated his voice a bit lower and lower as he turned more towards the Dark Side.  Not to the point where he sounds exactly like JEJ during the final duel, but enough that the vocal transition from "Anakin" to "Vader" would feel a little more natural.

Over at FanEdit, there's a guy who just finished an edit of Batman Begins.  One of the things he did was pitch Katie Holmes' voice down and in the before/after clip he posted, it makes a HUGE difference.

 You realize he has a voice changer and amplifier in the mask, right?

Contary to popular belief, the Holiday Special was more of a Thanksgiving special, given that it premiered just several days before Thanksgiving.

Try double checking. That's pathetic if it doesn't include the chamber.

A cross section of the Executor would be awesome.

Bingowings said:

Monroville said:

doubleofive said:

How does one get permission to use Vader's Personal Elevator?  How could Vader be caught unawares if his wall dings that someone is headed down to see him?  Just playing devil's advocate here (and I really like the hallway idea).

That one is easy: it's like the "basement" button in the Arkham Asylum elevator in BATMAN BEGINS.  Only someone with the password or the key can unlock the button and use it, whereupon when someone uses it an automatic signal is sent to Vader in his chamber (so he knows someone is coming).

Also in regards to Vader's chamber, I would personally choose the elevator with airlock.  Vader doesn't have to be 2 feet away from the bridge, being that with an elevator or hallway he could still be anywhere from 1 to 10 levels below the bridge and still within the command tower.  I think the "privacy" factor is a more pertinent reason to change the background behind Piett than anything else.

Also also remember that when Luke took off the helmet in JEDI, the front face mask was still in place, which means Vader would still be using his mechanical breathing apparatus to... well, breath.

EDIT - it looks like the front IS attached to the rest of the helmet, as you can kind of see here (you can see it better when watching the movie):

I agree, the mask should stay on but the helmet should be lowered even if it does make out that Vader is a really lazy git for not using his hands (maybe the helmet needs to be locked onto the collar and mask, Luke does take some time removing it in ROTJ).

 

I don't know that he could lower it properly by himself. The EU explains that he could barely lift his hands over his head, and seeing how the suit restrains him, makes sense.

He's there. In the shadows. Waiting.

Oh Davnes. You are no match for the power of the DarkFather humor.

Especially since I personally would never have considered him to be of the light side. Anakin in the PT was so dark gray that the "fall" meant nothing.

While you're at it, why not change Lando into a white guy? I think Vader is all the black that ESB needs.

Uncanny Antman said:

DarkFather said:

You seriously want to tell me that Vader would be perfectly okay with a bunch of random-ass Joes having such a chance to glimpse him without his helmet on, or to have regular sneak peeks on the private meetings going on within?

If Vader was your boss, would you take even the tiniest chance of getting sprung peeking in on his business when the door was open?

 

Yeah, me neither.

 

Look in the picture. Someone in the hall has their head turned in his direction. On purpose or an accident, they have a good chance of spotting him.

Plus, the Imperials on that ship seemed to have near suicidal tendancies at times. Everytime I hear "and will apologize to Lord Vader", I wonder if the guy actually thought that would work. :P I'd be hauling ass to the nearest escape capsule.

You seriously want to tell me that Vader would be perfectly okay with a bunch of random-ass Joes having such a chance to glimpse him without his helmet on, or to have regular sneak peeks on the private meetings going on within?

Who said he would have to walk that far to get to the action of things anyway? It could be an extra room separating the main decks from his private chamber. It's not like it has to be a mile long corridor or anything.

I'd think that would be one of the rewarding things about the story: a slimeball weasel that feels he needs a bunch of pheromones to attract a mate, that ends up getting owned by a worthy villain.

Xizor seems very Count Dracula to me. He's an evil, reptilian royal who puts on a facade of being accomodating to his guests, and then turns on them. He tries to seduce Leia (Mina). Luke would be sort of the Jonathan Harker since Han isn't present. Vader would be the Van Helsing who sees Xizor for what he is, outmanuevers his schemes, and eventually destroys him.

It's sketchy, but I do see more than passing similarities. After I know more, I might do a compare/contrast.

Well, go make an EU criticism thread then. No use in hijacking TheBoost's thread that is about the positive.

Vaderisnothayden said:

Most Star Wars fans are over on TFN gushing. Some "negativity" is refreshing. 

Yeah, but how much negativity?

The fans I see on TF.NET still gushing (regardless of what anyone says, it's not near as bad as it used to be), are either teenaged fangirls (which I think make up the majority), trolls who want to piss OT fans off, or psychopaths who I doubt really care about Star Wars in the first place. A lot of the mods fall into the latter category.

Now, my leap into EU isn't even close to being over. I've only read portions of Shadows of the Empire, and the parts I did read, I found good. Later on I'll try to buy it in paperback instead of reading the ebook to get a better perspective for my own personal opinion, and then move onto the Thrawn Trilogy.

Until then, I'm interested in everyone's opinions of these two central EU villains and their tales.

So far I see a trend of Thrawn Trilogy being almost universally accepted as great, while Shadows seems to be more of a mixed back.

Oooh. I thought you had your game face on or something in post 112. That would've been great entertainment for everyone, since we're both masterdebaters.

Most Star Wars fans have grown very cynical and jaded. That results in an almost constant harsh critiquing of all things Star Wars except for the OOT. There's so much negativity. A thread centering around the positive is actually refreshing.

At first it seemed like they were going to have Palpatine's aging into the corpse we see in ROTJ be gradual but aggressive, probably from being so deep in the dark side. At some point they changed their minds and it mostly came down to the result of the duel with Mace Windu.

C3PX: I'm sure Uncle Owen, Aunt Beru, and Obi-Wan would look like hand-me-downs if set beside people of the same age from let's say Bespin or Coruscant. And where would you get the impression you'd stepped on my toes? What?

Sluggo: I agree, but even if I didn't like a retcon, I wouldn't label it an outright "error" as long as it could be explained with sound reasoning.